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worse than a sword.
    “Ah come on, Maddo!” It was Aethan, striding over with his horse in tow. “We’ll be back soon enough. Those Eldidd dogs can’t fight worth a pig’s fart.”
    “So they can’t, true enough.” He forced out a smile of his own. The captain had insisted that he keep the truth to himself until they were miles from the dun. “Where’s young Branoic?”
    “Here, sir.” Branoic came up, leading his horse into line. The lad was grinning as broadly as if they were going to some royal entertainment. “Let’s hope our enemies can fight well enough to give us some sport, huh? Ye gods, I thought I’d go mad this winter, shut up in the dun with naught to do but loll around and dice.”
    “Listen to him!” Aethan rolled his eyes heavenward. “I’ll wager we get our fill of blood soon enough.”
    The words stabbed Maddyn like an omen, but he kept smiling.
    “Aethan, do me somewhat of a favor, will you? Ride with our young Branno here, and keep an eye on him.”
    Although the lad bristled, as if to say he didn’t need such help, Aethan forestalled him with a friendly punch on the arm.
    “I will, at that, at least until the fighting starts. Then he can keep an eye on me.”
    They laughed, both as excited as young horses turned into pasture after a winter in the stables. The sight of them together wrung Maddyn’s heart for reasons that he hated to put into words, the one dark and grizzled, his oldest friend, the other blond and young, so new to his life thatwinter, and yet it seemed that he’d known Branoic for a hundred years. When the captain started yelling orders, the moment passed, but still, as they rode south, laying their false trail, Maddyn found himself brooding over it. It was a dangerous thing for a fighting man to care so deeply for his friends, especially when they were starting out on the bloodiest road they’d ever ridden.
    “What’s so wrong with you?” Caradoc said abruptly. “Your bowels stopped or suchlike?”
    “Oh, hold your tongue!”
    “Listen to him! Feisty today, aren’t we?”
    “My apologies, Carro. I hate lying at the best of times, and these are the worst. Saying farewell to Clwna, and her and the other women thinking well be back in an eightnight or so—it ached my heart.”
    “They’ll have to live with the truth just like the lads will. Listen to me, Maddo. Today we start a ride ordained by the gods themselves. Our petty little troubles are of no moment. None. Do you understand me?”
    “I do, at that.” He shivered suddenly, just from the quiet way that Caradoc spoke of such grave things. “Well and good, then. A man’s Wyrd comes when it comes.”
    “So it does, and ours is upon us now.”
    Maddyn turned in the saddle to look at him and wonder all over again just who Caradoc had been, back in his other life before dishonor sent him down the long road. It occurred to him that at last he was going to find out—if, of course, they all lived long enough to ride through the gates of Dun Cerrmor.
    Branoic was surprised at how little ground the silver daggers covered that afternoon. Even though the spring days were short, they could have made some twelve miles before sunset, but instead they stopped for their night’s camp on the banks of the Elaver just some five miles from the dun. Branoic tethered out his horse and Aethan’s while the elder man carried their gear to a campsite and drew them provisions from the pack train. As glad as he was to be out of the dun and riding, Branoic’s mood was dark that evening, and he swore at the horses for ducking their heads and grabbing grass while he was trying to change bridle for halter. He was disappointed, that was all, heartsick that hewas stuck in Pyrdon instead of riding behind the true king on his journey to Cerrmor—or so he told himself. Since he’d never been an introspective man, the excuse rang true enough.
    When he went back to the camp he found the troop settling in. Some men were spreading