required to perform. Not that he was ever required to perform any heroics, unlike the men around him with their glorious names. Ranfi eld the Raging. Wolftooth the Cruel. Iron Guts the Bloody. If anyone would ever be suitably motivated to come up with a name for Fleece, it would probably be something along the lines of Fleece the Thoroughly Unsuited to Battle, or Fleece the Far Too Pretty to Be Hit, or, the most likely option, Fleece the Where the Hell Has He Run Off to Now?


Bravery was not one of his strong points. It wasn’t even one of his weak points. The fact of the matter was that bravery just wasn’t one of his points. During armed confl ict, Fleece liked to pick a little section of the battlefi eld, somewhere along the edge, and pretend to be dead. He kept some fresh cow’s blood in a pouch inside his tunic, and he’d give himself a healthy splatter when he got comfortable. Then, when all the fuss was over, he would miraculously recover, and hurry back to camp with all the other survivors. It was a tricky business, and once or twice he had come close to actually encountering a living enemy, but his luck had held. So far.


He didn’t like the turn this day was taking, however. He was jammed right in the middle of ten thousand Hibernian soldiers. When Tua gave the order to advance, he’d have to slip sideways to the edge, which wasn’t going to be easy. He looked up, trying to peek over the brutish, ugly, stinking men in front of him, and saw the top of Tua’s head as he rode back towards them.


made an expression of pain


‘For freedom!’ Tua roared, and Fleece winced as the troops bellowed, ‘For Hibernia!’ and then, in another bellow, even more animalistic than the fi rst, ‘For the King!’


roar


Swords were drawn and held aloft and the roaring went on and on. Fleece didn’t know how anyone could have drawn their swords when they were this tightly packed in.


Leaving his in the sheath by his leg, he instead waved his little knife and shouted a bit. It was all fairly ridiculous. Getting worked up about freedom and Hibernia was one thing, but the king? The king was a fat slug who’d had his golden throne shipped over so he could sit back in the camp and eat and drink while his loyal subjects fought and died for him. Naturally, Fleece didn’t count himself among their number.


‘Advance!’ General Tua roared, and troops surged ahead violently.


Fleece was thrown forward, his face squashed against the man in front. Trying to regain his balance, his feet were clipped by the man behind so he had to take tiny quick steps. He got an elbow in the face and howled as he reached out to steady himself. His knife nicked someone as he did so and they cursed at him.


‘Sorry!’ he called. He could feel his face already starting to swell. He tried to slip sideways, to the edge of the throng, but there were no gaps between the hulking, shouting, grunting soldiers.


Suddenly they were moving faster, jogging, but Fleece’s feet were no longer touching the snow-covered ground. He was being carried along with them, held aloft by the huge shoulders squashing in on either side. Now he could see over the heads of the men in front.


218 FIRE & ICE 2


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