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She nodded, slowly. The creation forges were built during the Last War, and few members of the house understood the enchantments involved. One of the forges at Blacklion was unreliable, but with the demands of the war, it was often used anyway. Most of the time the warforged it produced were satisfactory, but she still remembered the failures—cripples and creatures with deformities that could never be shaped from flesh. She remembered a torso with a half dozen arms flailing about, crushing the skull of an attending magewright, and her father, stepping in and shattering the horror with a touch.

You destroy failures, Lei. It is the way of your house—and the way of the world. It is a mercy to end the suffering of such a thing. I merely offer you that same mercy.

Lei searched the trees ahead, looking for some sign of Pierce. She kept walking, and for the moment her anger burned away her exhaustion. “Is that what your Lord of Blades says? It’s a mercy to destroy humanity?”

The eerie rustling came again, a flutter across his form. We are guided by a force far greater than any one warforged, and I was not talking about humanity. I was talking about you.

“Then who—”

Her complaint was cut off by a song. A woman’s voice, faint and full of sorrow. Lei’s staff. She couldn’t quite hear the words, but somehow she knew their meaning. Death surrounds you, beyond your metal guardians. Strike the shadows, for the truth is not what it seems. Lei could feel anguish sweeping over her, and she knew this pain was trapped within the staff. She could almost touch the spirit within, but somehow it was just beyond her reach.

Lei had stopped the instant the song began, frozen by the despair that flowed from the staff. Hydra raised its arms, and she could see Harmattan’s gleaming eyes watching her from within the shroud of steel.

What is it?

“Danger.” Was he asking for her opinion, or did he know more about the power of the staff?

Harmattan hissed a command in a language Lei didn’t recognize. The four scouts spun in place, forming a perimeter with a pair of eyes at each cardinal point.

Stay between Hydra, little one. We may as well protect you until you choose to die. Harmattan strode out of the circle.

Lei scowled but held her ground. The staff was murmuring quietly, singing of circling death.

An instant later a long, low shape melted out of the undergrowth and raced toward the warforged. Lei caught a glimpse of a lean, black panther-like creature racing forward on six legs. A pair of long, whip-like tentacles flowed out from its shoulder-blades, each tipped with vicious bone hooks. Its gleaming red eyes met hers, its lips drew back in a snarl—and then she saw one of Hydra’s spiked arms pass right through its skull.

There was no blood, no sound of impact, and no reaction from the creature. Instead, it lashed out with its tentacles. It seemed to be flailing at empty air, until the attacking Hydra staggered back. A gouge appeared across his chest, accompanied by the sound of bone scraping against steel.

Lei remembered Daine’s last lunch at the Ship’s Cat—the meat that had appeared to be floating off the plate. Displacer beast! The creature she could see was just an illusion, a reflected image of the invisible predator that lurked nearby. Hitting such a creature would be a matter of luck as much as skill, trying to guess where it was by the blows it landed on its victims.

The hunter wasn’t alone. Even as Lei and the warforged turned to face the attacker, three more of the beasts leapt from the shadows. Two of Hydra’s sentinels reeled from invisible blows, and a powerful stroke dug a furrow into Harmattan’s chest—a wound that vanished an instant later. Lei paused, gripped by indecision. Should she join in the battle, or leave the warforged to fight on their own?

The conflict was over before she had time to decide. Harmattan seemed to explode outwards. A whirlwind of razor-sharp metal swept across the path, and Lei heard the sound of tearing flesh and agonized howls that fell silent within