Joe Abercrombie - The Heroes

He wedged a boot up on the gate in what he hoped was a manly style, trying to sound cool as snow while his heart was burning. ‘Scale got himself in a pickle, has he?’

‘It’s the Southerners pickled so far, the stupid bastards.’ White-Eye pulled his helmet off and wiped his forehead on the back of his sleeve. ‘Twice Scale’s driven them back. First time they came strolling across like they thought we’d just give the bridge over. Your brother soon cured them of that notion.’ He chuckled to himself and Pale-as-Snow joined him. Calder offered up his own, though it tasted somewhat sour. Everything did today.

‘Second time they tried rafts as well.’ White-Eye turned his head and spat into the barley. ‘Could’ve told them the current’s way too strong for that.’

‘Good thing they never asked you,’ said Pale-as-Snow.

‘That it is. I reckon you lot can sit back here and take your boots off. We’ll hold ’em all day at this rate.’

‘There’s a lot of day still,’ Calder muttered. Something flashed by. His first thought was that it was a bird skimming the barley, but it was too fast and too big. It bounced once in the fields, sending up a puff of stalk and dust and leaving a long scar through the crop. A couple of hundred strides to the east, down at the grassy foot of the Heroes, it hit Clail’s Wall.

Broken stones went spinning high, high into the air, showering out in a great cloud of dust and bits. Bits of tents. Bits of gear. Bits of men, Calder realised, because there were men camped behind the whole length of the wall.

‘By—’ said Hansul, gaping at the flying wreckage.

There was a sound like a whip cracking but a thousand times louder. White-Eye’s horse reared up and he went sliding off the back, tumbling down into the barley, arms flailing. All around men gawped and shouted, drew weapons or flung themselves on the ground.

That last looked a good idea.

‘Shit!’ hissed Calder, scrambling from the gate and throwing himself in a ditch, his desire to look manly greatly outweighed by his desire to stay alive. Earth and stones rattled down around them like unseasonal hail, pinging from armour, bouncing in the track.

‘Sticking to the sunny side,’ said Pale-as-Snow, utterly unmoved, ‘that’s Tenways’ stretch of wall.’

Bayaz’ servant lowered an eyeglass with a curl of mild disappointment to his mouth. ‘Wayward,’ he said.

A towering understatement. The devices had been discharged perhaps two dozen times and their ammunition, which appeared to be large balls of metal or stone, scattered variously across the slope of the hill ahead, the fields to each side, the orchard at the foot, the sky above and on one occasion straight into the river sending up an immense fountain of spray.

How much the cost of this little aside, so we could dig a few holes in the Northern landscape? How many hospitals could have been built with the money? How many alms-houses? Anything worthier? Burials for dead pauper children? Gorst struggled to care, but could not quite get there. We probably could have paid the Northmen to kill Black Dow themselves and go home. But then what would I find to fill the blasted desert between getting out of bed and—

There was an orange flash, and the vague perception of things flying. He thought he saw Bayaz’ servant punch at nothing beside his master, his arm an impossible blur. A moment later Gorst’s skull was set ringing by an explosion even more colossal than usual, accompanied by a note something like the tolling of a great bell. He felt the blast ripping at his hair, stumbled to keep his balance. The servant had a ragged chunk of curved metal the size of a dinner plate in his hand. He tossed it onto the ground where it smoked gently in the grass.

Bayaz raised his brows at it. ‘A malfunction.’

The servant rubbed black dirt from his fingers. ‘The path of progress is ever a crooked one.’

Pieces of metal had been flung in all directions. A particularly large one had bounced straight through a group of labourers leaving several dead and the rest spotted with blood. Other fragments had knocked little gaps in the stunned audience, or flicked over guardsmen like skittles. A great cloud of smoke was billowing from where one of the tubes had been. A blood and dirt-streaked engineer wandered out of it, his hair on fire, walking unsteadily at a diagonal. He didn’t have any arms, and soon toppled over.

‘Ever,’ as Bayaz sank unhappily into his folding chair, ‘a crooked one.’

Some people sat blinking. Others screamed. Yet more rushed about, trying to help the many wounded. Gorst wondered whether he should do the same. But what good could I do? Boost morale with jokes? Have you heard the one about the big idiot with the stupid voice whose life was ruined in Sipani?

Denka and Saurizin were sidling towards them, black robes smudged with soot. ‘And here, the penitents,’ murmured Bayaz’ servant. ‘With your leave, I should attend to some of our business on the other side of the river. I have a feeling the Prophet’s little disciples are not idle over there.’

‘Then we cannot be idle either.’ The Magus waved his servant away with a careless hand. ‘There are more important things than pouring my tea.’

‘A very few.’ The servant gave Gorst a faint smile as he slipped away. ‘Truly, as the Kantic scriptures say, the righteous can afford no rest …’

‘Lord Bayaz, er …’ Denka looked across at Saurizin, who made a frantic get-on-with-it motion. ‘I regret to inform you that … one of the devices has exploded.’

The Magus let them stand for a moment while, out of sight, a woman shrieked like a boiling kettle. ‘Do you suppose I missed that?’

‘Another jumped from its carriage upon the last discharge, and I fear will take some considerable time to realign.’

‘The third,’ wheedled Denka, ‘is displaying a tiny crack which requires some attention. I am …’ his face crumpling up as though he feared someone was going to stick a sword in it, ‘reluctant to risk charging it again.’

‘Reluctant?’ Bayaz’ displeasure was as a mighty weight. Even standing beside him Gorst felt a powerful urge to kneel.

‘A defect in the casting of the metal,’ Saurizin managed to gasp, sending a poisonous glance at his colleague.

‘My alloys are perfect,’ whined Denka, ‘it was an inconsistency in the explosive powders that was to—’

‘Blame?’ The voice of the Magus was almost as fearsome as the explosion had been. Believe me, gentlemen, there is always plenty of that left over after a battle. Even on the winning side.’ The two old men positively grovelled. Then Bayaz waved a hand and the menace was gone. ‘But these things happen. Overall it has been … a most interesting demonstration.’

‘Why, Lord Bayaz, you are far too kind …’

Their servile mutterings faded as Gorst picked his way to where a guard had been standing a few moments before. He was lying in the long grass, arms out wide, a ragged chunk of curved metal embedded in his helmet. One eye could still be seen through the twisted visor, staring at the sky in a last moment of profound surprise. Truly, every man of them is a hero.

The guard’s shield lay nearby, the golden sun on the face gleaming as its counterpart showed through the clouds. Gorst picked it up, slid his left hand into the straps and trudged off, upstream, towards the Old Bridge. As he passed, Bayaz was sitting back in his folding chair with one boot crossed over the other, his staff forgotten in the wet grass beside him.

‘What should they be called? They are engines that produce fire, so … fire engines? No, silly. Death tubes? Names are so important, and I’ve never had the trick of them. Have you two any ideas?’