Hugh Cook - The wizards and the warriors

– Durnwold. Was a life for him here. A dowry, a dozen sheep. Richness. The woman could still be bred from. She was a child bright enough, till the ice broke under her that winter, and her mother worked her body gone blue till it breathed. Strong body, meat and milk, heat in the right place. I'll have her down myself if you don't come back. Down and under…

– And Valarkin. What does the oddling think he'll do in the cold outside? Stay here, and we could make a man out of him, but no, he has to walk on air. I remember when he was a child. I took him up on that blea hill in the rawky weather, and he croodled down like he was scared of the sky. Stay here, and we could make him something.

– But now, they're going, the two of them. So go then, but there's nothing to gain but a sword in the guts. And the hand that drives it will turn it.

Before dawn, Morgan Hearst, and the half-dozen men who had volunteered to go with him, left the castle, riding eastward toward daybreak. They planned to go to the seaport of Skua, taking a corduroy road which the Collosnon had built across the swamps to the north of the Eastway, to give their invasion a road sufficiently wide for baggage wagons.

Hearst's mission was to gain intelligence on the strength of enemy forces at Skua; if the target proved worthy, Prince Comedo's troops would march there to dare another bloodbath under the aegis of the mad-jewels. The plan was for Hearst and his men to link up with the main body of Comedo's troops at the High Castle in Trest: that was when a decision would be made.

At Skua, Hearst would also try to discover – perhaps by kidnapping someone for interrogation – whether Volaine Persaga Haveros was still alive. If the oath-breaker was not now rotting down to earth along with the other thousands of unburied Collosnon dead near Castle Vaunting, then Hearst would try for the traitor's head.

Durnwold had wanted to come with Hearst, who had told him it was more important for him to see how Elkor Alish organised a small army for the march: that way, he would really learn something.

Riding east to the rising sun, Hearst felt light-hearted, excited. War again. What can compare with it? Nothing! Some day he would die – and maybe soon. But war was the only life he chose to live, and he would accept whatever death it gave him. He remembered other places, other times, when, facing death, he had challenged it with a roar which was half berserker rage, half exultation.

So many battles. He had fought on a frozen river that was breaking up in the spring, so that ice would suddenly tilt or break, sending men in full armour plunging into freezing water. He had fought knee-deep in surf, blood in the water bringing sharks among the fighters. He had fought in fields of clutching mud, in forests, in ravines, on mountain slopes. He had fought when wounded, matching sword with sword when he had the sun in his face and blood in his eyes.

– Death will be death, in its own good time.

But for now, a Collosnon cavalry horse under him, companions to left and to right, a shared word, a joke… it was enough.

Soon, the night was defeated. It was dawn. Back at Castle Vaunting, doors banged open; cursing squad leaders roused their sleeping men: 'Get up, you idle corpse-rapists. Come on! Move yourselves! Hands off cocks! On with socks!'

A rising wind, sweeping in from the Central Ocean, caught the doors, slamming them from side to side. A battle-horn sounded: rouse, rouse!

The soldiers yawned and grumbled, stumbling into clothes and armour, but the leave-time feeling was upon them. Hot porridge to fill the belly for the long day. Snort of horses: a Collosnon mount for every man. Jingle of harness. Smells of sweat, leather, horse dung. Arguments.

'Andranovory! That's my horse you're sitting on!'

Last jokes. Sleep rubbed from sore eyes. The laboured breathing of men with brewery breath. Echoes crashing through hangover heads. Men yelling and quarrelling over missing clothes, lost boots. Clatter of swords and armour. Obscenity upon obscenity.

On their mission east, they meant to destroy any Collosnon forces they found in Trest, and to find and kill the wizard Heenmor. The Melski had now told Blackwood that Heenmor had not gone north, as far as they could discover; scouts had found a marshland fisherman who had survived the Collosnon invasion, and who claimed to have seen Heenmor going east at the end of winter.

Prince Comedo himself had solemnly sworn that everything possible would be done to kill Heenmor, and to secure the death-stone which Elkor Alish had described so well, so the wizard could take it south to return it to the Dry Pit.

Prince Comedo woke in his clothes. He reached for the jug by his bed and drank deeply. The door opened; Gorn peered in, then, seeing the prince was awake, withdrew. What was the matter with him? Did he think that a prince of the Favoured Blood would oversleep on this day, his day, the day he rode out at the head of his army?

He took another swig from the jug.

His bottle, where was his bottle? Here! His green beauty, safe and smooth to carry him. That was part of the bargain he had made with the wizards. The woodsman Blackwood would carry the bottle, for the prince – his judgment was not necessarily impeccable -was convinced that Blackwood lacked the will to oppose him or betray him. Certainly he was more trustworthy than any of the unprincipled cutthroats who served Comedo as soldiers.

The priest Valarkin would carry the spare ring for the bottle. Comedo congratulated himself on another brilliant choice. As a temple priest, Valarkin was automatically hated, and had failed to win favour with the prince's soldiers since arriving in the castle. If he ever wanted to steal the bottle, he would find it difficult to persuade anyone to conspire with him. Yet Comedo knew that Durnwold would protect his brother Valarkin if any soldier made a move against him. So you could have your cake and eat it – or, in Comedo's idiom, keep your virgin virgin yet shag it senseless.

Comedo, cradling the bottle in his arms, imagined himself emperor of half the continent, with people falling down to worship on their knees at the very mention of his name. Hail him! Mighty warrior! Mighty conqueror! War, obviously, was the life he was made for.

Elsewhere in Castle Vaunting, Blackwood woke beside Mystrel. His eyes were gritty; he had not slept much during the night. He remembered how she had wept; how she had despaired. But he had told her their future should be safe enough.

Comedo's men would march with the mad-jewels to defeat any enemy they met, so there was no danger there. Blackwood was vague as to how the castle would be guarded while they were gone, as he had not been privy to the councils of war which had made the arrangements – but no doubt something would be done. In any case, it was not far to the High Castle. Five days' easy riding should get them there, so it was hard to see how they could be away for long.

Somewhere, not for the first time, the sound of a battle-horn roused the castle.

Blackwood dressed. He buckled on his belt; he was taking his hunting trousse, a bow and a quiver of arrows, and his canvas rain-shelter. Like every other man, he would also be taking a pack; these had back-straps so men could carry them, though horses would take the weight on the journey to the High Castle.

Every man carried in his pack the issue Alish had insisted on. There were rations for ten days (dried meat, salted fish, barley flour, rice) and an issue of siege dust which would support life for twenty days if they ever got hungry enough to start eating it. Alish had also insisted that every man carry spare boots, fishing lines, fish hooks, at least one woollen blanket and at least two leather waterbottles.