Hanging from its black leather saddle were various harnesses for weapons, including a yew bow and a quiver of arrows, long knives, a bola, and spears of various lengths. A polished metal shield, circular and convex, was hooked over the saddle horn, ready to be snatched up in an instant. Its rim was etched with intricate wards.
Twilight Dancer stood quietly as the Painted Man checked it for wounds, seeming unconcerned with the demons that lurked just a few feet away. When he was assured that his mount was unharmed, the Painted Man turned back to Leesha and Rojer, who stood nervously in the centre of the circle, still reeling from the events of the last few minutes.
'Stoke the fire,' the man told Rojer. 'I've some meat we can put on, and a loaf of bread.' He moved towards his supplies, rubbing at his shoulder.
'You're hurt,' Leesha said, coming out of her shock and rushing over to inspect his wounds. There was a cut on his shoulder, and another, deeper gash on his thigh. His skin was hard, and crisscrossed with scars, giving it a rough texture, but not unpleasant to the touch. There was a slight tingle in her fingertips as she touched him, like static from a carpet.
'It's nothing,' the Painted Man said. 'Sometimes a coreling gets lucky and catches a talon on flesh before the wards drive it away.' He tried to pull away, reaching for his robe, but she was not to be put off.
'No wound from a demon is 'nothing',' Leesha said. 'Sit down and I'll dress these,' she ordered, ushering him over to sit against a large stone. In truth, she was almost as frightened of the man as she was of the corelings, but she had dedicated her life to helping the injured, and the familiar work took her mind away from the pain that still threatened to consume her.
'I've an herb pouch in that saddlebag,' the man said, gesturing. Leesha opened the bag and found the pouch. She bent to the fire's light as she rooted through the contents.
'I don't suppose you have any pomm leaves?' she asked. The man looked at her. 'No,' he said. 'Why? There's plenty of hogroot.'
'It's nothing,' Leesha mumbled. 'I swear, you Messengers to think that hogroot is a cure for everything.' She took the pouch, along with a mortar and pestle and a skin of water, and knelt beside the man, grinding the hogroot and a few other herbs into a paste.
'What makes you think I'm a Messenger?' the Painted Man usked.
'Who else would be out on the road alone?' Leesha asked.
I haven't been a Messenger in years,' the man said, not flinching at all as she cleaned out the wounds and applied the stinging paste. Rojer narrowed his eyes as he watched her spread the salve on his thick muscles.
'Are you an Herb Gatherer?' the Painted Man asked, as she passed a needle through the fire and threaded it.
Leesha nodded, but kept her eyes on her work, brushing a thick lock of hair behind her ear as she set to stitching the gash in his thigh. When the Painted Man made no further comment, she flicked her eyes up to meet his. They were dark, the wards around the sockets giving then a gaunt, deep-set look. Leesha couldn't hold that gaze for long, and quickly looked away.
'I'm Leesha,' she said, 'and that's Rojer making supper. He's a Jongleur.' The man nodded Rojer's way, but like Leesha, Rojer could not meet his gaze for long.
'Thank you for saving our lives,' Leesha said. The man only grunted in response. She paused briefly, waiting for him to return the introduction, but he made no effort to do so.
'Don't you have a name?' she asked at last.
'None I've used in some time,' the man answered.
'But you do have one,' Leesha pressed. The man only shrugged.
'Well then what shall we call you?' she asked.
'I don't see that you need to call me anything,' the man replied. He noted that her work was finished, and pulled away from her touch, again covering himself from head to foot in his grey robes. 'You owe me nothing. I would have helped anyone in your position. Tomorrow I'll see you safely to Farmer's Stump.'
Leesha looked to Rojer by the fire, then back at the Painted Man. 'We just left the Stump,' she said. 'We need to get to Cutter's Hollow. Can you take us there?' The grey hood shook back and forth in a negative.
'Going back to the Stump will cost us a week at least!' Leesha cried.
The Painted Man shrugged. 'That's not my problem.'
'We can pay,' Leesha blurted. The man glanced at her, and she looked away guiltily. 'Not now, of course,' she amended. 'We were attacked by bandits on the road. They took our horse, circle, money, even our food.' Her voice softened. 'They took…everything.' She looked up. 'But once I get to Cutter's Hollow, I'll be able to pay.'
'I have no need of money,' the Painted Man said.
'Please!' Leesha begged. 'It's urgent!'
'I'm sorry,' the Painted Man said.
Rojer came over to them, scowling. 'It's fine, Leesha,' he said. 'If this cold heart won't help us, we'll find our own way.'
'What way is that?' Leesha snapped. 'The way of being killed while you attempt to hold off demons with your stupid fiddle?'
Rojer turned away, stung, but Leesha ignored him, turning back to the man.
'Please,' she begged, grabbing his arm as he, too, turned away from her. 'A Messenger came to Angiers three days ago with word of a flux that spread through the Hollow. It's killed a dozen people so far, including the greatest Herb Gatherer that ever lived. The Gatherers left in the town can't possibly treat everyone. They need my help.'
