Jezal jumped in his saddle as a bright flash lit the sky, and then another, frighteningly close. Fingers of light clawed at the bulging undersides of the clouds, snaked through the darkness overhead. Long thunder rolled out across the gloomy plain, popped and crackled under the wind. By the time it faded the wet cart had already rolled away, robbing Jezal of his chance to retort. 'Damn idiot apprentice,' he murmured, frowning at the back of his head.

At first, when the flashes had come, Jezal had tried to keep his spirits up by imagining his companions struck down by lightning. It would have been oddly appropriate, for instance, had Bayaz been cooked to a cinder by a stroke from the heavens. Jezal soon despaired of any such deliverance, however, even as a fantasy. The lightning would never kill more than one of them in a day, and if one of them had to go, he had slowly begun to hope it might be him. A moment of brilliant illumination, then sweet oblivion. The kindest escape from this nightmare.

A trickle of water ran down Jezal's back, tickling at his raw skin. He longed to scratch it, but he knew that if he did he would only create ten more itches, spread across his shoulder blades and his neck and all the places hardest to reach with a hooked finger. He closed his eyes, and his head slowly drooped under the weight of his desperation until his wet chin hung against his wet chest.

It had been raining the last time he saw her. He remembered it all with a painful clarity. The bruise on her face, the colour of her eyes, the set of her mouth, one side twisted up. Just thinking of it made him have to swallow that familiar lump in his throat. The lump he swallowed twenty times a day. First thing in the morning, when he woke, and last thing at night, as he lay on the hard ground. To be back with Ardee now, safe and warm, seemed like the realisation of all his dreams.

He wondered how long she might wait, as the weeks dragged on, and she received no word. Might she even now be writing daily letters to Angland that he would never receive? Letters expressing her tender feelings. Letters desperately seeking news. Letters begging for replies. Now her worst expectations would all be confirmed. That he was a faithless ass, and a liar, and had forgotten all about her, when nothing could have been further from the truth. He ground his teeth in frustration and despair at the thought, but what could he do? Replies were hard to send from a blighted, blasted, ruined wasteland, even supposing he could have written one in this epic downpour. He inwardly cursed the names of Bayaz and Ninefingers, of Longfoot and Quai. He cursed the Old Empire and he cursed the endless plain. He cursed the whole demented expedition. It was becoming an hourly ritual.

Jezal began to perceive, dimly, that he had until now had rather an easy life. It seemed strange that he had moaned so long and hard about rising early to fence, or about lowering himself to play cards with Lieutenant Brint, or about how his sausages were always a touch overdone of a morning. He should have been laughing, bright-eyed and with a spring in his step, simply to have been out of the rain. He coughed, and sniffed, and wiped at his sore nose with his sore hand. At least with so much water around, no one would notice him weeping.

Only Ferro looked as if she was enjoying herself even less than him, occasionally glaring at the pissing clouds, her face wrinkled up with hatred and horror. Her spiky hair was plastered flat to her skull, her waterlogged clothes hung limp from her scrawny shoulders, water ran down her scarred face and dripped from the end of her sharp nose, the point of her sharp chin. She looked like a mean-tempered cat dunked unexpectedly in a pond, its body suddenly seeming a quarter of the size it had been, stripped of all its air of menace. Perhaps a woman's voice might be the thing to lift him from this state of mind, and Ferro was the nearest thing to a woman within a hundred miles.

He spurred his horse up alongside her, doing his best to smile, and she turned her scowl on him. Jezal found to his discomfort that at close quarters, much of the menace returned. He had forgotten about those eyes. Yellow eyes, sharp as knives, pupils small as pin-pricks, strange and disconcerting. He wished he had never approached her now, but he could hardly go without saying something.

'Bet it doesn't rain much where you come from, eh?'

'Are you going to shut your fucking hole, or do I have to hurt you?'

Jezal cleared his throat, and quietly allowed his mount to drop back away from her. 'Crazy bitch,' he whispered under his breath. Damn her, then, she could keep her misery. He wasn't about to start wallowing in self-pity. That wasn't his way at all.

The rain had finally stopped when they came upon the place, but the air was still full of heavy damp, the sky above was still full of strange colours. The evening sun pierced the swirling clouds with pink and orange, casting an eerie glow over the grey plain.

