As it happened, Luthene needed more than one book to write down the memories as they came to her. Everything was so disjointed, however, and she found herself numbering the pages and then referencing those numbers when a related memory came to her. Especially odd were the memories that did not fit, indeed which seemed impossible. Perhaps Lajaka would be able to help her sort things. Luthene also sketched in the pages whenever a face came to mind that she couldn't properly describe with words. These drawings were hardly works of art, but they helped things fresh in her mind. Perhaps, she reasoned, by recalling these memories enough times as herself, they wouldn't fade so easily when the clock was repaired.

Travelling through the desert was a bit easier this time, with Galin and Luthene only needing to watch each other, and with far more supplies than scrolls. While neither of them were fond of ships, it was faster to take one from Cittapashe to Dunholm, so they returned to the quaint port town. It was busier than  before, and while Galin tried to find them room at an inn, only the Cockles and Mussels had room for them. It was rather cozy the second time.

A longship took them to Dunholm, and there they put word out that they were looking for Lajaka. A woman with such a distinctive name was hard to miss, and there was a man with half a nose at a dockside tavern who seemed to remember her. "I'd like to teach her some bloody manners, that whore." He gave Luthene a lewd glance, and Galin slipped an arm around her waist. This was something he'd done plenty of times now, but this seemed more protective. It reminded her of the time he'd first done it with the Company, when they were offering her a place in their huts. This one is mine, it seemed to say. Move along.

After a few day in Dunholm, they had managed to get word out that there was silver in it for anyone who knew of Lajaka's whereabouts, and directed her to Adeluna. Word was that they were already there, having more loot than they could sell in the North. Luthene was relieved.

Finding a ship to take them to Adeluna was more difficult, but they managed to find a captain hauling cargo who could take them aboard. This trip was as cold and miserable as the last one, though Luthene was far less shy about sharing a blanket with Galin, and like when they were out on campaign, they arranged themselves like a pair of spoons to keep warm.

Winter winds are harsh and cold, but the captain knew how to ride them to his destination. As a result, it took less time than Luthene expected for them to dock in Adeluna, and she was grateful for it. Then they disembarked and learned the terrible news: plague.

"Maker's bullocks, I never should have let you two go," Domnall said when they reached the hall. "I hope fixing that bloody clock was worth it, because it's the last leave you'll get for a while. Lost near thirty men already, and a dozen more sick. They'll all die too, like as not, and not a damn thing to be done about it. Lost the physician yesterday." Luthene was saddened to learn this. The loss of anyone was hard, but she was closer to the physician from the time when Galin was recovering from his injury.

"Give them weak ale or watered-down wine," Luthene said without really thinking. Her mother had survived two plagues and told her some things. With the physician dead, the things she'd learned as a child might be the best they'd have. "Keep the sick well away from the healthy, if you can. Even away from their families, else they'll just get sick, too. You're right, the sick men will likely die, and the best thing is to keep more people from catching the illness by being around them." She paused, thinking. "Do you know of anyone who got sick and lived? Or caught plague before?"

Domnall scratched his chin. "Aye, I think so."

"Try to get them to care for the sick. Not much to it, just give them something to drink if they ask, and…" Luthene shrugged. "And pray the Maker spares them. I don't think someone can catch plague twice, so a man who lived through it is the best to care for the rest." She reached for Galin's hand and held it tight. In the back of her mind, she wished they had stayed away longer.

Plague. The word was heavy in the air in Dunholm and rumors swirled that a pestilence had struck in Adeluna’s capital, leaving the dead and stricken in the streets. Galin touched the amulet around his neck to ward off the ill luck of the words, spoken on the docks of the Highland port city. Many ships were not willing to sail south for fear of the contagion, the sailor said as he hauled a barrel of salt herring onto a sling to get it aboard his ship. “Heard it from a ship passing us as we got here from Cittasphe,” he said offhandedly, trying to load the provisions so the ship could sail with the evening tide. Galin shrugged his cloak from his shoulders and grabbed one of the barrels himself, trading his labor for information in an unspoken bargain. “A bad one, they say. Welts on the skin, fevers, coughing, and a day or two later, you’re a dead’un. Some survive though the Maker only knows how, since this thing kills about everything it touches. Must be lucky, the two of you,” he said, nodding toward Luthene on the dock. “Missed it, seems like, or at least weren’t there for the start. The start’s always the worst. No one knows what’s happening til there’s a pile of bodies waist high in the market.” Galin grunted in agreement and tossed his barrel to a sailor waiting in the hold. The ship would take them south, risking the disease for a chance to bring supplies to the city that was beginning to starve as well as suffer the ravages of the plague. Salt herring, wheat, barley, and wine filled the hold that was more often stuffed with pelts, silks, and Northern swords for trade in the south. But with the markets of Adeluna bare as drovers and farmers kept far from the city walls to avoid the pestilence, the barrels of preserved fish would be worth their weight in crescents.

The journey south was wet and cold with a wind spreading a damp chill into every inch of the ship as it raced over the waves to Adeluna. Galin was loathe to travel in a ship, especially one that left the sight of land, but it was preferable to a hard a long slog down the length of Canelux. When the ship finally moored in Adeluna’s harbor, Galin leapt over the side onto the dock, not bothering to wait for a ramp. Ground that did not shift under his feet, he decided, was the real proof of the Maker’s care. Collecting his belongings and wishing the sailors safe trading and good health, he and Luthene headed back outside the city to the camp the Highlanders under Domnall kept near the east gate. As they walked, they saw the signs of the pestilence all around them. Doors were boarded over and marked with red painted exes, warning that the inhabitants were infected and would be quarantined in their homes until they either recovered or died. In a city of Adeluna’s size, the measure, though harsh, would likely save lives.

