Chapter 2: Little Disasters
T'was nothing under the Archbishop's desk.
Naught but spiders, dust bunnies and... whatever THAT was, willed Rindy Cartrimer. Gingerly she recoiled from the questionable spoil, chin on knees, shins hugged and meditated on impossible and invisible. The young rogue contemplated consequence if indeed the Archbishop found current duties best served sat at his desk: T'was a dire speculation of alarm, bootheels, bloody indignation, violence... nothing good. The inevitable rush of beefy guards and she with but her tiny dagger would at best elicit gruff laughter and new memorial stains on the already well-storied flagstone. Sudden humiliation and certain death proved a more positive of her suppositions. She'd entertained some predictions that were downright fuggin' lachrymose while in rodent heed to the silk wrinkle varicose translucence and toenail jaundice sandaled just inches beyond her hidey-hole. Unawares and but a gray whisker away the aged priest searched with a mumble of utter desperation… for what Rindy could guess not. The Archbishop wouldn't want for anything she'd yet possessed: She'd planned carefully. She'd worked delicately and rarely left a trace. She'd yet to actually steal anything.
She silently chanted a rogue mantra: Eyes down, tempt nigh the knack in your prey. Stealth was skill beyond petty magick and trickery and the palpable could be maintained undetectable with discipline and practice. Ponder naught t'ain't now. Breathe… breathe shallow, hyperventilation was an easy slip on the fight or flight slide.
T'ain't nothin' here, m'lord, she urged. T'ain't I here 'cause I CANNAE be here.
There were many reasons an amatuer theif couldn't exist in the Cathedral of Light: T'was guarded jealous in the heart of the human capital. T'was midday, a weekday and a bank holiday with the cranky Cathedral Staff on highest formal vigilance amidst the pius clatter of pilgrim soles. The visitor devout were politely corralled and tightly accounted-for, relegated to restrictive tours from The Grand Entrance to the cathedral's Sacredest Mortal Works beheld for a metered preponderance and then modestly shuffled on through to Ye Olde Gift Shoppe. The sanctuary Exit had been known to abruptly contact posteriors in departure. The well-groomed courtyards near the busy canalway arch were scrutinized by obvious and non-obvious security measures. Renowned nigh impregnable, only foolish sinners would strive to subterfuge such the stalwart sentinel stewardship secured so with steel and sanctity as was Stormwind's Cathedral of Light.
Rindy and her uncelebrated gang of cohorts were just the fools to sin such.
Of course the gutter knew the drain, she'd figured. Her fellow conspirators were low among the filthy and castaway with little visible means of support-which meant Rindy could afford them. They were as untrustworthy as echoes in an avalanche zone which meant Rindy knew exactly where she stood. But the rumors had proved right: The ragamuffin street clan had a rare-and to Rindy invaluable-knowledge of prewar sewers under the Cathedral of Light used (naturally) as intended and too for occasional shelter from those less weatherly of storms.
She could rely on her surly dwarf escort to secure the vulnerable canalway sewer entrance until she emerged victorious... or the hubbub announced that she wouldn't. She could also trust the pair to slit her throat when most profitable and convenient. Luckily Rindy was aware of a very specific supply and demand at the somewhat unlikely confluence of underworld powers related to her mission. The knowledge promised a faint chance for success with preservative quantities of her lifeblood and guts still internally arranged. She liked the odds-
The priest putted a hopeful grunt, moved quickly to his left and reached low.
Rindy gritted back fawn compulsion, pale gripped the hilt pressed on the drumroll under her breast and evoked a few handy deities with a zeal unwont-albeit silently and a tad hypocritically. Faith lay nae among her strongest points and that suited the current task just fine; Operation God Squad wasn't by any means a blessed endeavour. Thievery from the clergy (even to expose conspiracy at highest levels) didn't tend to go over well with true believers.
Master Shaw had shared her zeal for the mission-without a visible enthusiasm for Rindy's participation, any reasonable expectation of her success… or clear permission for her to proceed. Well read was she on the art of plausible deniability, so she'd winked and admitted that she perfectly understood his evasiveness. Mathias' palm to forehead gesture had been professionally authentic, his eye-roll flawless. With a practiced patience he'd politely repeated his request for two sugars and skimmed cream and tsked her away with a fatherly disdain. (A veritable good-to-go for any able spy, she reflected.) Rindy's REAL father actually did disdain a hundred times better but she'd only buy HIM coffee to throw it in his smug gnome face.
She'd hiked her metaphorical pitards and ducked into the bricked keep of bloop stew and stench and steeled for a long slog. Her spine crept from the very tangible twin dwarvish glares of murder at her back and a supposition of divine disdain doubtless imagined. Muck up, leg stuck down and think of naught but the smell of roses, knee deep rinse and repeat for thirty or so yards in the heavily used sewer. The four pounds of rubber suit was soon a reservoir of sweat she'd convinced herself was but a mass exchange. When she'd passed from sight of her partners-and hence any connection to the outside world-she'd somewhat relaxed and half-recalled a poem she'd heard somewhere once;
Dinnae be ye afraid,
If y'all alone.
T'is how ye started,
T'is how we gotta go.
She'd idly pondered on the nature of cathedral sewerage. T'was there a degree of benediction? If a priest's touch was blessed... surely t'was holy sh-
Hold. Freeze. Oh thrice damn. Stop the daydreams wee rogue, she fraught smaller, silenter. Sucked in a reserve of breath she didn't have. Mere inches away the priest had squatted in worried search of lower shelves and passed an impressive clap of flatulence. Hectic withered paws patted and tipped shelf contents, had grown more frantic in his quest. The slightest turn of his holiness's head would've had him nose-to-whisker faced by the tetraplegic saucer of the junior rogue hidden in his deskwell.
Best nae linger. She complimented herself on her near perfect stealth-maintained until she'd cracked her skull against desktop in the sudden dive for cover. That she'd not shat herself when the heavy door banged opened ahead of his most unexpected return was commendable and would have certainly negated the thrice-damned sweaty oversuit and booties. The priest was concentrated on the crowded bookcase and he'd shown no obvious mind to intruders. Aye, a close thing, she considered. His Holiness's apparently grand mood was evidenced as he'd whistled old tunes with an uncharacteristic spring in his hurried approach and for this Rindy had near religious gratitude. She'd also appreciated that 'Fortune Our Glory Be in Her' featured a high pitched middle-eight and the Archbishop's rendition was faithful. She'd heard his whistle mere moments before his otherwise disastrous return to his chambers.
An ebb in her fear of discovery filled with new humors-confidence, energy. Stay calm, she decided. Nose wrinkled, fuggin' priests diet was rich, she decided.
"Amen!" the priest cried. He rose with impossible swiftness and a stamp of sandal.
Rindy blenched and her skull smacked diffident oak. She bit her knuckle until she tasted blood, gnashed on the rip of thunder in her head. Her hair stuck to the desktop underside as she grimly coiled to lash out.
The Archbishop wavered, paused, stood confused or suspicious while Rindy balled around her dagger. But the fogie wheezed and steadied himself-in compensation after an unwisely rapid uprightness. A breath, two, and he'd regained some composure and staggered away, bestowed a benedictory kiss on the ornate box of chocolates he'd reclaimed. With halitosis shine and nigh further hesitation he whisked around his desk in a swish of vestments. He held the gift of sweets in gnarled reverence to lead his flight, loath in his haste to close the door. His sinewy hoot of 'Mine T'is a Bounty of Glory' and rhythmic slap of sandals faded into the granite distance.
