A/N: Whew, finally a moment to myself. Babies are more time-consuming than you'd ever know until you have one. :P Sorry I haven't been able to respond much to reviews lately - it's all I can do sometimes to spend two seconds checking my email. I still really appreciate hearing from you all!
Olkhor felt dumber than he had in a long time. He felt like a damn whelpling gazing goggle-eyed at a wrapped present during Winter Veil, hoping that if he stared hard enough it might contain exactly what he wanted most. But those gods-blasted ruins were not doing anything new today, just as they hadn't for the past few days now. Either Galmak was having a pleasant vacation in there and didn't feel like coming home yet, or the animals still had a shitload more runes to find. Or the whole theory was bogus and he and the meatheaded ogre might as well have been taking knitting lessons the past week for all the good they'd been doing here. Olkhor snarled his frustration and kicked at a tree root as he turned away from his vigil.
They'd moved camp a few days ago, once he'd judged the pile of runes must be pretty large, even by Teyagah's standards. He couldn't imagine even such an obsessive woman wouldn't have her limits – the animals had excavated probably a dozen dozen of the damn things by now. And so he and Chu'thog had moved closer, theoretically ready to respond and help if something unusual began to happen in the village. Unusual was not happening, though.
Or at least it wasn't until the tauren decided to come out just a little further than usual looking for firewood.
Olkhor was just sitting down to some lunch when the damp breeze brought a new smell to his nose. He turned his face to the wind and sniffed, and immediately recognized the peculiar musty, heavy odor of tauren, closer than ever. With a subsonic growl he motioned to Chu'thog and the two of them rose silently to move away into the brush.
Lahgga had gone east today in search of dry wood. He'd been forced to range a little further, having already picked clean the closer sources around the village. The store he'd built up was running low and it was time to find a little more dry wood for immediate use and several bundles of damper wood to dry out for the future. With a quick, shimmering cast of magic, he'd slipped into his feline form as he left the village and set off into the trees.
With a silent jerk of a finger, Olkhor pointed through the mid-day gloom. It was definitely the tauren they'd seen in the ruins on many occasions. He was snapping a dead bush's branches with powerful, almost absent-minded movements and piling the wood in a rope sling nearby. Olkhor pointed to Chu'thog's spear, pointed to the tauren, and wrapped a hand around his own upper arm. The ogre followed the movements carefully, grinned and nodded.
The spear, like its owner, was surprisingly silent for its size. With a mighty heave, Chu'thog sent it flying through the air with barely a whistle. Olkhor, however, gave a whistle of appreciation as the glinting tip buried itself with amazing precision right in the tauren's upper arm. Lahgga roared in pain and alarm; Olkhor and Chu'thog charged forward. The ogre tackled the tauren and sent him thudding to the ground with the wind knocked out of him, and Lahgga's roar died in an undignified squeak. Olkhor seized the spear at the middle and held it as it was, still stuck deep in the tauren's arm.
"Who…" Lahgga managed to wheeze out. He groaned and tried to reach for the spear, but Olkhor tightened his grip and let the blade sink just a hair deeper. Lahgga tried to howl until Chu'thog wrapped an enormous hand around his snout.
"Would love to take this out, since you seem to hate it so much," Olkhor growled with a trace of a feral grin, "but then I think you'd end up as a cat and try to get away from us."
"You'll bleed me out and I can't tell you anything dead," the tauren groaned.
"Don't think so." Olkhor examined the wound with exaggerated concern. "It's not that bad. Guess I could replace it with my axe in your leg if you'd rather."
"If you're wanting to know about that place, I can't tell you much. Just got hired for a job on Azeroth, is all. Some undead… assumed they were Scourge. You don't ask too many questions in my business or you wind up dead."
"I smell a stinking kettle of bullshit," Olkhor said with glee. "And anyway… what do you think, Chu'thog, do we care much what he has to tell us about this, or would we rather smash heads?"
"Smash heads!" Chu'thog roared, before Olkhor growled at him to keep quiet so close to the ruins.
