Something worse is coming. Rojer had all too good an idea what that might be.
He considered. Even with the hora magic amplifying his music, he was not sure he could drive off so many demons, but even if he could manage it despite their increased resistance tonight, the fleeing corelings would trample right over his friends in the process.
He took a deep, calming breath, thankful he had ordered his wives to stay behind.
‘Amanvah,’ he said into the chinrest of his fiddle. ‘I know I haven’t been the best husband, but never once have I regretted taking you and Sikvah to wife. You have honoured me as wives should, and helped show me my own worth. If I don’t make it back, remember me when you sing.’
She could not reply, but perhaps that was just as well. Rojer dropped the melody that made him invisible and began a new one, his enchanted fiddle carrying the tune to every coreling ear.
Here I am, the music told them. Weak and defenceless. And you are so very, very hungry.
For a moment, nothing happened; then suddenly every coreling face snapped his way. Hundreds of black eyes fixed on him. Whatever influence the mind demon had over the drones, they could not deny their nature. They shrieked and leapt his way, long claws extended and teeth snapping the air.
Rojer turned and ran, faster than he ever had in his life. All the while he kept playing, calling the demons after him.
Arlen stood still as stone, watching the woods. He tried to Draw, but the ambient magic was faint, and the current flowed away from him, pulled by some unseen force. His Knowings yielded nothing.
They seemed to have been gone an eternity, but in truth he knew it was only minutes. His sharp ears caught the roaring of demons over the background noise and he tensed, but the sound was followed quickly by Rojer’s music. He waited.
Long as that music’s playing, they’re safe, he thought. But if it stops …
There was a great flash in the cloudless sky. Arlen knew the signature of a lightning demon when he saw it. Even in the places they ranged most people thought the rare demons just a tampweed tale, and Arlen had never seen one in Angiers. Local Warders didn’t even bother including lightning wards in their circles.
The minds can summon any breed, he realized, and felt their chances of survival dip still further. How would the Cutters fare against the blunt, butting heads of clay demons, or the coldspit of snow demons that could shatter steel? The acid muck of swamp demons? Those whose shields and armour Arlen or Leesha had warded personally would have some protection, but he knew all too well how poorly common warded armour withstood the talons and spit of those rare breeds.
But Gared and Renna had the right wards, and Rojer was still playing …
In fact, the music was getting louder, the sound rapidly approaching, accompanied by the roaring of what seemed a thousand corelings. He saw Rojer appear from the woods, running as fast as his legs could carry him. His aura was one of pure terror, held in tight check by the rhythm of his playing. An instant later Arlen saw why as a seemingly endless stream of field demons raced out of the trees after him.
They put on speed when they reached open ground, but Rojer stopped short before they could overtake him, changing his tune to the harsh, jarring sounds Arlen had heard him use so many times before. Amplified by the fiddle’s magic, the sound struck the reap like a physical blow, scattering the demons in a wave around him.
Arlen dematerialized, and for the split second he was in the between-state, he felt the thrumming of mind demons’ power in the air, and knew Renna had been right. He might meet the will of one of them in that state, but two or more could well prove his undoing.
But there was no time for the coreling princes to attack him as he re-formed an instant later at Rojer’s side and the mind wards around his shaved head reactivated. Arlen picked up the Jongleur like a toddler and leapt, clearing the distance back to the greatward in two great bounds.
‘Where are the others?’ he demanded, but before Rojer could answer, there was a cry, and Arlen looked up to see Renna, covered in demon ichor and glowing bright with magic, leaping through the swarm of field demons, Gared Cutter slung over her shoulder like a sack of flour.
Renna landed on a field demon’s back with a flash of magic, and when she leapt away, the demon did not rise again. Arlen rushed out again, drawing field wards in the air as he cleared a path for them. After a moment they crossed, Renna leaping onto the open way as Arlen got behind her to cover their retreat. He caught the nearest field demon by its hind leg and used it as a club to bash away its fellows. The demon’s flailing claws cut into their scales like no mortal weapon could.
The smell of ichor was thick in the air, and Arlen had to suppress a wave of hunger such as he had not felt in years. He wanted to bite down on the demon sizzling in his warded grasp, tearing through its armour to taste the soft meat beneath.
He shook his head violently, resisting the base instinct long enough to hurl the demon into the reap and run back to the greatward where Renna was gently laying Gared on the ground. The giant Cutter’s aura was flat. He was alive but unconscious.
‘What happened?’ Arlen asked.
‘Just a knock to the head,’ Renna said, easing Gared’s helmet off. ‘He saved my life.’
‘Or delayed you dying,’ Rojer said. Arlen turned to him and saw the Jongleur’s mask had slipped, the terror that still coloured his aura evident in his expression. ‘The demons are building a greatward of their own.’
So that was why the ambient magic had been drawn away. ‘Corespawn me for a fool!’ Arlen shouted. He let his atoms slide apart and leapt skyward, floating at the upper edge of the greatward’s protection as he looked out over the land. As Rojer had said, there, barely a mile away, glowed a greatward unlike any symbol Arlen had ever seen. It wasn’t anywhere near the size of one of the Hollow’s greatwards, but already the demon ward was active.
Out of the corner of his eye, Arlen saw something more and turned, his horror growing. Flickering lines of connection were forming as the demon greatward linked to another off to the southeast, near New Rizon. He turned a full circle and saw demons digging a third, off to the southwest by the fledgling borough of Lakdale. This demon ward was incomplete, but already it was beginning to Draw. It would link with the others in only minutes.
Even Arlen’s new senses could not pierce the veil of the demon wards – magic flowed in, but not back out. And yet he could feel the three coreling princes, perched like spiders at the centre of a web. And all the while, the rock and wood demons continued to dig, strengthening the wards and making them increasingly permanent.
Arlen dropped back down, landing easily beside Renna and Rojer. ‘Not just one. There’s three of the ripping things, each with a mind at its centre.’
‘Creator,’ Rojer muttered.
‘Need to tell the count,’ Arlen said.
Renna nodded. ‘I’ll get the horses.’
Arlen shook his head. ‘Too slow.’
Renna looked at him, worry on her face. ‘Floating and healing the sick is bad enough. You do this …’
‘Can’t be helped, Ren,’ Arlen said. ‘The rest of you ride hard back to the graveyard. Maybe we’ll have something resembling a plan by then.’ With that, he dissipated.
Immediately Arlen felt the pull of the greatward. Like blood pumping through a heart, all the power of the wardnet flowed to and from the keyward of Cutter’s Hollow. Instead of drawing on that power, he allowed himself to fall into its stream, instantly materializing at the centre of the Corelings’ Graveyard.