The company was hit with the disease as well and by Domnall’s count, over thirty were already dead or dying and with more likely to follow. Galin cursed under his breath and looked at his commander with an anxious expression while he gripped Luthene’s hand. It was worse than he expected, worse than the winter fevers that would often strike in the Highlands. “And Galin, before you think you’re finished, we have things to discuss. Alyson, you seem to have a proper idea for surviving this, so you are in charge of the sick. Take what you need of the physician’s. His quarters are just the other side of the hall, as you know.” He waved Luthene off and Galin squeezed her hand once more and then turned back to Domnall.

“You said there were things to discuss?” Galin looked at Domnall curiously, wondering what in the nine hells the man could want to talk about with a plague on. The older man gestured toward a small stool across from his seat and once both men were seated, he began to talk.

“You have talent, boy, I’ve seen it, and I think you’ll make a good leader of the lads. Dyffd’s sergeant’s died and I need a man I can trust there to keep things from falling into a shambles. That’ll be you, of course, and you’ll be moving your hut to his once it’s cleaned out. Alyson can join ye or keep your’n for herself if she’s tired of your pathetic rutting. Don’t think of it as a kindness. This will be a bloody misery of a time until folk are healthy again, so keep yer head and make sure the troop gets about its business. Dyffd’s laid up himself but it looks like he’ll be recovering. Least that’s what the leech said before he dropped dead himself. Now get ye gone, boyo, and whip those country bastards back into shape like proper fighters, yeah?”

Galin blinked a moment, letting the words sink in and he hated the sound of them. He had told Luthene in the North that he had no want to lead, not desiring the tedium and responsibility of it all. He was a soldier not a chancery clerk. “Aye, sir,” he said hollowly and stood, heading to the physician’s hut to find Luthene. When he came upon her, already among the medicinal herbs and leather-bound texts, he cleared his throat and slumped against the doorjamb. “Domnall’s a bastard,” he growled. “Put me as second in Dyffd’s troop now, of all things. Bloody second in the bloody skirmishers. If I didn’t know better, I would think the bastard was spiting me taking the time for the damned clock. What in the hell do I know about skirmishing, eh?”

Fool! Luthene thought as she entered the physicians quarters and took inventory. She shouldn’t have said anything. Now, without a proper physician, the unfortunate task fell to the only one stupid enough to admit some knowledge of it. All she had to go on were her mother’s stories… and now a dead physician’s books. At least she could read them, which made Luthene just slightly more qualified than many of the men in the company.

Fortunately, he was an organized man, and much of what he used to treat the plague victims had already been set aside. Nearby were his own notes, and while they were written in a sort of shorthand, Luthene managed to figure out most of it: treatments that had little effect, such as leeching, or lancing the sores, things often prescribed in texts but with no observable benefit. One note offered some hope: he’d given a man some treacle he’d found in an old, dusty chest, and the man had lived. Unfortunately, when Luthene went looking for the bottle, it was empty. It wasn’t enough to save you, was it? she thought sadly. Still, she’d ask for more. An open text suggested this treatment as well, and the word ‘old’ had been underlined. Probably an important detail. Would maggots on the sores help, she wondered. Again she looked at the doctors; he had tried it, with no luck.

Galin found her as she was looking over the collection of herbs and trying to decide what might be useful. He was upset; Domnall had promoted him, but to a unit of skirmishers. Luthene looked up, and saw him leaning against the doorjam. “About as much as I know about curing plague,” she replied, then crossed the room and reached for him. She kissed him and held on, the way women often do before their husbands go off to a battle they may not return from. When she pulled away, there was terror in her eyes. She kissed him again, then was content to rest her head against him for a while until the worst of the fear passed.

“You’ll learn. Dyffd will have to help you, and if not him, then…” She shrugged. Perhaps there were treatises on the subject to help him learn the techniques. Then he’d have to practice. Hopefully there would be time for that. “I’ll help you as best I can. Am I to move to your unit as well?” Luthene didn’t know much about skirmishing, either, but she learned quickly enough.

“If you can find shops or stalls that are still open, I’ll need clean cloths, perhaps some vinegar, and old treacle. The older the better, I think. A merchant might try to sell you something new, but if it doesn’t smell off, I don’t think it’ll be any good. As much of that as you can. You know where I keep my coins.” Luthene paused, and pursed her lips. “And someone who has gotten sick and lived. Whatever’s left that isn’t going to finding Lajaka, offer it. Try… try the slums, if they’re safe. A man with nothing to lose.” Her eyes were downcast. “I’m afraid to go to them, Galin. The sick, I mean. I’m afraid I’ll get sick myself.” When she looked up[ at him, her expression was earnest. “Don’t get near the sick yourself. I won’t tell you anything the doctor wrote, so if Domnall asks if you can help, you can honestly tell him you can’t. And if I… if I fall ill myself, you cannot go to me, do you hear? At least let me die knowing I didn’t put you in danger, too.”

“Ach no, you know more about that than I do of skirmishing. And you’re the wise one, remember? All your reading and the line. Maker knows the best I can do is make out my own name, more or less. So whatever you don’t know, I figure the books can tell you.” Galin grumbled a bit, knowing that his lack of literacy kept him from a host of knowledge but at the same time, was content to live simply, without the complications that all that sort of knowledge would bring. She closed the distance between them and kissed him and when she pulled away, he saw the fear on her face. She was in charge of the sick and dying and that, as the physician learned, was like a death sentence. He did not have the words to calm her immediately so he held her and kissed her again and held her to his chest. His heart was thumping but he kept his breathing calm so that while she held him, she could feel the sort of even calmness that he hoped would settle her nerves as well.