Lahgga was wheezing with pain by now and his blood was beginning to stain the ground. Olkhor stepped over to the pile of firewood, dumped it out of the sling, and handed the ropes to Chu'thog to break apart into ties for the huge tauren. He wasn't sure if the ties would keep Lahgga from taking on his stealthy cat form forever, but they would probably make it more difficult and painful. It should be long enough, anyway, to get something set up that might work a little better.
"Tie him and come back over," he said to the ogre, then headed back to the camp. Once there, he grabbed several handfuls of runestones off the pile and began arranging them in a circle about ten paces in diameter. He examined his handiwork and added a few more to the circle just as Chu'thog trundled into view, the tauren resting like a giant, very disgruntled baby in his arms. Olkhor pointed to the circle and Chu'thog laughed.
"You smart," the ogre praised. Olkhor grunted.
"Shit," Lahgga commented at the sight of the rune circle, and now Olkhor was satisfied that he could agree with Chu'thog. The trussed tauren bucked futilely as the ogre dumped him inside the circle.
"I guess you know what these are," Olkhor remarked dryly, pointing at the stones, "and who made them. I also guess you know they're not very friendly to people who try to use magic inside them." He had no idea if that were strictly true – the runes might only be tuned to keep Galmak from using magic. It was unlikely Lahgga knew any more about them than Olkhor did, however, and he would certainly know that anything Var'kan and Teyagah had a hand in was bound to be nasty.
The tauren stared at him with a sullen, angry eye. "What do you want to know?" he finally snarled.
"Are the orc and the draenei still in decent shape in there?"
A glare and a snort. "For now."
"Is that…" Olkhor let out a particularly foul and inventive string of curses, finally running up to, "…damned troll still in the village?"
Lahgga nodded grudgingly.
"Alright." The orc jerked his head at Chu'thog and they stepped away through the bushes so they could speak privately. "Move, and you'll run into his spear again," Olkhor called back over his shoulder. Chu'thog grinned widely and twirled the huge spear for emphasis.
"What we do now?" the ogre asked.
Olkhor gazed thoughtfully through the trees toward the nearby ruins for a moment before he answered, "Nothing again. More waiting."
"What…" It was almost a whine, and the orc smiled sourly.
"Think, meathead. That idiot confirmed our theory about the runestones. Galmak's getting stronger, but he's got to be good and ready before he makes a move. Only one chance, see. But now we've taken out one of their problems for them. Kitty-cow is here trussed up like a turkey and not going anywhere. That leaves the undead, which Galmak'll have to deal with anyway, and then just that gods-damned troll. The shades, of course; dunno how he plans on handling that. But still, one less problem for them."
Chu'thog considered this for a moment and then nodded with some disappointment. "You right. We smash heads later, at the signal."
"Exactly. The animals'll help us guard that goon in the meantime. We just have to make sure he stays tied inside that circle and doesn't yell too loud."
"Why did you keep silent until now?"
Var'kan's voice was flat but the anger on his face was unmistakable. Jas'ka lowered his eyes and slumped his shoulders.
"Thought 'ee'd come back. 'Ee been out a thousan' times fo' firewood an' meat."
Teyagah's arms were crossed; one foot tapped impatiently at the floor and her eyes were narrowed in scorn. "Coward. You are afraid of taking the blame since he was your suggestion. Why didn't you go with him?"
"He was just paid a few days ago," Var'kan commented. "A mercenary. Perhaps we got just what we paid for."
"Ah wouldn' go wit' a deserter, Ah serve da Horde wit' pride!" The troll managed a little defiance, but it died quickly at the look on Teyagah's face and turned to sullenness. "Ah know Lahgga an 'ee wouldn'ta run off. Lahgga finishes 'is jobs."
"Then perhaps he'll still come back and finish," Var'kan said with a dangerous glint in his eye. "Until then, you will be on double watch. We will deal with him later, once our business is concluded here."
