The wind was cold. The snow seemed almost luminous on the valley floor, a white sheet that would-betray an enemy movement. The sentries fought to stay awake on the ramparts, listened for their Sergeants' footsteps, wondered what the dawn would bring from the east.

To the south there was a glow in the sky, a red suffusion that marked where Partisans were spending the dark hours. Somewhere, just once, a wolf gave a sobbing howl that was ghostlike in the high, dark night.

Sharpe's final visit to the sentries was to the men who guarded the hole hacked in the southern side of the keep. He looked at the snow-covered thorns of the hill and knew that, should tomorrow they be overwhelmed, that was the escape route. Many would never take it, but would lie dying in the Castle, and he remembered the winter four years before when he had led the single Company of Riflemen, in weather worse than this, on a retreat that had been as desperate as tomorrow's might be. Most of those men were dead now, killed by disease or by the enemy, and Harper had been one of the men who had struggled south in the Galician snows. Harper.

He went to the steps which led straight and broad down to the dungeons. Lightly wounded Fusiliers guarded the prisoners and they did so in a stench that was vile, a stench that rose from the crammed, foul bodies in the dark. The guards were nervous. There was no door to the dungeons, just the stairway, and they had made a barricade, chest high, at the bottom of the steps and lit it with flaming straw torches that showed the slick wetness of the nearest patch of floor. Each guard had three muskets, loaded and cocked, and the thought was that no prisoner would have time to clamber the barricade before a bullet would throw him back. The guards were pleased to see Sharpe. He sat with them on the steps. 'How are they?

'Bleeding cold, sir.

'That'll keep them quiet.

'Gives me the creeps, sir. You know that big bastard?

'Hakeswill?

'He got free.

Sharpe looked into the darkness beyond the torches. He could see the half-naked bodies piled together for warmth, he could see some eyes glittering at him from the heap, but he could not see Hakeswill. 'Where is he?

'He stays at the back, sir.

'Given you no trouble?

'No. The man spat a stream of tobacco juice over the unbalustraded edge of the stairs. 'We told them if they came within ten feet of the barricade, we'd fire. He patted the butt of his musket, one captured from Pot-au-Feu's men.

'Good. He looked at the half-dozen men. 'When are you relieved?

'Morning, sir. Their self-elected spokesman said.

'What do you have to drink?

They grinned, held up canteens. 'Rum, sir.

He walked down the steps and pushed at the barricade. It seemed firm enough, a mixture of stones and old timber, and he stared into the darkness and understood why this damp place would scare a man. It was called a dungeon, though in truth it was more like a huge, branching cellar, arched low with massive stones, but doubtless it had been a place where men had died through the ages. Like the men Hakeswill had killed here, like the Muslim prisoners who would have defended their faith by refusing to convert despite the Christian knives, racks, burning irons, and chains. He wondered if anyone had ever been happy in this place, had ever laughed.

This was a tomb for happiness, a place where no sunlight had reached for centuries, and he turned back to the stairs, glad to be leaving this place.

'Sharpy! Little Dick Sharpy! The voice was behind him now, a voice Sharpe knew too well. He ignored Hakeswill, began climbing the steps, but the cackle came, mocking and knowing. 'Running away, are we, Sharpy?

Despite himself, Sharpe turned. The figure shuffled into the torchlight, face twitching, body wrapped with a shirt taken off another prisoner. Hakeswill stopped, pointed at Sharpe, and gave his cackling laugh. 'You think you've won, don't you, Sharpy? The blue eyes were unnaturally bright in the flames of the torch, while the grey hair and yellow skin looked sallow, as if HakeswilPs whole body, except his eyes, were a leprous growth.

Sharpe turned again, spoke loud to the sentries. 'If he comes within fifteen feet of the barricade, shoot him.

'Shoot him! The scream was from Hakeswill. 'Shoot him! You poxed son of a poxed whore, Sharpe! You bastard! Get others to do your dirty work for you? Sharpe turned, halfway up the stairs, and saw Hakeswill smile at the guards. 'You think you can shoot me, lads? Try, go on! Try now! Here I am! He spread his naked arms wide, grinning, the head on its long neck twitching at them. 'You can't kill me! You can shoot me, but you can't kill me! I'll come for you, lads, I'll come and squeeze your hearts out in the dark. The hands came together. 'You can't kill me, lads. Plenty's tried, including that poxed bastard who calls himself a Major, but no one's killed me. Never will. Never!

The guards were awed by the force of Hakeswill, by the passionate conviction in the harsh voice, by the hatred.

Sharpe looked at him, hating him. 'Obadiah? I'll send your soul to hell within a fortnight.

The blue eyes were unblinking, the twitching gone, and Hakeswill's right hand came slowly up to point at Sharpe. 'Richard bloody Sharpe. I curse you. I curse you by wind and by water, by fog and by fire, and I bury your name on the stone. It seemed as if his head would twitch, but Hakeswill exerted all his will, and the twitch was nothing more than a mouth-clenched judder, a judder followed by a great scream of rage. 'I bury your name on the stone! He turned back to the shadows.

Sharpe watched him go, then turned himself and, after a word with the guards, climbed to the very top of the Castle's keep. He climbed the turning stairs until he was in the cold, clean air that blew from the hills, and he breathed deep as though he could cleanse his soul of all the bad deeds. He feared a curse. He wished he had carried his rifle, for on the butt of the gun he had carved away a small sliver so that a patch of bare wood was not covered with varnish, and he could have pressed a finger on the wood to fight the curse. He feared a curse. It was a weapon of evil, and a weapon that always brought evil upon the person who made the curse, but Hakeswill had no future but evil and so could deliver the words.

A man could fight bullets and bayonets, even rockets if he understood the weapon, but no man understood the invisible enemies. Sharpe wished he knew how to propitiate Fate, the soldiers' Goddess, but She was a capricious deity, without loyalty.

It came to him that if he could see just one star, just one, then the curse would be lifted, and he turned on the ramparts and he searched the dark sky, but there was nothing in the heavens but cloud and heaviness. He searched desperately, looking for a star, but there was no star. Then a voice called to him from the courtyard, wanting him, and he went down the twisting stair to wait for morning.