"…not until you give me reason to, little mage..."
Anya realised too late that perhaps she should have waited a moment longer before entering, but on the other hand she wasn't sure whether time was essential or not. And she also didn't quite like the raised voices a moment earlier. It should have been no trouble for any decent elven ear to pick up, but the echoing stone walls of the dungeons distorted sound a lot and it seemed the arcane warding muffled it to some extent too.
Sylvanas turned on the spot when Anya came in and stood at attention. She had a feeling that this was one of the moments when the Dark Lady might need to stand on ceremony. To her relief Sylvanas looked irritated, certainly, but also relieved and maybe even a little bit amused.
"Lieutenant Eversong, I need to find Kalira and Varimathras. You have the watch over Lady Proudmoore. Ensure her safety and comfort while I am gone." Sylvanas ordered.
Anya saluted her.
"I have sent the other squad out to gather food and water, they are instructed to return before nightfall, Dark Lady."
"Very good. Once things have returned to order I will assign a mage I trust to conjure water and basic refreshments at your convenience." Sylvanas turned to the mage. "Until later, Lady Proudmoore."
"Until later, Da…Lady Windrunner."
When Sylvanas passed by Anya there definitely was something in her eyes and in Lady Proudmoore's that Anya had a hard time placing. At least they didn't seem to have been arguing, or if they had it must have been short.
And Lady Proudmoore was finally here and she was safe and sound and that was really what mattered for the time being.
Anya looked closer at her. She seemed a little absent somehow, but maybe that was just tiredness after the ordeals of the latest days.
"So now I am in your custody again, lieutenant Eversong. Is this where you tell me to 'be good' while you are keeping watch?" Lady Proudmoore asked with a strange small smile. