The ground punched the breath from his lungs, threw his legs into the air. He thumped back down in the mud. On his back. He had time to begin his roll before the cussers directly ahead exploded. The impact sent him tumbling. Bloody shreds rained down on him.

A large object thumped beside Paran’s head. He blinked his eyes open. To see a man’s hips – just the hips, the concavity where intestines belonged yawning black and wet. Thighs were gone, taken at the joints. The captain stared.

His ears were ringing. He felt blood trickling from his nose. His chest ached. Distant screaming wailed through the night.

A hand closed on his rain-cape, tugged him upright.

Mallet. The healer leaned close to press the captain’s sword into his hands, then shouted words Paran barely heard. ‘Come on! They’re all getting the Hood out of here!’ A shove sent the captain stumbling forward.

His eyes saw, but his mind failed in registering the devastation to either side of the path they now ran down towards the north gate. He felt himself shutting down inside, even as he slipped and staggered through the human ruin ... shutting down as he had once before, years ago, on a road in Itko Kan.

The hand of vengeance stayed cold only so long. Any soul possessing a shred of humanity could not help but see the reality behind cruel deliverance, no matter how justified it might have at first seemed. Faces blank in death. Bodies twisted in postures no-one unbroken could achieve. Destroyed lives. Vengeance yielded a mirror to every atrocity, where notions of right and wrong blurred and lost all relevance.

He saw, to the right and left, fleeing figures. A few sharpers cracked, hastening the rout.

The Bridgeburners had announced themselves to the enemy.

We are their match, the captain realized as he ran, in calculated brutality. But this is a war of nerves where no-one wins.

The unchallenged darkness of the gate swallowed Paran and his fellow Bridgeburners. Boots skidded as the soldiers halted their mad sprint. Dropping into crouches. Reloading crossbows. Not a word spoken.

Trotts reached a hand out and dragged Hedge close. The Barghast shook the man hard for a moment, then made to throw him down. A squeal from Spindle stopped him. Hedge, after all, carried a leather sack half full of munitions.

His face still a mass of bruises from Detoran’s fond touch, Hedge cursed. ‘Ain’t no choice, you big ape!’

Paran could hear the words. An improvement. He wasn’t sure who he sided with on this one, but the truth of it was, it no longer mattered. Trotts!’ he snapped. ‘What now? If we wait here—’

The Barghast grunted. ‘Into the city, low and quiet.’

‘Which direction?’ Antsy asked.

‘We head to the Thrall—’

‘Fine, and what’s that?’

‘The glowing keep, you thick-skulled idiot.’