Duncan sat on the steps outside his billet, listening to the sounds of drunken Marines intent on giving themselves lovers pox or drinking themselves into early graves. The sounds of the city drifted into the Marine station, as well, though it was quieter than it had been a few hours earlier.

The stars had come out, a half of a moon shone down, and Duncan looked up at them, teeth clenched around a pipe stem. Every so often he trembled, and he reached up to the pipe, just to give his hands something to do.

He could still feel the deck of the People’s longship beneath his feet; the way his pistol had barked; the way his sword had twisted in his grasp when he swung it . . . the way his blood had sang—

Removing the pipe, he took a deep, shuddering breath. It didn’t smell like the harbor; or even like the dirty air of the City. Instead, he could still smell the acrid smell of powder smoke, dead bodies that had lost control of their bladders, and the coppery stench of blood.

The feeling of blows from the People, once they’d been captured still stung, and he flinched involuntarily at what they’d done after. The pagans had always hated his race. But all they had done was nothing beside Zile nan Rèv. Burning that place had been sweet, but not enough—

Footsteps sounded from his right, but he didn’t turn to face them, and instead knocked out the pipe. The smolder had gone out. How could anyone give a tharos to him? Another one, good God! He’d fought and lost. He’d been a prisoner. He’d loved the stridsefttand too much—he’d been helpless. . . . If, perhaps . . .

“Are you well, Lieutenant?” a voice asked.

He finally turned and saw it was one of the whores who’d been smuggled into the barracks by the enlisted. Most of the officers were probably with their own, vaguely-higher class women, and wouldn’t dare bring them within sight of the enlisted: Best not to give either the women or the enlisted men any undue ideas.

At his blank look, she shook her head and gathered her flimsy skirts to sit beside him. “I’ve seen that kind of look before,” she said kindly, and, involuntarily, a flicker of a smile appeared on Duncan’s lips. Given how many soldiers, Marines, and sailors frequented the brothels, he didn’t doubt it was true.

“Maybe I could help you take your mind off of whatever it is,” she added, casually tossing her hair back. It wasn’t wrapped in a kaly, and was instead worn free. “I’m not generally inclined to charge a sad soul like yours too much.” Her emphasis was made with a slight laugh.

He shook his head, glancing at her. In the muted starlight she looked to be all curves and lace, though he could see faint lines of age around her face that makeup hadn’t been able to conceal. Despite her painted lips and the artificial blush put into her cheeks, his attention was drawn to the way she held herself. She was sturdy, like someone he had once known, and the half-forgotten memories made him smile unexpectedly. It was a pleasant thing.

Reaching into his coat, he pulled out his purse.

She seemed surprised that her advances had met with such success, but didn’t protest when he put half a quilling in her hand. “Do you have a proper bed in your billet—”

“I just want to talk,” he said quietly, stopping her. At her puzzled glance, he looked away. “I mean no offense, but you are twice my age.”

“That’s generally what gets men your age in my bed—experience is everything,” she said dryly. When he didn’t laugh, she frowned. “Your mates would be cheaper than paying to talk with me.” She rolled the half quilling in her fingers, not giving it up just yet.

“Women hear things differently than men.”

“Well, you could try your own mother, Raven. Or maybe a sweetheart.”

He glanced back at her. “The woman who bore me is buried a half a thousand miles from here, and I would hope my betrothed has long since forgotten me.” The old sadness that came from the words was faded and intertwined with the half-forgotten memories that had made him smile.

The conversation stilled, and the whore sat awkwardly. Finally, she shivered a little in the nighttime chill—though it never truly got very cold in Pothomar—and said, “Perhaps it would be warmer in your billet.”

Sitting in silence for a moment, Duncan stood up and opened the door. Lighting a candle, he gestured toward a chair, while he sat on his cot. It was too short for him, and his knees poked up a little, though she didn’t seem to notice that.

Instead, she glanced about, looking at a worn copy of a book, the spine of which was printed in Hrafnstungan, laying on a table beside his hat. Her eyes fixed on the pair of brass tharos pinned to the hat, and she glanced to him quickly, as if asking if they were real.

Reaching under the cot, he retrieved a nearly-empty bottle of wine, and then gestured to behind where she sat. She turned in her seat, finding some glasses resting on a shelf, and took two of them, wiping the dust out.

Pouring, he glanced up at her, seeing her face better in the candlelight. She truly did not look very out of the ordinary . . . except for her blue eyes. They were jaded from experience, but there was a wisdom behind them that reminded him only too well of his father’s wife, in her later years.

Maybe that was enough of a reason for doing something so foolish.

“It was the People of the Moon,” he said quietly, holding his glass of wine with both hands. He would not shake, he vowed. Not this time. “Coming back from Daber on convoy duty . . . they jumped us. I don’t know much about fighting a man-of-war, but I know how to use a sword and a pistol, and when they came to close action with us, I was on the main deck with my platoon and the Major.”

