~ Author's Notes ~

Alonea is a very 3D character, but I don't think this fact is coming out on the pages enough. I have opted to spend a couple chapters detailing her backstory, thoughts, emotions and opinions. Sorry if some of you find this boring and yay for those who don't!

I ignored her and now she's plotting revenge on my chapters.

George Sandayana once said,

"Only the dead have seen the end of war."

He lied.

~*~ Chapter 9 ~*~

~ Acharus: The Ebon Hold ~

The Lich King was coming. Members of the Ebon Hold strong enough or entrenched enough to feel the raw power were tense and excited. The brothel brimmed with patrons looking to sate some kind of lust or another. A whore, drained of all his blood by the literal blood-thirsty patrons, was wheeled into the kitchen just as the mistress of the hold made her way out. She paused for a moment, watching the corpse sail around the corner. Its face was frozen in a look of elation. He had died happy, perhaps not knowing that it was his last moment.

Or perhaps because he had.

Disgust ran through Alonea's tall form, a feral growl coming to her throat. Traitor. It was so easy for some of them to escape service, though not so easy for others. Moving into the hall her face twisted in annoyance. The residence of the brothel had it easy. All they had to do was drink the blue potion and drift off while someone else did all the work. Her job? No, that was much more difficult. It had been week – weeks!- since she produced a stalwart servant for the war effort. The Lich King was as benevolent and forgiving as a warriror's bloodlust when things did not go His way. That is to say she was better off volunteering to take the corpse' place should the He become annoyed with her lack of productivity.

Just one fresh body, not still in puberty; that is all I desire.For two days now she had felt Him coming, starting just before Thanis had vanished into the night. The Highlord had felt it even longer than she, though he kept his own council. Who's business was it who wasn't powerful enough to feel the pull for their Master? The Death Knights were salivating at the impending slaughter. A few of the stronger necromancers had the sense to know what was about to happen. The Lich King rarely visited outside Northrend unless there was a situation in dire need of His personal attention. Someone as great as He could not be bothered to keep personal tabs on every single minion. It was up to those like Mograin to run parts of the Scourge on their own.

Speaking of greatness – or the lack thereof – Thassarian was doing his best to keep Koltira and Alonea out of each other's path. Even for masters of mayhem and disease those two were closer than soul-chained undead minions had any right to be. Alonea and the rest of the necromancers were disgusted by it; a constant reminder of what they wanted and could never have. The master necromancer must have had some formidable goodwill at one point to have created the High Elf to the tatooed human"s specifications, but it was long gone now. As it stood she couldn't stand the sight of another set of long ears if they weren't Thanis'. It just reminded her that her favorite plaything was missing and Koltira had lost it. Once more she couldn't punish Koltira for it since by all rights the toy had gotten up and walked off by itself. It is still his fault.

For his part the elfin 'knight had volunteers to be chained to the roof if it would make his seething mistress happy. The son of her soul felt every annoyance and ever pull she had in wanting to replace or relocate the thing that had been lost. "Momma" indeed. She was a cat who's runt kitten had wandered off it bothered her. Something as delicate as Thanis – irreplaceable masterpiece that he was – had never been let out alone on purpose. His maker had always been sure to keep him on a short string.

Bothering Koltira bothered Thassarrian. Bothering Thassarian bothered the Highlord. Bothering the Highlord was the highlight of bored days spent waiting for something worth her time but today was not a good day to get on the man's bad side. Most days he was cool and collected and on others he was a blond menace looking to quickly, harshly remove whatever thorn was in his boot. With the Lich King coming she could not afford to be that thorn. She, like all of them, was replaceable.

She had allowed Koltira to spend a day on the roof, thinking it would make her feel better. The bits of his flesh stripped by the buzzards were as quickly replaced by the magic flowing through those icy blue tattoos. Quel'dorie, even dead ones, still needed magic and his ability to blend the magic of his calling with the regenerative properties of the plague set him apart amongst all Death Knights. Irony at it's finest. By nightfall she had taken a griffin up and gotten him down. The naked elf avoided eye contact, puzzled as he was by her changes in temperament. Thanis had always been special, had always been kept close, but was a lone soldier really worth thenon-verbal pining? All of them were prepared to die eternally for the cause and it was only a matter of time before the final death came calling. The ability to think about anything else but the war was a trait of the living and living wants and whims contradicted the goal of the Scourge: to eradicate ever trace of life on Azeroth.

