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His arm was twisted painfully as in her death roll she momentarily trapped his sword, but he managed to tear the weapon free.

The other two riders were shouting to each other, and one pulled hard away from the fight, setting heels to his horse. The last warrior brought his mount round and lowered his lance.Advertisement

Yedan urged his gelding into a thundering charge, but at an angle away from his attacker-in the direction of the fleeing scout. An instant’s assessment told him he would not catch the man. Instead he lifted himself upward, knees anchored tight to either side of the gelding’s spine. Drew back his arm and threw his sword.

The point slammed up and under the rider’s right arm, driven a hand’s breadth between his ribs, deep enough to sink into the lung. He toppled from his horse.

The last rider arrived, coming at Yedan from an angle. Yedan twisted to hammer aside the lashing blade of the lance, feeling it cleave through his vambrace and then score deep into the bones of his wrist. Pain seared up his arm.

He dragged his horse into the rider’s wake-the Liosan was pulling up. A mistake. Yedan caught up to him and flung himself on to the man’s back, dragging him from the saddle.

There was a satisfying snap of a bone as the Watch landed atop the warrior. He brought his good hand up and round to the Liosan’s face, thumb digging into one eye socket and fingers closing like talons on the upper lip and nose. He jammed his wounded arm with its loosened vambrace into the man’s mouth, forcing open the jaws.

Hands tore at him, but feebly, as Yedan forced his thumb deeper, in as far as it could go, then angled it upwards-but he failed to reach the brain. He got on to his knees, lifting the Liosan’s head by hooking his embedded thumb under the ridge of the brow. And then he forced it round, twisting even as he pressed down with his bloodied, armoured arm jammed across the man’s mouth. Joints popped, the jaw swung loose, and then, as the Liosan’s body thrashed in a frenzy, the vertebrae parted and the warrior went limp beneath him.

Yedan struggled to his feet.

He saw the scout with the punctured lung attempting to clamber back on to his horse. Collecting a lance, Yedan strode over. He used the haft to knock the warrior away from the horse, sending the man sprawling, and then stepped up and set the point against the Liosan’s chest. Staring down into the man’s terror-filled eyes, he pushed down on the lance, using all his weight. The armour’s enamel surface crazed, and then the point punched through.

Yedan pushed harder, twisting and grinding the serrated blade into the Liosan’s chest.

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Until he saw the light leave the warrior’s eyes.

After making certain the others were dead, he bound his wounded arm, retrieved his sword and then the surviving lances and long-knives from the corpses, along with the helms. Rounding up the horses and tying them to a staggered lead, he set out at a canter back the way he had come.

He was a prince of the Shake, with memories in the blood.

Yan Tovis opened her eyes. Shadowed figures slid back and forth above her and to the sides-she could make no sense of them, nor of the muted voices surrounding her-voices that seemed to come from the still air itself. She was sheathed in sweat.

Tent walls-ah, and the shadows were nothing more than silhouettes. The voices came from outside. She struggled to sit up, the wounds on her wrists stinging as the sutures stretched. She frowned down at them, trying to recall… things. Important things.

The taste of blood, stale, the smell of fever-she was weak, lightheaded, and there was… danger.

Heart thudding, she forced her way through the entrance, on her hands and knees, the world spinning round her. Bright, blinding sunlight, scorching fires in the sky-two, three, four- four suns !

‘Highness!’

She sat back on her haunches, squinted up as a figure loomed close. ‘Who?’

‘Sergeant Trope, Highness, in Yedan’s company. Please, crawl no further, the witches-there’re wards, all round, Highness. All round you. A moment, the witches are on their way.’

‘Help me up. Where’s my brother?’

‘He rode out, Highness. Some time ago. Before the fourth sun rose-and now we’re burning alive-’

She took his proffered arm and pulled herself on to her feet. ‘Not suns, Sergeant. Attacks .’

He was a scarred man, face bludgeoned by decades of hard living. ‘Highness?’

‘We are under attack-we need to leave here. We need to leave now!’

‘O Queen!’ Pully was dancing her way closer, evading the scored lines of the wards encircling the tent. ‘He’s coming back! Witchslayer! We must ready ourselves-drip drip drip some blood, Highness. We brought ya back, me an Skwish an we did. Leave off her, you oaf, let ’er stand!’ pqdm.com