The Great Leveller: Best Served Cold, The Heroes and Red Country

by Joe Abercrombie

  ‘Oh, my whims stretch beyond the kettle …’

  Hoofbeats echoed out of the rain, a lone rider thumping up the track from the west, everyone straining breathlessly to see as a chinless frown emerged from the wet gloom.

  ‘Felnigg!’ snapped Finree’s father. ‘What’s happening on the left?’

  ‘Mitterick bloody well went off half-drawn!’ frothed Felnigg as he swung from the saddle. ‘Sent his cavalry across the barley in the dark! Pure bloody recklessness!’

  Knowing the state of the relationship between the two men, Finree suspected Felnigg had made his own contribution to the fiasco.

  ‘We saw,’ her father forced through tight lips, evidently coming to a similar conclusion.

  ‘The man should be bloody drummed out!’

  ‘Perhaps later. What was the outcome?’

  ‘It was … still in doubt when I left.’

  ‘So you haven’t the slightest idea what’s going on over there?’

  Felnigg opened his mouth, then closed it. ‘I thought it best to return at once—’

  ‘And report Mitterick’s mistake, rather than inform me of its consequences. My thanks, Colonel, but I am already amply supplied with ignorance.’ And her father turned his back before Felnigg had the chance to speak, striding across the hillside again to look fruitlessly to the north. ‘Shouldn’t have sent them,’ she heard him mutter as he squelched past. ‘Should never have sent them.’

  Bayaz sighed, the sound niggling at her sweaty shoulders like a corkscrew. ‘I sympathise most deeply with your father.’

  Finree was finding that her admiration for the First of the Magi was steadily fading, while her dislike only sharpened with time. ‘Do you,’ she said, in the same way one would say, ‘Shut up,’ and with the same meaning.

  If Bayaz took it he ignored it. ‘Such a shame we cannot see the little people struggle from afar. There is nothing quite like looking down upon a battle, and this is a large one, even in my experience. But the weather answers to no one.’ Bayaz grinned up into the increasingly solemn heavens. ‘A veritable storm! What drama, eh? What better accompaniment to a clash of arms?’

  ‘Did you call it up yourself just for the atmosphere?’

  ‘I wish I had the power. Only imagine, there could be thunder whenever I approached! In the Old Time my master, great Juvens, could call down lightning with a word, make a river flood with a gesture, summon a hoar frost with a thought. Such was the power of his Art.’ And he spread his hands wide, tipping his face into the rain and raising his staff towards the streaming heavens. ‘But that was long ago.’ He let his arms drop. ‘These days the winds blow their own way. Like battles. We who remain must work in a more … roundabout fashion.’

  More hoofbeats, and a dishevelled young officer cantered from the murk ahead.

  ‘Report!’ demanded Felnigg at great volume, making Finree wonder how he had lasted so long without being punched in the face.

  ‘Jalenhorm’s men have flushed the enemy from the orchards,’ answered the messenger breathlessly, ‘and are climbing the slope at the double!’

  ‘How far have they gone?’ asked Finree’s father.

  ‘When I last saw them they were well on the way up to the smaller stones. The Children. But whether or not they were able to take them—’

  ‘Heavy resistance?’

  ‘Becoming heavier.’

  ‘When did you leave them?’

  ‘I rode here with all despatch, sir, so perhaps a quarter of an hour ago?’

  Finree’s father bared his teeth at the downpour. The outline of the hill the Heroes stood on was little more than a darker smudge in a curtain of grey. She could follow his thoughts. By now they might have captured the summit in glory, be engaged in furious combat, or have been bloodily driven off. Anyone or no one alive or dead, victorious or defeated. He spun on his heel. ‘Saddle my horse!’

  Bayaz’ smugness was snuffed out like a candle flame. ‘I would advise against it. There is nothing you can do down there, Marshal Kroy.’

  ‘There is certainly nothing I can do up here, Lord Bayaz,’ said her father curtly, stepping past him and towards the horses. His staff followed, along with several guards, Felnigg snapping out orders in every direction, the headquarters suddenly alive with rattling activity.

  ‘Lord Marshal!’ shouted Bayaz. ‘I deem this unwise!’

  Her father did not even turn. ‘By all means remain here, then.’ And he planted one boot in the stirrup and pulled himself up.

