'We go now, a long road. Silence until we reach the forest. Any questions?' Alben whispered.

They set off in single file, Alben leading the way, Maquin taking rearguard, eight men slipping through the abandoned town of Ripa, giving wide berth to the bonfires that marked Vin Thalun guard posts. If the fires had not been burning Maquin would still have been able to find and avoid most of them by the drunken singing.

We are under siege, but these Vin Thalun are not made for such things. They are too savage, bred to strike hard and fast, win or retreat. A siege requires patience, planning, organization. Lykos is up to this task, maybe, but the rest?

Soon they were out of the town and into the long gra.s.s that undulated all the way to the Sarva forest. A breeze off the bay soughed through the gra.s.s. Maquin was sweating when they reached the first trees of the forest. They paused here, drank from water skins and rested a few moments. Maquin looked back, the lights from Ripa's walls and tower twinkling like starlight in the distance. He thought of Fidele in that tower, remembered their parting, could still taste her lips.

I feel alive again, as if I've woken from a long sleep. From a nightmare. He grinned again. He found he'd been doing that a lot since he'd woken from his fever. Although in this new world some of the monsters from my nightmare have followed me. He thought of Lykos, a dark rage bubbling up from the place where it always simmered deep within him, growing as he thought of the pain the Vin Thalun had brought Fidele.

Alben put a hand on his shoulder and he had to stop himself reaching for a knife.

'You'll see her again,' Alben whispered to him, too quiet for anyone else to overhear.

'How far to Balara?' Maquin asked.

'Half a day's ride. So for us a day and a half of hard walking.'

'We'd best be off, then,' Maquin said.

'Aye. Fidele tells me you're accustomed to forests.'

'You could say that. I served with the Gadrai in Forn.'

'Well then, join me at the front, and let's see if we can make Balara in a day.'

With that they set off into the forest, the trees engulfing them like a dark cloak.

'There it is,' Alben said, pointing. Balara was visible through a gap in the trees, a crumbling stone ruin built upon a tree-shrouded hilltop by ancient giants.

In another lifetime, when the world was a different place.

It was a little past dawn, sunrise gleaming upon the eastern wall of the ancient fortress. All eight of them stood and stared for a while. Maquin saw a wain slowly roll up a track to the east, pulled by auroch, six Vin Thalun riding with it. They were not good hors.e.m.e.n. No one said a word as the wain and riders disappeared within the broken archway of what had once been the grand entrance to the fortress.

'We didn't come all this way for nothing, then,' Alben murmured.

They'd near enough run the whole way, taking them just over a day. Maquin's body ached in a thousand places, but it felt good to be out in the wide open, no walls, only trees and sky. 'Get some sleep,' Alben said to them all. 'I'll take first watch. We'll move at sunset.'

Maquin dipped his fingers into black mud beside a stream, wiped streaks across his cheeks, rubbed the rest across the pommel and cross-guards of his sword and knives. The others were performing similar acts, going through their own rituals that rea.s.sured them before the prospect of battle. Maquin reached inside his leather jerkin and pulled out a piece of red velvet. Fidele had given it to him when they parted, cut from the hem of her dress.

'Ready to move,' Alben said close by. 'We are to investigate the ruins. Our orders are to find out why the Vin Thalun are here. No killing.' He shrugged. 'Not until I say so.' Men grinned around him.

They hate the Vin Thalun almost as much as I do.

Alben drew a circle in the mud with a stick. 'This is Balara.' He drew a smaller circle at its centre. 'This is the heart of the fortress, a tower and foundations where we found the Vin Thalun fighting-pits.'

That made Maquin snarl, an involuntary reaction.

Another line from the outer wall to the tower. 'This is the main route in, most likely the bulk of the Vin Thalun will be contained within this area.' He drew a line circling the area between the gates and the central tower.

'That's all we know about the fortress.' He shrugged. 'We will search first. Perhaps that is all we'll do. We may leave without drawing blood. That decision will be made later, and by me alone. Do you understand me?'

Alben looked around the half-circle of men, held each one's gaze a few moments.

'Good. Then let's move.'

They followed Alben up the slope. The trees thinned and the men broke out into open meadow, the weak light of a new moon and stars gilding the hillside and ruin towering above them in silver.