The young rogue gasped a lifespan and slumped. She gingerly patted her second contusion in as many minutes, winced and gently tugged strands of her hair from the underdesk goo. She twisted up and nosed over the desk, blinked through the clutter at the ajar doorway for another few breaths.
She reassured herself: The priest's behavior supposed success to a certain shapely young cohort-employed coincident and in recent by Rindy-to proffer an unsavory itinerance on the rumored propensities of that very clergybeing. There'd been some concern that the Archbishop had grown pius in the wake of unwholesome public accusations and thence would prove resistant to such wicked worldly temptation. But the rogue had known better. She'd assured her comely co-conspirator that she knew the hopeless pervert in any crowd. And she'd, naturally, been right.
She'd not anticipated the priest's audacity to include subsidy and an unplanned return to his chambers… but things could have gone worse. Had she been caught… or forced to sap unconscious a religious icon in his very own inner sanctum? The hypothetical outrage might see some luckless waif swung from the 'Valley gallows, starved in dungeon murk or simply bagged and weighted for discreet natatory disposal. She didn't linger because the luckless waif bore remarkable resemblance to Rindy Cartrimer. Her fingers dabbed at her head for blood and she credited a lack thereof on the dwarf aspect of her thick skull.
And her thoughts were of dwarvish prose; Rejoice l'il snoop! Holy-roller off to get viced. Ye rogue be nae herebouts afore ye can say 'gettafugout.' A predator confidence curved her lips, Mother's language always lifted her spirits. Rindy flipped a half-hearted salute to prosperity and squirmed out of her hidey hole, whacked her head a third time in the awkward gymnastics of exit but refused further fret. Amen.
Tips and toes across the chamber, palmed and sheathed her dagger. She shouldered against the heavy door, winced at the bone on slate of aged hinges. Lamp flame twitched on the moment draft and agitated the shadows. She paused breathless. Big eyes on everything, she padded back to the desk wary of traps possibly activated by the closure. Satisfied of her precaution she took in the desktop chaos with a glance.
And groaned. The clergy appeared to appreciate professional-grade clutter almost as much as private time with nubile parishioners. She cracked her knuckles, dove in and rifled the mess at her best speed. Documents flashed under her fingers; A grocery list. Orders of Merit. A menu from Thunderbrew's hearth. Some rude art obviously confiscated from lowbrow riffraff. Tobacco (which found a new home in her purse.) Soiled earplugs from the Deeprun.
More Crap. Junk. Garbage. Moot.
Her digits nimbled for hard edges, tested the pull of each drawer with feather tugs. A sudden shark lurch, she flipped a scribbled mass schedule and exposed a silver lockbox exactly as described in the mission brief. She plucked her best lockpick from a braided sideburn and leant down with tongue-trapped focus. A twinge of lilliputian torque, butterfly snick of tiny tumblers and the lid prized opened, held fast on a clever friction brace when pushed full upright.
Inside a gilded journal binder also as expected. Clamshelled, the golden facade unmasked a ring-bound stack of tattered parchment. She fanned the pages with a dance of fingers, denoted certain marks of authenticity just as she'd been instructed. Her gnomish observance absorbed fragments despite a fugacious inspection; "Cleef blood..." "...preserved the faith…" "...of our nobel race." "Sinclair implicated..." "With Great reward and risk to..." "...most generously compensated..." Blah, blah and blah-hokie-fuggin-blah, she scoffed.
Bad Guys, she considered, always kept the best books. T'was ultimately because no one actually considered themselves The Bad Guys. The important folk fully expected praise for their actions or ideals in a future braced with the nobility of hindsight and higher states of logic. Loyalist scribes oft archived their evil little dissuaded by petty contemporary morals.
Hum, she lifted a brow. Seemed to be right about half the time, she admitted. The aged journal was doubtless an epic of betrayal and bravery and Rindy couldn't care less. From her tunic she withdrew the doppelganger binder, discretely borrowed from Mathias immediately after he'd refused to approve the mission. Side-by-side the two were far from perfect dupes. Her sabre-hard gnomish thumbnail jabbed at the original's binder metal, felt just the right give and left smallish indent in solid fuggin' gold. The worthless replacement left to satiate cursory inspections and the real binder emancipated-a prize of tattered papers to placate a sceptical boss and the shiny stuff to soothe her unsavory partners. Sure... the EXACT letter of her mission called for journal and binder delivered intact but she had her own expenses to consider-not to mention her delicate skin-and the real boon was doubtless in the juicy gossip. Mathias would live with the mild disappointment. He'd readily admitted he'd had vast experience with such.
Villainy complete, she released the catch, set the strongbox carefully closed again and slid the schedule parchment back into perfect place. Wiggled her shoulders as she slipped the prize into the clever pouch stitched in her tunic under the left breast. Job done, t'was suddenly high time to be on her insidious way. She'd vaulted the desk in a single padded leap and began to evoke stealth.
She froze. Her brows furrowed and she belayed the spell. Confused, she scanned up a crowded bookcase and centered on the top shelf. Amidst the flimflam of bovine devotion shined a polished onyx statuette. The slender figurine was of partially robed (naturally) elvish femininity, delicate arms outstretched under a splay of slim digits skyward and a gaunt regality midnight rapt to celestial wonders alas undepicted. To Rindy the object glowered back with a glaucous radiance that ghosted when she closed her eyes. An energy cut to her very paralytic depths and left her beguiled and helpless to the moment. She sneered, t'was her thrice-damned head magick triggered... again. Fug li'l ole me.
Rindy shed the trance with a shake of her head. She pivoted on a heel and cast breathless survey back about the office. No… no… and her gaze locked on an epitrachelion draped on an ugly chair shoved forlorn against the wall. The stole was sun-bleached and partly obscured by moldy vestments and thus displayed some neglect-assumed to persist with absence, she hoped. T'was the best she could do.
She snatched the stole, snapped a cloud of mites into the light, spun and stepped up to the bookcase. A hop up to clamp fingertips on the highest shelf she could reach. She winced as hardwood and aged fasteners creaked under her weight as she climbed and held up when the next rung complained a tad too much. Close enough. She'd wound the stole over her hand because her business gloves were fingerless. A strain and reach… she'd barely touched the statuette. Again she jerked and made a solid contact with the second try.
The effigy rocked, teetered... tumbled and Rindy checked the fall with a breathless juggle amidst a squall of dust. She further dared her grip to crook the statue under her arm in a rush, jammed the freed knuckle to her septum and barely stifled a sneeze. A blink to dismiss the fuzz from her vision and she reaffirmed her hold. She crammed the bundle into the free right-side pocket, stole and all and moved her shoulders to secure the object.
Rindy had dared not touch flesh to the statue-not to any object she detected with her head magick. Her historical reactions to direct contact had proven acute and unpredictable. Had she indulged, Rindy might as well summoned the local deacon and curled up for a nap on the desk. Naked-yeah THAT had occurred too, she recalled sourly. Privacy and security were absolute prerequisites to sooth her touchy-feely-magick-mystery compulsions. The holy hornets' nest was not the place and mid-burglary was definitely not the time.
She released her vice and dropped to the balls of her feet, stooped and owled for sounds of the worst. Satiated, she slipped the door and again the thunderclap of hinge rattled her soul. She tipped a furtive gander into the hall: Empty.
