The Warded Man (Demon Cycle, #1)(58)

“She’ll make it,” Arlen said, stroking the courser’s neck. When Keerin had the mollies inside, he took her bridle and led her into the cave.

As the others settled in, Arlen studied the cave mouth. Wards were chiseled into the stone, but not the floor of the entrance. “The wards are incomplete,” he said, pointing.

“Course they are,” Ragen answered. “Can’t ward dirt, can we?” He looked at Arlen curiously. “What would you do to complete the circle?” he asked.

Arlen studied the puzzle. The mouth of the cave wasn’t a perfect circle, more like an inverted U. Harder to ward, but not too hard, and the wards carved on the rock were common enough. Taking a stick, he sketched wards in the dirt, their lines connecting smoothly with those already in place. He checked them thrice, and then slid back, looking at Ragen for approval.

The Messenger was silent a moment as he studied Arlen’s work, then nodded.

“Well done,” Ragen said, and Arlen beamed. “You plotted the vertices masterfully. I couldn’t have woven a tighter web myself, and you did all the equations in your head, no less.”

“Uh, thanks,” Arlen said, though he had no idea what Ragen was talking about.

Ragen caught the boy’s pause. “You did do the equations, didn’t you?” he asked.

“What’s an equation?” Arlen asked. “That line”—he pointed to the nearest ward—“goes to that ward there.” He pointed to the wall. “It crosses these lines”—he pointed to other wards—“which crisscross with those here.” He pointed to still others. “It’s as simple as that.”

Ragen was aghast. “You mean you just eyeballed it?” he demanded.

Arlen shrugged as Ragen turned back to him. “Most people use a straightstick to check the lines,” he admitted, “but I never bother.”

“How Tibbet’s Brook isn’t swallowed by the night, I have no idea,” Ragen said. He pulled a sack from his saddlebag and knelt at the cave mouth, sweeping Arlen’s wards away.

“Dirt wards are still foolhardy, however well drawn,” he said.

Ragen selected a handful of lacquered wooden ward plates from the sack. Using a straightstick marked with lines, he spaced them out quickly, resealing the net.

It hadn’t been dark for more than an hour when the giant one-armed rock demon bounded into the clearing. It gave a great howl, sweeping lesser demons aside as it stomped toward the cave mouth, roaring a challenge. Keerin groaned, retreating to the back of the cave.

“That one has your scent now,” Ragen warned. “It will follow you forever, waiting for you to drop your guard.”

Arlen looked at the monster for a long moment, considering the Messenger’s words. The demon snarled and struck hard at the barrier, but the wards flared and knocked it away. Keerin whimpered, but Arlen rose and walked up to the mouth of the cave. He met the coreling’s eyes and slowly raised his hands, bringing them together suddenly in a loud clap, mocking the demon with his two limbs.

“Let it waste its time,” he said as the demon howled in impotent rage. “It won’t get me.”

They continued on the road for almost a week. Ragen turned them north, passing through the foothills of the mountain range, ascending ever higher. Now and again Ragen would stop to hunt, felling small game from great distances with his thin throwing spears.

Most nights they stayed in shelters noted in Graig’s log, though twice they simply camped in the road. Like any animal, Ragen’s mare was terrified by the stalking demons, but she did not try to pull free from her hobble.

“She deserves a name,” Arlen said, for the hundredth time, pointing at the steady horse.

“Fine, fine!” Ragen finally conceded, ruffling Arlen’s hair. “You can name her.”

Arlen smiled. “Nighteye,” he said.

Ragen looked at the horse, and nodded. “It’s a good name,” he agreed.





CHAPTER 9

FORT MILN

319 AR





THE TERRAIN GREW STEADILY ROCKIER as the tiny lumps on the horizon rose higher and higher. Ragen had not exaggerated when he said a hundred Boggin’s Hills could fit in just one mountain, and the range stretched as far as Arlen could see. The air grew cooler as they climbed; strong gusts of wind whipped through the hills. Arlen looked back and saw the whole world spread out before him like a map. He imagined traveling through those lands with only a spear and a Messenger bag.

When they finally caught sight of Fort Miln, Arlen couldn’t believe his eyes. Despite Ragen’s tales, he had still assumed it would be like Tibbet’s Brook, only larger. He nearly fell from the cart as the fortress city rose up before them, looming over the road.

Fort Miln was built into the base of a mountain, overlooking a broad valley. Another mountain, twin to the one Miln abutted, faced the city from across the valley. A circular wall some thirty feet high surrounded the city, though many of the buildings within thrust still higher into the sky. The closer they got to the city, the more it spread out, the wall going for miles in each direction.

The walls were painted with the largest wards Arlen had ever seen. His eyes followed the invisible lines connecting one ward to another, forming a web that would make the wall impervious to corelings.

But despite the triumph of achievement, the walls disappointed Arlen. The “free” cities weren’t really free at all. Walls that kept the corelings out also kept the people in. At least in Tibbet’s Brook the prison walls were invisible.