Prince was gone.

My beautiful white horse, the last gift Sylvanas had given me when she'd been alive, was dead.

I felt numb, not wanting to get out of bed or do anything.

Sylvanas stayed with me as much as she could, but having a city to run, she couldn't stay with me all day and all night.

But she did make sure that I ate something, spoon-feeding me, though Sunwell knew she didn't have the patience for it.

She was grieving too, I noticed, but her grief was different than mine. I couldn't figure it out, and didn't know how to comfort her, except to force myself to move on, although at that point in time, I didn't want to. I wanted to be sad. I wanted to cry, and didn't want to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

"Faith, please…" she told me. "Don't do this."

I looked at her and saw the pain in her eyes.

"I can't see you like this." She stood up, exasperated, and I grabbed her hand, pulling her back to me, climbing onto her lap and wrapping my arms around her waist.

"I'm sorry, Sylvanas," I said to her. "I don't mean to hurt you. Forgive me?"

"Do you promise to get up, take a bath, and get dressed?"

I nodded.

"Good. Now let's see you getting up."

"Will you make love to me?"

"If that's the only thing that will get you moving, fine," she shook her head at me and watched as I got undressed and stood up, going to where the iron tub was located in a corner of the room.

I conjured some hot water in there, and was about to step in when I felt a hand on my waist.

"I'll see you later on, okay?"

"You're not staying?" I asked, despair threatening to come over me at the thought of being alone.

"I would if I could. Come see me when you're done?"

I nodded.

I met Sylvanas in the Undercity throne room a while later. She took my hand when I reached her, squeezing it gently. "Are you all right?" she asked me.

"No. But I will be."

"Good. I was wondering if you could do me a favor."

"Sure."

"I hate to ask you this, because it's menial, but I trust your magic."

"Just ask me?" I said, feeling a little amused.

"Could you please check the bridges in the city? Some of them seem to be crumbling for some reason."

I started to laugh, "You dragged me out of bed to ask me to check on the Undercity bridges?"

"Do I need to make it an order?"

I was still laughing, "No, no, I'll check them, don't worry. But they're crumbling because we're in Undercity and stuff tends to decay here faster than anyplace else." I shook my head and looked at her, "May I have a kiss?"

"Incorrigible," muttered Sylvanas, pulling me to her and pressing her lips to mine, "Happy?"

"No. But it's a start." I kissed her again and left, ignoring the heated glare coming from Varimathras. I'd been getting more of those looks from him lately, and I wasn't altogether reassured about it.

Sylvanas trusts him.Make an effort, will you?

I supposed that I had to, so I simply put it out of my mind and went to the bridges, which were indeed in bad shape. One of them was crumbling before my eyes as masons attempted to repair it. Standing close, I added magic to what they were doing, and found that it worked quite well. After an hour, the bridge was sound.

We moved on, working on three other bridges, before I realized that somebody was watching me. I wouldn't have normally paid attention to her, except that I noticed that, while she was clearly dead, she wasn't a Forsaken.

At first glance, I saw that she was as tall as I was, perhaps a hair taller. Her skin was a very pale icy blue, her hair dark silver. Her eyes glowed with the blue necromantic light that animated death knights, and I could almost feel the chill coming from her body in waves. For some reason, she seemed familiar to me, but I couldn't pinpoint it.

She was very pretty. She must have been breathtaking in life, and I wondered how it was that she had been turned into a death knight.

"Hey you!" she called to me.

Hey me? I raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah, you the elf slave on the bridge."

Elf slave? I looked down at myself. My black robes were dusted gray because of my work on the bridges, but I most certainly hoped that I didn't look like a slave. I glanced at the masons, who just shrugged at me.

"What, are you mute?" said the knight, coming closer. "I'm looking for Sylvanas."

"Sylvanas," I repeated.

"The queen?"

"I know who Sylvanas is," I replied.

"Oh, good. For a moment there I thought you were an idiot."