Breath in. Her thick fists came together under her chin and she concentrated. Gear and flesh shimmered, shed all color. A moment made chalk and charcoal and she'd vanished into full rogue stealth. Undetectable, invisible to naught but the sharpest of sense or magick. In theory. Breath out.
She shed all lethal compunction to hunker or haste and took up the unhurried cadence of a practiced clandestine transit in retrograde. Ahead, a lifelong of creep through busy, bright halls to a storeroom with her discreet sewer exit. Again she'd don the sweaty foulness of the rubber suit and booties. Slink to escape in an acrid subterrain eternity to where her escape terminated (perhaps not the best word) with a lethal scallywag escort in wait.
She'd already eked a kernel of strategy for murderous dwarves and irascible gangmates. Thought positively, she'd well hatch a plan before the tunnel ended. Some sharp persuasion, a little evasion and speedy griffon abscondence and she'd be tavern-sat and on the prowl for that callow tripod hunk who DESERVED her company for the night. She could already taste the ale on his breath.
T'was necessarily therapeutic; A girl couldn't possibly subsist on thrill and coin alone and stay clear-minded. And-who knew?-there might not always be that firm bed, roof and hearth at the end of the… sewer. She kept well abreast of her loftiest dreams, t'was a big world with much to do and see. Her species-whichever proved dominant-reliably offered at least two centuries to roam wide and do stuff. Rindy was still short of a second decade alive but she'd seen age sap her Mom and Da-
She winced with sudden dread recollection of her Mom and Dad's imminent return home. The parental wrath would be acute and unavoidable once reported was her truancy from the expensive school, seen were the constabulary citations, heard of was the justifiable neighborly outrage and detected was the inevitable damage and theft of household goods associated with her entertainment of questionable acquaintances. Rindy decided she might just grow to appreciate the fuggin' sewer.
Concentrate, she chided, best ye served as a tiny spot of nothing for a while, t'ain't ye here, t'ain't ye there, ye a rogue on a mission. She stepped into the hallway and began her long sneak to solicitude. In a wake of ghostly departure the Archbishop's office was left emptier than one might've reasonably expected.
The beaten warrior returned alone from the storm.
Whitewashed and transmountain wind beaten he'd staggered off the griff from Menethil Harbor with an oath on his lips and anger in his heart. He'd cursed first the witless beast that, on the last leg of a long journey, had blithely flown through the heart of dismal winter welcome. Cursed too that the infamous climate rarely offered a sublime reception. Be it damp, snowbound, icy, raw, frigid, gelid, bitter or any delightful combination thereof Dun Morogh weather was typically a critical impact on the constitution. The native dwarves had seventy insipid words for cold. They'd formed fourteen terms for frostbite and had no less than thirty-six types of ale prescribed specifically to combat inevitable winter depression-said depression described by twenty phrases in the Greater Dwarvish.
Gnomish too had appropriate terms the warrior wouldn't dare repeat in any civilized company. Though no sane being might honestly describe the subterrain city of Ironforge as civilized, at least warm and terminal could be accurately applied and that mattered a tad.
The surly tempest had spat griffon and gnome rider nearly upon the city wall. The winged bitch had curled and careened blind through the ice-caked Skygate with inches to spare. She'd flared every possible feather of drag once inside over the Great Forge and still orbited twice before slowed to land with any modicum of dignity. At the roost the 'Griff Master had thoughtfully hired extra hands to chisel arrivals from their saddles.
Once on stable ground the warrior had clobbered the imbecile griffon with his frozen gauntlet. His departure was an indignant push through the crowds as the Griffon Master raged and threatened to his back. He was again inundated, then by the fugues of the bloated Ironforge population. Despite a famous dwarf bluster the city was acutely crowded as her citizens had sought business indoors from a latest blizzard. Sadly, fifteen minutes walked from the Great Forge proved an anticlimactic highlight of the warrior's four 'griff, two boat and three day 'strider-ride journey from Kalimdor to his long-unglimpsed front door.
He'd shut out the clash of boulevard, slammed the bolt home. Blank, he'd silently shed a mismatch of tattered expediency and desperation at the foyer. Sighed: T'was days short of a full year since he'd last been on this landing.
He'd not departed so alone or uncelebrated. A year marked as all but wasted he feared. He caressed tension from the neckline to furrowed brow of his bald scalp. He stood blind and dumb among discarded equipment, dulled on his household. A year squandered: His edge allayed. Falters in sight of goals. Lives wasted. He'd been detained, nearly exposed and all but broken.
His house: Expensive furniture, gaudy nicknacks, his thrice-damned possessions stared back. The pricey suite with the sophisticated kitchen, multiple bedrooms balconied to the Grand Avenue in upscale Third Tier Ironforge. The pointless prestige that taunted his sanity. T'was a temple of torture he'd maintained, this thrice-damned tidy little hole. He'd not kept image snaps on the walls as so many fools did-and just as well; He didn't think he could stomach HER thrice-damned gaze at the moment or her judgement and ghost. His frown twitched as he realized the haunted abode but a vapor too... HE'D not called a place home since the Fall of Gnomeregan. The costs, impact on his reputation... he'd never overcome the-
Stop.
He tucked in his composure and the emotion retreated far behind his big eyes, compressed to a spark and extinguished. His own face peered back from between cloaks on the mirror set on the rack wall. "You're not a bad man," he assured himself. He adjusted the dirty collar and picked at a foreign tangle on his pitch goatee.
He'd never doubted lives would be lost. One cultivated external relationships to secure resources. Resources were to be consumed when results justified means. Results bespoke of well-placed ambitions. Ambition for his theories demanded sacrifice. Sacrifice required calculation and likely some atonement. Two loyal people had perished in bloody Dire Maul, his mate and the guild leader-he'd pronounce them heroes. Two more guildies were somehow lost on an expedited journey home-best attributed to be well-intentioned klutzes. Two more hadn't returned from an admittedly impulsive quest for revenge-chalk them up among the victims of betrayal.
MOST of his folk had returned intact over a week prior.
His guildmates would expect sentiment and he'd make the right noises for soft hearts, console the loved ones. The warrior could frown and shed tears, grovel and whine, eulogize and lambaste on demand with little effort. He'd sure emphasize the betrayal, the apathy of others that led to such losses. Name names. Vengeful mourners, seekers of truth and legacy and angry kin made for quite the motivated recruits-even when emotion imperilled individual judgement. Folk just thought like that, he reminded himself. Lives were wasted because the rewards didn't QUITE justify the costs. Alas vendetta was easily steered. With his theories eventually proven a few casualties would be inconsequential. Bought for duty, anger or greed lives on Azeroth were cheap.
The beaten warrior's grin was vague. He'd returned battered and empty-handed but FAR better informed than he'd departed. The data uncovered exposed an echo, just a pulse in the complex tissue but promise of a vital crux, a central point that controlled all. He'd just need follow the vein of evidence to the heart of the matter. For the rest, Binoff Cartrimer had long ago learned to wield-and twist-the blade.
