Joe Abercrombie - Half a War

‘More swarm across the straits from Yutmark every day,’ said Gorm. ‘We must fall back. We must abandon Throvenland.’

Skara flinched. Abandon Bail’s Point. Abandon her land and her people. Abandon her grandfather’s memory. The thought made her sick. Or even sicker.

Uthil let his naked sword slide through his hand until its point was in the grass. ‘I do not see victory that way.’

‘Where do you see it?’ pleaded Skara, struggling to sit straight and plaster a queen’s dignity onto her face, even if she would far rather have curled up crying under her chair. But Uthil only twisted his sword gently, face as hard as the cliffs below them.

‘I stand always ready to trust to my weaponluck, but I am not alone. I must think of my wife and my son. I must think of what I might leave them.’

Skara felt her gorge rising and fought it down. When even the Iron King could not say steel was the answer, things were truly desperate.

Mother Scaer turned her shaved head and spat over her shoulder. ‘Perhaps the time has come to send a bird to Grandmother Wexen.’

Father Yarvi snorted. ‘Mother Adwyn made it very clear she will never make peace with me.’

‘So you say.’

Yarvi narrowed his eyes. ‘Do you think I lie?’

Scaer glared back. ‘Usually.’

‘King Fynn made peace with Grandmother Wexen,’ said Skara, her voice cracking. ‘Some good it did him!’

But the two kings sat in brooding silence as Mother Scaer leaned in, tattooed forearms resting on her knees. ‘Every war is only a prelude to peace. A negotiation with swords instead of words. Let us go to Grandmother Wexen while we still have something to bargain with-’

‘There’ll be no bargains!’ came a barking voice. ‘There’ll be no peace.’

Thorn Bathu stalked around the nearest howe. At first, Skara felt a rush of gladness at the sight of her. The very woman you needed when you faced impossible odds. Then Thorn jerked a chain and brought a prisoner staggering after her, hands bound behind him and a bloodstained bag over his face. Then Skara saw a figure following in a cloak of rags, hood drawn up. Finally she met Thorn’s eyes, smouldering in blackened sockets with a fury almost painful to look upon.

‘Bright Yilling attacked Thorlby,’ she snarled, kicking her prisoner onto his knees before the three rulers and their three ministers. ‘He burned half the city. Queen Laithlin is still there with her son, caring for the wounded. He killed men, women, children. He killed-’ She gave a strangled cough, and bared her teeth, and she mastered herself again and raised her sharp chin, eyes glistening. ‘He killed Brand.’

Gorm frowned sideways at his minister. Uthil’s fist whitened about the grip of his sword. Father Yarvi’s eyes went wide, and he seemed to slump on his stool.

‘Gods,’ he whispered, all the colour drained from his face.

‘I am … so sorry …’ stammered Skara. She remembered how Thorn had held her when she was first brought to Thorlby. Wished she could do the same for her now. But her face was so twisted with anger Skara hardly dared look at her, let alone touch her.

The newcomer pushed back her ragged hood. A dark-skinned southerner, lean as a whip and with burns scattered across the left side of her face. They would have made Skara wince to look upon once, but she was growing used to scars.

‘Greetings, great kings, great queens, great ministers,’ she bowed, and showed burned bald patches in her cropped grey hair. ‘In the Land of the Alyuks they call me Sun-nara-Skun. In Kalyiv they call me Scarayoi, the Walker in the Ruins.’

‘What do they call you here?’ snapped Mother Scaer.

‘She is Skifr,’ murmured Yarvi.

‘The witch Skifr?’ Scaer’s lip twisted with disgust. ‘The thief of elf-relics? The one denounced by Grandmother Wexen?’

‘The very same, my dove.’ Skifr smiled. ‘Grandmother Wexen burned my house and killed my kin, and so I am your bitter enemy’s bitter enemy.’

‘The best kind of ally.’ The Breaker of Swords frowned at the chained man. ‘And must we play a guessing game over this visitor?’

Thorn snorted, and ripped the bag from his head.

Skara was sickened at first to see his face. Battered shapeless, bloated with bruises, one eye swollen shut and the white of the other stained red. Then she realized she knew him. He was one of those who had stood in the Forest the night it burned. One of those who had laughed as King Fynn toppled into the firepit. She knew she should hate him, but all she felt at the sight of his ruined face was pity. Pity, and disgust at what had been done to him.

Be as generous to your enemies as your friends, her grandfather had always said. Not for their sake, but for your own.

Thorn’s mood was anything but generous, however. ‘This is Asborn the Fearless, Companion to Bright Yilling.’ She dug her fingers into his blood-crusted hair and wrenched his face up towards her. ‘He was caught in the raid on Thorlby, and he proves to have fear in him after all. Tell them what you told me, worm!’

Asborn’s mouth lolled slack and toothless and broken words croaked out. ‘A message … came to Bright Yilling. To attack Thorlby. When … and where … and how to attack.’ Skara winced as his wet breath clicked and crackled. ‘You have … a traitor among you.’

Father Yarvi sat forward, his withered hand clenched in a mockery of fist. ‘Who is it?’

‘Only Yilling knows.’ His one bloodshot eye was fixed on Skara’s. ‘Perhaps they sit here now … among you.’ His broken mouth curled into a red smile. ‘Perhaps-’

Thorn struck him across his broken face, knocked him sideways, lifted her arm to hit him again.

‘Thorn!’ shouted Skara, clutching at her chest. ‘No!’ Thorn stared at her, face twisted with grief and fury at once. ‘Please, if you keep hurting him, you hurt yourself. You hurt us all. I beg you, show some mercy!’

‘Mercy?’ Thorn spat, tears streaking her scarred cheek. ‘Did they show Brand mercy?’

‘No more than they showed my grandfather.’ Skara felt her own eyes stinging as she leaned desperately forward. ‘But we have to be better than them!’

‘No. We have to be worse.’ Thorn hauled Asborn savagely up by his chain, lifting her clenched fist, but he only smiled the wider.

‘Bright Yilling comes!’ he gurgled out. ‘Bright Yilling comes and he brings Death with him!’

‘Oh, Death is here already.’ Skifr turned, raising her arm, a thing of dark metal gripped in her fist. There was a deafening crack that made Skara jolt in her chair, a red mist blew from the back of Asborn’s head and he was flung twisted onto his side with his hair on fire.

Skara stared, wide-eyed, cold with horror.

‘Mother War protect us,’ whispered Gorm.

‘What have you done?’ shrieked Mother Scaer, springing up and sending her stool tumbling over in the grass.

‘Rejoice, my doves, for I have brought you the means of your victory.’ Skifr held the deadly thing high, a wisp of smoke curling from a hole in its end. ‘I know where more of these can be found. Relics beside which the power of this one would seem puny. Elf-weapons forged before the Breaking of God!’

‘Where?’ asked Yarvi, and Skara was shocked to see his eyes shining with eagerness.

Skifr let her head drop on one side. ‘In Strokom.’

‘Madness!’ screeched Mother Scaer. ‘Strokom is forbidden by the Ministry. Anyone who goes there sickens and dies!’

‘I have been there.’ Skifr raised a long arm to point at the elf-bangle burning orange on Thorn’s wrist. ‘I brought that bauble from within, and I still cast a shadow. No ground is forbidden to me. I am the Walker in the Ruins, and I know all the ways. Even those that can keep us safe from the sickness in Strokom. Say the word, and I will put weapons in your hands against which no man, no hero, no army can stand.’