I was now all alone with Leighara, moderately injured, and absolutely ravenous. This was possibly not my best idea.
I searched desperately for something innocuous to talk about. I hadn't needed to make small talk since before I died. Well technically, I had while infiltrating various settlements, but I had aggressively prepared intricate scripts for those forays. I had stopped myself from planning this trip in the same way, attempting to distance myself from the Eboncloak as much as possible. Given I had been him, that was going to be quite difficult, but I could at least attempt to act differently.
"What did you need to sneak around Ireclaw for?" I asked before she could bring up one of the five hundred things I didn't want to talk about.
She chuckled as she walked across the clearing towards me. Irrationally, I backed up a step before I could stop myself. She looked at me, and raised her hands as if in surrender and continued more slowly. I forced myself to take a small step back towards her as she answered me.
"Oh, that. When I first came to Kalimdor, after," an ominous pause here, "After. I had met Lorn's cousin Kerwyn and idolized her instantly. She was this 8-foot tall, amazingly talented huntress. I told Lorn what I wanted more then anything was to be a hunter like her. He laughed at me, and explained how humans are no good at anything that required stealth or patience." She snorted in amusement. "I was furious with him more a year after that. I barely even spoke to him. And while he was off doing 'druid things' with the Argent Dawn, I worked with Kerwyn on learning the art of hunting. When he came back that summer, I snuck up behind him and landed an arrow right next to his ear. Needless to say rather then admitting I had managed to surprise him, he launched into a speech about 273 rules of bow-safety."
She reached me and crooked one of her arms. The little owl that had been attacking me earlier ghosted down to land on her leather glove. It leaned over and preened her hair, chittering happily.
"This is Riley, I raised him from a chick," She proudly stated, for all the world like she was trying to show off for her big brother again. She tried to offer the owl to me, but he hissed menacingly and I decided not to lose any more skin to him. The owl also seemed happy with this result, and nibbled on the gauntlet until Leia gave him a hunk of raw meat. I tried to pretend I didn't find it appetizing.
"How did you end up with Lorn anyway?" I asked before I could stop myself. It was a foolish question; while I didn't know the particulars, the general situation was going to have to touch on things I had been hoping not to remind her of.
One of the first things Kel'Thuzad had made me do was go after my family. I had fought him tooth and nail, but as his command was backed by the Lich King's voice, I had no choice. It was easier to fight than when Arthas was my King, but I still ended up obeying in the end. My father had sent Leia and Alex away days ago, so he faced me alone armed only with his war hammer and the Holy Light. I remember the fight well, better than I remember anything about my father from when I was alive. I remember his wounded brown eyes, the color mine used to be. I remember being confused and enraged at the sensations this man, the one who had raised me, was giving off. I remember his pleading with me to not do this, to just let the Light back into my heart. I remember how much the Light burned where he struck me.
Most of all I remember when I slid Crimsonrime into the gap between his breastplate and his arm. I remember the shocking feeling of fulfillment and pleasure as he bled out on my blade. His was the first life I had taken in my long service. It had bought Leia and Alex a longer head start, and in fact I lost their trail because of it. It had done nothing for me but cement my damnation. I had given up for a long time after that, a very long time.
Leia looked away from me, but still answered, "I met him after… after father… died," she swallowed and continued, still not meeting my eyes, "Alex and I were given to the Silver Hand, as wards. Since father had served them so well, they felt they owed his children a chance. When they formed the Scarlet Crusade from the, uhh, remains of the Silver Hand, Alex and I both wanted to join, and help destroy the Scourge."
"I can hardly believe Ireclaw would have been involved with the Scarlet Crusade," I said, attempting to steer the conversation away from places I wasn't ready for.
"Oh, no, I met him around fifteen years ago, when I quit that bigoted pack of Light-blinded zealots and joined the Argent Dawn. I ended up being assigned to his patrol, and in retrospect it was love at first sight. I know it sounds silly, but when I met him, I just felt whole for the first time since mother died.
"He was understandably hesitant about my affections, but he agreed that the Plaugelands were no place for an 17-year-old, so he offered to let me live with his family. I was a brat, I'm sure, and he was as stodgy as only a 300 year old trying to deny his attraction can be. After the Kerwyn incident, we bickered every time we were together for more then ten minutes. After 8 years of this, his family had had enough, and just sort of arranged everything. One day we were just ushered to a service at the Moonwell. It was the first time I had seen him speechless," she smiled.