“Dyffd’s sick,” he said simply. Sick with the plague was near enough to dead, even if Dyffd was thought to be recovering. Galin had only seen this sort of thing once before, as a child. Dunholm had been wracked by it and the pestilence spread even into the more remote parts of the Highlands. Thankfully, the farther from the port it got, the weaker its grip on the people, so in his village, only a handful died. He had survived, never truly taking sick, but he had been ministering to those that were alongside his mother. She had been a healer, knowledgeable in matters of herbs and medicines, and as she moved among the sick, Galin went with her to help as best he could. He had not taken ill, even during the worst of the plague, so he reckoned he was safe from its ravages. “And if he dies, I am stuck in charge of those buggers from the south. Ain’t proper fighters by a long chalk but they are mine now, so the Maker help me. And aye, you can join if you have an interest in bows and skulking like poachers in the high grass. To be honest, I would love to have you but I can’t ask anyone to volunteer for this sort of misery.”

She was rattled, that much was clear, but she was still doing her duty. Galin pulled Luthene close and kissed her forehead. “Old treacle, vinegar, and a daft bugger able to stand the sickness. Got it.” She looked up at him, telling him how she meant to keep him from the dangers of the plague and he chuckled then shook his head. “Darling, you’ve already missed the mark. First off, I wouldn’t stand about while you were out among the damned, just hoping you would be well. And second, I survived this sort of thing once, in the North. Came from Dunholm, and from the south before that. Must have been carried in the ships, for there’s no other reason. And the woman what raised me, she was a healer and I was never more than a foot from her through it all, and never even a hiccup. So I won’t be worrying about it myself and you, you poor thing, you are stuck with me. And if you start talking about dying, I will bloody well tie you to the mast of the first ship out of this place and send you on your way. Have you understood?” He smiled as he looked down at her, squeezing her against him a moment longer before he headed toward the city proper to gather supplies for her.

He borrowed one of the horses from the company’s stables and trotted to the heavy, iron-bound gates of the city. The guard that usually stood there were absent and the gates hung open. It was eerie but Galin pushed the strangeness of it out of his mind. He had to find the treacle and other medicines that Luthene needed or else more men would die. It was not as daring as a nighttime raid against an enemy camp but, with the city shuttered and marked by death, it was as dangerous and as necessary. There were bodies in the street, left unburied because their families had either succumbed as well or had left when the first of their number took ill, so many that even the ravens and stray dogs had already eaten their fill and more. His horse picked its way through the cobbled streets to the row of shops where the physicians and apothecaries plied their trade. Most of the shops were closed, some even marked with the red ex that showed it was a plague house. Even the healers, as the camp’s physician had found, were not spared the sickness.

One of the shops had a shingle hanging over the door, carved in the shape of a mortar and pestle, and a giant red ex across the door. Galin looked up and down the street and, seeing no one, dismounted and kicked hard against the lock. The first blow shook the door and the second snapped the wooden locking bar, letting the door swing open. Inside, in the front room, he saw the medical supplies of the apothecary and a host of books, bound in leather on a shelf. Opening his bag, he took the books and crammed them inside, assuming that Luthene would be able to make head or tails of them. Galin left the bag near the open door and ventured into the shop to find another bag for the medicines. He stepped over the bloated corpse of the man he assumed was the apothecary and emptied a bag of flour in the kitchen. Coughing from the flour in the air a moment, Galin placed the stoppered jars in the sack, taking everything left in the place. They were dead, he reasoned, and had no need of medicine.

Galin lashed the new supplies to the saddle of the company’s horse and mounted again awkwardly. He hated horses and riding but it could not be helped if he wanted to get the supplies Luthene and the men in camp needed so desperately. Clicking his tongue, he led the horse back onto the main road and out the east gate toward the camp. When he arrived, he headed for the physician’s hut and found Luthene there. “So how is the camp,” he asked as he untied the bundles from the horse’s saddle. “I have books, Maker knows what about, and every potion, salve, ointment, and tincture in the place. I can’t say for sure what is what so I decided to grab it all and let you make the choices. I am not the cunning one of us, after all.” Smiling at his jest, he pulled her close and kissed her without warning. When he pulled away, his voice was low and choked with emotions he often did his best to ignore. “And don’t you dare go talking about dying again… I don’t think I’d want to bear that, losing…” He trailed off and simply held her a moment, taking comfort in her presence. When he slowly released her, he let out a long breath and resumed his joking tone. “So… where do we start?”

So Dyffd wouldn’t be able to teach Galin anything. He was ill, and when it was plague, that meant he would be dead soon, like as not. Luthene held on to Galin a bit tighter, considering the problem. If Dyffd couldn’t show him to use a bow and teach him proper skirmishing tactics, who did that leave? Most of the men in that unit were close, and to ask any of them for help would undermine his authority over them, like as not. Was there anyone left alive who was part of that unit, but not from the same part of the Highlands as the rest? If there was such a man, he might be the best choice. And treatises, if she she could find any.

“I expect there will be room in the unit for another, and finding men for the wall will be easier than filling out a unit of skirmishers. So yes, I’ll volunteer, but I don’t expect it to be all misery.”

Never before had Luthene ever felt so relieved to be wrong. Galin had lived through plague once before, and even knew a bit about how to care for those suffering and dying from it. Perhaps between the two of them, and the physician’s books, they might even save a few. She was still a little afraid— what if they were wrong about his resistance to plague?— but he was still the best man to be with the sick. Luthene nodded when he asked if she understood him, and did her best to return his smile, returning his embrace before he left to collect the things she had asked for.

Once he’d left, Luthene walked through the hall, taking note of where the sick were. Most stayed in their own huts, with healthy men on either side, clustered depending on the unit they served in. That, Luthene knew, would be a problem. When Galin returned, she would want to set aside an area for those infected with plague, as far away from the healthy men as she could get them. Bedding and clothes that belonged to the sick or the dead would be burned. Perhaps their armour, too, if she could convince Domnall. It would have to be cleaned throughly, at least. Vinegar might do.

Luthene was back in the physician’s quarters figuring out the best place to keep the sick when Galin returned with sacks of books and supplies. She didn’t bother to ask him how much they had cost; the books alone were worth more than either of them had, combined. But the dead had no use for such things.

