The Second Empire

EIGHTEEN

All day they had been trooping into the city, a motley procession of armed men in livery all the colours of the rainbow. Some were armed with nothing more than halberds and scythes on long poles, others were splendidly equipped with arquebuses and sabres. Most were on foot, but several hundred rode prancing warhorses in half-armour and had silk pennons whipping from their lance heads.

Corfe, General Rusio and Quartermaster Passifal stood on the battlements of the southern barbican and watched them troop in. As the long serried column trailed to an end a compact group of five hundred Cathedraller cavalry came up behind them, Andruw at their head. As the tribesmen passed through the gateway below Andruw saluted and winked, then was lost to view in a cavernous clatter of hooves as he and his men entered the city.

“That’s the last contingent will make it this week, General,” Passifal said. He was consulting a damp sheaf of papers. “Gavriar of Rone has promised three hundred men, but they’ll be a long time on the road, and the Duke of Gebrar, old Saranfyr, he’s put his name down for four hundred more, but it’s a hundred and forty leagues from Gebrar if it’s a mile. We’ll be lucky to see them inside a month.”

“How many do we have then?” Corfe asked.

“Some six thousand retainers, plus another five thousand conscripts-most of them folk from Aekir.”

“Not as many as we had hoped,” Rusio grumbled.

“No,” Corfe told him. “But it’s a damn sight better than nothing. I can leave six or seven thousand men to garrison the city and still march out with-what? Thirty-six or seven thousand.”

“Some of these retainers the lords sent are nothing more than unschooled peasants,” Rusio said, leaning on a merlon. “In many cases they’ve sent us squads of village idiots and petty criminals, the dregs of their demesnes.”

“All they have to do is stand on the battlements and wave a pike,” Corfe said. “Rusio, I want you to take five hundred veterans and start training the more incapable. Some of the contingents, though, can be draughted straight into the regular army.”

“What about their fancy dress?” Passifal asked, mouth twitching.

Many of the lords had clad their retainers in all manner of garish heraldry.

“It won’t look so fancy after a few days in the mud, I’ll warrant.”

“And the lords themselves?” Rusio inquired. “We’ve half a dozen keen young noblemen who are set on leading their father’s pet army into battle.”

“Rate them as ensigns, and put capable sergeants under them.”

“Their daddies may not like that, nor the young scrubs themselves.”

“I don’t give a stuff what they like. I won’t hand men over to untried officers to be squandered. This is war, not some kind of parlour game. If there are any complaints, have them forwarded to the Queen.”

“Yes, General.”

Feet on the catwalk behind them, and Andruw appeared, his helm swinging from one hand. “Well, that’s the last of them,” he said. “The rest are hiding in the woods or the foothills.”

“Did you have any trouble?” Corfe asked him.

“Are you serious? Once they saw the dreaded scarlet horsemen they’d have handed over their daughters if we’d asked. And I very nearly did, mark you. Poor stuff, though, most of ’em. They might be all right standing atop a wall, Corfe, but I wouldn’t march them out of here. They’d go to pieces in the field.”

“What about the retainers?”

“Oh, they’re better equipped than the regulars are, but they’ve no notion of drill at any level higher than a tercio. I’d rate them baggage guards or suchlike.”

“My thoughts exactly. Thanks, Andruw. Now, what about these horses?”

“I have a hundred of the men under Marsch and Ebro escorting the herd. They’ll be here in three or four days.”

“How many did you manage to scrape up?”

“Fifteen hundred, but only a third of those are true destriers. Some of them are no better than carthorses, others are three-year-olds, barely broken.”

“They’ll have to do. The Cathedrallers are the only heavy cavalry we have. If we mount every man, we can muster up some…”

“I make it a little over two thousand,” Passifal said, consulting his papers again. “Another batch of tribesmen arrived this morning. Felimbri I think, nearly two hundred of them on little scrub ponies.”

“Thanks, Colonel.”

“If this goes on half the damn Torunnan army will be savages or Fimbrians,” Rusio said tartly.

“And it would be none the worse for that, General,” Corfe retorted. “Very well. Now, how are the work gangs proceeding on the Western Road…?”