Two empty carts stood upright, another was tipped up on its side, one wheel broken off, a dead horse still tethered to it, lying with its pink tongue lolling out of its mouth, a pair of broken arrows sticking from its bloody side. The corpses were scattered all around in the flattened grass, like dolls discarded by a bad-tempered child. Some had deep wounds, or limbs broken, or arrows poking from their bodies. One had an arm off at the shoulder, a short length of snapped bone sticking out as if from a butcher's joint.

Rubbish was scattered all around them. Broken weapons, splintered wood. A few trunks smashed open, rolls of cloth ripped out and slashed across the wet ground. Burst barrels, shattered boxes, rooted through and looted.

'Merchants,' grunted Ninefingers, looking down. 'Like we're pretending to be. Life's cheap out here alright.'

Ferro curled her lip. 'Where isn't it?'

The wind whipped cold across the plain, cutting clean through Jezal's damp clothes. He had never seen a corpse before, and here were laid out . . . how many? At least a dozen. He started to feel slightly peculiar halfway through counting them.

No one else seemed much moved, though familiarity with violence was hardly surprising among these characters. Ferro was crawling around the bodies, peering down and prodding them with as little emotion as an undertaker. Ninefingers looked as though he had seen far worse, which Jezal did not doubt he had, and done far worse besides. Bayaz and Longfoot both looked mildly troubled, but not much more so than if they had come upon some unknown horse tracks. Quai scarcely even looked interested.

Jezal could have done with a share of their indifference at that moment. He would not have admitted it, but he was feeling more than a little sick. That skin: slack, and still, and waxy pale, beaded with wet from the rain. That clothing: ripped and rifled through, missing boots, or coats, or shirts even. Those wounds. Ragged red lines, blue and black bruises, rips and tears and gaping mouths in flesh.

Jezal turned suddenly in his saddle, looking behind, to the left, to the right, but every view was the same. Nowhere to run to, if he had even known in what direction the nearest settlement lay. In a group of six and yet he felt utterly alone. In a vast, open space, and yet he felt utterly trapped.

One of the corpses seemed to be staring, unnervingly, straight at him. A young man, no more than Jezal's age, with sandy hair and protruding ears. He could have done with a shave, except, of course, that it hardly mattered now. There was a yawning red gash across his belly, his bloody hands lying on either side of it, as though trying to squeeze it shut. His guts glistened wetly inside, all purple-red. Jezal felt his gorge rising. He was already feeling faint from eating too little that morning. Damn sick of dry biscuit, and he could hardly force down the slops the others put together. He turned away from the sickening scene and stared down at the grass, pretending to be searching for important clues while his stomach clenched and heaved.

He gripped his reins as tightly as he could, forcing down the spit as it rushed into his mouth. He was a proud son of the Union, damn it. What was more he was a nobleman, of a distinguished family. What was still more he was a bold officer of the King's Own, and a winner of the Contest. To vomit at the sight of a little gore would be to disgrace himself before this mixture of fools and primitives, and that could under no circumstances be permitted. The honour of his nation was at stake. He glared fixedly at the wet ground, and he clamped his teeth shut, and he ordered his stomach to be still. Gradually, it began to work. He sucked in deep breaths through his nose. Cool, damp, calming air. He was in complete control. He looked back at the others.

Ferro was squatting on the ground with her hand in one of the victim's gaping wounds as far almost as her wrist. 'Cold,' she snapped at Ninefingers, 'been dead since this morning at least.' She pulled her hand out, fingers slimy with gore.

Jezal had belched half his meagre breakfast down his coat before he had time even to slide out of his saddle. He staggered a couple of drunkard's steps, took a gasping breath and retched again. He bent over, hands on his knees, head spinning, spitting bile out onto the grass.

'You alright?'

Jezal glanced up, doing his best to look nonchalant with a long string of bitter drool hanging from his face. 'Something I ate,' he muttered, wiping at his nose and mouth with his trembling hand. A pitiful ruse, he had to admit.

Ninefingers only nodded, though. 'That meat this morning, most likely. I been feeling sick myself.' He gave one of his revolting smiles and offered Jezal a water skin. 'Best keep drinking. Flush it away, uh?'