He blinked out of his insipid reflections. He'd absently wandered into the great room and sat the family table, elbow rested on the satchel at his hip. A quick glance over his shoulder verified that he'd organized and pegged his ragged equipment, ritual of another life. Spell broken, he unfastened his buckle, wrapped the scabbard in his belt and tossed the entire filthy affair on the trestle. The metal clanked, scratched finish and scattered clumps of filth on the fine surface. He ducked the strap from his shoulder and held the frayed canvas ruck up. His head tilted in predatory confusion at the satchel. His mate's pack... and with the owner dead in Dire Maul t'was his last vestige of... her. Yes, he should feel something.
And Binoff did: He felt tired, pissed and frustrated. A tad worried. He wanted a bath. He released the strap. The shapeless mass clunked down next to the other pauper debris. He closed out the room for a few moments, rested his head, started slightly from the tingle of stubble on on his palm. A sneer in recollection of four days rode from Auberdine, flea-circus tavern charm with the rurals, rangers and rubes of western Kalimdor. He'd bartered or abandoned all but the most essential of things enroute for the smallest of comforts. He'd spent days seasick and saddlesore. He'd accepted four duels-one unregulated and to the death-and he still hadn't cheered up.
Anger and worry about the Guild: He'd not received a warlock summon back to Stormwind, even after he'd scryed his intentions. Binoff had thrice-damn bled for Mayday yet his guildmates just let him walk home. He was an officer in a Gold-band guild! The others had taken their portals home from Feathermoon Stronghold when the locals started to whine about trespasses and penalties. He, as the responsible leader, stayed to... supervise the rescue and smooth things over. He'd used that last scrying bowl to advise Mayday that he and Grammy were ready to return promptly. The expected warlock summons-a simple, cheap spell meant to instantly transport he and Grammy to the guild hall-failed to eventuate.
Without the means to seek alternative transport they'd been forced to trod the long way home like guildless newbies. He'd nearly killed Grammy because the dwarf priest had forced his ridiculous ideals of companionship on several occasions.
Binoff Cartrimer wasn't in the best of moods.
The Old Town Barracks had been hammered onto the ruins of an old keep left disused by city expansion. The budget-minded citizenry had applauded such frugal reuse of veteran resources and the preservation of such... classic architecture. The redesignated Barracks was to provide shelter and support to those celebrated soldiers of the Alliance who'd found themselves estranged from their peacetime haunts by distance, politics or unfortunate psychology. Between the wars the numbers of prerequisite candidates dwindled and potential occupants had always been exceptions in the ranks, so the Old Town Barracks would be naturally luxurious and recuperative so uncrowded.
The idea had been the brainchild of Bolla Valewarder, Fifth Ward night elf councilor-at-large who'd rode a slew of similar brilliant schemes to far more potent political affiliations in Ironforge. Of course his departure and disassociation came long before the barracks project was complete and more flexible management chiseled away at the ideals over the course of the refit.
The placement of the Barracks in a rough Stormwind neighborhood was happenstance-but property value in the gilded human capital was far from inconsequence. The incumbents advantaged Old Town's less desirable real estate values and expanded the requirements of hospice to the incorrigible of personality and history and saw the most bachelor, transient and oft troublesome of Alliance soldiery assigned to the Old Town Barracks. Such beings who persisted expedient of trouble deep into peacetime were typically extreme examples, so berth in the Old Town barracks promised a... colorful experience.
Less public and less popular organizations had too sued for some floorspace in Alliance facilities. One particular was SI:7. Covert intelligence typically avoided pomp and polish, was unpopular in peace and was in turn despaired by politics. All parties involved were best gruntled to have their spies and thieves relegated to the modest bowels of the Old Keep.
There were few surprised to hear rumor that murky rogue trainers and suppliers favored the roughcut and roomy location as ideal for their business as well.
Arthur Huwe was one of these less vocal but well storied of inhabitants. He'd bivied among the ex-cons and lifers on the west side since his marital difficulties and taught a little Rogue infamy to pass the quiet time. Arthur had had a long career, was semi-retired and had seen many proteges off into the big world. He'd too mourned-oft proudly-to see some of their names added to unmarked ledgers in the SI:7 basement archives. But with age came disillusionment and a particularity about who he tutored... and in this he was troubled.
Since the last war he'd seen a drastic drop off in recruit quality caused by a politically-driven quota of diversity and acceptance in lesser candidates. Too him only those who'd met his fairly precise specifications were suitable and he had the hardcore, long-learned and thrice-damned experience in the bloody field to know. Of course he demanded raw talent and a hard drive in his students but he also expected certain… classic traits.
Arthur Huwe was a racist and a chauvinist. If some considered his views outdated or repugnant he had just remind them of the uneven record held by the lesser races of the Alliance and the dire statistics of females in the art of subterfuge (beyond missions required of feminine wiles and enacted with masculine backup.) His patience was constantly tweaked as his spineless leaders placed an increased dependency and showered significant reward on lesser races and the fairer sex. He'd made such quite clear to his superiors and they'd no choice but to accept his rights as inalienable.
Still, they had to push his buttons and preach their thrice-damned noble ideals. So came a vapid diversity of unworthy students and he did what he could to weed out the worst of the lot.
His biggest current challenge was the pissant half-breed trainee whose thrice-damned mother had some unfathomable sway among the leadership and, inevitably, Mathias Shaw. When came his turn, Huwe had-of course-professionally administered the first lesson to the brat. He'd then required an explanation and confirmation to continue. Management had said that such records were, naturally, under royal seal and he'd been quietly rebuffed. This outraged him. He'd consequently failed the dwarf-gnome mutt outright and packed her right back to the cadre office confident that she'd be dismissed to some clerical dungeon.
Mathias Shaw had trained her himself. Huwe had been flabbergasted. He'd missed the next three days with chest pains and the healer was not kind in his pronouncements. So he'd delegated his discord, since Arthur Huwe was not alone in his more enlightened views. He shared his struggle with a small but loyal retinue of fellow soldiers and worthy tutees. He would not go quietly and they could shove that-
The very wench hopped from the stairway and angled serenely toward him. He made theater of his imminent departure for lunch as she approached. He leant over his stand and tapped an unprimed pen over a blank receipt and pointedly ignored her for three long minutes. She waited wordless, hip at a cant, arms crossed and with that all-too-familiar self righteous twist on her ugly half-bred mug. He decidedly made her wait a little longer.
With a huff he acknowledged her with a purist dignity, "Yeah?" He frowned down his nose on her rounded features, arms akimbo.
She gave him a small, innocent, smile. "Sloan said ye got a new recipe," she rumbled.
"T'is quite expensive," he noted helpfully. "Only sold one," he pretended to consult his memory.
"Eh," she shrugged. "Got a voucher."
Huwe frowned and straightened. "I gotta verify-"
Rindy held out a small roll of parchment, whuffed a recalcitrant breath and tapped her foot, jutted opposite her hip. Huwe felt his cheeks grew hot and his nostrils flared as he stared at a blur of script in her fingers. The half breed had DARED express annoyance to a Senior Rogue? He was true pure human and a full member of the organization! Worse yet he knew exactly what the scroll she offered contained. He snatched the offensive object out of her chubby fingers and vexed crimson. He didn't allow his hand to shake. Eventually he jammed the note into a pocket and cleared his throat. He poked through his fanny pack where he kept only the most vital of lesson plans, advanced tools and rare recipes. As he searched he heard her shuffle.
"Who got the other one?" she asked.
"Cannae say," he insisted.
"Well," she admitted. "If it were the wendigo-lookin' feller missin' teeth ye go recycle that scroll. He ain't gonna use the enchant."
