So's last time I told you about Rathna the succubus, and how she were supposedly summoned, and all about she ended up in a dark room staring all night at some slob snorin' away.
Well now, I can't really go further in the story without telling you about Derion, otherwise known as the man in the bed, otherwise known as the warlock. Who was in the bed. Sleepin', you know.
Of course, like every warlock except for the brand-new ones, Derion had not begun his career as a warlock. He had been a mage, and a crashin' good one, too! He got awards for his conjured cinnamon rolls two years in a row at the Stormwind City Bake-off and Hog Festival, at least until a few nosy goodwives saw him Evocate and he was barred from all such contests in all the human realms (except Dalaran, where this behavior was a matter of course).
The problem Derion ran into as a mage was the problem of almost. He were almost the best pupil in his classes, he were almost chosen to the Council of the Six in the Kirin Tor, he almost arrived in time to keep Arthas from killing Uther the Lightbringer. After the last, he said "dash it all," though he probably used words worse than what I just said, and spent months in deep study of dark and evil magics—then he emerged as the Alliance's foremost warlock.
He didn't realize it, o'course, but he was a careless, studious kind of handsome. Add that to his formidable reputation and his refusal to join any guild (even a couple o'Horde guilds made serious offers) and it were easy to see why women threw themselves at him. Sometimes literally. (Nydrinde Duskwind, a night elf warrior-princess sort of a girl, once used her Intervene ability on him randomly in Darnassus, figuring that the best first impression was the impression of her body ramming into his. Trust me, it weren't sensual.)
Luckily for him though, our lad Derion had a sense of humor despite his basic "lone wolf" persona. Luckily for everyone else around him too—he once grew so angry at a flag carrier in the Warsong Gulch that he incinerated the hunter himself. (O'course, that actually worked in his favor because the several Horde who witnessed the incident fled screaming, bellowing, shrieking, and inexplicably, clucking. The Horde are strange and wonderous.)
All in all, Derion was a fine prize of a man for someone who gave up turning people into sheep and then running away for the joys of annihilating people by fire, summoning demons, and scaring people so badly they ran around in blind terror (the last was a great party trick, I can tell yas).
It was morning before he woke, late morning at that. He stretched luxuriously, like a panther, and yawned (also like a panther). He hoisted himself into a sitting position on the bed and stretched again. Just as he reached for his robes, he heard an unfamiliar female voice piercing the gloom of the darkened room.
"About time you woke up." Her accent was at once harsh and fluid, is what he thought. And he didn't know what she was, which made him a mite nervous, as you can guess. But the type of man Derion was, well, he always buried his fear under nonchalance and panache. It's why many people feared him: how terrible must the man who never seems scared be?
Anyway, he went through the motions of normal dressing, figuring if she was going to kill him, he would've been dead as he slept, or would be dead soon anyway. He even tied the sash of his robe with a flourish and put on his blackest, shiniest black shiny boots. He threw back the window curtains before turning towards the corner where the voice had come from. And guess who he saw there? Our Rathna!
"And what, if I may ask, is a succubus doing in my room?" Derion inquired, a touch haughty, a touch sarcastic. "Have I offended a fellow warlock, or attracted the attention of the Burning Legion? Or perhaps you're going door-to-door selling flying brooms?"
The succubus (that would be Rathna) reddened. Derion was intrigued; he had never imagined that succubis could blush. "No!" she cried. "You summoned me, and when I got here you were asleep. So I waited for you to wake."
Derion looked her over more carefully. He thought that she was either very stupid, or she considered him very stupid. He decided to tread carefully.
"I didn't summon you. I was sleeping," he told her cautiously. Surprisingly, her eyes began to glisten. Derion squinted at her. Surely she's not going to cry, he thought. You see, a demon crying is like Tyrande marrying Sargeras, or a hunter doing something intelligent. It never happens, and if it does happen, you begin to doubt your senses. Well, demons do cry, but it's from laughter while you writhe in agony. Nevertheless, she did look as if she was about to cry. Derion squelched any instinct he had to comfort her. For Light's sakes, she was a succubus, it weren't like she were a babe in the wood!
"If you didn't summon me, who did?" Rathna choked out. She was beginning to think her people were playing some kind of practical joke on her, and she didn't find it one bit funny.
Derion just looked at her for a moment. She seemed sincere, which only confused him more. "I don't know," he said after a moment. "There aren't any other warlocks in this inn. There aren't any other warlocks in town that I know of. Either you missed the mark big, or something odd is going on." He paused for another moment. Rathna looked absolutely distraught. In order to distract her, he asked the fateful question: "What is your name?"
"Rathna," she replied. And that, my dears, is when everything changed.