Jezal sloshed a mouthful of water round his mouth and spat it out, watching Ninefingers walk back to the bodies, and frowning. That had been strange. Coming from another source it might have seemed almost a generous gesture. He took another swig of water, and began to feel better. He made, somewhat unsteadily, for his horse, and clambered back into the saddle.

'Whoever did it was well armed, and in numbers,' Ferro was saying. 'The grass is full of tracks.'

'We should be careful,' said Jezal, hoping to impose himself on the conversation.

Bayaz turned sharply to look at him. 'We should always be careful! That goes without saying! How far are we from Darmium?'

Longfoot squinted up at the sky, then out across the plain. He licked his finger and held it up to the wind. 'Even for a man of my talents, it is hard to be accurate without the stars. Fifty miles or thereabouts.'

'We'll need to turn off the track soon.'

'We are not crossing the river at Darmium?'

'The city is in chaos. Cabrian holds it, and admits no one. We cannot take the risk.'

'Very well. Aostum it is. We will take a wide route round Darmium and off westward. A slightly longer path but-'

'No.'

'No?'

'The bridge at Aostum lies in ruins.'

Longfoot frowned. 'Gone, eh? Truly, God loves to test his faithful. We may have to ford the Aos then-'

'No,' said Bayaz. 'The rains have been heavy and the great river is deep. The fords are all closed to us.'

The Navigator looked puzzled. 'You, of course, are my employer, and as a proud member of the order of Navigators I will always do my utmost to obey, but I am afraid that I can see no other way. If we cannot cross at Darmium, or at Aostum, and we cannot ford the river . . .'

'There is one other bridge.'

'There is?' Longfoot looked baffled for a moment, then his eyes suddenly widened. 'You cannot mean-'

'The bridge at Aulcus still stands.'

Everyone glanced at each other for a moment, frowning. 'I thought you said the place was a ruin,' said Ninefingers.

'A shattered graveyard, I heard,' murmured Ferro.

'I thought you said no one goes within miles of the place.'

'It would hardly have been my first choice, but there are no others. We will join the river and follow the northern bank to Aulcus.' Nobody moved. Longfoot in particular had a look of stunned horror on his face. 'Now!' snapped Bayaz. 'It is plainly not safe to remain here.' And with that he turned his horse away from the corpses. Quai shrugged and flicked his reigns and the cart grumbled off through the grass after the First of the Magi. Longfoot and Ninefingers followed behind, all frowns and foreboding.

Jezal stared at the bodies, still lying where they had found them, their eyes staring accusingly up into the darkening sky. 'Shouldn't we bury them?'

'If you like,' grunted Ferro, springing up into the saddle in one easy motion. 'Maybe you could bury them in puke.'

Bloody Company Riding, that was what they were doing. That was what they'd been doing for days. Riding, looking for Bethod, with winter coming on. Bog and forest, hill and valley. Rain and sleet, fog and snow. Looking for signs that he was coming their way, and knowing that there wouldn't be any. A lot of wasted time, to the Dogman's mind, but once you've been fool enough to ask for a task, you better do the one you're given.

'Stupid bloody job, this,' snarled Dow, wincing and twitching and fussing with his reins. He'd never been too much of a one for horseback. Liked to keep his feet on the ground and pointed at the enemy. 'Waste of our fucking time. How d'you put up with scouting, Dogman? Stupid bloody job!'

'Someone's got to get it done, don't they? Least I got a horse now.'

'Well I'm right delighted for you!' he sneered. 'You got a horse!'

The Dogman shrugged his shoulders. 'Better than walking.' 'Better than walking, eh?' scoffed Dow. 'That just binds it all up!'

'I got new breeches and all. Not to mention good woollens. The wind don't blow half so cold round my fruits no more.'

That got a chuckle from Tul, but it seemed Dow wasn't in a laughing mood. 'Wind round your fruits? By the fucking dead, boy, is this what we're come to? You forgotten who you are? You was Ninefingers' closest! You came over the mountains with him in the first place! You're in all them songs along with him! You scouted at the head of armies. A thousand men, all following your say-so!'

'That didn't turn out too happy for anyone concerned,' muttered Dogman, but Dow was already laying into Tul.

'And how about you, big man? Tul Duru Thunderhead, strongest bastard in the North. Wrestled bears and won, I heard. Held the pass all alone, while your clan got clean away. A giant, they say, ten feet tall, born under a storm, and with a belly full o' thunder. What about it, giant? The only thunder I've heard you make lately is when you take a shit!'