“The camp is a mess,” Luthene replied as she looked over the jars, reading the labels and putting them on the shelves. ”We need to set aside some huts and move all the sick people there. They must be isolated from the rest as best we can, and hopefully that will cut down on how many more fall ill. Can’t have anyone else sleep in their beds, either; I’d burn them, if Domnall will allow it, especially if the man dies.” She was cut off when Galin pulled her to him and kissed her. Even caught off guard like she was, Luthene returned his affection, a marked change compared to a month ago. His tone seemed raw when he spoke, and she reached up to caress his cheek. Luthene gave no answer, unsure if she could give him her word and keep it. She wanted to tell him that she’d be alright, that he would not lose her, but plague ignored such promises and carried people off in spite of them.

Galin released her, and it was back to business. “Well, first I’d like to see what you managed to find.” Luthene handed him the sack with the jars, and pulled out on. “Look at the first letter, and shelve them with others that start with the same. If you know what any of them are, call them out. I’m going to look through these books.” The first tome she found was a ledger, likely not much use to her, and Luthene set it aside. The second, at first, seemed more promising: a book on social diseases. Then she opened it and flipped through the pages, and her cheeks coloured. “I’m not sure how much use this one will be,” she said, leaving it open but set aside. Perhaps Galin couldn’t read, but there were plenty of diagrams.

Luthene was about to open the next book when one of the younger men entered the hut, out of breath. “It’s Domnall,” he said, gasping for breath. “Vomited blood, he did, then he collapsed. He’s awake, but he’s not getting up.”

“Move another bed into Dyffd’s hut,” Luthene ordered. The skirmishers’ dwellings were nearer the end of the hall, and perhaps the best option for keeping the sick isolated. “Galin, you go to Domnall, get him on his side if he’s not already. Once there’s a bed ready, help him there if he can walk, or carry him if he can’t. I’ll prepare… something to give him.” For all the good it will do. “Then we’ll need to get the sick men housed there, two to a hut, three if they’ll fit. Healthy skirmishers are to take their things to other huts, but no one healthy is to sleep in a bed another man died in.” It wasn’t going to make Galin any friends among his new unit, but he had the authority to command them, authority Luthene didn’t have, and she didn’t know any other officers who would listen to her.

"Looks like a task for the bloody second of the bloody skirmishers,” he growled as she listed her suggestions to preserve the camp. All of them made sense but were going to end with him having to give orders and chivvy men around and he already dreaded the prospect. “So I am rousting out the healthy from my section, moving them to another section and stacking the dead and dying like cordwood in my section’s quarters. Grand, they will love that, especially if I have to fire the bloody places once the dead are gone properly. Endear me to them, it will, I haven’t a doubt.” He grumbled, still unwilling to accept his position but he knew that if he openly defied Domnall over it, he would be ejected from the company entirely and likely Luthene as well and he would not take that risk at the moment. Maybe in a few weeks, when the madness of the plague subsided, he would leave all this in the dust and trek back North, maybe even kill the bastard that ran him off his farm. But until then, he was trapped and he knew it, so he shouldered the burden with undisguised ill grace.

He took the jars and pots from the sack and began to organize them as Luthene had suggested, by the first letter scrawled on the parchment glued to them. He did not have the heart to explain that he had barely a scrap of literacy in the letters of Adeulna. He was simply matching like looking symbols that were as foreign to him as the script of the elves or the dwarves. In the North, the clans had their own sort of alphabet but it differed significantly from that of Adeluna’s and even then, he was barely educated in even those letters. What use was it for the bastard son of a healer and a herder to know how to read and write? He had tried to pick up Adeluna’s letters once, during the war, but it left him frustrated and content to let others handle the reading and let him stick to fighting. So far, it had worked out well enough for him though he had a sneaking worry that with his unwanted promotion he would find himself in need of at least more literacy than he possessed, and he cursed again. He glanced at the book Luthene had left open on the table and chuckled, not needing an ounce of learning to interpret the diagrams. “I’d keep that handy,” he said, laughing and closing it. “Without the sawbones, you might see yourself dealing with more than just the plague until Domnall hires a new one.”

Domnall would likely not live long enough to see a new physician, let alone hire one. “Well, damnation it is,” he snarled, pushing the young solider aside. “Alright boyo,” he said, subconsciously using the term Domnall himself had used earlier that day, “time to earn your pay. You scrounge up a litter and get Domnall in it and over to Dyffd’s quarters. I will be making a ruckus down there.” Breathing a silent prayer to the Maker for guidance, he touched the amulet around his neck and ducked out of the physican’s hut and stormed across the camp to the skirmishers’ quarters.

“All right you miserable bastards, everyone in Dyffd’s company that ain’t sick, fall in outside in two ranks with all your kit. You have five minutes or I start breaking heads. Now move!” His voice echoed like a thunderclap through the huts and men poked their heads through doorways to see who was making the ruckus. Most saw him, not a skirmisher, and laughed as they went back about their days, thinking Galin had lost his mind. Chewing his lip impatiently, Galin decided to try one more time as the seconds passed slowly. “If you sheep fucking lowland bastards make me drag you out, I will make every mother’s son of you wish he hadn’t been born.” Still no one moved but a voice, indistinct from inside one of the huts suggested that his threat would be far more comfortable wedged where the sun did not shine.

Instead of waiting any longer, Galin strode to the hut where he knew the largest man in the skirmishing troop lived with his woman and ripped the leather covering away from the door. The man, standing a full head taller than Galin, came out of the hut with a wicked grin and spat at the Highlander’s feet. “Bugger off you inbred mountain savage. You ain’t one of us so you ain’t got a place telling us a damned thing, have ye?” He shoved both hands against Galin’s chest and sent him staggering back a pace. “So run along back to yer woman and let her know that if she’s in need of a proper man, to see Dyffd’s company.”

