“So this battle against the blood witches, it’s part of the Wanderers’ mission from Eshtamon,” Rigan supplied.
Brock nodded. “Yes. Believe me when I say it’s the sort of task you hope you never actually have to complete.”
“Perhaps individually none of us is as strong as the most powerful of the blood witches,” Mina added. “But pooling our magic, we are much more. And perhaps we will have Eshtamon’s favor as well, since the struggle with Colduraan and his First Beings is old and bitter.” She smiled, and for the first time since they began the conversation, Rigan felt a spark of hope. “We will stop this.”
“Do we even know where the witches are?” Calfon asked.
“They’ll go to Thornwood,” Brock said. “It’s well-placed for harnessing powerful magic. Thornwood was constructed to be an anchor for power. There are caves in the cliff beneath it that have been used for ceremonies for centuries—perhaps even to the time when creatures like He Who Watches were worshipped as gods.”
“That doesn’t sound good,” Corran said.
“Take heart,” Mina interjected. “We can also draw on the site to anchor, as well as on the deep forest at the edge of the estate. It, too, is a place of old power. And we have allies there. I have called to them, and they will help.”
“I’d heard that those who went into the old forest didn’t come out,” Ross observed.
Mina gave a predator’s smile. “The forest is protected, and we call on its protectors for aid. They have common cause with us in this matter and no love for either blood magic or Colduraan. Remember—the enemy of my enemy is my friend.”
One of Brock’s hunters slipped up beside him to whisper a message. Brock nodded and said something in reply, then turned back toward Corran and the others. “It appears some of those reinforcements have arrived—and emissaries for others as well.”
“Emissaries?” Trent echoed.
“I believe he meant me.” A stranger stepped out of the darkness. Calfon and the other hunters jumped to their feet and reached for their weapons.
Mina and Brock put themselves between the hunters and the newcomer without a second of hesitation. “Stand down,” Brock ordered. “He’s an ally.”
“I don’t know what he is, but ‘ally’ wouldn’t have been the first word to come to mind,” Calfon murmured.
Even the warm glow of the fire could not add color to the man’s corpse-pale skin. He stood well over six feet tall, with a narrow build and long, slender fingers. An angular face with dark eyes and hollow cheeks that did not look entirely human—or completely alive.
Rigan sensed magic, old and alien. “What are you?” he asked, taking a cautious step forward.
“Call me Leland. It’s as good a name as any,” the stranger said in a voice that sounded… amused. “As for the ‘what,’ I believe your word is ‘guin.’”
“You’re a sanguinary,” Rigan murmured. “I’ve read the lore in the old texts, but I wasn’t sure they were telling the truth.”
“Want to fill the rest of us in?” Corran prompted, irritation clear in his tone.
“Leland comes from the Old Wood beyond Thornwood,” Mina said, remaining between the hunters and the guin. “His people take refuge there, and serve the forest energy.”
“His race subsists on blood,” Rigan explained. “Hence the name.”
“A vampire, like that damn strix we fought?” Ross asked sharply.
“We are nothing like the strix,” Leland said archly, as if the comment gave great offense. “We serve the forest, as guardians. If it puts your mind to rest, we only hunt what comes into the oldest part of the woodland, where humans are forbidden.”
“They’re trustworthy,” Mina assured the hunters, who looked skeptical. None of them drew their weapons, but they did not move their hands far from the grip of their swords.
“Like the man-wolf we met,” Rigan said. “If the lore is right, the guin are strong and scary fast, top predators. If they’re willing to come out of the Old Wood for this fight, we could use their help.”
“Our mystics have foreseen the abomination the blood witches seek to summon,” Leland said, his voice thick with contempt. “It cannot be permitted. Thornwood lies at the edge of the Old Wood. It is within our role as guardians to be of assistance in the fight.”
“And the others, will they come?” Mina asked.
“Others?” Corran’s eyes darted from Rigan standing dangerously close to a blood-drinking forest predator to the Wanderer and his witch-wife, and back to Leland, whose expression betrayed nothing.
