Suddenly he was ten years old again, lying on the ground with his arms covering his head as Cobie Fisher literally kicked the piss out of him. Cobie, Gart, and Willum Fisher had taken it in turns kicking him for talking to Willum's sister Aly, who was twelve. Arlen had secretly shined on her, thinking her kinder than the Fisher boys who regularly tormented him.

But Aly had proven him wrong that day, laughing right along with the others as Arlen gripped his piss-soaked overalls and ran off in tears.

The mind demons held on to that moment, vibrations of pleasure resonating in the air. There is no sweeter taste than humiliation, one thought.

I enjoy rage, another thought, as they watched Arlen take his violent revenge a few weeks later. It is so ... primitive.

Arlen felt derision from the demon that held him. Enraging a human is as easy as making a flame drone burn. It is their nature. A more refined taste is anguish.

Suddenly Arlen was eleven, watching again as his father stood frozen behind the porch wards while his mother and Marea were torn to pieces. He tried to scream, but he had neither mouth nor lungs in the between-state.

He felt the demons feeding on his pain, but there was nothing he could do to stop their invasion of his memories. Like children with a bag of honey nuts at the Jongleur's show, they forced him to relive the night Mery broke with him, riding his shoulders as he wandered the streets of Fort Miln alone at night, raindrops mixing with the tears on his face.

Instead of kicks, the demons tormented him with every secret shame of his life, every failure, every mistake or loss of control. Some were memories that had haunted him all his life, others all but forgotten until the corelings lifted them out of his mind to examine like trinkets in the bazaar.

He was back in Abban's guest pavilions, trying desperately to pull up his trousers after one of Abban's unwed daughters 'accidentally' walked in on him masturbating. She offered coyly to help, and Arlen did not know what terrified him more, giving his Krasian friend who had likely orchestrated the event an excuse to claim offence and force him to take her to wife, or the thought of her laughing at his lack of experience. His erection had vanished in an instant, but in some ways that only made things worse.

He is given a chance to mate and fails, a demon thought, and Arlen's shame doubled, feeding the demons further.

They continued to dissect his mind, reaching the point when he and Abban stole the map to the lost city of Anoch Sun from Sharik Hora. The mind demons drank deeply of his guilt over the theft, surprising even Arlen with its depth and intensity. He had rationalized the crime at the time, but it never sat well with him, especially because the crime had led to his finding the Spear of Kaji and starting the world down a road it might not be ready for.

Suddenly the coreling princes became deadly serious, delving deeper into his memories, sifting every sight and sound and smell as he examined the map and made his trek through the desert. When he opened the sarcophagus of Kaji, finding the spear, they hissed in his mind.

We must see the place razed, the local mind thought. There may be other secrets locked there.

Agreed, thought the others.

The more they chattered among themselves, seemingly oblivious or uncaring of the fact Arlen could hear them, the more the demons became three distinct entities in his mind. The one at the centre of the net who held him prone was older, stronger, having earned his place in the keyward. The others were not subordinates precisely, but they deferred like young men to a greybeard.

Demon manners, Arlen thought, forgetting the pain for an instant.

The local mind demon sensed his amusement and increased the pressure again, jarring Arlen out of lucidity and back to unembraceable agony as they clawed deeper into his mind, consuming Jardir's betrayal in the Maze.

If this one's memories are true, the unifier in the south may not yet understand the full power of the artefacts, the local mind thought.

There was assent. With the unifiers dead, the rest of the stock can be contained. We can leave the cursed surface and return to the mind court triumphant.

Only to have the consort claim the victory as his own, the eldest mind thought.

We should kill this one as soon as we are done Knowing him, the youngest ventured, before the consort can feed on his memories. Arlen could sense the treason in the thought, and for a moment all were silent.

With the Queen about to lay, we must offer the consort no advantage, the eldest agreed.

They resumed stripping his memories like tearing pages from a book. There was understanding when Arlen relived the night he tattooed himself, followed by shock and disbelief when, a few weeks later, he began to eat the flesh of demons.

He is unlike the other unifiers. He steals our power for his own.

By accident only, the eldest thought. The secret will die with him.

They continued to stride through his mind, and again there was a vibration of amusement as they witnessed Arlen's time in the mud with Leesha. Again this one fails at mating!

There was less amusement as they watched the Battle of Cutter's Hollow, but neither was there great concern. The coreling princes were taking the humans' measure and finding them wanting.

But they hissed as they watched Arlen and Renna kill the mind that had come for them last new moon. He felt their rage, and for just an instant fear as they watched him scatter the defeated mind's essence by casting it off a path to the Core.

