Brayan's Gold (8 page)

Arlen took an extra couple of days to catch his breath while the Goldmen finished preparing their messages for his return trip. He still tired easily in the thin mountain air, but the effects bothered him less each day. He spent the time wisely, watching the miners put the new thundersticks to use. Everyone wanted the favor of the new Messenger, so they were quick to answer his questions.

After watching as they reduced a solid rock face into tons of rubble in an ear-splitting instant, Arlen knew the destructive power of the thunderstick had not been exaggerated. If anything in the world could penetrate One Arm’s thick carapace, it was this.

At last all was in order, and on the third day he put his heavy armor back on and headed to the stables. His saddlebags were already packed with supplies, and in them, Arlen found a small box of thundersticks packed in straw, along with a sealed envelope addressed to Derek in flowing script.

As the Baron had promised, it was far easier going down the trail than coming up. He made it to the first wardpost early in the day and pressed on, making the station well before dusk. Derek came out to meet him.

“I’ve a special letter for you,” Arlen said, handing him the envelope. The keeper’s eyes lit up at the sight, and he held the unopened letter up to the sun.

“Creator,” he prayed, “please let it be that she ent bled.”

He tore the letter open excitedly, but as he read his smile faded and his face slowly drained of color, becoming as white as the snow around him. He looked up at Arlen in horror.

“Night,” he said. “She’s out of her corespawned mind. Does she honestly think I’m going to run off to Miln?”

“Why wouldn’t you?” Arlen asked. “You just prayed to the Creator for this very thing.”

“Sure, when I thought it would make me the Baron’s son-in-law, not when it means a week and more alone with the corelings.”

“What of it?” Arlen asked. “There’re campsites the whole way, and you’re a fine Warder.”

“You know what the worst thing about being a keeper is, Messenger?” Derek asked.

“Loneliness?”

Derek shook his head. “It’s that one night it takes to get home. Sure, you can tumble downhill to the station in a day, but going back up, you always have to stop at that corespawned wardpost.” He shuddered. “Watching the corelings stalk with nothing between you but magic. Don’t know how you Messengers do it. I always come home with piss frozen to my breeches. I ent ever even done it alone. My da and brothers always come out when I’m relieved, so the four of us can take turns at watch.”

“Folk make the trip all the time,” Arlen said.

“And every year, at least half a dozen of them are cored on the way,” Derek said. “Sometimes more.”

“Careless people,” Arlen said.

“Or just unlucky,” Derek said. “Ent no girl worth that. I like Stasy well enough, and she’s a ripping good rut if you get her alone, but she ent the only girl in Brayan’s Gold.”

Arlen scowled. Derek’s calm obstinance, producing excuse after excuse for his cowardice, reminded him of his father. Jeph Bales, too, had turned his back on wife and child when it meant spending a night out of walls, and it had cost Arlen’s mother her life.

“You go back to Brayan’s Gold without Stasy and your child, you ent half a man,” he said, and spit on the ground.

Derek growled and balled a fist. “What’s it to you anyway, Messenger? What do you care if I run off with the Baron’s daughter or not?”

“I care because that girl and the babe she’s carrying deserve better than a ripping coward,” Arlen said, and then there was a flash behind his eyes as Derek punched him. He rolled with the blow, coming around to drive his steel-plated elbow hard into the keeper’s kidney. Derek howled and doubled over, and Arlen’s next swing took him full in the face, laying him out flat in the snow. Feelings long buried came roaring to the surface, and Arlen had to check himself against a desire to continue the beating. He got back on his horse. “Don’t think I’ll be staying,” he told Derek as the keeper rolled up onto his elbow, shaking his head to clear it. “Rather spend a night alone with the corelings than behind warded walls with a man who’ll turn his back on his own child.”

The trail climbed a ridge and then dropped steeply, leaving Brayan’s Gold and the Waystation on the far side of the mountain. Arlen’s bruised cheek throbbed dully in the cold, and his mood grew blacker as he went. It was not the first time he had underestimated a man and felt betrayed, nor would it likely be the last, but always it was for the same reason. Fear. Fear of the corelings. Fear of the night. Fear of death.

Fear’s a good thing,
his father used to say.
It keeps us alive.

But as with so many things, his father had been wrong. Jeph Bales had taken his fear and embraced it so fully he was convinced it was wisdom. Allowing himself to be ruled by fear might have extended Jeph’s years, but under its heavy yoke, Arlen doubted his father had ever truly lived.

I will respect the corelings,
Arlen thought,
but I will never stop fighting them.

An hour before sunset, he stopped and made camp, laying out his circles and hobbling Dawn Runner, making sure she was well blanketed. He glanced at the crate of thundersticks, and decided he could wait no longer. Not far back he had crossed a narrow pass that was perfect for his purposes. He took two spears, two thundersticks, and his shield, hiking back uphill. He soon found the pass, overlooked by an escarpment much like the spot Sandar had chosen to waylay him and Curk.

He headed up the trail a bit further, scattering small lacquered plates etched with light wards in the snow along the path One Arm was soon to come bounding down. He returned to the pass and climbed the escarpment, looking out eagerly over the trail as he waited for dusk.

