**WARNING: Chapter has sexual content (hopefully tastefully written). Sorry for the delay between 12 and 13 and the shortness of the chapters, but I'm trying to work my way through some writer's block issues.**
Thirteen.
The sun had not even crested the Redridge Mountains to the east, but Necrucian was already mounted and waiting for Kal just outside the gates of Stormwind. The deathknight carried nothing save the armour he wore and the greatsword named 'Redemption' upon his back while Kal's mount carried a bedroll and saddlebags of provisions. Necrucian said nothing, turning his mount down the road and leaving at a trot as Havarbrook's mount fell in beside him.
"It's three days to Westfal, and another after that before we'll reach Moonbrook." Kal had a map, but was doubtful he'd need it. They had but to follow the Trade Road east to the bridge that separated the provinces of Elwynn and Westfall, and then on to their goal.
"I'm aware." was all he got in reply and Kal decided the next four days were probably going to be some of the longest of his life. The deathknight's black, armoured destrier towered over Kal's smaller bay courser, but the gelding was game and had no problem keeping up with the stallion's longer stride. The hood of Necrucian's cloak concealed most of his face, save for his mouth and chin, but his blue eyes glowed from the depths of his cowl. The sun finally crested the eastern peaks and the clear sky glowed in shades of orange, pink and blue. There was no chill in the air, and breaking day promised to be warm and dry.
The day dragged on, as did the silence between the Captain and the deathknight and it annoyed Kal to no end. It wasn't that Necrucian was simply ignoring him. That he could have lived with, but the big man in black plate acted as though Havarbrook wasn't even there. Just before nightfall, they set up camp at the edge of a creek just off the road. While Kal's courser was sweaty and tired, neither undead man or beast seemed the least bit fatigued, and from the cold glance Necrucian gave him, it was obvious the deathknight believed Kal was just slowing him down. The deathknight disappeared into the woods while Havarbrook tended to his mount, returning with an armload of wood before pulling the saddle from his destrier.
Rifling through his saddlebags, Kal found his small kettle and a pair of cups and set about boiling some water to rehydrate a large bar of dried rations. The Captain squatted by the fire, tending to the kettle while the deathknight stood leaning against a tree and staring off into the night. "Did I wrong you in another life?" Kal couldn't take the strained silence anymore, and the tension between them was thick enough to cut with a dagger. Slowly, the deathknight's head turned and Necrucian looked down at him. The burning blue eyes shone from beneath the deathknight's cowl as he skewered Havarbrook with a cold stare, but Kal refused to be intimidated. "Where does this hatred you have for me come from?"
"If I hated you boy, you'd know it." The deathknight's voice was devoid of emotion, but the cerulean eyes beneath the cowl narrowed. Kal doubted there was that many years between them in age and bristled at the other man's condescending words.
"Then what the hell is your problem with me?" he asked as he stood from the fire. "What exactly did I do to earn your enmity?"
Necrucian was silent for a long moment while Havarbrook glared at him across the fire. How easy it would have been to just call upon the darkness that empowered him and throttle the irritant as he'd been forced to with Taliah when she'd drawn steel on Bolvar. The deathknight had only to look at the man to know who was better with a sword. Kal wouldn't have a prayer. "It took a Forsaken assassin to bring her down in Tarren Mill, and the anger of the sea to nearly take her life on our voyage here." Necrucian's eerie, hollow voice was low and cold "Yet the paladin is nearly killed by some lout with a sword while outside the shelter of Stormwind's walls." The frigid blue eyes narrowed into slits, hard and sharp as shards of glacial ice, and the air seemed to take on a chill despite the fire. "You were not strong enough to protect her."
"I was wounded…" Kal could almost feel the pink scar across his ribs twinge. "If it weren't for Taliah, I'd be dead." The memory of her kneeling over him, healing his wound as her own strength failed and trails of blood had slid from her nostrils and ears left the bitter taste of failure in his mouth. Havarbrook's hands curled into fists "You speak as though she were in need of protection. Taliah is a paladin, not a child."