The small knot of men stood on the windswept battlements and went through the headings on Passifal’s lists one by one. The lists were endless, and the days too short to tackle half their concerns, but little by little the army was being prepared for the campaign ahead. The last campaign, perhaps. That was what they hoped. In the meantime billets had to be found for the new recruits, willing and unwilling; horses had to be broken in and trained in addition to men; the baggage train had to be inventoried and stocked with anything thirty-odd thousand soldiers might need for a protracted stay in a veritable wilderness; and the road itself, which would bear their feet in so few days’ time, had to be repaired lest they find themselves bogged down in mud within sight of the city. Nothing could be left to chance, not this time. It was the last throw of the dice for the Torunnans. If it failed, then there was nothing left to stand between the kingdom and the horror of a Merduk occupation.

Corfe had been invited to dine that night at the town house of Count Fournier. He did not truly have the time to spare for leisurely dinners, but the invitation had intrigued him, so he dressed in court sable and went, despite Andruw’s jocular warning to watch what he ate. Fournier’s house was more of a mansion, with an arch in one wing wide enough to admit a coach and four. It stood in the fashionable western half of the city, within sight of the palace itself, and to the rear it had extensive gardens which ran down to the river. On the bank of the Torrin there was a small summerhouse and it was to this that Corfe was led by a crop-headed page as soon as he had left his horse with a young stable boy. Fournier met him with a smile and an outstretched hand. The summerhouse had more glass in it than Corfe had ever seen before, outside of a cathedral. It was lit by candle-lanterns, and a table within had been set for two. To one side the mighty Torrin gurgled and plopped in the darkness, its bank obscured by a line of willows. As Corfe looked around, something detached itself from one of the willows and flapped away with a beat of leathery wings. A bat of some sort.

“No escort or entourage, General?” Fournier asked with raised eye-brow. “You keep little state for a man of such elevated rank.”

“I thought I’d be discreet. Besides, the Cathedrallers are mobbed every time they ride through the streets.”

“Ah, yes, I should have thought. Have a seat. Have some wine. My cook has been working wonders tonight. Some bass from the estuary I believe, and wild pigeon.”

Silver glittering in the candlelight upon a spotless white tablecloth. Crystal goblets brimming with wine, a gold-chased decanter and a small crowd of footmen, not one yet in his thirties. Fournier noted Corfe’s appraising glances and said shortly, “I like to be surrounded by youth. It helps keep my-my energy levels high. Ah, Marion, the first course, if you please.”

Some kind of fish. Corfe ate it automatically, his plate cleared by the time Fournier had had three mouthfuls. The nobleman laughed.

“You are not in the field now, General. You should savour my cook’s work. He is an easterner as a matter of fact, a convert from Calmar. I believe he might once have been a corsair, but one should not inquire too thoroughly into the antecedents of genius, should one?”

Corfe said nothing. Fournier seemed to be enjoying himself, as if he possessed some secret knowledge which he was savouring with even more gusto than he did the food.

The plates were taken away, another course came and went. Fournier talked inconsequently of gastronomic matters, the decline in Torunn’s fishing fleet, the proper way to dress a carp. Corfe drank wine sparingly and uttered the odd monosyllable. Finally the cloth was drawn and the two men were left with a dish of nuts and a decanter of brandy. The servants left, and for a while the only sound was the quiet night music of the river close by.

“You have shown commendable patience, General,” Fournier said, sipping the good Fimbrian spirit. “I had expected an outburst of some sort ere the main course arrived.”

“I know.”

“Forgive me. I like to play my little games. Why are you here? What’s afoot on this, the eve of great events? I will tell you, as a reward for your forbearance.”

Fournier reached under his chair and set upon the table a bloodstained scroll of paper. Upon it was a broken seal, but enough of the wax remained for Corfe to make out the crossed scimitars of Ostrabar’s military. Despite himself, he sat up straight in his chair.

“Do have a walnut, General. They complement the brandy so well.” Fournier broke one open with a pair of ivory handled nutcrackers. There was blood on the nutcrackers also.

“Make your point, Fournier,” Corfe said. “I do not have any more time to waste.”

Fournier’s voice changed: the bantering tone fled to be replaced by cold steel. “My agents made a capture today of some interest to us all. A Merduk mullah with two companions, out riding alone. The mullah was a strange little fellow with a mutilated face and no fingers on one hand. He spoke perfect Normannic, with the accent of Almark, and claimed to be one Bishop Albrec, fresh from the delights of the Merduk court.”

Corfe said nothing, but the candlelight made two little hellish fires of his eyes.

