There was no way Cart and the soldiers with him at the front of the line could stop all of the charging worgs, and only a handful of other soldiers were close enough to help. He fell back, leaving room for the worgs to pass. The worgs weren’t any more interested in a fight than Cart was, so he let them go. As soon as they had passed the soldiers’ line, they scattered to the winds.
“Mirra,” he called, and the sergeant scurried to stand before him. “Take two squads back to the camp. Tell Haldren what we found, and come back here with miners-as many picks as the camp can spare.”
Mirra saluted and went to gather her two squads. Cart pulled the other soldiers together and started preparations to spend the night at the worgs’ den.
No one slept. Camped outside the entrance to the worgs’ shaft, the soldiers were in constant fear of worgs, and the shaft itself loomed like a constant, vigilant presence. Soldiers who glanced that way turned away quickly, and Cart felt a slow pulse that resonated in the metal cores of his limbs, a sensation that hovered just at the edge of pain. He wondered how far the shaft went-had the worgs already succeeded in clearing a path to the crystal, opening a channel for its awful presence to extend into the neighboring valley?
As soon as the sun’s light faded completely from the sky, the worgs launched their first attack. They struck at the weakest point-a relatively small cluster of soldiers a short distance from any reinforcements. It was a quick and brutal strike, leaving two soldiers dead, then the worgs retreated before any help could arrive. Cart pulled the troops closer together, and they nervously awaited the next attack.
The worgs always came just as the soldiers began to relax or grow tired, letting their attention wander and loosening their grips on their weapons. Each time, they left at least one soldier dead or grievously injured, and as far as Cart could tell, the worgs had suffered no significant wounds. As the night wore on, the attacks became less frequent as the tension among the soldiers grew, but each one took a greater toll as fatigue slowed their reactions and weakened their hands. Cart managed to bring down one worg when the beasts made their only significant mistake-attacking too close to where Cart stood guard.
With dawn’s light, Cart looked down at a row of six bodies. It could have been worse, he told himself, but that was little comfort. What was supposed to have been work to busy idle hands had become a costly engagement.
By the time the soldiers had constructed and lit a pyre for their fallen comrades, Mirra arrived with her two squads of soldiers, a platoon of miners, and Ashara, who insisted on inspecting the crystal and supervising the collapse of the tunnel.
Cart took one of Mirra’s squads into the shaft first, to ensure that no worgs remained inside. At the shoulder, the worgs were taller even than Cart, so the height of the ceiling gave plenty of room. It was the width that made Cart nervous-if they did find any worgs, it would be a series of one-on-one fights in the narrow tunnel, and the soldiers would have trouble swinging their weapons at full strength. They made it only a short way inside before Cart called a halt and withdrew to replace his axe with a spear more suited to fighting in close quarters. So armed, he advanced into the tunnel alone, holding a sunrod before him to light his way. If only one soldier could face a worg at a time, he wanted that soldier to be him.
The shaft was straight, with no branches, and ran deep into the rock of the ridge. To his surprise, he found the tunnel shored up with wooden beams. How could the worgs have brought the beams into the tunnel? To imagine them digging into the rock like dogs burying a bone was one thing-but the idea of them carrying lumber into the shaft to support the ceiling seemed absurd. He resolved to have a miner examine the construction after he had scouted to the end.
As he expected, the light from his sunrod soon sparkled blue against what seemed like a doorway cut into the rock, outlining a crystal wall. A few paces farther in, he realized that the shaft widened and rose higher before the blue rectangle, as though the worgs had built a subterranean temple to replace their scattered labyrinth in the canyon.
Steeling himself for an ambush, he advanced slowly and as quietly as he could to the end of the shaft. He found himself in the entry to an impressive chamber carved from the stone. The walls were polished smooth except around the blue doorway, where a demonic figure was chiseled into the rock. Its feline head snarled in rage, and its clawed hands held the limp form of a winged serpent. The blue crystal gleamed between its legs, framed by pillars and a lintel that were also carved from the stone. The sculpture, more than the shores, convinced him that the worgs had not built this temple.
No worgs lurked in the chamber, but as he looked around, something moved within the crystal. First he saw a silver swirl-the serpent swimming through the mineral sea. Its movements had a sense of urgency that drew Cart a little closer. Other feelings surfaced in his mind, awe and wonder, respect and compassion for the sacrifice the spirit had made, giving its own freedom to bind the evil here in the earth. Cart wanted to honor that sacrifice.
Then a shadow moved behind the serpent. Two claws took form within the shadow and tore at the serpent, pushing through the barrier it had tried to make. He felt a flash of the serpent’s fear, then an overwhelming sense of anger. The shadow pressed against the surface of the crystal, and Cart stared into the incarnate face of evil.
A tool of war, like a sword or a siege engine. Is that what you are?
Cart was trapped in shadow floating in a sea of blue. He heard a whispered voice, not in his ear, but in his mind.
What god cares about the warforged? I will be that god, and you will be my champion.
The owner of the voice had plumbed the deepest reaches of his mind and soul, the heart of his desire.
You will lift my banner, and the warforged of all the world will rally to it. And there will be war, glorious war, the glory of battle and conquest. Khorvaire will be yours.
I was made for war, Cart thought.
And what is a warforged to do in a world without war? They built you for war and then abandoned you. But you will show them what they have done. They have brought war on themselves. War now has a mind and a will of its own.
It’s true, he thought. When the humans built war machines with minds, free-willed beings whose sole purpose was war, they condemned themselves to perpetual war. Until the last warforged lies dead and broken on a battlefield, there will always be war.
There will always be war. But these humans-Kelas, Haldren, Ashara and the rest-they try to use war as a tool, an instrument of their politics. You will bring war for war’s sake, war without pretense. War with no goal can have no end, for it will never attain its goal.
The mention of Ashara’s name stirred something in Cart that seemed to drive back the shadow just the slightest bit. To her, he was not a tool. In her eyes, he was something more than a machine built to be a soldier.
Of course you are more than a mere soldier-so much more. You are a hero, and you will be my champion.
To be a hero and to be your champion seem like two different things, he thought.
You will be whatever you desire. At my right hand, your destiny will be yours to choose.
Destiny. That word brought different memories to mind, memories of Gaven at the gates of Khyber, seizing his destiny and the Prophecy by the horns and wrenching them to his own will. Gaven had convinced Cart that his thoughts of godhood were illusions, that the path to greater good did not lie with the acquisition of greater power. Gaven had forsworn the power of divinity.
Gaven cannot be the Storm Dragon. He didn’t fulfill the Prophecy of the Storm Dragon. The Storm Dragon is yet to come.
No, Cart thought.
A flash of silver drove the shadow back still farther, and Cart found himself standing before the crystal doorway, both hands pressed to its surface and his forehead leaning against it. He heaved himself backward, sprawled on the floor, and the darkness was gone.