Ferro stood on one of the stones, hands on hips, staring out across the plain through narrowed eyes. The wind tore at the grass and made waves from it, like the waves on the sea. It tore at the great clouds too, twisting them, ripping them open, dragging them through the sky. It lashed at Ferro's face, nipped at her eyes, but she ignored it.

Damn wind, just like always.

Ninefingers stood beside her, squinting into the cold sun. 'Anything out there?'

'We are followed.' They were far away, but she could see them. Tiny dots in the far distance. Tiny riders moving on the ocean of grass.

Ninefingers grimaced. 'You sure?'

'Yes. You surprised?'

'No.' He gave up looking and rubbed at his eyes. 'Bad news is never a surprise. Just a disappointment.'

'I count thirteen.'

'You can count 'em? I can't even see 'em. They coming for us?'

She raised her arms. 'You see anything else out here? Might be that laughing bastard Finnius found some more friends.'

'Shit.' He looked down at the cart, drawn up at the base of the hill. 'We can't outrun them.'

'No.' She curled her lip. 'You could ask the spirits for their opinion.'

'So they could tell us what? That we're fucked?' Silence for a moment. 'Better to wait, and fight them here. Bring the cart up to the top. At least we've got a hill, and a few rocks to hide behind.'

'That's what I was thinking. Gives us some time to prepare the ground.'

'Alright. We'd best get to it.'

The point of the shovel bit into the ground with the sharp scrape of metal on earth. An all too familiar sound. Digging pits and digging graves. What was the difference?

Ferro had dug graves for all kinds of people. Companions, or as close as she had come to companions. Friends, or as close as she had come to friends. A lover or two, if you could call them that. Bandits, killers, slaves. Whoever hated the Gurkish. Whoever hid in the Badlands, for whatever reason.

Spade up and spade down.

When the fighting is over, you dig, if you are still alive. You gather up the bodies in a line. You dig the graves in a row. You dig for your fallen comrades. Your slashed, your punctured, your hacked and your broken comrades. You dig as deep as you can be bothered, you dump them in, you cover them up, they rot away and are forgotten, and you go on, alone. That's the way it's always been.

But here, on this strange hill in the middle of this strange country, there was still time. Still a chance for the comrades to live. That was the difference, and for all her scorn, and her scowls, and her anger, she clung to it as she clung to the spade, desperate tight.