She didn't know when it dawned on her than Thanis was not coming back. Apparently she had been the last to come to the conclusion. Anger arose first and was as quickly replaced with sorrow that had not been felt for the better part of a decade spent in the service of the Scourge. She was alone again, sucked into the shadows once more to spend her existence without the presence of another Kaldorie. Damn the living! Damn their need to congregate, to feel companionship, to breed. Cursing herself did not ease the discomfort.

Thassarian, head to boot in black skull themed armor, said nothing as the softly clad necromancer delivered his protege still bound in magic wrought chains. "Next time he disobeys my orders I'll rip his heart out and feed it to the ghouls." Both pairs of glowing blue eyes searched her face trying to decide if she were bluffing. Yes, the heart still held certain sway over the actions of a Death Knight. That was why the Lich King had His removed and placed it in the care of the Cult of the Damned. The memories and emotions of Arthas Menathil could bother the Lich King no longer. The two men before her did not have that luxury.

"Is he really that precious to you, mistress?" Thassarian's hollow voice was hard to read.

Angry brown eyes locked onto his own, staring him down, "My master piece, as you said. Irreplaceable." Claws which rarely saw use these days flexed with want to sink themselves into his eyes and tear them out.

"Mistress, sometimes I think you forget he's dead. By your order no less."

Alonea scoffed, "Of course I know that. I chose him myself, did I not? You were there."

For a long moment the pale 'Knight didn't speak. Finally the soft words came out, "I was there. I remember how he came to you thinking you had come back to him-"

"Enough! The mewling things we were back then are nothing now. The pointless wars we fought are nothing compared to the glory of being Scourge. I can always find another elf. As you humans say, 'They're making more every day.'"

Leaving the pair in her wake she turned herself towards the offices to prepare for the impending visit. Whether it would bring good news or bad, His wrath or His blessings, was still to be determined. Either way there would need to be a feast and accommodations and of course entertainment.

A few hours latter there came a knock on the door. Death Knights didn't knock because their boots usually announced their arrival – and ghouls just didn't have the sense to do it – so it must be a fellow necromancer.

"Enter," the mistress bid, sliding off the rotting chair on which she was perched and straiting up. In the candlelight she would look imposing and impressive and that was the point. The underlings just didn't get a moment's reprieve from thinking she'd kill them at any moment. On occasion she did.

However, the woman who walked through the door was not afraid of Alonea, or anyone. Fear had been ripped out of her like dozens of other memories the moment she had lost the position of Master Necromancer to the shadow priest newcomer over a decade ago.

Necrophasia blinked in the dim light, human eyes unable to see as well at night as the aptly named night elves. What passed for clothing was tattered up to her thighs and barely covered her assets. The cut in the front went down to her navel, making it look like she wore some tattered sheets and nothing more. The lack of ornamentation on such an well-worn dress bespoke her position as the mistress necromancer's second-in-command.

"What?" Alonea hated the woman and everything she stood for, though the woman didn't remember what she had done to make her superior feel that way.

"Master sends word that He has captured a paladin which will serve as the nights entertainment." The sickly sweet and insane-level cheeriness of her voice gave Alonea violent urges. "He orders that accommodations for a living dwarf be made immediately." It was the smaller woman's duty to play secretary but her boss didn't like it when news like this went through the hands of lesser-than servants before coming to her.

"Yes, yes. Make the living quarters ready. Change out the soup from the bath tub and replace it with as clean of water as you can find. Nothing with plague in it else the creature will try to cleanse it and last thing we need is another enormous vat of holy water."

Necrophasia giggled like a child, her mind perpetually stuck at the age she had been captured by the Lich King years ago. "Too bad Thanis isn't here anymore; I would so love to see him-"

"Did I give you the impression I care about your silly wants? Get out!" Alonea was certain this woman-child was the reason she hated young offerings so much. Barely out of puberty when she'd come to the Scourge she had all the sense of a teenage girl hyped up on hormones and none of the sense of an adult past the age of preening.

Necrophasia frowned but left without a word. Though she didn't remember how she came to be Scourge she very much remembered where she lived before. Northrend was a wild and exciting place to grow up. Few humans settled that far north but it had been her father's dream to be the first to make a living on the frozen continent. She didn't remember how she went form being a happy child playing with ragdolls on the farmstead to being a necromancer for the Scourge.