But the feeling was short-lived. The demons resumed their cold search, watching the events of the last few weeks.

The female knows the secret to power, the local mind thought. She must be killed as well.

Arlen, who had thought his own will broken, suddenly felt the strength to resist again. He struggled against the overwhelming press, not seeming to shift it at all, but it was enough for the mind demons to take note.

He cares about her. There was surprise and amusement at the thought.

His anguish upon her death will be exquisite.

A fitting punishment for the trouble he has caused among the stock.

They probed.

His thoughts say she is out in the night even now ...

For a moment the pressure eased as their thoughts turned out through the senses of their drones, searching for a sign of a woman with warded flesh, glowing bright with stolen magic.

Renna! Arlen focused all his strength in that instant, not trying to break free, but only to solidify the barest fingertip. The mind that held him kept him from re-forming enough to render his painted wards, but he managed just enough to draw one in the air. He had only a slight spark of power to give, but a spark was all that was required as the crate of thundersticks detonated.

The night sky lit up in a flash of intense heat. Roaring filled the air and the ground shook as trenches collapsed onto the demons digging them. The wave of pressure splintered trees and crumpled field demons like wads of paper.

Trapped by the will of his captors, Arlen was caught in the blast, though it could not harm him in his ethereal state. He tried to ignore the distraction, waiting for what seemed an eternity, but a moment later the link among the demons shattered along with their wardnet.

In that instant of shock, Arlen broke free of the mind that held him and fled down the nearest path. He felt the pull of the Hollow's wardnet and in an eyeblink was there, Drawing magic like a drowning man breaking the surface would gasp air. Strength washed over him, driving away the pain and despair, but Arlen wasted no time enjoying it. Immediately he leapt skyward, seeking his former captor.

The mind demon, still reeling in shock from the loss of its greatward, was easily spotted by his power a beacon in the night. His brothers had never left their own greatwards and remained safe, but deferential though they might have been to the elder mind when the odds were in their favour, Arlen knew the demons would not risk themselves to help him. Altruism was as alien a concept to them as love.

The elder mind demon's mimic, in the form of a gigantic field demon, was loping towards its master at incredible speed, but wasn't there to protect it yet. Arlen Drew hard on the Hollow wardnet, tracing heat and impact wards to send a huge blast of magic at the coreling prince. It had none of the subtlety of their assault upon him, but subtlety was not needed here.

The demon saw the attack coming and dematerialized with the speed of thought, but the magic travelled faster than thought and he was still mostly solid when the blast struck, killing both mimic and mind.

As before, the death scream of the mind demon sent psychic waves through the air more potent than any crate of thundersticks. Drones for more than a mile in every direction dropped dead from the shock of it, and even Arlen put his hands to his head to try to massage out the pain.

The other minds must have felt it, too, for the demons fighting the Hollowers, while not killed, fell into disarray. Arlen looked at his people and realized the price of his arrogance. In the minutes he had been trapped, the organized drones had taken a heavy toll.

Boulders and tree trunks lay scattered about the field amid the broken bodies of dozens of men and horses. There was no sign of Captain Gamon, and Thamos, his armour spattered with ichor, had lost his horse and was fighting spear and shield against a rock demon. Promise ran free, trampling field demons into the ground as Renna fought at his side.

Gared had kept his seat, but Rockslide now had Dug Butcher slung unconscious across his back as well. The Hollowers had killed their share, but the Core could spew an endless stream, whereas every human life was precious and irreplaceable if they hoped to win.

The sight of the dead and wounded filled Arlen with anger and he Drew again, ignoring the burning in his skin as he sent a blast of power into a knot of field demons, clearing a path back to safety.

'Retreat,' he called, sending his voice far and wide. 'Keep your heads, but move back to the greatward quick as you can. Work's done for now.'

Twice more he drew wards of heat and impact, incinerating groups of demons to help his people back to safety. He used the same wards Leesha used to pull moisture from the air to water her garden to drown a pack of flame demons that tried to give chase. They fell to the ground, steaming and writhing as they gurgled water, glowing eyes going dark.

When the Hollowers were safe, Arlen turned to the stockpiles of boulders and trees the corelings had built, pulling more and more power as he began destroying them.

He Drew so hard, the entire wardnet began to flicker and dim. Arlen's throat and nose were on fire like he had eaten a handful of Krasian firepeppers. His muscles ached and his fingernails grew hot. His eyes were dry and stung when he blinked.

But there were stockpiles still, so he pulled yet more, until suddenly everything went black, and he felt himself falling.

Forgot to breathe again, he thought just before he hit the ground.

24.

