They would strike the peasant army’s flank like a knife blade plunging into the side of a whale. And about as effective. Suicide! Even if we make the ford, we’ll flounder. Horses will fall, men will drown, and the peasants will descend to reap slaughter. Still they rode on. Moments before contact, he saw Weasel Clan horsewarriors reappear from the dust cloud. Counterattack. More madness!

Crow riders swept to either side of the historian, the momentum of their charge at its peak. Duiker turned his head at Coltaine’s fierce, joyous shout.

Arrows whizzed past. The flank of the peasant army contracted, flinched back. When the Wickans struck, it was into a solidly packed mass of humanity. Yet, at the last moment, the Crow Clan riders wheeled towards the river and rode alongside the flank. Not a knife plunge. A sabre slash.

Peasants died. Others fell in their frantic retreat and were trampled by the frenzied horses. The entire flank bloomed red as the savage Wickan blades travelled its length.

The peasants holding the ford’s landing were crumpling beneath the Weasel Clan’s counterattack. Then the lead riders of the Crow Clan struck the north edge.

The peasant line seemed to melt away before Duiker’s eyes. He now rode with the Crow Clan, horse shoulders hammering his legs to either side. Blood rained from raised weapons, spattering his face and hands. Ahead, the Weasel Clan’s riders parted, covering their kin’s wild charge straight into the clouds of dust.

Now the mayhem truly begins. For all the glory of Coltaine’s charge, ahead lay the river. Wounded soldiers, refugees and Hood knew what else.

The historian snatched what he felt would be his last breath a moment before plunging into the sunlit dust.

His mare splashed water, yet barely slowed. The way before him stretched clear, a swirling, strangely choppy sweep of muddy water. Other riders were barely visible farther ahead, their horses at full gallop. Duiker could feel the unyielding, solid impact his mare’s hooves made as they rode on. There was not four and a half feet of river beneath them, but half that. And the hooves struck stone, not mud. He did not understand.

Corporal List appeared alongside the historian, as well as a straggling squad of Crow horsewarriors. One of the Wickans grinned. ‘Coltaine’s road – his warriors fly like ghosts across the river!’

Various comments the night before returned to Duiker. Tumlit – that nobleman’s observations. Reinforced wagons apparently overloaded with wounded. Stone cutters and Engineers. The wagons crossing first and taking most of the night to do so. The wounded were laid atop the stone blocks. The damned Engineers had built a road!