The Heroes

he’d make a law against growing the bastard stuff. Only soft crops allowed, on pain of— He ripped two more bristly wedges out of his way and froze.
    The standards were right ahead, no more than twenty strides off, flapping hard on their staves. Each was embroidered with a golden sun, glittering in the light of a dozen lanterns. Beyond them the stretch of bald, soggy ground Scale had died defending sloped down towards the river, crawling with Union horses. Hundreds of tons of big, glossy, dangerous-looking horseflesh and, as far as he could tell by the patchy torchlight, they were still coming across, hooves clattering on the flags of the bridge, panicked whinnies echoing out as they jostled each other in the darkness. There was no shortage of men either, shouting as they struggled to get their mounts into position, bellowed orders fading on the wind. All making good and ready to trample Calder and his boys into the mud in a few short hours. Not a particularly comforting thought, it had to be said. Calder didn’t mind the odd trampling but he much preferred being in the saddle to being under the hooves.
    A pair of guards flanked the standards, one with his arms wrapped around him and a halberd hugged tight in the crook of his elbow, the other stamping his feet, sword sheathed and using his shield as a windbreak.
    ‘Do we go?’ whispered Pale-as-Snow.
    Calder looked at those guards, and he thought about mercy. Neither one seemed the slightest bit ready for what was coming. They looked even more unhappy about being here than he was, which was quite the achievement. He wondered whether they had wives waiting for them too. Wives with children in their soft bellies, maybe, curled up asleep under the furs with a warm space beside them. He sighed. Damn shame they weren’t all with their wives, but mercy wasn’t going to drive the Union out of the North, or Black Dow out of his father’s chair either.
    ‘We go,’ he said.
    Pale-as-Snow held up a hand and made a couple of gestures. Then he did the same on the other side and settled back onto his haunches. Calder wasn’t sure who he was even waving at, let alone what the meaning was, but it worked like magic.
    The guard with the shield suddenly went over backwards. The other turned his head to look then did the same. Calder realised they’d both had their throats cut. Two black shapes lowered them gently to the ground. A third had caught the halberd as it dropped and now he turned, hugging it in the crook of his own elbow, giving them a gap-toothed grin as he imitated the Union guard.
    More Northmen had broken from the crops and were scurrying forwards, bent double, weapons gleaming faintly as the moon slipped from the clouds again. Not twenty strides away from them three Union soldiers were struggling with a wind-torn tent. Calder chewed at his lip, hardly able to believe they weren’t seen as they crept across the open ground and into the lamplight, one of them taking a hold of the right-hand flag, starting to twist it free of the earth.
    ‘You!’ A Union soldier, a flatbow part-raised, a look of mild puzzlement on his face. There was a moment of awkward silence, everyone holding their breath.
    ‘Ah,’ said Calder.
    ‘Shit,’ said Pale-as-Snow.
    The soldier frowned. ‘Who are—’ Then he had an arrow in his chest. Calder didn’t hear the bowstring but he could see the black line of the shaft. The soldier shot his flatbow into the ground, gave a high shriek and fell to his knees. Not far away some horses startled, one dragging its surprised handler over onto his face and bumping across the mud. The three soldiers with the tent all snapped around at the same moment, two of them letting go of the canvas so that it was blown straight into the face of the third. Calder felt a sucking feeling in his stomach.
    More Union men spilled into the light with frightening suddenness, a dozen or more, a couple with torches, flames whipped out sideways by a new gust. High wails echoed on Calder’s right and men darted from nowhere, steel glinting as swords were swung. Shadows flickered in the darkness, a weapon, or an arm, or the outline of a face caught for an instant against the orange glow of fire. Calder could hardly tell what was happening, then one of the torches guttered out and he couldn’t tell at all. It sounded as if there was fighting over on the left now too, his head yanked about by every sound.
    He nearly jumped into the sky when he felt