~*~ Chapter 20 ~*~

Kayas sipped the tea, letting the mellow liquid slide down her throat. It smelled like home. It tasted like home. She shifted to her elven form, took up the warm cup in her hands. "Shadowglen fadeleaf." She whispered.

The Warlock smiled, "Correct!" He wasn't bad looking for a formerly rotting corpse. At last he still had a full head of neatly groomed hair. Assuming it was his hair of course… "The Goblins are wonders at cross faction trading. I paid a pretty penny for that-"

"Apparently I'm not kaldorie enough for the good stuff." The scout began to whine.

"You don't like tea, child."

"I do so! Just… not… that tea."

The Warlock was highly amused, grinning at the youngest elf in room over her shoulder. "He prefers that stuff from Silvermoon. What do you call it?"

"Mana thistle, from Sunfair Farms. It's organic!"

The Priest was trying not to laugh but it wasn't working, "Define 'organic'." He scoffed. "Get back to work, youngling. Leave Serz alone. Whom he shares his tea with is his business."

Serz yellow eyes narrowed and two sets of male snorts and giggles came from behind her. There was some joke here she didn't understand. Instead of feeding it he extended a bony hand to Kayas and said, "It's a pleasure to meet you, my dear. I am Sean of Darrowshire. People call me Serz now of course."

'Of course,' She had heard a great deal about Darrowshire during their travels threw the Plaguelands. There had been a traitor there and everyone had died. All that was left now is the absent-minded ghost of a little girl who repeatedly asks strangers to find her missing dolly. Heartbreaking.

Gingerly she extended her own hand, trying not to mourn the loss of color there as she took his. Also trying not to grimace at touching a member of the Forsaken willingly. But his hand was warm from the tea and not altogether overly disgusting. "Kayas of Auberdine, Druid of the Wild."

"Lovely meeting you, quite lovely."

The imp bounced off his knee and lifted the lid from a small silver box. Inside were sparkling shapes of many sizes and colors. "Would you like a sugar cube, sweety? It really brings out the floral undertones of fadeleaf." Her beady eyes were smiling, rimmed in black lashes darkened with mascara. The soul shard on her necklace was almost empty and glowing dimly.

Kayas blinked. A well-behaved demon? "Thank you. Any relation to Ziltip?"

The she-imp stiffened, "I should say not! That ghastly creature – all he does is complain. Of course, if I belonged to that one-"

"Careful." Jetadiah warned.

"Of course. My apologies. Not all Warlocks are inclined to be so civilized as my Master here. It is a rather personal choice." There was a soft thunk and Ms. Imp went bounding behind her master. "Not to mean there is anything wrong with – er- that is – the way she is."

"Quite enough of that, Layla." Serz said. To the Priest he said, "Forgive her, m' Lord. Her tongue runs faster than her mouth when she's getting hungry."

"I don't take too kindly to insults of my companion, Serz. Teach her some manors before you bring her round again." Kayas turned to shoot a look at the Priest. He had gone at once from being a downtrodden wreck to a preening High Elf again in seconds. Then back to a wreck.

"Of course, it shant happen again." The little imp was hiding from the Priest's glare, swaying from foot to foot nervously. Serze reached down to pet the panther. "She's just hungry, isn't that right? Well fix her up in no time." Motioning for the imp to give him something, Serze took the small soul shard when the imps tiny hands dislodged it form it's mounting.

The shard shifted to float before the palm of his left hand, he stroked down the length of the panther. At first Kayas was about to protest, but then noticed the tiny twinges of purple looking lighting stuff shooing out of the cat's fur and into the shard. Cocking her head she watched as the application was repeated over the entire length of the purring cats body. Some of the bolts were rather large compared to others.

Then she understood. "Fleas? You're draining the souls from the fleas?"

The Warlock smiled, "That's right, my dear. And ticks. Mr. Meows wuvs his flea treatment. Don't you Mr. Meows?" The cat purred into his other palm. When the shard was full it was handed back to the imp, who replaced it on her necklace and went back to her tea.

Kayas blinked, "That's brilliant!" Fleas, those little buggers that bit her in the worst spots when she didn't bath often enough and spent too much time outdoors in her feline forms, were nasty buggers. She regularly had to undergo unpleasant and oft-times burning herbal treatments to get rid of them.

