“Need the men. Fighting the Union’s never been easy.”
True enough. Bethod, Black Dow, Scale Ironhand, they’d all found it out the hard way. The Union had been getting the better of better men than Stour Nightfall for years.
Stour seemed to guess the way Clover was thinking and gave one of those sly sideways winks of his, like they were all caught up together in the same funny secret. “But we never had Angland on our side before.”
“We had the First of the Magi on our side,” grunted Calder, getting even sourer, if that was possible. “Tipping all the scales. Loading all the dice.”
“When I wanted his help, you said it wasn’t worth the price.”
“I said don’t land yourself in his debt. I didn’t say spit in his eye.” Calder shook his head grimly. “You don’t understand what he is.”
Understanding things was a problem for other folk, far as the Great Wolf was concerned. He gave a hiss, half-boredom, half-disgust. “When did you turn so bloody sour, Father? To hear you carping, no one would ever guess you won the North!”
Calder spoke soft. “With Bayaz’s help, I won it. Like the Bloody-Nine. Like my father. If Bayaz starts helping someone else—”
“Then I’ll fight ’em and I’ll win!” snarled Stour, showing his teeth. The sun came out then, peeping through a patch in the cloud, and brought a sparkle from the marching men. “Look at that!” There was a rainbow over the road south towards Ollensand. “A good omen, I reckon. An archway we’ll march through to victory!”
Cheers at that from some of the Named Men on the roof, and weapons shook, and calls of the Great Wolf. No one mentioned the one thing about rainbows that came at once to Clover—you can march at ’em for ever but you’ll never actually reach the bastards.
Calder gave a disgusted sigh as he watched the King of the Northmen swagger towards the steps. “The dead save me from the fucking young.”
“No getting away from ’em, sadly,” muttered Clover. “The older you get, the more of ’em there are.”
As so often, his wit was wasted. Calder was frowning down at his fists, bunched on the grey stones of the parapet. “This was the spot where the Bloody-Nine killed my father.”
“Mmmm.” Clover remembered it well enough. He’d held a shield in that duel, between the Bloody-Nine and the Feared, before his name was even Steepfield, let alone Clover, a mad young bastard full of fire.
“And his dream of the North united died with him.”
“Mmmm.” Clover remembered the crunching as Bethod’s skull was smashed to mush. The thud as his body dropped in the Circle.
“For thirty years I’ve been trying to coax it back to life. Tending to it with my every breath. We’re nearly there, Clover. One victory more.”
Clover had his doubts on that score. He’d seen victories enough, and they were like the false summits of a great fell. You struggle towards ’em, sure you’ve made the top, then the moment you get there you see another just beyond. No fight was ever the last. No victory was ever for good. But Black Calder was getting old. He wanted to see his great legacy secured before he went back to the mud. Then he could trick himself into believing it wouldn’t crumble a few moments after.
He gripped Clover by the arm. He had quite the grip, for a thin man. “You have to keep watch on him, you understand me?”
“Mmmm.”
“He’s the future.”
“Mmmm.”
“We might not like it. He might not deserve it.”
“Mmmm.”
“But he’s the future, and the future has to be protected.”
Clover thought of that cage in Skarling’s Hall. “How do you protect a man from himself?”
“He’ll learn better, in time.”
Clover had his doubts about that, too. Sooner or later, you have to stop expecting folk to bend around your plans and fit your plans to the folk you’ve got. But he reckoned Calder had laboured on his plans so long they’d turned hard, and brittle, and apt to shatter. So he stuck to, “Mmmm.” It was a contribution that worked for any circumstance. A listener could hear whatever they wanted in it.
“If things turn sour over there, do whatever you have to, you understand? Bring him back alive. Do that, I’ll see you rewarded.”
“Mmmm,” said Clover, one more time. “Well, I’ve always liked to be rewarded.”
And he set off towards the steps to join the great army of the North.
Orso’s command tent was, being generous, a shambles. In fact, since Hildi and a group of baffled soldiers were still scratching their heads over how to put half of it up, and Orso had known nothing about leading soldiers at Valbeck a year before and learned nothing since, one could have said it was a command tent featuring neither tent nor command.
Messengers, scouts and adjutants blundered through in confusion, trampling mud, tripping over guy-ropes and tearing down canvas. Orso hardly even knew what an adjutant was, yet he had about a dozen of the bastards. The babble reminded him of a wedding party held in too small a room, except the guests were panicking and almost all men.
General Forest barked out orders, trying to impose some sanity. Arch Lector Pike fingered his melted chin, trying to sift truth from conflicting reports. Corporal Tunny watched it all from a folding field chair, the Steadfast Standard propped beside him, with an air of knowing amusement which Orso found particularly aggravating.
“Your Majesty,” Hoff was wheedling, with his trademark wringing of the hands, “I wish you would consider returning to the Agriont where you can be protected—”
“Out of the question,” said Orso. “Believe me, Lord Chamberlain, I would much prefer to be in my bed than my saddle, but this rebellion is like a fire in a distillery. If it is not stamped out at once it will spread. And I have to be seen to stamp it out.”
“So this is all about appearances?” murmured Vick.
“Being king is all about appearances,” said Orso. “An endless performance with no chance for an encore and for damn sure no applause. Hildi, you do have my armour, don’t you?”
“’Course I do,” she grunted, without looking up from the confusion of ropes.
“You don’t plan…” Hoff looked pale. “To fight, Your Majesty?”
“Bloody hell, no. But I plan to damn well look like I might.”
There was a crash as a messenger tripped, reeled into a table and sent rolled-up maps bouncing about the tent.
“That is enough!” shouted Orso. “Forest, Pike, Tunny, Teufel and Hoff, stay. The rest of you out.” He would not have minded ejecting a couple of those named, but he supposed he needed all the help he could get. “Gorst, make sure we are not disturbed.”
“Buth—” muttered Hildi around a cord she was gripping in her teeth while she tried to tie two others together.
“You, too. Out!”
Hildi shrugged, let go of the ropes, and with a gentle flutter one wall of the tent billowed out and slowly collapsed to the ground. A fitting metaphor for Orso’s campaign so far, he rather thought. He spoke through gritted teeth.
“Let us take one thing at a time. Your Eminence, is there any sign of the rebels?”