they could be hurt.
But what difference did it make in a world where men like Jeph wouldn’t stand up to the corelings, not even for their own families? What hope did any of them have?
He stared at the blackness around him for hours, but in his mind’s eye all he saw was his father’s face, staring at them from the safety of the wards.
The rain tapered off before dawn. Arlen used the break in the weather as a chance to lift the trough, but he immediately regretted it as the collected heat the wood had stored was lost. He pulled it down again, but stole peeks until the sky began to brighten.
Most of the corelings had faded away by the time it was light enough to see, but a few stragglers remained as the sky went from indigo to lavender. He lifted the trough again and clambered to his feet, trying vainly to brush off the slime and muck that clung to him.
His arm was stiff, and stung when he flexed it. He looked down and saw that the skin was bright red where the firespit had struck. The night in the mud did one good thing, he thought, knowing his and his mother’s burns would have been far worse had they not been packed in the cold muck all night.
As the last flame demons in the yard began to turn insubstantial, Arlen strode from the pen, heading for the barn.
‘Arlen, no!’ a cry came from the porch. Arlen looked up, and saw Jeph there, wrapped in a blanket, keeping watch from the safety of the porch wards. ‘It’s not full dawn yet! Wait!’
Arlen ignored him, walking to the barn and opening the doors. Missy looked thoroughly unhappy, still hitched to the cart, but she would make it to Town Square.
A hand grabbed his arm as he led the horse out. ‘Are you trying to get yourself killed?!’ Jeph demanded. ‘You mind me, boy!’
Arlen tore his arm away, refusing to look his father in the eye. ‘Mam needs to see Coline Trigg,’ he said.
‘She’s alive?’ Jeph asked incredulously, his head snapping over to where the woman lay in the mud.
‘No thanks to you,’ Arlen said. ‘I’m taking her to Town Square.’
‘We’re taking her,’ Jeph corrected, rushing over to lift his wife and carry her to the cart. Leaving Norine to tend the animals and seek out poor Marea’s remains, they headed off down the road to town.
Silvy was bathed in sweat, and while her burns seemed no worse than Arlen’s, the deep lines the flame demons’ talons had dug still oozed blood, the flesh an ugly swollen red.
‘Arlen, I …’ Jeph began as they rode, reaching a shaking hand towards his son. Arlen drew back, looking away, and Jeph recoiled as if burned.
Arlen knew his father was ashamed. It was just as Ragen had said. Maybe Jeph even hated himself, as Cholie had. Still, Arlen could find no sympathy. His mother had paid the price for Jeph’s cowardice.
They rode the rest of the way in silence.
Coline Trigg’s two-storey house, in Town Square, was one of the largest in the Brook, and filled with beds. In addition to her family upstairs, Coline always had at least one person occupying her sickbeds on the ground floor.
Coline was a short woman with a large nose and no chin. Not yet thirty, six children had made her thick around the middle. Her clothes always smelled of burnt weeds, and her cures usually involved some type of foul-tasting tea. The people of Tibbet’s Brook made fun of that tea, but every one of them drank it gratefully when they took a chill.
The Herb Gatherer took one look at Silvy and had Arlen and his father bring her inside. She asked no questions, which was just as well, as neither Arlen nor Jeph knew what they would say if she did. As she cut at each wound, squeezing out sickly brown pus, the air filled with a rotten stench. She cleaned the drained wounds with water and ground herbs, then sewed them shut. Jeph turned green, and brought his hand to his mouth suddenly.
‘Out of here with that!’ Coline barked, sending Jeph from the room with a pointed finger. As Jeph scurried out of the house, she looked to Arlen.
‘You, too?’ she demanded. Arlen shook his head. Coline stared at him a moment, then nodded in approval. ‘You’re braver than your father,’ she said. ‘Fetch the mortar and pestle. I’m going to teach you to make a balm for burns.’
Never taking her eyes from her work, Coline talked Arlen through the countless jars and pouches in her pharmacy, directing him to each ingredient and explaining how to mix them. She kept to her grisly work as Arlen applied the balm to his mother’s burns.
Finally, when Silvy’s wounds were all tended, she turned to inspect Arlen. He protested at first, but the balm did its work, and only as the coolness spread along his arms did he realize how much his burns had stung.
‘Will she be all right?’ Arlen asked, looking at his mother. She seemed to be breathing normally, but the flesh around her wounds was an ugly colour, and that stench of rot was still thick in the air.
‘I don’t know,’ Coline said. She wasn’t one to honey her words. ‘I’ve never seen anyone with wounds so severe. Usually, if the corelings get that close …’
‘They kill you,’ Jeph said from the doorway. ‘They would have killed Silvy, too, if not for Arlen.’ He stepped into the rooms, keeping his eyes down. ‘My son taught me something last night, Coline,’ Jeph said. ‘He taught me fear is our enemy, more than the corelings ever were.’ Jeph put his hands on his son’s shoulders and looked into his son’s eyes. ‘I won’t fail you again,’ he promised.
Arlen nodded and looked away. He wanted to believe it was so, but his thoughts kept returning to the sight of his father on the porch, frozen with terror.
Jeph went over to Silvy, gripping her clammy hand in his own. She was still sweating, and thrashed in her drugged sleep now and then.
‘Will she die?’ Jeph asked.
The Herb Gatherer blew out a long breath. ‘I’m a fair hand at setting bones,’ she said, ‘and delivering children. I can chase a fever away and ward a chill. I can even cleanse a demon wound, if it’s still fresh.’ She shook her head. ‘But this is demon fever. I’ve given her herbs to dull the pain and help her sleep, but you’ll need a better Gatherer than I to brew a cure.’
‘Who else is there?’ Jeph asked. ‘You’re all the Brook has.’
‘The woman who taught me,’ Coline said, ‘Old Mey Friman. She lives on the outskirts of Sunny Pasture, two days from here. If anyone can cure it, she can, but you’d best hurry. The fever will spread quickly and if you take too long, even old Mey won’t be able to help you.’
‘How do we find her?’ Jeph demanded.
‘You can’t really get lost,’ Coline said. ‘There’s only the one road. Just don’t turn at the fork where it goes through the woods, unless you want to spend weeks on the road to Miln. That Messenger left for the Pasture a few hours ago, but he had some stops in the Brook first. If you hurry, you might catch him. Messengers carry their own wards with them. If you find him, you’ll be able to keep moving right until dusk instead of stopping
