The wind carried voices that weren't wind. The old watchtower, which had stood silent since the war ended, creaked with footsteps. And the well—the deep, stone-lined well at the fort's heart—was humming.
"I'm not a soldier," Elara said.
Lightning split the sky. For an instant, the figure's hat was blown back, and she saw its face—or rather, the lack of one. A smooth, featureless oval of porcelain, with only the faintest impression of features beneath, like a mask not yet finished.
"You've been repairing things for years," it continued. "Clocks. Hearts. But you've never tried to repair what's broken here. What's been screaming in the well since before the first stone was laid."
Elara had lived at Fort Marrok for seven years. She had mapped every tunnel, every hidden cistern, every root-cellar and forgotten magazine. She had never seen that door.
Another flash of lightning. The figure was closer now, though she hadn't seen it move.
The figure tilted its head. Rain ran off its hat in silver curtains.