Path of the Warrior (12 page)

Arhulesh laughed harshly but his face was serious.

“The war-mask is not a thing, it is a state of mind. You have come close to it, or you would not be here. You will know it when it comes. We cannot tell you what it will be like, for it is unique to each of us.”

“Just know that we have all been through the same experience,” added Min. He laid a hand on Korlandril’s shoulder. Korlandril was slightly uneasy with a gesture of such familiarity, having only just been introduced. He resisted the urge to pull away but Min must have sensed his reaction. He drew his hand back. “When it comes, you will share what we all share and my touch will not be so unwelcome.”

“I did not mean any off—”

“We do not apologise to one another,” cut in Elissanadrin. “Know that in this place, with mask on or off, all is forgiven. The past is the past, the future will be whatever it will be, and we share only the present. Perhaps it is regret that keeps you from discovering your mask. Leave it behind; it has no place in your spirit. As a warrior, regret will kill you as surely as a blade.”

Korlandril pondered this silently. The others turned as one towards the exarch armour at the head of the hall and Korlandril looked over his shoulder to see that Kenainath had returned. He had made no sound that Korlandril had heard and he was at a loss to know how the others had been aware of his arrival. Perhaps they had not been aware at all; the thought that the exarch might have heard the conversation disturbed Korlandril, though he was not sure why.

“It is time for us to depart,” said Elissanadrin.

“Not you,” Min said as Korlandril took a step towards the doorway.

“Enjoy your training, little scorpion,” added Arhulesh, directing a glance towards the exarch, who stood with arms folded across his chest, looking sternly at his disciples.

Bechareth passed Korlandril last, giving a short bow in farewell before leaving with the others. Suppressing a sigh, Korlandril turned towards Kenainath.

“I am yours to teach,” Korlandril said, dipping his head.

“That is well and good, for there is still much to learn, Striking Scorpion.”

When the eldar first rose from the bosom of the ground, nourished by the tears of Isha, the gods came to them and each offered them a gift. Asuryan, lord of lords, gave the eldar Wisdom, that they would know themselves. Isha gave the eldar Love, that they would know one another. Vaul gave the eldar Artifice, that they would make their dreams a reality. Lileath gave the eldar Joy, that they would know happiness. Kurnous gave the eldar Desire, that they would know prosperity. Morai-heg gave the eldar Foresight, that they would know their place in the world. Khaine gave the eldar Anger, that they would protect what the gods had given them.

The training continued as before; though now in armour and often in the company of the other warriors of the shrine. Kenainath also turned his attention to introducing the disciplines of stealth and ambush, leading Korlandril through the swamps as silently as a breeze. The pair of them travelled to places new to Korlandril—narrow gorges, winding rivulets and shadow-shrouded caves. Despite the bulk of the Striking Scorpion armour, Korlandril moved as soundlessly as if he were naked. So controlled and effortless was Korlandril’s motion, so attuned was he to the swaying of the branches and the slightest ripple of water, he was able to blend his movements to those of his surrounds.

For thirty-eight cycles this continued. Korlandril could discern no pattern to the lessons save for some inner timeline that Kenainath maintained for himself. He did not know against which mark he was being judged or to what standard he might aspire, and so could only follow Kenainath’s instructions without question. The exarch made no mention of any change in Korlandril’s skills, though he knew for himself that they were steadily improving.

In the carefully choreographed ritual of the shrine, Korlandril could now respond so quickly to the exarch’s commands it was if he anticipated them. He kept pace with the other Striking Scorpions without thought. His progress, even if unremarked by the others, gave him some satisfaction and he looked forward to the underlying spirit of sharing he felt when he practised alongside the rest of the shrine. Always he felt invigorated when putting on his armour, but now he was left also with a sense of fulfilment when he took it off.

At the rising of the thirty-ninth cycle, Kenainath, clad in his armour but without his helmet, came to the bare dormitory where Korlandril slept. He instructed Korlandril to don his own wargear and led him into a new chamber. Here were arranged the weapons of the Striking Scorpions, hung upon the wall of the circular room. Ten slender chainswords were paired with matching shuriken pistols.