Galin’s gaze was murderous as he stood his ground, clenching his jaw to try and keep the decorum expected of a leader. “As of this morning, Domnall put me in charge of this sorry excuse for soldiery and I am telling you get your ragged arses out and in ranks. Anyone that don’t, I’ll have you horsewhipped and thrown out of the bloody camp to fend for yourselves in this plague. Are we clear?”

“I don’t think we are, scum. I think you’d better piss off before I decide I just don’t like ye and slit your sniveling throat.” The man crossed his arms and smiled confidently while the rest of the skirmishers crept out of their shelters to watch what was about to happen. Owen Cooper was one of the largest men in the company as a whole and the largest of the skirmishers without a doubt. His chest and arms with broad and strong after years of working the heavy war bow and he had a reputation as one of the best bare knuckle fighters in the company. Galin reached up to his shoulder and unpinned the simple broach that kept his cloak clasped around his shoulders and let it fall on the ground behind him.

“I think you have a big mouth, Owen Cooper, and no one has had the good sense to shut it for you before it got you in trouble, so I will be doing that, I think, and with pleasure.” Galin grinned malevolently at the hulking lowland skirmisher. “But now you’ll learn to fight against a proper man, not one of you limp dicked yeomen of the forest.” Owen turned to the assembled skirmishers and what seemed to be men from other troops, gathered to see the bloodletting that was sure to come and put his hands out at his sides theatrically.

“So yon pup thinks he can take me in a fight, does he? What do you lads…” His question ended in a whimper of pain as Galin drove his boot hard up between Owen’s legs. As the big skirmisher doubled over in pain, Galin followed with a two-handed strike that hammered into the back of Cooper’s neck.

Galin was surprised the man was still on his feet. Blows like that would have sent a man to the ground in a mass of pain but not the Cooper. He shook his head to clear it and staggered a few paces backward before straightening himself up painfully, moving his hands up to protect his face from the next of Galin’s strikes. Instead, the younger man drove his fists into Owen’s belly, first his right then his left. It was like hitting oak but Galin could see from his face that the blows hurt Cooper. The taller man grunted and lurched forward, fist swinging and then Galin’s head seemed to explode like a Sularian firework as one of Cooper’s huge fists slammed into the side of his head. He butted his head forward and felt it crack against the other man’s face, sending blood pouring from his nose.

Cooper moved forward again with startling speed and grabbed the smaller man up in a tight, rib-shattering hold. Gasping, Galin raked the hobnailed heel of his boot down the man’s shin and was rewarded with a hiss of pain but he did not let go. With his arms pinned, the only weapon Galin could think to muster was his teeth and he bit down hard on the larger man’s cheek until he tasted blood and the grip slackened enough for him to duck away. He back up a few paces but found the group of spectators had closed the ground and was shoved back into the melee. Cooper ducked his head and rammed it into Galin’s and the smaller man’s vision was overtaken by swirling lights as he sunk to one knee. Cooper, scenting victory, closed on him with a vicious kick but Galin was ready and grabbed the man’s boot, tugging him off balance. As the man slammed into the dust, Galin pinned him down with his knees on the man’s shoulders and began to rain blows on his face as the man struggled and writhed under the punishment.

To his astonishment, the man wrenched himself free, throwing Galin off and sent him staggering into the arms of the men that gathered outside the fight. As they shoved him in toward Cooper again, Galin knew he was about to be struck and half-tensed in anticipation of the blow. It came like a blacksmith’s hammer, a left against his ribs and then a right into his belly, sending him shuffling backward again. As the skirmisher came forward, Galin steeled himself, preparing for the sort of hammering he had learned to expect in a shield wall. He brought both his hands together in front of his face, inviting his opponent to hammer into his ribs. As the first blow landed, Galin slammed down on the man’s forearm with the angle of his elbow and jabbed his other into Cooper’s throat. The man staggered back, struggling for breath, and Galin followed with a series of punishing blows to his torso, but still Cooper would not quit.

Before the two could come to blows again, a racking cough and a string of curses silenced the growling crowd around the pain. Domnall, carried on a stretcher between two men of Galin’s old troop, was snarling for silence. “Disperse you bastards. Now. Skirmishers, out in your damned gear like the man told you, now. Galin, with me.” Even as he felt his eye swelling shut, Galin smiled at Cooper and pushed past him to follow the captain of the company.

“Bastard,” the skirmisher whispered as he past, but with a note of respect, even as he glared daggers at the Highland interloper following Domnall’s litter. As long as nights were dark, the bastard would have to sleep with one eye open, Cooper thought.

Galin ducked into the hut that now housed Domnall and Dyfdd and waited for the captain to settle himself in a seat near the feeble fire. “I give you this troop and you’re brawling like a common drunk at the harvest fair? Maker help us all, you thick bastard.” Galin straightened under the reproof but said nothing. “There’s a bloody plague on and you have nothing better to do that squabble like strays over offal? You are to command these men, not beat them into bloody ruin. Do you understand the damned difference?” Galin kept a politic silence, preferring to let Domnall say his piece. “If you’re going to keep the bastards from gutting you in your sleep, you’ll have to do more than batter Cooper bloody.” Domnall coughed and was distressed at the sight of blood on his hand when the fit passed. “They need to know what you expect of them. Keep that simple, keep them alive, and win. If you can do that, they’ll follow you the Abyss. If you can’t, Cooper will be the one gutting you in your sleep. And speaking of, win that bugger over. He’s one of the best we’ve got and I can’t have the two of you snapping like dogs every second. Remember that. Simple rules and win over Cooper’s trust. Now go.”

