A Time of Blood (Of Blood and Bone #2) - John Gwynne Page 0,159

was starting to regret that decision.

They were closer now, roughly six or seven hundred paces from the ridge and their enemy. Drem searched their line for Fritha, but could not see her pale, fair stubble amongst those on the ridge.

Four hundred paces and the huntsmen halted, the shield walls and mounted warriors behind all undulating to a halt. With all of the warriors that had formed the shield wall and huntsmen’s line, Drem and Cullen were close to Byrne now, in the row behind her.

The huntsmen began to string their bows, men and women taking a handful of arrows from quivers at their hips and stabbing them into the ground in front of them.

Up on the ridge Drem heard a shouted command and saw shields appear, the warriors up there forming a wall of shields of their own.

They can do that better than I expected.

A shout from the line of huntsmen, arrows nocked, drawn and loosed in one heartbeat, a volley rising high into the sky, arcing down towards the ridge top, drumming into the wall of shields, sounding like hail on turf. A few screams echoed down the slope, Drem spying half a dozen shields tremble and fall. More shields filled the gaps.

Another volley was in the air, and then another, and another.

“It’s a hard thing, standing and facing a volley or three of arrows,” Cullen said with a grin. “Takes some stones. This should soften them up, get them rattled before we even get started.”

A few arrows flickered back at them, flying up from the ridge and down the slope. Cullen slung his shield from his shoulder and leaned to hold it over Drem as well. There was a stuttered thumping as the arrows thumped into turf or wood. A solitary yell, but the arrows did little damage—there were too few of them.

Another volley from the Order’s huntsmen, a handful of screams from the ridge, and then Byrne signalled for a horn to be blown.

The huntsmen dropped back between the shield walls, most of them reforming on foot on the left flank. Keld slipped back to Drem and Cullen. Drem handed Keld his reins and the huntsman climbed back into the saddle of his mount.

Byrne’s hornsman was about to blow a new signal when a gap opened in the line on the ridge and a giant emerged, riding upon a bear. Gunil. His hair raven black, long moustache knotted with leather, his war-hammer slung across his back.

Drem heard a muttering from amongst the giants upon the right flank, felt his own breath catch.

They helped to kill my da.

Gunil rode his bear down the ridge, thirty or forty paces, then reined in. He leaned down in his saddle and lifted something that was hanging from a harness.

Drem felt a fist clench in his gut, because he knew what it was even before Gunil spoke. He felt Keld and Cullen tense beside him.

“No,” Cullen hissed.

“A gift for you,” Gunil roared, his voice echoing down the vale, and he lifted Sig’s severed head and swung it around his head by her long blonde warrior braid, then hurled it down the ridge at them. It arced up into the sky, then descended, bouncing and then rolling to stop a hundred or so paces before the advancing warband.

Gunil sat tall in his saddle, arms outspread.

“There lies Sig, your greatest warrior, slain by ME,” Gunil cried. “And I ask you: WHO’S NEXT?”

He shrugged his war-hammer from his back and raised it over his head, bellowing wordlessly at the Order of the Bright Star and giants as if he would challenge them all.

A terrible silence settled over the slope, Drem’s eyes focused only on Sig’s severed head.

“I AM,” a voice shouted in response, right next to Drem.

Cullen gave a wordless shriek and kicked his mount, the horse leaping away. Keld snatched at Cullen’s reins but grabbed only air, and then Cullen’s horse was breaking into a gallop, threading between the shield walls and pounding up the slope.

Others broke along the line, following Cullen; to Drem’s right there was a roaring of bears and a handful of giants burst into motion.

“HOLD,” Byrne yelled, but the ground was shaking and warriors were yelling, Cullen louder than any of them as he pounded towards Gunil.

Keld and Drem shared a look and then Keld was urging his mount on, Drem close behind him.

A black-winged shape rose up from behind the warriors on the ridge, Drem recognizing it as the half-breed, but shouts came up from the enemy warband of,