The stink of boiled leather and piss lay heavy on the air. Smoke drifted low between the rows of tents, thick with the sour bite of damp wood that never burned clean. Men muttered as they worked straps and buckles, mended rents in gambesons, or took to the dice. A dog slunk between cookfires with its ribs showing, nosing after scraps and growling at the boys who chased it off with stones.
Ser Terry of Holtspike walked among them with helm beneath his arm and a hand upon the pommel of his sword. His spurs rang dull upon the packed mud, half-swallowed by the clamor of the host. He moved like a man used to being watched, and indeed eyes did follow him, though not with the warmth of love. Respect, aye. Fear too, perhaps. But never love.
Knights were rare enough among this levy of farmhands and trappers, but rarer still were knights who had won their spurs by deed, not by birth. Terry had been a champion in the Sixth Knighting, and all men knew it. That glory lay five years past, yet the memory clung to him like a rusted chain. To some it made him a hero; to others, a braggart. He cared little. Let them whisper. It was not their voices that gave him his seat, nor their coin that filled his purse.
Yet even his spurs were a lesser thing than a mage's robe.
At the far edge of camp the sorcerers had raised their pavilions: bright silks in hues no farmer could afford, stitched with runes that shimmered faint blue when the sun struck them. They kept apart from the rest, as if common soldiers carried some pestilence of sweat and dung that might soil their gowns. A line of ditch and rope marked their quarter, and none but messengers dared cross it.
Terry spat. "Gods curse the lot of them," he muttered. The spittle vanished in the dust. A few of the men heard, and one barked laughter, sharp and short. The disdain was not his alone. You could see it in every squinting glance, every muttered oath when a mage passed by trailing perfumes and airs of superiority.
Men did not love their masters, yet they obeyed them.
Terry's eye was caught by a broad back hunched at a firepit, where some poor stew bubbled thin as ditchwater. The man ladled with slow hand, then raised the bowl to lips too thin for such a frame. The hair was greying at the temples, though it had once been thick and black.
"By the Five," Terry said, striding near. "Tom Barleycorn, is it truly you?"
The man lifted his head, blinked, and squinted against the smoke. Then his mouth split in a grin, half-toothless but honest. "Ser Terry? Gods blind me, I near thought you some lordling. Didn't ken it were you under all that tin." He reached to clap Terry's arm, the gesture easy, unawed.
Terry returned it with a laugh. "New armor makes a man a stranger, eh?"
"Aye. Stranger still when the man's gone from plough to spurs while the rest of us rot in mud. Thought you'd near forgot us little folk."
"Never," Terry said, though the word tasted heavy. "Though Holtspike lies far behind me now."
They sat a moment by the fire. Terry's steel gleamed in the smoke, while Tom's patched brigandine bore stains that no washing could scour. A gulf yawned between them that no words could bridge, yet for the space of that fire it was as though they were boys again, cutting reeds by the river.
"Ser," piped a voice.
Terry turned to see his squire picking his teeth with a straw, the lad's fine woolen cloak too clean by half for a camp such as this. Edric was his name, third son to Lord Mallory of Greywick. Sixteen and still soft at the jowl, his hands more fit for harpstrings than steel. Terry had taken him for the purse his lordship offered, and the new armor besides.
"Edric," Terry said, drawing him forward. "This is Tom Barleycorn, of the village where I was born. Tom, my squire."
Tom gave a crooked smile. "Fine lad. Bit green."
The boy stiffened. "I am of noble birth."
"Aye," Tom said, "and I'm son of a dungheap. Matters little when arrows fly." He laughed, though not unkindly, and the boy colored.
"Pay him no mind," Terry said. "He'll find his steel soon enough."
Tom's eyes lingered a moment longer, then he stirred the stew again. "Tell me, Ser. Do you still give coin to the orphanage? You and your brothers once swore to keep it."
Terry hesitated. The orphanage. Its thin-faced children with hollow bellies haunted him more than any dream. "I've no time to see to them myself, not with war on us. But coin I send, aye. Enough to keep them fed, I hope."
"Good," Tom said, nodding slow. "Elsewise, I'd have words."
Terry would have asked more, but the air shifted, and all at once the murmurs hushed.
She came with light about her. Arch-Mage Mary Arondite.
The gown she wore was sky-blue, embroidered with threads of silver that caught the dusk. Her hair was black as a raven's wing, her skin pale, her eyes dark wells that drank the firelight. Men looked, then looked away, fearing to be seen looking. Even the dog slunk off with tail between its legs.
"Gods," Tom breathed, "but she's fair. Fairer than summer wheat. Pity she's a mage."
