The Heroes

each other. As if on an instinct they were all pairing off with the partner who suited ’em best, like folk at a harvest dance. Except this dance seemed likely to shed a lot of blood.
    ‘Put ’em up,’ growled Craw, and his voice had more iron now. A warning, and the dozen all seemed to shift forwards around him at it, steel rattling.
    Tenways showed his rotten teeth. ‘Fucking make me.’
    ‘I’ll give it a try.’
    A man came strolling out of the dark, just his sharp jaw showing in the shadows of his hood, boots crunching heedless through the corner of the fire and sending a flurry of sparks up around his legs. Very tall, very leanand he looked like he was carved out of wood. He was chewing meat from a chicken bone in one greasy hand and in the other, held loose under the crosspiece, he had the biggest sword Beck had ever seen, shoulder-high maybe from point to pommel, its sheath scuffed as a beggar’s boot but the wire on its hilt glinting with the colours of the fire-pit.
    He sucked the last shred of meat off his bone with a noisy slurp, and he poked at all the drawn steel with the pommel of his sword, long grip clattering against all those blades. ‘Tell me you lot weren’t working up to a fight without me. You know how much I love killing folk. I shouldn’t, but a man has to stick to what he’s good at. So how’s this for a recipe …’ He worked the bone around between finger and thumb, then flicked it at Tenways so it bounced off his chain mail coat. ‘You go back to fucking sheep and I’ll fill the graves.’
    Tenways licked his bloody top lip. ‘My fight ain’t with you, Whirrun.’
    And it all came together. Beck had heard songs enough about Whirrun of Bligh, and even hummed a few himself as he fought his way through the logpile. Cracknut Whirrun. How he’d been given the Father of Swords. How he’d killed his five brothers. How he’d hunted the Shimbul Wolf in the endless winter of the utmost North, held a pass against the countless Shanka with only two boys and a woman for company, bested the sorcerer Daroum-ap-Yaught in a battle of wits and bound him to a rock for the eagles. How he’d done all the tasks worthy of a hero in the valleys, and so come south to seek his destiny on the battlefield. Songs to make the blood run hot, and cold too. Might be his was the hardest name in the whole North these days, and standing right there in front of Beck, close enough to lay a hand on. Though that probably weren’t a good idea.
    ‘Your fight ain’t with me?’ Whirrun glanced about like he was looking for who it might be with. ‘You sure? Fights are twisty little bastards, you draw steel it’s always hard to say where they’ll lead you. You drew on Calder, but when you drew on Calder you drew on Curnden Craw, and when you drew on Craw you drew on me, and Jolly Yon Cumber, and Wonderful there, and Flood – though he’s gone for a wee, I think, and also this lad here whose name I’ve forgotten.’ Sticking his thumb over his shoulder at Beck. ‘You should’ve seen it coming. No excuse for it, a proper War Chief fumbling about in the dark like you’ve nothing in your head but shit. So my fight ain’t with you either, Brodd Tenways, but I’ll still kill you if it’s called for, and add your name to my songs, and I’ll still laugh afterwards. So?’
    ‘So what?’
    ‘So shall I draw? And you’d best keep always before you that if the Father of Swords is drawn it must be blooded. That’s the way it’s been since before the Old Time, and the way it must be still, and must always be.’
    They stood there for a moment longer, the lot of ’em, all still, allwaiting, then Tenways’ brows drew in, and his lips curled back, and Beck felt the guts dropping out of him, because he could feel what was coming, and—
    ‘What the
fuck
?’ Another man stalked up into the firelight, eyes slits and teeth bared, head forwards and shoulders up like a fighting dog, no want in it but killing. His scowl was crossed with old scars, one ear missing, and he wore a golden chain, a big jewel alive with orange sparks in the middle.
    Beck swallowed. Black Dow, no question. Who beat Bethod’s men six times in the long winter then burned Kyning to the ground with its people in the houses. Who fought the Bloody-Nine in the circle and nearly won, was left with his life and bound to serve. Fought alongside him then, and with Rudd Threetrees, and Tul Duru Thunderhead, and Harding Grim, as tough a crew as