"She is a paladin with an uncommon talent for finding or creating trouble." It was all Necrucian could do to not just reach out and twist the man's head off. In his mind, by taking her outside the safety of the city, Havarbrook had deliberately put Taliah in danger, and that was something the deathknight would not forgive. An icy smirk pulled at Necrucian's lips "You think you know the paladin, boy?" the deathknight barked a soft, short laugh. "You know nothing, Kal Havarbrook. Leave well enough alone."
Kal blinked as the realization hit him and let out a laugh of his own. "You're jealous." His tone was incredulous. Though Necrucian's gaze upon him remained steady, the deathknight did not deny the accusation. The deathknight had shown little enough emotion other than anger and contempt since they'd first laid eyes on each other. From the stories he'd heard from survivors of the fall of Lordaeron, deathknights were supposed to be little more than soulless killing machines, devoid of anything but the desire to slaughter and destroy in Arthas' name. Yet for all the grief Necrucian had given him in the last few days, Kal found he actually pitied the man and told him so. In three giant strides, the deathknight closed the distance between them so quickly that Kal didn't even have time to draw his sabre. Necrucian grabbed him by the throat, yanked the officer off his feet and pulled Kal so close they nearly could have kissed.
"Keep your pity, boy." The deathknight's eyes flared terribly bright and his anger seemed to frost the air so that Kal's strangled breaths turned to vapour in the air. "Pray that Taliah does not succumb to her wounds. For if she dies, not even the King can protect you from me." The deathknight's voice was a low growl and for the first time, Kal found himself afraid of the big man in black. He could hear the air whistle as it tried to get past the vice about his throat and his lungs screamed for air. The threat hung in the frigid air between them for what felt like an eternity and Kal began to see spot from lack of oxygen. With a last look of utter contempt, Necrucian opened his mailed fist and let Havarbrook drop to the ground. He turned away and walked off into the darkness as Kal landed on all fours, gasping for air. "Get some sleep, human. You're slowing me down enough as it is."
The yellow, orange and green canopy above them rustled gently in the breeze and the forest floor was dappled with afternoon sunlight. Silvery bark of the trees seemed like paper upon their trunks and the sweet sound of singing birds filled the air. With all the beauty around them, it was easy to forget that only four miles behind them, a savage war was raging.
Taliah held Joscelin's hand as they walked through the knee-high foliage beneath the spreading bows of the trees. The tired, dour look he had worn like a mantle back at the encampment had almost vanished, and Harkness seemed almost renewed. When a plea for aid had come from the combined force of Blood Elves and Draenei, warning that a massive demonic army held the fabled if tainted Sunwell, the Argent Dawn had answered. Lord Maxwell Tyrosus had assembled enough volunteers to form two mixed companies of archers and infantry, and given command of the force to Joscelin Harkness. Tyrosus had been reluctant to let Taliah join him, worrying that she would be a distraction within his new command, but had relented when it had become obvious that short of putting her in the stockade, there would be no separating the two paladins. At twenty-one, it was Joscelin's first command. Harkness had acquitted himself well, had made a point to learn the names of everyone in his command and had earned their respect as a man who would not ask anyone to do what he was not willing to do himself. When the butcher's bill of every engagement was tallied and he helped bury those they were lucky enough to find enough pieces to identify for a proper burial, the sense of loss was staggering. After a month of ferocious fighting, nearly half his men were dead or maimed, and while he hid it well, Taliah knew the burden of leadership weighed heavily upon him.
She looked over her shoulder and gave him a coy smile as the trees thinned and the ground beneath their feet became sandy. The warm breeze coming off the ocean smelled of salt with a hint of seaweed, a far cry from the stench of blood, torn-open bowels and scorched flesh that had filled their days and nights for weeks. Their unit had been pulled from the front lines for three days of rest, hot meals and clean bedrolls before they would have go back to sleeping in the mud and eating cold saltbeef and hardtack. She turned and grinned, kicking off her boots while she squirmed out of her breaches and tunic before dashing naked into the gentle surf, Joscelin hot on her heels. With only a day left of leave, Taliah was determined that for the next twenty-four hours, she would make Joscelin forget the last five weeks.