Jas'ka drew himself up and saluted with a sulky scrap of dignity. He disappeared back down the corridor, muttering, before the door clicked shut behind him.
Hyara had watched the exchange with a touch of malicious amusement. She couldn't decide which was more likely: Lahgga really was the capricious, greedy bastard his mercenary background would suggest, or Olkhor was trying yet another tack to help them out of here. It was also a bonus to see Var'kan and Teyagah both looking sourer than usual because of someone besides herself and Galmak. The smirk left her face, however, when she heard the next thing that came out of Galmak's mouth.
"No brilliant ideas of escape, whelp," Teyagah said with a glare. "We will be watching you as closely as ever."
But Galmak barely seemed to hear the comment. He was staring across the room with a faint frown, half lost in thought, and then he opened his mouth and asked hesitantly, "What's involved in becoming undead?"
Their captors traded a fleeting, expressionless glance. Hyara could barely believe her ears.
"For the person undergoing the process, very little," Var'kan replied neutrally, perhaps also not daring to believe what he'd heard. "All the preparation is done by those performing the ritual. It is relatively painless. Even the death need not be painful."
Hyara thought she saw Teyagah's mouth quirk at some part of Var'kan's explanation. The draenei shivered involuntarily and stared at her husband, willing his mind to open to her and disclose what he was thinking. But she couldn't sense much of any emotion from him. He was calm as a forest pond and just as unreadable below the surface.
Galmak paused for a moment in thought and then took a breath like a diver before the plunge. "How does the immortality work? What makes you so sure you're immortal?"
It was obvious now that Var'kan had made up his mind to tread very lightly, as if he feared scaring away this new and skittish curiosity. He took a seat heavily on one of the room's chairs and made a motion for Galmak to sit also. The young orc sat obediently, while Teyagah continued to hover in front of him with her unfathomable gaze boring into the top of her pupil's head. Hyara knew he could feel her fear and confusion because she was feeling something besides calm from him now – it was the sensation of a gentle but firm and impatient push against her mind. He wanted her to stay out of this. He wanted to ask these questions and hear the answers without her input. And she absolutely didn't want that.
She finally found her voice, although she felt as if there were a rock lodged in her throat. "Galmak. You don't need to hear any of this. Please don't listen to them."
He didn't even look her direction. She saw the unmistakable gleam of triumph in Var'kan's eye and the horrible grin cracked his face. He answered Galmak as if she'd never spoken.
"For one, young brother, the undead body does not age in the way a living body does. Teyagah and I look today exactly as we did the day we died, decades ago, aside from a few recent casualties on my part, of course." He chuckled and waved a hand at the stump of his left ankle. "And instead of biological healing, which in many cases is a very time- and energy-consuming process, our bodies are replenished by magical regeneration. The energy our bodies draw upon is outside ourselves and limitless. Of course, once again, there are some injuries which are unhealable or even fatal. A missing or very badly mangled foot will not regrow, even for us, nor will a missing eye. But you have seen that there are nonetheless many injuries we can simply shrug off which a living body could not endure; I believe you'll remember when you put a knife through my chest."
He said it merely conversationally, a simple reminder of an inconsequential incident, and Galmak only nodded. Galmak's expression had shifted subtly and Hyara's stomach tingled unpleasantly as she recognized cautious but growing interest in him.
"And so," Var'kan continued, "without aging or decay or susceptibility to all the usual injuries comes a form of immortality. Rather different, of course, from your mate's variety, since hers is not truly immortality but extreme longevity. She will grow old some very far off day; an undead such as us will not, but will simply continue until stopped in his tracks by some outside force. Our bodies do not betray us, you see."
"I haven't heard that the Forsaken are particularly immortal. Maybe a little longer lived, but I've seen what starts to happen to them after they've been around a while. What's so special about you compared to them?"