"Imagine that," I said, turning back towards the bridge and performing a spell on it to hold the stones together more securely. The structure glowed a brief white before the magic settled.

"Hello, so where is she?"

"Lady Sylvanas?" I looked at the clock on the wall, "She's most probably still in the throne room in the Royal Quarter."

"Take me to her."

"Excuse me?"

"I said, take me to her."

I nearly refused. Quite apart from not wanting to be ordered around by a newcomer as though I were some common street urchin, I felt immediate dislike for this girl, whoever she was. But since it would take me to Sylvanas, I wasn't really going to complain. I looked at the masons, "I'll be right back," I told them as I joined the death knight.

"So, you work for the Forsaken, do you?" she asked me as we began to walk.

"You might say that," I answered.

"Oh, you can't tell me? Did they forbid you to talk or something?"

She really thought that I was a slave to Undercity. I would have laughed, but the idea of anybody thinking that about me was repulsive. Quickly, I performed a spell on myself to get rid of the dust that covered me, turning my clothes fully black again.

"That's better. You looked ghastly. Although your skin looks horrible, even after that. Can you fix it?"

I knew my skin had been pale lately because I hadn't been eating much. But her comment stung me. "You ought to take a look in the mirror before you start commenting on other people's appearance," I told her as we reached the throne room, where Sylvanas was talking to a few ambassadors from the Darkspear Trolls and Thunder Bluff.

The girl struck me, hard, her gauntleted hand catching my face and sending me reeling back against the wall, where I hit my head.

Several people cried out. Guards immediately advanced on the girl, grabbing her arms, and Sylvanas fairly flew to me.

"Faith… are you okay?" she asked me softly. Her hand touched my jaw, where I could already feel a bruise forming. "Say something."

"I'm fine," I mumbled, more embarrassed than anything. I hadn't even seen it coming.

Sylvanas stood, unsheathing her sword and walking to the girl, who had been forced to kneel on the floor.

"Give me one good reason not to end what's left of your life, death knight," she snarled.

"You're going to kill me for striking a slave?"

"You think she's a…" Sylvanas raised her sword.

"Wait, please!" said the girl, looking around suddenly. "I came here to serve you. You said that Undercity would be open to death knights."

"Unless they strike my top advisor for absolutely no reason," Sylvanas' voice was dangerously low.

"I didn't know she was your top advisor! She was working on the bridges like some common slave." She glared at me, "You didn't tell me."

"You didn't ask," I said, unable to open my jaw very wide. "As a matter of fact, you didn't even introduce yourself."

"Cindera," she said. "Cindera Bloodstorm."

I realized why she had seemed familiar to me. "Ah, damn," I muttered. "The Scourge got her."

Sylvanas looked at me, "What?"

"I sent you that sketch while I was in Hearthglen, remember?" I pushed myself off the wall. "I'll go alert Lady Liadrin to this."

"Get yourself healed first."

"I'm fine."

"Now."

"I'll do it there."

Before Sylvanas could protest any further, I created a portal to Silvermoon and stepped through it, landing in the portal room at Sunfury Spire.

"Faith!" cried Halduron, who was apparently there talking to one of the mages on duty. "What are you doing here? You're hurt?"

"Oh, it's nothing," I said through gritted teeth. Pain was cresting in the area where Cindera had struck me. "I need to talk to Lady Liadrin. Is she near?"

"Actually, she's talking to Lor'themar now. Come on over, we'll get your jaw fixed."

"It'll heal on its own," I said, although I was getting one hell of a headache.

"Stop being brave," he gently took my arm and led me further inside the spire just as Lor'themar and Lady Liadrin came out of one of the meeting rooms. "Ah, Liadrin, Faith needs to talk to you. But, could you do something about this first?" he gestured to my jaw.

Lady Liadrin came towards me and probed my face gently. I hissed in protest and tried to pull away, but her hands followed. "Hold still, Faith," she said. She whispered a spell, and her fingers became very warm. The pain in my jaw and head increased for a second, before diminishing completely. "There you go. What happened? Did Sylvanas hit you again?"

