Forsaken - Part One - My Brother's Keeper

Yvette Brack was a monster. She knew it already, had known the moment she'd stood in front the Lich King and felt her mind crumple readily to his will. With her own hand she'd killed her brother, remorseless and unfeeling, and then just as quickly as she'd been thrown into the war machine, she found herself spat back out again.

Returned to her own will. A second time. Twice now, she'd been a shambling servant of the Lich King. There was great emptiness inside of her, something that could no longer hope to be filled in. That she kept on at all baffled even her at times, when her own people snarled at her and whispered cruelties that she couldn't... no, she could imagine them, now. She knew they could never enact such things. But she could.

She had great power, now. Terrible power. It welled up from the blackest corners of the nether, seeping easily through the tattered, pathetic remnant of her soul, and she wielded it with cruel efficiency. Antoine had found that out first hand as she'd buried her sword into his flesh.

Sometimes, she imagined she would run into him, also a Death Knight, able to understand what it was to be a conscious monstrosity. To be an embodiment of what everyone loathed. She was more hated than the Dark Lady's Majordomo, and that was saying a great deal.

At the same time, she was glad he'd finally reached some sort of peace. He'd always been sad that he'd never have a family, that Yvette wouldn't. Antoine had been a far too gentle a person for war.

Nobody wanted to believe that she was no longer under Scourge control, not even other Forsaken. What she represented made any sane person disgusted. Even children cowered in her wake. Innocents were the finest judges of character. They ought to be afraid. She was a murderer. A monster.

She stooped in front the marker of her brothers grave and laid a rose on it. Yvette was certain she ought to feel some sort of shame or remorse that the delicate flower had withered in her grasp, but she felt nothing. There was no body beneath the earth here. She did not care to imagine what had been done with it.

Twice-damned, she was, and gunning for a third shot. She'd head to Northrend soon, to fulfill her oath and destroy the Lich King for what he'd done to her. Twice.

What she could feel was anger. Deep, gnawing, furious anger that made the edges of her vision haze red. These were the only things she could muster now. Rage. Hatred. The desire to inflict pain. She could focus it, now. It had been honed to a razor sharp edge, and she continued to whet it against the Scourge.

"I will avenge us both or die trying," she told her brother, running the sharp, bony points of her fingers against Antoine's headstone, "Perhaps when we meet again, beyond, you will forgive me."

It was just Edgar's luck that he'd been stuck on Death Knight duty. Not that there were any rosy assignments in Northrend, of course, but that he got to keep tabs on the creepy bitch was hardly near the top of the list of things he'd hoped he'd be selected for. He was a loyal soldier, had been since he'd been freed from the Scourge, and he'd do his duty as he'd been ordered too.

That she seemed disinclined to even idly chat was a blessing and a curse. He couldn't imagine anything a Death Knight wanted to chat about was pleasant, but the grim silence was oppressive none the less.

They sat across from each other on the zeppelin, the rest of the passengers sitting well away from her. Her posture reminded him a bit of a broken doll, the exposed joints in her elbows propped on her armored thighs, fingers dangling between, twitching. Her shoulders were hunched, as was her spine, and her gaze had been fixed firmly on the floorboards the entire time.

Though most Forsaken had eyes that emitted a soft amber glow, hers glowed a bright blue. It filled the passenger hold with an eerie, unsettling light. Her presence, in fact, had seen the entire trip in silence. There had been some muttering at first, whispered snatches of conversation, but her presence seemed to suck the life out of the very air.

Maybe they were all just imagining it, but Edgar had a feeling it wasn't terribly far from the truth. Any spot she'd stood on long enough, the grass withered, the ground cracked. They were Forsaken, but she was truly damned.

They were to help the effort at Vengeance Landing. Sylvanas wanted a base of operations secured in Northrend, and she was well on her way to accomplishing the task. How much it had cost her to pay off the goblins for this particular trip... Edgar was willing to be bet he'd never see that amount of gold in his lifetime.

Yvette barely moved, shifting her head up slightly and making Edgar tense. Their eyes met through her limp hair and Edgar felt like all the saliva in his mouth dried up... what was left of it, anyway.

"We're under attack," she said quietly.

"What-"

Edgar was thrown back against the wall as the zeppelin listed violently. He braced himself for Yvette to land on him, noting how everyone else had been thrown against the wall in a jumble of curses and limbs, but she caught herself on her hands and knees deftly, just to his right. She'd anticipated the attack, after all. Somehow.

"Did you set us up?" he demanded of her through the shouting of the crew and passengers. The zeppelin shuddered and the shrieking of gargoyles reached his ears. Whatever passed for blood froze in his veins at the sound.

