A crisp, strident blare of buccinas awoke Josiri from wine-sodden dreams. Wincing at the bright evening sun, he edged to the window and stared down at Eskavord.

Beyond Branghall’s wall, a crowd gathered outside the reeve’s manor. The marketplace was full. Not of soldiers – though soldiers stood on the periphery – but of ordinary folk. Properly full, from the lychfields of the church to the walled bank of the river. A double-line of blue council tabards stood at silent attention beneath the manor’s balcony. Josiri frowned. There hadn’t been a reeve in Eskavord since his mother’s death, and Governor Yanda had never been one for speeches. Akadra. It had to be Akadra. Not content with all he’d taken, he now eyed Eskavord. How long before he sought the dukedom alongside?

“Bastard’s welcome to it.” As he spoke, Josiri knew the words a lie.

Even through the haze of alcohol and self-pity, a part of him yearned to go down there. But only a small part, tamped down and wearied. The rest reached for another bottle.

“Sorry about that.” Revekah pulled on the “borrowed” helmet. “You’ll sleep it off.”

The Tressian soldier – now bound, gagged and wedged firmly behind the stable’s stalls – said nothing. Revekah fought a twang of distaste. The lad looked so young. Everyone did, the older you got. Despite the lad’s occupation – despite the creak in her bones – Revekah felt as much a bully as she had at her first meeting with Katya Trelan.

She still remembered that night, clear as Selanni crystal. She’d caught the privileged little snot sneaking about town at an unrespectable hour. The rest of the patrol had egged her on to throw the girl a scare. Barely of serving age herself, Revekah had acceded and dragged the eight-year-old back through the streets to the jail.

Katya hadn’t wept, hadn’t wailed. But the look in her eyes . . . Well, that was where you saw truth, in the eyes. Front couldn’t hide it, nor pride conceal it. It wasn’t until years later, when Kevor Trelan left for Council, never to return, that Revekah marked that same desperate worry in the eyes of the woman who’d since become her dearest friend.

Funny how things changed. And how much stayed the same.

Revekah straightened her sword-belt. Close enough to pass muster. With a last tug on the tabard she left the dung-laden confines of the stables behind for the crowded streets. Soldiers hurried east. Everyone else headed west towards the marketplace.

Revekah joined the former, taking care to put snap in her step. One of the first lessons she’d learned back in the day: look like you belonged, and you could go wherever you liked. So it proved. No one challenged her as she trod the cobbled road straight through East Gate and out onto the muster field.