A dawn of some sort was breaking. Cold, damp mist hung in the air, thick as smoke and sharp as ice, clinging to skin and cloth alike. It seeped into lungs with every breath, wet and sour, carrying the promise of rot and iron before a single shot had yet been fired.

  Down in the marshes it was colder still, I was certain—colder than the blasted top of the fort. Up there, they could see everything. Survey the whole. Make their grand plans. Sip their fucking tea and talk of lines and numbers as if men were chalk marks on a board.

  Down here, the view was different altogether.

  Dugouts. Trenches. Communication lines cut into the earth like open veins. Mud walls shored up with rotting planks, slick with last night’s rain and older blood. The wonders of modern warfare, laid bare. The kind of warfare that promises your death the moment a part of you forgets to stay hidden. Whistling cannon screaming overhead. Bullets snapping past like angry insects. Horses snorting and stamping somewhere behind the lines, ready to trample friend and foe alike when fear took them.

  It was all here. All of it.

  And Edelmer—may Joseph blister his tongue—had the brightest idea of all.

  My god-damned loud mouth. Too many stories. Too much booze. Too much recollection poured out over an evening like cheap ale. Somewhere between the cups I’d let it slip that I was a veteran.

  Well. Fuck me.

  Veteran meant useful. Veteran meant expendable. Veteran meant you go where the ground drinks first.

  So into the trenches I went.

  He even saw fit to give me a title. “Troop-surveyor.”

  What in Joseph’s rotting name was that meant to be? Staring at the troops? Counting their toes? Kicking their arses when they farted too loud or breathed out of turn? What did he want from me?

  I could see through his guise well enough. He wanted me sent away. Made useful in the particular sense that I was no longer standing near him, no longer speaking truths that scraped against his nerves. Damn him for it.

  My dim, circling thoughts dragged my eyes up toward the walls of the fort. Grey stone swallowed by mist. I imagined I could see him up there—Edelmer, stiff-backed and certain—but of course he was hidden from me. High ground always hides its sins.

  I spat all the same.

  “What are you spitting for, sir?”

  Wha—who the hell—

  I snapped my head to the right. Ah. There. One profoundly dumb-looking young child, barely more than a boy, clutching his gun like he didn’t know which end of it wanted to kill him. He stared straight through me like cattle do—eyes empty, unfocused. Not at me. Through.

  “What am I spitting for?” I snapped. “At you, pig-headed piece of shit. Do you even know how to fire that device, you fool?”

  His eyes sharpened then, just a fraction. Something resembling awareness crawled into them. His hands tightened on the weapon, knuckles whitening as if the thing might bolt.

  “Yes, sir,” he said, stiff and loud. “I have been trained by the Sun Swords to aim, fire, and reload!”

  Whore-born fool.

  I raised my axe—rusted piece of shit that it was—and struck him with the back end, hard under the shin. Just enough to knock the breath and the nonsense clean out of him. Most of his fire fled then, as I’d expected. Courage like his is loud until it’s tested.

  “What?” I snarled. “Does the discipline of an old infirm like me scare you?” I leaned in close, breath fogging between us. “You will face thunder and blood soon. Soon. Stand fucking proud, you piece of shit, and get ready to kill.”

  For a heartbeat, I saw it. The spark. The urge to strike back. Jaw tight, shoulders tensing—boyhood rage clawing at the surface. Then something heavier settled in him. The man won. He straightened. Spine stiff. Chin up. Beaten—but proud.

  Good enough.

  “Eyes on the river,” I said, slower now. “Coordinate fire-lines with your troop. Stop chewing grass and wake up. Death is coming—and we are to kill it.”

  His gaze finally landed on me. Properly this time. Clear. Awake.

  Fuck you, Edelmer.

  A drum struck. The tap-tap, then thunder.

  It crawled straight up my spine, that sound—an old sore splitting open, something that had festered deep in mind and marrow and never truly healed. The body remembered even when the years pretended otherwise.

  The roll for battle stations.

  “ALLLL TO STATIONS!” I roared.

  The sound startled me. A foolish, almost shameful flicker passed through—near enough to a blush. To think the words were still there, still waiting in the back of my throat after all this time. That command had not rusted. It had only slept.

  “Battle stations!” the young boy shrilled before me, voice cracking but loud, carrying farther than it had any right to.

  His companions echoed him. A Sun Sword line, ragged but standing, backed by pressed villagers clutching pikes, axes, sharpened scraps of wood—anything that could be convinced to pierce flesh. Tools of farming turned desperate by necessity.

  Nevertheless, the bastards readied themselves.

  Guns came up, barrels trained into the grey nothing beyond the trench. Fingers white on stocks. Breath held too long. The less fortunate—those without powder or iron—crouched low, bracing their bodies, setting their feet, preparing to become the point that stopped whatever dared come close.

  Good. The imbeciles were readied.

  I touched the shoulder of the boy I’d been haranguing moments ago, just enough to anchor him. A wordless passing of weight. Then I moved past the line.