"Sylvanas… no! No, but we found Cindera. The paladin you reported missing a few months ago."

"Bloodstorm, yes. Her parents have been frantic. Thank the Sunwell you found her. Where is she?"

"Undercity," I said slowly.

"Why's she in Undercity?" asked Lor'themar.

I sighed, "She's not… ah, she's not technically alive. I'm sorry."

"What? What are you saying?"

"The Scourge got her, probably when she got to the Ghostlands. They must have brought her to the Plaguelands and killed her there, because she's a death knight now."

Lor'themar swore, shaking his head, "I thought the Scourge was all but gone from Quel'Thalas. Evidently I was wrong."

"There are still some active pockets in Suncrown Village and Windrunner Spire."

"They retook the Spire?" I asked.

Lady Liadrin nodded, "The Forsaken stationed at Tranquillien are already working on it."

"Good. I trust you'll let me know if you need further assistance." I put a hand on her shoulder, "I'm sorry about your paladin."

"Can she stay in Undercity?"

"If Sylvanas hasn't executed her for striking me, I think she might."

"She's the one who hit you?" she sounded stunned. "I knew her… she was never the kind of person to be violent."

"Sylvanas never tortured anybody when she was alive either. Service to the Scourge changes people. I need to get back to Undercity, but I just wanted to let you know about this."

Lady Liadrin nodded, "Thank you, Faith."

"Thanks for the heal."

"Anytime. I'll have to contact her family… I suppose they can go to Undercity to see her or something."

"I wouldn't recommend that, in all honesty. They need to get used to the fact that she's gone, and whatever is there, inhabiting her body, it's not their daughter."

"I don't think that'll matter to them, Faith. The Bloodstorms are a very influential family on Sunstrider Isle, they won't take no for an answer. You know them, they were called Sunstorm before Quel'Thalas fell."

"Well then, they'll have to face the consequences," I said, remembering what I'd heard about the patriarch of the family. "They need to grieve for the daughter they lost. Otherwise, they'll have a worse time than I'm having now dealing with what Sylvanas has become. Trust me when I say it's not easy."

"We know."

"I know you know. I'm just telling you that you should prepare them for the worst." I smiled, "I'm sorry for the rushed visit. I promise I'll stay a bit longer next time."

"You look pale, Faith. Have you been eating?"

"Not really… Prince died."

"Your horse?" asked Halduron.

"Sylvanas' horse, yeah. It just… brought back some bad memories, that's all." I gave everyone quick hugs, then created another portal and went home, where Sylvanas was waiting for me. Cindera was still kneeling on the floor, with a sword to her neck. Droplets of dark blood had pearled on her pale skin where the blade had already nicked her.

"What did they say?"

"They'll contact her parents. Incidentally, Sylvanas, you'll remember them. It's the Bloodstorm family from Sunstrider Isle. They were called Sunstorm."

"If you think that'll stop me from executing her for hitting you, you're wrong."

"I'll leave that up to you, Your Grace," I said, giving a small bow. "But remember that I struck you once out of anger, and you didn't have me executed on the spot."

I could tell that Sylvanas wanted to scream at me for bringing that up, but she couldn't do anything until we were alone, so I quickly went on.

"I can only hope that you will be as magnanimous this time around."

"You would hope that, wouldn't you?" she asked me.

"Look, I'm really sorry I hit her," said Cindera. "But I can serve you, I swear I can. I served Arthas loyally –."

"That's really not going to help you here," I said.

"He killed me too. I didn't ask for it."

"But you served him loyally in death," said Sylvanas.

"I didn't know any better!"

"Like you didn't know any better when you struck her," Sylvanas nodded towards me. "If I ever see you touch her again, I will execute you without hesitation, do I make myself clear?"

Cindera nodded.