'So you want me to not only put aside my own path, but to go into a village rife with flux?' the Painted Man asked, sounding anything but willing.
Leesha began to weep, falling to her knees as she clutched at his robes. 'My father is very sick,' she whispered. 'If I don't get I here soon, he may die.'
The Painted Man reached out, tentatively, and put a hand on her shoulder. Leesha was unsure of how she had reached him, but she sensed that she had. 'Please,' she said again.
The Painted Man stared at her for a long time. 'All right,' he said at last.
Cutter's Hollow was six days ride from Fort Angiers, on the southern outskirts of the Angierian forest. The Painted Man told them it would take four more nights to reach the village. Three, if they pressed hard and made good time. He rode alongside them, slowing his great stallion to their pace on foot.
'I'm going to scout up the road,' he said after a while. 'I'll be back in an hour or so.'
Leesha felt a stab of cold fear as he kicked his stallion's flanks and galloped off down the road. The Painted Man scared her almost as much as the bandits or the corelings, but there was no denying that in his presence, she was safe from those other threats.
She hadn't slept at all, and her lip throbbed from all the times she had bitten it to keep from crying. She had scrubbed every inch of herself after they fell asleep, but still she felt soiled.
'I've heard stories of this man,' Rojer said. 'Spun a few myself. I thought he was only a myth, but there can't be two men painted like that, who kill corelings with their bare hands.'
'You called him the Painted Man,' Leesha said, remembering.
Rojer nodded. 'That's what he's called in the tales. No one knows his real name,' he said. 'I heard of him over a year ago when one of the duke's Jongleurs passed through the western hamlets. I thought he was just an ale story, but it seems the duke's man was telling true.'
'What did he say?' Leesha asked.
'That the Painted Man wanders the naked night, hunting demons,' Rojer said. 'He shuns human contact, appearing only when he needs supplies and paying with ancient gold stamped with forgotten faces. From time to time, you hear tale of him rescuing someone on the road.'
'Well, we can bear witness to that,' Leesha said. 'But if he can kill demons, why has no one tried to learn his secrets?'
Rojer shrugged. 'According to the tales, no one dares. Even the dukes themselves are terrified of him, especially after what happened in Lakton.'
'What happened?' Leesha asked.
'The story goes that the Dockmasters of Lakton sent spies to steal his combat wards,' Rojer said. 'A do
zen men, all armed and armoured. Those he didn't kill were crippled for life.'
'Creator!' Leesha gasped, covering her mouth. 'What kind of monster are we travelling with?'
'Some say he's part demon himself,' Rojer agreed, 'the result of a coreling raping a woman on the road.'
He started suddenly, his face colouring as he realized what he'd said, but his thoughtless words had the opposite effect, breaking the spell of her fear. 'That's ridiculous,' she said, shaking her head.
'Others say he's no demon at all,' Rojer pressed on, 'but the Deliverer himself, come to lift the plague. Tenders have prayed to him and begged his blessings.'
'I'd sooner believe he's half-coreling,' Leesha said, though she sounded less sure than her words told.
They travelled on in uncomfortable silence. A day ago, Leesha had been unable to get a moment's peace from Rojer, the Jongleur constantly trying to impress her with his tales and music, but now he kept his eyes down, brooding. Leesha knew he was hurting, until part of her wanted to offer comfort, but a bigger part needed comfort of her own. She had nothing to give.
Soon after, the Painted Man rode back to them. 'You two walk too slow,' he said, dismounting. 'If we want to save ourselves a fourth night on the road, we'll need to cover thirty miles today. You two ride. I'll run alongside.'
'You shouldn't be running,' Leesha said. 'You'll tear the stitches I put in your thigh.'
'It's all healed,' the Painted Man said. 'Just needed a night's rest.'
'Nonsense,' Leesha said, 'that gash was an inch deep.' As if to prove her point, she went over to him and knelt, lifting the loose robe away from his muscular, tattooed leg.
But when she removed the bandage to examine the wound, her eyes widened in shock. New, pink flesh had already grown to knit the wound together, her stitches poking from otherwise healthy skin.
'That's impossible,' she said.
'It was just a scratch,' the Painted Man said, sliding a wicked blade through the stitches and picking them out one by one. Leesha opened her mouth, but the Painted Man rose and went back to Twilight Dancer, taking the reins and holding them out to her.
'Thank you,' she said numbly, taking the reins. In one moment, everything she knew about healing had been called into question. Who was this man? What was he?
Twilight Dancer cantered down the road and the Painted Man ran alongside in long, tireless strides, easily keeping pace with the horse as the miles melted away under his warded feet. When they rested, it was from Rojer and Leesha's desire and not his. Leesha watched him subtly, searching for signs of fatigue, but there were none. When they made camp at last, his breath was smooth and regular as he fed and watered his horse, even as she and Rojer groaned and rubbed the aches from their limbs.
There was an awkward silence about the campfire. It was well past dark, but the Painted Man walked freely about the camp, collecting firewood and removing Twilight Dancer's barding, brushing the great stallion down. He moved from the horse's circle to their own without a thought to the wood demons lurking about. One leapt at him from the cover of the brush, but the Painted Man paid no mind as it slammed into the wards barely an inch from his back.
