Sara Douglass - Pilgrim

Their leader, StarSon Caelum, walked slowly about, the fingers of one hand rubbing at his chin and cheek, his eyes sliding away from the fear in his men’s faces, thinking that now he knew how Drago must have felt when his Icarii powers had been quashed.

There was nothing left. No Star Dance. No enchantment. Nothing. Just an emptiness. And a sense of uselessness so profound that Caelum thought he would go mad if he had to live beyond a day with it.

“Faraday said she would join us here,” Zared said, watching Caelum pace to and fro. He sat on a log, his hands dangling down between his knees, his face impassive.

“And you think she can help us against this … this …?” Caelum drifted to a halt, not sure quite what to call this calamity that had enveloped them.

“Can you ? ”

Caelum spun about on his heel and walked a few paces away.

“We can do little, Caelum, until we hear from Faraday.”

“Or my parents.”

“Or your parents,” Zared agreed. He paused, watching Caelum pace about. He did not care for the loss that Caelum — and every other Enchanter — had suffered. They relied so deeply on their powers and their beloved Star Dance, that Zared did not know if they could continue to function effectively without it. Caelum was StarSon, the man who must pull them through this crisis — but could he do it if he was essentially not the same man he had been a few weeks ago? How could anyone who had previously relied on the Star Dance remain effective?

Maybe Axis. Axis had been BattleAxe, and a good BattleAxe, for years before he’d known anything about the Star Dance.

And yet hadn’t Axis said that even when he’d thought himself human, mortal, he’d still subconsciously drawn on the Star Dance? Still used its power and aid?

Well, time would tell if Icarii blood was worth anything without the music of the Star Dance.

At the moment, Zared had his doubts. He would gladly trade Tencendor’s entire stock of useless Enchanters and SunSoars for the hope Faraday offered.

Suddenly sick of watching Caelum pacing uselessly to and fro, Zared stood and walked over to where Herme, Theod, DareWing FullHeart and Leagh were engaged in a lacklustre game of ghemt.

Leagh looked up and smiled for him as he approached, and Zared squatted down by her, a hand on her shoulder.

“How goes it, Leagh?”

“She wins,” Herme replied, “for how can we,” his hand indicated his two companions, “allow such a beautiful woman to lose?”

Leagh grinned. “My ‘beauty’ has nothing to do with the fact, my good Earl Herme, that I am far more skilled than you.”

All the men laughed, and threw their gaming sticks into the centre of the circle scratched into the dirt before them.

Zared touched Leagh’s cheek softly, then looked to DareWing. “My friend, I wonder if I might ask something of you?”

The Strike Leader inclined his head. “Speak.”

“Faraday told us that there were certain times of the day when it would be dangerous to go outside, times when the Demons would spread their evil. DareWing, I need to know when exactly these times are.”

“Dawn, dusk, mid-morning and mid-afternoon, and night,” Theod said. “This we know.”

“Yes, but we need to know more specifically. If we know exactly when it is safe for us to roam abroad, then we will have a better idea of how to counter these Demons … or at least, when we can try to do so. Besides, somehow we will have to rebuild life around,” he paused, his mouth working as if he chewed something distasteful, “our new-found restrictions. We need to know when it is safe to live.”

DareWing nodded. “I agree … but how?”

“Can you station members of your Strike Force, perhaps twenty at any one time, along the south-west borders of the Silent Woman Woods? They will be safe enough if they remain among the trees, and perhaps they can observe … observe the behaviour of those still trapped in the open.”

DareWing nodded, agreeing with the location. The south-west border of the Woods would be close to Tare, an area more highly populated than the northern or southern borders of the Woods. If they needed to observe, that would give them their best possible chance.

“The more we learn,” he said, “the more hope we have.”

“You do not want any of our men stationed there?” Herme asked quietly.

“My friend,” Zared said. “I ask only the Icarii because they can move between the border and back to our placement faster than can human or horse legs.” He stood up. “I profess myself sick at not knowing how to react, or what to do next. Until Faraday returns we must do what we can.”

DareWing rose to his feet, nodded at Zared, and faded into the gloom of the forest.

Fifteen paces away Askam sat with his back against a small sapling, his eyes narrow and unreadable as he watched Zared move to talk quietly with Caelum.

His mouth thinned as he saw Caelum nod at Zared’s words and place a hand briefly on the King’s shoulder.

After three days of observation, they had a better idea of the span of the Demonic Hours. From dusk to the time when the sun was well above the horizon was a time of horror, the time when first Raspu, then Rox and finally Mot ruled the land. Pestilence, terror and hunger roamed, and those few who were caught outside succumbed to the infection of whichever Demon had caught them. After the dawn hour there were three hours of peace, a time of recovery, before Barzula, tempest, struck at mid-morning.

Although the occasional storm rolled across the landscape during Barzula’s time — whirlwinds of ice or of fire — the scouts reported that the primary influence of the tempest appeared to occur within the minds of those caught outside. Once Barzula’s hour had passed and he had fed, there was again a time of peace (or, rather, a time of frightful anticipation) for some four hours until Sheol struck at mid-afternoon. Again, an interval of three hours when it was safe to venture outside, then the long hours of pestilence and terror through dusk and night.

The precise time span of the Demonic Hours were marked by a thin grey haze that slid over the land from a point to the east, probably the location of the Demons themselves. It was a sickening miasma that carried the demonic contagion with it, lying over the land in a drifting curtain of madness until it dissipated at the end of the appointed time.

“And those caught outside?” Zared asked softly of the first group of scouts to report back.

“Some die,” one of the scouts said, “but most live, although their horror is dreadful to watch.”

“Live?”

The scout took a moment to answer. “They live,” he finally said, “but in a state of madness. Sometimes they eat dirt, or chew on their own excrement. I have seen some try to couple with boulders, and others stuff pebbles into every orifice they can find until their bodies burst. But many who live past their first infection — and those dangerous few hours post-infection when they might kill themselves in their madness — wander westwards, sometimes north-west.”

The scout paused again, locking eyes with his fellows. Then he turned back to Zared and Caelum. “It is as if they have been infused with a purpose.”

At that Zared had shuddered. A purpose? To what end? What were the Demons planning?

But the scouts had yet more to report. One group had also seen seven black shapes running eastwards across the Plains of Tare towards the Ancient Barrows. Horses they thought, but were not sure. Above them had flown a great dark cloud … that whispered.

No-one knew quite what to make of it.

“We have roughly three hours after dawn, four hours between mid-morning and mid-afternoon, and then another three hours before dusk,” Zared said to Caelum and Askam on the third morning since they had taken shelter in the Woods.