The Warded Man

onthe hair. When he was satisfied, the Warded Man tied the other end and handed it to him.
    Rojer beamed at the gift, treating it with resin before taking up his fiddle. He put the instrument to his chin and gave it a few strokes with the new bow. It wasn’t ideal, but he grew more confident, pausing to tune once more before beginning to play.
    His skillful fingers filled the air with a haunting melody that took Leesha’s thoughts to Cutter’s Hollow, wondering at its fate. Vika’s letter was almost a week gone. What would she find when she arrived? Perhaps the flux had passed with no more loss, and this desperate ordeal had been for nothing.
    Or perhaps they needed her more than ever.
    The music affected the Warded Man as well, she noticed, for his hands stopped their careful work, and he stared off into the night. Shadows draped his face, obscuring the tattoos, and she saw in his sad countenance that he had been comely once. What pain had driven him to this existence, scarring himself and shunning his own kind for the company of corelings? She found herself aching to heal him, though he showed no hurt.
    Suddenly, the man shook his head as if to clear it, startling Leesha from her reverie. He pointed off into the darkness. “Look,” he whispered. “They’re dancing.”
    Leesha looked out in amazement, for indeed, the corelings had ceased to test the wards, had ceased even to hiss and shriek. They circled the camp, swaying in time to the music. Flame demons leapt and twirled, sending ribbons of fire spiraling away from their knotted limbs, and wind demons looped and dove through the air. Wood demons had crept from the cover of the forest, but they ignored the flame demons, drawn to the melody.
    The Warded Man looked at Rojer. “How are you doing that?” he asked, his voice awed.
    Rojer smiled. “The corelings, they have an ear for music,” he said. He rose to his feet, walking to the edge of the circle. The demons clustered there, watching him intently. He began to walk the circle’s perimeter, and they followed, mesmerized. He stopped and swayed from side to side as he continued to play, and the corelings mirrored his movements almost exactly.
    “I didn’t believe you,” Leesha apologized quietly. “You really can charm them.”
    “And that’s not all,” Rojer boasted. With a twist and a series of sharp strokes of the bow, he turned the melody sour; oncepure notes ringing out discordant and tainted. Suddenly, the corelings were shrieking again, covering their ears with their talons and scrambling away from Rojer. They drew back further and further as the musical assault continued, vanishing into the shadows beyond the firelight. “They haven’t gone far,” Rojer said. “As soon as I stop, they’ll be back.”
    “What else can you do?” the Warded Man asked quietly.
    Rojer smiled, as content to perform for an audience of two as he was for a cheering crowd. He softened his music again, the chaotic notes smoothly flowing back into the haunting melody. The corelings reappeared, drawn to the music once more.
    “Watch this,” Rojer instructed, and changed the sound again, the notes rising high and grating, causing even Leesha and the Warded Man to grit their teeth and lean away.
    The reaction of the corelings was more pronounced. They grew enraged, shrieking and roaring as they threw themselves at the barrier with abandon. Again and again the wards flared and threw them back, but the demons did not relent, smashing themselves against the wardnet in an insane attempt to reach Rojer and silence him forever.
    Two rock demons joined the throng, shoving past the others and hammering at the wards as yet more added to the press. The Warded Man rose silently behind Rojer and lifted his bow.
    The string hummed, and one of the heavy, thick-headed arrows exploded into the chest of the nearest rock demon like a bolt of lightning, brightening the area for a moment. Again and again the Warded Man fired into the horde, his hands a blur. The warded bolts blasted the corelings back, and the few that rose again were quickly torn to pieces by their fellows.
    Rojer and Leesha stood horrified at the slaughter. The Jongleur’s bow slipped from the fiddle’s strings, hanging forgotten in his limp hand as he watched the Warded Man work.
    The demons were screaming still, but it was pain and fear now, their desire to attack the wards vanished with the music. Still the Warded Man fired, again and again until his