Warden's Path

by Heath Pfaff

  For a while after he finished speaking I couldn’t help but sit there in stunned silence. Ghoul’s little lesson was a piece of history I’d never heard, and the revelation that the black liquid was just gone now didn’t set well at all. That the golems were changing on top of everything else felt like too much to comprehend when laid before me at one time.

  “Do the Wardens know about the black liquid? How will you make more golems? Is this . . . is it all my fault?” I had so many questions, the last of which was the one that concerned me the most embarrassingly enough, but I was worried for Ghoul too. He made golems. That was what Ghoul did. I wasn’t certain how he could continue his work without the ichor beneath the school, and what purpose would the Warden’s find in him if he couldn’t? I wasn’t exactly certain this was all a bad thing. Not being able to produce golems might be seen as a good turn of events, but what these changes might portend worried me a great deal.

  “The others know.” He said, and I thought I detected some unease. “They believe it’s a result of the thing Arthos brought back with him. They think it is some kind of weapon, or something that can be used like a weapon. I’ve been instructed to determine another way to construct golems, but that is folly. There is no other way to create what they want. Yes, my Will does go into making them, but the black liquid, the Will of the Pit, as I like to call it sometimes, that is what binds them to life. It is what makes them obedient and animate. Only real darkness can suppress humanity with such pure malevolence.” He chuckled darkly at this, one of his strange, almost satirical, laughs. “They might as well have asked me to make a windmill without wind, or a water wheel without water. I can build the bits, and I can craft the engine, but there is nothing left to power that engine. They don’t understand because they never understood what it was that I did when I created the golems. They saw the art, but knew nothing of the medium. And no, Lillin, this isn’t your fault. This was bound to happen. You were unfortunate enough to be there when it did, or maybe fortunate in that you know what is happening. I haven’t decided whether everything has a purpose, whether fate rules us all, or if everything is just random chance.”

  He shrugged and let out a long sigh. “The dark has been getting closer to all of this time, even before you were born. You bare no responsibility. I’m not sure Arthos does either, even if it was his direct folly that brought us here.”

  I felt a bit of relief at that, though guilt still nagged at me. I thought it was likely that it always would. “Maybe it’s for the better that the golems can’t be made anymore.” I said, trying to push my thoughts in a different direction. “They are terrible things, Ghoul.” I told him firmly.

  He shrugged his shoulders again and chuckled. “They are, but they were my purpose. They were that which I pursued all of my life, and now I have nothing. I’m not yet sure how to go on from here. I will play at doing as they’ve asked me, I suppose. They still need me for the other golems. They know that. Those that exist are tied to me. There is no telling what would happen if I ceased to be. They might break free of the shackles that bind them, or they might just fall apart where they stand. If they decided to attack the Wardens, then there would be trouble, but as long as I am connected to them, they won’t be a threat.” He frowned. “Hopefully. We could destroy them eventually, but not with any ease. They are very powerful. They have always been very powerful. Almost Wardens, but tied down by my Will.”

  This caught my attention keenly. “Would they become who they were before if they were freed?” Could Ori come back in some form?

  His eyes flashed for just a moment, but then he was shaking his head. “Lillin. I know what you’re thinking, but that is a very bad idea. The suffering those things live in . . . “ He shook his head. “You don’t want them free of the bindings they’re placed under. They are still the people they once were, but they are those people after unending suffering for the extent of the time they’ve been in those shells. If you think that I am mad, then you know nothing of the minds that exist in those steel bodies. My experiments have proven that they are best left as they are. At least, best for those of us as we are now. I can only imagine the wrath with which they would attack us if cut loose.” He hesitated a moment, as though he’d had a different thought, something else had occurred to him for a fleeting moment, but then he just smiled and the thought seemed to pass.

  “Maybe the Wardens deserve that wrath.” I said firmly.

  Ghoul nodded. “Of course we do. We all deserve that and much worse. We are built on the bodies of our friends and allies. There is not a one of us who is innocent of stepping over the weak to become strong, but we serve a purpose. The Wardens do good, even if they are not inherently good. If we were to be wiped out, or if we were to lose a substantial number of our people, this world would fall into chaos. The Way would push across the Expanse and war would take hold in every major city. Millions and millions of innocent people would die, bandits would run free in the countryside, and I don’t believe the golems would stop killing at just the Wardens. Some of them, the ones trapped within those shells for too long, would have nothing left but a loathing for those that were human and untouched. They would kill and destroy as long as they continued to move. The Wardens are terrible, Lillin, but the void left by our passing will be filled with destruction.” He paused again a moment. “Would that I might undo a fraction of what I have done . . . “

  His eyes shimmered as he gave me a crooked smile. “Soon none of this will matter anyway. Like I said, something is coming, and it is malevolent and driven by no desire greater than the spread of pure chaos.”

  “How do you know that for certain?” I felt compelled to ask. I was also concerned, and I also felt a sense of impending darkness looming, but what made it more than just a bad feeling? Why did he believe it with such a certainty?