Attrition

333 AR Autumn

Second Night of New Moon

Leesha was in the temporary hospit in New Rizon when the flashes of light began. She was desperately trying to stitch a man's chest back together, but twice needed to stop work and lean over him, shielding the wound with her own body as explosions shook the building and dust clattered from the rafters. Outside, people were cheering and screaming in equal measure.

'What in the Core is going on out there?' she demanded.

'I'll find out, mistress.' Wonda grabbed her bow, glad to have something to do.

She returned a few minutes later. 'Mistress, you need to come quick.'

Leesha could not spare her even a glance, her fingers slick with blood as she tried to stem a bleeding artery. 'I'm a little busy at the moment, Wonda. What's happened?'

'You need to come now,' Wonda said. The urgency in her tone made Leesha glance up at last. Wonda's face was pale with fear. 'Deliverer's down.'

Everyone looked up at that. 'Impossible!' a woman shouted as others began to wail.

Leesha looked back at the open wound, her work far from complete. 'I can't just ...' she began, but then Amanvah laid a hand over hers.

'Go,' the dama'ting said. 'I will take care of this.'

Leesha looked at her. 'Are you-'

'I have been treating injured Sharum since I was seven years old, mistress,' Amanvah cut her off. 'Go.'

Leesha nodded, grabbing a cloth to wipe her hands before lifting her skirts to run after Wonda.

'Tell me what you know,' she said as they went.

'Folk say he appeared in the sky,' Wonda said, 'hurling fire and lightning like the Creator himself to cover the retreat. But then the greatward dimmed, and he fell.' She choked on the last words, and wiped at her face with an arm. Leesha had never seen the giant young woman cry, and the sight did more to bring home the severity of what had happened than anything she could have said. She picked up her pace, arriving breathless at the crowd that had gathered.

'Move aside for Mistress Leesha!' Wonda shouted, but she didn't wait for them to comply, grabbing people and shoving them aside to clear the path.

In the centre of the ring, Renna knelt by Arlen's twisted body, lying still on the cobbles. Blood was pooling around his head. Gared and several Cutters stood by keeping the onlookers back, and they quickly opened a way to admit Leesha.

'Don't you die on me, Arlen Bales!' Renna shouted at him, clutching one of his hands, but Arlen gave no response.

'He's alive,' Leesha said as she found his pulse, weak and erratic. His skull was bashed in where it had struck the cobbles, and Leesha could feel the fractures spiderwebbing out from the spot. Jagged bones jutted from his skin. He had a broken shoulder and collar, shattered ribs, pelvis ...

But the bleeding had stopped. 'Night,' Leesha breathed. 'He's healing already.'

Renna looked at her. 'Ent that a good thing?'

'Not if he heals all twisted,' Leesha said. 'We need to get him on an operating table. Gared! Can you lift him? Carefully!'

Gared moved to comply, but Renna effortlessly shoved him aside, lifting Arlen as tenderly as a babe in swaddling. 'Everything's gonna be sunny,' she promised as tears streamed down her face.

For the next hour, Leesha, Darsy, and Renna pulled, twisted, and splinted Arlen back into his proper shape. Twice, Darsy had to rebreak bones that had healed incorrectly. Through it all, Arlen remained unconscious, which would have been for the best, if not for the head trauma.

Gared stuck his head in when the sun finally crested the sky. 'He gonna be all right?'

Leesha wiped the sweat from her brow and shrugged. 'We've done all we can. He's alive and healing fast, we'll just have to wait till he wakes up on his own.'

But who will we find when he does? she wondered silently. His skull had been cracked like an egg, and though the fractures had melted away before her eyes, there was no telling if the fall had done damage even magic could not heal.

A Gatherer needs to know how to deliver hard news, Bruna had taught, but she also needs to know when. Telling the others, even Renna, that Arlen might have permanent brain damage would set a panic through the Hollow that they couldn't afford.

Gared nodded and left. Thamos came in soon after. He was spattered with ichor, his thick hair matted with sweat and the enamel shattered in more than one part of his armour, but he seemed hale enough. Leesha felt a slight relief at that, holding on to that good news as she asked for the bad.

'How many dead?' she asked.

Thamos shook his head. 'Hundreds confirmed already, but there are over a thousand unaccounted for. We're only just starting to gather the remains of bodies left out in the night and take stock of those here in the hospit. I thought Captain Gamon dead until I saw him here in plaster.'

Leesha nodded. 'He was knocked from his seat, but his armour caught on the saddle, and his horse dragged him all the way back to the greatward. His hip is broken, and he has a concussion.'

'Will he walk again?' Thamos asked.