Not quite knowing how, Korlandril walked directly to the arms that he knew belonged to his armour. He ran his fingers along the cladding of the chainsword, able to feel the entwining decorations through the empathic connection to his gauntlet as if he touched it with bare skin.

“Take up your weapon, let it become part of you, feel it in your hand,” said Kenainath.

Korlandril closed his fingers around the guarded hilt of the chainsword and lifted it easily from the curved wall bracket. Like his armour, it was surprisingly light for its size. It fitted snugly into his palm, like an extension of his arm. He twisted his wrist and examined the narrow blades, each sharp enough to slice through flesh and bone with a single stroke. He saw red reflections of his own admiring face in the jewels along its length.

“How do I activate it?” he asked.

“How does your heart beat, your fingers move at your whim, that is the answer.”

Korlandril stalked to the centre of the chamber and took up the stance known as Sweeping Bite, hunched forward slightly. His right fist was raised in front of his left shoulder, but now he could see that the length of the chainsword extended horizontally in front of his face, just below eye level. He rotated, sliding back his right foot, the weapon flashing in an arc, finishing in Hidden Claw.

Growing in confidence, Korlandril moved through the First Ritual of Attack, pacing steadily across the chamber, cutting back and forth with the chainsword. At the fifth stance—Rising Fang—the chainsword purred into life of its own accord.

Shocked, Korlandril stumbled, the weapon almost falling from his grasp. Kenainath made a strange hissing sound and Korlandril turned, expecting to see scorn on the exarch’s bare face. The opposite was true. For the first time since Korlandril had met him, Kenainath was quietly laughing.

“As it was with me, first time. I took up a blade, now so long ago.” Kenainath’s humour dissipated quickly and he gestured for Korlandril to continue.

The chainsword had fallen lifeless in his grasp. Regaining his focus, Korlandril started afresh from the first stance, and almost immediately the chainsword’s teeth whirred into motion, making no more sound than the buzzing of a lava-wing. Unperturbed, Korlandril continued, cutting and slashing, each move increasing in speed until the blade was a green and gold blur in the air. He made backhanded cuts and rounded overhead chops, advancing on invisible foes.

As he weaved the blade around him, the shadowy foe he visualised during his routines came into sharper focus. Its eyes still burned red but it took on a more distinct shape, narrow at the hip, broader at the shoulder. In the eye of Korlandril’s mind, his foe bobbed and ducked, parried and countered, advanced and retreated.

With an explosion of breath, Korlandril delivered a killing strike, sweeping the blade up beneath the chin of his imaginary adversary, to come to a perfect standstill in Claw of Balance. Drawing a lungful of air, Korlandril stepped back, assuming the stance of repose. He turned towards Kenainath.

The exarch betrayed nothing of his thoughts. There was neither praise nor condemnation in his expression. The pride Korlandril had felt in his performance evaporated quickly under that inscrutable stare.

“You have now begun, the Path continues onwards, you must follow it.”

Korlandril dared a glance towards the shuriken pistol on the wall, and then looked back at the exarch. Kenainath gave one shake of the head and pointed at the chainsword in Korlandril’s hand.

“First master the claw, the venomous bite comes next, the sting is the last.”

Korlandril licked his dry lips and nodded. He returned to the centre of the chamber and took up Claw from Shadow. The chainsword responded to his urging before he had so much as twitched a muscle and within moments he was moving again.

For the following cycles Korlandril trained in isolation, until Kenainath was convinced that he could spar with the other Striking Scorpions without undue danger to them or himself. After twenty-three cycles, the exarch informed Korlandril that he was ready to train armed with the other warriors. Kenainath took his warrior-acolyte to a grove not far from the shrine and gestured for Korlandril to seat himself on a moss-covered log.

“What of history, the tale of the scorpion, can you tell to me?” Kenainath asked. “What myths have you heard, of Karandras and Arhra, the first of our kind?”

Korlandril raked his fingers through his hair as he remembered what he could.

“Asurmen was the first, the creator of the Path of the Warrior,” he said. “I guess it was Asurmen that discovered how to don the war-mask. He founded the first shrine and gathered disciples to teach, Arhra amongst them, the Father of Scorpions. Some dark fate befell Arhra, of which I do not know the story, and his greatest pupil Karandras took up the mantle and spread the teachings of the Striking Scorpion.”