  “If you put your ear to a door you can hear the voices in the next room over. Well, my ear has been against the door for a long time, Lillin, and for awhile I knew all the voices talking from the other side, but now something else is speaking, and this new voice is getting closer and easier to hear. Wardens have long sat at the door, waiting and watching. Blackened, girl, we have toyed with the door, opening and closing it as we want as though that wouldn’t attract notice, but it did! The dark didn’t find us until we began playing with those portals, but it knows we’re here now. It knows, and it wants to join us. Now it has a way. It’s coming. Everyone can feel it, but some won’t know what they’re feeling. Some can sense it more keenly than others.” He touched the point between his eyes. “Some can see that the shadows are alive, and others just see shadows.”

  “If this is true, then what do we do?” Dreea asked, she’d been quiet for most of this conversation, which was something she often did around strangers, and Ghoul was not only new to her, but he was as strange as anyone we’d met. I couldn’t blame her for not having much to say.

  “There is nothing to be done. I’m not sure there is an enemy to fight here. It would be like fighting the sun. It will rise despite what we might try and do. This darkness has found it’s time and I don’t know what we can do about that.” Ghoul’s response was bleak and foreboding.

  “What if we stole the item Arthos brought and took it through a door? We could put it somewhere else.” I was trying to find an answer. I refused to believe that things were hopeless.

  “That might slow what is happening, but I don’t think it would stop events from grind on. It might be too late for that now. The retreat of the Will of the Pit, that’s a sign that things have already progressed. Whatever it is, whatever twisting force has been seeking us out, it is already here.”

  In a far firmer tone he went on. “I think it is far better that you get away from this place. Become strong, as strong as you can. You’ll need to be stronger than any of us. I still believe you need to find a path as a scout. There are places you need to go, and things you must yet see. Maybe that is the way you will save us.” His expression faltered some. “
Or maybe I’m just insane still. I’m not sure it’s becoming a scout at all that you need, maybe just being on that path, or maybe . . . no, I’m not sure.” His expression faltered into one of confusion.

  I felt bad for him in that moment. “Alright, Ghoul. If that is what you think is best then I will continue on my path. I will learn what I can.” In the back of my mind I was already plotting how I might find that thing Arthos brought here and get it away. It had to be possible. I could take it with me when I left, and then find a place to throw it. No one would ever find it, and it would be away from our world. I just had to figure out how to open the doors.

  “Lillin, I can see your mind working. You’re not good at hiding things from me.” Ghoul said. “Leave the thing Arthos brought here alone. It’s in a place you can’t go right now. They wouldn’t let someone of your rank anywhere near it, and if you took it they’d know very quickly. If you can’t hide the truth from me, how would you hide it from those trained to look for such things?”

  A scowl creased my expression. “I don’t like it when you do that.”

  “Do what, read you like print on a scroll? Perhaps if you were better at keeping your emotions in check I wouldn’t be able to do that.” Ghoul smiled, and it didn’t seem quite as dark as most of his expression. “We’ve known each other for a little while now. You have gotten better at hiding things, but your face is still telling when you’re trying to lie. I can see the hints of your fibbing, the same ones I remember from three years ago. When you’ve been alive as long as I have that isn’t so very long at all. I remember clearly.”

  My cheeks flushed a bit in embarrassment. “Then there is nothing for it at all? I just continue my training like nothing has changed?” Exasperation touched my voice against my ability to try and restrain it.

  “That is all there is for us to do.” Ghoul’s reply wasn’t what I wanted, but there was nothing new about that. I was trapped on a path again.

  13.3

  Leaving the school behind once more was as much a relief as it was a source of trepidation. I was happy to see the walls fade into the distance, and to have the memories of all I’d encountered there begin to dwindle, but I was still leaving what had become my home. This time I was also leaving behind Arthos and the mystery of the strange item we’d brought back through the door. That worried me, even if there was still no clear evidence that things had changed.

  I had it on Ghoul’s word that the black muck had retreated, but that was hard to see as a bad thing. I should have been less worried than I was. I was under new tutelage, and the only thing I needed to occupy myself with was learning to use my Will more effectively. That was the only responsibility I had.

  Korva led us out of the school much the same way we’d gone with Arthos. I was more than pleased to find Zara waiting for me when we reached the stables. She’d already been prepared for travel, and was very eager to see me again. If the bond between us had weakened at all, I couldn’t tell. Apparently she’d refused two other Wardens since returning, something that really didn’t happen that often. Korva thought it had to do with the raw force of my Will.

  “You may well have permanently bent that one to you.” She noted with a slow nod of her head, as though she was confirming this for herself as she spoke. “They say you have a particularly powerful Will about you, and I can certainly see that in your bond with the Kie. We’ll have to work hard to allow you to focus that. It’s rare that raw power is what you need in any situation, not when it comes to Will.”