"No," Yvette said. Edgar didn't like to exaggerate, but her complete calm as the zeppelin lurched in the air was creepy. She'd hardly even moved, either, while he'd slipped around and struggled like a fish out of water.

"Scourge!" a goblin voice shrieked above deck.

"Shit," Edgar said, struggling for his sword. Yvette put a hand on his wrist, her grip stronger than he'd thought possible, and freezing to boot, "What are you-!"

"Don't," she said, digging her fingers into the wooden hull, "Not yet."

Yvette was watching the others struggle for their own weapons, and when the zeppelin jolted again, she released Edgar's wrist and grasped his shoulder before releasing him. The Death Knight dug both hands in, looking down to supervise jamming her sharpened toe bones into the wood as well.

"Hang on," she suggested. Edgar flicked a look at the other passengers. One of them managed to lurch upright, fighting against gravity as it flipped them around madly, and grabbed for the door that led to the deck. Despite the wild movements the zeppelin was making, he didn't at all understand why Yvette was acting as though they were going down.

There were heavily armed, well trained guards on the zeppelin, and the goblins were resourceful creatures even at their worst. Why would she assume they'd need to hang on for dear life? And why was it she was advising only him? They weren't the only passengers aboard!

His thoughts were cut short when it felt like a rug had been pulled out from under him, and he scratched frantically for purchase on the hard walls. Something had punctured the balloon. They were going down, but for the moment, he was going up.

The icy grip of the Death Knight jolted him as it closed around an arm again, and Yvette yanked him forcefully back towards her. His head bounced against the hull with a solid thud, and everything went black.

When Edgar woke again, it was with a startled gasp, and he sat up, flailing his arms a little. The cold he'd felt on his arm seemed to have spread to his entire body. His clothes were wet. His sword was missing. Hells, his shoes were missing.

And a short distance away sat Yvette, almost in the exact same position as she had been on the zeppelin. This time, however, the sword she carried with her was out, and while one arm still dangled off her thigh, her other hand was draped on the crossbar of her weapon. She'd shoved it point first into the snow, ice crystals forming along the blade.

She looked at him, silent, perhaps waiting for him to speak first.

"What happened? Where are we?" Edgar muttered, checking himself over. He touched his head gingerly, wincing. Had she meant to knock him out?

"Northrend," Yvette said. He felt as though her eyes were peeling him apart layer by layer, searching for any meaty bits that might still be good. It was an uncomfortable feeling and he cleared his throat, nervous.

"What happened?" he repeated, trying to wring out his clothes. It was the worst where the armor pressed the cloth in tighter – he couldn't freeze to death, but he could still feel things. He noticed then that she hadn't even attempted to dry off. Her hair had frozen into spiky chunks, and even her armor seemed to have a thin sheet of ice covering it.

"We were attacked by the Scourge."

"Damn it, Death Knight, I know all of that," Edgar said, tone hot. He regretted it instantly and looked away, still able to feel her eyes on him. It was the only expressive thing she had left, really – her 'face' was little more than a skull with rags of skin clinging to it, devoid of a nose to wrinkle or lips to purse. In a way, it was as though she were constantly grinning, and that did nothing to set him at ease.

"They were looking for something," she said, finally moving her eyes off of him and down at the snow covered ground, "Me, I think. I do not think the others survived."

"Why would they be looking for you?" Edgar demanded, "And how did you know they were coming?"

"I could hear them," she said. He was beginning to note, with growing frustration, that she was only answering one question at a time.

"How could you? I thought you weren't part of the Scourge anymore," he frowned, standing up and brushing off ice and snow. Some part of his brain insisted he was too cold, and he wrapped his arms around himself and shivered. Edgar still listened to these desperate little directions from his brain. Some Forsaken hated to be reminded of their humanity, but others, like himself, didn't mind it.

"You could hear them, too, Lieutenant Jerrik, if you listened," Yvette replied, "The same magic that made you, that made me, has made them."

"Even if I could, why would I want-"

"You don't," Yvette interrupted, "That is why you did not hear."

Edgar didn't find her answers the least bit reassuring.

"Why was I spared?" he asked, looking around. They were a ways inland but still in plain view of the ocean. There was no sign of the wreckage.

"I spared you," Yvette said.

"Why? Need a snack for later?" Edgar asked with a slight sneer. He felt cowardly for lashing out at her, but really, she wasn't doing anything to allay his nerves.

"You can tell them that I was not responsible for the attack. Not involved," she said, looking up at him again.

