Peter Brett - The Painted Man

By the time dawn's first light peeked over the horizon, the mud of the square had been churned into a foul stew of human blood and demon ichor; bodies and limbs were scattered everywhere. Many jumped in fright as the sun struck the demon corpses, setting their unholy flesh alight. Like bursts of liquid demonfire from all over the square, the sun finished the battle, incinerating the few demons that still twitched.

The Painted Man looked out at the faces of the survivors, half his fighters at least, and was amazed at the strength and determination he saw. It seemed impossible that these were the same people who were so broken and terrified less than a day before. They might have lost many in the night, but the Hollowers were now stronger than ever.

'Creator be praised,' Tender Jona said, staggering out into the square on his crutch, drawing wards in the air as the demons burned in the morning light. He made his way to the Painted Man, and stood before him.

'This is thanks to you,' he said.

The Painted Man shook his head. 'No. You did this,' he said. 'All of you.'

Jona nodded. 'We did,' he agreed. 'But only because you came and showed us the way. Can you still doubt this?'

The Painted Man scowled. 'For me to claim this victory as my own cheapens the sacrifice of all that died during the night,' he said. 'Keep your prophecies, Tender. These people do not need them.'

Jona bowed deeply. 'As you wish,' he said, but the Painted Man sensed the matter was not closed.

332-3 AR

Leesha waved as Rojer and the Painted Man rode up the path. She set her brush back in its bowl on the porch as they dismounted.

'You learn quickly,' the Painted Man said, coming up to study the wards she had painted on the rails. 'These would hold a horde of corelings at bay.'

'Quickly?' Rojer asked. 'Night, that's undersaid. It's not been a month since Leesha couldn't tell a wind ward from a flame.'

'He's right,' the Painted Man said. 'I've seen five-year journeyman Warders whose lines weren't half so neat.'

Leesha smiled. 'I've always been a quick study,' she said. 'And you and my father are good teachers. I only wish I had bothered to learn sooner.'

The Painted Man shrugged. 'Would that we all could go back and make decisions based on what was to come.'

'I think I'd have lived my whole life different,' Rojer agreed.

Leesha laughed, ushering them inside the hut. 'Supper's almost ready,' she said, heading for the fire. 'How did the village council meeting go?' she asked, stirring the steaming pot.

'Idiots,' the Painted Man grumbled.

She laughed again. 'That well?'

'The council voted to change the village name to Deliverer's Hollow,' Rojer said.

'It's only a name,' Leesha said, joining them at the table and pouring tea.

'It's not the name that bothers, it's the notion,' the Painted Man said. 'I've gotten the villagers to stop calling me Deliverer to my face, but I still hear it whispered behind my back.'

'It will go easier for you if you just embrace it,' Rojer said. 'You can't stop a story like that. By now, every Jongleur north of the Krasian desert is telling it.'

The Painted Man shook his head. 'I won't lie and pretend to be something I'm not to make life easier. If I'd wanted an easy life…' he trailed off.

'What of the repairs?' Leesha asked, pulling him back to them as his eyes went distant.

Rojer smiled. 'With the Hollowers back on their feet thanks to your cures, it seems a new house goes up every day,' he said. 'You'll be able to move back into the village proper soon.'

Leesha shook her head. 'This hut is all I have left of Bruna. This is my home now.'

'This far from the village, you'll be outside the forbiddance,' the Painted Man warned.

Leesha shrugged. 'I understand why you laid out the new streets in the form of a warding,' she said, 'but there are benefits to being outside the forbiddance, as well.'

'Oh?' the Painted Man asked, raising a warded brow.

'What benefit could there be to living on land that demons can set foot on?' Rojer asked.

Leesha sipped her tea. 'My mum refuses to move, too,' she said. 'Says between your new wards and the cutters running about chopping every demon in sight, it's a needless bother.'

The Painted Man frowned. 'I know it seems like we have the demons cowed, but if the histories of the Demon Wars are anything to go by, they won't stay that way. They'll be back in force, and I want Cutter's Hollow to be ready.'

'Deliverer's Hollow,' Rojer corrected, smirking at the Painted Man's scowl.

'With you here, it will be,' Leesha said, ignoring Rojer and sipping at her tea. She watched the Painted Man carefully over the rim of her cup.

When he hesitated, she set her cup down. 'You're leaving,' she said. 'When?'

'When the Hollow is ready,' the Painted Man said, not bothering to deny her conclusion. 'I've wasted years, hoarding wards that can make the Free Cities that in more than name. I owe it to every city and hamlet in Thesa to see to it they have what they need to stand tall in the night.'

Leesha nodded. 'We want to help you,' she said.

'You are,' the Painted Man said. 'With the Hollow in your hands, I know it will be safe while I'm away.'

'You'll need more than that,' Leesha said. 'Someone to teach other Gatherers to make flamework and poisons, and to treat coreling wounds.'

'You could write all that down,' the Painted Man said. Leesha snorted. 'And give a man the secrets of fire? Not likely.'

'I can't write fiddling lessons, in any event,' Rojer said, 'even if I had letters.'

The Painted Man hesitated, then shook his head. 'No,' he said. 'The two of you will only slow me down. I'll be weeks in the wilds, and you don't have the stomach for that.'

'Don't have the stomach?' Leesha asked. 'Rojer, close the shutters,' she ordered.

Both men looked at her curiously.

'Do it,' she ordered, and Rojer rose to comply, cutting off the sunlight and filling the hut with a dark gloom. Leesha was already shaking a vial of chemics, bathing herself in a phosphorescent glow.

'The trap,' she said, and the Painted Man lifted the trap door down to the cellar where the demonfire had been kept. The scent of chemics was thick in the air that escaped.

Leesha led the way down into the darkness, her vial held high. She moved to sconces on the wall, adding chemics to glass jars, but the Painted Man's warded eyes, as comfortable in utter darkness as in clear day, had already widened before the light filled the room.

Heavy tables had been brought down into the cellar, and there, spread out before him, were half a dozen corelings in various states of dissection.

'Creator!' Rojer cried, gagging. He ran back up the stairs, and they could hear him gasping for air.

'Well, perhaps Rojer doesn't have the stomach yet,' Leesha conceded with a grin. She looked at the Painted Man. 'Did you know that wood demons have two? Stomachs, I mean. One stacked on top of the other, like an hourglass.' She took an instrument, peeling back layers of the dead demon's flesh to illustrate.

'Their hearts are off-centre; down to the right,' she added, 'but there's a gap between their third and fourth ribs. Something a man looking to deliver a killing thrust should know.'

The Painted Man looked on in amazement. When he looked back at Leesha, it was as if he were seeing her for the first time. 'Where did you get these…?'

'A word to the cutters you sent to patrol this end of the Hollow,' Leesha said. 'They were happy to oblige me with specimens.

'There's more,' she said. 'These demons have no sex organs. They're all neuter.'

The Painted Man looked at her in surprise. 'How is that possible?' he asked.

'It's not that uncommon among insects,' Leesha said. 'There are drone castes for labour and defence, and sexed castes that control the hive.'