50
The Exchange
A foul wind ripped off the Seven Sisters. Even out here, east of Parth, they felt the wrath of the storm descending off the mountains. Springtide beckoned, but it seemed winter still had more to say.
Holden’s men were restless. They’d had no word from east or west in a fortnight or more. The war could be over and they wouldn’t know it, and the men had said as much, muttering to each other over their cups. They’d devolved to the part of the campaign where they spent more time musing about the things at home they missed rather than the bravery they’d spend when battle reached them.
That is the real business of war, Hadden Dereham was known to say, over the wintertide fires. The battle of an idle mind. But Hadden Dereham had never seen war; nor had any man in the Northerla
