Night in the village was a suffocating blanket of dread.
In the barn, the Burned Men huddled around a dying fire. The atmosphere was thick with the smell of defeat—and something else. Something sweet and rotten.
Vok son of Nagga sat on a crate, staring into the flames. His face was a mask of thunder.
Today had been the greatest humiliation of his life.
"They didn't even chase us!" a warrior roared, smashing his fist into the dirt. "They hid behind their sticks like women! Cowards!"
"Rats!" another spat. "They poke with long spears and run away! They are not men!"
The Burned Men nodded, their anger boiling over. They were hunters. They were wolves. They understood the chase, the ambush, the bloody melee. But this... being poked to death by peasants hiding in a hole? It was an insult to their gods.
But Vok remained silent. He knew his anger had cost them. He had led them into a meat grinder because his pride was hurt.
Five dead. Thirty wounded.
And the enemy was still there, digging, fortifying, waiting.
Suddenly, Val son of Nango—the small scout—burst into the barn, his face streaked with tears.
"Vok! You must come! It's... it's the wounds!"
Vok followed him to the side of the barn where the wounded lay.
The scene was a nightmare.
Men who had taken only minor scratches—cuts on the arm, nicks on the leg—were writhing in agony. Their skin was burning hot. They were speaking in tongues, their eyes rolling back in their heads.
Vok knelt beside a warrior who had taken a spear thrust to the shoulder. They had cauterized it with a red-hot knife, as was their custom. The fire usually cleaned everything.
But not this.
The wound was swollen to the size of a melon. The flesh around the burn was purple and black, oozing a foul-smelling pus that made Vok gag.
Rot, Vok realized, horror gripping his heart. The rot that eats men alive.
He looked around. Every wounded man was the same. The infection was spreading with unnatural speed.
Then it hit him.
The spears. The arrows.
They dipped them, Vok thought, his blood running cold. They smeared their weapons with filth.
"Cowards!" Vok roared, his voice shaking the rafters. "Honorless dogs! Poisoners!"
To die by the sword was a good death. To die rotting from the inside out because a peasant rubbed shit on a stick? It was an abomination.
The realization broke the spirit of the camp. The Burned Men looked at their dying brothers and saw their own fate. The "sheep" were not just weak; they were venomous.
Vok knew the end was coming. The Lowlanders were waiting for the sickness to do its work.
"Gather!" Vok commanded. "Those who can stand!"
Only seven men stood up without staggering. Seven out of forty.
The rest lay on the straw, their breathing shallow, their bodies burning up.
Vok looked at them, words failing him. How could he ask them to fight?
But then, a wounded warrior—his arm black and useless—pulled himself up. He leaned against a post, his eyes burning with fever and defiance.
"Vok," the man rasped. "Go."
"What?"
"We are dead men," the warrior wheezed, grinning through blackened teeth. "The rot has us. But we can still swing an axe."
He looked at the other dying men. They nodded. It was the silent agreement of the damned.
"We will stay," the warrior said. "We will make noise. We will make them think we are many. We will charge them when they come."
"And you," he pointed at Vok with his good hand, "you take the healthy ones. You climb the cliffs. You go home."
He turned to Val, the scout.
"And you, little Val... stop crying. You are a good hunter. Go back to the mountains. Don't come down here again. The Lowlands... are poisoned."
Vok looked at his brothers. He wanted to weep. He wanted to scream. Instead, he nodded.
"Good hunting," Vok whispered.
"Good hunting," the dying men replied.
Vok turned to the seven survivors.
"Let's go," he said, his voice hard as flint. "We leave the dead to kill the living."