They cavorted in the waves like children, laughing and splashing and not caring that the camp's rearguard was probably watching. Had it not been for the sleek grey shape of a shark that came to investigate the noise in the breakers, Taliah was quite certain they would have stayed in the water until they'd both turned wrinkled and cold. They retreated from the surf, ceding the sea to the sharp-toothed predator and Taliah took Joss by the hands and led him up the beach to the treeline. While she was small and wiry, Harkness was tall and powerful. His muscles flexed and shifted beneath his tanned skin as he pulled Taliah back toward him, his arms wrapping about her somewhat possessively. Her tongue stroked over his broad chest and she could taste the ocean on his skin as she looked up at him from beneath her lashes.
Joscelin fought to temper his arousal, but when Taliah's teeth raked playfully across his chest and she grasped him with both hands to give him a gentle squeeze, Harkness couldn't have cared less if half the Burning Legion had suddenly appeared and stopped to watch. He sank to his knees, dragging her down with him and Taliah eagerly straddled his strong thighs. Joss bent his head, his lips pressing to hers and she wrapped her arms around his neck, her hands stroking through his red-gold hair as she squirmed shamelessly against the column of throbbing flesh trapped between them. His hands slid from her breasts and down her sides, stopping past the curve of her hips to grasp her rear, lifting Taliah easily. She pulled his face to her chest and Joss buried it between her breasts before his lips sought out their hardened peaks. His young lover gasped and squirmed in ecstasy and while she was distracted, Harkness began to lower her onto his lap.
There was nothing small about the man she'd pledged herself to, and Taliah bit her lip and threw back her head as Joss slowly buried himself, inch by inch, to the hilt. She was more than ready for him, but after a month in which they'd been too exhausted or busy fighting for their lives to have any time for sporting, she found their usual somewhat snug fit a little uncomfortable. Taliah could not help the throaty groan and shudder that escaped her and Joss pulled his mouth from her flesh, his blue eyes studied her face. "Are you all right?" His deep voice was husky with desire, but his concern for her comfort was genuine. In reply, Taliah pulled his face back to her breast.
"Less talk, more-" Anything she was going to say subsequently disappeared in a whimpered moan as Joss went back to his suckling. Taliah let him decide the rhythm and rocked against him eagerly. Slowly, his lips worked up her chest and branded her throat with kisses.
A few new scars had joined the others that marked her pale skin and he traced the one upon the top of her shoulder with his tongue. "We really shouldn't be doing this…" Despite his words, his hips continued their slow, deep movements that made Taliah bite her lip to keep her passionate cries quiet.
"Why not?" Taliah ground her hips against him, nearly making him explode, but when his grip on her rear tightened she subsided. It wasn't often that she would give him total control during their lovemaking, but she knew he was desperate for both emotional and physical release from the stress he was under. She could think of no better way than this. "Are you afraid someone might find us?" Her lips pressed to his ear, her heated breaths caressing his skin while her tongue and teeth teased his earlobe.
Her hands alternated between gripping and stroking his sodden, shoulder length hair and Joss chuckled wryly as he gently bit and sucked at her throat. "No, I'm afraid of what Tyrosus and Fordring will do to me if I have to send you back to Light's Hope because I put a child in your belly." Taliah threw back her head and laughed, but she sank to her knees and buried him as deeply as she could take him. Joscelin's eyes widened in surprise and rolled back in his head as his teeth left marks upon her neck.
"You talk too much…" She murmured against his skin, only to suddenly gasp, eyes wide, as her body arched against Joscelin. Taliah knew he'd have liked nothing more than to send her back to Light's Hope. Despite all they'd been through, between the fall of Lordaeron, the corruption of the Scarlet Crusade and the daily struggle to survive in the Plaguelands, the fighting in Quel'Danas was some of the most brutal and horrific they had ever endured. She moaned and shuddered eagerly as he kept her body against him. His hips gave an abrupt thrust and she cried out, her short nails raking his back as she buried her face into his chest while her breathing became a steady, soft panting. He felt her quiver around him, but he was unrelenting, determined to savour every whimper, moan and squeal he could get out of her. Harkness had always been a considerate lover, and though Taliah would have been content had he merely taken her for his own pleasure that day, Joss ensured she was well sated before allowing himself release. When he gave the final deep thrust and spent himself within her, Taliah buried her face against his strong neck to stifle what would have been a loud, shuddering cry.