  ‘By the dead,’ hissed Bayaz under his breath.

  Finree gave him a sickly smile. ‘It seems you may be called to the front after all. Perhaps you can see the little people struggle at first hand.’

  The First of the Magi did not appear amused.

  Blood

  ‘They’re coming!’

  That much Beck knew already, but men were packed so tight into the Heroes he didn’t know much else. Wet furs, wet armour, weapons gleaming with rain, scowling faces running with water. The stones themselves were streaky shadows, ghosts beyond a forest of jagged spears. Spit and splattering whisper of drops on metal. Crash and clang of steel echoing from the slopes, shouts of battle muffled by the downpour.

  A great surge went through the crowd and Beck was lifted right off his feet, kicking at nothing, dumped in a mass of punching, jostling, shouting men. Took him a moment to realise they weren’t the enemy, but there were a lot of blades poking every which way even so and it didn’t have to be a Union one to stick you in the fruits. Hadn’t been a Union sword killed Reft, had it?

  Someone elbowed him in the head and he staggered sideways, was knocked by someone else and onto his knees, a trampling boot squashed his hand into the mud. Dragged himself up by a shield with a dragon’s head painted on it, owner not best pleased. Man with a beard roaring at him. Battle sounds were louder. Men struggling to get away or get towards. Men clutching at wounds, blood run pink in the rain, clutching at weapons, all dripping wet and mad on fear and anger.

  By the dead, he wanted to run. He wasn’t sure if he was crying. Just knew he couldn’t fail again. Stand with his crew, that’s what Craw said, weren’t it? Stand with his Chief. He blinked into the storm, saw a flash of Black Dow’s black standard flapping, soaked through. Knew Craw had to be near it. Pressed towards it between the jerking bodies, boots slithering in the churned-up slop. Thought he caught a glimpse of Drofd’s snarling face. Heard a roar and a spear came at him. Not even fast. He moved his head to the side, far as he could, straining with everything he had, and the point slid past his ear. Someone squealed in the other one, dropped against him, warm on his shoulder. Grunting and gurgling. Hot and wet all down his arm. He gasped, wriggled his shoulders, shrugging the corpse off, working it down towards the mud.

  Another surge in the crowd and Beck was dragged sliding to the left, mouth open as he fought to stay upright. Warm rain spattered his cheek, the man in front of him suddenly whisked away and he was left blinking at space. A strip of mud, covered with sprawled bodies, and rain-pocked puddles, and broken spears.

  And on the other side of it, the enemy.

  Dow roared something over his shoulder but Craw couldn’t hear him. Could hardly hear anything over the hissing of the rain and the clamour of rough voices, loud as a storm themselves. Too late for orders. Time comes a man just has to stick with the orders he’s given, trust in his men to do the right thing, and fight. He thought maybe he saw the hilt of the Father of Swords waving between the spears. Should’ve been with his dozen. Stood with his crew. Why had he said yes to being Dow’s Second? Maybe ’cause he’d been Threetrees’ Second once, and he’d somehow thought if he had the place he used to have the world would be like it used to be. An old fool, grabbing at ghosts. Way too late. Should’ve married Colwen when he had the chance. Asked her, anyway. Given her the chance to turn him down.

  He closed his eyes for a moment, breathed in the wet, cold air. ‘Should’ve stayed a carpenter,’ he whispered. But the sword ha
d been the easier choice. To work wood you need all manner of tools – chisels and saws, axes great and small, nails and hammers, awls and planes. To be a killer you just need two. A blade and the will. Only Craw wasn’t sure he had the will any more. He squeezed his fist tight around his sword’s wet grip, the roar of battle growing louder and louder, binding with the roar of his own breath in his ears, the roar of his own heart pumping. Choices made. And he gritted his teeth, and snapped his eyes open.

  The crowd split apart like a timber down the grain and the Union boiled from the gap. One barrelled into Craw before he could swing, their shields locked together, boots slithering in the mud. A glimpse of a snarling face, managed to tip his shield forward so the metal rim dug up into a nose, and back, and up, gurgling, whimpering. Dragging at the shield strap with all his strength, jabbing with it, stabbing with it, growling and spitting with it, grinding it into the man’s head. It caught the buckle on his helmet, halftore it off. Craw tried to twist his sword free, a blade whipped past him and took a great chunk out of the man’s face. Craw left sliding in the muck, nothing to push against.

