Path of the Warrior (26 page)

The longer Korlandril spent at the shrine, the less he thought of death. He was surrounded by it now, its messenger and its target. He dimly recalled flickers from the fighting with the humans: brief vignettes of destruction and slaying lasting no longer than a heartbeat. The recollections brought no sensation with them, like a play with no words, or a silent opera. They were simply things that had happened.

One particular cycle after training, Korlandril mentioned this in passing to Arhulesh. His fellow Striking Scorpion stopped in his stride and directed a penetrating look at Korlandril.

“You are remembering scenes of bloodshed?”

“Just images,” replied Korlandril. “Do you not?”

“No! Nor would I wish to. I can feel those memories inside me, down in the shadows of my spirit, and that is enough to make me sicken with guilt and woe.”

“I do not understand. We all know that we have drawn blood and slain. It is irrefutable fact. We are Aspect Warriors; it is what we have trained to do. I am no longer an Artist but I can still visit the sculptures I created.”

“There is a difference between intellectual acknowledgement and emotional connection. Your sculptures were the product of your actions, not the memory of them. Tell me, Korlandril, what did it
feel
like to sculpt your first masterpiece?”

“It was…” Korlandril foundered. He was not sure of the answer. “There was a sense of achievement, for certain. And release. Yes, definitely a moment of creative release when it was completed. Much like the surge of energy I felt in my first battle.”

“This is dangerous!” cried Arhulesh, backing away from Korlandril.

“Your fright is unwarranted,” said Korlandril, extending a hand to placate his companion. “What has so shocked you?”

“You compare acts of creation and destruction. That is not healthy. If you continue in this way, you will remember the joy you felt, and that would signal something very grave indeed.”

“Why do you separate death from life, destruction from creation, in such an arbitrary way?”

“Because creation can be undone, but destruction cannot! You may come to hate a statue that you crafted, and can smash it to a thousand pieces, but the memory of it will remain. It is not so with death. You can never bring back those who have been slain; you cannot grant them the gift of Isha. As the act cannot be undone, the memory must not remain.”

“Korlandril still wears his mask, since the last battle, and he cannot remove it.”

Korlandril and Arhulesh spun to see Aranarha walking out of Kenainath’s chambers. The Deadly Shadow exarch was close behind.

“It would be too soon, more swiftly than I have seen, I am not so sure,” said Kenainath.

“He has confessed it himself, sees what our eyes see, voiced that which we hear within,” replied Aranarha.

“No, that is not true!” snapped Korlandril. “I performed the rituals; I removed my war-mask.”

“Then you have nothing to fear, walk from this dark place, go into the light outside,” said Aranarha, his tone challenging.

“I shall!” declared Korlandril. He turned to Arhulesh, who still eyed him warily. “Come, my
friend,
let us go to the Meadows of Fulfilment and you can tell me more of Elissanadrin.”

He hooked an arm under Arhulesh’s and dragged him towards the door. As they walked down the passageway, the admonishing voice of Kenainath drifted after them, his words intended for his fellow exarch.

“That was a mistake, confrontation fills his mind; he will seek a foe.”

“Ignore them,” Korlandril said with a forced laugh. “They are jealous of our freedom.”

Arhulesh said nothing.

Arhulesh extricated himself from Korlandril’s invitation shortly after the two had left the shrine, citing a former appointment. Korlandril considered his options.

He felt no desire to sculpt, there were already three half-finished works in his chambers and none of them appealed. He was not hungry or thirsty. His attempt to inveigle Arhulesh into an outing had been borne more out of boredom than a desire for company.

He decided that Elissanadrin would be able to drag him from the ennui that had slowly grown within him since the last battle. She was a Striking Scorpion and would understand the tedium Korlandril felt.

He found an infinity circuit terminal not far from the shrine portal, hoping to locate Elissanadrin. Placing his hand upon the crystal interface, Korlandril attempted to align with the pulsing spirits within. The connection was fleeting, the energy of the infinity circuit reluctant to conform to his requests. Korlandril was no spiritseer and had no means to commune with the infinity circuit to divine its agitation. He removed his fingers from the crystal, concentrated his thoughts more clearly on Elissanadrin, and tried again.