Galin tossed the words over in his head as he left the hut and saw that the skirmishers had finally paraded with their gear. Cooper stood at the right of the rank, in the place of honor, and Galin felt an urge to tell him to step back into the second file but, remembering Domnall’s words, relented. “Skirmish troop, you are taking up lodgings near the hall, near my quarters. This area’s for the sick alone now. Once you’ve taken yourselves and your families to your new lodgings, all that are able bodied, move the sick into your huts, three men a hut. After that, report to the physician's surgery. Alyson will have more tasks for you and follow them as though they’re from Domnall himself. Are we understood?” The men grunted in the affirmative. Galin waited, letting the silence drag out a moment before he asked again, his voice firm. “I said, are we bloody well understood?” The men answered sullenly but they answered and that was a victory enough for Galin. As they dispersed, Luthene came up with her new physician’s tools to see to Domnall. Smiling crookedly, he winked at her with his swollen eye. “That went better than expected.”

“Don’t even think it!” Luthene said when Galin suggested that she might need to do more than try and treat plague, and not all of the horror in her voice was mocking. “I’m already mostly useless. I’ll consider it a victory if not many more fall ill, though I’m not sure the men will feel the same way when their sick comrades die.” But that was the way of it; recovering from plague was a miracle, and the best she could hope for was to keep healthy men from catching it.

Galin was quick to take action, and the boy who reported Domnall’s illness left to do as he was ordered. Galin left, too, and Luthene saw him clutch his amulet as he often did when he knew he was facing something difficult. It couldn’t be helped, especially with Domnall now ill and unable to give the order himself. As he left, she flipped through more books looking for possible treatments. Washing with vinegar and rosewater was suggested, but the old physician had noted that this hadn’t been found helpful, and he proposed that the illness was inside the body. Treacle, then, perhaps thinned with a big of rosewater to make it easier to swallow, and to cleanse a man that way. Another text suggested that plague was caused by miasma, and burning fragrant flowers would combat it. Lacking any better theories of her own, Luthene bundled some together, one for each room. She made sure to add lavender to each; it was said to be relaxing, and if nothing else, it might help the sick to sleep.

Luthene was aware of the commotion, as men were passing the old physician’s hut to see what was going on, and she could hear some of the shouting, but she forced herself to remain where she was until she had everything ready. She tucked a needle and sutures in the pocket of her apron as well, not for treating plague, but in case a fight had broken out.

Sure enough, when she had gathered her things and steeled her nerves enough to leave the hut, Luthene found Galin and Owen Cooper bloodied and bruised; one of Galin’s eyes was swollen so much that when he winked at her, she hardly noticed. She felt bad again for putting him in the position. “Well, you’re still standing, though I question your judgement. Get back to the physician’s hut while I see to Domnall, and then probably to Cooper, if he’ll let me.”

Before entering the hut where Dyfdd and now Domnall were lying, Luthene tied a piece of cloth around her nose and moth, as she’d seen illustrated in one of the texts. It would keep out the miasma, she hoped. Once inside, she set the flowers on a brazier, then poured some of the treacle into a cup for Domnall. Even thinned, she noticed that it was difficult for him to swallow, and he started coughing again. Luthene handed him a cloth so he could spit out the blood. “On your side,” she instructed when he lay back down. “I don’t want you choking the next time your start to cough like that.” While she tried not to let it show, it was hard to conceal all the emotion from her voice. “Stubborn fool,” she added softly, in case Dyffd was alert enough to hear them. “You’ve been sick at least a day already, maybe two, haven’t you?”

Domnall only smiled.

Dyffd was worse off. He was still breathing, but would not wake to take any of the treacle she had prepared. She left it in the hut, hoping she might give it to him later, but knowing that the next time she entered the hut, he would be gone.

Cooper was cursing Galin and the order to vacate his hut, and as expected, wasn’t willing to let Luthene look him over. She saw bruises on his face and clotting blood above his eyebrow, but that was all the inspection she was permitted. Not in the mood to try and challenge his pride, Luthene instead turned to his woman, Maria. She was collecting their things in a bag, and Luthene handed her the needle and sutures. “Once he’s calm enough to let you, wash his wounds and use this to close up any larger gashes,” she said quietly.

Maria nodded. “I know how to calm him,” she said with a smile. Luthene was momentarily surprised to hear an accent like her own. But of course Maria would be from Adeluna, most of the women were, but Luthene spent so little time with them that it was easy to forget. Perhaps that should change.

A few men were standing around the physician’s hut, skirmishers who had already moved their things elsewhere and were now, as ordered, waiting to see if she would have tasks for them. “Go to the huts that belonged to the men who have died. Clean out their things. Burn their clothes and their beds.” Some of the men balked a little at the suggestion. “There might be traces of plague on those things,” she explained, “and if another man wears the clothes or sleeps in the bed, he might get sick, too.” They weren’t so hesitant after that.

Once safely inside the hut and with the flap closed, Luthene sighed heavily. She didn’t remember command being this difficult before, expect perhaps in dealing with the Archmage. And there were still Galin’s injuries to tend to. “Alright, get your tunic off before you get any more blood on it. If you managed to break your rib again I swear I’ll gut you myself.” Her hands found the old scar, and she prodded the area gently, but nothing felt amiss. She checked around where more bruises were forming, but as far as she could tell, no ribs were broken. The worry left her mind, and her cheeks coloured. The silence hung for a moment before Luthene went to fill a basin and wash his cuts.

“I’m not sure about transferring to your unit after this,” Luthene said as she patted his cuts with a cloth soaked with vinegar water. Served him right if it stung, too. “It will be hard enough for you to command the men, and I fear my being there will only deepen the resentment.” She paused. “Because you will have to command them. Dyffd’s not long for this world, and Domnall doesn’t look good, either. I’ll help you if I can, and if you think it’s best I fight beside you, I will be there, but I’m not sure of it myself. They’re cohesive, I’m more an outsider to them than you are, and I’d have to learn the bow as well.

“Speaking of learning,” Luthene went on, “if you want, I could help you with your letters. I know you and words aren’t the best of friends, and written words are worse, but it’s a useful skill. I mean, what if I wanted to write you a letter or something? And don’t tell me you’d use a clerk, what if it was private?” Finished cleaning, she set the cloth and bowl aside. “I promise, if you learn, I won’t tell the men. Wouldn’t want them to promote you again, you’d end up with two black eyes!”

