The cathedral was thronged with a murmuring crowd of damp-smelling people. They knelt in the pews or on the flagged floor and queued in their hundreds to have a chance to say goodbye to their monarch. Unending lines of them. They were not grieving so much as awed by the solemnity, the austere splendour of the dead King’s lying-in-state. Lofantyr had not ruled long enough to become loved, and was a name, no more. A figurehead in the ordered system of the world.

Outside it sounded as though a heavy sea were beating against the hoary old walls of the cathedral. Another crowd, less tractable. The surf-roar of their voices was ominous, frightening even. A quarter of a million people had gathered in the square beyond the cathedral gates. No-one was quite sure why—probably they did not truly know themselves. The common people were confused. Palace bulletins stated that the recent battle had been a victory for Torunnan arms. But why then was their King dead and eight thousand of their menfolk lying stark and cold upon the winter field? They felt themselves duped, and were angry. Any spark would set them off.

And yet, Corfe thought, I am expected to take my turn standing ceremonial guard over a dead man, when I am now commander-in-chief of a shattered army. Tradition. Its wheels turn on tyrelessly even in a time like this.

But it gave him a space to think, if nothing else. Two days since the great battle of the Torunnan Plain. “The King’s Battle” they were already calling it. Odd how people always thought it so important that a battle should have a name. It gave some strange coherence to what was, after all, a chaotic, slaughterous nightmare. Historians needed things neater, it seemed.

Twenty-seven thousand men left to defend the capital—the Last Army. Torunna had squandered her soldiers with sickening prodigality. An entire field army destroyed in the sack of Aekir. Another decimated in the fall of Ormann Dyke. And even this remaining force had lost nearly a third of its number in the latest round of blood-letting. But the Merduks—how many had they lost? A hundred thousand in the assaults on Aekir, it was reckoned. Thirty thousand more in front of the dyke. And another forty thousand in the King’s Battle. How could a single people absorb losses on that scale? Numberless though the hordes of the east might be, Corfe could not believe that they were unaffected by such awful arithmetic. They would hesitate before committing themselves to another advance, another around of killing. That was his hope, the basis for all his half-formed plans. He needed time.

Corfe and Andruw were relieved at last, their place taken with grim parade-ground formality by Colonels Rusio and Willem. Corfe caught the cold glance of Willem as he marched away towards the back of the cathedral. Hatred there, resentment at the elevation of an upstart to the highest military command in the west. Well, that was not unexpected, but it would complicate things. Things were always complicated, even when it came to that most basic of human activities, the killing of one’s fellow man.

C ORFE was unburdened of his armour by a small regiment of palace servitors in the General’s Suite of the palace. His new quarters were a cavernous cluster of marble-cold rooms within which he felt both uncomfortable and absurd. But the general could no longer be allowed to mess with his men, drink beer in the common refectories or pick the mud off his own boots. The Queen Dowager—now Torunna’s monarch and sole remaining vestige of royalty—had insisted that Corfe assume the trappings of his rank.

It is a long time, Corfe thought to himself, since I shared cold turnip with a blind man on the retreat from Aekir. Another world.

A discreet footman caught his eye and coughed. “General, a simple repast has been set out for you in your dining chamber. I suggest you avail yourself of it while it is still hot. Our cook—”

“I’ll eat later. Have the palace steward sent to me at once, and some writing materials. And the two scribes who attended me last night. And pass the word for Colonel Andruw Cear-Adurhal.”

The footman blinked, crinkling the white powder on his temples. Where in the name of God did that fashion begin? Corfe wondered distractedly.

“All shall be as you wish, of course. But General, the palace steward, the Honourable Gabriel Venuzzi, is answerable only to the Monarch of Torunna. He is not under your aegis, if you will forgive me. He is a person of some considerable importance in the household, and were I to convey so—so peremptory a summons, he might take it ill. If you will allow me, I, as senior footman of the household, should be able to answer any questions you might have about the running of the palace and the behaviour expected of all who dwell within it, as guests or otherwise.”

This last sentence had inserted within it a sneer so delicate it almost passed Corfe by. He frowned and turned a cold eye upon the powdered fellow. “What’s your name?”

The footman bowed. “Damian Devella, General.”

“Well, Damian, let’s get a few things straight. In future, you and your associate servitors will wipe that white shit off your faces when you attend me. You’re not ladies’ maids, nor yet pantomime performers. And you will send for this Venuzzi fellow. Now. Clear it with Her Majesty if you must, but get his powdered backside in this room within the quarter-hour, or by God I’ll have you and your whole prancing crew conscripted into the army and we’ll see if there’s even six inches of backbone hidden under all that velvet and lace. Do you understand me?”

Devella’s mouth opened, closed. “I–I—yes, General.”

“Good. Now fuck off.”

Scribes, a writing desk, a decanter of wine, appeared with remarkable speed. Corfe stepped out on to his balcony as behind him the dining chamber was transformed into an office of sorts and members of the household scurried about like ants whose nest has been poked with a stick.

Outside sleet was withering down from the Cimbric Mountains. Corfe could see the vast crowd still milling about in Cathedral Square, their voices meshing into a shapeless buzz of noise. Half of them were Aekirian refugees, still without homes of their own or the prospect of any alteration in their wretchedness. That would change, if he could help it. They were his people too. He had been a refugee like them and could never forget it.

“What’s afoot, General?” Andruw’s cheery voice demanded. Corfe turned. His friend was dressed in old field fatigues and comfortable boots, but his colonel’s braid was bright and shining-new. It looked as though he had stitched it on himself. Some of the ice about Corfe’s heart eased a little. It would be a black day indeed that saw Andruw out of humour.

“Just trying to get a few things done before the funeral,” he told Andruw. “That crowd means business, even if they don’t know it themselves yet. You brought the papers?”

“They’re on the table. Lord, I’ll need some sleep tonight. And some fresh air to blow away the smell of all that ink and paper. Stacks of it!”

“Think of it as ammunition. Ah—excuse me, Andruw.”

A richly dressed man with an ebony staff of office had been admitted to the room by the footmen with all the pomp of an eastern potentate. He was very tall, very slim, and as dark as a Merduk. A native of Kardikia or perhaps southern Astarac, Corfe guessed.

“Gabriel Venuzzi?”

The man bowed slightly, a mere nod of the head. “Indeed. You, I believe, are General Cear-Inaf.”

“The very same. Now listen here Gabriel, we have a problem on our hands and I believe you may be able to help me solve it.”

“Indeed? I am glad to hear it. And what might be the nature of this problem, General? Her Majesty has requested me to give you any assistance in my power, and I of course must obey her commands to the letter.”