A crossbow string twanged and there was a wet thunk followed by a thud as the Faelen rider landed in a heap on the ground, the shaft of a steel bolt sticking out of his left eye.

  Riot released the horse, grabbed Ruddle by his one remaining arm and fell through the open door of the farmhouse onto the dirty floor, the stink of mold and decay filling his nostrils.

  A barrage of screaming Faelen darts peppered the farmhouse wall, chipping away at the stone. Some of them found their way through the open windows and hit the far wall. Men shouted and someone cursed, the smell of burned flesh filling the dirty space.

  How was he still alive? A tender search of his head found no obvious damage, but he felt like someone had buried a hatchet in his skull.

  Battles were mostly periods of quiet boredom, followed by frenzied moments of madness. Normally, Riot wanted the madness to come so that he could get it over with, but right now, he needed the quiet, at least until his head stopped thumping.

  “Stop firing, back from the windows,” he croaked.

  The order was passed around and perhaps there was a god that looked kindly on soldiers, because after the crossbows had fallen silent, the Faelen darts also slowed and stopped. The all clear was called, and a tense silence stole through the farmhouse, punctuated only by the whimpering of the wounded. Ruddle’s skinny body was among them. Aiden Cox, the finger snapper knelt at the old mans side, wrapping his stump with a strip of bandage.

  Riot spat a glob of blood on the floor. “Will he make it?”

  “Hard to say, there’s nary a drop of blood left in him.” Cox nodded to another body stuffed in a gloomy corner. “That dead’un was already here, wasn't us that killed him.”

  The boy had been dead less than a day by the looks of him. The dark green veins that crept across the pale skin said he’d been killed by a wikkan. Not the way Riot would want to go. Every soldier knew that the fortunes of war decided if you lived or died by the enemy's hand, but it was fate's cruel twist to be killed by your own side.

  Runes carved into the flesh on the back of the boy's hands and long jagged scars snaking up his forearms marked him as Leybound.

  A boy in ragged homespun, barely into his fifteenth winter. Was this really the dangerous prisoner?

  “I guess we caught him then?” Riot said.

  “Dunno bout that Sarge,” Cox replied. “There’s another one downstairs and he ain’t happy. Sounds rich though. Officer.”

  Riot moved at a crouch, avoiding the open windows, to where five men of the company huddled over a dark hole in the floor. Stone steps led down, and he caught the smell of blood and wood smoke.

  Several of the men sported slices and cuts. One looked like he’d run into a wall, his nose a smashed ruin on his face.

  “We caught the Leybound, Sarge,” one said.

  “Doesn’t look to me like you caught him,” Riot replied, wincing as he settled himself against a wall.

  “He’s a nasty bastard,” confirmed another.

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  “You down there.” Riot paused, trying to recall the name the wikkan had given them. “Are you Gerrard Price?”

  “I’ll talk with your commanding officer,” came the reply.

  Riot sighed. The man's words were clipped and precise with that built-in air of superiority. You could put an officer in a ten-foot hole full of shit, and he would still think he was above the muck-raker up top shoveling more in.

  “I’m Sergeant Riot, and I’m all you're going to get. Who’s the dead boy up here?”

  “Rhodes.”

  “You kill him?”

  “Do I sound like a wikkan?”

  Riot guessed not. “If you come up, you’ll be bound, but we’ve got water and food. Make us come get you, and we won’t be kind about it.”

  “Rider approaching!” Cox called.

  Riot cursed softly. “I’ll give you some time to think about it.”

  Outside, a Faelen officer reined in his horse a dozen yards away leaning on pommel of his saddle with a wide smile on his face. Riot tried to walk normally, but the ground didn’t seem to want to cooperate.

  “Sergeant Riot, I thought that was you.”

  “Alar-something?” Riot said, struggling to recall the officer from the ravine.

  “Alar-dal.”

  “What do you want?” Riot said.

  “Eloquent as ever, Sergeant. One of my officers is dead, I wish to retrieve him.”

  “I didn’t kill this one,” Riot said defensively.

  “Don’t be hard on yourself, perhaps you are having an off-day. There is also a stream at the bottom of the hill. I would like to fetch water for my horses unhindered, and in return, I propose that your men can do the same, agreed?”

  The sun was about to fall below the southern horizon, not much time before full dark. Riley was likely well on his way back to the camp by now, which meant in the morning he could expect Williams and the regiment to come and get them. If Riley had been captured or was lost, then Williams would still come to look for the Arcanist, so all Riot had to do was wait.

  “Why don’t you just leave? It’ll be dark soon, we can all go home.”

  Alar-dal looked amused. "Oh, I believe we will stay for a little longer. If there is nothing else?”

  “Got any of that weed you lot drink? My head’s killing me.”

  Alar-dal fished a small vial from a pouch on his hip and tossed it to Riot. The bitter liquid stung his throat, but moments later, he began to feel its numbing effects.

  “Thank you,” Riot said.

  “You might not be thanking me soon, Sergeant,” the Faelen replied, urging his horse gently back down the slope.

  Riot took half the men to the small river to fill canteens and found half a dozen Faelen rankers already on the far bank watering horses. They gave Riot a friendly wave as he dunked his head in the fast-flowing water, gasping from the cold.

  Three of the blue jackets approached the Faelen infantry, calling out to trade and soon tightly bound packages were tossed across the water in both directions. Faelen rations were pitiful, but they had an endless supply of the foul weed the men smoked.

  Back at the farmhouse, they rested the leybound boy in a shallow grave in the courtyard and as darkness fell they lit small fires to make a thin soup.

  Ruddle still hadn’t woken up. The blood soaked bandage on the stump of the old man's arm looked black and it would rot if they didn’t get him back to the city soon.

  Riot set sentries, found a patch of floor that seemed less damp than the rest, and fell into a grateful sleep.

  He felt as though he had barely closed his eyes before some sense nudged him awake. It was black as pitch outside, and the low flicker of a small fire at the back of the farmhouse threw shadows onto the walls. So what had woken him? No stamp of horses, no shouts of alarm, the dead were silent in their graves.

  So what was it?

  Aidan Cox was a silent shadow at the closest window, but the other windows were empty, save for two crossbows learning against the stone.

  “Where’s Emerson and Swan?” Riot hissed.

  “Don’t know Sarge,” Cox murmured, without turning around.

  A soft sound reached Riot, a sound he knew well. The fleshy thumps of someone quietly receiving a beating.