While Leesha prepared supper, Rojer limped bowlegged around the circle, attempting to walk off the stiffness of a day's hard riding.
'I think my stones are crushed from all that bouncing,' he groaned.
'I'll have a look, if you like,' Leesha said. The Painted Man snorted.
Rojer looked at her ruefully. 'I'll be all right,' he managed, continuing to pace. He stopped suddenly a moment later, staring down the road.
They all looked up, seeing the eerie orange light of the flame demon's mouth and eyes long before the coreling itself came into sight, shrieking and running hard on all fours.
'How is it that the flame demons don't burn the entire forest down?' Rojer wondered, watching the trailing wisps of fire behind the creature.
'You're about to find out,' the Painted Man said. Rojer found the amusement in his voice even more unsettling than his usual monotone.
The words were barely spoken before howls heralded the approach of a pack of wood demons, three strong, barrelling down the road after the flame demon. One of them had another flame demon hanging limply from its jaws, dripping black ichor.
So occupied was the flame demon with outrunning its pursuers, it failed to notice the other wood demons gathering in the scrub at the edges of the road until one pounced, pinning the hapless creature and eviscerating it with its back talons. It shrieked horribly, and Leesha covered her ears from the sound.
'Woodies hate flame demons,' the Painted Man explained when it was over, his eyes glinting in pleasure at the kill.
'Why?'Rojer asked.
'Because wood demons are vulnerable to demonfire,' Leesha said. The Painted Man looked up at her in surprise, then nodded.
'Then why don't the flame demons set them on fire?' Rojer asked.
The Painted Man laughed. 'Sometimes they do,' he said, 'but llammable or no, there isn't a flame demon alive that's a match in a fight with a wood demon. Woodies are second only to rock demons in strength, and they're nearly invisible within the borders of the forest.'
'The Creator's Great Plan,' Leesha said. 'Checks and balances.'
'Evolution,' the Painted Man countered. 'If the flame demons burned everything away, there would be nothing left for them to hunt. Nature found a way to solve the problem.'
'You don't believe in the Creator?' Rojer asked.
'We have enough problems already,' the Painted Man answered, and his scowl made it clear that he had no desire to pursue the subject.
'There are some that call you the Deliverer,' Rojer dared.
The Painted Man snorted. 'There's no Deliverer coming to save us, Jongleur,' he said. 'You want demons dead in this world, you have to kill them yourself
As if in response, a wind demon bounced off Twilight Dancer's wardnet, filling the area with a brief flash of light. The stallion dug at the soil with his hooves, as if eager to leap from the circle and do battle, but he stayed in place, waiting for a command from his master.
'How is it the horse stands so unafraid?' Leesha asked. 'Even Messengers stake down their horses at night to keep them from bolting, but yours seems to want to fight.'
'I've been training Twilight Dancer since he was foaled,' the Painted Man said. 'He's always been warded, so he's never learned to fear corelings. His sire was the biggest, most aggressive beast I could find, and his dam the same.'
'But he seemed so gentle when we rode him,' Leesha said.
'I've taught him to channel his aggressive urges,' the Painted Man said, pride evident in his normally emotionless tone. 'He returns kindness, but if he's threatened, or I am, he'll attack without hesitation. He once crushed the skull of a wild boar that would have gored me for sure.'
Finished with the flame demons, the wood demons began to circle the wards, drawing closer and closer. The Painted Man strung his yew bow and took out his quiver of heavy-tipped arrows, but he ignored the creatures as they slashed at the barrier and were thrown back. When they finished their meal, he selected an unmarked arrow and took an etching tool from his warding kit, slowly inscribing the shaft with wards.
'If we weren't here…' Leesha asked.
'I would be out there,' the Painted Man answered, not looking up at her. 'Hunting.'
Leesha nodded, and was quiet for a time, watching him. Rojer shifted uncomfortably at her obvious fascination.
'Have you seen my home?' she asked softly.
The Painted Man looked at her curiously, but made no reply.
'If you've come from the south, you must've come through the Hollow,'Leesha said.
The Painted Man shook his head. 'I give the hamlets a wide berth,' he said. 'The first person to see me runs off, and before long I'm met by a cluster of angry men with pitchforks.'
Leesha wanted to protest, but she knew the people of Cutter's Hollow would act much as he described. 'They're only
afraid,' she said lamely.
'I know,' the Painted Man said. 'And so I leave them in peace. There's more to the world than hamlets and cities, and if the price of one is losing the other…' he shrugged. 'Let people hide in their homes, caged like chickens. Cowards deserve no better.'
'Then why did you save us from the demons?' Rojer asked.
The Painted Man shrugged. 'Because you're human and they're abominations,' he said. 'And because you struggled to survive, right up to the last minute.'
'What else could we have done?' Rojer asked.
'You'd be amazed how many just lay down and wait for the end,' the Painted Man said.
They made good time the fourth day out from Angiers. Neither the Painted Man nor his stallion seemed to know fatigue, Twilight Dancer easily pacing 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.
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