The woman held her glass tightly, listening to the Raven in silence.

“We went over with ropes, or just jumped across; hit them before they had the chance to do the same to us. I had a straight sword and three pistols,” he touched his chest with one hand, almost still feeling the weight of the weapons, “and when I hit the deck of the longship . . . I fired a pistol and dropped it, before a pagan hit me with a club. Piece of broken deck, I suppose. . . . It made me mad. Made my heart sing.” He could see her confusion at his last sentence.

He took a deep breath. “We nearly took their ship and had pushed them back below decks, before someone shouted from up top: We were being boarded by the other ship—there were two of them, and the second one was just a tad bigger.” He took a sip from his glass. “It was hell. Absolute hell. Trying to pull away from the one ship while rushing off to fight the other. . . .” He frowned more severely. “There were too many.

“I got on deck in time to see one of the ship’s lieutenants be cut in half.” He eyed her suddenly, as if making sure she understood it hadn’t been a euphemism. “They backed us down to the magazine, and there was no stopping them.”

He closed his eyes for a long moment.

“I went a little mad,” he said slowly, as the grief intermingled with the memories of fear. “We have a word for it in the Ravenlands . . . ‘stridsefttand.’ ” He shuddered as she nodded, having heard the word before. “I killed and killed . . . and bled and bled. Everything was gone; only the killing and the dying remained. . . . Then, I realized that I was alone; that everyone else was dead or captured.

“The People hauled the Captain down, and he told me to put down my sword . . . he’s a Raven, like me. He understood. . . . I must have looked like an anda and more than a little insane, bleeding and covered in filth and the blood of a dozen men.”

He almost shook. “I could still feel it; the stridsefttand. Hear it. I wanted it; I wanted the comfort and the death. I wanted to die with a pagan on my sword.”

He was silent for a long time, and the whore said, “But you didn’t.” Her voice was gentle, but her words were not a question.

“I fainted.” Shame colored his words.

“I take it you escaped,” she said, after a long pause.

He made a grunting sound. “Some of us did,” he said. “The sailors kept me alive, and the People took us back to their fleet, somewhere north of Weymas . . . I’ve never seen so many ships in one place.”

It was very quiet in the little room, and he took a long drink of the wine, frowning at it.

“Is that why you have . . . those?” she questioned, staring at the pair of tharos.

He looked at them as well. “The second one.”

“What was the first one?”

Hell, prison, beatings, torture . . . starvation: That was the first one.

“I don’t want to talk about that.”

She looked away—from both him and his hat—setting her glass aside, untouched, and said, “And now what?” At his questioning glance, she continued, “What are you going to do, now?”

“I’m going to get drunk, and regret it in the morning.” His sudden dry humor made her smile just a little.

“You don’t seem like that kind.” She took his glass from him gently, and pursed her lips as she tried to find the right words. “What was so terrible about that?” she asked. “What is it that’s haunting you? Is it the battle? The People?” She hesitated. “The first one?” She didn’t mean to, but she glanced back to the hat.

He stared at her, humor failing and a touch of incredulity in his expression. Slowly, it eased away, and he began to speak again. “Sometimes, I forget that I am an alien in a strange land,” he said. “When the stridsefttand is upon you . . . it’s like you’re drunk. You forget things. All you feel is the moment; the hatred and the fear. You decide who dies and lives, and it’s like it’s already happened. You become a hand of death.”

The Raven’s expression became more severe with every word, and he said, “I’m no philosopher, and I know nothing of what I’m trying to explain. I don’t know if the words could even be found here: The Triant has the color of three languages, but none of the meaning.”

His tone was almost cold, as he spoke of the stridsefttand, and he wondered if she understood. If she even could. Perhaps it was only something for Ravens to know.

“I’ve heard of that;” she said quietly, “this stridsin—” she faltered on the word, then shrugged. “You Ravens fear it, but it’s saved your people and others more times than I know.” She snorted. “But for it, I’d be laying with some Pental gentleman, instead of Wild Raven lieutenants. How could it be so terrible?”

He hardly even heard her words, but, at some level, they registered. “If you lived with it, you would know.” He felt tired and empty, like a man did once the stridsefttand had departed. His stomach seemed to roil at the wine he’d sipped, and he leaned back, turning his eyes to the ceiling of the little billet for a moment.

When he didn’t speak again, the whore set her glass on the table, rising slowly. He felt a twinge of regret, as she walked to the door. He shouldn’t have said anything about the People or the stridsefttand. Had he been wiser—or, at least, more rakish, like Yost—he would have taken her and whatever comfort he could, instead of trying to explain things that Rosers couldn’t understand.

Her hand closed around the doorknob, but froze there for a long moment. Without turning, she dragged the chair she had sat in, and propped it up under the knob.