As before, Korlandril experienced the briefest glimmers of Alaitoc, envisaging the craftworld as a whole, but was not able to detect any presence of Elissanadrin. Perturbed, he stepped away from the interface. The passageway was devoid of other eldar who might assist him, so Korlandril headed towards the Dome of Midnight Forests, the entrance to which was a short walk away.

The bright light of the path gave way to the more diffuse twilight of the dome as Korlandril passed through the wide arch into the trees. This part of the parkland was sparsely traversed due to its proximity to several Aspect shrines. Korlandril headed towards the lakes at the centre, knowing them to be a popular haunt of many Artists and Poets. Perhaps he would see Abrahasil. He had not met his mentor since first going to the Deadly Shadow.

As Korlandril walked through the trees, his thoughts broke in many directions. Memories of encounters beneath the shady foliage flickered through his mind, but he did not linger on any in particular. The shades of the leaves intrigued him, moving into purplish autumnal hue. The softness of the grass underfoot was welcoming. He ran his hands across the craggy bark of a lianderin, his fingers detecting every whorl and knot.

All these thoughts occupied him, but they could not drive out his foremost experiences. A patch of light might reveal him and he kept to the shadows. He changed direction at irregular intervals so as not to approach his target from a direct line. He constantly scanned root holes and branches for signs of danger, though the Dome of Midnight Forests was devoid of any threat larger than a dawnfalcon.

Korlandril’s paranoia grew as he heard fleeting voices from ahead. He had covered a considerable distance, unaware of the passage of time. The twilight was darkening through the heavy canopy, signalling the beginning of the dome’s night cycle. He had entered not long after the Time of Cleansing at mid-cycle.

The glitter of water could be seen between the trees. There was movement and a figure appeared on a path ahead.

Korlandril was behind the concealing bulk of a tree before he realised it, clinging to the shadow like a spider on its web. From his hiding spot, Korlandril eyed the arrival. She was a little shorter than him, with black and gold hair swept high from her pale forehead. Her soft white tunic had a long tail that danced in the subtle dome breeze, twisting on itself and curving invitingly in her wake. She was laughing, a crystal reader in hand, eyes focussed on its pale display.

“Forgive my intrusion,” said Korlandril, stepping on to the path.

The maiden shrieked and the reader fell from her grasp. She caught it before it hit the wood bark of the path, swiftly straightening as Korlandril approached, a hand held out in apology.

“I did not mean to startle you,” he said.

“Why would you sneak up on me like that?” she demanded. Now that she had been given a moment to study Korlandril, she took a fearful step back. Her voice was subdued. “What do you want from me?”

Korlandril could not fathom the cause of her disquiet. He had surprised her, but that did not warrant such a guarded reaction.

“I have a question. Have you experienced any problems with the infinity circuit of late?”

“I have not,” she said stiffly. Her tone was clipped, her language formal and cold. Though they were strangers, there was no reason for such bad manners.

“It was a simple enough request,” said Korlandril. “I do not understand your hostility.”

“Nor I yours,” she said, turning away. “Leave me alone.”

Korlandril stood dumbfounded as she strode quickly back towards the lakes. He took a moment to review what had happened.

Korlandril was behind the concealing bulk of a tree before he realised it, clinging to the shadow like a spider on its web. From his hiding spot, Korlandril eyed the arrival. She was a little shorter than him, with black and gold hair swept high from her pale forehead. Her soft white tunic had a long tail that danced in the subtle dome breeze, twisting on itself and curving invitingly in her wake. She was laughing, a crystal reader in hand, eyes focussed on its pale display.

“Forgive my intrusion,” said Korlandril, stepping forwards into Claw with Rising Sun, right arm crooked ready to defend, left arm raised for a strike.

The maiden shrieked and the reader fell from her grasp. She caught it before it hit the wood bark of the path, swiftly straightening as Korlandril approached, moving forwards in a crabwise fashion, right arm extended in Lunging Serpent.

“I did not mean to startle you,” he said, shifting to the posture of repose.