"So, what, I'm your alibi?"

"Yes," Yvette said. She drummed her fingers idly on her sword, the dull clinking sound all but swallowed up by the featureless expanse surrounding them.

"We shouldn't be out in the open like this," Edgar said after another painfully long silence, "Especially if they're looking for you."

She sat up slowly, the thin film of ice that had hardened on her cracking and crumbling off. Yvette looked up at the grey clouds crowding the blue sky a moment before standing. Despite the obvious heft of her blade, she held the long hilt with one hand as though it weighed nothing.

Edgar tried to shake off the feeling of cold and looked around, turning in a half circle somewhat uselessly. He really hadn't the first clue where they were, or what direction they ought to head in. The Undercity would likely assume them dead. Why waste the resources on a search party? He was kidding himself if he thought he was irreplaceable, and the Dark Lady herself had been eager to get Yvette out of the city. Sylvanas was more sympathetic than most, at least in Yvette's case, but the Death Knight was an unsettling reminder to everyone of the Lich King's vast power. Their was something primal and raw about her, something untamed and barely controlled.

"Where should we go?" Edgar said. He shrugged his shoulders and looked to Yvette, wishing silently that he didn't have too. It was sinking in slowly that he was stuck with a Death Knight for the foreseeable future... however long that was.

Yvette didn't answer in words, and instead pointed off into the distance. At the edge of the rocky, snow covered plain there was a line of snow laden trees. It looked no more welcoming than any other place, but it was a direction.

"What's over there?" he asked her, hesitant even as she began to trudge in the direction she'd pointed. At least she didn't expect him to lead the way.

"Trees," Yvette said.

Edgar blinked and followed, tempted to smirk. Part of him insisted that she wasn't joking, however. Whatever or whoever Yvette had been, she was something else entirely now. She'd been stripped of her life twice and there wasn't much left over. Could her sense of humor have survived both ordeals?

Yvette wasn't terribly concerned with what Edgar thought of her or the situation. The truth of the matter was quite clear. They were stranded on Northrend, just the two of them, and they would have to find some way to amend the situation.

Lieutenant Edgar Jerrik had likely been given the assignment as her babysitter because of his subdued manner. He seemed disinclined to aggression unless the situation called for it, and he had a healthy fear of her. That was good. He'd do what she said if they got into anymore unpleasant situations.

He was slightly more well preserved than most Forsaken, though the heavy hood he wore told her that his hair hadn't fared well. Part of him still clung to his human instincts, something she herself absently wished she still had. There was nothing left of her that was human anymore. Nothing to make her shiver, or grimace, or grumble about the cold.

The whisper of the Scourge was strong here. It had been a low murmur on Azeroth at best, much of it background noise stirred up by the Forsaken. Here, though, the Scourge seemed to sing loudly, the terrifying gestalt echoing off the mountains.

It repulsed her, just as the idea of even hearing it repulsed Edgar. On the basest of levels the idea of it made what little skin she had left want to slough off. She wanted to claw at the sides of her face and shriek and snarl, anything to get rid of the seductive, hissing whisper. Such things would do no good, however, and she pushed past the encroaching madness. She had a task to accomplish.

As they trudged, occasionally Edgar would ask her something inane. He was afraid and wanted to make her seem more personable, but she remained silent to confound his efforts. He ought to be afraid. They were in very real danger here and some foolish (and false) sense of security would do him no favors.

It made him angry that she wouldn't talk to him. Angry, and more afraid, it seemed, because he quickened his pace slightly, nearly walking right next to her, and he kept looking up.

He began to check himself over in more detail when it was clear she wouldn't converse with him. No shoes, much of his armor missing, no weapon... he was at the mercy of this place. At her mercy.

A metallic glint caught her eye and she actually turned her head as he fidgeted with a gold ring. It was a simple band, nothing fancy, but it was in very good condition, untarnished despite its perch on a dead man. He looked relieved to see it. Somehow, in the struggle before, it had stayed on while his boots had not.

Yvette felt a tiny gnawing of curiosity. Was it some token from his previous life, or was there some Forsaken woman as deluded as he was? She realized she was staring when he met her gaze, and he cleared his throat awkwardly. It was a silly gesture, in her opinion – as if he produced enough saliva to clog his throat anymore.

She waited as he waited for her to ask about it, and when it was obvious she wasn't going to make the first move, Edgar sighed. Yvette found it passingly amusing that he was so desperate for conversation he'd continue to put up with what must have seemed to be infuriatingly poor social skills.

"I'm married," he said, "Her name is Anne. She's in the Royal Deathguard."