She shook her wrist to release Riley, and offered me her hand. I hesitated, not wanting to take it while I still needed, for lack of a better term, food. Being this injured was more irritating then anything else, but I didn't like to leave gapping holes in my body for several reasons. The primary ones being, of course, plague containment and mobility issues, things like not wanting to be filled with mold were secondary.
Most undead can't heal themselves, but I had learned a few ways it could be done. All of them unfortunately required a store of living power to draw from and I had sworn not to "defile" the forest anymore, so I needed an alternative. I used to carry enough life within me for just this purpose, but since I had left the Scourge, I had stopped feeding from the living. If pressed I could use the energy contained in blood, or if truly desperate, I could harvest pain and fear. Though the latter would be very difficult without my blade.
My sister dropped her hand and looked away, since I had not offered mine in return. I took this opportunity to check my satchel to see if any of the vials Tirion had give me had survived the conflict. I found one of the three still intact. I bent down and retrieved my scroll from the melting snow and crammed it back in my bag.
"Won't you come inside? I have some bandages, and I can get you something to eat," she eventually offered, sounding slightly hurt.
"I would like that," I said, trying to be encouraging. I refrained from correcting her about food. It was unlikely she would have anything that would be useful for me to consume, but I could safely eat more or less anything so I could at least manage to be polite. Mostly, I wanted some privacy to close my wounds, and it would be easier to do so in the house.
"Alright…" she said and led me towards her home. I followed her at my top pace, which was currently something around that of an elderly tortoise. I was missing a lot of my muscles on my left side, and it was taking a lot of willpower to use my leg at all. Leia noticed and slowed her pace to match mine. It took a long time to reach the door, and my sister kept shooting guilty looks at me.
"You shouldn't feel bad, you were just trying to protect your family. And it doesn't really hurt," I said, wanting to reassure her.
She stopped to unlock the door and stared at me in disbelief.
"I could stick my hand all the way into your torso, I can clearly see your tibia, and you're covered in blood. How does that not hurt?" she asked incredulously, and then immediately looked even more ashamed.
"Well, the short answer is I can't really feel physical pain," I replied, leaning against the front of her house for support.
"And the long answer?" she asked, clearly curious.
"I can feel my injuries, but physical damage like this doesn't really register when compared to something like Light-based attacks. Or fire. I feel… discomfort I suppose. But this is mostly just an annoyance because it restricts my movement."
"Wow… It must be nice, not to feel pain."
"I'm in constant pain. It's just not physical pain," I responded resignedly.
"Oh," Leia said in a very small voice and finally opened the door. She gestured for me to precede her inside. I pushed off the wall and carefully stepped into her home. Immediately I felt the luminous blessing of Elune and the brighter blessing of the Light slide over me. I was glad that Leighara and husband had maintained the spiritual protections on their home; they would ensure that if I thought of Arthas while in the house, I would be protected from his mind.
I looked around the main room feeling lost. There was a pair of couches, a table and several small plants and I could see a few doors that led off the main room. Hesitating, I stood just inside the doorway unsure if I should explore further. I was afraid to touch anything since I was still covered in blood, and even the parts of me not bloody were hardly clean. Instinctively, I inhaled deeply, trying to take in the many new scents; the two children stood out in particular. I dimly felt something alive as I heard a growl to my right. I turned to find an irate white wolf.
"Hush Stella," Leia scolded, "Go outside, shoo. Sorry, in all the commotion, I had forgotten she was still in here."
The wolf edged past me, still growling, and fled into the clearing outside the house. Leia pointed at a door in the far wall and said, "That's the bathroom. There's a robe in there you can wear while we try and bind your wounds. I don't care if they don't hurt, I am not going to let my brother limp around my house," she finished in a tone that implied arguing with her would be pointless. I wondered if our mother had also used that tone.
I limped past her into the bathroom and shut the door. If I was going to heal myself, I wanted to do it before she came back. The blessings muted both my hunger and life-sense, so self-control wouldn't be an issue, but I didn't want Leia to have to watch this. Even I felt that the process of growing new healthy flesh only for it to immediately die was a perversion.
