“Second, Breven doesn’t want him to know anything about it. Greigur would be far more likely to send his own men after the artifact than he would be to help the Baron retrieve it, so we’ve got to make sure he doesn’t know anything about it. Which is going to make hiring a handful of Deneith soldiers under his nose a very tricky proposition.”
“Why do they have to be Deneith?”
That gave Sabira pause. Breven hadn’t told her she needed to hire men from the House; in fact, he hadn’t specifically told her she needed to take anyone with her at all, though he must have meant for her to do so when he gave her access to his bank account.
But thirty Blademarks and a powerful sorceress had gone down into Tarath Marad, and the only one who returned was their guide. If Sabira was going to follow in their footsteps, she wanted the best warriors she could find at her back. She’d just assumed they’d be wearing the Deneith chimera on their armor, but Greddark was right. There were other mercenaries in Stormreach, ones whose services could be bought without Greigur’s knowledge, and their steel was just as sharp as that of anyone who wore the green and yellow.
Sabira chuckled self-deprecatingly. As often as she ridiculed others for their blind obedience to the House, her assumption that Deneith warriors were superior to any others simply by virtue of their name was just another side of the same coin. She was suddenly glad she wasn’t traveling with either Aggar or Elix-both of them would have seen her hypocrisy in an instant, and only one of them might have kept quiet about it.
“They don’t, necessarily. But I don’t know who else we can find, hire, and supply before the fourth bell.”
Greddark shrugged. “How about some warforged? A lot of them don’t seem too happy working for Cannith right now; I’d bet they’d jump at the chance to prove they’re more than just two-legged toolboxes.” He looked over at Glaive, who was bringing them two mugs of cider, since the tavern sadly carried neither tea nor dwarven whiskey.
“No offense meant,” he said to the warforged.
“The mere fact that you are concerned I might be offended proves that,” the barkeep replied as he set down their drinks. “How many warriors do you need?”
Sabira chewed her lip thoughtfully. Tilde had gone in with thirty men, but the very size of her party could have led to its demise-the larger the group, the harder it was to pass unnoticed by the things that lurked in the shadows, or to maneuver in tight places when such notice could not be escaped.
She looked over at Greddark inquiringly, but the dwarf shrugged, as if to say, “It’s your show.”
“It’s not a question of how many,” she said after a moment. “It’s a question of how good they are.”
Glaive nodded his approval.
“In that case, you will want to speak to Bardiche. He is a warforged in search of a purpose-better you give it to him than the Lord of Blades.”
“The Lord of Blades?” Sabira repeated in surprise. “I didn’t know his cult extended this far outside the Mournland.”
She didn’t know much about the shadowy figure, and everything she had heard was full of exaggeration and contradiction. By all accounts a powerful and charismatic warforged, the Lord of Blades was rumored to be building an empire for the living constructs out of the bones and ashes of the nation that had once been Cyre-though for what purpose, no one could truly say. She’d heard him variously described as a teacher and a prophet, a warlord and a madman. The truth, of course, was probably somewhere in between those extremes.
What she hadn’t heard was that he had any interest-or sway-in Stormreach. That would certainly explain the unrest among the Cannith warforged. Though the Treaty of Thronehold had given the warforged their freedom at the end of the Last War, there were many people who still regarded the metal men as little more than slaves. Even the most enlightened tended to see the warforged, who had originally been created as weapons of war, as painful reminders of that century-long struggle. Few accepted them as actual people, let alone individuals with abilities and desires that might well have nothing to do with warfare.
If asked, she would have said Stormreach, home of misfits and outcasts, was a perfect haven for warforged-or anyone, really-struggling to find acceptance in the wider world of Eberron. Apparently, she would have been wrong.
“There are many Bladesworn among my brethren now,” Glaive replied. “Some say the Lord of Blades himself has come to Xen’drik, seeking an ancient device that will give him ultimate power.”
“Lot of that going around,” Greddark said, and Sabira kicked him beneath the table.
“So where can I find this Bardiche?” she asked a little too loudly, giving the dwarf a dirty look.
Glaive seemed oblivious to the exchange. More likely, he just didn’t know what to make of the silly fleshlings.
“When last I saw him, he was near the Maker’s Gate with two others, arguing with one of the monitors. If he has not yet been taken into custody for his impertinence, you may still find him there. You will know him by the dramatic flourishes he uses when he speaks. I believe his makers may originally have intended for him to serve House Phiarlan.”
“Wait. They arrest people for impertinence here? You might as well turn yourself in now, Sabira,” Greddark quipped, pushing the bench back to avoid another blow to his shin as he made to rise.
Before Sabira could think of a properly scathing rejoinder, Glaive put a hand on the dwarf’s shoulder to stop him.
“Your pardon, Dark Artificer, but having seen your skill in aiding Kupper-Nickel, I am hopeful you might be able to assist another of my brethren who has all but lost the use of his right arm. The Cannith artificers want to remove it and replace it with a blade or a hammer, or some other implement of war. Perhaps even something similar to a rune arm-”
“Rune arm!” Greddark interrupted with a disdainful snort. “Don’t know what the Canniths see in them. Bulky things. Make it impossible to drink your tea. Give me blade or a wand any day.”
Glaive paused for a moment, nonplussed. When he was sure the dwarf’s outburst was over, he continued.
“But Jester has worked diligently to master the lyre and fears that he will no longer be able to play once they are finished with him. If you could perhaps offer him another alternative, I know he would be very grateful. He might even be willing to join you on your quest. While he longs to play at the Livewood, he is quite agile and his services might be of use to you.”
Greddark looked over at her, and Sabira shrugged.
“Go. I can talk to Bardiche myself. Though I’m not really sure we need two jesters on this trip. Maybe if the warforged turns out to be funnier, I’ll take him with me instead and you can stay here and keep pretending you’re a Cannith instead of a Kundarak.”
She gave him an acid smile and stood up.
“Better than pretending I’m a Deneith,” the dwarf muttered under his breath as she walked away, but she acted like she hadn’t heard him.
“… can’t loiter around here all day. Move along.”
The Cannith monitor-a different one from when they’d first come into the enclave-was waving his crossbow around as the lead warforged responded theatrically, wringing his hands. The gesture was both amusing and somewhat pathetic, given his face’s total lack of ability to convey the accompanying anguish.
“All we want are jobs. A mission, a reason to exist. If we cannot find that here, where we were made, then where can we?”
Glaive was right. Bardiche would have fit right in with the players of House Phiarlan. He’d have made an excellent actor if he’d been anything other than a warforged.
“That’s not my problem,” the monitor replied impatiently as Sabira approached. “You need to move along. Word is the warforged are becoming a danger to the peace-loving residents of this ward.”