"They are very different, whelp," Teyagah said with a sniff. "They were raised by crude means, with methods meant for the masses. They were never intended to retain any of the characteristics they have been able to regain with their freedom from the Scourge. Our process is entirely different, and magically based. The people raised through our means have always – always – been intended to retain their minds, their individual wills, and their powers before death. Our undeath was meant to strengthen, not to turn us to automatons."
"And they do retain all those things. Every time? There's nothing… nothing unexpected?" He showed a trace of uneasiness now along with his guarded enthusiasm, although to his wife he seemed inwardly very calm still.
"Never anything unexpected when someone such as myself or your grandmother is performing the ritual," Var'kan reassured. His voice was almost warm now and Hyara could smell his triumph across the room. It made her seethe, the way he believed he'd won, or nearly so. Galmak wasn't serious, not at all, not… not yet.
She tried again, feeling slightly more desperate than last time. Even hearing him talk about it set her stomach twisting. "Love, why are you–"
"Hyara, I want to hear about this," he growled. His voice was gentle but he was unmistakably annoyed.
The rebuke, however mild, stung; they were so rarely at odds with each other, and even less often about anything that mattered much. "Not on my account," she said. "I'd rather have a half dozen decades with you as you were meant to be than have you twist yourself like– like them."
It hurt them both as soon as she'd said it, but Light help her, it was the right thing to say. He didn't need this. She loved him and they'd both known what they were in for from the beginning.
He stared at her, and her heart felt like breaking at the sadness she saw in his brown eyes. "You're not the one who's going to die after those half dozen decades," he said softly.
***
The day was finished finally, after several more excruciating hours. Jas'ka was in a particularly bad mood and had practically kicked them back into their prison room. Hyara rearranged the blankets and pillows and then laid down with her face to the wall.
She wanted nothing more than to talk to her mate and find out what in hells he was thinking, while at the same time she didn't want to say a single word to him. What was he thinking? He couldn't make himself suffer like that, couldn't be thinking of making her crazy with worry. He couldn't possibly believe he'd hit upon the best way to be a father to their twins, by allowing those two to kill him and then transform him into… that. It was unspeakable.
"Hyara," he said quietly, and tonight she heard barely a trace of the strain in his voice that she'd grown used to hearing when he held the Shadow under control. "Please listen to me a moment." He laid down at her back and nestled his warm body against hers. She didn't pull away. "Try to forget about anything I said in there. I'm sorry I had to do that to you, love, but it seemed like the best way."
"Now what are you talking about?" she choked. "I hardly knew what I was hearing. I didn't think you'd ever consider…"
"No. I needed to do that because… well, because of your blow-up with Teyagah, frankly."
She squirmed over to her other side and faced him in disbelief. "You… rat. You made me think…" She was flushed with the beginnings of outrage, an expression he'd always found particularly alluring on her, and he couldn't resist flashing a devilish grin.
He sobered quickly, though. "Love, I'm sorry. We're so short on time now, and more so after you lost your temper. What I said in there might have bought us another day or so; I don't know. They convinced me to embrace Shadow magic because it was the only thing I could do, and I'm counting on them believing they can do the same with this. Showing some interest might head them off from taking a more drastic approach. But it had to be believable, do you see? It wouldn't have been if you'd shown any other reaction but what you did. I'm so sorry it had to be that way."
It was an achy, sick relief she felt. He didn't mean it, and that was good. It was good that he was still resigned to die thousands of years before she would. Gods, why did they need to get these awful reminders once in a while? She nuzzled her face against his chest and smeared her tears across his dirty shirt front.
"So let me guess," she said, voice muffled and stuffy. "By tomorrow morning we've argued and I've cried my eyes out, but you've stayed stubborn and it's made you more determined than ever to hear more about it. And I just sit there looking woebegone and despairing, but more or less reconciled to it since it's what you seem to want."
"Yes," he said gently. "That's the idea. And meanwhile more runes disappear, providing Palla and Gink can find any more. We're very close, love. But I need a little longer to be as sure as I can. Ancestors know I'm uncertain enough, and I'll only get the one chance."