'What of it?' snarled Tul. 'You any different? Men used to whisper your name, scared to speak it out loud. They'd grip their weapons tight and stick close by the fire if they thought you was within ten leagues! Black Dow, they used to say, quiet and cunning and ruthless as the wolf! He's killed more men than winter, and he's got less pity in him! Who cares a shit now, eh? Times have changed, and you rolled just as far downhill as the rest of us!'

Dow only smiled. 'That's my point, big lad, that's just my point. We used to be something, each one of us. Named Men. Known men. Feared men. I remember my brother telling me that there ain't no better man than Harding Grim with bow nor blade, no better man in all the North. Steadiest damn hand in the whole Circle of the World! How about that, eh, Grim?'

'Uh,' said Grim.

Dow nodded his head. 'Exactly what I'm saying. Now look at us. We ain't so much rolled downhill as fell off a bloody cliff! Running errands for these Southerners? These fucking women in men's trousers? These damn salad-eaters with their big words and their thin little swords?'

Dogman shifted in his saddle, uncomfortable. 'That West knows what he's about.'

'That West!' sneered Dow. 'He knows his arse from his mouth, and in that he's a damn stretch better than the rest, but he's soft as pig fat, and you know it. Got no bones in him at all! None of 'em have! I'd be shocked to my roots if the better part of 'em have ever seen a skirmish. You reckon they'd stand a charge from Bethod's Carls?' He snorted hard laughter to himself. 'Now there's a joke!'

'It can't be denied they're a piss-weak crowd,' muttered Tul, and the Dogman couldn't very well disagree. 'Half of 'em are too hungry to lift a weapon, let alone swing one with some fire, if they could even work out how. All the good ones went north to fight Bethod, leaving us here with the scrapings from the pot.'

'Scrapings from a piss-pot, I'm thinking. What about you, Threetrees?' called Dow. 'The Rock of Uffrith, eh? You were the spike up Bethod's arse for six months, a hero to every right-thinking man in the North! Rudd Threetrees! There's a man carved out of stone! There's a man who never backs down! You want honour? You want dignity? You want to know what a man should be? Look no fucking further! What do you make of all this, eh? Running errands! Checking these bogs for Bethod where we all know he ain't! Work fit for boys and we're lucky to get it, I suppose?'

Threetrees pulled up his horse and turned it slowly round. He sat in his saddle, hunched up, tired looking, and he stared at Dow for a minute. 'Open your ears and listen for once,' he said, ''cause I don't want to be telling you this every mile we go. The world ain't how I'd like it in all kind o' ways. Ninefingers has gone back to the mud. Bethod's made himself King of the Northmen. The Shanka are fixing to come swarming over the mountains. I've walked too far, and fought too long, and heard enough shit from you to fill a lifetime, and all at an age when I should have my feet up with sons to take care o' me. So you can see I got bigger problems than that life hasn't turned out the way you hoped. You can harp on the past all you please, Dow, like some old woman upset cause her tits used to stay up by themselves, or you can shut your fucking hole and help me get on with things.'

He gave each one of 'em a look in the eye, and the Dogman felt a touch shamed for doubting him. 'As for checking for Bethod where he ain't, well, Bethod's never been one to turn up where he's supposed to be. Scouting's the task we've been given, and scouting's the task I mean to get done.' He leaned forward in his saddle. 'So how's this for a fucking formula? Mouth shut. Eyes open.' And he turned and nudged his horse on through the trees.

Dow took a deep breath. 'Fair enough, chief, fair enough. It's just a shame is all. That's what I'm saying. Just a shame.'

'There's three of 'em,' said Dogman. 'Northmen, for certain, but hard to tell their clan. Being as they're down here, I'm guessing they follow Bethod.'

'More 'n likely,' said Tul. 'Seems that's the fashion these days.'

'Just three?' asked Threetrees. 'No reason for Bethod to have three men on their own all the way out here. Must be more nearby.'

'Let's deal with the three,' growled Dow, 'and get to the rest later. I came here to fight.'

'You came here 'cause I dragged you here,' snapped Threetrees. 'You was all for turning back an hour ago.'

'Uh,' said Grim.

'We can get around 'em if we need to.' Dogman pointed through the cold woods. 'They're up on the slope there, in the trees. No trouble to get around 'em.'

