The Core

by Peter V. Brett

  Leesha touched her wand again. “I hope so, too.”

  Tensions grew high after sunset. Leesha walked Pestle in circles around the hilltop, staring into the night through her warded spectacles, but there was no sign of gathering demons, or anything out of the ordinary. The patrols rode the perimeter unmolested, and scouts sent beyond the forbidding checked in regularly.

  “Ent right,” Gared muttered.

  Leesha agreed. Last time the demons attacked on new moon, they began by constructing greatwards like engines in a siege. It wasn’t something that could be done quietly or without drawing attention.

  Instead, there was silence, save for the call of birds and the chirping of insects. Even the casual demon activity of any given night was absent.

  Leesha gave one of her earrings a twist. Their reach beyond the greatwards was minimal, but in Hollow County contact was instantaneous.

  “Mistress,” Darsy said in her ear.

  “Report,” Leesha said. “There is no sign of demon activity near Stallion’s Ranch.”

  “Nothin’ happenin’ in Gatherers’ Wood,” Darsy said. “Captain just checked in. Ent heard a peep elsewhere.”

  It was the same as Leesha checked in with the other boroughs, one by one. They patrolled, paced, fretted on the edge of battle, but when the dawn came, there was nothing.

  The alagai will strike at nightfall in the north of the Hollow, they had all agreed. What went wrong? Were Leesha’s dice indeed flawed?

  She thought back to the pattern, cemented in her mind from hours of study. Had they truly said that? Or had they all instinctively assumed the Hollow would be the demons’ target?

  The alagai will strike at nightfall, north of the Hollow.

  Night.

  “Arther.” Leesha felt a pain building behind her eye. “Be a dear and send Captain Gamon and the Hollow Lancers north.”

  Arther raised an eyebrow. “Mistress?”

  “Wonda, go with them. Take Kendall with you.”

  Wonda gaped. “Mistress?”

  Leesha clenched her fist, angry at her own arrogance, but she kept her voice placid. “I fear Angiers may be under attack.”

  CHAPTER 28

  ARAINE’S TALE

  334 AR

  Arther and Darsy fell in behind Leesha while she inspected the preparations in the Corelings’ Graveyard. “Report.”

  “Triage tents are stocked and ready.” Darsy waved toward the white pavilions filling the old town square. “Surgeries in the hospit and academy are standing by.”

  Leesha nodded. She’d traded the gowns she favored as countess for the blue dress and heavy pocketed apron that had served her for so many years as Gatherer. There would be no tea politics today. Only scalpels and needles and blood to her elbows.

  “Supply wagons are ready with food, water, soap, and clothing,” Arther said. “Temporary privies are assembled.”

  “I want teams sanitizing and swapping the buckets regularly,” Leesha said. “We can’t have…”

  Arther looked down his nose at her, and she drifted off. He already knew. Of course he did.

  “The Cutters…” Leesha began.

  Again the look. “Already at work, clearing land for the settlement.”

  Leesha blew out a breath. “Seems like just yesterday, we had no idea how to handle thousands of refugees pouring into the Hollow.”

  “Practice makes perfect,” Darsy said.

  “Only…” Arther began.

  Leesha and Darsy looked at him. “Yes?”

  “I fear it may not be thousands,” Arther said. “The Messengers report considerably less.”

  “Impossible,” Leesha said. “Gamon’s report said the city was lost.”

  Arther nodded. “Indeed.”

  The pain in Leesha’s head grew. “Fort Angiers was home to more than forty thousand souls. The surrounding hamlets held half again as many.”

  “At least,” Arther agreed. “But reports say the group led by Gamon’s Lancers numbers in the hundreds. We must prepare for the worst.”

  Leesha looked out at her people, hurrying to and fro in the Graveyard, preparing to give succor to an endless stream of survivors. “I thought we were.”

  Darsy put a hand on her shoulders. “Wasn’t the Krasians this time, Leesh. Demons ent got mercy for those that come out hands-up.”

  Leesha put a hand to her mouth, and it was all she could do to will back tears. So much death.

