The Shattered Land_ The Dreaming Dark - Keith Baker [109]
Do you remember your first kill?” Her voice was a whisper, drifting over the calls of waking birds.
Dawn was rising over the jungle. The vegetation around them was painted in orange and red, the fiery colors of autumn. Pierce and Indigo slipped through the underbrush, and Pierce was impressed by his companion’s grace and skill.
“No.” Pierce said. “I served Cyre for over two decades. Perhaps it is age, or the damage I suffered, for I was damaged often.”
“Soldiers,” Indigo said dismissively. “I remember each of my victims. When my human companions slept, I would recall those past struggles and consider what might come. I assume you have fought your companions in your mind? Your Lei, your captain?”
“He is not my captain anymore.”
“True … but you did not answer my question.” A blade flickered out of her forearm, and she cut through a wall of vines with a quick slash. When Pierce said nothing, she continued. “There is no shame in it. It is what you are: a weapon, made to kill. An ally today may prove a threat tomorrow.” She did not turn her head, but he could feel her gaze. “Surely we have battled in your thoughts?”
“Many times.”
“What was the outcome?”
“Satisfactory. You are a dangerous opponent, but I can match you.”
She did glance at him then. He studied her ghulra, the twisting sigil carved into her forehead, fixing it in his memory. “You know less of me than you think. Perhaps we shall put your projections to the test, once this business is concluded.”
“What is this business? A door embedded into the earth. What could bring you all the way to Xen’drik?”
“Harmattan will tell you, when he feels you can be trusted.”
There was a rustle in a nearby tree, and both warforged turned. Pierce had an arrow drawn and ready, but Indigo had already loosed a bolt from her shortbow. A shape fell to the ground—a small monkey with orange and gray fur, which had been hidden amid the bright foliage.
“Was that necessary?” Even as he turned, Pierce had a sense of the size of the creature from the sound and motion in the brush. The monkey hardly seemed a threat.
“You have been long away from battle, or you never fought the war as I did.” Walking over to the corpse, she put her foot on its chest and pulled the bloody arrow out of its skull. “Wizard’s familiar, shapechanged foe—we cannot take any chances.”
It was true—Pierce had fought the Valenar at Felmar Valley, and the elves had often used ravens and other birds as spies. Perhaps his instincts had grown dull, living in High Walls. Still, there was something about the twisted body, broken on the ground—something felt wrong. He pushed the thought away. “And you? Do you know all the answers, or do you just do what Harmattan tells you?”
Indigo returned the arrow to the string, and continued to move forward. “Harmattan serves all warforged. I trust his judgment.”
“You criticized me for following my friends. You seem to have traded one leader for another.”
There was a cold edge to Indigo’s voice. “What reason did you have for your service? None. You fought because you were ordered to, because you knew nothing else. You never had the courage to find your own path. I follow Harmattan, yes, but Harmattan is one of us, and the warforged are his only concern.”
“He does not look like ‘one of us.’”
Indigo cut away another patch of vines, studying the ground. “He was born a soldier, and he fell in battle—destroyed by humans, as you or I might have been, but he refused to die. He rebuilt himself. He is proof of our power, of our own divinity. Humans made us to die. Harmattan can lead us to true immortality.”
“Or perhaps Harmattan was made to be immortal. We are all different. Soldiers, scouts, war-wizards—we were made to serve different purposes. Perhaps this was his.”
“You have no faith,” Indigo replied. “You have spent too much time surrounded by flesh and blood. We are beings of magic, brother. We were not shaped by the hand of man. Humanity was the vessel that brought us to this world, but our true destiny