“The man-wolves of which this one spoke,” Leland replied tonelessly. “They call themselves thropes. A large pack shares the forest with my people—and the obligation of guardianship. It is a good partnership,” he said, and his smile exposed sharp teeth. “We hunt together. We take the blood; they take the meat and bone. Nothing wasted.”
“Do we have a truce?” Rigan asked, daring a glance to Brock and Mina. “If you fight beside us, can we count on your people and the pack not to harm ours?”
Leland smiled. “You are careful. Precise. As it should be. And yet, we already have an agreement with your people.”
“We’re not Wanderers,” Corran replied, knowing that in magic and in dealings with supernatural creatures, precise language mattered.
“Your blood smells of them.”
“My brother and I have Wanderer blood, but our friends do not, and we aren’t accepted as part of their clan,” Rigan replied. “Do we have an accord of safe passage with your Guardians?”
Leland chuckled. “Yes, witchling, your hunters will be protected, as we will protect those who Wander.”
“Tomorrow, we will ride for Thornwood,” Brock said. “Others will join us along the way, and by the time we arrive, we’ll lay our battle plans. Tonight, eat and sleep. Prepare for what lies ahead.”
Brock, Mina, and the other Wanderers withdrew to their wagons, while Corran, Rigan, and the rest of the hunters did the same.
“Do you trust them?” Calfon asked once the Wanderers were no longer in sight. Even so, he kept his voice quiet.
“Mostly,” Corran replied. Rigan nodded in assent. “Do I think there’s information they aren’t telling us? Yes. Do we have a choice? No. So it’ll have to be enough.” He looked to Rigan and the other witches. “Did you pick up anything with your magic?”
“I sensed some evasion,” Rigan replied. “Not untruth. The way someone might skirt a sensitive family topic. Mina’s a powerful witch, and while Brock may have left the Wanderers, he’s still got their magic. Except…”
“What?” Ross asked.
“I’ve never been around a Wanderer for long—other than Corran and Kell, who aren’t full blood,” Rigan said. “Usually, when I sense magic in someone, it runs like a bright river. The color varies, but it’s like a bolt of lightning trapped inside a body. With the Wanderers, it’s… different. The magic isn’t separate in a streak; more like it’s soaked into every fiber. There’s no distinction between ‘it’ and ‘them.’”
“But if they’ve been carrying out the will of an Elder God for generations, then maybe he changed them to suit his purpose,” Corran said.
“What about Aiden and Elinor?” Trent asked. “Can they help?”
Rigan considered for a moment, then nodded. “I think so, even if they could each single out just one of the witches to weaken. It’s going to take all of the blood witches to contain the power they’re raising and break through the Rift. If we can stop them before they contact the creature, maybe we can keep them from bringing it through.”
“Fight it in its realm, on its home territory, or fight it in our world, where it will destroy everything in its path,” Corran said.
“The legends said that if the Balance wasn’t kept, something horrible would happen, a catastrophe. Do you think this kind of thing was what they had in mind?” Rigan asked.
“Even First Beings might die when they run out of food,” Ross observed
.
“And we’re going to stop that—three witches, a handful of hunters and a few dozen Wanderers?” Calfon challenged.
“It’ll have to be enough,” Corran said. “We’re all there is.”
Corran and the other hunters finished setting up their sparse camp. Rigan wandered back to where Corran sat by the small fire. “You all right?” he asked, jostling Corran’s shoulder companionably.
Corran shrugged. “Are you?”
Rigan grimaced. “Not particularly. Didn’t have this in mind when we started out.”
Corran stared off into the distance, sure Rigan knew him well enough to see the fear and worry Corran hid behind a stony expression. “Neither did I. Wouldn’t have mattered, I guess. Not sure we could have done anything differently.” He shook his head. “I’m sorry. When Mama and Papa died, I was supposed to take care of you and Kell. And look how that turned out.”
“You did your best. Better than best.”
Corran gave a derisive snort. “Not good enough.”