  Some Gustavian men came running by in the opposite direction, boots clean, backs straight, uniforms still holding their colour. Long guns cradled like heirlooms, bayonets catching what little light the mist allowed. Neat. Trim. Like they still believed the world rewarded that sort of thing.

  I snorted as they passed.

  Then I struck one of our own—a lad clutching a rusted piece of shit not much better than my axe—with the flat of my hand against his shoulder.

  “You see,” I said, nodding after the blue-coated runners. “They’ll be begging for your axe if the horses come. I promise ye.”

  Something like a smile cracked his face.

  He knew, same as I did, that running was the wiser choice. Always had been. But wisdom doesn’t hold a line. Men do. I let him keep that small warmth a moment longer.

  There’d be time enough for the mud to teach him the rest.

  And past them, one big, ugly piece of refuse came stomping along the trench, proud as sin and twice as loud. Broad as a barn door, shoulders rolling like he owned the ground beneath him. I knew the gait before I saw the face.

  “ESKIL!”

  Stolen story; please report.

  The giant form swung around, slow and deliberate. Same hairless, shaved whoreson who’d threatened to kill me at the gates not long ago. We’d shared a few drinks since then. Enough to make him tolerable. Still a son of a devil—but he heeded me.

  “What the hell?” I barked. “Battle stations, now?”

  His thick brow creased, betraying a weight he didn’t bother dressing up. And more telling than anything else—no stink of drink on his breath. That alone set my teeth on edge.

  “Sounds of hooves on the other side of the river,” he replied. “Gustavian discipline is to scout the enemy first, then position accordingly.”

  A professional’s answer. Which meant the real trouble was already on its way.

  “So?” I said. “Ready to kill your kin? To watch them sink into the mud, pierce their brains with lead?”

  Eskil smirked. Yellowed teeth bared in a wolf’s grin, the kind that showed he’d already made peace with what was coming.

  “They slaughtered my lord,” he said, voice flat as packed earth, “and drove me into your shithole. I’d kill anyone who forced me to spend time with ilk like you.”

  Bile like that was hard not to laugh at.

  “Let’s hope they kill you fast,” I replied, “so your burden is eased.”

  Several rhythmic thuds approached. Many of them were felt behind me, beyond the thick walls of this hellhole—through stone, through timber, through bone. Riders, no doubt. Cavalry stirring, readying to meet their scouts before they could slink back across the river with words sharp enough to kill us all.

  They could not be allowed to relay their intelligence. Not fully. If we were to live, the enemy had to doubt. Had to hesitate. Had to be unsure of what waited behind this mud and misery until the very last heartbeat.

  One rhythmic thud was different.

  Closer.

  Each step made the dirt and mud shiver from its weight—real weight. An unbidden groan slipped past my teeth before I could stop it, dragged out of me by recognition older than thought.

  “Hold fast, Eskil,” I said. “A chest-face is coming.”

  His cock-sure smile dampened at once. Drained like colour from a corpse. He glanced back again.

  And there it was.

  Walking like it owned every inch of this frozen pit. Taller than any man. Broader than most cows. A slab of flesh and bone shaped wrong by mercy and worse by time. Its face sunk into muscle and rib like a curse that had grown tired of hiding.

  It carried something. Some tool—once meant to kill, perhaps still meant to. So muddied and scarred that no shape remained worth naming. Just weight, and purpose.

  As it moved down our line, the ground complained beneath it. Men shrank without meaning to. Breath hitched. Hands tightened on weapons that suddenly felt too small.

  It stopped.

  Right beside a youngling. Another pressed villager. A poor wretched child, ribs sharp beneath his coat, arms trembling as he heaved a cannonball nearly the size of his own head, teeth clenched so hard I thought they might shatter.

  The flesh-wall crouched.

  Its bulk folded down with a wet, grinding patience, eyes—plate-wide and set too low—studying the child from crown to heel. With eyes that large it was hard to tell where thought began, even when that gaze pierced straight through bone and marrow.

  What is this child doing here?

  It seemed to ask the world.

  I wondered the same. But I understood it all the same.

  Adults can aim. Shoot. Kill. Reload.

  If children carry, more men can kill.

  Simple calculations. Brutal arithmetic. I was certain even a Blemmye understood numbers like that.

  It blinked.

  An agonizingly slow blink, like time itself pausing to consider mercy.

  Then it leaned close and whispered.

  The sound never reached me—not properly—but the child heard it. Trembled like a quake caught mid-shudder, knees knocking, breath hitching. Still, he nodded.

  What choice did the young fool have, really? Telling a being fifty times his weight to piss off?

  Nevertheless, the lad steadied. Shoulders squared. Fear didn’t leave him, but it was leashed now. And with a final, silent nod, the Blemmye rose.

  The child ran.

  And damned if he didn’t look stronger for it—as if something heavy had been lifted from him the moment the flesh-wall’s attention moved on.

  Shouts rose from behind the walls. A fighting call, if I ever heard one. The riders, I reckoned. We’d see them soon enough.

  “Forget that brute for now, Eskil. Move your men. Any cannon not ready to be used is to be hidden. Cover them with dirt, shit, corpses—I care not. They must not see what we have.”

