This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.

Count Joseph, called the Gamecock, was not a happy man. Joseph was seldom a happy man; he would have been of more service to King Geoffrey had he been. But then, he most cordially loathed his sovereign, a feeling that was mutual. Still and all, when Avram, the new King of Detina, had made it plain he intended to free the blond serfs in the northern provinces, Joseph couldn’t stomach that, either. Sooner than accepting it, he and the rest of the north had followed Avram’s cousin, Grand Duke-now King-Geoffrey, into rebellion.

A sour expression on his face, Joseph-a dapper, erect little man with neat graying chin whiskers on his long, thin, clever face-left his pavilion and stared south toward the province of Franklin, from which the foe would come… probably before too long. The air of southern Peachtree Province was warm and moist with spring. It would have been sweet with spring, too, but for the presence of Joseph’s army and its encampment by the little town of Borders. Not even the sweetest spring air could outdo thousands of slit trenches and tens of thousands of unwashed soldiers.

One of Joseph’s wing commanders came up to him. Some said Roast-Beef William had got his nickname from his red, red face, others from his favorite dish. Saluting, he said, “Good morning, your Grace.”

“Is it?” Joseph the Gamecock asked sardonically.

“Well, yes, sir, I think it is,” William replied. Unlike a lot of officers who followed King Geoffrey, he was not a man of breeding. He was a skilled tactician, and had written the tactical manual both Geoffrey’s soldiers and the southrons used. Also unlike a lot of Geoffrey’s officers, Joseph emphatically included, he was not a prickly man, always sensitive of his honor. He’d even got on pretty well-as well as anyone could-with Joseph’s luckless predecessor in command of the Army of Franklin, Count Thraxton the Braggart.