‘On a day when we should have been working to secure all our futures, one brood has been rendered extinct and others will be so depleted they cannot hope to survive.’

Hirad felt the ocean-deep grief as if it were his own.

‘In our pride we used to think it was other species so blind that they would fight each other over nothing though their mutual extinction was the only sure result. And yet we are worse. Our failure could extinguish so many lives because we have chosen to touch them without offering them the choice to refuse us.

‘Tell me you are close to Xetesk.’

‘Less than a day, Great Kaan. But there’s one hell of a fight coming to get in there. The demons aren’t exactly going to usher us in, are they?’

Sha-Kaan paused. Below, the centre of the fight exploded in appalling flame, engulfing fifty, a hundred even. ‘When is the fight?’

‘It’s already begun. Julatsans and the Al-Arynaar are under attack as they approach Xetesk. We’re joining them and we’ll all enter the city early tomorrow morning.’

‘I will bring the Kaan to you.’

‘No,’ said Hirad. ‘We shouldn’t declare our hand and announce all our allies. Save your strength, save as many as you can and be ready when I call.’

Sha-Kaan rumbled. ‘You could fail at the gates.’

‘We won’t fail,’ said Hirad. ‘We’re—’

‘Don’t,’ said Sha-Kaan. ‘Don’t say it.’ Embryonic humour flared, gone in a wing beat. ‘Time to go, Hirad Coldheart. I must pick through the ashes and rebuild what I can.’

‘Good luck.’

‘Skies keep you, my friend.’

Hirad opened his eyes, pain already a fading pulse in his head. Above him, a ring of anxious faces. Thraun’s cracked a smile.

‘Sha-Kaan?’ he said and held out a hand.

Hirad grasped it and pulled himself up.

‘Yes,’ he nodded. ‘More trouble, I’m afraid. Look, we need to get a move on when we get into Xetesk. I’ll tell you on the way but it seems to me that every day we delay, fewer dragons will be alive to shield us.’

The cacophony surrounding the wagon train was so complete Rebraal could barely make himself heard. The demon attacks were incessant now and since the disastrous loss of two ColdRoom mage teams the previous night, the pressure on the Al-Arynaar warriors was acute. The humans were panicked now, losing their heads and then their souls when their discipline failed. Five of the eight wagons had elven drivers now and so few humans actually remained that Rebraal contemplated placing them all in wagons. Through his irritation at their failings, though, he couldn’t help but be impressed by the sheer doggedness that they showed. And every time their numbers fell, they still found time to joke. The Al-Arynaar couldn’t understand laughter in such dire circumstance but Rebraal had seen it all before with The Raven.

Right now, though, he was more concerned with the horses. All of them were tired and the accumulated stress was evident in trembling limbs and eyes that spoke of their confusion. His elves still spoke soothing words to them but eventually that would not be enough.

Above him, the demons were massing again. He didn’t have much time. Rebraal ran down the line of surviving wagons. His limp was becoming more pronounced. The cloth tight around his thigh could do only so much. The claws of the cursyrd had raked deep during the last attack and of course he hadn’t been able to rest and so the blood still flowed. The wound felt frozen, his muscle damaged, but he could not afford to stop. Not until Auum and The Raven reached them.

But where were they?

The wagon train was passing to the south-east of Triverne Lake now. Before long, they could expect concerted attack from the Xetesk cursyrd, adding to the legions that had dogged them from Julatsa.

Two days of constant noise, repeated attacks and movement broken only to change horses was taking quick toll. They were all tired: the mages in the wagons with paper-thin concentration; the warriors running beside them with muscles burning and fatigued; attack mages with barely time to cast the simplest spell in the mana holes before the cursyrd were upon them.

In every face he passed, human or elven, he saw exhaustion growing. In humans, he saw belief wavering. He shouted encouragement, clenched his fists and demanded strength. He invoked Yniss and Tual. He muttered under his breath for Shorth to be ready to accept them all.

Over five hundred had left Julatsa, man and elf. They had lost over a hundred and the survivors needed fresh hope. The Raven would provide it. The Raven never joined the losing side.

He reached the head of the column. Elves drove the leading pair of wagons now. Tired horses flagged but he was loath to stop. He glanced up for the thousandth time. The sky was darkening with cursyrd, their voices clamoured ever louder.

‘Ready!’ he called.

The word was passed down the line. Elves rode wagons, clustered by their sides, defended mages running close to mana holes. All felt their hearts quicken.

‘Dila’heth!’

The lead elven mage answered him. She was out of sight on the other side of the wagon. He jogged round to her where she talked with Pheone. The Julatsan leader was still strong, hanging onto the threads of human courage.

‘Gyal’s tears, Rebraal, you should be resting.’

Rebraal grinned fiercely. ‘You know I can’t.’

‘Where are they?’ asked Dila. She like him was shouting to make herself heard above the din of the cursyrd above.

‘Close,’ he said. ‘They have to be.’ He caught Pheone’s eye. ‘They’ll be here.’

She smiled. ‘I’m sure.’

‘Where’s your position?’ asked Dila.

‘I’ll be with the second pair of wagons. Keep the horses straight. Try that move outside the shell if you get the chance. Anything to disrupt them.’

She nodded. ‘They are so many. And think of the hundreds we have already killed.’

‘No, don’t think that way. Think only that Xetesk will be in sight before dark and that we will be inside before noon tomorrow. They’ll be expecting us.’

‘I hope so.’

‘Yniss watches over us.’

‘He needs to do more than that.’

‘I hear you, Dila. Run strong.’

He turned to Pheone. ‘Get on the wagon.’

‘No,’ she replied. ‘I need to be seen.’

‘You need to live,’ said Rebraal. ‘There are greater fights to come. Please. I don’t want to have to put you on there myself.’

Pheone bit her lip but nodded. ‘I guess you’re right.’

Rebraal inclined his head and jogged away back towards the second pair of wagons. He could barely see the horses for the elven escort. The human drivers though, he could, and they were terrified, eyes up not ahead. He breasted through the flanking guards, shouting his confidence and hearing it reflected back. He leapt onto the kicking board of the left-hand cart.

‘We go forwards, not upwards,’ he said, his hand on the shoulder of the driver.

‘Yeah, but death comes from upwards not forwards,’ growled the middle-aged man, Brynn. He had a face latticed by the cuts of the strike-strain, a bandaged head and a belligerent belief in his right to survive. Rebraal liked him. He was Hirad, ten years hence.

‘Let me watch the sky, Brynn. Just keep these animals in a straight line.’

‘They know better than to deviate with me behind them,’ said Brynn, face softening by a degree. ‘Ride with me this time, eh? See what it’s like from up here.’

‘I intend to,’ said Rebraal.

And the sky fell in.

Strike-strain poured into the back of the line, reavers to the front. It was a tactic they had worked before, attempting to drive the train at different speeds front and back, creating a chaotic middle ground.

‘Keep your form!’ called Rebraal into the din, his words carried up and down the line. ‘Hold your pace! Hold your pace!’

Like the locusts that plagued the southern dry plains of Calaius, the strike-strain flooded the rear wagons. For a few moments, Rebraal watched the clamouring cloud descend. Blades flickered in the sudden half-light. An IceWind howled a tear in the enemy and the wagons were obscured from view.