When she could finally found the strength to look up at him, Taliah saw not Joscelin's tanned, handsome face, but the cold grey countenance of Arthas upon his throne. The cold, carved stone of the Lich King's throne room replaced the warm sand of the Quel'Danas beach beneath her knees. Arthas lounged upon his throne, his thin bloodless lips twisted in sadistic amusement. "He would have an excellent deathknight." He reflected and studied the orb in his hand. The small glowing shard within was a quarter again as large as the day before. When Taliah got to her feet and glowered at him hatefully, the Lich King goaded her with a smirk.
"Bastard!" Taliah raged and jerked back against the collar. The eight-foot chain leashing her to the Lich King's throne snapped tight, but the paladin did not surrender. Her head throbbed mercilessly, but the pain was nothing compared to her fury and hatred for the man who tormented her. He accorded her no rest, relentlessly forcing her to show him the more compromising moments of her life; tender moments with Joscelin, especially the rare occasions she had surrendered fully to the man she had loved, or moments in battle where she had doubted herself or felt small and helpless. Her memories and emotions were laid bare before him, called forth on a whim, but with every memory he plucked from her consciousness, her rage grew, but so did her fear. When the Lich King sent a lance of searing pain through the collar, Taliah swallowed her howl of anguish, bared her teeth and fought harder. Arthas let the paladin struggle for along moment before the chain at her neck coiled about her torso to haul her into the air and draw her towards him. Taliah still refused to submit, and he intensified her agony until her body strained and her screams echoed through his halls. When tears began to roll down her cheeks in a torrent, her strength faded and her voice was nearly gone, the sensation of being pealed like an onion slowly faded.
"I'm not afraid of you!" she snarled through clenched teeth as she hung bound before him. The paladin's chest heaved and her throat burned like fire with every breath. Arthas took her chin in a cruel iron grip and looked into her eyes curiously.
"You're a poor liar, paladin." He told her matter-of-factly and gave a long, slow inhale, as though testing the air "I can smell the fear on you, girl. And yet you bring this all on yourself." Taliah tried to jerk her face away, but the Lich King's grasp upon her jaw was unrelenting. "The pain I inflict upon you is only to help you see the truth; that even here, there is no escape from your King. There is one way to end this pain… this violation…" he told her softly "Bend the knee. Accept the power I offer, and I will make you into a force of vengeance against all those who've wronged you."
"I am a paladin of the Silver Hand." Taliah's voice was a hoarse croak. "There is no vengeance, only justice." The lines between reality and the nightmare she was caught up in were beginning to blur. If this was all playing out in her head, why did she have no control? Was the Lich King's power truly so great, or was she only this powerless without the Light? The only thing she was certain of was that defeat here would be just as permanent as if she truly was chained before him. "There will be no redemption in the Light for you Arthas, and I'll be the first to piss on your ashes." The chains that held her aloft suddenly slammed Taliah to the floor and the paladin gave a grunt as the air was driven from her lungs.
"I see I have been too lenient." The Lich King rose slowly from his throne and walked around her once with slow, heavy strides before looking down upon her with irritation. With a cold rattle of chains, Arthas put the spiked toe of his boot under the paladin and flipped her onto her back. The floor was so cold, it took Taliah's breath away and as she gasped, the Lich King reached down, his frigid mailed hand covering her face. When his hand flexed, Taliah was certain he would crush her skull. "Come, girl." His growl was low and fierce "Let me show you the 'truth' of the Silver Hand and the brothers you hold in such high regard."
The anteroom of the chapel was not large and was filled nearly to capacity with burly men. She recognized Uther and Gavinrad easily enough, and Saidan Dathrohan. The fourth, from whose point of view she was sharing as though she were walking around inside his head, had to be a younger Arthas. Gavinrad and Uther looked troubled, as did Dathrohan.