  Soon after, Gamon and his Hollow Lancers—battered and bloody, their numbers thinned—rode into the square. Behind them, a caravan of refugees stretched down the road and out of sight, guarded by a handful of Wooden Soldiers and Mountain Spears, most of them sporting bloody bandages.

  Gamon himself had his arm in a sling, and when he took off his warded helmet, his head was wrapped in bloody cloth, yellow from sweat.

  Wonda and Kendall flanked him, looking equally filthy but none the worse for wear. All three were stone-faced.

  “They have gazed into Nie’s abyss,” Favah said.

  The three escorted what had once been a grand carriage. Now its wheels were mismatched, one of the doors replaced with a nailed board painted with wards. The slumped driver pulled up. An equally haggard footman dropped to the ground and set a stair.

  “Night,” Leesha said. It had not occurred to her until this moment that Duke Pether himself would be among the refugees. The Hollow was still technically his domain. Could he claim it right out from under Leesha? Would the Hollowers let him?

  She imagined Gared’s reaction, and knew that would never happen. If Angiers had fallen, then the Hollow was free, no matter what the Rhinebeck family thought.

  But Duke Pether did not emerge from the carriage, nor Duchess Lorain. Only Minister Janson’s young son Pawl. The boy hopped down and readied the stair, climbing back up to assist the Duchess Mum, her eyes sunken and hollow.

  —

  “They didn’t even bother attacking the walls.” Araine’s hand shook as she clutched her cup and saucer. Leesha had put a mild sedative herb in with the leaves. “They came up through the boardwalk. Tunneled right under our noses.”

  “Pether?” Leesha asked. “Lorain?”

  “Dead.” Araine’s gaze was distant. “All dead.”

  She sipped her tea, then grimaced and delicately spat it back into the cup. “Drugging my tea? You really are Bruna’s brat.”

  “You tasted half a skyflower leaf through all that honey?” Leesha asked.

  Araine looked down her nose. “The fact Leesha Paper served tea already honeyed was evidence enough.”

  “Drink it,” Leesha said. “You’ve been through an ordeal. It will help you relax while you tell your tale. Afterward, you’ll have a good sleep and be the better for it.”

  “Thank you, but no.” Araine looked to Pawl. “Bring a fresh cup. Make it yourself.”

  “Yes, Mum.” The boy moved to take her tea, but Leesha froze him with a raised finger.

  “Drink.” Leesha met Araine’s steely gaze. “Gatherer’s orders.”

  “Pfagh!” Araine broke the stare and drank the tea, but the victory was unsettling. The woman Leesha knew wasn’t so easily bullied. She waited until the cup was empty before signaling Wonda, who opened the door to admit Favah.

  “What is this?!” Araine looked like a hissing cat.

  “Dama’ting Favah is the ranking Krasian ambassador in the Hollow,” Leesha said. “Having her here will save me having to tell the story again. We’re all on the same side in this.”

  “It is as the daughter of Erny says,” Favah agreed. “Whatever…disagreements our people may have in the day are as nothing in the face of Sharak Ka. Krasia will offer safe succor to your people, and lend our spears to your vengeance, if it is to be had.”

  “I had four sons, Dama’ting,” Araine said. “One was killed by corelings, the other three by Krasians. If you want to lend spears to my vengeance, you can start by turning them on yourselves.”

  She turned to Leesha. �
�I won’t give away state secrets—”

  Leesha smacked the arm of her chair as she had seen Bruna do so many times, when the woman was tired of suffering a fool. It hurt her hand more than expected, but the crack that echoed through the room was worth the sting, cutting the Duchess Mum’s words short.

  “Angiers is lost,” Leesha said. “There is no state to protect. If the corelings are moving to exterminate humanity, we can’t afford to keep fighting among ourselves.”

  Araine blew a breath through her nostrils, but whether from plain sense or the skyflower, she deflated and made no protest as Favah moved to the couch across from her. If anything, she seemed calmer, more herself, with an enemy in the room.

  “At first we thought they could be contained,” Araine said. “The Mountain Spears surrounded the breach, but rock demons emerged, and the flamework weapons had no effect. The rocks smashed through them and secured the breach.

  “That was when it began to happen.”