The main gateway, where they had seen the wain enter, lay to the east. Alben led them in a wide loop, eventually ending up beneath the western stretch of crumbled and ruined wall.

As they climbed across huge boulder-sized blocks, a scattering of rock dislodged and fell, rattling loud in the dark. They paused ready for an alarm to be raised when none came, they went on.

They entered the ruins, slipping from building to building, the flicker of firelight ahead. They edged closer, fires burning in iron-wrought bowls edging a wide flagstoned street. At the end of it a broken tower loomed, an orange glow pulsing from a wide-open doorway at its base. Vin Thalun stood guard about the tower, four that Maquin could see. The wain they had seen arrive earlier was sitting in the shadows, the auroch nowhere to be seen.

Alben moved towards the tower, Maquin and the others following. They circled wide again, approaching the tower from the north side. Creeping up to one of the windows, Alben beckoned Maquin to join him.

Inside, the tower consisted of one huge circular room, a broken stairwell spiralling upwards about its edge. A fire-pit burned in its centre, the remains of a spitted carca.s.s crusting black. Vin Thalun were scattered about the room, eating, singing quietly, drinking. A score maybe, no more. Alben pointed. Maquin squinted, not seeing anything at first, then he noticed the iron spike hammered into the ground. Two thick chains were attached to it, trailing off into the shadows beneath the stairwell. Two hulking figures crouched in the darkness, barely visible, but Maquin knew them in an instant.

Lykos' giants.

Alben tapped his shoulder and they stole away from the window, back to the others grouped in the darkness. Alben whispered an explanation of what he and Maquin had just seen.

'Are they the giants that Fidele spoke of?' Alben asked Maquin.

'Aye. A female and a bairn. They are Lykos' giants.'

'Why are they here?'

'Why does he have them?'

The questions started to s...o...b..ll.

'It does not matter,' Maquin interrupted. 'All that matters is that they are precious to Lykos and that they are within our grasp.'

'What are you suggesting?' Alben asked him.

'That we take them from him.'

'Eight of us against thirty, near enough,' Alben said. He was looking at Maquin with his head c.o.c.ked to one side.

'It can be done,' Maquin said, returning his gaze. 'The guards, by stealth that's six, evens the odds a little.'

'And the score in that tower?' Alben said.

'I'm thinking you have a plan for that already.'

Alben stared at him a moment longer, lips twitching.

'How would we get the giants back to Ripa?' someone asked.

'The same way they were brought here under guard,' Maquin said. 'We would need to kill every man here. Word cannot reach Lykos. It would be a difficult journey back to Ripa, but there are enough of us to guard them, and you know the forest paths. We would slip back into Ripa as planned, under cover of darkness.'

'And if the giants do not cooperate.'

'They are mother and child. I saw with my own eyes that she will do anything to protect her bairn.' Maquin shrugged, a ripple in the dark. 'All we must do is convince her that it is better for her bairn's health that she cooperate rather than fight us.'

Alben stared at him long moments, then he nodded.

Maquin crouched below the tower window. Alben had left one warrior with Maquin Valent, one of Krelis' men, a veteran of many sea battles with the Vin Thalun before the peace of Aquilus and taken the others into the darkness.

'I will deal with the guards. Wait for my signal,' Alben had said as the shadows claimed him. Maquin had not bothered to ask what the signal would be.

I'll know it when it happens.

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 b.l.o.o.d.y.' 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 carca.s.s 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.

A quick glance saw Valent standing before the giants, giving ground to three Vin Thalun. Maquin saw the warrior he had kicked the spitted carca.s.s onto push it away and begin to rise from the ground. The main doorway was empty, bodies piled across it, the clash of iron telling of battle in the road outside. There were no others left within the tower. In two long strides Maquin was upon the man trying to rise, kicked him back to the ground and stabbed his sword into the soft flesh of his throat.

Valent went down, a gaping wound between his neck and shoulder. His attacker stood above him, sword-arm rising and falling into Valent's skull, an explosion of blood and bone. Another Vin Thalun stood close by, one arm hanging limp at his side, blood dripping from his fingertips. The third one was approaching the two giants, their bulk still huddled beneath the spiral staircase.