"Should we take the risk? Perhaps it would be best to just purge the Light from her consciousness." Dathrohan ran a hand over his face wearily. The memory was over a decade old, and Saidan was still human, and not merely the meatsuit for a demon that he would later become. "Had I known her bloodline led back to the Black Priest, I would have protested young King Varian's desire to have us foster her."
"She may be his direct descendent, but what happened in Arathor was almost two thousand years ago, and the deeds of Talos Melianir have long been forgotten by all but a few dusty historians and our own overzealous genealogist." Uther replied and his heavy brows turned downward in a scowl. "I will impress upon the man that he should forget what he has learned and swear him to silence."
"Perhaps Saidan is correct." Gavinrad The Dire's voice was one she knew well and Taliah felt sick to hear him agree with Dathrohan. "Perhaps there has been no trouble from the bloodline because this is the first instance of affinity for the Light since the Black Priest. It's a rare enough gift."
"Brothers…" it was Arthas who spoke now, and his voice was as she remembered, though it felt odd that she was seeing things as he had at the time. "Taliah is all of nine years old and has been uprooted from the only life she has ever known. She's frightened, and confused, and even now the girl is in her chambers crying and begging to be returned to her mother." Taliah remembered her journey to Stratholm from Southshore only too well; the feelings of fear, betrayal and abandonment had been so strong it had taken Gavinrad and Uther four years to convince her to write to her mother.
"Arthas is right." Uther's tone held a finality that the other men differed to, if grudgingly. "The Dawnstar girl has great potential, but it must be developed cautiously. She is yet innocent, so purging the Light from her mind would be a blasphemy, and yet the girl must not be free to explore her potential without guidance. If Taliah starts showing signs of … differing abilities… within the Light, we will deal with it then. As of now, however, she's a frightened child who needs our protection." Uther's blue eyes shifted to Gavinrad who looked less than pleased. "Considering the trouble she gave us on the journey here, however, she will need a firm, steady hand to guide her. I can think of no one better than you, Gavin." The Dire looked less than ecstatic.
"And if she is trained and turns against us later?" Gavinrad asked grimly "It will be my blade that is stained with the blood of Varian's child. It took the combined might of the elves and the Kingdom of Arathor to destroy the Black Priest. I will be damned before I allow her to wreak even a tenth of the destruction Melianir caused." Taliah couldn't believe what she was hearing. She had always regarded Gavinrad as a father, a protector who had cared for her wellbeing. She had never considered that he had been less her mentor and more of her keeper.
"Then let us hope it doesn't come to that."
Uther's words were a dismissal and the vision faded. Taliah blinked up at the ceiling as she once again saw the world within her mind through her own consciousness. It was a lie… it had to be. How could they have thought she would betray them, even before she could properly call upon the Light? Worst of all, to hear Gavinrad speak of ending her life, the man she had looked upon as a father in the absence of her own. And Uther, who had been no small object of hero worship to her, agreeing with him. Had it really been Arthas who had defended her? Had the meeting even happened?
"That is the 'truth' of the men you revere, paladin." Arthas told her as his cold hand came away from her face. "Had I not interceded on your behalf all those years ago, your abilities would never have been realized and you would have been condemned to a life of mediocrity." He knelt and looked down at her, his fierce, blazing eyes smouldering with blue fire within the sockets. Taliah's eyes squeezed shut against the intensity of his gaze and the sense of betrayal she fought to ignore.
"You're lying." The paladin told him flatly, trying to stamp out her doubts. "Nothing you say can be believed. You're a traitor, a liar and a coward and I'd spit in your face if not for the fact my mouth is dry."
"Lie to yourself if you must, paladin. It does not change what was discussed that day." He gave her a pitying look. "I will show you the truth of what you have seen, girl. Both Gavinrad and Uther are my… guests. When you come before me, you can ask them yourself." The Lich King returned to his throne, leaving Taliah on the floor to stare up at the ceiling, her heart filled with defiance, but the beginnings of doubt and despair as well.
He's lying. She told herself. Lord Gavinrad was a good man. He was my mentor, my father. He showed me the importance of loyalty and discipline. Loyalty and obedience to authority was something that came to her naturally, though discipline was something she had always struggled with. But if Arthas wasn't lying? What then?
Please… let him be lying.