The Warded Man (Demon Cycle, #1)(120)

Rojer’s hopes fell. Arrick really meant to spend a night on the road with nothing between them and the corelings but Geral’s old portable circle, which hadn’t seen use in a decade.

But Angiers was no longer entirely safe for them. As their popularity grew, Master Jasin had taken a special interest in thwarting them. His apprentices had broken Arrick’s arm the year previous, and stolen the take more than once after a big show. Between that and Arrick’s drinking and whoring, he and Rojer rarely had two klats to click together. Perhaps the hamlets could indeed offer better fortune.

Making a name in the hamlets was a rite of passage for Jongleurs, and had seemed a grand adventure while they were safe in Angiers. Now Rojer looked at the sky and swallowed hard.

Rojer sat on a stone, sewing a bright patch onto his cloak. Like his other clothes, the original cloth had long since worn away, replaced a patch at a time until only the patches remained.

“Settup th’circle when yur done, boy,” Arrick said, wobbling a bit. His wineskin was nearly empty. Rojer looked at the setting sun and winced, moving quickly to comply.

The circle was small, only ten feet in diameter. Just big enough for two men to lie with a fire between them. Rojer put a stake at the center of the camp and used a five-foot string hooked to it to draw a smooth circle in the dirt. He laid the portable circle out along its perimeter, using a straightstick to insure that the warded plates lined up properly, but he was no Warder, and couldn’t be sure he had done it right.

When he was finished, Arrick stumbled over to inspect his work.

“Looksh right,” his master slurred, barely glancing at the circle. Rojer felt a chill on his spine and went over everything again to be sure, and a third time, to be positive. Still, he was uneasy as he built a fire and prepared supper, the sun dipping ever lower.

Rojer had never seen a demon. At least, not that he remembered clearly. The clawed hand that had burst through his parents’ door was etched forever in his mind, but the rest, even the coreling that had crippled him, was only a haze of smoke and teeth and horn.

His blood ran cold as the woods began to cast long shadows on the road. It wasn’t long before a ghostlike form rose up out of the ground not far from their fire. The wood demon was no bigger than an average man, with knobbed and barklike skin stretched hard over wiry sinew. The creature saw their fire and roared, throwing back its horned head and revealing rows of sharp teeth. It flexed its claws, limbering them for killing. Other shapes flitted on the edge of the firelight, slowly surrounding them.

Rojer’s eyes flicked to Arrick, who was drawing hard on his wineskin. He had hoped that his master, who had slept in portable circles before, might be calm, but the fear in Arrick’s eyes said differently. With a shaking hand, Rojer reached into his secret pocket and took out his talisman, gripping it tightly.

The wood demon lowered its horns and charged, and something surfaced in Rojer’s mind, a memory long suppressed. Suddenly he was three years old, watching over his mother’s shoulder as death approached.

It all came back to him in that instant. His father taking up the poker and standing his ground with Geral to buy time for his mother and Arrick to escape with him. Arrick shoving them aside as he ran to the bolt-hole. The bite that took his fingers. His mother’s sacrifice.

I love you!

Rojer gripped the talisman, and felt his mother’s spirit around him like a physical presence. He trusted it to protect him more than the wards as the coreling bore down on them.

The demon struck the wards hard. Rojer and Arrick both jumped as the magic flared. Geral’s web was etched in silver fire in the air for a brief instant, and the coreling was thrown back, stunned.

Relief was short-lived. The sound and light drew the attention of other woodies, and they charged in turn, testing the net from all sides.

But Geral’s lacquered wards held fast. One by one or in groups, the wood demons were thrown back, forced to circle angrily, searching in vain for weaknesses.

But even as corelings continued to throw themselves at him, Rojer’s mind was in another place. Again and again he saw his parents die, his father burned and his mother drowning the flame demon before shoving him into the bolt-hole. And over and over, he saw Arrick shove them aside.

Arrick had killed his mother. As surely as if he had done the deed himself. Rojer brought the talisman to his lips, kissing her red hair.

“What’s that you’re holding?” Arrick asked softly, when it became clear the demons could not break through.

At any other time, Rojer would have felt a stab of panic at his talisman’s discovery, but he was in a different place now, reliving a nightmare and desperately trying to sort out what it meant. Arrick had been like a father to him for over ten years. Could these memories really be true?

He opened his hand, letting Arrick see the tiny wooden doll with its bright red hair. “My mum,” he said.

Arrick looked sadly at the doll, and something in his expression told Rojer all he needed to know. His memory was true. Angry words came to Rojer’s lips, and he tensed, ready to charge his master, throw him from the circle and let the corelings have him.

Arrick lowered his eyes and cleared his throat, beginning to sing. His voice, soured by years of drink, took on something of its old sweetness as he sang a soft lullaby, one that tickled Rojer’s memory just as the sight of the wood demon had. Suddenly he remembered how Arrick had held him in the very circle they now sat in, singing the same lullaby as Riverbridge burned.