  That began the lectures. I’d through we would spend much more time actually working on physical practice, but Korva seemed intent upon helping me understand the nature of Will, and the theories behind how it was controlled. She was a very different teacher from Arthos who’d loved to just throw tasks at me. I wondered what he was doing, or if he’d managed to gather his senses back to him since returning. I didn’t like that I had been unable to see him before being sent away.

  We traveled for two weeks before reaching the edge of the Expanse. In that time I was lectured on so many different intricacies of Will that it felt like I was in school all over again. The exercises we did were nothing likes the ones I’d worked on with Arthos. We didn't spin rocks, or juggle sticks. Instead I picked up individual threads of different colors on command, lifting them and putting them back down, changing their order, and then trying to tie them into knots with just my Will. That one stopped me. Picking them up was hard enough, especially without disturbing all of the threads laid out in front of me, but actually tying them was more difficult still.

  While I fought with this seemingly insurmountable task, Dreea kept up a steady discourse with Korva, her speech getting clearer, and her questions focusing on the nature of Will and it’s application. She was like a dry sponge exposed to water for the first time. She took in everything she could. The line of her questions worried me. It made me think she was still strongly considering becoming a Warden. I didn’t want her to pursue that goal. It was selfish of me, but I didn’t want her to go away, or to start something that could be so dangerous.

  One night, as we made camp and Korva slipped off to gather wood and herbs for tea, I sat down near Dreea, knots in my belly. “How are you doing?” I asked, afraid to get directly to the topic that I really wanted to discuss.

  She smiled and nodded. “I am doing well, Lillin. I have learned much, and I like traveling with you and Korva. She is smart and nice. She answers my questions, and I think she sees me as a person, not as an animal.” Dreea had changed outfits after we left the school. She was wearing clothes much like a warden would, though not in the shades of gray, and with no insignia. Her clothes were green and black mostly, pants and a shirt. She even wore a binding for her chest over her upper breasts, the only set that really protruded to any degree. She seemed eager to be seen the same as anyone else. I wanted her to remain the Dreea that I’d known all along, and it worried me that I could see her changing. I was afraid, and I wasn’t even sure of what exactly.

  I thought that it was perhaps unfair of me to desire she remain unchanged, when change was apparently what she wanted. Well, my desire wasn’t unfair, but pushing her to conform to my desires would be. Dreea had to be who and what she wanted to be. However, letting her join the Warden school was like letting her walk into death, or that was how it felt.

  The words that fell next from my lips seemed to spring of their own accord. “Dreea, I don’t want you to become a Warden.” I spoke firmly, and with a determination that I was surprised to find in my voice. I wondered if I could use my Will to press this command on her. I knew how that worked, though it was complicated for me. It took a finesse I still lacked, and even considering the possibility of doing so made me feel a bit queasy. Bending someone like that was a terrible thing to do.

  Dreea’s eyes opened wider in surprise, and her expression slid from her happy, contented one, to one that was clearly upset. “I don’t understand, Lillin. I want to become stronger, better, like you. I want to be accepted as I am. It is important to me.” I could tell I’d managed to hurt her with that single sentence, blurted out in a rush of concern.

  “It’s dangerous. The training is very dangerous. Most of the people who start it don’t survive until the end.” I tried to explain. “I don’t want you to do it because I don’t want you to die. You’re my friend. You saved my life. You’re already strong, and I accept you. You’re a person to me. Stay with me. We’ll travel, and explore, and get stronger together.” It sounded selfish to me as I said it.

  Dreea blinked at me, her expression still hurt. “We’ll grow stronger, but you will always be Warden Lillin, and I will always be Dreea the willifen. We won’t be equals. I cannot stand beside you as I am now, only below.” Her expression, which I had gotten better at reading, was still confusing to me. It looked pleading, like there was something she very much wanted from me in that moment.

  “You’re not below me. You’ve never been below me. I don’t see things that way a
t all.” I blushed a bit darkly and looked down. “I might have at first, but that was before I got to know you, to understand you. Please, Dreea, I’ve lost so many friends. I don’t want to lose you too.”

  Instead of looking pleased at my words, Dreea gave a soft whimper and her ears laid back. “You don’t believe I can do this? You think I will fail if I try to become a Warden.” The first was a question, the other was a statement of realization that seemed to come with a terrible sorrow.

  Those words struck at a nerve inside of me. It was as though I was a bell and she’d just swung the clapper. I’d had to say something incredibly similar to Zarkov once. He hadn’t believed in me then, and I’d really wanted him to. Now Dreea was sitting across from me, and that look in her eyes was the one that I knew I’d had in mine when I spoke to Zark.

  My heart sank. I wasn't sure whether or not she could handle the training, but if it was what she wanted, should I stand in her way? “I . . . “ My words faltered. “Dreea, I just . . .”

  She stood up and turned away from me. “I’m going for a walk. I’ll be back later.” She said, her voice husky and heavy with emotion. She took off then, slipping down onto all fours as she went from a walk to a run, vanishing into the woods. I wasn’t afraid that she’d get lost. Her nose would always lead her back, but I was afraid she wouldn’t come back. I should have supported her. What kind of friend was I?