Joe Abercrombie: Before They Are Hanged

“Back to the mud,” said Grim, face hanging slack as old cobwebs.

West chewed at his fingernails as he watched General Kroy and his staff riding up the road, a group of dark-dressed men on dark horses, solemn as a procession of undertakers. The snow had stopped, for now, but the sky was angry black, the light so bad it felt like evening, and an icy wind was blowing through the command post making the fabric of the tent snap and rustle. West’s borrowed time was almost done.

He felt a sudden impulse, almost overpowering, to turn and run. An impulse so ludicrous that he immediately had another, equally inappropriate, to burst out laughing. Luckily, he was able to stop himself from doing either. Lucky to stop himself laughing, at least. This was far from a laughing matter. As the clattering hooves came closer, he was left wondering whether the idea of running was such a foolish one after all.

Kroy pulled his black charger up savagely and climbed down, jerked his uniform smooth, adjusted his sword belt, turned sharply and came on towards the tent. West intercepted him, hoping to get the first word in and buy a few more moments. “General Kroy, well done, sir, your division fought with great tenacity!”

“Of course they did, Colonel West .” Kroy sneered the name as though he were delivering a mortal insult, his staff gathering into a menacing half circle behind him.

“And might I ask our situation?”

“Our situation ?” snarled the General. “Our situation is that the Northmen are driven off, but not routed. We gave them a mauling, in the end, but my units were fought out, every man. Too weary to pursue. The enemy have been able to withdraw across the fords, thanks to Poulder’s cowardice! I mean to see him cashiered in disgrace! I mean to see him hanged for treason! I will see it done, on my honour!” He glowered around the headquarters while his men muttered angrily amongst themselves. “Where is Lord Marshal Burr? I demand to see the Lord Marshal!”

“Of course, if you could just give me…” West’s words were smothered by the mounting noise of more rushing hooves, and a second group of riders careered around the side of the Marshal’s tent. Who else but General Poulder, accompanied by his own enormous staff. A cart pulled into the headquarters along with them, crowding the narrow space with beasts and men. Poulder vaulted down from his saddle and hastened through the dirt. His hair was in disarray, his jaw was locked tight, there was a long scratch down his cheek. His crimson entourage followed behind him: steels rattling, gold braid flapping, faces flushed.

“Poulder!” hissed Kroy. “You’ve some nerve showing your face in front of me! Some nerve! The only damn nerve you’ve shown all day!”

“How dare you!” screeched Poulder. “I demand an apology! Apologise at once!”

“Apologise? Me, apologise? Hah! You’ll be the one saying sorry, I’ll see to it! The plan was for you to come in from the left wing! We were hard pressed for more than two hours!”

“Almost three hours, sir,” chipped in one of Kroy’s staff, unhelpfully.

“Three hours, damn it! If that is not cowardice I fumble for the definition!”

“ Cowardice ?” shrieked Poulder. A couple of his staff went as far as to place their hands on their steels. “You will apologise to me immediately! My division came under a brutal and sustained attack upon our flank! I was obliged to lead a charge myself. On foot!” And he thrust forward his cheek and indicated the scratch with one gloved finger. “It was we who did all the fighting! We who won the victory here today!”

“Damn you, Poulder, you did nothing! The victory belongs to my men alone! An attack? An attack from what? From animals of the forest?”

“Ah-ha! Exactly so! Show him!”

One of Poulder’s staff ripped back the oilskin on the cart, displaying what seemed at first to be a heap of bloody rags. He wrinkled up his nose and shoved it forward. The thing flopped off onto the ground, rolled onto its back and stared up at the sky with beetling black eyes. A huge, misshapen jaw hung open, long, sharp teeth sticking every which way. Its skin was a greyish brown colour, rough and calloused, its nose was an ill-formed stub. Its skull was flattened and hairless with a heavy ridge of brow and a small, receding forehead. One of its arms was short and muscular, the other much longer and slightly bent, both ending in claw-like hands. The whole creature seemed lumpen, twisted, primitive. West gawped down at it, open-mouthed.

Plainly, it was not human.

“There!” squealed Poulder in triumph. “Now tell us my division didn’t fight! There were hundreds of these… these creatures out there! Thousands, and they fight like mad things! We only just managed to hold our ground, and it’s damn lucky for you that we did! I demand!” he frothed, “I demand!” he ranted, “ I demand! ” he shrieked, face turning purple, “an apology!”

Kroy’s eyes twitched with incomprehension, with anger, with frustration. His lips twisted, his jaw worked, his fists clenched. Clearly there was no entry in the rule book for a situation such as this. He rounded on West.

“I demand to see Marshal Burr!” he snarled.

“As do I!” screeched Poulder shrilly, not to be outdone.

“The Lord Marshal is…” West’s lips moved silently. He had no ideas left. No strategies, no ruses, no schemes. “He is…” There would be no retreat across the fords for him. He was finished. More than likely he would end up in a penal colony himself. “He is—”

“I am here.”

And to West’s profound amazement, Burr was standing in the entrance to his tent. Even in the half-light, it seemed obvious that he was terribly ill. His face was ashen pale and there was a sheen of sweat across his forehead. His eyes were sunken and ringed with black. His lip quivered, his legs were unsteady, he clutched at the tent-pole beside him for support. West could see a dark stain down the front of his uniform that looked very much like blood.

“I am afraid I have been… somewhat unwell during the battle,” he croaked. “Something I ate, perhaps.” His hand trembled on the pole and Jalenhorm lurked near his shoulder, ready to catch him if he fell, but by some superhuman effort of will the Lord Marshal stayed on his feet. West glanced nervously at the angry gathering, wondering what they might make of this walking corpse. But the two Generals were far too caught up in their own feud to pay any attention to that.

“Lord Marshal, I must protest about General Poulder—”

“Sir, I demand that General Kroy apologise—”

The best form of defence seemed to West to be an immediate attack. “It would be traditional!” he cut in at the top of his voice, “for us first to congratulate our commanding officer on his victory!” He began to clap, slowly and deliberately. Pike and Jalenhorm joined him without delay. Poulder and Kroy exchanged an icy glance, then they too raised their hands.

“May I be the first to—”

“The very first to congratulate you, Lord Marshal!”

Their staffs joined in, and others around the tent, and then more further away, and soon a rousing cheer was going up.

“A cheer for Lord Marshal Burr!”

“The Lord Marshal!”

“Victory!”

Burr himself twitched and quivered, one hand clutched to his stomach, his face a mask of anguish. West slunk backwards, away from the attention, away from the glory. He had not the slightest interest in it. That had been close, he knew, impossibly close. His hands were trembling, his mouth tasted sour, his vision was swimming. He could still hear Poulder and Kroy, already arguing again, like a pair of furious ducks quacking.