Huwe paused and squinted.
"Heard he got inna accident," she stated simply and looked bored.
Huwe well-feigned ignorance over affront in his normal surly demeanor. He'd finally found the proper recipe and held the disposable scroll out. He frowned deeply.
She reached but he pulled the script back. The face she made rankled him.
"Cannae 'magine ye thinkin' kid." He dismissed and shook the recipe scroll. The half breed didn't budge or reach again. "Now. Ye got a quarter hour…" he checked his chronometer. "Till'bout six bells before the scroll dissolves… ain't my fault if-"
"Thanks hey," Rindy smiled and snatched. She turned and bounced toward the entrance arch.
Arthur Huwe watched the half-breed female, another example SI:7's insistence on impurity and half measures in the ranks, take her leave. Mayhaps he'd reached his age of tolerance and t'was high time to think on true retirement.
For the life of a single breath a moonless bowl of stars spun framed in luminesced deciduous canopy. But sky wasn't possible sunk so low in a pitch marble radial burrowed core-deep under that ruin-littered beach and unquiet sea. No stars shown through a fog of icy unclean death in a damned depths. T'was wretched witchfire glared off the razors of naga wrath and blubberous unnamable filth on a path of desperate, seaweed-draped passages. Evil was exposed by rare ebb tide in its broken temple of crustacean acolytes. Soapy foam under mandibles, claws clicked and pellucid horror slithered from the damp surrounds of twisted and forgotten realms. Leathery eggs nested, once bred of a hungry maternity to be awakened by an encroachment of warm blood. An enraged terrapin endured an epoch of elder torture to confront they who might dare her frothed nightmare. Deep in the blaggard heart shimmers a reward of wealth and deliverance that insidious summons the salt-pickled rictus of vengeful prior adventurer corpses if disturbed. The final bow of jewel crowned heads to old threats unearthed. Death, no matter how alien, tireless awaits a scent of mortal blood in an unaired brine of evil.
Awake now.
Rindy pulled herself together. She'd fanned her arms in some forgotten instinct of black panic until her palm met a sharp edge and she'd started fully aware. She was prone surrounded by onyx shards on the cool grass. T'was dark enough for the faint wink of a few brighter stars through the wispy leaves and over rustic rooflines, as The Lady or Li'l Blue had yet risen to blot them out. The natural phosphors of preferred Mage Quarter illumination were sleep dimmed in the late hour and there was no one around.
She lay among the remains of the statue stolen from the Archbishop's office... because of course she did. She'd hoped to sell the statuette once she had what she needed but alas she'd busted any hope of profit. Again. She let her head fall back and closed her eyes, guttural groaned and still chilled by a distant subterranean damp she'd envisioned. A long moment as the wraiths of her head magick fled and she sat upright, cradled her lacerated palm in her lap.
Rindy actually looked forward to her Mother's return. Succao had sent word that Father had used his team's last scrying bowl to announce imminent departure from Kalimdor. She'd heard that most of his insurrection had returned safe from their Dire Maul quest at the start of the week. There was controversy, there was hesitation. T'was odd that no one had stopped by... but of course she'd been home minimally and had probably just missed them. Mayhaps Father would lighten up now that he'd had his expedition to research his stupid theories.
She'd used the last year well. True, she'd not troubled with the snobby academic basics school and she was certain to get it in the neck for that. But she'd trained three-years worth and that much more, she'd found more of the THINGS: The onyx statue was but the latest of a dozen artifacts she'd recognized with her head magick.
She blinked and caught up with the moment. She leant up on her elbows and looked about. The Mage Quarter parkland was sparsely populated at the best times and virtually deserted after twelve gongs-bells in Stormwind, she reminded herself. She'd brought the last three magick THINGS to the park. T'was lonely and t'was dark and not an overly fragile environment. Unhindered by trivial concerns she'd seen things.
An early treasure, an old brass pick, had shown her a Deadmines she'd never heard of, even in rumor: A labyrinth of angry pirates and Defias thugs in unimagined strength. Secret treaties of whispered cancers that wormed deep under Westfall and a blaggard monarch who plied pen and sword in his ship's private cabin sunk somewhere deep in the hills. Of course she'd awoke with the pick buried in an indelicate spot on the Statue of Elune. What if someone had happened on her in that state..?
The broken spear had told her about Hakkar and voodoo corruption in the swamps, AND left her stupefied for half a bell and with that odd accent in her voice for a solid day. A rusty dagger storied the ghosts of an old keep lost in the crags of Silverpine and she'd been haunted until the next dawn. She'd shouted Scarlet hymns at the top of her voice-misadventure that had lasted until the old relic cross had rusted to dust in hours. She was told names and incantations but they gave her headaches and sometimes her tongue fits because she'd learned in the alien languages. Some folk didn't have normal mouths or breathed... air. Elementals were the worst.
And with every THING she found she grew more sensitive to the magick. She also had a strong urge to tell other folk and make them find THINGS. She knew that but didn't quite understand what it meant. She hoped her Mother could sort it out... else Rindy might crack up and go to live with the crazy drunks in the bottom of Ironforge. She didn't know why she thought that either, but she did. Meanwhile, her rogue skills had outgrown her Stormwind tutors and she was ready for Ravencrest.
So Rindy had grand news to welcome her Mother home with. Days short from a year abroad and that would end soon. She would go into the dungeons, join the guild and bring all that she knew to help Mayday. Mother and daughter would fight in the deadliest, darkest, hardest and most profitable places. T'was where she wanted to go. She had nowhere to go but up.
Instead Rindy Cartrimer would take the worst news of her life into the little.
Binoff became aware of movement on the second floor above. So she was home. He checked the chronometer on his wrist and lifted a brow. His travels had outpaced the sun at least once and he'd never slept well on the move anyways. Again he yawned, and grimaced: He didn't want to do this without a nap. No choice now that she was aware of his return, he'd made plenty enough noise. Confrontation was inevitable. With a groan he lifted himself off the bench and limped around to the kitchen torrent. He kept an ear to the stairway as he scrubbed his hands and washed his face. The only towel evident was buried under a pile of dirty dishes and cutlery, he was too tired to explore the pantry, so he used his sleeve. Sat back with eyes dull and hands together on the opposite side of the family table, his back to the mess in the kitchen. He deigned to sit the high-backed chair at the head as was his place. Perhaps his daughter would appreciate such the gesture and make this all easier.
"Rindy!" he called.
He'd have to display an array of subtlety and humility to salvage the next few days in Mayday. He WAS worried about the thrice-damned lack of a guild warlock summons-likely that meant the other powers in the guild had gained from his absence and were in a froth. HIS faction was in obvious disadvantage after the year-long exodus. Grovelled returns with tails tucked were naturally unpopular among those who adventured for a living-and most folks were not fans of dead friends. This meant nearly half the guild who'd followed his rebellion to Feralas-his strongest supporters among them-might have been rendered impotent, possibly excised. Those left behind in Stormwind likely held a reasonable, justifiable grudge for the departure, expenditures and eventual deaths. Binoff was confident to listen and negotiate a recovery; He was an expert at agreement without conviction. He was significantly motivated, as well, to NOT waste more years and funds to gain favor among and groom the resources of another guild.