  Black Dow spun his axe around, brought the pick side down on someone’s helmet, punching right through to the haft. Left it buried in the corpse’s head as it toppled backwards, arms wide.

  A mud-splattered Northman tangled with a spear, his arm twisted over it and his war-hammer wafting about uselessly, a clawing hand on his face, forcing his head up while he peered down at the fingers.

  A Union soldier came at Craw. Someone tripped him and he went down on one knee in the muck. Craw hit him across the back of the head with a dull clonk and put a dent in his helmet. Hit him again and knocked him sprawling. Hit him again, and again, hammering his face into the mud, spitting curses.

  Shivers smashed at someone with his shield, smiling, rain turned the great scar on his face bright red like a fresh wound. War tips everything upside down. Men who are a menace in peacetime become your best hope once the steel starts swinging.

  A corpse kicked over from front to back, back to front again. Blood curling out into dirty water, plopping rain. The Father of Swords swung down and split someone open like a chisel splitting a carving of a man. Craw ducked behind his shield again as blood showered across it, rain spattered against it, mist of drops.

  Spears pushing every way, a random, rattling, slippery mass. The point of one slid slowly down wood and into a hand, and through it, skewering it into someone’s chest and pushing him down into the muck, shaking his head, no, no, fumbling at the shaft with the other hand as the merciless boots thumped over him.

  Craw prodded a spear-point away with his shield, stabbing back with his sword, caught someone under the jaw and sent his head jerking up, blood gushing as he fell, making a honking note like the first note of a song he used to know.

  Behind him was a Union officer wearing the most beautiful armour Craw ever saw, carved all over with gleaming golden designs. He was beating away stupidly at Black Dow with a muddy sword, had managed to drive him to his knees. Stand by your Chief. Craw stepped up, roaring, boot hammering down in a puddle and showering muddy water. Cut mindlessly across that lovely breastplate, edge scoring a bright groove through all that craftsmanship and sending its owner lurching. Forward again, stabbing as the Union man turned, Craw’s blade grating against the bottom edge of his armour, sliding right through him and carrying him backwards.

  Craw struggled with the grip of his sword, hot blood sticky all over his hand, up his arm. Holding this bastard up as he wrestled to twist the blade out of him, staggering together in the muck in a mad hug. Face against Craw’s cheek, stubble scratching, breath rasping in his ear, and Craw realised he never even got this close to Colwen. Choices made, eh? Choices—

  Wanting is not always enough, and however much Gorst wanted to, he could not get there. Too many straining bodies in his way. By the time he had hacked the leg from the last of them and flung him aside, the old Northman had already run Jalenhorm right through the guts. Gorst could see the bloody point of the sword under the gilded rim of his rain-dewed breastplate. The general had the oddest expression as his killer struggled to pull the blade out of him. Almost a smile.

  Redeemed.

  The old Northman twisted around as he heard Gorst’s howl, eyes going wide, bringing his shield up. The long steel chopped deep into it, splitting the timbers, wrenching it around on his arm, driving the metal rim into his head and tossing him tumbling sideways.

  Gorst stepped up to finish the job but again there was someone in his way. As always. Hardly more than a boy, swinging a hatchet, shouting. The usual stuff, probably, die, die, blah, blah, blah. Gorst was happy to die, of course. But not for this fool’s convenience. He jerked his head sideways, let the hatchet bounce harmlessly from his shoulder-plate, spun about, long steel curving after him through the wet air. The boy tried desperately to block it but the heavy blade snatched the hatchet from his hand and split his face wide open, spraying brains.

  The point of a sword whispered at him and Gorst whipped back from the waist, felt the wind of it across his cheek, a niggling discomfort under his eye. A space had opened in the screaming crowd, the battle blooming from a single press to mindless clumps of sodden combat at the very centre of the Heroes. All concepts of lines, tactics, directions, orders, of sides even, vanished as though they had never been. And good riddance, they only confuse things.

  For some reason a half-naked Northman stood facing him, with the biggest sword Gorst had ever seen. And I have seen a lot. Absurdly long, as if it had been forged for a giant’s use, dull grey metal gleaming with rain, a single letter stamped near the hilt.