Alonea did. Alonea knew about her father's failed expedition to find farm-able lands in the North. She knew how the Lich King had laughed at seeing the hold-fast set up, with it's pathetic palisade walls meant to keep the dangers out. She knew how her liege had waited until the little girl child had grown big and was harvested from the farm like ripe fruit. A hissing and spitting barbarian child form the Frozen Waste had landed at Acherus some 4 years after Alonea began her apprenticeship. Having been witness to just how thoroughly the Lich King can wipe out any traces of the living or their dwellings had turned the girl wild. She didn't understand the great honor being bestowed upon her by being chosen for His service. At first she had rebelled against it, not wanting to become a part of what destroyed her past. That is... until she tasted true power.

It hadn't taken her long to climb the ranks inside the hold, going from brothel maid to apprentice necromancer in just two years. When a slip of fate ended the then-master necromancer there were now two in position for the title. Competition amongst the Scourge was fierce and losing lead to the permanent kind of destruction which not even the plague of undeath could bring one back from. That is, the loser was given to the winner as the prize along with the title.

There was more than one way to destroy someone. Not that she and Alonea had not had their rows as apprentices, but destroying the arrogant woman's arrogance was the burning drive behind Alonea's desire to win. After her taste of power the little bitch had decided she was the chosen of the Throne and was going to sit on it herself someday. Whether it was as a new occupant or beside the current one was unknown, the kaldorei woman's ultimate goal in life was to destroy her – break her down- and rip out everything that made the insane human feel she was so much better than the rest of them. Better than a kaldorei.

It came down to their masterpieces. Alonea of course had Thanis, hand chosen by her not only because kaldorei minds could shape kaldorei minds the best, but because a former healer priest knew kaldorei bodies best. Her competition, younger and much less experienced in anatomy and physiology, chose an elf as well. Kel'dorie, unoriginal named by the brat who raised him, had been a fixation of his maker for over a year before a slip of the blade allowed him to be captured for her purposes. Alonea knew, as no one else probably had, that the human had fallen in love with the elf and though that killing him and bringing him to the hold to be raised as a Death Knight would save him from a fate the rest of the living were doom to. Again, Alonea's age and experience saved her – she had found out love was a weakness some years before and paid a high price for it. A very high price. Entering the Scourge was a promise to herself never to make that mistake again.

Exceptions are almost always made of a masterpiece Death Knight raised by an apprentice necromancer. They eat, they sleep, they poop – much like babies – but like babies usually serve no function other than to remind everyone 'look what I can make'. Alonea had always scoffed at new parents who were so proud of their babies abilities to cry and be hungry and learn their first language. When Thanis rose with all three of these abilities she suddenly understood why parents shoved their spawn in people's faces and said, "Hey, look what I made!" And why they expected praise for it.

Kel'dorei on the other hand could wield the magic that had been his calling in life. Frost and even fire, mixed as one, had shot out of his hands as he tried to kill the thing that raised him. His mistress was delighted at her creation's gifts, not understanding what the ability to be hungry had to do with anything. Death Knights didn't need to eat. Irony that the mark of how good a fully realized necromancer's work was would be determined by how close to "living" a reanimated corpse could be. The tie was broken when Thanis started singing as his kind were like to do when living. Though he had no language the other kaldorei in the room knew what it was: a death dirge to mourn himself since he had confessed in life that there was no one who would do it for him when he died. That the song had no real lyrics was irrelivent.

Alonea had won the competition. Seconds after Mograin granted smiled at her and announced she was the new Mistress Necromancer of the Ebon Hold she had entrapped her competition in a ring of shadow magic and made her watch as she destroyed Kel'dorei. Even as a card-carrying member of the Scourge she still felt the hated most of her kind did for the High Elves who forsook Elune and became obsessed with magic. This is all their fault.

When the twice-dead body of the elf landed on the floor with a wet plop Alonea had turned on the screaming human with much glee. Glee turned to ash as the girl recognized her fate and the last of her sanity broke. By the time Alonea cleared the ring of shadow magic her competition was sitting in the fetal position rocking. As her new mistress drew closer she looked up with large wet eyes and asked, "Do I get presents? I was good. It's almost Winter's Veil and the presents are still waiting under the tree." Tears had slid from the loser's eyes even as Alone ripped the memory of the last night spent with her family away and burned it to astral dust. Next she had her bound and took the greatest of pleasures in breaking her to the will of her new Mistress. Great, great pleasure.

