"Aharn!" The sentry pointed to the west. "Something is coming."
"Fergus! Take a patrol out," Aharn ordered.
"I also hear something," a spearman said, as his companions hooted their disbelief.
They had been six days at the Dun of Ruthven and, except for the ragged band of Shaws, there had been no Alban reinforcements. The elation of their victory over the Norse at the Spey encampment was fading as men wondered about wives and girlfriends back home in Fidach and realised they were alone in hostile territory.
"We are wasting our time here," one spearman openly grumbled. "And all on the word of some foreign woman who does not even share Aharn"s bed."
"You keep your mouth shut," Llew said, "or I will shut it for you."
"You are a friend of hers, an Alban rather than a Pict." The spearman s