Rigan closed his hand around Corran’s forearm. “No. You listen to me. You, me, Kell—we did the best we could. That’s all anyone can do. But we’re together; we’re alive, we’ve got friends on our side. I don’t know how this is going to go.” He gave a sharp, desperate laugh. “We’re going up against a god and his creature, and I’m saying that I don’t know how this is going to end. I must be crazy.”
“Maybe.” Corran managed a wistful smile.
“The point is—we’ll see this through. And there’s no one I’d rather have watching my back.” He squeezed Corran’s arm for emphasis, moving so his brother could not avoid meeting his gaze. Corran could see everything Rigan usually hid: fear, uncertainty, resignation, and beneath it all, fierce pride and love.
“Hey, we’ve got an Elder God of vengeance on our side,” Corran said. “It’s not over yet.”
“Damn right.”
Rigan withdrew his hand and looked away, but sat so that their shoulders brushed. They watched the fire until it burned to embers and Corran rose to take his turn at watch. “Get some sleep,” Corran said. “We’ve got to save the world tomorrow. Or not. Either way, it’s going to be a busy day.”
Chapter Thirty-One
However great its former luxury, Thornwood had fallen far from its days of glory. Cold, dusty, and damp, the rambling, abandoned hulk of a manor seemed a fitting stage from which five mad blood witches might summon the minion of a chaos god.
Five of the ruffians Jorgeson had hired as guards had deserted on the road to the manor, prudently worried that they might not live long enough to spend any coin they earned. Jorgeson wished with all his heart he could go with them.
He suspected the remaining men stayed out of fear of the witches. Or perhaps, like himself, they believed no escape to be possible. Jorgeson threw himself into erecting what defenses they could muster around the overgrown lawns of the old mansion. He could do little with such a small force to guard the manor, but Jorgeson had the sense that the witches had a plan that required minimal reliance on mere mortal efforts.
“Damned witches,” Jorgeson muttered under his breath. Spider and Roach were, of course, in awe of the elder magic-users, who accepted the adoration as their due. Shadowsworn, Nightshade, and Wraithwind, all of them were pretentious bastards with overblown names that likely hid a very mundane background. They reminded him of the foppish hangers-on in the Lord Mayor’s court, the men and women overly taken with their own importance and cleverness who lived to make an impression and thrived on gossip.
“At least I’m not likely to have to put up with them for long,” he remarked to himself, a bleak assessment of how he saw their endeavor unfolding.
The witches went to ready a suitable room for their magic, dismissing Jorgeson to manage the grounds. Spider and the guards hauled the living captives into the shadows of the manor, while Roach slung the corpse of the hanged thief over his shoulder, protesting loudly about the smell. Holcomb and Sonders dragged the rest of the materials the witches had gathered along the way, then made a hasty retreat.
Jorgeson wondered if, like him, they suspected that Nightshade and the others might decide the captives they had were not enough. He would die here. Once that certainty settled over him, Jorgeson felt a part of him relax, if not exactly into peace then into the knowledge that most of the things he had worried about no longer mattered. It had become clear to him some time ago that regardless of his success hunting the Valmondes and the rest of the outlaws, he would never get a full pardon from Aliyev. He had not liked Machison, and he had loathed Blackholt, so without the chance to redeem himself, his quest to avenge their deaths offered no vindication.
The cold knot of grim satisfaction in his gut lay in knowing that Shadowsworn had defied Aliyev to attempt this grand dark magic. Nightshade and Wraithwind had likewise deserted their masters to tempt a monster beyond reckoning to cross the Rift. He did not understand the madness that drove them or the delusion that a First Being could be leashed by mortals, regardless of their magic. But such a creature would lay waste to Kadar’s lands, then those belonging to Gorog and Tamas, assuring that Ravenwood defaulted not only on its agreement with Garenoth, but on all of its League contracts. Everything Aliyev had worked so hard to rebuild would be gone, and maybe the city itself as well. Perhaps the accursed Valmondes, too. If Jorgeson could not free himself, then he would assure that Ravenwood—and maybe all of Darkhurst—went down with him. Too bad he wouldn’t live to see it.
