Raucous snorted at his own train of thought. He sounded, to himself, like an old man, tired and aching and wishing for younger shoulders to bear his burdens. Though he supposed he would rather grow old than not.

Still. It would be nice to have the help.

There were just so many of the crowbegotten savages. And he'd been fighting them for so bloody long.

He walked toward the stairway leading down into the fortifications within the Shieldwall itself, where a heated chamber and a cot waited for him. He'd gone perhaps ten paces when a scream of wind, the windstream of an incoming Knight Aeris, howled in the distance.

Raucous paused, and a moment later, a Knight Aeris soared in, escorted by one of the Third Aleran's Knights who had been flying patrol. Night had fallen, but the snow always made that a minor inconvenience, particularly when the moon was out. All the same, it wasn't until the man had landed that Raucous spotted the insignia of the First Antillan upon his breastplate.

The man hurried to Raucous, panting, and slammed his fist to his heart in a hasty salute. "My lord," he gasped.

Raucous returned the salute. "Report."

"Message from Captain Tyreus, my lord," the Knight panted. "His position is under heavy attack, and he urgently requests reinforcements. We've never seen so many Icemen in one place, my lord."

Raucous looked at the man for a moment and then nodded. Then, without another word, he summoned his wind furies, took to the air and headed west, towards the First Antillan's position, a hundred miles down the wall, at the best speed he could manage for the distance.

His men needed him. Rest would have to wait.

It was what one did.

"And I don't care how hungover you are, Hagan!" said Captain Demos, in a perfectly conversational voice that nonetheless carried the length of the ship and up and down the dock. "You get those lines coiled properly or I'll have you scraping barnacles all the way across the Run!"