"If I knew this is what it took to get my tunic off around you, I would have picked a fight with that big poxy bastard weeks ago!” Galin laughed then winced, feeling tenderness in his ribs when he did. The man had nearly crushed the life out of his and his fists were like a kicking mule. Galin was confident that, in the end, he could have killed him, more accustomed to the press of close combat, but he was surprised how closely matched the contest had been. “And my ribs are fine. I would have known if they shattered. It’s a sort of feeling I wouldn’t soon forget.” He let her explore his possible wounds anyway, smiling a little and waiting for what he knew would be a moment of blushing when she recognized the reality of her position. He was rewarded with rising color on her cheeks and he chuckled until the pain form his ribs was too much.

He sat on a stool to allow her to more easily treat his cuts and bruises, trusting her after she had done so skillfully with his side after the raid against the rebellious lord in Adeluna. She had mixed vinegar in the water and he clenched his teeth at the first contact, the wound stinging as she cleaned it. “At least a cup of wine for the pain? The old physician was a far more considerate man,” he said and smiled. Luckily, none of his teeth had been loosened in the fight. He was not a vain man by any stretch but he was proud of his well-kept smile. “Not joining me in that paradise of a unit? Interesting thought, you staying in the line and me skulking with the skirmishers. I can see your point in all this, of course, but I am also more than willing to let the bastards complain until they are blue in the face and not care a whit. Domnall put me in charge and Dyffd’s dying. They are stuck with me for better or worse so they had best get used to the idea, same as I have to.” His tone was full of bitter resentment. There was no real chance for glory in the skirmishers and he wanted that more than he wanted coin. Money, he learned after he was driven south, came and went like a summer thunderstorm but a man’s name as immortal.

“They are cohesive because they are a bunch of inbred, no-good… Ah Maker’s sake woman, watch that cloth!” He winced as she drew the cloth harder than he would have liked over a cut above his eye. “Look, the trouble is, I ain’t a skirmisher. You can see that from this wee altercation. I fight head on and like a madman. Guile and cunning, them ain’t my strong skills. And I can’t shoot a bow better’n a twelve year old can, so I am about as much use as one up there.” He chewed his lip, thinking about the private war skirmishers fought between the battle lines and tried to see himself in among them. He had the inkling of an idea that may help him but it was as yet an unclear, half-completed thought.

“Maker’s bollocks, do you truly hate me?!” Galin’s face colored, more than the bruising, at the prospect of learning the letters of Adeluna. “We ain’t friends for sure,” he grumbled, thinking of the long-suffering priest who served as the village’s source of learning, and his eventual decision that Galin was ‘about as likely to learn his letters as a pig was to sprout wings and fly,’ and Galin tended to agree with him. “And that’s what clerks are bloody well for. Ain’t much use for anything else, so what would you be saying that’s so private a clerk can’t read it out to me?” He was grumbling for sure, dreading the inevitable end of this conversation when he would eventually acquiesce to her idea and spend what little time he had away from his wayward men like a boy yet to shave, learning his letters by a candle’s guttering light. “And if I do this, and you breathe a word of it, I’ll publicly throw you from my quarters and let the men fight over you, you hear me?” He smiled a little and groaned. “We both know eventually you’ll convince me to bloody well do it, but I won’t be damned happy about it. Now how about that wine, eh? Something to dull the pain now and steel me for the schoolmaster later?”

Even the top of Luthene’s ears were pink when he laughed. “Keep it up and I’ll have you put it back on,” she said. There was a hint of a smile on her face, however. “There will be no wine for you, and remember that if you have a mind to pick a fight with him again.” She cupped his chin in one hand so as to hold him steady while she worked. “I don’t think I’ll need to stitch any. Did you have to challenge Cooper, though? Try Clarke next time, he’s more your size.”

Again, Galin complained about the unit he was left with. He saw the wisdom in her not joining, but also didn’t seem to care if the men minded. “Domnall’s dying too,” she reminded him, her voice soft in case anyone was lurking about outside. “They might decide they’d rather one of their own lead instead of you, and I’m not sure they’d be kind in ousting you. I’m not looking forward to patching you up after fights worse than this one precisely because you don’t give a whit about their complaining. You don’t have to make friends with them, but you should at least try to make peace with them. If my being in the unit will anger them further, then it’s not the place for me, not until things have cooled down.” He winced, but Luthene didn’t let up until she was good and ready. “Don’t ‘woman’ me, Galin. You’ve got a mess of dried blood here I have to get off.” She sighed. “You’ve got some cunning, that’s how I ended up in the Company with you. You’ll have to learn the bow, and the strategies.” She paused, and smiled as an idea came to her. “You and your men might be from different areas, but you seem to all share a taste for southern women. I haven’t had reason to speak to Maria— Cooper’s woman— until today, but she sounds like she was born here in this city. We might get along, her and I, and we all know who truly commands a man. It might mean I’ll have to exchange gossip, but perhaps if I can befriend Maria, it will make your life a little easier. And then I might be able to join your unit.”

As Luthene expected, Galin grumbled at the prospect of learning to read, but at least he seemed to relent, accepting the inevitable. “What if I had to tell you something unsavoury about your clerk, hm? I don’t know. Something… private.” Her cheeks coloured again. “Might be able to learn bow techniques from a manual, if I can find one. If it’s a book in our hut, it’ll be assumed to be mine. And you won’t have to ask any of the men. Surely if I can learn to be a physician from books, you could learn a bow.” She laughed, and kissed him. “Yes, go have your wine, or perhaps something stronger. And put your tunic back on,” she added, tossing it to him.

