Aidan felt the thrill of riding into battle, felt for the first time that he was one of the men, truly a warrior. Here he was, riding up front, preparing to meet the enemy, to save his father. He had been successful in his mission; thanks to him, the men of Leptus were riding to rescue his father. The thought of what lay waiting for him just beyond the horizon, his father, stranded, needing reinforcements, made Aidan forget his fear. He thought single-mindedly of saving him, of proving to his father that he was the son he had raised him to be. And that quelled all his fears. They had been riding for hours since Leptus, and as they neared the canyon, Aidan heard a rumble in the distance, sounding like thunder. It was, he knew with a jolt, the sound of battle. Of men killing each other. It rumbled and echoed, bouncing off what could only be the walls of the canyon, reverberating even from here—and as it did, Aidan felt a sense of desperation. He tried to suppress a feeling of panic as he tried not to imagine the awful things that could be happening to his father.