“Our adventurous cleric was bearing this scroll on him. He took quite a deal of persuasion to give it up, I might add. After further persuasion he revealed that he had been charged with delivery of it to you, my dear General. You alone, and in person. Now, we have an agent in the enemy camp, that you already know. But would you believe that until tonight I did not know the identity of that agent? Strange, but true. Now I know everything there is to know, General. Or almost everything. Perhaps you could explain to me why exactly you are receiving despatches from someone at the very heart of the Merduk court?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about, Fournier. What is in this scroll?”

“That is of no matter for the moment. However, there is the rather alarming prospect of the Torunnan commander-in-chief being in clandestine communication with the enemy High Command. That, my dear Corfe Cear-Inaf, is treason in anyone’s book.”

“Don’t be absurd, Fournier. It’s come from this agent of yours you’ve been preening yourself over for weeks. What’s in the damned scroll? And what have you done with this Albrec?”

“All in good time, General. You see, the interesting thing is that the scroll did not come from any agent of mine. It came, as my little misshapen bishop finally admitted, direct from the hands of the Merduk Queen herself. Perhaps you could explain this.”

Corfe blinked, startled. “I have no idea-”

“Colonel Willem,” said Fournier, raising his voice a fraction. And out of the darkness a group of men instantly appeared. The candles lit up the length of their drawn swords.

A shaven-headed man with a patch over one eye stepped into the summerhouse. Willem, one of Corfe’s senior officers. Behind him was young Colonel Aras. Willem had a horse pistol cocked and ready, the match already smouldering on the wheel.

“Place General Cear-Inaf under arrest. You will take him to my offices down by the waterfront and hold him there.”

“With pleasure, Count,” Willem said, grinning to show broad gap-ridden teeth. “Get up, traitor.”

Corfe remained in his seat. The amazement fled out of his mind in a moment. Suddenly many things had become clear. He took in the faces of the newcomers with a quick glance. All strangers to him but for Willem and Aras. They were not even in army uniform. He turned to Fournier, keeping his voice as casual as he could.

“Why not just have me shot now?”

“It’s obvious, I would have thought. The mob would never wear it. You’re their darling, General. We must discredit you before we hang you.”

“You’ll never convince the Queen,” Corfe told him.

“Her opinion is as immaterial as her rule is unconstitutional. The line of the Fantyrs is at an end. Torunna must look elsewhere for her rulers.”

“I’ll wager she’ll not have to look far.”

Fournier smiled. “Willem, get this upstart peasant out of my sight.”

They had a closed carriage waiting in the court-yard. Corfe was manacled and locked inside. Aras shared it with him, another pistol cocked and pointed at his breast, whilst Willem and the others rode pillion. The carriage lurched and bumped through the sleeping capital, for it was late-some time past the middle night, Corfe guessed. His mind was racing but he felt curiously calm. It was all in the open at last. No more intrigue: only naked force would work now.

He looked Aras in the eye. “When I saw you hold your ground in the King’s Battle I never would have believed you could be a part of something like this.”

Aras said nothing. The carriage interior was lit by a single fluttering candle-lantern and it was hard to see the expression on his face.

“This will mean civil war, Aras. The army will not stand for it. And the Merduks will be handed the kingdom on a plate. That is what he intends-to be governor of a Merduk province.”

Again, silence but for the rumbling of the iron-bound wheels and the horses’ hooves on the cobbles.

“For God’s sake, man, can’t you see where your duty lies?”

The carriage stopped. The door was unbolted and opened from without and Corfe was hauled outside. He could smell dead fish in the air, pitch and seaweed. They were down near the southern docks, on the edge of the estuary. Lightless buildings bulked up against the sky, and he could see the masts of ships outlined before the stars. He offered no resistance as they manhandled him. Willem wanted him dead at once, that was plain. Corfe would not give him an excuse to fire.

Swinging lanterns scattering broken light on the wet cobbles. Men in armour, arquebuses, pikes. The soldiers were all in strange liveries-part of the conscripted retainers that Corfe had brought into the capital. They had foxed him there. He had brought the enemy into the city himself. That was the reason for their confidence.

Inside. Someone boxing him on the ear for no reason. Down stone stairs with water running down the walls. Torchlight guttering here, a noisome stink that turned his stomach.

“Hold him,” Willem’s voice said, and men pinioned him. The one-eyed colonel sized him up in the unsteady torchlight.

“Caught you by surprise, didn’t we? You thought it was all signed, sealed and delivered. Well you thought wrong, you little guttersnipe-” and he brought the butt of his pistol down on Corfe’s temple.