An ear tipped upward, Binoff speculated to the muffled thump of Rindy's balcony slider through the ceiling. An eventual crash from the alley so evidenced the escape of a latest delinquent. His daughter maintained a parade of turbulent, short-lived tristes as a reliable spark to ignite ugly maternal rows. She appeared to have stayed in form in his absence.
He sighed, waited and reddened, fists clenched. Rindy acted out with a fair persistence and with a slew of themes. Three schools had dismissed her, each more expensive than the last. She had a significant record with the Stormwind authorities and knew most of Ironforge law enforcement on a first-name basis. She wouldn't be allowed back in Darkshire while the current sheriff still presided. She kept with a loose circle of low-spoke and reprehensible dregs from the choicest of bad neighborhoods. She had somehow convinced them that she was an urchin savant and not simply a spoiled sociopath from the Third Tier who could see the Bronzebeard Gardens from her bedroom window. He'd even heard echoes of cartel contacts, to which he'd particularly not cherished the implication.
Teeth clenched, Binoff seethed. Had the thrice-damned half-breed gone into Dire Maul and not his mate… He lanced the speculation as emotional and unconstructive.
The need to split Mayday had perhaps doomed his task to failure, he admitted. A flaw he'd need to correct. His immediate reception in the guild hall once he got around to Stormwind would tell him much more. Grammy should report in soon...
A door slammed. A shadow paused a breath at the second floor balustrade with a rustle of fabric. A hammer of big feet on the stairs, the flash of hairy legs and flare of nightgown. She held up at the curve of banister on the landing where she hugged the gargoyle bust prototypical of her Mother's unfathomable motifs. Rindy's hair was a greasy squirrel of hasty braids, her face pursed a freckled chisel of teenage arrogance. She scanned the great room before she locked her gaze with his. "Sorry," she pouted artistically. "Hadda knew y'all be home I'dda cleant up the place."
"Don't speak that gibberish!" Binoff caviled. He ducked behind a hand on his forehead to hide further reaction. When he eventually recovered his daughter smiled and held her elbows. He'd swallowed his ire but his daughter preempted.
"Where is Mom?" she piqued.
He looked askance with a breath. "Rindy," he requested gently as he could. "Come in here."
She frowned at his tone, made a moment uncertain. A squint and a small delay before she trounced off the landing. She diverted to the kitchen and looked back. "Thirsty?" she prompted.
"Did you leave anything?" he blurted. Winced.
"Some moonberry," she rumbled and chose to ignore the slight. "I think there's honeymint-"
"Berry is fine," Binoff asserted.
Rindy swiped three mugs from the pile with her shirt. "Had I known I'd picked up somethin'," she explained as she worked. "Maybe some Fizzbang?"
He nodded and squinted at the third cup. "I used the scrying bowl a week ago," he protested. "Guild knew my plans."
"Heard something like that," she mummed vaguely as she gained the table, passed him his mug, placed the other opposite. She plopped into his high-backed chair at the head, quickly peered at the little door through the pantry arch. When she looked back her stare repeated her first question. She kicked her feet on the trestle top and crossed her ankles.
"Thoughtful," he hedged, a finger traced the ceramic handle.
"Where is Mom?" she lingered carefully on each word.
He hesitated, lips parted and darned his fingers for a breath or two before his hand groped blindly over. He patted at her arm before he clasped and stared at his daughter. She putted at the motion, released her mug to, in turn, touch him back. He flinched from the oddity of her four digits and a gnome's sabre-nail thumb in a dwarvish scale. Her oversize lips drew taunt at his reaction and she pulled both her arms away from him. Stared hard.
Binoff touched his forehead again and took a breath. Met her gaze.
Rindy's eyes were cast dwarven apart and gnome huge, in the same gray as her Mother's, under a wide heavy brow on a big round face. Her chin was small, her nose broad and thick, cheeks high and bright. Her hair grew gnome-fast and in dwarf places, such as her chin and arms-never a case with pure gnomides. Her shoulders were wide and straight as her Mother's, her arms slightly long in her Father's way. Her female characteristics went with a tendency toward the dwarvish, which unfortunately meant exaggerated. Binoff was barely tolerant of her appearance despite years grown used to her. He'd best described her once, among comrades, as a pre-contact gnome's idea of a dwarf-such mayhaps drawn on a torchlit cave wall by an idiot child.
He was confounded by her popularity with males, especially humans. It was likely because she rarely said no, he figured. And Grammy… well Grammy had his foibles-a large part of Binoff's assurance of his loyalty-and convenience as Grammy wasn't allowed within earshot of a school or orphanage in the three cities. Her Mother had been infinitely irked by her daughter's promiscuity and would have unmanned Grammy had she been made wise of THAT history. Binoff took his Daughter's urges for what they were-cries for attention-and HE didn't care if the half-breed fugged half the 'Kingdoms; Rindy kept those habits to infuriate her Mother. The pile of unwashed dishes, the muddy footprints and signs of a frequent uncouth entertainment of disreputable strangers in HIS house during his year away-not to mention her mid-afternoon sloth-irked her Father.
Binoff Cartrimer ground his teeth and looked away. He couldn't fathom his thought process before the Fall. Family bliss? A substitute for the loneliness of his obsessive and generally unpopular research? A need to spread his seed, his name? With a dwarf?
Rindy had faded in stages before him, her breath caught in her throat. The half-breed held her Father fixed with her Mother's gray. The face, that affronted him to no end, slackened as the girl digested the unspoken with a gnomish disconnect in her poise and dwarvish emotion in her eyes. "How?" she hissed, grown palid.
"A wipe in Dire Maul," Binoff replied offhand, though with appropriate tragedy and compassion in his voice. He offered his hand across the trestle while he pondered his historical decisions, his temporary insanity. "She wasn't all we lost," he heard himself add.
"You killed her," Rindy stated simply.
He froze. "I did NOT," he protested without pause and with more defensiveness than he'd preferred. "We HAD what we sought. We HAD it," his eyes clicked up, locked on her. Softened, "Your mother was killed by betrayal and incompetence."
"Who?" She quizzed him with blurred eyes.
"No one of OUR team," he explained. "We got bad intelligence, we got overwhelmed," he looked far away. "Working blind. We trusted..." His knuckles whitened on his barely-touched drink. "Feathermoon refused to seriously aid us. They sent a minimal team of old fools and trusted a criminal to lead the rescue."
"Rescue?" his Daughter demanded.
"Bixie, Grammy and Kandre," Binoff dirged. "Separated and trapped after the wipe."
"And..?" Rindy had stood and turned her back.
"Grammy made it out," he said. Blinked, went to say more, but held up and chewed on his knuckle.
Rindy saucered, puffed up in a flare that was no escalation of sadness.
He nodded at the reaction. Understood. He looked away.
"Who's in charge of Mayday?" she managed within a small onset of sobs.
"I don't yet know," he admitted sourly. "I came straight home."
"Commendable," she grunted.
Binoff's eyes slid at her. She'd used a Gnomish adjective for complex options that bore no significant effect-ill or otherwise-to an operation and was thence more trouble to design out than simply retain. The sarcasm was clear in their remarkably concise language. She didn't believe him. Her cheeks were a crimson shelf for tears, fingers intertwined, shoulders shook. But no pool of trauma, her glare was hard. As sharp and tensile as what she'd meant in Gnomish: Thanks for nothing.
Binoff opened his mouth to comment.
Rindy snatched the strap across the table and dragged the bag to her chest.
