Vol'jin: Shadows of the Horde

7

A storm blew in from the south, with howling winds, dark clouds, and snow flying sideways so hard it stung the flesh. The blizzard hit very fast. Vol’jin had awakened to sunshine, but before he had finished his chores—in this case dusting the tops of shelves in which many ancient scrolls were kept—the temperature dropped, the air darkened, and the storm shrieked as if the monastery were under assault by demons.

Vol’jin knew little enough about blizzards that he didn’t panic. Senior monks combed through the monastery, bringing everyone together in the massive dining hall. Everyone went to their mess area. Being taller than anyone else, Vol’jin could easily see the monks counting heads. It occurred to him that such a savage storm might blind someone and confuse him. To be lost in the storm would be to die in it.

To his shame, Vol’jin did not notice what Chen pointed out even before the head count was completed. “Tyrathan’s not here.”

Vol’jin glanced toward the mountaintop. “He wouldn’t head out when a storm gonna be blowing up big like this.”

Taran Zhu stood on a raised dais. “There is a hollow where he often stops to rest. It faces north and is sheltered. He never would have known the storm was coming. Master Stormstout, you will fill a cask with your Get Well brew. First and second houses will organize themselves to search.”

Vol’jin lifted his head. “What you be having me do?”

“Return to your chores, Vol’jin.” There was no “jian” in Taran Zhu’s use of his name. “There is nothing for you to do.”

“That storm will be killing him.”

“It will kill you, too. Faster than it will him.” The elder pandaren clapped his paws once and his charges scattered. “You know little of snowstorms like this. Shatter stone you might, but the storm will shatter you. It will suck out your warmth and your strength. We would carry you back here before we ever found him.”

“I cannot be standing by…”

“. . . and do nothing? Good, then I shall give you a task, a question to contemplate.” The pandaren’s nostrils flared, but his voice remained even and unemotional. “Is it to save the man that you wish to act, or to preserve your self-conception as hero? I expect much dusting to be done before you have reached the truth.”

Fury roared through Vol’jin’s soul, but he did not give it voice. The master monk had hit the truth twice, perfectly on target like the archers under his command. The storm would kill Vol’jin. It might even kill him were he fully healthy. A tolerance for cold had never been much in demand among the Darkspear trolls.

More important, and the shot that sunk home the deepest, was Taran Zhu’s reading of why Vol’jin wished to be part of the rescue. It was less out of concern for Tyrathan Khort’s welfare than it was for himself. He did not want to be sidelined when danger demanded action. That spoke of weakness, which he did not want to acknowledge. And were he able to rescue Tyrathan, then Vol’jin and his condition would be ascendant over that of the man. The man had witnessed his weakness, and this rankled.

As he returned to his dusting, Vol’jin realized that he felt beholden to the man, and this did not sit well with him. Trolls and men had never been true to each other except through hatred. Vol’jin had killed more men than he cared to count. The way Tyrathan had studied him said the hunter had killed his share of trolls. They had been born enemies. Even here, the pandaren kept them because they were so opposite that they balanced each other.

And yet, what have I been having from this man but kindness? Part of Vol’jin wanted to dismiss that as weakness. It was supplication based in fear. Tyrathan hoped that when Vol’jin was well, he would not kill the man. While it was easy to imagine this was true, and countless were the trolls who would believe it as if it were a message delivered by the loa, Vol’jin could not accept it. Tyrathan might have been tasked with his care, but the kindness with the tunic, that was not a servant fulfilling a duty.

It was more. It deserves respect.

Vol’jin had finished the high shelves and begun the lowest before the search parties returned. Excited voices suggested they’d been successful. At the noon meal, Vol’jin looked for Tyrathan first, then Chen and Taran Zhu. When he failed to see them, he looked for the healers. He saw one or two but for only as long as it took them to grab some food and disappear again.

The storm’s occupation of the mountain meant a grim dark day, the end of which was heralded by greater darkness and more cold. As monks gathered for the evening meal, a young female monk found him and brought him back to the infirmary. Chen and Taran Zhu awaited him, neither looking happy.

Tyrathan Khort lay in bed, his flesh gray yet with sweat dappling his brows. Several thick blankets covered him to the throat. He thrashed against them, but so weakly they imprisoned him. Sympathy flashed through Vol’jin.

The monastery’s lord pointed at Vol’jin. “There is a task you will perform. If you do not do it, he shall die. And before an ignoble thought can root itself in your mind, I tell you this: if you refuse, surely you shall die. Not by my action or by that of any of the monks here. Because that thing you shattered beyond the stone will be allowed back into your soul, and it will kill you.”

