gathered to the spectacle, and each flash of light as the wards activated showed Arlen more and more of them: a fell horde, eager to flay the flesh from his bones.
More wind demons swooped in, and were thrown back by the wards. The flame demons, too, began to hurl themselves at him in frustration, accepting the stinging burn of the magic in hope of powering their way through. Again and again they were thrown back. Arlen ceased to flinch. He began to scream curses at them, shoving his terror aside.
His defiance only enraged the demons further. Unused to being taunted by their prey, they doubled their efforts to penetrate the wards as Arlen shook his fists and made rude gestures he had seen the adults in Tibbet’s Brook make to Hog’s back sometimes.
This was what he feared? This was what humanity lived in terror of? These pathetic, frustrated beasts? Ridiculous. He spat, and the saliva sizzled on a flame demon’s scales, trebling its fury.
There was a hush from the howling creatures then. In the flickering light of the flame demons, he saw the coreling host part, clearing a path for a rock demon that stomped towards him, its footsteps like an earthquake.
All his life, Arlen had watched corelings from afar, from behind windows and doors. Before the terrifying events of the last few days, he had never been outside in the air with a fully formed demon, and had certainly never stood his ground. He knew their size could vary, but he had never appreciated just how much.
The rock demon was fifteen feet tall.
The rock demon was enormous.
Arlen craned his head upward as the monster approached. Even at a distance, it was a towering, hulking mass of sinew and sharp edges. Its thick black carapace was knobbed with bony protrusions, and its spiked tail slid back and forth, balancing its massive shoulders. It stood hunched on two clawed feet that dug great grooves in the ground with every thunderous step. Its long, gnarled arms ended in talons the size of butchering knives, and its drooling maw split wide to reveal row after row of bladelike teeth. A black tongue slipped out, tasting Arlen’s fear.
One of the flame demons failed to move from its path quickly enough, and the rock demon swiped at it in an offhand manner, its talons tearing great gashes as the blow launched the smaller coreling through the air.
Terrified, Arlen took a step back, and then another, as the giant coreling approached. It was only at the last moment that he came to his senses and stopped before he retreated right out of the protective circle.
Remembering the circle gave fleeting comfort. Arlen doubted his wards were strong enough for this test. He doubted any wards were.
The demon regarded him for a long moment, savouring his terror. Rock demons seldom hurried, though when they chose to, they could move with astonishing speed.
As the demon struck, Arlen’s nerve broke. He screamed and fell to the ground, curling up in a tight ball, covering his head with his arms.
The resulting explosion was deafening. Even through his covered eyes, Arlen saw the bright flash of magic, as if night had become day. He heard the demon’s shriek of frustration, and peeked out as the coreling whirled, smashing its heavy, horned tail against the wards.
Again the magic flared, and again the creature was thwarted.
Arlen forced himself to let go the breath he had been holding. He watched as the demon struck his wards again and again, screaming in rage. A warm dampness clung to his thighs.
Ashamed of himself, of his cowardice, Arlen came to his feet and met the demon’s eyes. He screamed, a primal cry from deep within him that rejected everything the coreling was and everything it represented.
He picked up a stone and threw it at the demon. ‘Go back to the Core where you belong!’ he cried. ‘Go back and die!’
The demon barely seemed to feel the stone bounce off its armour, but its rage multiplied as it tore at the wards, unable to get through. Arlen called the demon every foul and pathetic thing in his somewhat limited vocabulary, clawing at the ground for anything he could throw.
When he ran out of stones, he began jumping up and down, waving his arms, screaming his defiance.
Then he slipped, and stepped on a ward.
Time seemed to freeze in the long, silent moment shared by Arlen and the giant demon, the enormity of what had just happened slowly dawning on them. When they moved, they moved as one, Arlen whipping out his etching stick and diving for the ward even as the demon swiped a massive, clawed hand at him.
His mind racing, Arlen assessed the damage in an instant, a single line of the sigil was marred. Even as he repaired the ward with a slash of the tool, he knew he was too late. The claws had begun to cut into his flesh.
But then the magic took effect once more, and the demon was hurled back, screaming in agony. Arlen, too, screamed in pain, rolling over and pulling the claws from his back; hurling them away before he could realize what had happened.
He saw it then, lying in the circle, twitching and smoking.
The demon’s arm.
Arlen looked at the severed limb in shock, turning to see the demon roaring and thrashing about, savaging any demon foolish enough to come within its reach; savaging with one arm.
He looked at the arm, its end neatly severed and cauterized, oozing a foul smoke. With more bravery than he felt, Arlen picked the massive thing up and tried to hurl it from the circle, but the wards made a two-way barrier. The stuff of corelings could no more pass out than in. The arm bounced off the wards and landed back at Arlen’s feet.
Then the pain set in. Arlen touched the wounds along his back, and his hands came away wet with blood. Sickened, his strength ebbing, he fell to his knees, weeping for the pain, weeping for fear of moving and scuffing another ward, and weeping, most of all, for his mam. He understood now the pain she had felt that night.
Arlen spent the rest of the night cowering in fright. He could hear the demons circling, waiting, hoping for an error that would allow them access. Even if sleep had been possible, he would not have dared attempt it, lest a shift in his slumber grant the corelings their wish.
Dawn seemed to take years to come. Arlen looked up at the sky often that night, but each time he saw only the giant, crippled rock demon, clutching its caked and ichorous wound as it stalked the circle, hatred in its eyes.
After an eternity, a hint of red tinged the horizon, followed by orange, yellow, and then a glorious white. The other corelings slipped back down to the Core before the yellow touched the sky, but the giant waited until the last, its rows of teeth bared as it hissed at him.
But even the one-armed rock demon’s hatred was no match for its fear of the sun. As the last shadows scurried away, its massive horned head sank beneath the ground. Arlen straightened and stepped from the circle, wincing in pain. His back was on fire. The wounds had stopped bleeding in the night, but he felt them tear open once more as he stretched.
The thought led his eyes back to the clawed forearm lying next to him. It was like a tree trunk, covered in hard, cold plates. Arlen picked the heavy thing up and held it before him.
Got a trophy, at least, he thought, making an effort to be brave even though the sight of his blood on the black talons sent a shudder through him.
Just then, a ray of light reached him, the sun finally more above the horizon than below. The demon’s limb began to sizzle and smoke, popping like a wet log thrown on a fire. In a moment, it burst into flame, and Arlen dropped it in fright. He watched, fascinated, as it flared brighter and brighter, the sun’s light bearing down upon it until there was naught left but a thin, charred remnant. He stepped over and gingerly nudged it with his toe, collapsing it into dust.
Arlen found a branch to use as a walking stick as he trudged on. He understood how lucky he was. And how stupid. Wards