“Like begets like. If someone kills a member of your clan dishonourably, you kill them dishonourably. If someone risks their life for you, you risk your life for them. No need for a code of laws. Honour is all you need.”

Fury, Stone Hill clan leader, interview with Triadic Priest-Scholar.

Hans Draiger, 16 October 1582 AAA. Farrier’s Hill.

He heard the flutter of wings and a thud behind him, and his third eye saw that Glaive had landed behind him.

“Did you get Traharn?” Glaive croaked.

“No.” Hans said, not daring to look away from Valkej. She and her fighters looked like they were itching for a chance to go for their weapons.

Over the distance crackle of flames and gunfire, he heard drumbeats and shouted orders. They were coming closer and closer.

“Commonwealth’s coming at us!” a militiaman yelled.

Christ-Horus.

“They’re coming for here? What?” Lorne yelled up at Arlew.

“We burnt down two airships. Of course they want to make sure we’re dead.” Valkej said, perverse pride in her voice.

“How far?” Lorne continued, ignoring Valkej. “Looks about, I don’t know, five, six hundred yards. A while away. There’s a lot of them. Pike and shot.” Arlew called back. The militiamen who’d stayed inside were hurring in, leading horses, and slamming the doors behind them.

“Take off your weapons.” Uln said, keeping her rifle levelled on Valkej. They had the few of Traharn’s fighters who were still up heavily outnumbered, and weapons trained on them.

“Those fuckers going to burn us?” Valkej asked, glancing at Glaive.

“Yes.” Glaive said.

“For fucks sake! Throw away your guns.” Uln snapped, her voice reverted to her Woose accent, both high pitched and deep at once.

Valkej did, throwing off her carbine and sabre, her remaining fighters doing the same.

“No!” Lorne said, putting himself in between Valkej and Glaive.

“Listen, the Commonwealth is coming, we have to get out of here-“ Hans began to say.

“I bloody well know that!” Lorne snapped, then turned to Glaive. “Listen, Glaive, we’ll bring her to trial, you already killed two of them-“

“Or you could leave them for the Commonwealth.” Hans said.

Glaive clicked. “They killed wyverns, not humans. Wyvern justice.”

“Look, Mister, they’re two hundred yards away! Run or fight! Give me a bloody answer!” Arlew was yelling down at them, other militiamen taking up fighting positions along the walls.

“You burned the one who actually did the killing, Traharn’s probably fighting the Commonwealth as we speak! Wasting time here achieves nothing!” Hans yelled.

“Still getting closer!” Arlew shouted down from the wall. “Should we get someone to shut the gates?”

“Yes, yes, do that!” Lorne said.

“How about we knock her on the head, bugger off, then work out what to do later?” Uln said.

Finally someone’s talking sense!

“Sir, Arlew’s right, we need to get ready to fight rather than taking these people-“ another militia trooper, her gun reluctantly trained on one of Traharn’s men, said.

“These people are working for the man who tried to kill my wife.”

“Then why don’t you let me burn her?” Glaive croaked.

A moment later, someone fired, and all hell broke loose. The militia on the walls opened up a moment before the rymthmic crash of a battalion firing by ranks started up.

I’m not getting into a gunfight with the Commonwealth.

Someone on the walls was struck and fell, and another went down, twitching and frothing. His third eye saw a demon, coiling and crushing her soul like a constrictor.

“Bugger this! Get up here and fight!” Arlew shouted. The militia on the ground began running for the walls, and the Farrier’s Hill militia, no longer watched, ran for it or grabbed their weapons. No one was stupid enough to start a fight in a building under attack.

“Give me my weapons back-“ Valkej began to say.

“No.” Glaive said, stalking towards her.

Hans edged over to Uln, keeping his rifle on Valkej.

“We need to get out of here. We’ll be bloody slaughtered if we try and take on an entire battalion.” Hans said.

Uln shook her head. “Should just shoot her and be done with it.”

Lorne was jogging for the walls.

Hans glanced at Glaive. “You’ve no guarantee she was actually responsible.”

“Those rockets are from Highhome. She’s involved.” Glaive answered over the noise of gunfire.

Hans shut his eyes. The infantry were within sight of his third eye by now, a solid mass of souls coming straight at them.