“That is true enough, the briefest account of it, but you should know more,” replied Kenainath, crouching opposite his pupil, his eyes intent. “Arhra fell from grace, touched by the dark of Chaos, and betrayed his kin. He turned on the rest, brought daemons to the First Shrine, hungry for power. The Asurya, the first exarchs of the Path, fought against Arhra. They lost the battle, scattered to the distant stars, and Arhra escaped. He strayed from the Path, consumed by his ambition, and found new pupils. His teachings are wrong, a perversion of the Path, the Fallen Phoenix. It is a great wrong, one that we cannot forgive, the worst betrayal. Karandras hunts him, across the stars and webway, for retribution.”

“Arhra still lives? The tale of the Fallen Phoenix was mixed up with the other myths of the Fall. Not even the eldar had such long lives.”

“Who can say for sure, in the warp and the webway, time passes strangely.” Kenainath sighed and his expression was sad, a stark change from his usual indifference or hostility. “Keep true to the Path, heed Karandras’ teachings, remain Korlandril.”

“Have there been others?” Korlandril asked fearfully. “Warriors that follow the Path of the Fallen Phoenix?”

“Not from my pupils, I have guided them all well, taught them properly,” said Kenainath as he straightened quickly. The exarch’s familiar stern expression returned. “Go back to the shrine, tomorrow you fight proper, tonight you must rest.”

Dismissed, Korlandril walked slowly back beneath the dismal bowers of the trees to the shrine building wondering why the exarch had chosen that moment to reveal the truth about the founding of the Striking Scorpions. As the lights of the shrine dimmed for the night portion of the cycle, Korlandril lay awake pondering what the following cycle would bring.

He woke early, full of nervous energy. The shrine was still swathed in twilight and he swiftly pulled on a loose robe and left his solitary dormitory, feeling confined by its walls. In the gloom outside, the swamp was quiet save for the first chattering of the jade-toads. He took a deep breath, accustomed now to the humidity and heat, though he was far from thinking his present environs were his home.

With that, his thoughts turned to the rest of Alaitoc, as they usually did when he was left with time to think. It was with only a barely intellectual interest that he thought of Thirianna. She was probably upon the Path of the Seer by now. Though it had been a short time, barely a blink in the life of an eldar, that moment when his inner anger had been unleashed by her dismissal seemed distant. Irrelevant. His struggle was not with Thirianna, or Aradryan, or any other eldar. It was with himself.

His body and mind were being perfected for one thing—to slay other living creatures. The thought caused him to shudder. Today he would face one of the other members of the Deadly Shadow, but it would not be a fight to a death. It would be controlled, disciplined, ritualistic. Though he knew nothing of real war, he imagined it to be a desperate, harrowing maelstrom of courage and fear, action and blood. And in that anarchy of battle he would kill. He did not know when, or how, but as surely as he had not been an Artist until he had sculpted his first piece, he would not truly tread the Path of the Warrior until he killed his first foe.

He did not know how he would bring himself to do it. Would it be taken out of his hands? An instinct of defence to protect his life? Would it be coldblooded, a pre-meditated slaying of another creature defined as an enemy of the Alaitocii by the farseers and autarchs?

Korlandril realised that this was the war-mask Kenainath and the rest talked about. Only on one occasion had he been ready to strike out in anger, truly wishing harm on another individual; that cycle in the swamp, when rage and hate had combined into a moment of pure action. He tried to capture that instance again, but all of his tricks of memory failed him. In that heartbeat his entire being had been focussed on that one effort to hit Kenainath, and nothing else.

For some time he wandered the pathways around the shrine, not straying too far. He knew the twisting trails as well as any other part of Alaitoc, their mysteries unveiled to him through Kenainath. He no longer feared his surroundings. More importantly, he knew that in overcoming his apprehension of this place he had steeled himself against future dread and doubts when confronted by the unknown and unknowable. He was self-aware enough to understand the process being awoken in him by the teachings of Kenainath, weaving layers of the war-mask that would, one day, emerge from within his spirit.