Corfe staggered, and at the second blow the world darkened and his legs went out from under him. He struggled, but the men about him held him fast as Willem rained blow after blow down on his head. No pain, just a succession of explosions in his brain, like a battery of culverins going off one by one. Somehow he remained conscious. His blood dappled the flags of the floor, gummed shut his eyes and nose. He heard his own breathing as though from a great distance, as stertorous as that of a dying consumptive.

Keys clinking, and then he was flung into a black cell, and the door clanged shut behind him. The footsteps outside retreated, laughter retreating with them.

His head felt like it belonged to someone else. The lights were sparkling through it like a twilit battle, and the tight manacles were already puffing up his hands. The floor was sodden and stinking.

Corfe sat up, and the pain began to seep in under the shock of it all. His ears were ringing, his mouth full of blood. He retched, heaving out a mess of bile on to the filthy floor.

“Who is that?” a voice asked in the darkness, an odd voice, something wrong with it.

“Who wants to know?” he rasped.

“My name is Albrec. I’m a monk.”

He fought for breath. “We meet again, then. My name is Corfe. I’m a soldier.” And then the blackness of the cell folded over his mind, and his face hit the floor.

By dawn the arrests had begun. Willem and his men went around in squads. Andruw and Marsch were picked up first, along with Morin, Ebro and Ranafast. Then Quartermaster Passifal and General Rusio were roused out of their beds and led away in chains. The Cathedrallers’ barracks were surrounded by three thousand arquebusiers under Colonel Willem, while Colonel Aras led twenty more tercios to confine Formio’s Fimbrians. An order was issued to the army in general, directing it to stay in barracks, and a curfew was imposed upon the entire city. Lastly, Fournier himself took fifty men and marched them into the palace, demanding admittance to the Queen’s chambers. Odelia was placed under guard-for her own protection, naturally-and the palace was sealed off.

By noon the waterfront dungeons were crammed full with almost the entire Torunnan High Command, and the brightly clad retainers whom Andruw had mocked were in control of three quarters of the city. The Cathedrallers had made an abortive breakout attempt, but Willem’s arquebusiers had shot them down in scores. The Fimbrians had as yet made no move except to fortify their barracks with a series of makeshift barricades. They had little or no ammunition for their few arquebuses, however, and their pikes would be almost worthless in street fighting. They were contained, for the moment. Fournier was confident they would accept some form of terms and was content to leave them be. As the afternoon wore round, however, he had batteries of heavy artillery wheeled into position around both them and the Cathedrallers, and Colonel Willem took some twelve thousand of the Torunnan regulars out of the city to the north. They had been told that a Merduk raiding party was closing in on the city and their commander-in-chief had ordered them to intercept it. Once they had left Torunn, though, Willem led them off to the east, towards the coast where they would be safely out of the way. The rest of the regulars, leaderless and bewildered, remained in barracks, while around them the populace were kept off the streets by armed patrols and rumours of Merduk infiltrators were circulated to keep them cowed. Thus, with a judicious mixture of bluff, guile and armed force did Fournier tighten his grip upon the capital.

He took over the chambers Lofantyr had used for meetings of the High Command in a wing of the palace, and by the early evening the place was abuzz with couriers coming and going, officers receiving new appointments and confused soldiers standing guard. After a frugal meal he dismissed everyone from the room and sat at the long table in the chair which King Lofantyr had once occupied, toying with the oiled point of his beard. When the clap of wings sounded at the window he did not turn round, nor did he seem startled when a homunculus landed before him amid the papers and maps and inkwells. The little creature folded its wings and cocked its head to one side.

“I must congratulate you,” the beast said in a man’s voice. “The operation proceeded even more smoothly than we had hoped.”

“That was the easy part. Maintaining the facade for the next week will be harder. I trust you are keeping your master well informed.”

“Of course. And he is mightily pleased. He wants Cear-Inaf kept alive, so that he may dispose of him at his leisure when he enters the city.”

“And the Queen? What of her? She cannot live, you know that.”

“Indeed. But Aurungzeb has this strange aversion to the execution of Royalty. He feels that kind of thing puts odd ideas into men’s minds.”

“It may be that she will simply disappear, then. She may escape and never be heard of again.”

“I think that would be best.”

“When does your master’s army move?”

“It has begun to march already. In less than a week, my dear Count, you will be the new governor of Torunna, answerable only to the Sultan himself. The war will be over.”