Sylvanas took her blade away, sheathing it again. "Take her to Koltira Deathweaver and tell him what happened. He'll deal with her." She watched as the guards led Cindera away, then looked over to me, her eyebrow raised, "What the hell was that?"

"You don't remember the family?"

"I didn't let them intimidate me when I was ranger-general, I sure as hell won't let them do so now that I'm ruler of Undercity."

"Lady Liadrin told me that they'll probably want to come here to see her."

"I really don't feel like dealing with grieving parents. Especially not those grieving parents."

"I'll take care of them if you want me to. You won't have to worry about any of that."

"Until she hits you again." Sylvanas took a step towards me, resting her hand on my cheek, "Are you okay?"

I smiled, kissing the palm of her hand softly, "Yeah, I'm all right. Don't worry about me, love, I'm not made of glass."

"Tell me your jaw wasn't broken from that hit."

"It's not broken now." I reached up to squeeze her hand, which dropped from my face, "I'll go finish the bridges, I had one more to go. Do you need me for anything else today?"

"Scourge meeting, at five."

I nodded, "I'll see you then."

I went back to work on the bridge, where the masons were waiting for me. Evidently, news of the altercation had spread, because they didn't seem surprised by my absence. After we were done, I walked around, doing little odd jobs for people around the city, as was my custom when I wasn't busy.

As I carried a basket of venomous mushrooms to the apothecary's, I heard Cindera's voice.

"So, what is she, Sylvanas' pet or something?"

"She's her top advisor. You'd do well not to cross her, and never hit her again."

"Not in front of the queen, anyway. She's definitely something. I've never met anybody like her. Do you think she's seeing anybody?"

Her companion, whom I identified as Koltira, made a dismissive sound, "That is none of your concern. But you should really refrain from hurting her advisor in the future."

"Well, I didn't know she was her top advisor. I don't even know what her name is. Why won't anybody tell me?"

"They'll tell you when you're ready to know. And as long as you talk about her so dismissively, you won't need to know."

"You're telling me that this blood elf doesn't mean anything to Sylvanas? She's not her whore?"

I felt the hair standing up on the back of my neck as anger rose within me. I considered showing her exactly who I was, but if Sylvanas hadn't mentioned it, I figured she had her reasons.

"For your own safety, I highly advise you to never say something like that again. I've only been here for two weeks, but I've noticed that she and the Dark Lady are very close. And she's got a lot of friends here."

Cindera came into my line of sight, and I cloaked myself in invisibility for a moment. She shrugged, "Whatever. That girl doesn't scare me. She hardly looks like she can hold a sword, much less do anything else but repair bridges."

I walked away, not wanting to hear any more. There wasn't anything I could do anyway, having spoken against her execution.

You don't know what she's been through. She could have been tortured like Sylvanas was before she died. And being with Sylvanas isn't always like taking a walk down the beach.

Maybe a Scourge-infested beach…

After dropping off the basket of mushrooms at the Apothecarium, I made my way to the area where the druids always gathered. It was a warmer place in Undercity, with crackling fires and, more importantly, good food.

I ate with them, sharing hearty bread with butter and the sweetest honey I could imagine. It was simple food, but it was good. It reminded me of evenings back in Thunder Bluff. Hamu joined us as I was finishing up my second slice of bread, and sat down next to me to eat as well.

"So, I heard about that death knight who slugged you," he said to me. "She broke your jaw?"

"She was wearing gauntlets," I replied, drizzling honey on another slice of warm bread.

"You're okay, though?"

I nodded, "She turned out to be the paladin we heard was missing when we were at Hearthglen."

"That's a shame," he said.

"You don't know the half of it. Her parents used to be a thorn in Sylvanas' side. They kept trying to pawn their son off on her."

"What do you mean?"

"For marriage."

Hamu laughed softly and looked pointedly at me, "Guess she proved them wrong."

"Guess so, yeah."

"How did the two of you become an item, if I might ask?" The druid who had spoken, a female named Ishafa, had a quiet voice and was sitting across from me.