"She outranks you," Yvette observed, the barest thread of amusement in her hollow voice.

"She does," Edgar said fondly. His expression was conflicted. He obviously had great affection for the woman, but at the same time, he was questioning if he'd ever see her again.

Yvette lapsed into silence. Edgar wanted to talk about her, how they met, why they were married even in undeath, but she wasn't interested anymore. Things like that would only stir her to bitter anger, a stark reminder of her own profound losses. It also served to remind her that she no longer felt sorrow – only rage and the need to cause suffering. Edgar would be able to clear her name when they returned to the fold, and so she needed him to be on her side. Tearing him to bits wouldn't do her any good.

"Miss Brack, I would appreciate it if you'd at least communicate to me what we're doing," Edgar sighed, "The obvious aside, I mean. I know we're walking towards trees."

A slight shrug caused an irritable sigh to crawl from Edgar's throat. His nerves were already frayed, and she was only pushing him closer and closer to some sort of outburst. It warred with his fear of her, fear of how she might respond to being chastised, and she hoped it came to a head soon. Once they'd gotten past that, perhaps he would be a bit more useful.

"Do you hear any Scourge?" he asked her nervously.

"Yes."

Instead of replying he ducked slightly, looking around frantically and tossing looks to her when he could.

"Where!?"

"That way," Yvette said. She pointed off towards the mountains.

"Damn it," Edgar muttered, adding in a louder voice, "Any near us?"

"No," Yvette said.

"Do you think you're funny?" he asked her. She hadn't slowed her relentless pace towards the trees, and he occasionally had to rush forward a few steps to keep up.

"No."

"Quit with the clever shit, then," Edgar said uneasily, "This is bad enough without smart ass remarks from a mon-"

He stopped himself a half a second before Yvette was suddenly in front of him, her face uncomfortably close to his. Everything seemed to stop then. She could taste his fear as it swelled off of him in waves. Even though her head only came up to his shoulder, it was as though she was towering over him. How easy it would be, to dismember him, to gnaw on his rotten flesh. She could feel the snap of his bones in her teeth, feel his sludgy Forsaken blood dribbling down her chin. It would be so easy, it had already happened in her mind.

Yvette tilted her head slightly, shifting some of her scraggly hair out of her face with one finger. It was a vestigial gesture, a habit that had survived despite her dehumanizing ordeals. Once, many lifetimes ago, she had glorious hair that often fell into her eyes.

Push your hair away, Yvette. Let me see your pretty eyes!

"Please don't kill me," Edgar squeaked. It was very unbecoming, his groveling, "I didn't mean..."

"You did," Yvette told him. If he was still human, she mused idly, he would have soiled himself by now. He hadn't moved an inch, even though she hadn't so much as raised her voice, let alone her weapon. Everything inside of her ached to slaughter him. His marriage was nothing but a pathetic sham, after all, and he was only a few steps up from being a rankless grunt in the grand scheme of things.

But I need him, she reasoned with herself, tilting her head the other way. Yvette took one step back from him, noting how his posture stiffened even more.

"Don't speak again," Yvette said. Edgar nodded frantically as she turned without another word and continued towards the trees.

He was right, of course. She was a monster.

That didn't mean she liked to hear about it.

The silence continued, and the sun was sinking low by the time they reached the treeline. Edgar had been on edge the entire time, certain that Yvette would turn on him at any moment and crush him like a flea. She hadn't yet, anyway, and he was starting to hope that perhaps she'd let his insult slide entirely.

It wasn't as though he'd been gunning to start an argument with her. He still felt like her behavior wasn't quite appropriate given their dire situation. He'd just... well. He'd been stupid. Anne would have slapped him in the back of the head. Anne. He had to seen Anne again. They'd barely had time for goodbyes before he'd been shipped off.

Lost in thought, he nearly walked into Yvette when she abruptly stopped, glad they had a great deal of room to maneuver. He merely sidestepped her, as though he was trying to get a look at... whatever she was doing. Staring off into the distance, it seemed.

"What is it?" he asked, unable to help himself. In the dwindling light, her eyes cast an eerie blue glow on the snow and the trees.

Yvette made a hissing noise, and it took Edgar a moment to realize that it was the sound of lipless shushing. He shivered in spite of himself.

At first he couldn't hear anything. Trees rustling in the wind. The distant howl of wind through narrow crevices.

Crying.

Edgar looked at Yvette in alarm and strained to listen harder, pulling his hood back. He still had hair, but the rather prominent bald spot that dominated the top of his head was embarrassing, so he kept it covered up. Even without his hood, though, he couldn't focus on the sound. In life, he'd been a bit embarrassed by how bushy and hairy he'd been. In death, he hid the damned bald spot to avoid hearing jokes about it.

