Tol confessed he did not, then asked, “What is Juramona, lord?”

“The imperial seat of this province, and my stronghold. It lies two days’ ride due east of here.” Odovar coughed, grimacing. “Two days’ ride is eight days’ walking, and my head is still thundering from Grane’s blow. Fair broke my helmet, it did.”

Pushing Tol away, Odovar tried to walk unaided, but his knees buckled immediately. He sank on his haunches.

“I’ll not make it with the land heaving under my feet like this!” he declared. “Help me, boy.”

Again Tol braced him, and Lord Odovar managed to stand once more. “Lend me that stick,” he commanded, and Tol gave him the hoe. The warrior braced the wooden blade into his armpit and essayed a step. The hoe handle was short but stout, and bore the big man without cracking.

“This is good seasoned ash,” Odovar said. “I’ll take it with me.”

Tol winced. His father had made that hoe. It was the only one they had. Without it, planting the onion crop would be much harder. Even so, he dared not deny so powerful a lord.

“Don’t look so downcast,” Odovar said. “I’ll pay for it. One gold piece will buy an armload of hoes.”

The warrior limped a few more steps, then halted, swaying drunkenly. “Damn Grane and all the Pakins!” he thundered. “My head feels like a poached egg! Come with me, boy. I need you.”

“But my father-my family-”

“Do as I say!”

Worried but obedient, Tol put himself under Odovar’s other arm. Between the strong boy and the sturdy hoe, the injured warrior made better progress. He asked Tol his name and age. To this last, the boy could only shrug and say he didn’t know.

“You don’t know?” Odovar repeated, and Tol looked away, ashamed of his ignorance. “Well, you’re a strongly built lad, whatever your age.”

The tumult of battle had faded, and once the marshal and the boy passed through the cleft in the hills Tol beheld the scene of the fight for the first time. Spread below in a narrow gap in the trees were dead men and horses, heaps of them. Tol had seen dead men before, but never so many at once. The air was heavy with the smell of blood, like the farmyard when his father slaughtered a pig.