Korlandril looked at her retreating back, wondering how it was he had slipped into the ritual postures without effort, and why he had not been aware of it. The two versions of the same event vied in his mind—the one the experience as it had happened, the second his more conscious reflection upon it.

The stranger’s fearful and angry reaction proved that his recollection of events was true; it had been his experience of them that was amiss. He had stalked her like prey. Troubled, Korlandril turned away from the lakes and headed back into the woods as the light dimmed and the Midnight Forest earned its name.

Korlandril could not think. There were too many distractions: rustling leaves, skittering insects, hooting birds, yelping creatures.

He tried to centre his thoughts but every movement triggered his instincts and he was instantly aware, eyes fixed on a snuffling thorn-eater or ears pitched to detect the next beat of a wing overhead. Even the gentle swaying of the trees and the dappling of Mirianathir’s light demanded his attention, each shifting shadow requiring his scrutiny before he could settle again.

For most of the night cycle he sat frustrated in the grove, far from the paths used by lovers and philosophers, trying to attain a measure of equilibrium.

Frustrated, as the dome’s field depolarised to let through more of the dying star’s rays, Korlandril quit his attempts at meditation and headed for the Deadly Shadow.

Korlandril found the shrine empty, or those parts to which he had access. He suspected Kenainath was present somewhere—where else would the exarch be?—but the chamber of armour and hall of weapons were deserted. In silence, the mantra running through his head, Korlandril equipped himself for training.

He went through his opening routines with ease, stringing together a series of attacks and defences to loosen his muscles, tightened by his unsettling experience in the forest. As he went through these motions, he began to frame the shadow-foe in his mind, readying himself for more extreme exertions.

He found that zone of control and instinct he desired, his chainsword flickering in and out at his whim, weaving a deadly dance of blade alongside imaginary shurikens and bursts from his mandiblasters.

Korlandril stopped, halfway between Rising Claw and Serpent from Shadow.

His shadow-prey had a face. Several in fact. The faces of the humans he had killed. He saw them morphing into each other, eyes dead, mouths agape.

With a laugh, Korlandril slashed at the apparition’s throat, taking the head clean off. Its ghost whispered away into cloudy shreds and disappeared. Korlandril continued his training without it. He needed no imaginary foe to fight; he had drawn real blood and taken real lives.

He practised for most of the cycle and was quite weary by the time he hung up his chainsword and took off his armour. Despite his fatigue, his mind was still aflame, not the least satiated by his exertion. Hunger and thirst gnawed at him, but it was not just for food and drink that he craved. He wanted something to occupy himself. He needed some entertainment.

He found the others at the Crescent of the Dawning Ages and sat with them, a full platter on the table before him.

“I am of a mind to hear a recital, or perhaps see a theatrical performance,” he told the others between mouthfuls of food. “Something stirring, with drama, and perhaps a little bit of sensuousness.”

“There is a rendition of
Aeistian’s Tryst
in the Dome of Callous Winters,” Elissanadrin told him, helping herself to the carafe of summervine Arhulesh had brought to the table.

“Too rhetorical,” Korlandril replied.

“There’s a
Weaving of the Filigrees
in the Hall of Unending Labours,” suggested Arhulesh. His eyes flickered between Korlandril and Elissanadrin in a suggestive manner. “Perhaps the two of you could attend.”

Korlandril considered this for a moment, but dismissed the idea. He did not want to be distracted during his first congress with Elissanadrin. The more he thought about it, the less appealing the notion of physical intimacy with his companion became.

He shook his head.

“We could race skyrunners along the Emerald Straits, I’ve always wanted to try that,” suggested Elissanadrin.

Korlandril sighed.

“It’s not as dangerous or thrilling as it looks, not if you’ve any experience with a skyrunner at all.”

“I’m not going to waste my time with this,” said Arhulesh, standing up. “It’s clear that you have no appetite for any suggestion I might make. Enjoy the summervine.”

“Wait!” Korlandril cried out. “I am sure we can think of something. I just want to find something to kill time.”

All within earshot turned towards Korlandril. Across the Crescent of Dawning Ages a shocked silence descended.