They made love tenderly that night, savoring it more than ever for the pain they'd felt that day, and each trying not to think that it could be their last time. When they'd finally exhausted each other they fell asleep on the floor, not even bothering to care that Jas'ka had been listening from behind the curtain. But Hyara filed the information away with her brain already working at a way to use the troll's perverted interest.
Unusually, they awoke early the next morning to Teyagah's voice snapping something at Jas'ka, and then the curtain whipped aside and she clapped her hands impatiently for them to get up. They shrugged off their sleepiness as Galmak grabbed his pile of books and Hyara her pillows, and then they were being hustled toward the next room to begin another day. Galmak noted that Lahgga was still absent, Jas'ka eyeing them malevolently from his seat at the fireside. The troll's eyes lingered perhaps a little too long on Hyara, and Galmak bared his tusks in a warning snarl as he disappeared into the back room.
"Have you made progress with the books?" Var'kan asked immediately.
Galmak nodded with some reluctance. "It's not as hard as I thought it'd be. I've worked through the first few."
"Of course it isn't, when you are learning the other knowledge that goes with it," Teyagah sniffed. "No doubt your stubborn mother put all sorts of ridiculous ideas in your head about it being too hard."
"She didn't put any ideas at all in my head about learning Demonic," he shot back with a glare. "She gave it all up, did you know that? She hasn't used her abilities as a warlock in years. Maybe a half a dozen times since I was born, and only when she had no other choice. She despises it and she never would have wanted that path for her son if there'd been any other way. Everything you taught her, if you taught her anything at all, has gone for nothing for more than twenty years now." He was on a roll and didn't feel like stopping. Was there anything that could bring Teyagah down a peg? The desire to hurt her emotionally was suddenly very strong. "And do you know what else? I wasn't a shaman more than a few months at most. I never cared for hiding behind magic when I fought. I've been a hunter all my life, just like my father."
For a moment he thought he'd achieved his goal. She was staring at him with open incredulity; about which revelation, he couldn't be sure. But then she laughed, and it was his turn to wonder – the laughter sounded genuine, open and mirthful, with no hint of scorn or irony.
"She did, did she? Stubborn girl, indeed. She threatened she would. I remember that last year… she had lost faith in our cause, even in the face of the humans' brutality. She continued for a time, but there was no heart in it, a mere defensive reflex. She swore she would give it up the first real chance she got, and now you say she has done it all these years. My strong, ridiculous daughter." Her smile was all pride and it made her features more beautiful. With a wrench of his stomach, Galmak realized that at this moment only the eyes looked undead. Here was the grandmother he'd never known.
And then it melted away, her face twisted again in the bitter scorn she seemed always to wear. "Tell your slave to sit," she spat. "She is gaping like an idiot Lost One." Teyagah spun away and stalked to a far corner where she made herself busy with some cryptic task, leaving Var'kan to take over. But he was staring at Teyagah too with some inscrutable look on his face and it was a few awkward seconds before he seemed to come to himself again.
"I trust you have considered further our conversation from yesterday," he said finally.
"I have," Galmak answered and allowed his eyes to grow hard with stubbornness and shift for an instant toward Hyara. Var'kan wouldn't have missed that look. "I want to hear about what's involved, specifically. I know you said there was nothing for your subject to do, but I want to hear about it anyway."
"Hmm, understandable, I suppose," the undead mused after a careful pause. He dragged a chair closer and sat. Galmak wondered suddenly at the gesture. Did Var'kan tire, undead though he was, standing with only the iron cane to lean on, or was it merely habit to sit?
The undead pursed his lips and nodded as if squaring something in his mind, then began.
"We began the process of preparation weeks ago. Months ago, really, if you count all the items we brought from Azeroth. There are many things involved beyond the magic we use. Jas'ka was instrumental in procuring some of the items for us, since our mobility, even on Azeroth, tends to be rather limited. There are not many places that welcome undead of our particular provenance, as you can imagine. You have seen our preparation of these powders–" He motioned to the work benches around the room, "–which we will use in the ritual. They are, of course, magically infused. With many of them, the balance is very delicate and the preparation extremely difficult to obtain the best results. There, you are lucky; Teyagah and I are highly skilled in all aspects of necromancy. There are runes involved as well, and spoken spells."
