The Last Sunset (Oaths Of The Iron Highlands #5)

Chapter One The Burden of Command

The great hall of Kincaid Keep had once been a place where men argued over trade, grazing rights, and whose hound had gotten into whose smokehouse.

Those quarrels had felt large enough at the time.

Kenan would have welcomed ten of them now if it meant driving away the thing that had settled over the keep in recent weeks.

War had a smell before it ever stained a blade.

It lived in wet wool drying by the hearth, in leather gone stiff with long days in the saddle, in the sour tang of fear men pretended was only sweat.

It lived in the quiet between voices, in the way warriors glanced toward the doors whenever the wind struck them, half expecting another messenger, another call to ride, another list of the dead.

Kenan stood near the long council table with his arms crossed over his chest, studying the map spread beneath the wavering light of torches and fire.

The edges had curled from damp and rough handling.

Ink marked roads, hills, streams, and a dozen small outposts that looked painfully fragile when reduced to strokes of brown and black. Too much ground. Too few men.

Gavin stood at the table’s head, one hand braced against the wood, the other resting near a cluster of stones that marked the last positions of the alliance. He had not sat since the council began. Neither had anyone else.

No one wanted the posture of comfort while they discussed how much more they could afford to lose.

“They pushed us back again near Dunbrae,” Fergus said. He stood opposite Kenan, thick shouldered and broad handed, his beard still damp where rain had clung to it. “Not enough to call it a rout. Enough to tell every man who was there what comes next.”

“What comes next,” Tavish muttered from the side bench, “is what always comes when we give ground. They smell weakness and come harder.”

Kenan did not turn. He knew that voice too well, the old edge of challenge that Tavish had never fully buried, even after the last years had taught him caution. Some men made peace with a laird’s judgment. Some merely learned when to hide their resentment.

Donal sat near the hearth, age and old wounds keeping him from standing long, though his gaze was as sharp as any man’s in the room. “Strength is not measured only by how loudly a warrior speaks of charging into a wall,” he said.

Tavish’s mouth flattened.

Good, Kenan thought. Let him chew that for a while.

Gavin’s eyes stayed on the map. “How many did we lose?”

Fergus answered without softening it. “Twelve dead. Eighteen wounded badly enough that they will not hold a line again for some time, if ever.”

The words settled heavily. No one cursed. No one struck the table. They were past the point where numbers alone could shock.

Kenan stared at the little black mark that stood for Dunbrae and felt the old, familiar fury claw at him.

He knew that ridge. He knew the men who had held it.

He could picture exactly how the ground narrowed, how the enemy would have driven forward under cover of the trees, how the retreat would have looked, bitter and disciplined and too slow for the men who had not made it back.

He knew because he should have been there.

The thought came unbidden and hard, as it always did.

He should have been on the line, where a man could do something with anger besides swallow it.

“Roderic is not only taking land,” Baird said.

The trader stood near the far end of the table, his rings flashing when he lifted a hand.

“He is taking grain, routes, carts, smithing iron, anything that keeps an army fed or shod. Every village he unsettles becomes another drain on us. We are paying for his campaign before he ever reaches our walls.”

“And what would you have us do?” Kenan asked, his voice rougher than he intended. “Send him a purse and ask if he would kindly choke us more slowly?”

Baird’s chin jerked up. “I would have us think beyond swords, Captain.”

Kenan’s jaw tightened. Captain. The title had felt right all his life. It was a thing a man could hold. Simple. Honest. A captain stood with his warriors, fought beside them, bled beside them, and if men died under his command, at least he could say he had looked the same danger in the face.

There was no honesty in maps.

Gavin finally lifted his head. Weariness sat beneath his eyes, but his voice was steady. “Enough. We all know what is being taken from us. The question is how we stop losing more.”

Silence held for a beat. Rain hissed against the shutters. Somewhere outside in the yard, a horse gave a sharp, restless cry.

Kenan shifted his weight, the ache in his bad knee reminding him of a winter raid years ago. He welcomed the pain. It kept him inside his body, kept him from thinking too much about the twelve men Fergus had just counted.

“We strike harder,” he said. “Not one raid, not one skirmish. We gather the strongest companies, hit the supply lines feeding Roderic’s southern push, and force him to divide his attention. He grows bold because he thinks we are cornered. Show him teeth, and he starts calculating again.”

