Cullis looked down to the seat beneath him as more explosions thundered, far away in the dust. The half-track shuddered.

The seat below Cullis was covered in red.

"Medic!" he yelled.

" What?"

"Medic!" Cullis screamed over another explosion, holding his red-stained hand out. "Zakalwe! I'm hit!" His good eye was wide with shock. His hand trembled.

The young man looked exasperated and slapped Cullis" hand away. "That's wine, you cretin!" He lunged forward, hauled a bottle out of the older man's tunic and dropped it in his lap.

Cullis looked down, surprised. "Oh," he said. "Good." He peered inside his jacket and carefully extracted a few pieces of broken glass. "Wondered why it was fitting so well," he mumbled.

The engine caught suddenly, roaring like something made furious by the shaking ground and the swirling dust. Explosions in the gardens sent brown sprays of earth and pieces of shattered statuary over the courtyard wall, landing spattering and chunking all around them.

He wrestled with the gear-lever until the drive engaged and nearly threw him and Cullis out of the half-track as it leapt forward, out of the courtyard and into the dusty road beyond. Seconds later the major part of the great hall collapsed under the combined zeroed-in weight of a dozen or so heavy artillery pieces, and smashed down into the courtyard, filling it and the surrounding area with splintered wood and masonry and yet more tumbling clouds of dust.

Cullis scratched his head and muttered into the helmet he had just been sick into.

"The bastards," he said.

"That's right, Cullis."

"The filthy bastards."

"Yes, Cullis."

The half-track turned a corner and roared away, towards the desert.