  He looked like some lurid painting by an artist who never saw a battlefield, but silly-looking people can be just as deadly as silly-sounding ones, and Gorst had coughed out all his arrogance in the smoke of Cardotti’s House of Leisure. A man must treat every fight as though it is his last. Will this be my last? We can hope.

  He rocked back, cautious, as the man’s elbow twitched up for a sideways blow, shifted his shield to meet it, steel ready to counter. But instead of swinging the Northman lunged, using the great blade like a spear, the point darting past the edge of Gorst’s shield and squealing down his breastplate, sending him stumbling. A feint. The instinct to jump back was powerful but he forced himself to keep his eyes fixed on the blade, watched its path curve through the rain, an arc of glistening droplets following after.

  Gorst wrenched himself sideways and the great sword hissed past, caught the armour on his elbow and ripped it flapping off. He was already thrusting but the point of his steel caught only falling water as his half-naked opponent slid away. Gorst switched back for a savage head-height cut but the man snaked under it, hefted the great sword up with shocking speed as Gorst’s steel swept down, blades ringing together with a finger-numbing clang. They broke apart, watchful, the Northman’s eyes calmly focused on Gorst in spite of the hammering rain.

  His weapon might have looked like a prop from a bad comedy, but this man was no jester. The stance, the balance, the angle of the long blade gave him all manner of options both in defence and attack. The technique was hardly what one would find in Rubiari’s Forms of Swordsmanship, but then neither was the sword itself. We both are masters, nonetheless.

  A Union soldier came tottering between them before Gorst could move, bent over around a wound in his stomach, hands full of his own blood. Gorst smashed him impatiently out of the way with his shield, sprang at the half-naked Northman with a thrust and a slash, but he dodged the thrust and parried the cut faster than Gorst would have thought possible with that weight of metal. Gorst feinted right, switched left, swinging low. The Northman was ready, sprang out of the way, Gorst’s steel feathering the mud then hacking a leg out from under a struggling man and bringing him down with a shriek. Don’t stand in the way, then, fool.

  Gorst recovered just in time to see the great sword coming, gasped as he ducked behind his shield. The blade crashed into it, leavin
g a huge dent in the already battered metal, bending it hard over Gorst’s forearm and driving his fist into his mouth. But he kept his feet, drove back, tasting blood, crashed into the Northman’s body shield-first and flung him away, lashed backhand and forehand with his steel, high and low. The Northman dodged the high but the low caught him across the leg with the very point, sent blood flying and made his knee buckle. One to me. And now to finish it.

  Gorst whipped his steel across on the backhand, saw movement at the limit of his vision, changed the angle of his swing and let it go wide, roaring, opening his shoulder, hit a Carl in the side of the helmet so hard he was ripped off his feet and pitched upside down into a tangle of spears. Gorst snapped back, bringing the steel scything over, but the Northman rolled away as nimbly as a squirrel and came up ready even as Gorst’s sword sent up a spray of dirty water beside them.

  Gorst found he was smiling as they faced each other again, the battle a sodden nightmare around them. When did I last live like this? Have I ever? His heart was pumping fire, his skin singing as the rain trickled down it. All the disappointments, the embarrassments, the failures are nothing now. Every detail standing out like a flame in the blackness, every moment lasting an age, every tiniest movement of him or his opponent a story of its own. There is only win or die. The Northman smiled back as Gorst shook the ruined shield from his arm and into the mud, and nodded. And we recognise each other, and understand each other, and meet as equals. As brothers. There was respect, but there would be no mercy. The slightest hesitation on either side would be an insult to the skill of the other. So Gorst nodded back, but before he was done he was already springing forward.

  The Northman caught the sword on his but Gorst still had his free hand, shrieking as he swung it, gloved fist thudding into bare ribs, the Northman twisted grunting sideways. Gorst aimed another lashing punch at his face but he jerked away, the pommel of the great sword shot out of nowhere and Gorst only just wrenched his chin back far enough, the lump of metal missing his nose by a whisker. He looked up to see the Northman leaping at him, sword raised high and already coming down. Gorst forced his aching legs to spring one more time, notched steel gripped in both hands, and caught the long blade with his own. Metal screeched, that grey edge biting into his Calvez-made steel and, with impossible keenness, peeling a bright shaving from the blade.