The Vagabond stares Sir Coriand down like a brave man stares down a charging bull, even though he’s flanked by both golems. I both adore her in that moment and think she bears a tragic likeness to real Saints of the past — the ones torn apart by crowds, sawn in half, and beheaded. She has their fire in her eyes, their staunch refusal to quit, their intolerable enemies.
It almost hurts to look at her.
I won’t be able to save her if it comes to that.
But I write. As fast and as furiously as I can. And I try to make a monster that can break and yet be broken. I diagram out rules and sketch out plans, and if my handwriting is illegible and my sketches much revised, the arcane power of this place does not seem to care.
My shadow is growing.
I write of how sin amplifies itself by curling the spirit in on itself round and round, like a tree stunted by growing within a dwelling. I write that, and the demon billows wide. I write of how anger, when fed, feeds on the one who is angry, and I feel the crack form in the center that I can leverage later.
I glance up and see Owalan move from the corner of my eye. I shout my warning and clench my jaw as his sword splits the air an inch from Victoriana’s face. My heart is in my throat as she twists to the side. I thrash against the straps holding me in unconscious reaction, but I can no more leap to her aid than I can fly.
Her demon dog leaps from the shadows. He grabs Owalan by the shoulder, bearing him down to the earth.
A spike of fear shoots through me. Too many buckles hold me in place. And I will not be able to help as long as I am tied into this harness. My fingers fumble with the buckle on my forearm, blunt against the smooth leather.
“If you want to help her, you’d best write,” Sir Sorken calls out. “You won’t be getting down until you’re done. That’s how this works, my lad.”
His shadow demon shambles over to mine and strikes it with a powerful overhand blow to the shoulder.
I bite my lip, put pen to paper, and scratch until my hand cramps, forcing speed and power into the lines of the shadow I craft. I write of compression and the art of water pumps in the aqueduct systems, and as I write, my shadow tightens and strengthens. It grabs a strand of Sorken’s demon, dragging it a little over the line where our shadows meet before that scrap of shadow shreds away and the demons burst into fragments.
I curse as my shadow falls to shreds and then slowly starts to build beneath me again. Sorken’s is in the same state. I should be throwing all my efforts into my fight against him, but I’m distracted by the sight of Owalan and Victoriana spinning through the space where our two demons were only moments before.
Their blades clash, steel on steel, as they whirl. Victoriana lands a double-handed strike on Owalan’s shoulder, but the other paladin still has his armor — I never did ask what happened to the Vagabond’s, and curse me for that. I was so fascinated by how I could feel her warmth through the cloth of her clothing that I forgot entirely that there ought to be steel cladding over it.
With a flick of a pen, I add heat to my demon, writing of how the sear of a guilty conscience is like to a fire that can never be fully quenched, beginning to build him again from scratch.
Beneath me, dancing around my black, filthy shadow, Victoriana ducks under a blow from Cleft, her groan audible as she spins out of the defensive duck and brings her sword up just in time to turn Owalan’s blow.
My guts tighten.
She’s forgotten Suture.
I cry out a warning as he lunges in from behind her, grasping with bone fingers. At the last moment, the dog leaps, catching Suture’s forearm between its canine teeth. The golem tries to shake the dog off, bones rattling, bits of cloth tearing off. Brindle’s sleek body shakes with him, teeth rattling but refusing to quit, just like his mistress.
It’s with the dry-stick snap of a breaking bone that he finally flies through the air, half the golem’s forearm and hand still locked in his jaw, to land hard on the edge of the sand rim.
I can’t afford to watch to see if he can recover. I write about the tenacity of evil, how a single root left behind can grow again as if it were never razed in the first place. My shadow pops back to strength as if it were never ripped apart — and only just in time. Sir Sorken’s demon leaps toward Victoriana, snatching at her foot.
She goes down in a heap, a pained gasp breaking her silence.
I drive my demon forward, using its bulk to push Sorken’s back. It thrusts with the power I’ve scribed into it. And if I did not feel guilty before, it is coming back now. I am creating a monster. I am good at it.
Sir Owalan sails back into the fight, swinging his blade at Victoriana. She rolls and pops up to her feet, where her dog stands, still shaking the broken golem arm in his jaws, spittle flying everywhere.
“Don’t think I’m done questioning you, Sir Coriand,” she says, pointing the tip of her blade at him for a heartbeat before turning back to Owalan just in time to slide his strike away. Her eyes flash and her cheeks are flushed with the fight. I force my gaze away and back to what I pen.
“You’re a terribly dogged thing, Beggar,” Sir Coriand says, annoyed. “I heartily wish Sir Kodelai had succeeded with your demise.”
“And why should I not be? We who are poor have only honor and truth left.”
“Then enjoy this truth,” Sir Coriand says. “Up there in that harness is your friend Adalbrand, who spared your life from false accusation only yesterday. And he works studiously to craft a demon. Are you and yours really so different from us? You will do what you must to survive, too.”
“Too?” she grits out before leaping so high that she kicks up, pivots on Suture’s chest, and spins over Owalan’s blade to land at his back. He barely makes the turn in time to deflect her sliding blow, and the awkward defense makes him stumble at the same time that her dog plows into him and bowls him over.
“Too,” Coriand barks. “Do you think you can put this back now? The ability to craft demons to order is out in the world, child of foolishness. You cannot re-cork the bottle. You cannot un-drink the wine. It will be used now by us or our enemies. Better it be us. Better we find ways to use it. To survive. Because someone will.”
