Wren stood with Yulan and Hamdan and Kerig, gazing out at the impossibly huge throng gathering itself before them. Readying itself to crush them and trample them into the soft earth.
‘I told you we should have brought the Clamour,’ Kerig observed.
‘Now, you know that wouldn’t have been a good idea,’ Hamdan chided him with a wry smile. ‘Not on a journey like this. Too far, too hard. We might all be about to die, but there’s no call for taking such a foolish risk.’
Kerig rolled his eyes.
‘You Massatans are all mad.’
‘Hush,’ Yulan said. ‘I’d not want the levymen to hear you talking of dying and Permanences. Not now. A bit of faith and hope’s the only armour they’ve got.’
‘It’ll not last long against a few thousand Huluk Kur,’ Kerig said bluntly.
Yulan glanced at the Clever.
‘You need to foster some faith of your own, Kerig. This woman here,’ – he gestured towards Wren – ‘came out of those hills alive. You don’t think we can match her mettle? And you don’t think your Captain might have a few more gambits of his own?’
It was said quite calmly, but Wren thought she heard some spikes – frustration at least – just below the surface of the words. There was not quite the same easy trust between Yulan and Kerig as lay between him and Hamdan. Kerig did not seem to notice, or did not care. He smiled.
‘You should know it doesn’t come easy, but I’ll foster what I can, Captain.’
‘Good. Now go find me that man who speaks the Huluk Kur tongue. It’s time for a little talking, I think. Always better to try that rather than just rushing into the killing and the dying.’
Yulan went out a little way, accompanied by a single spearman whose slumping shoulders and heavy tread betrayed his unhappiness. In one hand, Yulan carried a single severed head, holding it by the hair. He stopped and raised it up, displaying it to the great host of the Huluk Kur arrayed there before him like an audience to some fell ceremony.
Wren saw Yulan speaking to the spearman at his side. She could not hear what he said. Then the spearman called out in the Huluk Kur tongue. His was the only voice in the huge bowl of land. It sounded clear and loud.
Whatever he said, the Huluk Kur greeted it with a howl and a roar. Yulan threw the head into the marsh before him and turned and set his back to the army of his enemies. He and his relieved companion returned through the line of spearmen.
‘What’s happening?’ Wren asked as Yulan passed her.
‘I’ve told them to give me their strongest and their best man. The one who’s never been defeated. I told them I’ll kill him, and when I do they’ll go away into the north and leave the Kingdom in peace.’
‘Oh,’ Wren said.
‘Pride can be a terrible weakness, especially when mixed with anger. We’ll see how much of those things the Huluk Kur have.’
The Huluk Kur warrior who came out from among their ranks was, as best Wren could judge, the biggest man she had ever seen in her life. He stood a full head taller than Yulan and his shoulders were like logs resting atop his chest. He was stripped to the waist. Spiral scars adorned his breast. Each of his massive arms had half a dozen cords tied around it, all dyed a different colour. And in his hands he carried a sword so huge Wren doubted she would even be able to lift it. From pommel to blade tip it looked to be as long as she was tall.
‘Well,’ Hamdan mused. ‘That’s a very big sword he’s got there.’
‘It is,’ said Yulan. ‘I’ve not seen any of the rest of them with a sword. Have you?’
‘No.’
‘No. What do you suppose the chances are that he doesn’t really know how to use it?’
‘I doubt it matters if he knows how to use it,’ Hamdan sniffed. ‘If he lands a blow, it won’t stop till it meets stone or earth clean on the other side of you. I’d suggest you don’t let him hit you.’
‘Get me a short-sword and dagger, would you?’ Yulan said quietly, setting down his shield. He unbuckled his own belt and let it fall, with scabbard and blade, to the ground.
‘You want me to protect you?’ Kerig asked as Hamdan moved away.
Yulan shook his head emphatically.
‘You’ll need all your strength to save everyone if I die.’
‘And how should I do that?’