  He’d already been thinking it. I could tell. But putting words to it made the world move. Gears turned behind that ugly mug of his, slow and heavy, and then he nodded.

  “Move, you sorry heathens!” he bellowed. “Stop gawking at the chest-face—if you’ve seen one, you’ve seen a thousand! Hide the cannons! Lay atop them yourselves if you’ve no trash to heap on them! Hurry!”

  The rumble was distant now, no longer something half-felt and guessed at. It showed itself plain enough—four dozen horses and riders steaming down the border road, breath fogging, hooves striking in a rolling thunder that carried clean through mud and bone.

  What an assembly.

  Some rode armoured like the richest robber-baron, steel polished, plates catching what little light the morning dared offer. Others wore nothing but the blue coat of the Gustavians, cloth pulled tight against the cold, faces set hard beneath neat hats. One could swear even the horses galloped differently—trained muscle moving with a purpose bred into sinew.

  They were armed the same, though. Wheel-locks of the finest make, mechanisms clicking with practised certainty. Sabres hung loose and eager, edges sharp enough to cleave any dumb shit foolish enough to drift too close. Some Gustavians carried lances as well—long hardwood shafts ending in needles of steel, meant for punching through men like wet parchment.

  Many things were worth laughing at these days.

  But seeing what the two finest armies of the New World could do together—moving as one, disciplined, dangerous—pulled an unbidden smile across my face instead.

  I readied myself to move. God knows these sorry fools would need steady hands soon enough. I slung my axe up onto my shoulder and flexed my good hand, loosening the fingers, readying it for beatings if beatings were what it took to keep men alive.

  I moved—and to my surprise, and to my horrible, ungodly annoyance, the Blemmye stopped me.

  A calm hand settled on my shoulder. Not forceful, yet the weight of it held me fast all the same, a promise pressed into flesh and bone that it could grind me into the dirt if it so chose.

  I turned, fury already boiling over.

  This thing—this fucking thing—thinking it could halt me like some snot-filled urchin pulled from a ditch?

  I was ready to let it know exactly what I thought of that notion, ready to spill my intentions in words sharp enough to cut stone, when I met its eyes.

  They were large. Round as a helmet. As round as a cannonball cradled in a gunner’s arms. They looked straight into me—into me—but not unkindly. Had there been malice there, true malice, I might have ended my own life there and then, before it took the liberty itself.

  “Be kind to them,” it said.

  Simple words. Smaller than I’d expected. Better, even. I had been bracing for a reckoning—thought it might condemn my mouth, my drink, my hands. Thought it might strip me bare.

  Instead, it went on.

  “They are scared, and fresh. They do not know what comes. You have seen much, so share your wisdom.”

  Then—it had the audacity to smile.

  What, was a kind beating not to your liking?

  Very well then, you brickwall of a bitch. I’ll listen to ye.

  It let go, and I spat in response. It moved on, to whatever purpose a thousand pounds of flesh could conjure, its weight sinking into the mud as if the earth itself made room for it.

  I moved to steady a line of younglings.

  “You pestilent bitches better have listened,” I barked. “Hide the goods. Ready to shoot. Ready to maim any blue-coated imbecile that looks our way.”

  A few Gustavians glanced at me then—faces tightening, sensibilities bruised by my choice of words. Poor things.

  “Yes,” I snapped, catching their eyes, “that includes you. If I don’t see your guns pointing down the river this instant. This stinking mud is yours now. Be proud of it—or drown in it.”

  Yes, sirs, followed. Respectful, I was sure. Or afraid. Hard to tell the difference when men finally understand where they stand. Still, the title sat wrong on me. Chafed worse than wet boots.

  Last time I ever told my sob stories to any man.

  Lucky for Elrik he had a bad leg. He’d have heard it all, had he been here.

  Snaps shattered any thought I still had left.

  Pops—like pig fat blistering in a pan, like wet wood cracking in a stove. Distant promises of bullets already hunting for flesh, bone, and guts before their owners ever saw a face.

  A horse whined. High. Sharp. Wrong.

  They got one.

  Or one of them got us.

  Fuck.

  “REEEAAAADYY!” I roared, throat tearing open around the word. “DEATH HAS FOUND US! AND WE WILL PIERCE IT DEAD—MARK MY SORRY WORDS!”

  The roar that answered was ugly. Good. Anger bled through it, stained with the same colour that lived in my chest—dark, but with embers still glowing if you looked close enough.

  A kid I didn’t know sprinted past me, arms wrapped around another cannonball, the thing nearly dragging him into the mud with every step. Some foolhardy, bearded, armoured son of a bitch struck up a song—couldn’t place it, didn’t care. Something old. Something loud. A few of the younger ones answered, voices cracking, searching for courage in noise.

  That was good.

  I sighed—no, I emptied myself. Washed my lungs clean of doubt and breath both. Let it all go.

  Here I was again.

  Shots fired. Beings killed. Men coming closer whether we wished it or not.

  I scanned the horizon once more, eyes cutting through mist and smoke and fear alike.

  Was there anywhere left to run this time?