Threetrees looked up at the sky, pink and grey through the branches, and shook his head. 'No. We're losing the light, and I wouldn't like leaving 'em behind us in the dark. Since we're here, and since they're here, we'd best deal with 'em. Weapons it is.' He squatted down, talking quiet. 'Here's how we'll do it. Dogman, get round and above, up on that slope there. Take the one on the left when you hear the signal. You follow me? The one on the left. And best not to miss.'

'Aye,' said Dogman, 'on the left.' Not missing more or less went without saying.

'Dow, you slide in quiet and take the middle.'

'The middle,' growled Dow. 'He's done.'

'That leaves one for you, Grim.' Grim nodded without looking up, rubbing at his bow with a rag. 'Nice and clean, boys. I don't want to be putting one o' you in the mud over this. Places, then.'

The Dogman found a good spot up above Bethod's three scouts and watched from behind a tree trunk. Seemed like he'd done this a hundred times, but it never got any easier on the nerves. Probably just as well. It's when it gets easy that a man makes mistakes.

Dogman was watching for him, so he just caught sight of Dow in the fading light, slithering up through the brush, eyes fixed ahead on his task. He was getting close now, real close. Dogman nocked an arrow and took an aim at the one on the left, breathing slow to keep his hands steady. It was then that he realised. Now he was on the other side, the one that had been on the left was on the right. So which one should he shoot?

He cursed to himself, struggling to remember what Threetrees said. Get around and take the one on the left. Worst thing of all would have been to do nothing, so he aimed up at the one on his left and hoped for the best.

He heard Threetrees call from down below, sounding like a bird out in the woods. Dow gathered himself to jump. Dogman let his arrow fly. It thudded into the back of his task just as Grim's arrow stuck him in the front, and Dow seized hold of the middle one and stabbed him from behind. That left one of 'em untouched, and very surprised-looking.

'Shit,' whispered the Dogman.

'Help!' screamed the last of 'em, before Dow jumped on him. They rolled in the leaves, grunting and thrashing. Dow's arm went up and down once, twice, three times, then he stood up, glaring through the trees and looking mighty annoyed. Dogman was just shrugging his shoulders when he heard a voice behind him.

'What?'

Dogman froze, cold all over. Another one, out in the bushes, not ten strides away. He reached for an arrow and nocked it, real quiet, then turned slowly round. He saw two of 'em, and they saw him, and his mouth went sour as old beer. They all stared. Dogman aimed at the bigger one and pulled the string right back.

'No!' he shouted. The arrow thudded into his chest and he groaned and stumbled, fell down on his knees. Dogman dropped his bow and made a snatch at his knife, but he hadn't got it drawn before the other one was on him. They went down hard in the brush, and started rolling.

Light, dark, light, dark. Over and over they went, down the slope, kicking and tearing and punching at each other. Dogman's head smacked against something and he was down on his back, wrestling with this bastard. They hissed at each other, not words exactly, sounds like dogs make fighting. The man pulled his hand free and got a blade out from somewhere and Dogman caught his wrist before he could stab it home.

He was pushing down with all his weight, both hands on the knife. Dogman was pushing the other way, both hands on his wrists, hard as he could, but not hard enough. The blade was coming down slowly, down towards Dogman's face. He was staring at it cross-eyed, a tooth of bright metal not a foot from his nose.

'Die, you fucker!' and it came down another inch. The Dogman's shoulders, his arms, his hands were burning, running out of strength. Staring at his face. Stubble on his chin, yellow teeth, pock marks on his bent nose, hair hanging down around it. The point of the blade nudged closer. Dogman was dead, and there was no help for it.

Snick.

And his head wasn't there any more. Blood washed over Dogman's face, hot and sticky and reeking. The corpse went slack and he shoved it away, blood in his eyes, blood up his nose, blood in his mouth. He staggered up, gasping and choking and spitting.

'Alright, Dogman. You're alright.' Tul. Must've come up on them while they were struggling.

'I'm still alive,' Dogman whispered, the way Logen used to when a fight was done. 'Still alive.' By the dead, though, that had been a close thing.

'They ain't got too much in the way of gear,' Dow was saying, poking round the campsite. Cookpot on the fire, weapons and such like, but not much food. Not enough to be all alone out there in the woods.