“No!” Briar cried, gripping her skirts. “Don’t leave me!”
Dawn gripped Briar’s shirt tightly with one hand, and slapped his face with the other. His head seemed to flash with light, and he stumbled back, letting go her skirts.
“Ent got time to baby you right now, Briar. You mind me,” his mother said. “Go to the hogroot patch and hide there. Bruise the leaves and rub them all over your body. Cories hate hogroot. Even the smell of it makes them sick. I’ll be back soon.”
Briar sniffed and wiped at his tears, but he nodded and his mother turned and ran for the house. A wood demon caught sight of her and ran to intercept. Briar screamed.
But Dawn kept her head, doing the same dance Relan had done that very morning. In a moment, she had the coreling stumbling left as she ran to the right, disappearing back through the window.
Feeling numb, like he was in a dream, Briar stumbled over to the hogroot patch. He rolled in the thick weeds, tearing off leaves and rubbing them on this clothing and skin. As he rubbed the leaves into his pants, he found one leg soaked through. He had pissed himself after all. The twins would never stop teasing him once they saw.
He cowered there, shaking, as his family’s cries echoed in the night. He could hear them calling to one another, bits of sentences drifting on the night smoke to reach his ears. But no one came to the garden, and moments later, the night began to brighten, the gray smoke giving off an evil, pulsing glow. Briar looked up, and saw the ghostly orange light came from the windows of the house.
The shrieks of the demons increased at the sight, and they clawed the dirt impatiently, waiting for the wards to fail. A wood demon struck at the house, and was thrown back by the magic. A flame demon tried to leap onto the porch, and it, too, was repelled. But even Briar could see that the magic was weakening, its light dimming.
When a wood demon tried the porch, the wardnet had weakened enough for it to power through. Magic danced over the demon’s skin and it screamed in agony, but made it to the front door and kicked it in. A gout of fire, like a giant flame demon’s spit, coughed out of the doorway, immolating the demon. It fell back, shrieking and smoldering, but a pack of flame demons had made it through the gap by then and disappeared into the house. Their gleeful shrieks filled the night, partially drowning out his family’s dwindling screams.
Hardey stumbled out the side door, screaming. His face was dark with soot and splattered with gore, and one arm hung limply, the sleeve wet with blood. He looked about frantically.
Briar stood up. “Hardey!” he jumped up and down, waving his arms.
“Briar!” Hardey saw him and ran for the garden wards, his usual long stride marred by a worsening limp. A pair of howling flame demons followed him out of the house, but Hardey had a wide lead, and it seemed he would make it to Briar in the hogroot patch.
But Hardey hadn’t cleared half the distance when a wind demon swooped down, digging its clawed feet deep into his back. Its wing talons flashed, and Hardey’s head thumped to the ground. Before the body even began to fall, the wind demon snapped its wings and took to the air again, taking the rest of Hardey with it. Briar screamed as the demon vanished into the smoky darkness.
The flame demons shrieked at the departing wind demon for stealing their prey, but then leapt onto Hardey’s head in a frenzy. Briar fell back into the hogroot patch, barely turning over in time to retch up his supper. He screamed and cried, thrashing about and trying to wake himself up from the nightmare, but on it went.
It grew hotter and hotter where Briar lay, and the smoke soon became unbearable. Burning ash drifted through the air like snowflakes, setting fires in the garden and yard. One struck Briar on the cheek and he shrieked in pain, slapping himself repeatedly in the face to knock the ash away.
Briar bit his lip to try and stem the wracking coughs, looking around frantically. “Mother! Father! Anybody!” He wiped at the tears streaking the ash on his face. How could his mother leave him? He was only six!
Six is old enough to be caught by alagai for running when it is best to keep still, Relan said, or for keeping still when it is best to run.
He would burn up if he stayed any longer, but as his father said, the fire was drawing demons like dung did flies. He thought of the goldwood tree. It had hidden him from his brothers. Perhaps it could save him again.
Briar put his head close to the ground and breathed three times as his mother had told him, then sprang from hiding, running hard. The swirling smoke was everywhere, and he could only see a few feet in any direction, but he could sense demons lurking in the gloom. He raced quickly over the familiar ground, but then somehow ran into a tree where he was sure none should be. He scraped his face on the bark, bouncing and landing on his back.
But then the tree looked at him and growled.