Chapter 8: The West Wall

The west wall of Fort Gallowmere burned orange against the dark, and the air above it crackled with green light.

Yui ran up the stairs to the wall walk with her tunic half-laced and her notebook in her fist, and Greta limped beside her shouting orders.

The hex-riders were out on the frozen ground below, a dozen of them on black horses, with long staves lifted.

Each time a stave dipped, green fire curled up over the parapet and a soldier screamed.

"Down!" Brunhild's voice cut through the noise like a blade. "Shields up! Pull the wounded behind the line!"

She stood at the head of the gate stair in full steel, with her sword drawn and her white-gold head bare.

Yui had held that head in her lap an hour ago.

There was no sign of it now in the hard grey face.

"Shield wall at the gate," Brunhild called. "Keep them behind the line. Lady Yui, there."

She pointed her sword at a stretch of wall under the overhang, where the stones were lit only by torches.

Forty men lay and sat against it, in rows, gasping.

The black rot spread across their faces and hands.

Yui dropped to her knees at the first one.

"Hold still," she said, and laid her fingers on his cheek.

White light.

The black pulled back, and the man sagged against the wall, whole.

"Next."

She did not look up.

She had learned the rhythm in four days: touch, light, release, next.

A woman with a mark across her throat.

A boy with the rot crawling up both arms.

Behind her the shield wall rang as the green fire broke on it, and the shouts came and went.

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