So Maquin and Valent waited, listening to the murmur of conversation filtering out of the window. Someone was complaining of the plunder that they were going to miss out on when Ripa fell.

A loud shout, the signal Maquin had been waiting for, followed closely by the clash of iron. Inside the tower twenty Vin Thalun leaped to their feet, drawing swords and rushing to the tower’s wide doorway.

Maquin shared a look with Valent, who reached for his sword hilt. Maquin shook his head. ‘It’ll be knife-work first, close and bloody.’ Valent nodded and then Maquin was climbing through the window into the tower.

No one saw them, all eyes were fixed upon the main door where shadowy figures fought. No one except the giantess. Her eyes met Maquin’s, small and dark in a shadow-haunted face. She made no sound, no movement, just watched him as he slipped behind a Vin Thalun warrior. Maquin ripped his eyes away from her, though he felt her gaze still upon him as he grabbed the Vin Thalun, one hand clamping across a mouth, the other sawing his knife across the warrior’s throat.

Close by Valent slipped his knife between a Vin Thalun’s ribs.

Maquin slew another before they were heard. Men peeled away from the doorway, where bodies crammed the entrance, already corpses snaring feet.

Alben is holding them in the doorway, confining them where their numbers will be useless.

Half a dozen men at least came at him and Valent. Maquin strode forwards to meet the attack, leaving Valent to protect the giants.

He kicked at the blackened carcass spitted above the fire-pit, sending it crashing into a Vin Thalun, knocking him to the ground, saw one of the others hesitate.

‘It . . . it’s the Old Wolf,’ the Vin Thalun cried, a flash of doubt sweeping his face, his cry loud enough for others to hear. There was a pause amongst them and Maquin took advantage, hurling a knife which buried itself with a dull crack up to the hilt in another Vin Thalun’s forehead.

Maquin drew his sword.

The Vin Thalun circled around the fire-pit, slowly.

Mistake. Should have rushed me.

He moved to the right, sidestepped a hesitant blow, and hacked at the man’s ribs, felt bones break, ducked the sword-swing of another warrior, kicked the first into the fire-pit in an explosion of flame, pivoted, took the next sword blow overhead with his own blade, stepped in close, iron grating sparks, and punched his knife through leather into a belly, ripped it sideways as he pulled away, intestines spilling into a steaming heap in his wake. The recent wound in his belly began to throb, an ache deep within.