A standalone set during a single three-day battle in the North between the Union army and the Northmen, structured almost as a military procedural. The Heroes is Abercrombie's most formally ambitious novel - the battle is the plot, and the focus shifts between characters on both sides as the fighting develops. Bremer dan Gorst, a disgraced duelist reduced to royal observer, provides the most sardonic point of view. Calder, a Northman chief's son who doesn't want to fight, provides the counterpoint. Characters from the trilogy appear, aged and changed. The novel is a meditation on heroism, war, and the gap between legend and reality.