Padric heard Fat Donall laugh, followed by a wet noise of glee in Drefan’s throat, but it was Poncey Swan that he watched. The weak-chinned bastard’s face was full of lust as he approached, laying the bow aside and drawing his skinning knife. Padric waited, ready to kick Poncey Swan off his feet as soon as he was near. This one, he would take with him.

“My Lord Swinehelm!” Slouch Hat’s voice cut through the hall. “You need not Winetongue’s wife, when you have her son!”

The Red Cap looked up and squinted hard, then rushed forward, knocking Drefan and his torch away from the husk. “What did you say?”

“I tell you,” Slouch Hat said firmly, “you let them kill that boy…and you kill the Gaunt Prince’s heir.”

Padric watched, full of confusion and fear, as Torcan Swinehelm turned and looked at him for the first time.

F OURTEEN

FOURTEEN

“Them’s loaded, they are,” Canker complained.

“Shit-liar, you,” Nape spat back. “Now roll.”

Canker snatched up the dice irritably and cast them in the ash pit.

“Ruttin’ hell,” he cursed the result.

“Smoke and Fire!” Nape cheered. “There’s a right measure. Nape wins!”

“Nape’s a smug fuck,” Canker muttered.

“Smug or no, I gets the honors when the cat comes back.”

“If’er she comes back.”

“She will. You watch.”

Canker glanced around the clearing for the twentieth time. “Still thinkin’ we ought have a look-see.”

“Bugger that! And you. Through marchin’ in the woods, me. Got the finer’s all right here. Wait in comfort and see a proper result, mark me.”

Nape stretched and lay back, resting his head on the corpse of the collier’s wife. Canker remained restless, shifting on the seat he had made of the dead dog.

Nape looked up at the sky, scratching between his bandy legs. “Think I fancy a little throttling.”

“Whatta you on now?”

“The cat,” Nape replied. “Gonna takes me time. Get a good long strangle outta her. Watch her eyes pop! This’n dropped too fast when you poleaxed her.” Nape reached back and punched into the woman he used as a pillow. “And that bastard had to be stuck quick. Fast fucker.”

Canker looked towards the forest’s edge where the body of the collier still lay, spear sticking straight out his back to mark where he fell. “Twas a right good toss,” he admitted.

“If I may say,” Nape giggled.

“You’re the shit-liar now, Nape! ‘Twas Midden’s throw that did for him. I saw. Your’s lost in the trees somewhat.”

Nape’s head craned off the woman to glare at Canker. “Mine struck home, I says and Midden missed.”

“Not the way of it!”

“Was! And Midden’s not here to say otherwise.”