“The war will be over,” Fournier repeated thoughtfully. “Cear-Inaf is an upstart and a fool. He has done well, but even his much-vaunted generalship could not prevail against a hundred and fifty thousand. What I have done is spare Torunna a catastrophic defeat. I have saved thousands of lives.”

“Indubitably.” Was it his imagination, or was there a sardonic sneer to the voice which issued out of the homunculus?

“Go now,” he said sharply. “Tell your master I will hold Torunn for him. When the army arrives the gates shall be thrown open, and I shall see to it that the regulars are deployed elsewhere. There will be no resistance.”

“What of Cear-Inaf’s personal troops? Those tribesmen and the Fimbrians, not to mention the veterans from the dyke?”

“They are contained. They will be entirely neutralised within the next few days.”

The homunculus gathered itself up for flight, spreading its bat-like wings. “I certainly hope so, my dear Count. For your sake.” Then the creature paused in the act of springing into the air. “By the way, we have heard rumours that there is an agent of yours at work in the court. Is this true?”

“That is a rumour, nothing more. All my attempts to insert an agent close to Aurungzeb have failed. You may congratulate him on his security.”

“Thank you. The homunculus will return in two days, to monitor your progress. Until then, Count, fare well.” And the thing took off at last, and flapped its way out of the open window. Fournier watched it go, and when it had disappeared he took a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped the sweat out of his mustache.

When Corfe woke he thought that the nightmare which had plagued his unconsciousness was still about him, cackling in the darkness. He raised a hand to his face and felt agony shoot through his wrists as its chained fellow came with it. His hands were swollen to the point of uselessness. Another day in these manacles and he would lose them. His face, when he touched it gingerly, felt as though it did not belong to him. It was some misshapen caricature his fingers found strange to the touch. Despite himself, he groaned aloud.

“Corfe?” a voice said. “Are you awake?”

“Yes.”

“What have they done? I’ve heard shooting.”

“They’re trying to take over the city, I should think.”

“They’ve been bringing in other prisoners all morning. Dozens of them. I hear the doors.”

Corfe found it hard to keep his thoughts together. His mind seemed wrapped in wool. “Fournier caught you,” he said muzzily.

“Yes, on the way in. I had two companions. Merduks. He killed them after the torture. They would not speak.” There was a sound like a sob. “I’m so sorry. I could not bear it.”

“The scroll. What was in it?”

“The entire Merduk campaign plan and order of battle.”

Corfe struggled to clear his mind, collect his thoughts. He fought against the urge to lay his head in the foul-smelling muck of the floor and go to sleep.

“The Merduk Queen-he said it was from her. Is that true?”

There was a silence. Finally Albrec said, “Yes.”

“Why? Why would she do such a thing?”

“She is-she is a Ramusian, from Aekir. She wanted revenge.”

“I honour her for it.”

“Yes, though nothing will come of it now. What is Fournier going to do?”

“I think he means to surrender the city to the Merduks. He has done some deal. I have been an arrogant fool, such a fool.”

Quiet descended upon the interior of the cell. Water was gurgling away somewhere, and they could hear the rush of the sewers below.

The sewers.

“Father,” Corfe said with sudden energy. “Go over the floor of this place. There must be a drain somewhere, a grating or something.”

“Corfe-”

“Do it!”

They began searching around in the fetid darkness with their hands, their fingers squelching into nameless things. Once, Corfe’s fastened upon the wriggling wetness of a rat. He listened for the sound of the water, finally found it and tore heaps of rotting straw from around the grating. His half-numb fingers searched out its dimensions: eighteen inches square, no more.

A yank on the metal of the bars, but it would not budge. It was firmly set in mortar. He searched his pockets with awkward, fevered haste, and found there a folded clasp knife. Willem had taken his poniard, but had been too busy pistol-whipping him to search his pockets.

“Bastards!” Corfe spat in triumph. He unfolded the knife with his clumsy hands and began scraping at the mortar which held the grating fast. It was already crumbling in places, loosened by the wetness of the floor. He levered up clods and splinters of the stuff, stabbing with the little knife. There was a crack, and the point broke off. He hardly paused, but worked on in the smothering darkness by touch. Every so often the coruscating lights in his head came back, and he had to pause and fight the dizzying sickness they brought. It took hours-or what seemed like hours-but at the end of that time he had picked out every trace of the mortar from around the grating. He put the broken knife carefully back in his pocket. Something warm and liquid was trickling down his temples. Sweat or blood, he knew not.

