He landed again, just short of the opposite timber wall this time, head ducking and shoulder seeming to barely brush the ground before he tumbled right over, touched one foot on a horizontal log and used it to twist round before landing balanced on the other foot now drawn tight beneath him. Facing the seven corpses he had just felled.
And facing two Malazan marines who, for once and just this once, had precisely nothing to say.
The marines of the 3rd and 4th Companies gathered in front of the tavern, stood or sat on the bloodstained cobbles of the main street. Wounds were tended to here and there, while others repaired armour or filed the nicks from sword edges.
Fiddler sat on the edge of a water trough near the hitching post to one side of the tavern entrance, taking stock. Since the coast, the three other squads of 4th Company had taken losses. Gone from Gesler’s squad were Sands and Uru Hela. From Hellian’s, Lutes and Tavos Pond, both of whom had died in this cursed village, while from Urb’s both Hanno and now Bowl were dead, and Saltlick had lost his left hand. Fiddler’s own squad had, thus far, come through unscathed, and that made him feel guilty. Like one of Hood’s minions, one in the row just the other side of the gate. Crow feathers in hand, or wilted roses, or sweetcakes, or any of the countless other gifts the dead were eager to hand their newly arrived kin-gods below, Smiles is turning me into another Kanese with all these absurd beliefs. Ain’t nobody waiting other side of Hood’s Gate, unless it’s to jeer.
The two sergeants from the 3rd came over. Badan Gruk, whom Fiddler had met earlier, and the Quon, Primly. They made an odd pair, but that was always the way, wasn’t it?
Primly gave Fiddler a strangely deferential nod. ‘We’re fine with this,’ he said.
‘With what?’
‘Your seniority, Fiddler. So, what do we do now?’
Grimacing, Fiddler looked away. ‘Any losses?’
‘From this scrap? No. Those Edur pulled out fast as hares in a kennel. A lot shakier than we’d expected.’
‘They don’t like the shield to shield fighting,’ Fiddler said, scratching at his filthy beard. ‘They’ll do it, aye, especially when they’ve got Letherii troops with them. But of late they dropped that tactic, since with our munitions we made it a costly one. No, they’ve been hunting us, ambushing us, driving us hard. Their traditional way of fighting, I’d guess.’
Primly grunted. ‘Driving you, you said. So, likely there’s a damned army waiting for us this side of Letheras. The anvil.’
‘Aye, which is why I think we should wait here a bit. It’s risky, I know, since the Edur might return and next time there might be a thousand of them.’
Badan Gruk’s thinned eyes grew yet thinner. ‘Hoping your Fist is going to catch up with a lot more marines.’
‘Your Fist now, too, Badan Gruk.’