Maquin ran at them.

He hamstrung the one with the injured arm, heard him drop to the ground with a thud as he threw himself into the warrior that had slain Valent, buried his knife to the hilt in the man's armpit, left it there, spun away and staggered on towards the man now attacking the two unarmed giants. He was hacking at the giantess, who was crouching before the bairn, her teeth bared in a snarl, using the chain she was shackled with to block his sword blows. Maquin saw she had not been entirely successful, blood running from a gash in her forearm, another from her calf.

The Vin Thalun heard Maquin's approach and turned, swinging his sword, sending Maquin's stabbing thrust wide, and they crunched together, wrestling, Maquin trying to break free, make room to swing his blade. They tripped over the giant chain and crashed to the ground, rolling on the stone floor. Pain spiked in Maquin's body, his old wound screaming a complaint.

No time for pain. He ground his teeth.

Maquin lost the grip on his sword, b.u.t.ted his head forwards, felt something crunch. The grip about him loosened and he reached for the last knife in his boot. A punch in the kidneys took his breath away, pain exploding in his back, then an arm was around his throat. He bucked, writhed, threw his head backwards but nothing changed the iron grip around his neck. He clawed at the arm, feeling his strength fading, a dark nimbus seeping into the fringes of his vision, white dots exploding in his head. Something gripped one of his boots and he saw the warrior he'd hamstrung dragging himself across the floor, leaving a trail of blood. I will not die.

Panic swept him and gave a last burst of adrenalin. His body spasmed, every muscle and sinew straining, his face purple, tendons thick as rope bulging in his neck, but still the grip about his throat held.

He slumped, feeling the strength flowing out of him, somewhere distantly realized with mild surprise that this was the end.

Fidele . . .

His body jerked suddenly, shook like a straw doll, then the grip around his throat was gone and he was choking, sucking in great, ragged breaths. Behind him a man screamed.

The warrior gripping his ankles stared up at him, then let go and reached for a sword.

Too late.

Maquin kicked him in the face, pulled his last knife from his boot and stabbed the man through the eye. He spasmed, legs kicking, then went slack.

Maquin rolled over, saw the warrior who had almost killed him caught by the giantess. She'd wrapped the length of her chain about his throat and was pulling tight. The man's face was a grey-purple explosion of veins, bulging eyes and swelling tongue. There was a popping sound, vertebrae in his neck snapping, and his head suddenly lolled, eyes glazing. The giantess continued to pull, muscles bulging, rippling along her forearms like snakes in a sack. With a tearing sound Maquin saw the flesh about the chain begin to fray, then tear, blood seeping, then exploding in a violent jet as the giantess gave one last savage wrench and the man's head ripped free.

She stepped away, her eyes fixed on Maquin, letting the Vin Thalun's corpse flop to the ground, and sitting beside her son, who gripped her hand tightly.

Maquin backed away, picked up his sword, still watching the giants, then headed for the tower doorway, stopping to retrieve his knives on the way.

Alben stepped into the room. Blood sheeted his forehead and his sword was red to the hilt. 'The giants?'

'Still alive.' Maquin pointed to the shadows beneath the stairwell.

They stood and stared a long while at the giants, who returned their gaze with wariness.

She saved my life. The thought left Maquin feeling uncomfortable. But then, I saved hers. She was still bleeding from her wounds.

Alben offered her a flask of water.

'Drink, and clean your wounds,' Alben said. The giantess stared unblinking back at him. Alben tried again. 'Deach agus glan do gortuithe.'

Giantish.

The giantess frowned, then reached out and took the water skin. She sniffed it, took a tentative sip, then gave it to her bairn. He took a deep drink, then poured water over his mother's wounds, washing the blood away.

'I can tend your wounds, bind them for you,' Alben said.

'Cad ba mhaite leat?' the giantess said. Her lips twisted in a sneer.

'Me troid ar son an realta geal. Sbhilt anois. Ach ni feidir liom a leagtar t' saor in aisce mo namhaid stor. Ni mor duit teacht liom,' Alben replied.

'Ni feidir liom,' the giantess growled, her voice a basal rumble. 'Bhaineann me go dti an aingeal dorcha.'