It was a woman, and she blinked at him, frowning, even as she clenched a fistful of his cloak. He answered the frown, puzzled. She shoved her other hand into his face, showing him the bandaged stump where a thumb would jut.

‘It’s that damned Whiteblade!’ she yelled.

In answer, Kyle yanked free the blade and swept it across her neck in one swift motion. The crowd of outlanders shouted and gagged their horror as her head fell in a gout of jetting blood. He attempted to yank free but her fist still held him tight by the cloak. He chopped off that hand at the wrist.

Other hands grabbed at him and these he severed as well. The crowd – those not clenching stumps of wrists and forearms – now scrambled to give him room. He fled north.

But yells and alarm preceded him. Armed soldiers exited a large tent right in front of him. A few quick cuts crippled these and he pushed inside. He sliced the main centre pole, and as the heavy sailcloth tent billowed down around him he cut his way out at the rear. Now he ran.

Calls for archers sounded all about. He tried to keep to the darker patches of the tent encampment, but more and more torches were being lit as troops crowded the ways. Ahead, across trampled fields and a creek, lay woods. He pounded for the creek. Troops from tents nearby attempted to slow him by blocking his way. The white blade severed shields, vambraces, spear hafts, and two crossbows before their handlers had finished cocking them.

Several arrows hissed past him. One plucked his cloak, then he was tumbling down a muddy slope into a shockingly chill rushing creek. He slogged on. A tossed burning torch crashed into his back, sending him off his feet into the creek. Arrows nipped the waves about him.

‘Get him!’ someone yelled from the shore.

A new voice bellowed, commandingly, ‘Stay out of his reach! Archers, form up!’

Kyle lurched to his feet and stumbled on. He was surprised, then, to see a thick night fog now rolling out of the forest. He couldn’t understand it, but it was a blessing and he made for it.

‘Damned northern giants!’ someone yelled.

‘Fire now!’ the commander ordered.

Kyle dived under the swift waist-high waters. The current buffeted him and the water seemed to suck all warmth from his body. He simply attempted to stay under for as long as he could; he gripped at boulders his questing hands found in the bed, tried to bring his legs down.