Joe Abercrombie - Last Argument of Kings

“Who will you take orders from?” asked Logen.

“I’ll take ’em from you, Bloody-Nine, and from no other! The moon loves you, and I love the moon, and you’re the man for—”

“Then get your people together and get to fucking cutting wood and stone. I’m bored o’ your blather.”

Crummock knocked out his ashes sourly against the wall. “You’re no fun at all, you boys, you do nothing but worry. You need to think on the sunny side o’ this. The worst that can happen is that Bethod don’t show!”

“The worst?” Dogman stared at him. “You sure? What about if Bethod does come, and his Carls kick your wall over like a pile o’ turds and kill every last one of us?”

Crummock’s brow furrowed. He frowned down at the ground. He squinted up at the clouds. “True,” he said, breaking out in a smile. “That is worse. You got a fast mind, lad.”

Dogman gave a long sigh, and stared down into the valley. The wall might not have been all they’d hoped for, but you couldn’t knock the position. Coming up that steep slope against a set of hard men, high above and with nothing to lose, ready and more’n able to kill you. That was no one’s idea o’ fun.

“Tough to get organised down there,” said Logen, speaking Dogman’s own thoughts. “Specially with arrows plunging on you from above and nothing to hide behind. Hard to make numbers count. I wouldn’t much fancy trying it myself. How are we going to work it, if they come?”

“I reckon we’ll make three crews.” Dogman nodded to the tower. “Me up there with five score or so o’ the best archers. Good spot to shoot from, that. Nice and high, and a good view of the front o’ the wall.”

“Uh,” said Grim.

“Maybe some strong lads to throw a rock or two.”

“I’ll lob a rock,” said Tul.

“Fair enough. Then the pick of our lads up on the wall, ready to take ’em on hand to hand, if they get up there. That’ll be your crew, I reckon, Logen. Dow and Shivers and Red Hat can be your seconds.”

Logen nodded, not looking all that happy. “Aye, alright.”

“Then Crummock up behind with his hillmen, ready to charge if they make it through the gate. If we last more’n a day, maybe you can swap over. Hillmen on the wall, Logen and the rest behind.”

“That’s quite the plan for a little man!” Crummock clapped him on the shoulder with a huge hand and damn near knocked him on his face. “Like as not you had it from the moon while you slept! Ain’t one thing in it I’d change!” He slapped his meaty fist into his palm. “I love a good charge! I hope the Southerners don’t come, and leave more for the rest of us! I want to charge now!”

“Good for you,” grunted Dogman. “Maybe we can find you a cliff to charge off.” He squinted into the sun, taking another look up at the wall that held all of their hopes. He wouldn’t have cared to try and climb it, not from this side, but it wasn’t halfway as high, or as thick, or as strong as he’d have liked. You don’t always get things the way you like, Threetrees would have said. But just once would’ve been nice.

“The trap is ready,” said Crummock, grinning down into the valley.

The Dogman nodded. “The only question is who’ll get caught in it. Bethod? Or us?”

Logen walked through the night, between the fires. Some fires had Carls round them, drinking Crummock’s beer, and smoking his chagga, and laughing at stories. Others had hillmen, looking like wolves in the shifting light with their rough furs, their tangled hair, their half-painted faces. One was singing, somewhere. Strange songs in a strange tongue that yapped and warbled like the animals in the forest, rose and fell like the valleys and the peaks. Logen had to admit he’d been smoking, for the first time in a while, and drinking too. Everything felt warm. The fires, and the men, and the cool wind, even. He wove his way through the dark, looking for the fire where the Dogman and the rest were sitting, and not having a clue which way to find it. He was lost, and in more ways than one.

“How many men you killed, Da?” Had to be Crummock’s daughter. There weren’t too many high voices round that camp, more was the pity. Logen saw the hillman’s great shape in the darkness, his three children sitting near him, their outsize weapons propped up in easy reach.

“Oh, I’ve killed a legion of ’em, Isern.” Crummock’s great deep voice rumbled out at Logen as he came closer. “More’n I can remember. Your father might not have all his wits all the time, but he’s a bad enemy to have. One of the worst. You’ll see the truth of that close up, when Bethod and his arse-lickers come calling.” He looked up and saw Logen coming through the night. “I swear, and I don’t doubt Bethod would swear with me, there’s only one bastard in all the North who’s nastier, and bloodier, and harder than your father.”

“Who’s that?” asked the boy with the shield. Logen felt his heart sinking as Crummock’s arm lifted up to point towards him.

“Why, that’s him there. The Bloody-Nine.”

The girl glared at Logen. “He’s nothing. You could have him, Da!”

“By the dead, not me! Don’t even say it girl, in case I make a piss-puddle big enough to drown you in.”

“He don’t look like much.”

“And there’s a lesson for all three of you. Not looking much, not saying much, not seeming much, that’s a good first step in being dangerous, eh, Ninefingers? Then when you let the devil go free it’s twice the shock for whatever poor bastard’s on the end of it. Shock and surprise, my little beauties, and quickness to strike, and lack of pity. These are the things that make a killer. Size, and strength, and a big loud voice are alright in their place, but they’re nothing to that murderous, monstrous, merciless speed, eh, Bloody-Nine?”

It was a hard lesson for children, but Logen’s father had taught it to him young, and he’d kept it in mind all these years. “It’s a sorry fact. He who strikes first often strikes last.”

“That he does!” shouted Crummock, slapping his great thigh. “Well said! But it’s a happy fact, not a sorry one. You remember old Wilum, don’t you, my children?”

“Thunder got him!” shouted the boy with the shield, “in a storm, up in the High Places!”

“That it did! One moment he’s standing there, the next there’s a noise like the world falling and a flash like the sun, and Wilum’s dead as my boots!”

“His feet was on fire!” laughed the girl.

“That they were, Isern. You saw how fast he died, how much the shock, how little the mercy that the lightning showed, well.” And Crummock’s eyes slid across to Logen. “That’s what it’d be to cross that man there. One moment you’d say your hard word, the next?” He clapped his hands together with a crack and made the three children jump. “He’d send you back to the mud. Faster than the sky killed Wilum, and with no more regret. Your life hangs on a thread, every moment you stand within two strides of that nothing-looking bastard there, does it not, Bloody-Nine?”

“Well…” Logen wasn’t much enjoying this.

“How many men you killed then?” the girl shouted at him, sticking her chin out.

Crummock laughed and rubbed his hand in her hair. “The numbers aren’t made to count that high, Isern! He’s the king of killers! No man made more deadly, not anywhere under the moon.”

“What about that Feared?” asked the boy with the spear.

“Ohhhhhh,” cooed Crummock, smiling right across his face. “He’s not a man, Scofen. He’s something else. But I wonder. Fenris the Feared and the Bloody-Nine, setting to kill one another?” He rubbed his hands together. “Now that is a thing I would like to see. That is a thing the moon would love to shine upon.” His eyes rolled up towards the sky and Logen followed them with his own. The moon was up there, sitting in the black heavens, big and white, glowing like new fire.