“Achilles and Hector together couldn’t ha’ driven all they off that land,” said Ser Dagon.

The boy was shouting his screams now.

“I think our squires have the most honour in this fight,” Ser John agreed. He wished he could get up. He wished the boy would die. He wished that there was something—anything—he could do.

He made himself pray, which was hard with the accusations of the boy’s screams so close to his head.

There was another roar—the horn sounded again, one long wind, and suddenly the air was full of ops. Workings flew past, balls of fire of various colours flying back and forth.

“Christ and his phalanx of angels,” muttered Ser Giannis.

“Haaaaarrrrrhhhhh!” screamed the mass of pain and fear that had once been a knight of Jarsay.

Ser John picked him up, intending to crush him in an embrace. But Wilful Murder was there first. He leaned down as if tying his shoe and casually drew his ballock dagger across the young knight’s throat.

“Go fast, boy,” he said.

Ser John let the boy’s blood flow down the front of his breastplate. He met the archer’s eyes, and the man shrugged.

“Someone had to,” Wilful Murder said.

And then Rory was back with the war horses.

Ser John looked around, wondering if he looked as tired and haggard as Ser Giannis or Ser Dagon did.

“I’m of a mind to find out what happened, and mayhap play a role before the sun sets,” Ser John said. “But every man here has earned the right to say he has done enough.”

The other seven knights looked at him—covered in their comrade’s blood—and shook their heads.

“Let’s go kill them,” said Ser Dagon.

The road ran parallel to the fight for another half mile. Below them, as the spring sun began to set, they could see shapes moving across the cleared ground. Some of the hedged fields were quite small and Ser John didn’t know the area well enough to guess which lane would get him a view of the fight—if any.

But as the sun’s rays turned from gold to red, one of the huntsmen galloped up and pointed his crossbow south across the fields. “Past the farm gate,” he said, and they rode. An hour of picking their way along the road and stopping frequently to watch or listen had allowed all the archers to catch them up, mounted on their smaller horses. The pages brought up the rear.

Ser John was the first through the gate. It was a fine farm with a good stone house like Helewise’s, only smaller, and it had been spared by the last incursion of the Wild. Draper or Skinner—he knew the folk here.

Old Man Skinner stepped out of his door, a heavy arbalest cocked in his hand. “There’s boglins in my lower orchard,” he said. “I’ve been potting ’em for an hour. Took you lot long enough—Christ on the cross, you look rough, Ser John!” he said in sudden wonder. “Just my mouth a flappin’. I mean no harm. Water your horses—I’ll get water in the trough.”