When Yvette started to sniff through the ragged holes that marked where a nose once protruded, he felt his skin crawl.

He opened his mouth to speak but thought better of it, flipping his hood back up and tucking his bushy sideburns back in just to pass time. Eventually, Yvette headed off to the right, following the scent of... something young. Probably a baby, though it could have been a small child. Who would leave such a defenseless thing out in the freezing cold??

The crying grew louder the closer they drew, and they found a clearing that seemed to emerge abruptly in the middle of the sparse forest. There were fresh tracks, and Yvette seemed more interested in the clearing itself than the squirming baby. It was a little girl, an ice troll, and she hadn't even been left in a blanket. She'd been placed on a crude stone altar, and as he rushed over to it, he saw that someone had written crudely on her pale blue skin in blood.

Edgar's brow creased and he took off his hood again, tearing it from where it attached to his tunic. Hurriedly, he picked the baby up and wrapped her, pulling her close to his chest even though he felt it was a useless gesture. It wasn't as though he had much body heat to offer her.

She continued to scream unhappily, and he turned to look at the rest of the clearing, cradling the infant and shushing her absently. The trees were decorated with grisly, foreboding fetishes, carvings and skulls. This was obviously a place of some importance.

Yvette stood from inspecting some tracks and turned to look at Edgar. What was left of her brows knit together and she pointed to the altar.

"Put that back," she said, "It's not yours."

"Of course she's not," Edgar protested, glancing down at the baby. She was between screams, sucking in air to belt out another. How long had she been at it? "We can't just leave her out here."

"You have no idea what you're disrupting," Yvette said.

"Do you know?" Edgar asked.

"No."

"I'm not leaving a baby in the cold," he insisted. He was a bit disturbed that Yvette was even considering it.

"It's an ice troll. It will be fine," Yvette said, pointing towards the altar again.

"No baby is 'fine' in Northrend as far as I'm concerned," Edgar said.

"How will you feed it? We have a long way to go. Leave it on the altar. If it's parents return and find their baby missing, I do not imagine we will enjoy the results," Yvette said.

Edgar grimaced and looked down at the baby. She looked up at him miserably, gumming her fingers, and he couldn't help but think she was pleading with him somehow. Carefully, he brushed a bony hand against her scalp, pushing off what seemed to be dried blood. By the Dark Lady, she was a newborn baby.

She grabbed one of the skeletal digits and tried to put it in her mouth.

"No, no," Edgar cooed gently, "You don't want to eat that."

The little troll renewed her wailing.

"We can't leave her," Edgar insisted, scowling at Yvette, "Do you honestly think even a troll would leave a newborn baby out in the wilderness if they wanted it?"

"Trolls are very strange creatures. It's possible," Yvette said. She seemed disinclined to change her opinion, "You can't feed it or look after it. You're only drawing out its death. And that noise she is making will make traveling much more dangerous."

"She's scared," Edgar protested.

"Hungry and scared," Yvette agreed, stepping closer, threatening. She was obviously losing patience. Edgar almost didn't have time to react when the Death Knight grabbed the shrieking infant from his arms.

"No-!"

"We don't have time for this foolishness," Yvette hissed, glancing down at the suddenly silent troll.

The baby was staring at Yvette, her ice blue eyes wide, as though... fixated, or fascinated, or something. Perhaps it was fear. Yvette stared back, tilting her head, the two studying each other in a grimly comical fashion.

Edgar thought it looked like Yvette was considering the best way to eat the baby whole. The infant was dangling mid air, Yvette gripping the remnants of Edgar's hood to avoid actually touching the child. Her other hand clutched her runeblade. Seeing such a thing would be any parent's worst nightmare. Except, perhaps, this little one's parents.

Yvette jammed her sword into the earth and took the child with both hands, being overly cautious, he noted, not to touch the baby's skin. She began to examine the troll closely, turning her over in a way that made Edgar cringe. Something about the Death Knight kept the child hushed, however, when any other baby would likely scream in protest to the treatment.

"Hold her feet still," Yvette said abruptly, "Look at her left ankle."

Finding the request bizarre, Edgar hesitated a moment before complying, crouching down and gently taking hold of the tiny ankle. He blinked and leaned a bit closer before looking up at Yvette.

"She's got a tattoo," he said.

"Tattoo or birthmark?" Yvette promptly, flinching her head back as the baby reached out to touch her face.

