The Warded Man

the metal spear. He had laid a fire when he made camp earlier, so he struck spark to it and coaxed the flames to life, warming himself and a bit of dinner. Dawn Runner had been hobbled and blanketed in his circle, brushed and fed before Arlen left to explore the ruins that afternoon.
    As it had every night for the last three years, One Arm showed up soon after moonrise, bounding over the dunes and scattering the smaller corelings to stand before Arlen’s circle. Arlen greeted it as always with a clap of his two hands. One Arm roared its hatred in return.
    When he first left Miln, Arlen had wondered if he would ever find a way to sleep through the sound of One Arm hammering at his wards, but it was second nature to him now. His warding circle had been proven time and again, and Arlen maintained it religiously, keeping the plates freshly lacquered and the rope mended.
    He hated the demon, though. The years had brought none of the kinship the guards on the wall of Fort Miln had felt. As One Arm remembered who had crippled it, so too did Arlen recall who had given him the puckered scars across his back and almost cost him his life. He remembered, too, nine Warders, thirty-seven guardsmen, two Messengers, three Herb Gatherers, and eighteen citizens of Miln who had lost their lives because of it. He gazed at the demon now, absently stroking his new spear.What would happen if he struck? The weapon had wounded a sand demon. Would the wards affect a rock demon as well?
    It took all his willpower to resist the urge to leap from his circle and find out.
    Arlen had hardly slept when the sun drove the demons back into the Core, but he rose with high spirits. After breakfast, he took out his notebook and examined the spear, painstakingly copying every ward and studying the patterns they formed along the shaft and head.
    When he finished, the sun was high in the sky. Taking another torch, he went back down into the catacombs, making rubbings of the wards cut into the stone. There were other tombs, and he was tempted to ignore all sense and explore every one. But if he stayed even another day, his food would run out before he reached the Oasis of Dawn. He had gambled on finding a well in the ruins of Anoch Sun, and indeed he had, but vegetation was scant and inedible.
    Arlen sighed. The ruins had stood for centuries. They would be there when he returned, hopefully with a team of Krasian Warders at his back.
    By the time he came back outside, the day was wearing on. Arlen took time to exercise and feed Dawn Runner, then prepared a meal for himself, his mind turned inward.
    The Krasians would demand proof, of course. Proof the spear could kill. They were warriors, not ruin hunters, and would not give up a single able-bodied man for an expedition without good reason.
    Proof , he thought. And it was only right that it come from him.
    With barely an hour before sunset, Arlen began to ready his camp. He hobbled his horse again, checking the portable circle around it. He prepared his ten-foot circle as usual, then took a series of wardstones from his bags and began to lay them around it in a wide outer ring some forty feet in diameter. He placed the stones slightly farther apart than usual, carefully lining them up with their fellows. There was a third portable circle in the saddlebags—Arlen always kept a spare—and he set that one in the camp as well, off to the side in the larger circle, by its edge.
    When he was finished, Arlen knelt in his center circle, the spear at his side, and breathed deeply, clearing his mind ofdistractions. He didn’t watch as the sun dipped and the sand glowed on the horizon before going dark.
    The nimble sand demons rose first, and Arlen heard the wards of his outer circle spark and crackle, keeping them back. Moments later, he heard the roar of One Arm, scattering lesser demons from its path as it approached Arlen’s outer ring. Arlen ignored it, continuing to breathe, his eyes closed, his mind calm. The lack of reaction served only to anger the demon further, and it struck hard against the warding.
    Magic flared, visible even through his closed eyelids, but the demon did not immediately continue its assault. He opened his eyes, watching One Arm cock its head curiously. Arlen allowed himself a humorless smile.
    One Arm struck the wards again, and again it paused. This time, the demon let out a piercing cry and set its feet, thrusting its good arm at the warding, talons spread. As if it were pressing