Terry frowned. "What mean you by that?"
Tom gave a bitter chuckle. "Mean that she's not for the likes of us. Off-limits. Nobles wed nobles, mages wed mages. The rest of us get dirt and daughters with missing teeth."
Terry said nothing. In his heart, though, the thought burned sharp. Even had she not been mage, never would he stoop to wed her kind. They lorded their tricks over honest men, spat on steel and sweat alike. Better a farmer's girl with mud on her skirts than a sorceress with her nose in the air.
Mary's voice rang clear, cold as glass. "At dawn we march. Make ready. The enemy cowers in their last stronghold, and by morrow's end it shall be ash. Rest while you may. You'll have none on the morrow."
Her gaze swept across the men, landed on Terry for the span of a breath, then moved on.
Terry ground his teeth.
When she passed from sight, he turned to Edric. "Fetch me a whetstone. My blade needs kissing."
The boy scurried off.
Terry leaned close to Tom. "Tell me plain. Do you know what wrong the enemy's done? Why we march on them?"
Tom shook his head. "Nay. We're told naught but 'obey.' Perhaps they defied the crown. Perhaps they failed to kneel quick enough. What matters it? We march, we bleed."
A silence fell between them, broken only by the hiss of stew boiling over.
Edric returned with the stone, cheeks flushed from haste. Terry took it without a word and began to draw it slow along his edge. Shhhkt. Shhhkt. Each stroke rang like a prayer.
When the sword gleamed bright enough to catch the fire's glow, he sheathed it. "Come, lad. We've a long day ahead."
He clasped Tom's shoulder once more. "At dawn, then."
"Aye. At dawn."
The dawn came pale and grudging, its light the sickly hue of old parchment. The mists clung low to the ground, so thick a man could scarce see the boots before him. The camp stirred slow, like a beast roused unwilling from slumber. Men cursed and fumbled with straps, pisspots overturned, and the cooks ladled out what thin gruel had not already gone sour.
Terry buckled his cuirass with hard hands, each clasp biting cold. Edric fussed with the straps as if dressing for court. The boy's fingers trembled, whether from the chill or the thought of battle Terry could not say.
"Mind yourself," Terry grunted. "You'll have no second chance when steel is bared."
"Yes, ser," Edric murmured, eyes downcast.
The trumpets sounded thin in the fog, yet they stirred the host all the same. The banners lifted, damp with dew, their colors muted. Knights called their men to order, sergeants swore till their throats were raw, and the army began to shuffle into columns.
Terry found his place in the third platoon. Two dozen men, most clad in boiled leather, some with rusted mail, a few with nothing more than quilted jacks. His gaze moved over them, and there—shoulder hunched, helm under arm—stood Tom Barleycorn.
"Five Gods take me," Terry muttered, moving to his side. "I had not thought to see you here."
Tom grinned, weary but glad. "Aye. Seems the fates like their jests. We'll march together, as we once cut reeds together. Better than dying among strangers."
Edric wrinkled his nose at the farmer's smell but held his tongue.
The line lurched forward. Boots sucked at the mud, and the army spilled onto the forest road, a snake of steel and sweat that stretched farther than the eye could pierce the fog.
For a time, there was only the clop of hooves, the creak of wagons, the cough of men too long in the damp. The forest pressed close, its trees tall and old, their branches knit like clasped hands above. Crows stirred in the canopy, harsh-voiced, as if mocking the march.
Tom spoke low, meant for Terry's ear alone. "You've had no word from my little one, have you? My daughter, Elsie."
Terry blinked, remembering. A girl with hair the color of straw, eyes bright and eager. He had seen her on the eve of his leaving, clinging to her mother's skirts. "Aye. I saw her before I rode out. She asked after you."
Tom's face softened. "Gods bless her. She'll be near grown now. Taller, I'll warrant. Shame I was not wise enough to sell the farm and chase knighthood with you. Could've stood here with armor and a squire at my back, instead of rotting in the line with nothing but this." He tapped his dented helm, more rust than steel.
"You'd not have liked it," Terry said. "Knighthood's more oath than honor. You'd chafe at the bowing and scraping."
Tom laughed rough. "Perhaps. But a man might take to bowing if it comes with coin enough to feed his kin. As is, my daughter will see me off with naught but a farmer's crust to her name."
He glanced at Edric and smirked. "And you, lad—what think you of your station? Squires are naught but slaves in mail, from where I stand."
Edric stiffened, color rising. "I am heir to my father's lands should my brothers fall. A slave I am not."
"Then pray your brothers fall quick," Tom said with a crooked grin. "Else you'll spend your youth cleaning shit from spurs and armor. Mark me, the knight's purse fattens, but the squire's back bends."
