know he’s a father.”
“You’ll have to pass the waystation,” Arlen said.
“Won’t matter,” Stasy said. “A new keeper will be sent with us to relieve him, and he’ll be on his way back up the mountain before he even knows I’m locked in the coach.”
She looked around to make sure they were not being watched, then reached out and gripped Arlen’s hand. He saw passion in her eyes, and a thirst for adventure. “But if Derek knew what was coming and had supplies hidden, he could sneak down the mountain instead of up. Even if father sent someone after us the moment Derek went missing, we’d have a week’s lead. More than enough to find each other, sell my jewelry, and disappear into the city. We could get married no matter what his station and raise our child together.”
Stasy looked at him, her eyes burning. “If you’ll tell him this, Messenger, with no word to any other or mark in your log, I will pay whatever you ask.”
Arlen looked at her, feeling as protective as an elder brother. He would take her message for nothing, but he could not deny there was something he wanted. Something the baron’s daughter might be able to arrange.
“I need a thunderstick,” he said quietly.
Stasy snorted. “Is that all? I’ll have half a dozen of them packed with your supplies.”
Arlen gaped, shocked at how easy it had been, but it quickly melted into a smile.
“What do you need the stick for?” Stasy asked.
“Gonna kill a rock demon that’s been following me,” Arlen said.
Stasy tilted her head, studying him in that way people had, as if trying to determine if he were joking or simply mad. At last she gave a slight shrug and met his eyes. “Just promise you’ll deliver my message first.”
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.
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.
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.