Alonea alone amongst all of the Scourge necromancers had the ability to alter the memories of the living and dead. Gifts of her past as a healer of Elune. Now those gifts were used to ensure that her lessers and creations were obedient and loyal. The Lich King greatly admired these qualities and more than once invited her to Northrned where she may use them to better advance the Scourge cause. Polite refusal to leave the Ebon Hold before the Plaguelands were completely subjugated had earned patience and ire from her Master. She wanted to be there when New Avalon was destroyed, when Light's Hope was breached, when the hundreds of dead Silver Hand came into her possession. She wanted to march with the new army south through the Plaguelands, cutting down Scarlet resistance and when she reached Tirisfal Glades she wanted to be the one to hand Sylvanas back into the tender care of the Lick King. There was another reason for wanting to go to Tirisfal but she wouldn't think of it. Sylvanas shouldn't be allowed to escape; no one should. It was not so much half a lie as mostly a truth.

None of that can be accomplished in Northrend and so she stayed at Acherus year after year after year. The war waged on, battles were fought and won, resistance rose and was crushed and on occasion there was a visit from the Lich King and a bit of reprieve from the tedium that had become her day-in-day-out experience. How she longed for Silithus just now but Silithus had been full of political games by then and her breed were not political by nature.

Latter in the day Alonea found Necrophasia leaning out over the edge of the hold looking off towards the Throne. "I feel Him," she whispered excitedly as her mistress approached, "The Master is coming." All her competitiveness was gone now, taken and replaced by the unending need to serve, serve, serve. Like all the rest of the living she was fully aware that once upon a time there had been a memory called "greed" and "selfishness" but that since she no longer had both she no longer cared for either. The goal now was to be of use and as long as her Mistresses and Masters were happy then so was she.

Simpleton. "Today, I think. Or tonight." Alonea crossed her arms against the chill breeze. The frost that coated the skin of the barely living human bespoke of her skill with that particular branch of magic. It did her little good as a re-animator but at least she had some skill with it for self defense. How many of the necromancers had been drug over the edge of the hold by suicidal escapees was also kept tallied in secret places around the hold. That most of them lacked any practical self defense against the living was why most of them were kept on the hold and out of harms way. "Maybe He'll let us out. I long for a good massacre."

Alonea had plenty of real-world fighting skill. She had defended her home on Decolace when the end was near, turning from Elune of Light to Elune of Death and then losing her way on the path of the priestess; she had faught in Silithus after the Shadow Sister found her and taught her to embrace her darker nature; she had learned hand-to-hand and staff fighting when she joined the raiding parties that fought the Silithid swarm – training that came in handy when she was separated from her group during one of the many battles; she had honed her physical fighting skill after moving to Andorhal when the Scarab King had been defeated and a new one crowned; she had used those skills to remain alive during her apprenticeship to as a Necromancer after joining the fight against the living. The Scourge was the bastard offspring of the Burning Legion and, though she always hated the Legion and everything they had done to the world, there was no arguing with the human saying, 'If you can't beat them, join them.' And so she had.

The white woman's face lit up ugly with it's scars and dark burning brands across the blind eyes, "I relish a good slaughter. It has been weeks since I've had anything to play with."

Stupid, simpering child. You do not 'play' with the dead, not with the kinds of powers we posses. "I hear the Vrykul there make excellent toys. Perhaps the Master would favor you with a transfer." In truth it was Alonea who wanted to go to Northrend. She would never put to words the reasons she did not ask or kill for a transfer out of the vanquished Plaguelands. She needed war. She needed death. She needed the shadows and their cool embrace else forfeit her sanity. Her mind was assaulted by a memory waylayed by names. The Lich King was not the first to win her over with promises of death and destruction."Where you go, I will follow. Choose your enemy and they will be my enemy too." She would never admit to remembering who had said those words to her; she could not leave Acherus until those words no longer had meaning.

The Highlord's thudding boots clanged along the floor, ruining the word games she and her second were winding up. Both of them turned to courtesy to the Highlord. "The Lich King comes. He shall arrive this very day. A Dwarf Paladin has been captured alive and is being made ready to entertain the Master. The arena is being prepared. Whoever wins gets one reasonable request."

Alonea went stiff the same time Necrophasia's face lit up, "Can anyone fight him?" They both asked at once. What would I ask for? I'd ask for a village to slaughter and raise on my own. I'd ask for him to let me lose on any one of the Scarlet strongholds. I'd ask him to let me go back to Silithus and...no... NO! What is done is done and there is no going back!

"Yes, with rules to be laid out at the time. I'm here to tell you to prepare the rest of the hold. Our King is coming." With that the heavy boots carried their wearer away and quickly as he had come.

Necrophasia turned to her mistress and smiled, "I know exactly what I want when I win."

Alonea's long ears almost hit the woman as she she turned her back and walked away, "And you'll be the only person who knows what you want. I intend to win." My reward shall be your punishment, Thanis. You'll never run off on me again.