He heard a Glaive hiss something in her native language. Then she jumped, lightning fast, slamming Valkej to the ground with her claws and snapping her neck with her mouth with a wet crack.

Hans jerked back reflexively as his eyes shot open and he saw what had happened, almost pulling the trigger on his rifle before he stopped himself.

Half a dozen other guns were levelled on Glaive.

“Why the hell did you-“ Lorne yelled, turning back from the wall.

“You were going to hang her anyway. I saved you the trouble.” Glaive hissed.

“Christ Horus, why!” Hans said.

Glaive didn’t answer. She just turned away and took off, her scale-feathers rustling like leaves in the wind. The other two wyverns who’d gone down with her took off as well, moving up towards the wyverns in the sky.

Hans jogged over to Lorne. “What the hell do we do now-“

“Run. I’m not getting us chewed up in a firefight.” Lorne said. “Bloody wyverns.” He glanced up at the wall. “We’re falling back! Get down off there!”

By now, there were another two or three militia down, one of them still being savaged by a demon. Hans hit at the demon with his tendril with a feeling like punching water. It coiled loose from the victim, up into the air, then came swarming down on him. Shit-

Hans knew a few things about fighting demons from his days as an apprentice white witch to his aunt. The first lesson was that the sort of demon an army witch would be binding was bloody dangerous.

He managed to hit it with a tendril and tried to dig in, holding it back. It slid through, the aether rippling around it, coming straight for his soul. He threw a second tendril, not head on but hooked, straight into the side of its head. That seemed to knock the thing off him, and it went coiling off into the aether.

Uln grabbed and shook him. “We need to go, Lorne’s pulling us back.” As she said it, a rocket thudded down into the ground, burying itself up to the tail-stick, while a second crashed in through the roof of the manor house.

The militia were filing out through the manor’s courtyard, running towards the north gate, some leading horses, two or three to one man, and others dragging wounded. Other people, unarmed and unarmoured, were running too-Traharn’s household servants. Lorne flung open the north gate in the manor house and rushed out, Hans and Uln following. A few of Valkej's militia snatched up weapons and went for the walls. The rest fled with Lorne's men.

He looked around. It was a sunken country road, fringed on one side with a hedge and on the other with a low stone wall, with a patch of forest behind. Between that forest and the wall was a company of Commonwealth grenadiers, coming around the manor house, in red coats under iron breastplates with tall caps. “They’re over there!” Hans shouted in warning as they began to present arms, bayonets catching the morning sun as they levelled their weapons.

He threw himself down behind the wall, shouting “Get down!” over and over. Lorne was yelling “Get to the horses, get to the horses!” behind him. Uln dropped down next to him, cocking her rifle with a creak-they’d left their spears behind at some point.

“What the hell do we do?” Uln asked.

Hans bobbed his head up over the wall. The soldiers were pushing forwards, moving almost at a jog despite the weight of their armour.

“They’re going to bring it to push of bayonet!” someone shouted.

“Fuck it, run!” Hans yelled.

It they stood their ground on foot, they’d be bayonetted, and if they tried to mount up, they’d be gunned down. Running on foot seemed like the best option. His feet seemed to agree.

Then for the third time the wyverns were sweeping in, wings spread for landing, crushing grass under their bodies as they landed off to the left of the grenadiers. They weren’t dumb enough to put themselves in the crossfire. “Don’t fire!” Lorne screamed when he saw some of his men taking aim, and the Commonwealth officers were doing the same, their men halting and pulling up.

“They came for Traharn like you! Don’t shoot” Glaive was shouting, her mimicry cracking into a scream.

“Is he dead!” someone shouted back, an officer and a few other men jogging out ahead of the main group.

“He’s not there and most of his fighters are dead!” Lorne yelled back.

“Shoulder your arms, march away and we’ll let you go!” the officer shouted.

Lorne clambered over the wall, moving closer to the Grenadier officer.

Hans vaulted over the wall, following Lorne out.

“Traharn’s men tried to murder Lorne’s wife!” Hans shouted back, cupping his hands.

“And we want him and all his allies for consorting with fey and god knows what else! There was a fight in Trackford last night, we don’t know if they got him! They told us to continue out here to make sure we had all of them.” The grenadier officer shouted back, glancing nervously at a body of pikemen and musketeers in civilian clothes slowly coming forwards, into musket range.

