Trotts’s final gesture was a lightning-quick sweep of his broadsword across the lad’s stomach. Sleek flesh parted and the youth looked down in time to see his intestines tumble into view in a gush of fluids. He convulsed around them, pitched to the ground.

Trotts lay before the dying boy, clawing frantically at his throat, legs kicking.

The captain lurched forward, but one of his Bridgeburners was quicker – Mulch, a minor healer from the Eleventh Squad, raced into the Circle to Trotts’s side. A small flickblade flashed in the soldier’s hand as he straddled the writhing warrior and pushed his head back to expose the throat.

What in Hood’s name—

There was pandemonium on all sides. The Circle was dissolving as Barghast warriors surged forward, weapons out yet clearly confused as to what they should do with them. Paran’s head snapped round, to see his Bridgeburners contracting within a ring of shrieking, belligerent savages.

Gods, it’s all coming down.

A horn cut through the cacophony. Faces turned. Senan warriors were reasserting the sanctity of the Circle, bellowing as they pushed the other tribesmen and women back. Humbrall Taur had once more raised high his mace, a silent yet inescapable demand for order.

Voices rose from the Barghast surrounding the company of Bridgeburners, and the captain saw Moranth munitions held high in the hands of his soldiers. The Barghast were recoiling, drawing lances back to throw.

‘Bridgeburners!’ Paran shouted, striding towards them. ‘Put those damned things away! Now!’

The horn sounded a second time.

Faces turned. The deadly grenados disappeared once more beneath rain-capes and cloaks.

‘Stand at ease!’ Paran growled as he reached them. In a lower voice, he snapped, ‘Hold fast, you damned fools! Nobody counted on a Hood-damned draw! Keep your wits. Corporal Aimless, go to Mulch and find out what in Fener’s name he did with that flickblade – and get the bad news on Trotts – I know, I know, he looked done for. But so’s the lad. Who knows, maybe it’s a question of who dies first—’

‘Captain,’ one of the sergeants cut in. ‘They were gonna have at us, sir, that’s all. We wasn’t planning on nothing – we was waitin’ for your signal, sir.’

‘Glad to hear it. Now keep your eyes open, but stay calm, while I go confer with Humbrall Taur.’ Paran swung round and headed towards the Circle.

The Barghast warchief ‘s face was grey, his gaze returning again and again to the small figure now ominously motionless on the stained ground a dozen paces away. A half-dozen minor chiefs clustered around Humbrall, each shouting to make himself heard above his rival. Taur was ignoring them one and all.