I quickly stripped off the remains of my clothing leaving me in only my underwear, which was happily only mildly bloody. I recovered the vial I had found earlier and uncorked it. The tantalizing smell of blood wafted out and filled the tiny room. I poured some of Tirion's blood into my left hand and carefully placed the vial on the edge of the sink.
I reached down and with my right hand drew a crimson border around the ragged tear in my leg. Once I finished, I dug around in it to remove the remaining arrow pieces. I stood and repeated the process around the hole in my chest and the remains of my left shoulder. Picking the vial back up, I brought it to my face and savored its bouquet. I greedily drank the remaining liquid and called the runes of dark mending to my mind: Shadow's Healing, Twilight's Embrace and Blood Mending. I felt the start of the healing as the door beside me opened.
I ignored Leia's indrawn breath as I concentrated on the runes needed to knit my flesh back together. Slowly I felt the healing cease and I looked down at myself. The wounds had mostly closed, but they were still noticeably oozing. I turned to hide my face from my sister as I licked the last of the paladin's blood from my left hand. I managed to restrain myself from sucking the last few drops off my fingers, though I failed at suppressing a shudder of pleasure as the healing resumed. After the tingling stopped I washed the last of the blood off my hands in the sink and put the empty vial with the arrow shards. Much of the blood near the injuries had been reabsorbed so I was fairly clean. Well, cleaner anyway.
"I didn't know the Scour… umm, undead could heal," she awkwardly finished.
"Most of them can't," I admitted, "The Light is hard to wield if you aren't alive, and the nature-based healing is completely impossible. To heal without using the Holy Light requires either a fair mastery of runecraft, or uhh…" I trailed off, unwilling to finish the sentence. Any undead could heal if they consumed enough living flesh. That was why Forsaken cuisine featured rot and insects so heavily; they were the most socially acceptable way to consume living tissues. Well, and salad, but that seemed unlikely to catch on among the Horde.
I turned to face Leia and found myself staring up into her eyes. The green leaf tattoos around them perfectly matched their shade. She had washed off the blood that had been smeared on her face after she had hugged me. Hesitantly I raised one hand and traced the air over the bold lines of her markings. Emboldened, Leia reached out to brush the rune drawn over my right eye.
"When did you get this?" she asked, her fingers skimming the purple and black twisting design.
"When my… When Arthas started sending me out farther and farther from his influence on missions, I noticed I had regained some of my independence. He also began to watch me less and less as I stopped fighting him. I waited, and when I hadn't been able to feel him watching me for days I tattooed the rune onto my face," I hesitated but continued, "It means to see clearly. On that base I built a construct that basically means 'perceptions free of the influence of others.' It helped weaken his hold on me. Slightly anyways."
"And these?" she asked, gesturing to the silvery runes on my chest.
"Those are various runes of Light-working."
"I thought they looked familiar… Father had that one engraved on his mace," she pointed at the one traced on the scar over my heart.
"Yes. At'leiash, Light's Protection." As I said its name, the rune shone with the Holy Light. "I etched those after Highlord Fordring freed me. They help… ground me."
"Twenty years gone, and you still look practically like you did when you were 18," she sighed and pulled me into another hug.
"Funny, I don't remember my hair being this blue then," I tried to joke while forcing myself to return the hug. It still felt uncomfortable to touch her, but it was less unsettling than the first time.
She pushed away from me, but kept her hands on my shoulders. I watched her study me, comparing me to how I used to be. She was right, I hadn't grown since I died; this was hardly surprising. Not even my hair had really grown, though when it was cut or removed it eventually returned to this length. My hair had been the same dark brown as my father's, but death had turned it, my skin and my eyes varying shades of blue or grey. My eyes were the most different from before; they were the same eyes that the Lich King had, that all the Scourge had. They glowed the brilliant icy blue of a winter sky.
"No, your hair was more brownish. I remember you looked a lot like father looked…" she eventually said. She turned around and tossed me the robe that had been on the back of the door, revealing the mirror behind it.
"You should finish cleaning up, then put this on. I'll go make us some lunch," she finished and shut the door behind her, leaving me alone my reflection.