Twilight came quickly, and the stench of the demons rose with their foul mist, seeping from the ground to pollute the surface. The demons were sparse here, but not three feet from Arlen, a rock demon began to form on the escarpment, a squat beast, with armor the same color as the stone.

Arlen knew the demon would not notice him until it was fully formed, but he did not run or prepare a circle. Instead he crouched, waiting for the demon to solidify. When it was fully opaque he rushed in, shield leading. There was a full elemental circle of protection etched around the shield’s edge, and magic flared as Arlen reached the coreling, stopping him short and hurling the rock demon off the outcropping, clear over the side of the cliff face.

Arlen smiled as the demon’s roar receded to a distant crashing. There was a crack, and a shelf of snow far below broke free, burying the coreling where it landed. He doubted a fall could ever do lasting harm to a rock demon, but he took pleasure in its rage all the same.

It was a clear night, and twilight gave way to moon and stars that cast a dim glow on the snow. Even so, he heard the distant rumble of One Arm’s approach long before he caught sight of the giant rock demon.

He waited, match held in his shield hand and thunderstick in the other. His spears were stuck point-down in the snow, in easy reach. When the ward plates on the trail flared, filling the pass with light, Arlen struck his thumbnail against the match tip, lighting it with a pop. He touched the fuse of the thunderstick to the fire where it caught with a crackle. Immediately, he drew back his arm and threw, raising his shield and peeking over its edge.

One Arm stopped its charge, looking at the projectile curiously, but then its good arm whipped across, faster than Arlen would have imagined possible, to bat the stick away. It flew up out of sight before exploding with a force that shook the whole mountainside and knocked Arlen to one knee, his ears ringing. The bang echoed in the distance. One Arm was distracted for a moment, but seemed otherwise unaffected.

“Corespawn it,” Arlen muttered as the giant demon turned its attention back toward him. He was thankful he had brought a spare.

Pulling out the second thunderstick, Arlen fumbled for a match as One Arm charged. He managed to light and throw the second stick, but again One Arm was quick, stopping short and this time catching the stick, pulling it in for a closer look.

Arlen ducked behind his shield as the thunderstick went off right in the demon’s face. The night lit up with a roar, and the shockwave of heat and force bowled him over, nearly knocking Arlen from the escarpment. He fell flat and held on for dear life.

A moment later he laughed out loud and looked up, expecting to see half the demon’s head blown off, but One Arm stood there unharmed.

“No!” Arlen screamed, as the demon roared and resumed its charge. “No! No! No!”

He took up one of his spears, drawing back and throwing hard. The missile struck the demon full in the chest, splintering on impact and doing no harm.

“What does it take to kill you?” Arlen cried, but the demon took no heed. Knowing the fight was lost, he cursed and dropped his shield to the ground, standing at the center of its small circle of protection.

But the ground shook from the demon’s charge, a sound like constant thunder in the air, and Arlen’s knees buckled. He stumbled from his perch atop the convex shield, and knew he could not trust its protection through the night.

Quickly, he picked his shield back up, taking a spear in his other hand. His armor might protect him long enough to retreat back to Dawn Runner’s circle, but it was a long way to run through the snow at night, especially with seventy pounds of steel on his back. The roaring filled his ears, and it seemed the whole mountain shook.

One Arm reached the outcropping, leaping up to catch its lip. The great talons of its good arm dug into the stone as it pulled itself up. Arlen stabbed at the hand uselessly as the roaring sound grew deafening, and suddenly he realized it wasn’t One Arm causing it. He looked up and saw nothing but whiteness, rushing at him like water.

Barely thinking, Arlen leapt from the far side of the escarpment, half-sliding and half-tumbling down to the trail. Ignoring the sharp spikes of pain from the fall, he immediately fetched up against the mountainside and raised his shield.

Shaken loose by the thundersticks, the avalanche struck One Arm full on, knocking the giant demon over the cliff in much the same manner as Arlen had its smaller cousin. He saw the demon fall an instant before being buried himself.

There was surprising weight to the snow, and Arlen’s arm threatened to buckle, but he succeeded in creating a pocket of shelter, and when the rumbling ceased, he was able to quickly dig himself out as the majority of the snow continued on down the mountainside.

He went over to the edge of the cliff, but there was no sign of One Arm in the darkness, nor sound of its cries. Arlen laughed again and pumped a fist into the air. Perhaps he had not been able to kill the demon, but he had faced it again and lived to tell the tale, and it might be days before One Arm found his trail again.

A low growl sounded off to the side, and the grin died on Arlen’s face. The avalanche must have brought a demon down from higher up the mountain. His hand tightened on his spear, and he turned slowly, shield up.

The moon and stars were bright and reflected off the snow, casting a gray gloom through the darkness. At first he didn’t see it, but as the coreling drew closer, the wards on his armor and shield began to draw upon its magic, glowing softly. There was movement in the wardlight, and finally Arlen caught sight of it, a demon with pure white scales that glittered like snowflakes. It looked much like a flame demon, no bigger than a mid-sized dog and crouched on all fours, with a long snout and horns that ran back flat over pointed ears and a long, corded neck.