Vol’jin dropped to a knee and watched Tyrathan’s face. Fear, hatred, shame—these emotions and more passed over his features. “He sleeps. He dreams. What can I do?”

“It is not what you can do, troll; it is what you must do.” Taran Zhu exhaled slowly. “Away from here, to the south and the east, there is a temple. It is one of many in Pandaria, but it and its companions are special. At each the emperor Shaohao, in his wisdom, trapped one of the sha. The sha are of a similar nature to your loa. They embody aspects of intelligent nature—the darker ones. At the Temple of the Jade Serpent the emperor trapped the Sha of Doubt.”

Vol’jin frowned. “There be no spirit of doubt.”

“No? Then what was it you destroyed with that punch?” Taran Zhu gathered his paws at the small of his back. “You have doubt; we all have doubts, and the sha uses them. It makes them resonate within, paralyzing us, killing the soul. We, the Shado-pan, are trained, as you now understand, to deal with the sha. Unfortunately, Tyrathan Khort encountered them before he was prepared.”

Vol’jin stood again. “What can I be doing? What must I be doing?”

“You are of his world. You understand it.” Taran Zhu nodded to Chen. “Master Stormstout has prepared a draught from our apothecary. We call it memory wine. Both you and the man will drink, and then you will be guided into his dreams. As the loa sometimes work through you, so you shall work through him. You have destroyed doubt, Vol’jin, but doubt still infects him. You must find it and drive it out.”

The troll’s eyes narrowed. “You cannot?”

“If I could, do you not think I would do it rather than entrust it to someone who is barely a novitiate?”

Vol’jin bowed his head. “Of course.”

“One caution for you, troll. Understand that what you see and experience is not reality. It is his memory of what happened. Were you to speak with every survivor of that battle, none would tell the same tale. Do not strive to understand his memories. Find his doubt and uproot it.”

“I be knowin’ what to do.”

The female monk and Chen dragged over another bed, but Vol’jin waved it away. He stretched out on the stone floor next to Tyrathan. “Better to remember I be a troll.”

He accepted the wooden bowl from Chen’s paw. The dark liquid tasted greasy and stung as if laced with nettles. It soured quickly on the tongue save where the tannic bite numbed him. He swallowed twice to get the memory wine all down, then lay back and closed his eyes.

He projected his senses as he would when reaching out to the loa, but found the landscape distinctly Pandaren—all green and warm gray, though flecks of snow flashed through it. Taran Zhu stood there, a silent ghost. His right paw pointed toward a dark cave. Pandaren footprints also pointed the way but stopped at the stone mouth.

Vol’jin twisted sideways and ducked to get through. The stone walls squeezed. For a heartbeat he feared he wouldn’t make it. Then, with what felt like a tearing of his flesh, he made it.

And almost screamed.

He looked out at the world through Tyrathan Khort’s eyes and found it too bright and too green. He raised a hand to shield his eyes. Surprise raced through him. The arms were too short, the body broader and yet weaker. He could take only tiny steps. Everywhere he looked, men and women, wearing the blue tabards trimmed in gold of Stormwind, sharpened weapons and adjusted armor while jinyu conscripts gaped in awe.

A young soldier appeared in front of him and saluted. “The war leader requests your presence on the hill, sir.”

“Thank you.” Vol’jin rode along with the memory, getting used to the sensation of being in a human body. Tyrathan wore his bow over his back. A quiver slapped against his right thigh. A few bits of mail rustled, but otherwise leather encased him. He’d taken every part from beasts he’d killed. He’d tanned it and sewn it, trusting in nothing others had prepared.

Vol’jin smiled, for he recognized that sentiment.

Tyrathan ran up the hill easily—leaving Vol’jin little doubt why he enjoyed time on the mountain here. He stopped before a massive hulk of a man with a thick beard. The war leader’s armor gleamed blindingly, and the white of his tabard had no hints of blood.

“You asked to see me, sir?”

The man, Bolten Vanyst, pointed to the valley below. “That’s our objective. The Serpent’s Heart. Seems peaceful enough, but I know better than to trust that. I’ve culled a dozen skirmishers from my force—the best of the hunters. I want you to scout and report. I won’t have us ambushed.”

“Understood, sir.” Tyrathan saluted smartly. “You’ll have my report in an hour, two at most.”