Serz smiled, genuinely pleased to hear the compliment. "I strive for excellence in all that I do."

Taking one of the sugar cubes out of the tin she dropped it into her tea. Serz reached for the pot and topped her cup off. She smiled in thanks. She liked this man. This undead being who looked so much like all the other Forsaken she had seen – but was as different from them as she was.

"So," Kayas asked, trying to figure out how to broach the subject, "What brings you to… this place?"

"A diplomatic mission." Serze said, topping off his own cup and adding a flower shaped sugar 'cube' with a solidified honey droplet in the middle. * "I suppose you're more concerned with Caspin here than I, correct?"

"Did you put a collar on him? Mr. Tinkerbottom overt there put one on me."

There was a twin set of yelps that made Kayas jump and almost drop her cup. She and Serz turned to find black soot on the twin aprons the two engineers were wearing. Both of them were rubbing blackened fingers. "That didn't work." Caspin frowned.

"Try not sticking your finger in it." Jetadiah quipped dryly.

"You stuck your finger in it."

"Yes, but I'm a professional."

Caspin frowned, his silver eyes half lidded in annoyance. He leaned closer to inspect the contraption once more, keeping all fingers safely out of range.

Serze was speaking, "I was there in Undercity when Corrosa's horse trotted you threw the gates. She locked me outside with the wall of fire before I could say anything to her."

"I though she locked me in." And subsequently locked the Priest out on purpose. But it had nothing to do with them.

"Well there was that too. But in fact I would have taken you back outside. I know how to… get my way when it comes to Corrosa."

"Rawr!" Jetadiah growled. He and Caspin snickered like school children. If Serze could have blushed he would have, and yet his head was high and unashamed.

Kayas suddenly understood the tea joke. Serz and … Corrosa? She shuttered. Three sets of snickers went up that time. She was about to give her opinions but remembered what the Priest had said about the imp earlier. He was rather protective of his Warlock. His Warlock.

"As if anyone could get to her." Serz said, "I think I've been trying for years now and she wont have anything to do with me. Wont keep company with the likes of me, no."

He took a deep breath and got back on topic, "I was outside and I guess that was good. I've never seen the High Priest here angry. I never knew it was possible."

"I get angry." Jetadiah sniffed indignantly.

"Yes, but your anger's name is usually Corrosa, so people don't usually realize it's from you."

"Well I have a reputation to uphold."

Caspin though now was a great time to say something, "Being a-" Smack. "Ow!" And was as quickly silenced.

"Yes, well." Serze was going on, "I'm glad I didn't get threw the door. The Dark Lady never liked me much so there wouldn't have been anything I could have done to save you either. She shut Corrosa down pretty fast."

Kayas wondered what that meant. If she had simply told Corrosa to stay out of it maybe, but the wording 'shut down' seemed odd.

"She read that book you wrote." Caspin offered.

"And promptly forbid me from making any more copies."

"It's a good book."

"Yes, but I think the Dark Lady doesn't want her people trying to tame live animals like our Mr. Meows here."** The Warlock continued to pet the giant panther as he spoke, "When Jetadiah came back I don't know what shocked the Dark Lady more: him going in the mote himself to get you, his accusations or his threats."

"Threats?"

"Oh yes-"

"Careful." The Priest said. He was sprinkling some kind of black powder over their experiment. The smaller elf beside him had scooted back against the wall. His mouth was formed in a small O and he was paying more attention to the story than anything.

"No matter. He and Corrosa are a very good team. They stopped you from changing into undead… completely. Not to say the Plague didn't change your system a bit… but not as much as you think. Most of the changes were superficial. Skin tone, nail tinting-"

"Eye color, lack of pupils, my hair – the glowing green spots all over me." Again the Priest pretended to be to integrated with his project to notice the glare. For a moment she caught the eye of the youngest elf though. He quickly looked away, as did she.

"All aesthetics you see. I have a cream for dry skin. It works wonders. An apothecary in Undercity-"

"I've had enough of what the Undercity's apothecaries have to offer, thank you."

* It's amazing what they've down with tea accessories in the modern era of Azeroth.

** Before Forsaken could be hunters. More on this in a latter chapter.