“I want one barrier ring around the manor,” Nightshade told Jorgeson. “Physical obstacles, not magic. Then make a second ring fifty feet out from the first.”
“I don’t have many men left,” Jorgeson said, finding courage in the fact that if he was going to die anyway, he refused to cower. “That’s a lot of territory and a short period of time.”
“If you insist,” Nightshade replied. “I’ll send one of your witches out with some additional help. Mind you don’t let the helpers get too close to your guards, or there’ll be problems.”
Jorgeson didn’t like the ominous sound to that. Nightshade presented a contrast that made Jorgeson’s head hurt. Tall, elegant, and beautiful with blond hair and pristine white robes, the blood witch’s appearance contradicted his ruthless demand for human sacrifices. He was startlingly handsome, the type of man who would certainly attract attention in the Crown Prince’s court, or even the court of a king. But his eyes held the fire of madness, and the tight line of his thin lips hinted at his cruelty. Nightshade strode back to the manor before anything more could be said, robes billowing around him, managing to make a dramatic exit from even a mundane conversation.
“We need to make sure nothing disturbs the witches,” Jorgeson shouted to his small work crew. With the help of the wagon teams, they hauled sledges piled with stones, large branches, and uprooted trees from the edge of the property.
“Don’t like the look of those woods,” one of the guards said, standing a respectful distance from the dark verge of the forest. “Anyone who goes in there gets eaten.”
Jorgeson eyed the tree line and shoved down his intuition that told him to run. “Go into any woods with bears, wolves, and wild cats, and you’ll get eaten. Get back to work.”
The man moved off, looking relieved to move away from the edge of the woods. Jorgeson glanced back at the deep shadows beneath the trees and wondered whether magic of some sort caused their fear, or was there really something big and bad watching them from the darkness?
They had laid obstacles around nearly a third of the distance before Jorgeson heard startled cries from his guards that quickly turned to gasps and curses. He looked up and saw Spider loping toward him followed by a dozen walking corpses.
The smell of rotting flesh carried on the wind, making Jorgeson’s gorge rise. The guards scrambled back, putting distance between themselves and the blood witch’s contingent.
“I brought you more workers, as promised.” Spider’s smile told Jorgeson
the young witch enjoyed every moment of discomfort his entourage caused.
Jorgeson loosed a string of expletives before getting to the subject. “Are you mad? What am I supposed to do with corpses?”
Spider clucked his tongue. “That’s not very nice,” he said, and added a mocking “m’lord.” “They’ll work until they drop—or rather until parts of them drop off.” He wrinkled his nose. “So long as I command them, they pose no threat to the rest of you, and they won’t tire or want to break for supper.”
Jorgeson looked at the reanimated dead who stood unnaturally still behind Spider. Their skin had a gray-blue cast where settled blood hadn’t mottled it, but they were freshly dead enough that decomposition had not advanced too far to make them useless. Sightless eyes stared back at him, unblinking.
“Get them on the outer perimeter,” Jorgeson ordered, managing not to shudder. “It’s larger, so it will need more hands and take more time. Salvage anything we can use, but stay out of the forest.”
“As you wish, m’lord,” Spider said with an exaggerated bow. He spoke words of power, and the walking corpses turned in unison to stare at him, then shuffled forward at his command. Jorgeson watched until he saw Spider set them to dragging stones and hauling branches, or making barricades from old boards.
He was relieved to have the undead workers as far away from him as possible. From the looks on his soldiers’ faces, he knew they felt the same.
They finished the fortifications by late afternoon. Roach joined Spider shortly before the reanimated workers finished the outside ring. It did not seem to bother the walking corpses that they were on the far side of the barrier. The two blood witches left them standing there, slack-faced and still, and began to move along the tangle of refuse that made up the barricade, chanting as they went.
“Looks like those dead folk are too dumb to realize they’re on the wrong side of the fence,” one of the guards chuckled.
“Are they?” Jorgeson wondered aloud. “Because we’re trapped in here, and I’m not sure who’s safer.”
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