They made good time the fourth day out from Angiers. Neither the Painted Man nor his stallion seemed to know fatigue; Twilight Dancer easily paced his master’s loping run.
When they finally made camp for the night, Leesha made a thin soup from the Painted Man’s remaining stores, but it barely filled their bellies. ‘What are we going to do for food?’ she asked him, as the last of it vanished down Rojer’s throat.
The Painted Man shrugged. ‘I hadn’t planned for company,’ he said as he sat back, carefully painting wards onto his fingernails.
‘Two more days of riding is a long way to go without food,’ Rojer lamented.
‘You want to cut the trip in half,’ the Painted Man said, blowing on a nail to dry it, ‘we could travel by night, as well. Twilight Dancer can outrun most corelings, and I can kill the rest.’
‘Too dangerous,’ Leesha said. ‘We’ll do Cutter’s Hollow no good if we all get killed. We’ll just have to travel hungry.’
‘I’m not leaving the wards at night,’ Rojer agreed, rubbing his stomach regretfully.
The Painted Man pointed to a coreling stalking the camp. ‘We could eat that,’ he said.
‘You can’t be serious!’ Rojer cried in disgust.
‘Just the thought is sickening,’ Leesha agreed.
‘It’s not so bad, really,’ the man said.
‘You’ve actually eaten demon?’ Rojer asked.
‘I do what I have to, to survive,’ the man replied.
‘Well, I’m certainly not going to eat demon meat,’ Leesha said.
‘Me neither,’ Rojer agreed.
‘Very well,’ the Painted Man sighed, getting up and taking his bow, a quiver of arrows, and a long spear. He stripped off his robe, revealing his warded flesh, and moved to the edge of the circle. ‘I’ll see what I can hunt up.’
‘You don’t need to …!’ Leesha called, but the man ignored her. A moment later, he had vanished into the night.
It was more than an hour before he returned, carrying a plump pair of rabbits by the ears. He handed the catch to Leesha, and returned to his seat, picking up the tiny warding brush.
‘You make music?’ he asked Rojer, who had just finished restringing his fiddle and was plucking at the strings, adjusting the tensions.
Rojer jumped at the comment. ‘Y-yes,’ he managed.
‘Will you play something?’ the Painted Man asked. ‘I can’t remember the last time I heard music.’
‘I would,’ Rojer said sadly, ‘but the bandits kicked my bow into the woods.’
The man nodded and sat in thought a moment. Then he stood suddenly, producing a large knife. Rojer shrank back, but the man just stepped back out of the circle. A wood demon hissed at him, but the Painted Man hissed right back, and the demon shied away.
He returned soon after with a supple length of wood, shearing the bark with his wicked blade. ‘How long was it?’ he asked.
‘E-eighteen inches,’ Rojer stuttered.
The Painted Man nodded, cutting the branch to the appropriate length and walking over to Twilight Dancer. The stallion did not react as he cut a length of hair from its tail. He notched the wood and tied the horsehair flat and thick on one side. He knelt next to Rojer, bending the branch. ‘Tell me when the tension is right,’ he said, and Rojer laid the fingers of his crippled hand on the hair. When he was satisfied, the Painted Man tied the other end and handed it to him.
Rojer beamed at the gift, treating it with resin before taking up his fiddle. He put the instrument to his chin and gave it a few strokes with the new bow. It wasn’t ideal, but he grew more confident, pausing to tune once more before beginning to play.
His skilful fingers filled the air with a haunting melody that took Leesha’s thoughts to Cutter’s Hollow, wondering at its fate. Vika’s letter was almost a week gone. What would she find when she arrived? Perhaps the flux had passed with no more loss, and this desperate ordeal had been for nothing.
Or perhaps they needed her more than ever.
The music affected the Painted Man as well, she noticed, for his hands stopped their careful work, and he stared off into the night. Shadows draped his face, obscuring the tattoos, and she saw in his sad countenance that he had been comely once. What pain had driven him to this existence, scarring himself and shunning his own kind for the company of corelings? She found herself aching to heal him, though he showed no hurt.
Suddenly, the man shook his head as if to clear it, startling Leesha from her reverie. He pointed off into the darkness. ‘Look,’ he whispered. ‘They’re dancing.’
Leesha looked out in amazement, for indeed, the corelings had ceased to test the wards, had ceased even to hiss and shriek. They circled the camp, swaying in time to the music. Flame demons leaped and twirled, sending ribbons of fire spiralling away from their knotted limbs, and wind demons looped and dived through the air. Wood demons had crept from the cover of the forest, but they ignored the flame demons, drawn to the melody.
The Painted Man looked at Rojer. ‘How are you doing that?’ he asked, his voice awed.
Rojer smiled. ‘The corelings, they have an ear for music,’ he said. He rose to his feet, walking to the edge of the circle. The demons clustered there, watching him intently. He began to walk the circle’s perimeter, and they followed, mesmerized. He stopped and swayed from side to side as he continued to play, and the corelings mirrored his movements almost exactly.
‘I didn’t believe you,’ Leesha apologized quietly. ‘You really can charm them.’
‘And that’s not all,’ Rojer boasted. With a twist and a series of sharp strokes of the bow, he turned the melody sour; once pure notes ringing out discordant and tainted. Suddenly, the corelings were shrieking again, covering their ears with their talons and scrambling away from Rojer. They drew back further and further as the musical assault continued, vanishing into the shadows beyond the firelight.
‘They haven’t gone far,’ Rojer said. ‘As soon as I stop, they’ll be back.’
‘What else can you do?’ the Painted Man asked quietly.
Rojer smiled, as content to perform for an audience of two as he was for a cheering crowd. He softened his music again, the chaotic notes smoothly flowing back into the haunting melody. The corelings reappeared, drawn to the music once more.
‘Watch this,’ Rojer instructed, and changed the sound again, the notes rising high and grating, causing even Leesha and the Painted Man to grit their teeth and lean away.
The reaction of the corelings was more pronounced. They grew enraged, shrieking and roaring as they threw themselves at the barrier with abandon. Again and again the wards flared and threw them back, but the demons did not relent, smashing themselves against the wardnet in an insane attempt to reach Rojer and silence him forever.
Two rock demons joined the throng, shoving past the others and hammering at the wards as yet more added to the press. The Painted Man rose silently behind Rojer and lifted his bow.
The string hummed, and one of the heavy, thick-headed arrows exploded into the chest of the nearest rock demon like a bolt of lightning, brightening the area for a moment. Again and again the Painted Man fired into the horde, his hands a blur. The warded bolts blasted the corelings back, and the few that rose again were quickly torn to pieces by their fellows.
Rojer and Leesha stood horrified at the slaughter.