top and raised itself up, its back bristling with arrows.
Now, they should fire now! Argoth heard the loud thwonk of the ballista. The creature took one massive step upon the wall, a dark, hulking figure, Purity’s naked form like a small, pale flower held at its chest, then, in the next moment, both were swept away.
“Lords,” said Hogan.
“Quickly,” Argoth shouted, “to the bailey!”
By now most of the fortress guard had awakened and had come to the call to arms. Torches were lit. A quarter of a cohort, almost a hundred and fifty men, rushed to the gate of the inner wall, Argoth and Hogan following behind. When they reached the bailey between the two fortress walls, they rushed to the spot where the creature should have fallen.
Argoth expected at any moment to hear the men in front call out that they’d found the creature. But no such shout arose. Then one soldier lifted the massive ballista dart into the air.
“Scan the walls!” someone shouted. Men stood back to examine the moonlit walls. A group of soldiers charged forward, beyond the location where the ballista dart was found.
Argoth grabbed a torch from a soldier and stepped up to examine the tip of the dart. It was clean. Not a drop of blood. Not a speck of dirt.
He looked at the ground where the dart had fallen. Nothing heavy had landed here. He looked up at the wall. He knew the soldiers searching the rest of the bailey would not find the creature. It was gone, vanished into the night just as it had come.
“Purity,” he said. “What have you wrought?”
SOUL MEAT
T
he dart from the ballista might have passed through Hunger like stick through a pile of sand, but the Mother had created him with more than dirt. He had a skeleton of wood and stone. Of course, it was not just wood. Not simple stone. Whatever power the Mother controlled had bound him. He wasn’t just a piece of carpentry, for then the ballista dart would have shattered his chest. But it didn’t. The dart stuck in his ribs and the force of the impact threw him backward.
But it did not throw him directly away from the wall and into the bailey. Instead, it cast him off the rampart and into the bottom wall of the hoardings used to sweep attackers off the slopes and cliffs on the back side of the fortress. And that saved the Sleth woman, for Hunger was able to grasp one of the hoarding timbers and swing up underneath.
Hundreds of feet below him the sea sparkled in the moonlight. The waves surged and crashed upon the rocks, spraying forth great gouts of pale foam. Hunger would have survived the long drop to the sea, but the Sleth woman would have broken on impact.
He heard the men yelling, and he felt . . . pain? It was not sharp, but there was an echo of hurt. And then he realized it was not him, but the Sleth woman. He could feel the emotions roiling inside her body, feel them like one might feel a puppy thrashing in a sack. He realized he’d always been able to feel the souls of his victims. He wanted to devour her, but he ignored his appetite.
He didn’t have much time, and he didn’t dare climb down the cliff, for the men would see him, and then she would die. So Hunger skittered like a spider along the belly of the hoardings until he was on the other side of the fortress, far away from the shouting.
He lay the Sleth woman onto the rock and sparse grass that grew here. He had probed the collar down in the cellar of the tower, but could not find its clasp. It was said only a Divine could remove a king’s collar, only they knew the lore of unbinding. But did he not have magic also? He examined the collar again. There was no break, the collar seemed to have been woven around the woman’s neck. But nothing was that perfect. He could find the part if he searched slowly.
It seemed he had only just begun when the Mother stirred again. Hunger bent his concentration, moving faster and faster along the loops and whirls. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.
She was coming, he could feel it. Feel her fingers reaching out to his mind.
Panic rose in him. She couldn’t have it. She mustn’t have it. Then he found a spot that seemed different from the rest, but he