  Leesha felt a chill pass through her. “What began to happen?”

  “Mutiny,” Araine said. “Workmen in the gatehouses attacked the guards and opened the gates. Peasant brigades with warded weapons mustered, then turned on the soldiers. At first it seemed as if the peasants were in revolt…”

  “But they weren’t,” Leesha said. “There were mind demons inside the city walls.”

  Araine nodded. “A company of Wooden Lancers was mowing down demons by the dozen on the narrow streets, until their captain removed his helmet to wipe the sweat from his brow. He’d killed both his lieutenants before his own men pulled him down. They were struggling to pin him down when a copse of wood demons swept in.”

  Araine tapped a nail against her teacup, and Tarisa immediately filled it. “Reports like that kept on through the night. Most of the city shelters remained intact, as if the people weren’t the demons’ true goal.”

  “The palace,” Leesha guessed.

  “Our walls were thick, strengthened by magic, above and below,” Araine said. “No tunneling this time. They came up the Messenger road with reaps of field demons and copses of wood demons, but it was nearly dawn, and we were sure we could hold out until sunrise.

  “The wood demons all carried small stones.” The duchess held her hands apart, no larger than a melon. “But they threw precise as Jongleur’s knives. Not to break the wall…”

  “To mar the wards,” Leesha said.

  “Every guard in the palace wore a mind-warded helm,” Araine said. “As did the Royals and most of the servants, but it didn’t matter. A scullery maid with a knife killed three Wooden Soldiers, and the guards came to take us to the palace keep. On the way I saw a kitchen lad with a rolling pin storm a guarded stairway. Boy couldn’t have been more than eight, but he moved like a dama, dancing around the guards’ blows and between their legs, leaving a trail of crippled men in his wake.

  “By then we’d figured things out, drawing wards on the brow of everyone we encountered. The keep was secured, and Pether, Lorain, and I were placed in a thick-walled room that could only be opened from the inside. The guards fed us reports through a slot in the door.”

  Araine drew a deep breath. “Pether was raving and pulling his hair when suddenly he just…calmed. I took the moment’s peace as a blessing, but when I looked up, he wasn’t wearing his crown. He walked over to Lorain like he was strolling the garden, then pulled a knife and tried to cut her throat.”

  Leesha could not keep from drawing a horrified breath.

  “She took a deep cut, but caught his arm,” Araine said. “Lorain outweighed Pether by more than a little, and they struggled. And as they did, Pether, my pious boy, began to say…the most terrible things.”

  “What things?” Leesha asked.

  “I’ll cut my own cock off before I stick it in your rank hole again,” Araine’s voice was a deep rasp, “or see that rotten egg growing in your belly sit the throne.

  “And then,” Araine breathed, “he kicked her in the stomach, and kept on kicking until she was coughing blood. I swung my walking stick at him, but he caught it in his free hand and kicked me in the hip. By the time I recovered, he’d already cut her throat and turned on me, still holding the knife.”

  Araine’s voice turned back into the rasp. “Why should I stop there, Mother? I’m rid of the woman Euchor sent to bully me, but not the one who’s done it all my life.”

  “Night,” Leesha whispered. “How did you escape?”

  “I’ve learned a Gatherer’s trick or two in my time, girl,” Araine said. “Blinding powder in a hollow bracelet. I let him have the whole dose. Pawl tripped him to the floor while he choked, and helped me limp away. At the door I spared a last look, and saw my son plunge the knife into his own throat.”

  “Everam protect us,” Favah whispered.

  “The hall guards were all dead, but there was no sign of corelings,” Araine said. “Helms littered the floor. They killed one another.”

  Araine finished her tea, eyes distant. “I suppose the mind demon didn’t consider me threat enough to kill.”

  “A mistake the alagai prince will come to regret,” Favah said.

  “I doubt it,” Araine said. “We used a secret passage to return to the women’s wing, where a handful of my house guards remained. There was fighting in every hall, and we were forced to flee through the brothel tunnels out into the city.

  “Dawn came, driving the demons back to the Core, but the remaining guards in the palace closed the gates, locking us out. When I demanded entry, they posted Mountain Spears who fired on us.”