Edgar ran a finger over the very detailed, dark blue image that seemed to be a crude skull fetish. If it was a tattoo... well... the baby was so young, there was no way it wouldn't be at least bleeding or irritated. Trolls didn't heal that fast. But birthmarks didn't look like that. Maybe in ridiculous legends they did.

"It's too well formed to be a birthmark," Edgar insisted.

"What is it?"

"Some sort of skull," Edgar frowned.

"I- we need to leave," Yvette shoved the baby at him roughly, pulling her sword out of the earth with both hands.

"Yvette, what-"

He couldn't help but yelp when she gripped his upper arm to hurry him along, not prepared for the searing cold. She made the chilly surroundings seem like high noon in Tanaris, but it was certainly enough to get him moving.

One moment she'd been eager to leave the baby to freeze to death, and now, suddenly, they needed to rush off? He couldn't hear anything out of the ordinary.

Edgar looked over his shoulder just in time to see hands. Troll hands coming out of the frozen earth. He stumbled and only just managed to catch himself, squeezing the baby close to him and startling her into crying again.

"What the f-"

"Keep going," Yvette told him, turning around, "I'll find you after."

"Yvette!"

He stopped when she did, feeling a bit like he was in one of those dreams where no matter how fast he ran, he wouldn't get anywhere. Edgar didn't have the slightest idea of where he was, or where a safe place to go would be, or-

Her cold blue eyes fixated on him and Edgar swallowed hard. There was guttural snarling in Zandalari not far from where they stood.

"Go," she hissed. He was disturbed to note that the bark of the trees she was standing near began to blacken and curl. Edgar backed away a few steps, turned, and ran as fast and as far as he could manage.

The baby eventually grew tired of wailing by the time night had fallen. It became even colder then, the air harsh on even his resilient lungs, and he staggered to a stop in the hollow of a large tree. As soon as he stopped moving he realized how completely exhausted he was. Edgar sat down heavily and sighed down at the troll baby. She looked back at him, miserable.

"Sorry," he apologized to her quietly. Not that she understood, but he couldn't just say nothing. She was hungry, and shivering, and he couldn't do anything to amend either situation. His own joints felt stiff from the cold, and he'd been hungry even before the zeppelin accident.

It felt like it had happened years ago, as if he'd been trudging through the deep snow of Northrend for all his life. What had he been thinking, really, trying to save some abandoned troll baby? Anne would sigh and shake her head.

Edgar, you have more heart than sense, she'd say wearily. But then she'd smile at him. Even though death had stolen much of her beauty, there was enough left to take his breath away. How she must've looked when she was alive!

The baby eventually drowsed, falling into a fitful sleep. Though he fought valiantly to stay awake, straining to listen for troll voices or the ominous crunch of Yvette's boots on the snow, Edgar nodded off as well.

Yvette didn't need sleep. When she was still Forsaken, still at least partly human, she'd slept. She had even dream, the subject usually scraps of her old life. Yvette had always liked dreaming. It wasn't always happy things, but it was something human. Something alive.

But she no longer slept.

The ghoulish trolls that had risen from the ground had been ancient, decrepit, and had taken only moments to hack down. They'd been more dust and bones than meat, quite a disappointment in light of the hunger gnawing at her. She'd attend to that soon, before she returned to Edgar and the infant troll.

She'd been annoyed by his overwrought sentimentality, taking the screaming child from the altar and cradling like it was his own. As if they had time to indulge the remnants of his paternal instincts!

Then she'd felt the odd tingling of power after noting the footprints, the fetishes and wards all facing into the clearing. It was meant to keep something in, all of the wards and bones. She, more than anyone, understood binding magic. The amount of power it had taken to keep her already shredded soul trapped inside her equally battered and mangled body had been beyond comprehension.

Something just as powerful had been at work in that clearing, but far more ancient and malignant than the Lich King. And it wasn't even awake. It was barely aware, perhaps operating on some sort of dire instinct. The troll remains had obviously been meant to kill herself and Edgar for attempting to make off with the baby, an idle attempt from something vast and unimaginable, something hardly even aware of its own actions.

The baby troll was some sort of omen, some sort of harbinger. Yvette imagined her parents, terrified of bringing some sort of death omen into their tribe while the Scourge pressed in on them, had quickly disposed of her.

Anything that could rattle her soul, however, had the potential to be quite useful. The Lich King would pay for what he'd done to her and her brother, and she would use any means necessary.

Something wanted the baby to live, and she had no qualms making a pact with whatever that thing was. What did she have to lose?

