Hallyd bared his teeth. ‘Take it up with Infayen.’

‘Perhaps we will.’

Hallyd Bahann’s face suddenly twisted. ‘They will hunt you down! They will flay the skin from every damned one of you!’

Narad glanced up as three figures approached. A shaman and two witches. They had come down from the northwest, from the lands of House Dracons. With their bags filled with bones and talons, with teeth and acorns, feathers and beads. With magic like smoke around them. Say nothing more to me of ancient spirits and forgotten gods, and I’ll not speak of my memories of your kind screaming inside a burning longhouse.

The one bearing the antlered headdress now spoke. ‘Yedan Narad, we will take him if you like.’

‘Take him?’ He eyed the three. Their flat visages revealed nothing.

‘A clearing,’ the shaman continued. ‘Filled with sharpened stakes. It is fitting.’

‘What are they talking about?’ demanded Hallyd Bahann, struggling to shift position, twisting round in an effort to glare up at the shaman.

‘They seek to prolong your death, I think,’ Narad replied, sighing.

‘Torture? Abyss below, have mercy on me. It’s not done to soldiers – don’t you people understand that? When did the Tiste sink to the level of savages?’

‘Oh, we are savages indeed,’ Narad said, nodding. ‘Not soldiers at all, sir. You should have considered that before you sent your soldiers into the forests to slay the innocent. Before your soldiers raped the helpless. In your world, sir, you called your victims Deniers. What gift of your civil comportment did they so egregiously deny? Never mind. We have now fully embraced your ways, sir.’

‘You’re a damned deserter! That sword at your belt!’

Narad shrugged. ‘But I wonder, sir. What worth this civilization, when savagery thrives within it? When criminals abound in safety behind its walls? And no, I speak not of the Deniers, but of you and your soldiers.’

‘No different from you! What company? Tell me!’

‘Why, none other than Captain Infayen Menand’s.’

Hallyd’s eyes narrowed. ‘Ah, and do I see a bride’s blood on your hands?’

‘Yes,’ said Narad, ‘I think you do.’

‘Then—’

‘Then yes, sir. I followed orders. That was my crime, remains my crime, remains forever my crime.’

‘I’ll give you Infayen Menand,’ Hallyd hissed. ‘Free me. I swear I’ll lead her here, into ambush.’

‘Why is it, captain, that every army kills its deserters? Could it be, perhaps, that such objection by common soldiers in fact threatens the entire façade? That delicate tower of twigs and sticks, of stretched spider-silk and beads of sap, this tottering construct of institutional insanity that makes a cage of every virtue, only to then whisper of necessity?’

‘Deserters are cowards,’ growled Hallyd Bahann.