“So do we!” Lorne yelled.

“Then why are we pointing guns at each other?“ the officer shouted.

Lorne looked uncertain.

“One of them said Traharn was going to burn Trackford down!”

Traharn and his party are going down either way.

“I’ll-“

A single shot rang out, fired by and hitting no-one in particular.

It was all that was needed.

“Get down!” Hans screamed, throwing himself flat against the pasture as the grenadiers began to present.

Lorne yelled “Hold fire!” but it was too late. The militia fired the first volley, barely missing the wyverns as they flung themselves into the air. He heard the the crash of the gunshots, balls whistling overhead, the pang of them skipping off breastplates, the screams of a wounded man. Two or three grenadiers dropped as they charged, surging forwards, the officer urging them on, waving a sword and rondache, screaming at the top of his lungs.

“Run! Run!” Hans screamed, getting to his feet, pulling Uln up, rushing for the safety of the wall. Some of the militia were still firing after that first volley; those with double-barrels or pistols, or simply those who were quickest to reload.

That idiot, that idiot, he killed up all, they’re better trained, better armed and there’s far more of them…

He vaulted over and threw himself down just as the Grenadiers fired their volley in preparation for an attack with bayonets. Something fell over him; a man, screaming and flailing, pinning him down before Uln threw him off Hans. The Grenadiers were making to charge, but through the smoke he saw more men, militia with long rifles, charging forwards from a patch of woodland to fire into the grenadiers rear and more men rushing down the sunken road, peppering them with gunfire as they came. Pikemen came up too, like a walking forest, their unemcumbered musketeers leaving them in the dust. He hunkered down behind the wall, bullets whipping over his head, the massed gunfire leaving him half deaf.

“Hans! Can you see their bloody witch?” Lorne shouted, right in his ear.

He shut his eyes, briefly, trying to make out tendrils amongst the mass of souls. The Grenadiers, to his shock, were holding their ground despite it being their turn to be outflanked and outnumbered, each rank firing a volley into the militia before breaking off and sprinting for the manor house. He saw the witch, then, her tendrils fanning out, stretching and warping the aether in front of them into a bullet-slowing ward.

When he opened his eyes, he spotted more commonwealth soldiers coming around the manor house, pikemen and musketeers, but couldn’t make out the witch through the haze of smoke and moving bodies.

Beside him, Uln was already reloading, breathing hard.

Fuck it, just shoot.

He leaned up, picked a grenadier at random, aimed, fired, and dropped down, not even bothering to see if he hit, then started reloading, as fast as possible. By the time he’d done reloading, the last of the grenadiers had already broken off for the manor house, but some of them were firing down from the walls. The rest of the Commonwealth troops were milling about in confusion. Militia were running and firing every which way; some in mobs, some in neat formations, some rushing from cover to cover.

“Fall back and get to the horses!” Lorne yelled, scrambling up. “We’re falling back!” Hans yelled at Uln, as loud as he could despite her being right next to him. She got up, firing one last shot, then turned and ran, him sprinting right after her. Lorne’s militia were peeling back, some of them having to be hauled up bleeding even as local militia rushed in and took over their positions. A man went down ahead of him; Hans caught him by the scruff of the neck and pulled him along, half staggering, before Lorne took the weight off him. Some of the horses were down, hit by stray balls, and others had vanished. The horse-holders had run forwards into the fight or gone to ground.

“Holy shit, they’re bringing it to push of pike!”

He glanced back and saw the Commonwealth foot marching forwards in a ragged line, pikes and bayonets levelled, straight at the militia pikes.

“Mount up!” Lorne yelled, as they began to clamber onto their horses. There weren’t enough.

“Shouldn’t we stand and fight?” Arlew asked.

Lorne shook his head. “I came here for justice. We got that. Now we’re getting the wounded to safety.” He saddled up, slinging the bleeding man over the saddle pommel. Others were doubling up, two fighters to a horse, or simply getting ready to jog alongside the animals.

“Those are our bloody people getting brought to push of pike-“

Not my people. Not truly.

“We did what we came here to do. Now we get out of here.” Lorne said.

Lorne turned his horse away, and Hans followed.

He wasn’t getting himself slaughtered fighting for Carfane. They likely wouldn’t die for him, and they certainly wouldn’t die for Uln.