Donal studied him across the room. “And when he wants that very thing?”

Kenan looked at the old adviser. “You think he wants us to fight?”

“I think he wants us to choose badly,” Donal replied.

Tavish snorted. “So we choose nothing, and call ourselves wise.”

Gavin’s gaze moved from one man to another. “No one is arguing for nothing.”

“No,” Tavish said, “only for caution so deep it becomes surrender.”

Kenan let out a slow breath. He had no patience for Tavish tonight, or perhaps that was not true. Perhaps he had too much patience, the dangerous sort that came just before a man said something he would regret.

Fergus spared him by speaking first. “I was there this morning. The men are still holding, but they are tired. They need to see command choose something. A retreating army can survive fear. It does not survive uncertainty.”

At that, Gavin’s hand tightened on the table. Kenan saw it. So did Donal. The laird’s face did not change, but the weight pressing on him seemed suddenly visible, if only for a blink.

Kenan had known Gavin since they were both young enough to turn a stick into a sword and a stream into a battlefield.

He knew the look of a man thinking too fast because too many lives sat inside the next choice.

Gavin had always been clever. He had become steady.

But steadiness had a cost, and lately it seemed carved a little deeper into him each day.

“We are past the point where command can rest on hope,” Gavin said quietly.

The hall went still.

Kenan felt something move beneath those words, some shift in the air that had nothing to do with the storm outside. Around the table, men straightened. Even Tavish’s expression sharpened from irritation to wary attention.

Gavin looked directly at Kenan.

A cold unease slid through him.

“Speak plain,” Kenan said.

Gavin did. “We need one voice guiding the war effort. Not five men fighting over each move. Not scattered responses from every flank. One mind holding the field, the routes, the supplies, the probable losses, and the choices none of us want to make.”

Kenan’s mouth went dry.

Donal knew. He must have known before this council ever began. The old man’s eyes did not widen. They only settled more heavily on Kenan, as if in apology.

“No,” Kenan said.

The word fell sharp and immediate, before Gavin had finished whatever speech he had prepared.

A flicker of pain crossed Gavin’s face, gone almost at once. “You do not yet know what I am about to say.”

“I know enough.”

Fergus glanced between them, confusion giving way to dawning understanding. Tavish’s brows rose, then knit. Baird shifted, suddenly very interested. Men always grew interested when a burden might land on someone else.

Gavin spoke anyway. “Kenan, I am naming you War Chief of the Kincaid alliance.”

For a heartbeat the fire seemed to roar louder, the storm to strike harder, the whole keep to narrow around a single point.

Kenan stared at him.

Then he laughed once, short and disbelieving. “You cannot be serious.”

“I am.”

“I am a captain.”

“You are more than that.”

“I am exactly that.” Kenan planted both hands on the table and leaned forward.

“I know how to hold a line. I know how to lead a charge. I know how to keep men steady when the arrows start falling. That is not the same as this.” He stabbed a finger at the map.

“This is counting losses before they happen. This is sending men somewhere knowing half of them may not return, and calling it necessary. Find someone else.”

“There is no one else,” Gavin said.

Tavish let out a breath through his nose, almost a laugh, though there was little amusement in it. “You name a war chief because the war is going poorly, and you choose the man most loved by the warriors. Convenient.”

Kenan whipped toward him. “Do not make this about your old grudges.”

“Then tell me I am wrong,” Tavish shot back.

“Enough,” Gavin said, sharper now. The room obeyed.

Kenan dragged a hand through his hair. He could feel every eye on him, every thought forming. Surprise. Doubt. Relief. Curiosity. Fear.

He hated all of it.

“You want a strategist,” he said to Gavin. “Take Donal’s counsel and put it in younger hands. Take Baird’s ugly little merchant numbers if you must. But do not put me behind a table.”

Baird bristled. Donal did not.

Gavin shook his head. “Donal has wisdom, but not the stamina to oversee a campaign of this scale. Baird sees resources, not men. Tavish would divide the hall before dawn. Fergus is respected, but his strength lies in execution, not wider command. You understand the warriors, the field, the habits of our enemies, and the temper of the clans fighting under us. Men trust you.”

Kenan’s laugh this time held no humor at all. “Aye, they trust me because I stand with them.”

“And they will need to trust the hand that directs them when this worsens.”

When, not if.

Kenan knew that too. Everyone in the room did.