The hand let go his throat and he sucked in a breath. Felt himself pulled up by his coat. 'Shit on it, Dogman! I could ha' killed you!' He knew the voice now, well enough. Black Dow, the bastard. Dogman was half annoyed at being throttled near to dying, half stupid-happy at still being alive. He could hear Dow laughing at him. Hard laughter, like a crow calling. 'You alright?'

'I've had warmer greetings,' croaked Dogman, still doing his best to get the air in.

'Count yourself lucky, I could've given you a colder one. Much colder. I took you for one of Bethod's scouts. Thought you was out over yonder, up the valley.'

'As you can see,' he whispered, 'no. Where's the others at?'

'Up on a hill, above this fucking mist. Taking a look around.'

Dogman nodded back the way he'd come. 'There's corpses over there. Loads of 'em.'

'Loads of 'em is it?' asked Dow, as though he didn't think Dogman knew what a load of corpses looked like. 'Hah!'

'Aye, a good few anyway. Union dead, I reckon. Looks like there was a fight here.'

Black Dow laughed again. 'A fight? You reckon?' Dogman wasn't sure what he meant by that.

'Shit,' he said.

They were standing up on the hill, the five of them. The mist had cleared up, but the Dogman almost wished it hadn't. He saw what Dow had been saying now, well enough. The whole valley was full of dead. They were dotted high up on the slopes, wedged between the rocks, stretched out in the gorse. They were scattered out across the grass in the valley bottom like nails spilled from a sack, twisted and broken on the brown dirt road. They were heaped up beside the river, heaped on the banks in a pile. Arms and legs and broken gear sticking up from the last shreds of mist. They were everywhere. Stuck with arrows, stabbed with swords, hacked with axes. Crows called as they hopped from one meal to the next. It was a good day for the crows. It had been a while since Dogman saw a proper battlefield, and it brought back some sour memories. Horrible sour.

'Shit,' he said again. Couldn't think of aught else to say.

'Reckon the Union were marching up this road.' Threetrees was frowning hard. 'Reckon they were hurrying. Trying to catch Bethod unawares.'

'Seems they weren't scouting too careful,' rumbled Tul Duru. 'Seems like it was Bethod caught them out.'

'Maybe it was misty,' said Dogman, 'like today.'