“What happens if we lose, Da?”

“If we what?” growled Crummock, and he cuffed his son round the head with a great hand and knocked him on his face in the dirt. “On your feet! There’ll be no losing here, boy!”

“Not while the moon loves us,” muttered his sister, but not that loud.

Logen watched the lad struggling up, holding a hand to his bloody mouth and looking like he wanted to cry. He knew that feeling. Probably he should’ve said something about treating a child that way. Maybe he would’ve, on the first day, or the second even. Not now. He was too tired, and too sore, and too scared to care much about it.

Black Dow ambled up, something not too far from a smile across his face. The one man in the whole camp who might’ve been said to be in a better mood than usual, and you know you’re in some sorry shit when Black Dow starts smiling.

“Ninefingers,” he grunted.

“Dow. Run out of men to burn, have you?”

“Reckon Bethod’ll be sending me some more presently.” He nodded towards the wall. “What d’you think he’ll send today?”

“After what we gave ’em last night, I reckon those Crinna bastards are just about done.”

“Bloody savages. I reckon they are at that.”

“And there’ve been no Shanka for a few days now.”

“Four days, since he sent the Flatheads at us.”

Logen squinted up at the sky, slowly getting lighter. “Looks like good weather today. Good weather for armour, and swords, and men walking shoulder to shoulder. Good weather to try and finish us. Wouldn’t be surprised if he sends the Carls today.”

“Nor me.”

“His best,” said Logen, “from way back. Wouldn’t be surprised to see Whitesides, and Goring, and Pale-as-Snow, and fucking Littlebone and all the rest come strolling up to the gate after breakfast.”

Dow snorted. “His best? Right crowd o’ cunts, those.” And he turned his head and spat onto the mud.

“You’ll get no argument from me.”

“That so? Didn’t you fight alongside ’em, all those hard and bloody years?”

“I did. But I can’t say I ever much liked ’em.”

“Well, if it’s any consolation, I doubt they think too much o’ you these days.” Dow gave him a long look. “When did Bethod stop suiting you, eh, Ninefingers?”

Logen stared back at him. “Hard to say. Bit by bit, I reckon. Maybe he got to be more of a bastard as time went on. Or maybe I got to be less of one.”

“Or maybe there ain’t room on one side for two bastards as big as the pair o’ you.”

“Oh, I don’t know.” Logen got up. “You and me work real sweet together.” He stalked away from Dow, thinking about what easy work Malacus Quai, and Ferro Maljinn, and even Jezal dan Luthar had been.

Seven days, and they were all at each other’s throats. All angry, all tired. Seven days. The one consolation was that there couldn’t be many more.

“They’re coming.”

Dogman’s eyes flicked sideways. Like most of the few things Grim said, it hardly needed saying. They could all see it as clearly as the sun rising. Bethod’s Carls were on the move.

They were in no hurry. They came on stiff and steady, painted shields held up in front, eyes to the gateway. Standards flapped over their heads. Signs the Dogman recognised from way back. He wondered how many of those men down there he’d fought alongside. How many of their faces he could put a name to. How many he’d drunk with, eaten with, laughed with, that he’d have to do his best to put back in the mud. He took a long breath. The battlefield’s no place for sentiment, Threetrees had told him once, and he’d taken it right to heart.

“Alright!” He lifted up his hand as the men around him on the tower readied their bows, “Hold on to ’em for a minute yet!”

The Carls stomped on through the churned-up mud and the broken rocks where the valley narrowed, past the bodies of Easterners, and Shanka, left twisted where they lay, hacked, or crushed, or stuck with broken arrows. They didn’t falter, or lose a step, the wall of shields shifted as they came, but didn’t break. Not the slightest gap.

“They march tight,” muttered Tul.

“Aye. Too tight, the bastards.”

They were getting close, now. Close enough that Dogman had to try some arrows. “Alright, boys! Aim high and let ’em drop!” The first flight went hissing from the tower, arced up high and started to fall on that tight column. They shifted their shields to meet them and arrows thudded into painted wood, spun off helmets and glanced off mail. A couple found marks, a shriek went up. Holes showed, here or there, but the rest just stepped on over, trudging up towards the wall.

Dogman frowned at the barrels where the shafts were kept. Less than quarter full, now, and most of those dug out from dead men. “Careful now! Pick your marks, lads!”

“Uh,” said Grim, pointing down below. A good-sized pack o’ men were scurrying out from the ditch, dressed in stiff leather and steel capped. They formed up in a few neat rows, kneeling down, tending to their weapons. Flatbows, like the Union used.

“Get down!” shouted Dogman.

Those nasty little bows rattled and spat. Most of the boys on the tower were well behind their parapet by then, but one optimist who’d been leaning out got a bolt through his mouth, swayed and toppled, silent, off the tower. Another took one in his chest, breathing with a wheeze like wind through a split pine.

“Alright! Give ’em something back!” They all came up at once and sent down a volley, strings humming, peppering those bastards with plunging shafts. Their bows might not have had the same spit to ’em, but with the height the arrows still came hard, and Bethod’s archers had nothing to hide behind. More than a few fell back or started crawling away, screaming and squealing, but the rank behind pushed through, slow and steady, knelt down and aimed their flatbows.

Another flight of bolts came hissing up. Men ducked and threw themselves down. One zipped right past the Dogman’s head and clicked off the rock face behind. Pure luck he didn’t get pinned with it. A couple of the others were less lucky. One lad was lying on his back, a pair of bolts stuck in his chest, peering down at ’em and whispering, “shit”, to himself, over and over.

“Bastards!”

“Let’em have it back!”

Shafts and bolts started flapping up both ways, men shouting and taking aim, all anger and gritted teeth. “Steady!” shouted Dogman, “steady!” but no one hardly heard him. With the extra poke from the height and the cover they had from the walls, didn’t take long for Dogman’s boys to get the upper hand. Bethod’s archers started scrambling back, then a couple dropped their flatbows and made a run for it, one getting a shaft right through his back. The rest started to break for the ditch, leaving their wounded crawling in the mud.

“Uh,” said Grim again. While they’d been busy trading shafts the Carls had made it right to the gate, shields up over their heads against the rocks and arrows the hillmen were chucking down. They’d got the ditch filled in a day or two before, and now the column opened up in the middle and those mailed men moved like they were passing something to the front. Dogman caught a glimpse of it. A long, thin tree trunk, cut down to use as a ram, branches left on short so men could give it a firm swing. Dogman heard the first tearing crash of it working at their sorry excuse for a gate.

“Shit,” he muttered.

Knots of Thralls were charging forward now, light-armed and light-armoured, carrying ladders between ’em, counting on speed to make it to the walls. Plenty fell, pricked with spear or arrow, knocked with rocks. Some of their ladders were pushed back, but they were quick and full of bones, and stuck to their task. Soon there were a couple of groups on the walls while more pressed up the ladders behind, fighting with Crummock’s people and getting the better by pure freshness and weight of numbers.