Half a War. Джо Аберкромби

       The Fall

      ‘We have lost,’ said King Fynn, staring into his ale.

      As she looked out at the empty hall, Skara knew there was no denying it. Last summer, the gathered heroes had threatened to lift the roof-beams with their bloodthirsty boasting, their songs of glory, their promises of victory over the High King’s rabble.

      As men so often do, they had proved fiercer talkers than fighters. After an idle, inglorious, and unprofitable few months they had slunk away one by one, leaving a handful of the luckless lurking about the great firepit, its flames guttering as low as the fortunes of Throvenland. Where once the many-columned Forest had thronged with warriors, now it was peopled with shadows. Crowded with disappointments.

      They had lost. And they had not even fought a battle.

      Mother Kyre, of course, saw it differently. ‘We have come to terms, my king,’ she corrected, nibbling at her meat as primly as an old mare at a hay-bale.

      ‘Terms?’ Skara stabbed furiously at her own uneaten food. ‘My father died to hold Bail’s Point, and you’ve given its key to Grandmother Wexen without a blow struck. You’ve promised