  “Even in the day?” Leesha gaped.

  “It wasn’t long before we learned the guards at the gates were compromised as well,” Araine said. “They closed the gates and broke the winches, saying it was the only way to keep the demons out, never mind that it kept us in.

  “It wasn’t all the guards,” Araine said. “But the affected showed no signs. They walked in sunlight and donned helms with mind wards, cared for themselves and their weapons, acted normal in every way—until someone tried to leave. ‘Duke’s orders,’ they would say, barring the way as if it were routine, hearing no argument that His Grace was gone. It wasn’t until a Messenger tried to scale a wall, and the Mountain Spears shot him in the back, that we realized how much danger we were in. We tried to storm the gatehouses, but they barricaded themselves inside, manning the wall with Mountain Spears.”

  “Trapped, like alagai in the Maze,” Favah said.

  “We did what we could,” Araine said. “Everyone in the city had mind wards painted on their foreheads by then, and we used thundersticks to collapse the tunnels the corelings used for entry, but it didn’t seem to matter. The palace guards drew every curtain, painting the windows black, and we knew. The demons didn’t need to get back in the city. They never truly left.

  “The next night the demons began carving the boardwalk around the palace into a greatward, and more and more folk began turning on their fellows. A few peasants here and there—just enough to make everyone look crosswise at their neighbors—and the numbers of guards on inner and outer walls grew.”

  “I do not understand what the alagai gain in this,” Favah said.

  “They cut us off from our allies,” Leesha said. “They keep aid from Miln.”

  “I am not a fool,” Favah said. “But mercy—restraint, these are not the ways of the alagai. What point in taking the city and leaving the people alive?”

  “Because they don’t want to destroy the city,” Leesha said. “They want a larder.”

  Neither woman had a response to that, and it was just as well. Leesha had no reason to think Inevera brought Favah into her counsel regarding the swarm, and the fewer people who knew what Arlen and Jardir were doing, the better.

  “How did you get out?” Leesha asked.

  “Pawl.” Araine patted the boy’s hand. “He knows all the royal passages and had…contacts in the city that were able to smuggle us past the wall guards.”

  L
eesha looked at the boy, who seemed to shrink from her scrutiny. “If you got the duchess out, could you smuggle people back in?”

  “A handful, perhaps,” Pawl said. “Not a sizable force.”

  “In?” Araine asked. “Are you mad?”

  “I won’t leave thousands of people to the mercy of a mind demon,” Leesha said. “If we’re to have any hope of saving them, we’ll need to break through before the next new moon.”

  Araine sagged in her chair, skyflower and exhaustion finally setting in. “Perhaps. It’s your fight now. The Rhinebeck line is ended.”

  “Nonsense,” Leesha said. “The Duchess Mother yet lives.”

  “Ancient, and heirless,” Araine said.

  “You are still young, in my estimation,” Favah said. “Will you abandon your people to wait for the lonely path to open to you?”

  Araine looked at the dama’ting, but the fight had gone out of her. She appeared broken, and every day her age.

  “A question best left until you wake.” Leesha rang a bell, and Melny entered, the exiled young duchess still clad in her simple housekeeper’s apron and dress. Favah’s eyes flicked over her, taking in the servant’s garb and dismissing her.

  “This is Melny, one of the Gatherer’s apprentices,” Leesha said. “She’ll serve as your lady’s maid. She’s got a strong, healthy boy growing in her belly, but the babe is still months from birth. You’ll find she’s a hard worker.”

  Araine’s eyes revealed nothing as her daughter-in-law went to her. Pawl helped the old woman to her feet and the two of them lent her their arms on the way to the door.

  Araine turned to give Leesha a last look, and there were tears in her eyes.

  “Thank you, Countess.”

  CHAPTER 29

  WOLVES

  334 AR

  Inevera watched through the warded glass window of the carriage as Sharum in filthy blacks flitted through the scrub and hills to either side of the road.

  The Wolves of Everam had been following them for hours.

  The strain of conversing with Ashia over so many miles left her head spinning for days, but the resulting throws of the dice proved worth the pain, yielding some shred of the alagai princelings’ plan.