Edgar would continue to prove himself useful, in any event. He could play nursemaid for the infant as well as clear her name. If leaving Northrend was really in her best interest, however, was now unclear. It couldn't have been entirely an accident, them finding the child. If there was more in store, they would discover it as they made their way back to Vengeance Landing.

The hapless Forsaken had nearly called her a monster. As she idly snapped the neck of a deer she'd snared in ice, having found herself something to sate her hunger on, Yvette wondered if she'd been too quick to silence him.

She didn't find Edgar and the infant until dawn, mildly annoyed at how easy his trail was to follow. It looked as though he plowed through the woods in a blind panic and then slumped in a hollowed out tree trunk without even bothering to cover his tracks. Yvette imagined her assessment wasn't even the slightest bit far from the truth.

Crouching in the jagged entrance to their hidey-hole, Yvette watched them sleep. Edgar had slumped down, his chin touching his chest, and the baby was curled up close to his head, one stubby hand resting on his face.

Yvette was certain she ought to have felt something, watching a baby troll sleep peacefully on a reanimated corpse, but ever since the clearing she'd felt nothing but impatience. She wanted to keep moving. If they continued on to the fjord, they might find some domesticated animals. They would have too soon – trolls were resilient creatures, but a newborn baby, even one that may have some tenuous connection to the Old Gods, needed sustenance.

Something made Edgar stir and he groaned quietly, putting a hand to his face. One eye opened and he started, the abrupt movement causing the baby to fuss grumpily.

He rubbed her back with one hand and eyed Yvette warily, idly brushing ice out of his hair.

"I guess things went in your favor," he said quietly. His eyes flicked over her nervously, noting the dark, rusty stains on her pallid flesh and bones. Edgar especially noticed the stains on her mouth and how they seemed to trail down her chin, disappearing beneath her breastplate.

"Well enough," Yvette nodded, content to let him think she'd fought off some terrible foe and then eaten it. The baby started to warm up to squalling and Edgar did his best to avert disaster by shushing the baby, bouncing it, coddling it... but none of that helped abate her hunger, and he looked somewhat helplessly at Yvette.

"She's starving," he said, clearly not game to address the source of the gore she was covered in.

"We'll be in vrykul territory soon," Yvette said, glancing over her shoulder, "Perhaps taunka, though I do not think they will help us."

"Why would the vrykul be more willing than the taunka?" he frowned, thinking hard to the intelligence he'd read, "I thought the taunka were our allies-"

"I am clearly no longer Forsaken," Yvette cut him off, "It will be far easier to deceive the vrykul into thinking we are Scourge than to convince superstitious cows that I am of the Horde. Yes?"

Edgar looked uneasy and glanced down at the troll instead of answering, brushing snow off of her even as she wailed. He didn't like the idea of pretending to be Scourge, and Yvette didn't have much confidence in him pulling it off, but it was a better chance than him being able to talk a taunka chieftain that she wasn't Scourge.

"We could at least try the taunka," he said, worry plain on his face, "They might be more understanding of..."

"Of two shambling corpses with a baby troll?" Yvette said pointedly. Edgar grimaced, and to her amusement, she thought she saw a hint of insult on his face. He considered himself something more than just an animated shell. How quaint.

"No one in this stump is a well-loved creature," Yvette reminded him coolly, "We will deal with whatever we come too, but whatever happens, we must get it some food today, yes?"

"Her," Edgar corrected mutinously.

"Its gender is of little consequence," Yvette said, standing and stepping away from the tree so Edgar could get out.

He did so carefully, trying not to jar the baby much, even though she'd hardly notice in the midst of her screaming. If anything, a hunting party would find them long before they got close enough to even think of making off with a goat.

"You shouldn't get so attached," she warned, "When we return to the Horde, I do not imagine you will be allowed to keep her. What sort of future would two Forsaken soldiers offer a troll?"

Edgar looked rather wounded by the question and said nothing. Yvette imagined he'd already thought of a name and how he would convince his wife to take the infant in. Had she cared enough to be more than irritated, she would have sighed at his desperation. Of all the Forsaken to have in her company, she had one of the few who still had a majority of their soul intact. Many embraced their affliction, however grudgingly, but Edgar seemed stubbornly stuck in the mindset that he was still mostly human. By the end of their journey, however long it took, she expected he'd have that stripped from him. It would be for the best.

After a long silence, Yvette turned and led them further along into the wilderness.

Edgar didn't remember much from his life before the plague. He'd looked into it when he could, going through old records, investigating anything that had a twinge of familiarity, but he'd come up empty handed. It had upset him at first, but as the years wore on, it mattered less. When he'd met Anne, it had ceased to concern him at all. Making a new life was an adequate means to replace the one he'd lost.

