The Core

‘We’ll initiate him,’ Stela agreed. ‘But he can find his own path after that. Once folk see what Briar can do, might be some folk start calling themselves Mudboys.’

Briar scowled, and Stela winked. ‘Better than Hogbreaths.’

Briar laughed in spite of himself.

‘We all must find our own path.’ The man in Tender’s robe stepped up to Briar. Stela’s grip on his hand tightened painfully, but the man only bowed.

‘Welcome, Briar. I am Brother Franq.’

Stela’s grip on his hand eased, and the rest of the Painted Children followed suit. Callen and Keet might not have been able to challenge Stela, but this man could. ‘You’re the one writing New Canon.’

Franq dismissed the thought with a wave. ‘The words belong to Arlen and Renna Bales. I merely record them.’

‘And help us find their meaning,’ Stela said.

Franq bowed to Briar a second time. ‘I apologize for calling you traitor. The Tenders of the Creator taught me to judge, but Arlen Bales has shown us a better way. All who stand together in the night are brothers and sisters. We are all Deliverers.’

All around the camp, people drew wards in the air, echoing his word. ‘All Deliverers.’

‘Mistress Leesha had us split into three groups at first,’ Stela said as she walked Briar through the camp. ‘Strongest were training to join the Cutters one day. Mistress gave them all specially warded spears, short to make the Draw more efficient. We call ’em gut pumps, because you stick one in a demon’s gut and it pumps magic into you. Callen leads the Pumps.’

Briar turned his head slightly, examining Callen’s faction as Stela gestured to another cluster. ‘Keet’s group was runtier – most of them tried out for the Cutters and got passed over. Call them Bones, because the mistress put slivers of demon bone in their spears. Makes up the difference in muscle, and to spare.

‘My group were folk who had no illusions about being fit to fight demons.’ Stela nodded to another cluster, mostly young women dressed as sparsely as Stela. ‘Not strong enough to swing an axe or wind a crank bow like Wonda’s set.’ She held up her warded hand. ‘Mistress honoured us most of all. Warded our very skin.’

‘Mistress Leesha tattooed you?’ Briar asked.

Stela shook her head. ‘Drew them on with blackstem, but then she went away. When the stain started to fade, I asked Ella Cutter to take a needle and ink them on permanent before they were lost.’

Briar watched how the others in the camp gave the Wardskins a respectable berth. Though generally smaller in stature, they moved like predators, even here.

‘Children have grown since then,’ Stela said. ‘Widows and heirs of the Sharum lost at new moon.’ She gestured to the tents and water well used by the Krasian faction. They were not in battle, but every one of them had their night veils up, even the men. Briar noted on closer inspection that several of them had the light skin of Northerners, but had adopted Krasian dress and manner.

‘Then Brother Franq joined us and started training Siblings.’ She gestured to a smaller group, all in plain brown robes.

A tall woman stepped to the front of the cluster of Krasians, waving to them. The hair that fell from her headwrap was streaked with grey, her eyes full of wisdom, but she did not move like an elder. She was strong.

Stela led Briar to her, bowing. ‘Briar, this is Jarit, First Wife of Drillmaster Kaval. She leads the Pack’s Sharum.’

The woman studied Briar, trying to peel away the dirt and hogroot resin to see the features beneath. ‘What is your name?’ she asked in Krasian.

‘Briar asu Relan am’Damaj am’Bogger,’ Briar replied.

‘Damaj is a Kaji name,’ Jarit noted. ‘Yet you claim not to be one of us?’

‘Born and raised in Bogton,’ Briar said.

Jarit nodded. ‘I remember when your father went missing. The men of Kaji searched for him in the city and Maze, not knowing if he had died on alagai talons or fallen to a Majah blade. Who could have guessed he fled to the North?’

‘You knew my father?’ Briar asked.

Jarit shook her head. ‘No, but my husband was the Kaji’s greatest drillmaster. I learned much in his house.’

‘Jarit and her granddaughter Shalivah started teaching us sharusahk,’ Stela said, ‘after Wonda Cutter left with Mistress Leesha.’ At the comment a girl of ten appeared. She seemed more like Jarit’s daughter than her granddaughter, but Briar knew how magic could shave years from a person. He looked around the well, realizing how many of the Krasians were children. Two young Krasian men wore the brown robes of Siblings with added night veils.

‘Tender converted you, like my father,’ Briar guessed.

‘We still pray to Everam,’ Jarit said.

Briar nodded. ‘My father said Everam was the Creator, and the Creator was Everam.’

Jarit smiled. ‘Your father was a wise man. We have not been converted by Tenders, or they by us. All of us saw Arlen Bales cast lightning from the sky when Alagai Ka came on Waning. If there remained any doubt, it vanished when Arlen Bales cast Ahmann Jardir down in Domin Sharum. The son of Hoshkamin was a false Deliverer. The son of Jeph is Shar’Dama Ka, and we must be ready for his call.’

Briar grunted, having no real response. He nodded to the rising sun. ‘Why do your men keep their veils up?’

‘Everam commands modesty in His light,’ Jarit said. ‘Arlen Bales showed us that it is when we face Nie that we must bare ourselves and stand proudly against Her.’

‘Don’t let the modesty fool you,’ Stela said as they walked back to the Wardskins’ camp. ‘Pity the corelings when Jarit and her Sharum drop their veils.’

Briar spat. ‘Ent got pity to spare, comes to cories.’

‘Honest word.’ Stela gave his hand another squeeze, sending a thrill through him. ‘Come on. We’ve got work to do, if we’re going to initiate you tonight.’

‘What work?’ Briar asked.

They came up to a blonde girl weaving her long hair. She could not have been much older than Stela. Like the other Wardskins, she was clad in little more than a few scraps of leather, tattoos twining about her limbs and body.

‘This here is Ella Cutter,’ Stela said. The young woman gave Briar an appraising glance but kept her nimble fingers about the braiding. ‘Ella’s our best tattooist.’

Ella smiled. ‘Bath and a shave first. Need a clean canvas.’

Stela waved a hand before her nose. ‘First on my list. Got a cake of soap?’

‘Not sure about this,’ Briar said.

He felt strange after the bath. Stela had found a stiff brush and scrubbed every inch of him while some of the other Wardskins laughed and jeered. His skin tingled, dry and raw in the cold morning air.

Stela ignored the comment. ‘How in the Core do you still smell like hogroot?’

‘Sweat some, you eat enough,’ Briar said. ‘Keeps the cories away, even when someone forces you into the bath.’

Stela laughed at that, giving him a clean robe and bringing him to the tent where Ella knelt by a small fire with her implements. ‘Show Ella your hands.’

‘Not sure about this,’ Briar said again. ‘Said I’d come to camp. Din’t say I’d get inked.’

‘Arlen Bales says yur body is the only weapon yur never without,’ Ella said.

‘Just your hands for now,’ Stela said. ‘Every Wardskin does it. Gives us weapons we can’t ever lose.’