Джо Аберкромби - A Little Hatred - Book One (The Age of Madness)

‘Black Calder’s in those woods.’ She nodded off to the North. ‘Planning to sneak men around you, I reckon.’

‘You seen ’em?’

‘I must confess, I did not. But your daughter did.’ She slapped a heavy hand down on Rikke’s shoulder. ‘The moon has smiled upon us all and blessed her with the rare gift o’ the Long Eye. We should make ready for blood.’

‘You’re not joking.’ Rikke’s father pointed in the opposite direction. ‘Stour Nightfall might be coming down that road any bloody minute and Lady Brock’s counting on us to be one-half of a trap for him! We don’t arrive, the whole plan’s in the shit.’

Isern grinned like this was all quite the lark. ‘Not half as deep as if Black Calder sidles up our arses while we’re facing t’other way, though, d’you see?’

Rikke’s father pressed at his temples. ‘By the dead. I can’t turn around just on your say-so, Rikke. I can’t.’

‘I know,’ she said, shrugging her shoulders high as they’d go. ‘I wouldn’t.’

‘You seen ’em, though?’ croaked Shivers.

Rikke glanced sideways and there they still were, a great long line just in front of the trees, hundreds of Carls, their shields bright blobs of colour, gathered around Black Calder’s standard. ‘I see ’em now. The one at the front’s smiling right at me.’

‘Describe him.’

‘A long, lean, pale bastard with an axe and a sword, sort of hunched over, all elbows. Ugh.’ And she had to bend over herself, hands on her knees, head spinning.

‘Sounds a lot like the Nail,’ said Shivers, frowning down towards the woods. ‘If Black Calder sent a man around the back, the Nail’s the sort o’ man he’d send.’

Rikke’s father gave a low grunt. ‘Maybe.’

‘Give me a few Carls,’ said Shivers. ‘I’ll have a root around those woods. I find nothing, nothing lost.’

Rikke’s father looked from Shivers, to Isern, to Rikke, and back. ‘Root around, then, but quick. If we’re called for, we can’t wait.’

Shivers nodded and slipped down the crumbling steps. The sun was getting higher, and down in the valley on the brown strip of the road, men were moving. A few, and coming carefully. ‘Oh, by the dead.’ Rikke covered her eye with her hand, felt it still throbbing hot against her palm. ‘Tell me you see them?’

‘Oh, aye. Stour Nightfall’s scouts, I reckon.’ And Isern spat. ‘’Course I see them .’

Muddy grey dawn had become muddy grey morning by the time Leo rode up through the red bracken on the hillside. The men of Angland sat in massed ranks where they were hidden from the valley, armed and ready. Some stood to salute, a few held up their swords. Others called out, ‘The Young Lion!’ against their orders to stay quiet. Seemed the soldiers approved of him a lot more than his mother did.

She was kneeling in the bracken just beyond the summit, an eyeglass trained on the valley, a whispering group of scouts and officers around her.

She shook her head as he crept over, keeping low. ‘I thought I gave Antaup orders that you shouldn’t come up here?’

‘Yes, and I came anyway …’ He trailed off. There were men in the valley. Mounted men, spread out, watching their little show of incompetence down at the bridge. Northmen, without a doubt. ‘Nightfall’s scouts?’ he asked in an eager whisper.

She handed him her eyeglass. ‘And his main body is following close behind. Head of the column is there at the farm.’

Leo trained the glass on a few pale farm buildings higher up the valley. Metal gleamed on the brown strip of road. Mail and spear points. A column of armed men, moving towards the bridge. Carls, from the little spots of bright colour which must be their shields. Like seeing one ant in the grass and suddenly seeing dozens, Leo became aware of another column, and another.

‘Bloody hell,’ he squawked, excitement surging up his throat and nearly choking him. ‘They’re taking the bait!’

He squinted harder. There was something waving beside the farm. A tall grey flag, and though he couldn’t be sure at this distance, he’d a feeling there was a black wolf on it.

‘Nightfall’s standard,’ he whispered.

‘Yes.’ His mother pulled her eyeglass from his limp grip and set it to her own eye again. ‘And this time, I’ve no doubt, the Great Wolf is here in person.’

‘What did these bastards do?’ asked Clover, frowning up at the bodies.

‘They was on the Dogman’s side,’ said Greenway, nodding like a family dangling from a tree was a job well done.

Couple of Thralls had dragged a cupboard from the farmhouse, now they shoved it over in the dirt and started hacking at it with axes. Clover squinted at ’em, bemused.

‘What is it they think an axe will reveal that opening the doors won’t?’

‘Hidden stuff. Gold, maybe.’

‘Gold? You’re having a laugh.’

Greenway frowned a pouty frown – aside from sneers, it was his one expression. ‘Silver, then.’

‘Silver? If these bastards had silver, let alone gold, why the hell would they be up here farming for a pittance? They’d be in town, drunk, which is where I should bloody be.’

‘Best to be sure,’ said one of the men.

‘Oh, aye,’ said Clover. ‘Daresay you’ll be burning the house once you’ve found nothing, ’cause fire is pretty.’

The man glanced over at Greenway, somewhat sheepish, and scratched his head. Seemed that was exactly what he’d been planning.

‘And if Stour wants somewhere to sleep tonight, he can curl up in the ashes, can he?’ Clover strolled past, shaking his head. What a waste. Waste of people, waste of things, waste of effort. But that was war for you. Nothing he hadn’t seen a dozen times before. If the Great Wolf wanted to decorate his new land with corpses and have creaking ropes for music, then who was he to complain?

The king-in-waiting was a little further on with Wonderful, considering the view while he chewed on a stolen apple.

‘Don’t like the looks of this,’ said Clover, folding his arms tight. ‘Not one bit.’

‘No,’ said Wonderful. ‘It fucking stinks.’

The road dropped into a grassy valley ahead, a steep hill on either side. One had some old ruin clinging to its rocky top, the other was bigger and shallower, red bracken giving the crown a dried-blood look Clover didn’t much care for.

Between the two fells, down in the valley’s bottom, a little bridge crossed a stream. Looked like there might be a few Union men tangled up on both sides of it. Clover’s eyes weren’t all they once had been, but he thought he could see a flag waving above them.

Stour’s eyes were sharper, and thoughtfully narrowed in its direction. ‘You reckon that’s Leo dan Brock’s standard down there?’

Clover felt his heart sinking. It was getting to be a familiar feeling around Black Calder’s son. ‘Could be someone else’s?’ he tried, hopefully. ‘No one’s in particular?’

‘No, it’s his.’ Stour worked the words around and spat ’em out. ‘The Young Lion. What kind o’ name is that?’

‘Ridiculous.’ Clover held up his hands and fluttered the fingers. ‘The Great Wolf! Now that’s a name.’

Wonderful made a little squeak. She had her lips pressed together tight like she was trying not to shit herself. Stour frowned at her, then at Clover.

‘Are you making light o’ me, you old fucker?’

Clover looked dumbstruck. ‘Man like me, make light of a man like you? I wouldn’t dare. I’m agreeing the Young Lion is a stupid name for a man to have. For one thing, he’s not a lion, is he? For another he’s, what, twenty-ish?’

‘About that,’ said Wonderful.

‘So … considering the lifespan of a lion …’ Clover squinted up at the grey sky, no idea how long a lion lived, ‘probably … maybe … he’d be quite an old lion, would he?’