He gave a soft look. "Take your time with this," he offered. He elbowed with a feigned lack of concern at the satchel. "Uh, just take care. Some of that is quite exp-"
"At least," Rindy quaked, her voice a turbine of rage, red-rimmed eyes gone huge. "I'm not the biggest bastard in THIS room," she gritted. She jumped up, arms crushed her mother's satchel at her chest. Her action was violent and impulsive enough that her knee smacked the trestle bench. The stalwart aged wood creaked but stayed intact.
Binoff lifted a brow. The subjective vulgarity she'd used could refer to disowned offspring OR, in mecca-slang, a mechanical sexual aid designed in simulation of a biological partner. Contextually this was unclear unless the tense was intimate as implied. If such was so the Gnomish for 'room' so modified was oft used to describe the first-stage waste buffer for a gnomish latrine, and a 'Cartrimer' was a mechanism (Binoff's Father had developed) to improve flush irrigation through the very same device-which served to assuage the discrepancy by personal reference. Gnomish implications: Binoff was a dildo accessory built on a toilet. Or an unclaimed runoff of raw offal. OR Binoff's own Father had planned his son as one or all of the above objects.
The accusation was (naturally) cloaked in an understandably emotional tone that mayhaps assured an uninitiated listener that her choices came from mere grammatical errors. Binoff knew better, had heard worse from her lips and chose to ignore the slight. His Daughter was indeed a talented verbal pugilist-no one could debate that. As she stormed toward the kitchen he speculated on a preponderance of headaches in the near future. More lawyers' bills mayhaps. He'd need a strategy, else he'd not be able to concentrate-
She turned on a heel-left, stopped. Swung right. A hand reached awkward around the satchel for an empty bottle on the torrent counter. Stopped. Held in a bloodless clench. She half-stooped, clutched her Mother's favorite satchel and an empty bottle,
"Perhaps you should sit back down dear," her Father suggested. Another lift of brow. He leant aside to allow the bottle to spin past his head and shatter somewhere in the great room beyond. Rindy raged anew at the clean miss, her face was a ruddy scrunch of anger and sorrow confused. She spun again and stomped off under the arch to the pantry. She lifted upright a burly, errant arm as she went and cleared the counter of its collection of dirty dishes as she passed.
Binoff winced at the shatter.
"Rindy!" Binoff started to protest. Cringed as everything in even the loosest proximity of his daughter's tirade rattled, wobbled or cracked. She whipped open the rearmost door in the pantry and slammed into the tiny room revealed. Binoff sighed and rubbed his head.
Into the little she went. She swung the portal shut and sat on the slick, cold seat. Her awkward elbows brushed the walls of the cramped space of gnomish design. She hugged her knees, tucked into a single quake and sob mass, vaguely aware of a distant rush of subterranean streams far below and a slight draft up the back of her gown. She looked down to see tears on porcelain. Mom… Mom… and she was… suddenly blank.
She pulled the satchel into her lap. Stared. Something drew her out of herself. Her vision was clear without the tears, breath unhindered by hiccups and throat formerly constricted by grief. When she centered, her Mother's face was a visage as exact as an image-snap, as if she sat in the little with her Daughter. The last time THAT had been… the time Rindy had nicked herself with a second-hand dagger. The subsequent symptoms of the unknown poison used by the previous owner (likely diluted by age) aggressively purged Rindy's guts over three very memorable days. Mom had provided soup, water and support and they'd joked about it for weeks after. There HAD to be better memories, she chided herself.
Odd. The visage was so clear: Mother's jewelry, her tattoos, a scent of that thrice-damned tauren liquor she liked so much on her mustache. She'd dabbed her daughter's forehead with the fuzzy purple yeti cloth and sung that old rhyme under her breath. Odd, because the memory wasn't the point. Her hand wasn't the point but... Nae, under her hand... the bag. Nae, IN the bag. Rindy rifled the pack, jerked free a parchment-wrapped object. She let the bag fall to the floor and held her prize on her knees. She whispered Mother's old song and pulled at the parchment. The object, a tiny carving of a naga in jade, rolled free and fell into her open palm, her chest rose as she steeled herself. The parchment fell from her lap.
May ogres laid low and flowers be bloomed,
Thee must suffer and heed the worthy Attuned.
Rindy Cartrimer traveled a thousand miles, lived a thousand lifetimes and snapped back to reality before the discarded parchment had settled at her toes.
"Trap," She blinked, eyes focused well beyond. "They stealth up the ramp," she hissed. "Gotta be five to open." She, audience to the pageant, evaluated the performance. "Din't shatter the crystals, t'is how ye fugged up," she whispered. The actors depart, puppet strings grew slack. The lights fade. "T'is how ye died Mom."
Blackflash.
His hand reached out. Blood on the wall, from the stone. Ogres roar and flowers die. Mad he screamed and then he ran. He always runs because he's something different. You will know. The pet would have saved them.
Blackflash.
She shook her head. The naga tumbled onto the bag at her feet.
She had all she needed from the relic. Her tears, her sorrow returned in a wave. Again herself, she wondered where she'd be in a year. Anywhere but here, she decided and she cried a little more.
Binoff was squatted on the floor as he distractedly picked for salvageable remains in the pile of ceramic shards. He paused and glared when the front door again loosed the chaos of Ironforge into his home. He turreted on the invader until the bench creaked. He stood and kicked the rest of the shards against the counter base and lifted a brow.
"Got anything to drink?" asked Grammy the dwarf priest.
Binoff stared and held fast until Grammy seemed about to gobble. Relented with a sneer and nod. Waved him down. His hand came from his tunic with a small bottle and he stomped to the trestle. Drank deep before he passed the bib. "Well?" he growled and sat. Ignored the return offer so the dwarf set the bottle on the table between them. Binoff checked for the possibility of residual tears.
"T'was true," Grammy moaned. "Talked to Succao. Rozen and Styne are NOT here." He shrugged, "No one seen'em. They never came through."
"Fug all!" Binoff rubbed his head. A fist squeezed bloodless held at shoulder height.
Grammy winced, darned digits on the table. Added quickly, "I talked to… our friend in common." He shook his head, clasped the bottle again. "They never showed at the meet point either and…"
"And SHE'S righteously indignant," Binoff asserted, hissed the pronoun. "Because we got nothing," he gritted. He glowered at the dwarf.
"You think I'm right?" Grammy ventured, somewhat meek.
"About that hunter?" Binoff gritted. "If so, get our folk talking to Steamwheedle."
"They don't quite get along," the dwarf mewed.
"Then WE'LL talk to the fuggin' slavers," the gnome hissed. "The human is a louse. A fuggin' nobody. We'll never find him on all of Azeroth! You ARE sure?"
"Steamwheedle, absolutely," the priest soothed.
"Tell them to talk gold," Binoff determined. "That's all those fuggin' slavers know."
Grammy nodded. "I have-ahem-a little good news."
Binoff lifted an impatient brow.
"Our folk got open arms," the dwarf announced. "The Guild's glad to have us back."
Binoff appeared but adequately mollified.
"You still have pull," the priest added. "There enough loyal that-"
"Who's in charge?" Binoff demanded.
"Succao... popular as always, but he's weak." Grammy reported. "The Guild ain't done a THING 'cept maintain and moan in the whole year."
"Blythe his second?" Binoff tossed a hand.