“Over here, Father. Help me.”

Albrec bumped into him. “I have only one good hand.”

No matter. Three are better than two. Get a hold here.” He positioned the monk’s fingers for him. “Now, after three, pull like a good ’un.”

They heaved until Corfe thought his head would burst. A slight shift, a tiny grating sound, no more. He collapsed on to his side on the floor.

Several minutes passed, and then they tried again. This time Corfe was sure one corner of the grating had shifted, and when he felt over it he found that it was raised above the level of the floor flags some half an inch.

A strange, unearthly time of blinding pain and intense physical struggle, all in pitch blackness. They tugged on one corner of the grating after another, their fingers slipping on slime. Finally Corfe was able to get the chain of his manacles under one corner and pull back, feeling as though his hands were about to be wrenched off at the wrists.

A squeal of scraped metal, and he fell over on his back, the heavy grating jerking free to smash into his kneecap with dazzling pain. He lay on his back, gasping for air. “We-we did it, Father.”

They rested and listened in the blackness. No jailer approached, no alarm was raised.

“Are we going to go down there?” Albrec asked at last.

“We’re on the waterfront. The sewers here lead straight into the river. It shouldn’t be far-not more than a hundred yards. Come, Father Albrec. I’ll have you breathing clean air inside fifteen minutes. I’ll go first.”

The sound of rushing water seemed very loud as Corfe squeezed himself into the drain. He retched once at the smell, but nothing came up. His stomach had long since rid itself of the last vestiges of Fournier’s dinner.

His legs were dangling in a current of icy liquid. He felt a moment of black panic at the idea of venturing down there. What if there was no room to breathe? What if-?

His grip on the lip of the drain slipped and he scraped down through the short shaft and splashed into the sewer below. The current took him and buffeted him against rough brick walls. His head was under water. He could not breathe, was not even sure which way was up. His lungs shrieked for air. The tunnel was less than a yard wide; he braced himself against it, shearing the skin from his knuckles and knees. A moment’s gasp of air, and then he had slipped and was being hurtled along again. His head smacked against the tunnel wall. He felt like screaming.

And then he was in midair, flying effortlessly before crashing into water again after a fall of several yards through nothingness. Clean, cold air. He was out. He was in the river, and it was night outside. The water was brackish here, this close to the estuary. He choked on it, struggled manically to keep his head up, his manacled hands flailing. The current was taking him downstream, out to sea. But there was a tree here, leaning low over the water. He grasped at a trailing limb, missed, was slashed in the face by another and caught hold of a third, his grip slicing down the leaves. He pulled himself up it as though on a rope, and found mud under his feet. He waded ashore, shuddering with cold, and took a second to collect himself. Then he remembered Albrec, and floundered about on the muddy bank until he had found a long stick, all the while watching the surface of the racing river. He waited then for a long time, but saw nothing. It was too cold to remain. Either Albrec had drowned, or he had remained in the cell. He could not wait any longer. The lights of Torunn were bright and yellow and the city wall towered like a monolith barely two hundred yards away. Corfe had been washed ashore on a little patch of wasteland just within the city perimetre, not far from the southern barbican. It was too exposed here. He had to move on.

There were reed-beds here at the riverside, filled with old rubbish and stinking with the effluent of the sewers. He crept along in them as quietly as he could, and then stopped. Something was crashing about in front of him. A man.

“Lord God,” a voice whispered. “Oh, Lord-”

“Albrec!”

“Corfe?”

He moved forward again. The monk was caught in thigh-deep mud and looked like some glistening swamp denizen. Corfe hauled him out and then they lay there in the reeds for a while, utterly spent. Above them the clear sky was ablaze with stars from one horizon to the next.

“Come,” Corfe said at last. “We have to get away. We’ll die here else.”

Wordlessly, Albrec staggered to his feet and the two of them lurched off together like a pair of mud-daubed drunks.

“Where are we going?” the monk asked.

“To the only man of importance I think Fournier will have left alone. Your master, Macrobius.”

“What about the army?”

“Fournier will have it under control somehow. And he’ll have neutralised all my officers. Maybe the Queen too. I have to get these damned manacles off before my hands die. How much shooting did you hear when you were in there?”

“A lot of volleys. But they lasted a few minutes, not more.”

“There’s been no major battle then. They must have my men bottled up. The Merduks are probably on the march already. Hurry, Albrec! We don’t have time to waste.”