I smiled and gave a brief explanation of my relationship with Sylvanas, keeping it as simple as I could. "I didn't think I would ever be able to get over her death. And some days, I don't feel that I have."

"But you've come so far since I first met you," said Hamu. "You could barely say her name without bursting into tears. Now you're her… what are you to her exactly?"

"You'd have to ask her that," I told him.

"She cares about you, right?"

I nodded, "Yeah, I think she really does. We're both still trying to adjust to everything. I mean, we spent eighty years loving each other from afar. This is a huge change for both of us, but especially for her. She lost everything in the war."

"She didn't lose you."

"In a way, she did. I'm no longer the same girl who trembled every time she heard hoof beats down the road, hoping it was her coming back to me. And she's… dead."

"But you still love her as much as you did when she was alive."

"I do. I don't agree with everything she does, but I still love her. I can't imagine my life without her in it." I missed her suddenly. Finishing my lunch, I brushed crumbs from my hands and got to my feet, "Thanks for lunch, everyone. I'll bring you some herbs next time I'm outside"

"Sounds great. Bye Faith."

I waved to them, and quickly made my way back to the royal quarter. Sylvanas was in her office, reading over a bit of parchment long enough to make me wince. She had that look on her face, the one that usually made people run for cover.

She didn't look up when I entered, but she knew it was me. Her entire posture changed.

I leaned over to her and kissed her cheek once. Twice. By the third kiss, Sylvanas was nearly smiling.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"Killing you with kisses?"

"Keep that up, and I'll never finish reading this."

"Is it important?" I asked, dropping a kiss along her ear.

"It's about Northrend. You tell me."

I sat in Sylvanas' lap, straddling her, "Then you'll need to be nice and relaxed when you read this. So let me take care of you for a minute or two." I pouted, "Please?"

"Why exactly are you here?"

"I missed you."

"You just saw me a few hours ago. And you're going to see me again in three hours."

"But not alone. And I wanted to see you alone." I kissed the corner of her mouth, and suddenly, she grabbed my head, kissing me fully. My lips yielded beneath Sylvanas' kiss, letting her tongue stroke mine so sensually that it left me on fire.

I groaned into the kiss and began to wrap my arms around her when she slowly pulled away.

"No, no… come back here."

"Faith, please."

I dropped my head down onto her shoulder, "You said you'd make love to me if I got out of bed."

She chuckled, slapping my thigh playfully, "I lied. Up you get."

"No. You promised, and I'm not leaving until you make love to me." I pouted again, although she couldn't see it.

I felt her tensing incrementally. She hated when I gave her ultimatums, even if I was playing around. She said my name, her voice sending an unpleasant chill down my back.

"Okay," I whispered. "You know where to find me if you… I love you."

She didn't reply, waiting for me to get off her lap. She was fully tense again, and I kissed her cheek once as I attempted to extricate myself from her lap. I tried getting up, only to fall right back down onto her lap.

"Ow…"

"Faith, what… get up!"

"I can't! My boot's buckle is caught on the chair!" I kept trying to move my foot, but it was resolutely stuck.

Sylvanas looked at me, thunderstruck for a minute. The next moment, she was laughing.

I hadn't heard or seen Sylvanas laugh like that in a long time, and I could only look at her, biting my lower lip as I smiled, "I didn't do it on purpose, I swear."

Resting her head against my shoulder, Sylvanas reached down, her hand shamelessly stroking my leg as she tried to free my foot from the chair. "How in the world did you manage to…" She ducked her head lower, and I felt her fingers deftly manoeuvering my foot away from the chair. "Got it," she said.

Slowly, she came back up, her eyes meeting mine. Her hand once again traveled over my leg, resting on my thigh for the briefest moment.

"Thanks."

She kissed me gently, "Thank you for stopping by. I'll see you at the meeting."

"Yeah, you will."

I got up, unsteady on my feet now, looking back at her every once in a while. Her eyes were on me the entire time, and the expression on her face was one I would never forget.