"Of course," Grammy smirked. "Someone gotta hold his chain… Without Kandre and Bixie… they all done with infighting. Want a whole guild. Succao got them back on planning 'Core runs. Our folk come back and we suddenly got the numbers..."
"Fuggin' 'Core," the gnome groaned. He stood upright and pointed a finger, "tell our contact about the hunter. You can leave out your part, I'll vouch." He took another belt before his bottle vanished in his tunic. "Maybe we can still salvage..." His voice faded.
The dwarf and gnome stopped and turreted their gaze to the rear archway.
The young dwarf/gnome stood there, slumped against the wall. Regarded the duo with a scarlet beetle of brows. One hand grasped the tail of her nightgown and tamped at her eyes.
"How long have you been there?" Binoff gruffed.
His daughter ignored the gnome, glared at the dwarf. "Ye was with her?" she asked with a slight tremble to her Low Common. "When happened?"
"Your Mother died heroically," Grammy soothed in accented Gnomish. "We were betrayed." He tried a sad smile with reassurance in his eyes. "If you need anything dear. A talk or a hug…"
"Oh thae, I'm sure," the half-breed scorned, her manner and poise made the dwarf back away. She stomped from the arch and stalked past her Father and the priest. Hands fisted, eyes lined red, made her way to the foyer.
"Where are you going?" Binoff asked. Flicked debris from his fingers and his hand brushed the scabbard on the table. His tone was not perfect sincerity or concern nor unexpected.
"Stormwind," Rindy said, squared to him with her back to the door. "The Guild."
"To do what?" her Father groaned upright. His hand settled on the hilt. His eyes maintained soft but didn't divert. He pulled the scabbard as he rounded the trestle. Stopped front and center, billboarded over Grammy, where there was no obstruction between he and his Daughter at the door. "Dear. This is traumatic. Think before you act," he suggested with an artful twinge of concern. His dominant hand stood stationed, offhand a finger upright as he considered her thoughtfully. "And about what you might say," he added more quietly.
Grammy had stood upright, hands free, cheeks ashen.
Rindy blinked, but her face was unmoved. She tipped her head, leant nonchalantly against garments hung on the foyer wall. A tear traced her cheek and she smiled. Obscured by the drape and shadow her nimble gnome fingers wrapped the haft of the axe that was always there.
"Who betrayed Mom?" she asked. "Humans and some hunter?"
"A human hunter," Grammy corrected ambivalently.
Rindy screwed up her face, shook her head.
A growl from the gnome and the Grammy cringed, zipped up. Binoff waved a dismissive hand. "What does this matter?"
"Because I'm going to kill him…" Rindy explained simply. "Uh, t-them," she amended less certainly.
"Leave it to us," Binoff bluffed, face a mask. "We're looking into it."
Rindy held a moment. Glared. She continued her tasks.
"Why the Guild?" Binoff reiterated.
The girl had lost some bluster but her hidden hand remained unmoved. "I'm gonna claim Mom's raid slot. Joining Mayday."
"You aren't old enough," Binoff protested weakly. "You haven't the-"
"It's tradition and I won't take no," she insisted. "Mom's dead. They can't say no."
Binoff harrumphed. "I don't concur," he crossed his arms.
"I don't care," his Daughter retorted.
"Fine," Binoff nodded, waved her off and turned back to the trestle. "Best arrange for the Guild barracks. If you have any stuff-"
"There's nothing I want here," she sneered. "Any more questions?" She glowered, twisted and similarly invited comment from Grammy. The priest ducked away.
"Guilds can always use rogues." Binoff shrugged, "Have at it, Daughter dearest." He looked over his shoulder, "Just don't…" he struggled a moment. "Don't be... a problem."
Rindy smirked, lifted a favorite foul gesture and wiggled on an oversized pair of leathers under her nightie, stepped into a pair of her Mother's old boots. Rifled through the gear on the foyer. She draped a tunic, a helm and cape over her shoulder. Stuffed a set of ragged leather gloves in her waistline. "Oh," she paused and looked at her Father. "Ye dinnae mind if I…"
Binoff again waved her off. "Just leather. I can bring some better gear to the Guild Hall… if I get a chance," he offered. His manner was still surly, his eyes still hard.
"Thanks," she smirked. Stomped to secure the boots.
Father shrugged, bent a lip and lifted a brow.
Rindy pulled the bolt with the crook of her elbow. She pulled the door in and slipped around the frame. The ruckus of Ironforge again invaded the home.
"Welcome to Mayday," Binoff shouted as the door closed at her back.
Rindy lingered at the threshold. Father was a bastard, a liar and a schemer, but he DID betray some hints of heartbreak. He just didn't know what to do with such emotion, she figured. Mother always said things changed after Gnomeregan, said she hadn't known him then. But Rindy knew her Father now. And Mother was dead and she hadn't asked about the body, or the other casualties. She'd be plenty funerary at the guild hall.
A passage of masses beyond the gate and her tiny yard. Just folk about their own business, a river of colorful indifference just across the moss lawn, four flagstones and a world away. Many types, all walks in the world... and mayhaps some were her sorts? She shrugged, lifted a foot. Froze. Realized. Decided. With a purse of lips she tugged the latch and pushed opened the door again.
Her Father and Grammy looked up from a renewed discussion at the trestle. Grammy betrayed a hopeful quiz, her Father just glared in query. Rindy reached around the doorframe, grabbed the axe from under the cloaks and backed out. Without a word or another glance she spun and stomped out. The door swung shut. She set the axe haft to rest on her shoulder.
The half-breed clumped across the quad of green toward the crowded Ironforge boulevard at just past two solar gongs. Folk in return from lunch, tourists out in force. T'was almost shift change at the 'Forge, just past the portal renewal in the Mystic Ward, a high time for griffs and the traum and surly crowds. Rindy admired her Mother's folk and their city, dwarfs were at least a part of her, mayhaps the best part.
She swung the iron lattice aside, looked to the left and right. Boxes of garden fence kept zoos of colorful lawn ornaments, the squat of mailboxes beside their gates and a thousand homes exactly like hers curved into the smokey subterrain distance.
Anywhere but here, she thought.
Rindy grinned automatically and plunged into a tide of anonymity. The Deeprun Traum was a hike from her rich neighborhood and she hadn't copper for a griff unless she risked a five-fingered solution. A lost draenei tourist blinked and gave her an over-wide berth as if the rogue's demeanor advertised her exact train of thought. A drunk leered at her from a beer garden loft. One of the neighbors battered a rug over her balcony. A meccastrider stamped through the throngs with predictable tact and care. A pair of Thief Catchers gruffly chatted and glowered at random passers-by, astride their rams on the far wall.
She'd left her favorite dagger in her room and that was unfortunate but she always had the two kunai spades strapped over her kidneys. Her strictly utilitarian hairpin was four inches of forged steel dipped in a fast paralytic poison. There'd be a slim stiletto in the left heel of her Mother's boot, a garrote in the laces of the right. Her gnomish thumbs could be deadly and she bore self-inflicted scars to prove it. She ducked behind a dark vendor booth and faded into the cold comfort of full stealth.
Rindy Cartrimer intended to emotionally hijack the Mayday Guild. She'd shed tears-little theatrics involved-and humbly insist on her Mother's raid slot in the guild. She'd ask about her Mother's corpse and eventually her Father's punishment. She was in fuggin' pajamas and her Mom's boots. Rindy had the gall to ride the Traum so but never the naivety to go unarmed.