Odo slitted his eyes to keep out as much as he could. Even Guelf gulped a little. He was well used to the butcher-shop horrors that happened when men hacked and stabbed with edged weapons, but there was something chilling about this in an entirely different way. Moans and shrieks sounded every now and then, not often enough to be disregarded, so that every new one hit you fresh.

The seven wounded from Gervais who’d survived and three bodies of those who’d died here were laid together. Father Stanyon and a Mackenzie medic were standing toe to toe over one unconscious figure. The kilted clanswoman was slight but bristling, her brown braid swinging as she shook her head emphatically.

“And what part of no is it that’s too complicated for you to be understanding the now, you cowan blockhead?” she shouted in a Mackenzie lilt, arms windmilling the way they did.

“Here’s my Lord, talk to him, pagan bitch!” the priest shouted back.

Guelf grunted; he felt as if his eyes had been taken out and the backs sanded, then the sockets dusted with hot ash before they were replaced. He glared, but neither quailed.

“Out,” he snarled, and turned on his heel. “Now!”

Outside, Father Stanyon spoke in an angry, even tone. “She dosed that man we picked up with laudanum. Dosed him heavily, forced it suddenly down his throat.”

Guelf frowned. “So?” he asked.

Even he knew that was standard if you didn’t want to inject a wounded man with morphine, which was expensive even for military use and had to be saved for the most urgent cases. Ones who were unconscious or who couldn’t keep an oral medication down.

The Mackenzie medic nodded at him. “Not going to apologize, my Lord. Both the Father and I agree, the spalpeen isn’t actually one of your Gervais men.”

Baffled, Guelf’s stubbled face swung back and forth. “He isn’t?”

“No.” Father Stanyon hesitated. “He’s dressed in the bloodstained clothing of one of ours, however. Blood all over the right kidney.”

Guelf growled. That was the mark of an assassin; a knife in the kidney was the fastest and quietest way to kill quickly. There was a whole knot of big blood vessels there, and if you stuck the blade deep, in just the right place, and twisted sharply, unconsciousness followed almost instantly. It was a lot easier and less obviously messy than slitting a throat too, if you left the knife in for a moment.

“Killed one of ours to sneak in one of their spies?” he grated.

The Mackenzie nodded briskly, removing the surgical mask that had fallen around her neck over the thin golden torc.

“Yes. ’Twould be my guess, do you see, that he threw himself down looking all wounded and hurt to be carried in, planning to get up when nobody was looking in the hurry and chaos. Blood on clothing is not the most uncommon of things about here, I’m observing. It’s the Mother’s own luck that I happened to do a quick triage check; and there the spalpeen’s back was, not sliced or cut or stabbed at all. So I grabbed the creature’s nose and poured the dose down his throat.”