Galmak tried to keep the impatience from his voice. "And how does it all fit together?"
Var'kan narrowed his good eye and gazed imperiously at the young orc for a few seconds, obviously not caring for the interruption. He continued, ignoring the question, "As I said before, there need be nothing special about the death. Of course, there can be, if the person prefers it. Several of our fellows in the Aerie Peaks were reanimated that way in our village, as was I, in fact, before them. But the manner of death may be completely mundane, as long as any violence does not destroy the vital systems. The main one of which is the head, as you can imagine, with another being the heart, which you might be surprised to learn, young brother."
At this he paused and seemed to be inviting a comment. Galmak only raised a questioning eyebrow, which seemed good enough for Var'kan.
"The heart is still important for circulating magic in our bodies. You have seen that we don't have blood in your sense, but we do still depend on magical fluid in our veins, to an extent. A damaged heart in one to be raised can be repaired, as long as the damage isn't too extensive. But a destroyed or missing heart complicates things a great deal.
"And so, once the death has been achieved, the body is laid out and carefully prepared with the magical substances. The runes are scribed just so – it is very specific to each person – and the preliminary spells are cast. The process often takes longer the longer the person has been dead. It is always painstaking, regardless. The final spells are cast when the last, and most important, runes are scribed and activated. And then the ceremony is complete. The magic does its work and we welcome another into unlife."
Silence settled for a moment, with Galmak appearing deep in thought. There was the occasional stifled gulp or sniffle from Hyara across the room. Her mate could tell her distress was genuine even despite their conversation of the night before and he regretted that he could only send a little reassurance through their bond.
"Quite simple," Var'kan prodded with a glitter of impatience in his eye.
Galmak nodded slowly, though it didn't sound particularly simple to him and Var'kan had most certainly left out the useful details. "For me, at least," he agreed. It was the first admission, from either of them, that any of the conversation actually referred to him. That fact apparently wasn't lost on the undead and he smiled twistedly. "And," the young orc continued, "I'm to take it that you came here prepared, with just this in mind? You have everything ready?" He looked up and glared. "Don't take this as immediate acceptance. I want to know better what happens to Hyara afterward. What happens to the two of us together."
Var'kan coughed. It was an incongruous sound, as if he were masking a chuckle. "You may decide what happens to her. As I mentioned, there may be a way to complete her transformation to full eredar if you wish. If not, then you may keep her on as she is. What more is there to know?"
"Will my feelings for her change." His voice was very quiet and very firm. His brown eyes bored into the undead's.
Var'kan was unfazed. "I think, from what I have seen, it is more a question of what her feelings will do. She has made it clear she disapproves, young brother. You may find that her love collapses under such pressure. I suppose even under those conditions you could still keep her, but I imagine the arrangement would be… less satisfactory."
Galmak was inclined to just go on and let him dodge the question under the circumstances. There were a few other things he desperately wanted to know. "I remember you said that before about her transformation. What do you mean, you know how it could be completed?"
"Might," Var'kan corrected with a thin smile. "There are certainly ways on Legion worlds, but I expect that is far more trouble than anyone is willing to go to. There might be a way closer to home. Should you join us, we will look into it, that I promise. Really, there is no need to worry over your mate in all this. She will be taken care of, not least of all by you. And you will finally have far greater power to take care of her."
There was no end to Var'kan's evasiveness. Galmak snarled inwardly and sent a silent string of foul language at the undead as he resumed his feet for the next round of training. When lunchtime came around, he looked over to see Hyara sitting as usual against the wall with her face buried between her knees. At the customary signal from the undead, Galmak contained the roiling Shadow and sauntered over to collect her for their midday break.
"Bring one of your books," she hissed as he knelt at her side. "We're getting out now."