“Three if it’s complete.” The war leader dismissed him with a salute.

Tyrathan sped off and Vol’jin cataloged every sensation. As they descended a rocky hill trail, the troll noticed the leaps that the man refused. He sought a sense of doubt in those choices but instead found confidence. Tyrathan knew himself well, and to make those leaps, which would not have concerned a troll, would snap a leg or twist an ankle.

The sheer fragility of being human surprised Vol’jin. He’d always rejoiced in it. It made breaking them so very easy, but now it made him wonder about them. They knew death could come quickly, yet they fought and explored and showed no lack of courage. It was as if mortality was so well-known a companion that they could embrace it easily.

As Tyrathan arrived amid a squad of twelve hunters like himself, Vol’jin noticed that the man had no companion animal with him. The others did, marking their travels throughout the world. Raptors and turtles, giant spiders and bloodseeker bats—the humans chose their companions through a logic that escaped Vol’jin.

With concise hand signals, Tyrathan gave his soldiers their orders, then split them into small groups. Just as he splits the cubes in jihui. His own group he took around to the south, to the farthest objective. They moved quickly and quietly—equal in stealth to the velvet-footed pandaren monks. Tyrathan had an arrow nocked but not yet drawn.

When the scream came from the west, the reality of things changed. Vol’jin would have been lost save that he understood battle and how it shifted perception. Time slowed as he watched disaster unfold; then it sprinted as disaster erupted. It would take forever to watch an arrow fly toward a friend and yet only an instant for her life to pump out in a great crimson spurt.

Where there had been no enemies, now a legion beset his people. Odd spirit creatures raced among them, touching, rending, ripping shrieks from them before opening those same throats. Companion animals roared and snarled, biting and clawing, only to be swarmed over and ripped apart.

And Tyrathan, for his part, tried to remain calm. He loosed arrow after arrow with smooth, strong draws. Oh, da monks, they would be so shamed were he to touch a bow. Vol’jin did not doubt that Tyrathan could shoot so quickly and accurately that he could split a monk’s arrow before it ever hit the target, and then drive its head straight through.

Then a woman went down. Dark haired and sleek like the cat accompanying her. Tyrathan shouted, darted toward her. He sped arrows at the sha attacking her. He killed one, then a second, but a stone rolled beneath his foot. He missed the third.

From his vantage point, Vol’jin knew that shot would not have mattered. She stared at the both of them with glassy eyes in a red mask. Blood spurted, her tabard drinking it all in. If there was anything to be remembered at all of her death, it was the way her hand lay easily on her dead companion’s broad head.

Tyrathan went down to a knee; then something hit him hard in the flank. His bow flew from his hand as he sailed through the air. He smashed into a stone serpent, hitting just below his left hip. The leg snapped, arcing argent agony through him. He bounced once, then rolled to a stop. He faced the dead woman.

If not for me, you would be alive.

There it was, the root of doubt. Vol’jin looked down and caught a black thread stuck to a thorn. It pierced him once, just missing his heart, then burst out his back. It came around again, poised like a viper to strike once more.

But Vol’jin reached out with a spirit hand and caught it beneath the thorn as he might grab a snake. With the caress of a thumb, he decapitated it, then reached down and broke off the longer thread.

The middle section slithered quickly and deep into Tyrathan. It wrapped tight round his heart and began to squeeze. The man’s body tightened, his back bowed, but the broken thread could not squeeze hard enough. It twisted down and away, threading itself into his spine, and rode his pain up into his brain.

There it struck and wrung from the man a soul-rending howl. Vol’jin’s image of Tyrathan vanished like a reflection swallowed in a vortex. All light drained into a black hole, and then silver suffering burst back out, shocking man and troll alike.

Vol’jin jerked, face wet with sweat, his hands searching his body for wounds. He grabbed his thigh, feeling the pain of its breaking fade. He gasped, then looked at Tyrathan.

Hints of color had returned to the man’s flesh. He breathed more easily. He no longer struggled beneath the blankets.

Vol’jin studied him. Still so weak and far more frail than the troll could have imagined before walking in his skin, the man had steel in him that would allow him to recover. Part of Vol’jin hated that, since he recognized it as a trait that many humans shared. It was trouble for trolls. And yet, at the same time, he admired it because of the spirit it took to fight hard against death.

The troll looked up at Lord Taran Zhu. “Some escaped me. I be not able to get it all.”

“You got enough.” The pandaren monk nodded solemnly. “And for now, that will have to suffice.”