Esprл drew in a breath to scream, and Te’oma put a single finger over the girl’s mouth. “Ah-ah-ah,” the changeling said. “None of that. Play nice now, or I’ll tap your brain again. We have many miles ahead of us, and screaming for help every chance you get will grow tiresome very fast.” The changeling stared into Esprл’s sky-blue eyes. “If I take my hand from your mouth, do you promise not to scream?”
The girl hesitated for a moment before she nodded. Te’oma removed her hand.
“Now,” the changeling said. “How do you operate this thing?”
Esprл shrugged. “They didn’t tell me. Kandler barely lets me drive a wagon around Mardakine.”
Te’oma curled her lip at the girl. “Yet they left you here all alone?”
“They knew there could be fighting where they went.”
The changeling shook her head in disbelief. “I suppose,” she said. “I wouldn’t have left you here.”
Esprл cocked her head at Te’oma. “What would you have done?”
“Left those other knights to rot. They’re doomed as it is. No reason to put your heads on the block next to them.”
“You’d leave your friends to die?”
“I don’t have any friends.” As the words left her lips, Te’oma realized they were true. She felt a pang of regret at this, but she shoved it aside.
“What about the vampires?” Esprл pressed.
“What about them?”
“Weren’t they your friends?”
Te’oma laughed. The girl’s ability to surprise her was delightful. “Vampires don’t have friends. Not among the living.”
“Are you alive?”
Te’oma goggled at the girl. “I’m a changeling not a zombie. I breathe. I bleed the same as you.”
Esprл thought about that for a moment. “I’ve never met a changeling before.”
“Maybe you have and didn’t know it.”
“I doubt it.”
“What about Gum?”
Esprл’s eyes grew as large as a pair of moons. “The baker? That couldn’t be!”
Te’oma smirked. “Think whatever you like. You’ll never know now, will you?”
The girl considered this for a moment before she spoke. “He never kidnapped me,” she said.
“We’re not all so talented.”
“Esprл!” a voice called out from below.
Te’oma dropped to one knee and swung the girl around in front of her, a hand clamped over her mouth. “Vol’s black blood!” she said. “It’s that shifter.”
Te’oma knew she could take no chances, so she stunned the girl with her mind again. When she let her go, Esprл stood there quietly, her mouth slack and her eyes blank.
“Esprл toss down the ladder!” Burch said. “We got big trouble and no time!”
Te’oma whispered into the girl’s ear as she reached into her mind and mentally wiped the last several minutes from her brain. “As far as you’re concerned, I was never here,” she said softly, “but I’ll be seeing you soon.”
With that, the changeling padded off to a hatchway and slipped down into the hold below the main deck. She didn’t like letting the shifter back onboard, but she knew she couldn’t fly the airship by herself. Better to stowaway and get a free ride out of the Mournland than to have to walk out alone.
Chapter 39
Kandler stood on his knees and waited to die. He figured it was only a matter of moments before the new Superior gave the order. He wondered if Burch was still alive, and if so, what was keeping him.
“Don’t do it!” Xalt said to the warforged guards standing behind the kneeling prisoners. “I’m warning you.”
Superior stared at Xalt for a moment then threw his head back and let loose a tinny laugh. “I’m impressed, greaser,” he said. “I didn’t think you had that much metal in you.”
“I’d hoped you were better than the last Superior. It seems I was wrong. Your soul is twisted.”
Superior shook his head. “You spent too much time among the breathers,” he said. “They built us, put a sword in our hands, and pushed us out the door to kill. It’s what we were made for. It’s what we’re good at. We have no souls. Soldiers don’t need souls. They just get in the way of what we need to do. Maybe that explains it. You weren’t created to kill. You were built to fix. You’re a patch instead of a blade.”
While Superior ranted on, Kandler looked around for a way out. As he turned his head, the guard behind him slapped him across the face. It felt like getting smacked with the flat of a sword.
Superior didn’t miss a beat. “Maybe your makers gave you a soul,” he said to Xalt. “They wanted you to care about the rest of us. Otherwise, you’d just cower behind a rock while we died, calling for you to help us. I hope that soul rests easy inside of you. The rest of us, we don’t want them. We don’t need them. We just need these trespassers dead.”
“Say what you like, Superior,” Xalt said as he tapped a thick metal finger against its chestplate. “There’s something that moves us more than the magic that first sparked life in our shells. I’ve seen it in every one of us. I’ve even seen it in you. As your ‘greaser’, I see us each at our lowest points, when we need someone. when we’re in pain. I see how the others come by as I work on a fallen friend, wanting to know if there’s a chance. I’ve watched you all grieve at funerals held over our lost compatriots’ graves. I’ve seen souls-in all of us.”
Kandler stared at the artificer. He had never known warforged to be so eloquent. Until now, he’d only met them on the field of battle. There they seemed like nothing more than remorseless killing machines. At the moment, Kandler believed Xalt would be shedding tears if he could.
“Call it what you will,” Xalt continued. “Deny that you even have one. But my soul cries out against this injustice.”
Superior slapped a massive, three-fingered hand over its face and shook its head. “Justice is a breather concept,” he said. “It means nothing in the Mournland.”
“It means nothing to you.”
Superior nodded. “In the end, it’s the same thing. If you have a problem with that, you can take it up with Bastard.”
“I could go straight to the Lord of Blades.”
“Let me know when you do. I’d like to add your head to my collection.” Superior turned to the guards standing over the kneeling prisoners.
“Is there a means of appeal?” Deothen asked.
Superior waved the question off. “Don’t let this greaser give you hope. This is your end.”
“Go ahead and kill us,” Kandler said. He wasn’t sure where he was going with this, but he hoped it would buy him and the knights a bit more time. “You warforged are all cowards. We couldn’t expect a fate better than this.”
Superior folded its arms across its chest. “Cowards? Who attacked us out of nowhere? Who invaded our camp?”
“We came to save our friends.”
“By killing us?”
“You killed Levritt. It seems death is the only thing you understand.”
Superior stood as still as a statue then unfolded its arms. “What would you have me do? Release you so we can slay you in the heat of battle? Would that satisfy your breather sense of justice?”
As Kandler shook his head, an idea blossomed. It was crazy, but he didn’t see how he had anything to lose other than the chance to be the first one executed. “I challenge you to a duel, one on one. If you win, you can do with us as you wish. If I win, you let us go.”
Superior stood stock still again. Kandler was unable to read the creature, no matter how he tried. Then the