‘I have no idea. That’s why we have Clevers in the Free. To deliver surprises and wonders. You didn’t think you were going to get rich without having to work for it, did you?’
‘No,’ Kerig grunted. ‘It’s been clear that wasn’t going to happen since the first day I fell in with you people.’
‘And if the will’s there, all things are possible for a Clever, are they not?’
‘All things are possible,’ Kerig acknowledged. ‘I’d rather you concentrated on the possibility of beating that giant out there though.’
‘I’ll do that,’ Yulan said. ‘If you want my wager, mind you, they’re coming at us again whatever happens between me and that slab of flesh.’
‘Why fight him then?’ Wren asked, somewhat bemused at the air of calm these Free affected in the face of such a hopeless prospect. Though she supposed more sensible fear would not be of any great help to them now.
‘Because I might be wrong,’ Yulan told her. ‘It has been known. And even if I’m right, this buys some time, doesn’t it? Time for you and Kerig here to dream up some of those surprises and wonders.’
So the Free really would have me fight for them if it comes to it, she thought to herself. Once that very notion would have set a fire burning in her mind, unleashing excitement, fear, confusion, all manner of tumult. Now she only noted it. She was far too tired for tumult.
‘Listen, both of you,’ Yulan said to her and Kerig, abruptly grave. ‘Whatever happens, whatever you do: no women or children die. None of the slaves or captives the Huluk Kur have taken. Nobody dies but those who bear arms against us. No matter what that restraint might cost us, we hold to it. Always.’
Kerig nodded. Plainly, he already knew his Captain’s mind. So now did Wren, and she found it to her liking.
Yulan went out alone to meet his opponent. He picked his way carefully over the treacherous ground. Wren could see his feet sinking ankle-deep into water and mud. He carried sword and dagger loosely at his side.
They stood facing one another. Yulan was quite still. The champion of the Huluk Kur rolled his shoulders, swaying his great sword from side to side. His teeth showed in a snarl. He was talking to Yulan, an endless jagged chain of meaningless words.
‘Can he win this?’ Wren asked Hamdan softly.
‘He doesn’t like it much, but Yulan has a rare talent for killing men. That is his gift, and his burden. I doubt the Huluk Kur have ever quite seen its like.’
Nor had Wren. The huge Huluk Kur moved first. He surged forward, tearing his mighty legs free from the marsh. His sword curved up and round and down again far too quickly for such a huge weapon. It angled in towards Yulan’s shoulder like a falling tree.
But Yulan was not there when it fell. He was gliding sideways, as easily as if there was the hardest of ground beneath his feet. He moved as lightly as thought from beneath the descending sword. Ducking, he went around the Huluk Kur, under his arm. The dagger in his left hand darted out and cut its own neat, precise curve through air and through leggings and skin and muscle.
The Huluk Kur cried out and staggered, almost hopping. He pressed a hand to the back of his thigh. Even from where she stood, Wren could see the blood on the huge man’s palm when he lifted it again. A ragged cheer rose from the watching levymen. A rumble from the host on the far slopes.
Yulan set himself once more, balanced and still. The Huluk Kur limped at him. The blade came in a flat arc this time, at chest height. Yulan swayed backwards. The tip of the sword passed so close he must have felt the wind of its sweep on his face. Before that sweep was even done, while its strength was still twisting the Huluk Kur’s torso round, Yulan rushed in and stabbed the dagger up into his opponent’s armpit. It went deep and stayed there, buried in the crease between arm and shoulder, as the man howled and reeled backwards.
Yulan followed him and the two of them splashed through pools and around tufts of rushes. The great sword sank low, the arms that held it faltering. The short one flashed and cut. It opened long wounds, and at the last it drove up under the ribcage and found the life it sought and snuffed it out.
Yulan walked back towards his followers, leaving the great corpse behind him settling slowly into the soft, wet earth. A minute or two. No more. It took less than that, after their champion fell, for the army of the Huluk Kur to surge forward. They poured across the mire. They rushed around it, streaming across the slopes. They came raging and howling, hungry for the massacre.