She couldn't remember her old life either. Most Forsaken couldn't, but Anne had made an effort to avoid finding out. Anne had reasoned that it was pointless – whoever she'd been was dead. Who she was now had her own set of experiences to identify with.

He admired Anne's pragmatism and courage, and often boggled at why she had become smitten with him in the first place. Not that he would ever complain, but oftentimes he felt like her exact opposite.

Had he been a father when he was alive? It pained him to think that might be true, but it was difficult to reconcile his powerful need to protect the tiny troll any other way. He had been compelled the moment he'd seen her wriggling on the stone altar, instincts welling up inside of him that he hadn't even been aware he possessed. Maybe he'd been a lucky uncle. The eldest in a large family.

The little troll – Tegan, he'd decided to call her for now – was worrying him greatly. It was nearly nightfall again, and she'd ceased her desperate wailing around noon. Even ice trolls needed some warmth, and he was ill-suited to providing it to her. She needed a warm meal and to be swaddled in furs, not the scratchy material he'd used to cover his head for purely aesthetic reasons.

Edgar kept an eye out for animals, wondering if Yvette's presence somehow drove them away. He was beginning to feel the weight of her words from yesterday – his intervention was only prolonging Tegan's suffering right now.

Yvette hadn't protested the infant since yesterday either, however. There had been a sudden turning point when she'd shifted from attempting to leave the child behind to sending him off with her. It hadn't been spoken of again, and with the infant quieting, he wondered if it would be best if he didn't address the issue at all.

Edgar himself was beginning to feel some unpleasant hunger pangs. How much longer would he last? The cold was making his joints ache painfully, and he didn't know how much harder he could push himself before he started losing his less resilient extremities. Without boots, his toes were first in line.

Without head cover, the remnants of his ears would likely be second. Maybe. His bushy hair might shield them enough.

Absorbed in his own thoughts and with Tegan, he almost didn't notice when they broke free of the tree line. What startled him out of his thoughts was the color green. They weren't upon it yet, but it was in the distance. As were buildings of architecture he couldn't recognize. They weren't ruins, but at the same time they seemed to be popping out of an ancient text. Even the smoke curling up from within the... village? Even that didn't seem quite real.

"Vrykul," Yvette said, her first words in nearly a day. Edgar came to stand beside her and nodded, wishing he could read something off her blank face. Was she nervous? Optimistic? Was she even capable of feeling those things?

"How do you know they won't just kill us on sight?" Edgar fretted, "From the reports I've read-"

"They are allies of the Lich King," Yvette said. He was shocked to hear disgust plain in her voice – it was the first real emotion he'd heard from her, "I will be able to fool them."

"And what about myself and Teg- myself and the baby?" he said, quickly correcting himself. Yvette had caught it, of course, but seemed disinclined to pursue it.

"You are my servant, and the child is a ward of the Scourge."

Edgar grimaced, "Ward of the Scourge? That's far too convoluted. Nobody would buy that."

"When they see the mark on her ankle they won't question it," Yvette said.

"What does the mark mean?"

Yvette went silent and Edgar glanced down at the troll. What had the poor thing been born into?

"Pretend you're mute," Yvette suggested, "You won't understand anything they're saying anyway."

"What's your plan?" Edgar asked. More silence. His brow furrowed, "Yvette-"

She cut him off by trudging forward and he sighed. Even yesterday he would have protested and insisted she tell him what was going on, but he felt a sort of heavy despair and resignation settling into his bones. Did it really matter what her plan was? If he was going to live, if Tegan was, he'd just have to trust her. Trust a Death Knight who hadn't even bothered to wipe the gore from some troll meal off of her face.

Edgar looked down at the increasingly sluggish bundle clutched close to his chest and hoped that whatever dark purpose she'd been born into at least protected her from harm. He had no such hopes for himself – perhaps he looked ragged enough to be a servant, but Yvette's plan seemed flimsy and reckless. What if they didn't believe her? She couldn't hope to take on an entire village of vrykul. She couldn't be that powerful.

Tegan wasn't his. Not even in some remote sense. She was a troll, an ice troll, left in the wilderness to die for reasons unknown to him. Just because he'd taken it upon himself to attempt to protect her didn't mean he had any claim to her. If they survived the vrykul and made it across the fjord and back to the coast, she'd join the ranks of the many orphans Orgrimmar. Perhaps she'd be taken in by a troll family – the Darkspear's seemed loathe to let any race but their own rear their children.

In spite of all of that, he still felt obligated to do his best for her. Nobody else would.