As she was preparing to leave the hut to make sure the skirmisher’s quarters, now something of a hospital, were being vacated as ordered by healthy men, the young man who first alerted them to Domnall’s illness returned. “He’s coughing bad,” he said, his face pale. The colour drained from Luthene as well as she grabbed more cloth and an empty bowl. Again she tied something around her nose and mouth and she went to Domnall’s hut. A group of men were crowded around the entrance flap.

“Go,” Luthene said with more authority than she felt, and to her relief, they listened. She found Domnall lying on his back again, and she turned him to his side and opened his mouth. Blood poured out into the bowl, but not much. “Hold the bowl,” she told Galin. Standing, Luthene sat Domnall up a big, but hunched over the bowl. He started coughing again, and she pounded on his back with her palm, the way mothers often would for sick children, trying to dislodge the blood in his lungs. Domnall was gasping, coughing, choking, and there wasn’t a damn thing she could do about it. It was even more frightening when the coughing stopped, however, because his breathing had stopped also. Without a word, she guided Domnall’s body back down, and closed his eyes.

In the quiet, Luthene remembered Dyffd, and realized he hadn’t made a sound, had not even moved. Had he died, too, quietly and no one had noticed? Peacefully, she hoped. “Check Dyffd,” Luthene whispered to Galin. “I think we may have lost them both.”

It had been a good funeral, Galin thought. Rather than bury Domnall in the common graves that were dug well beyond the walls of the city and the Highlanders’ camp, Galin and the other troop leaders decided that they would burn his body and send his spirit to the Maker’s hall beyond the clouds. The night of the balefire, Galin ordered all the bedding and even the huts themselves of the plague dead to be piled in the center of the camp, piled high and doused in oil. Domnall and Dyffd were both burned, laid atop the pile with their shields on their chests. Galin hoped that including the dead commander of the skirmishers might earn him some good will with the men of that troop but it quickly dissipated when the new captain was chosen. He was one of the men of Domnall’s personal troop, a skilled fighter in the wall but a dullard in every other matter. He was particularly disdainful of the skirmishers, who saw themselves as a sort of elite, able to do more than hammer another wall to bloody ruin. Instead, he had the troop working like the rest of the men, training to fight in the shield wall and not honing their skills of stalking and killing with their bows. Galin, knowing the value of the men’s unique skills, worked them with their bows after the shield wall training, even though the men hated him for the extra work. Owen Cooper, his nose still swollen from his first encounter with the new commander of skirmishers, hated him more than most.

Cooper had expected to command the skirmishers after Dyfdd took ill and the old commander had as good as promised him the position before his illness. And now with Domnall dead and the new captain not willing to entertain the complaints of the skirmishers, he was stuck with the wet-behind-the-ears pup of a commander Domnall had picked without any apparent reason. After twelve years in the company and a further three in another, Cooper was one of the most experienced men in the company as a whole and the best skirmisher and the resentment for his new commander was fermenting into outright rebellion. Instead of practicing at the archery butts, he and his close compatriots went to his shelter and broke out a jug of wine, toasting the dead men of the company and damning their new commanders in the same breath.

While the men were supposed to be practicing with their heavy war bows, Galin was finding his own solution to serving with the skirmishing troops. He lacked the years of training and experience with the war bows to be able to match even the worst of the troop so he needed to find an alternative solution. He had gone into the city the day before and purchased a Tarishtari crossbow. Unlike some of the more primitive models in Adeluna and Mamlak, the engineers of Tarishtar had improved the power of the weapon, allowing it to be loosed accurately at over three hundred yards. While it was slower to shoot than the long, yew war bows the rest of the skirmishers favored, Galin was at least able to sight down the stock of the crossbow and loose it with confidence. And while his men practiced in the camp’s archery range, he went out alone, beyond the palisade and practiced on his own, setting a buckler on a tree limb two hundred yards away and loosing bolts until he could hit the target more times than not. It was a simple weapon, which was its real advantage for Galin. In a few weeks, he thought, he could be as accurate as a bowman without the years of straining at the butts.

His practice complete, Galin returned to the camp to see his men’s progress in training with their bows. When he arrived at the range and saw only a handful of men practicing, he growled in frustration and knew exactly where the others would be. “Owen bloody Cooper, that poxed son of a whore,” he spat as he stormed toward the big skirmisher’s hut. “Cooper! Cooper, you get your sorry arse out of your hut with your bow and you had better have a good damned reason for not being at the bloody targets.” Galin’s voice, pitched to carry over the din of a shield wall’s clash, and men in the other huts who had followed Cooper’s example slunk out to the range, not wanting to incur Galin’s wrath. “Cooper, shift your arse now. If I have to come into your sty of a hut, I will finish the beating I gave you last week and you won’t have Domnall’s skirts to hide behind you poxed coward.”

Already well in his cups, Cooper stuck his head out of the hut, looking for the insolent pup of a leader that was bellowing after him. When he saw Galin striding toward him, he pushed aside the leather door hanging and, reeking of wine, he stumbled a step, righted himself, and started toward Galin, his hand on his knife’s hilt. Galin stopped when he saw Cooper’s hand and smelled the wine on his breath. “If you draw steel,” Galin said in a whispering, menacing tone, “I will take great delight in gutting you and being rid of a pain in my arse. You’ll be fighting a proper warrior,” he continued conversationally as his own hand dropped to the well-worn hilt of his fighting knife, “a man that’s killed close and bloody and lived to tell the tale. So please, you miserable bastard, come and die and let me finally have some peace.” Cooper grinned and pulled his knife, the blade flashing dully in the afternoon son.

“Quit bleating, you little bugger, and fight me.”

Galin grinned back and yanked his blade free, ready to settle this conflict with the towering skirmisher once and for all. “As you wish, you bastard,” Galin growled and dashed forward, his blade held low, ready to rip into the skirmisher’s belly. It would be over in a second, he thought as he closed the distance, and then life could return to some sort of normalcy. This would be a killing he would actually enjoy.