Terry heard them as if from a distance. His mind wandered to Elsie's face, to the thin smile she had worn when last he saw her. He wondered if she wept at night, if she prayed her father might come home whole. He wondered if he himself might see Holtspike again, or if the Five had already marked his grave upon this road.
A crow cried, harsh and sudden.
The first arrow hissed from the trees.
It struck Edric's shoulder with a meaty thunk, and the boy cried out, spinning half about. Blood soaked the fine wool in a spreading bloom. For a heartbeat all was still—then the forest came alive.
Arrows fell like rain. Men screamed, shields lifted too slow, and the road choked with panic. Horses shrieked as shafts found their flanks. A man two paces from Terry fell with an arrow through his throat, blood bubbling as he clawed at the shaft.
"Shields! Shields!" Terry roared, though few bore them.
Tom shoved Edric down into the mud, breaking the shaft where it jutted from his shoulder. "Stay low, lad!"
The undergrowth split, and the enemy burst forth. Not knights, nor even soldiers proper, but ragged men in mismatched gear, their blades nicked, their faces wild with hunger and hate. Rebels, outlaws—call them what you would, they killed as well as any lord's levy.
Steel rang as the lines met. Terry's sword flashed, biting deep into the first man's neck. Hot blood spattered his face. He wheeled, parried a clumsy stroke, and drove his pommel into another's teeth.
"Hold fast!" he bellowed. "Hold, damn you!"
Yet the line buckled. Men broke and fled into the trees, only to be cut down from behind.
Through the chaos came a voice, clear as a bell, ringing with command. Arch-Mage Mary Arondite. She sat her horse at the rear, robes untouched by mud, her hands weaving shapes in the air. Blue fire licked her fingers, and where she pointed, men burned.
"Forward!" she cried. "Press them into the wood! Leave none alive!"
Terry saw it then—women, children—huddled beyond the treeline, half-hidden among the huts and carts. Refugees, not warriors. Wide eyes, thin arms clutching babes. The rebels fought not for conquest but for shelter, for kin.
Mary's fire leapt, a man's scream tearing high before his flesh blackened. The huts would burn next.
"No," Terry muttered. His hand clenched white about his hilt.
"Ser?" Edric whimpered, clutching his bleeding shoulder.
Terry's eyes burned. Orders be damned. He would not see babes roasted for some mage's triumph.
He turned to Tom. "With me. Guard the villagers. Strike down only those who raise steel."
Tom gaped. "That's disobedience, Terry. Treason, some would say."
"Say what they will. I'll not butcher children."
Without waiting, Terry broke from the line, driving into the trees. Tom cursed but followed, dragging Edric by his good arm.
The rebels' eyes widened at the sight of a knight charging them, his blade flashing like winter sun. Terry's first stroke split a spear in twain, the second felled its wielder. He pushed deeper, cutting, parrying, shoving men aside. Tom fought at his flank, a farmer's fury in every blow.
"Go!" Terry roared at the cowering villagers. "Run! To the hills!"
A woman clutched her child and fled, others stumbling after. Hope sparked in their eyes where once there had been only terror.
But hope was short-lived.
A warhorn split the air. From the deeper wood poured more men, twice their number, ragged yet fierce. They fell upon Terry's small knot like wolves upon a wounded hart.
Steel screamed. Tom went down beneath three, rising again with blood streaming from his brow. Edric, pale and gasping, tried to lift a sword with one good arm.
Terry cut down one, then another, but a third blade slashed his thigh, near sending him to his knees. He fought on, rage lending strength.
Then the world lit blue.
Mary Arondite's fire burst through the trees, a sheet of searing light that tore men from their feet. Screams echoed as the rebels broke, their courage burned from them. What huts remained caught flame, smoke curling high into the canopy.
Terry staggered back, half-blinded, chest heaving. He had lived. The villagers had lived.
Then the mage's eyes found him.
Mary rode forward, her horse stepping daintily over the corpses. Her face was pale marble, her voice cold as winter steel. "You broke from the line. You defied command."
"I saved the innocent," Terry spat, blood on his lips.
"Innocence is no shield against treason," she said. With a flick of her hand, soldiers closed in around him.
Rough hands seized his arms, tore the sword from his grasp. He fought them at first, but too many came, and his strength was spent. His knees struck mud.
Mary looked down upon him, her dark eyes unreadable. "By order of the Arch-Mage, in the name of the Crown, Ser Terry of Holtspike, you are under arrest."
The words struck harder than any blade.
As they bound his wrists, Terry lifted his gaze to the sky, where crows still circled, black against the pale dawn.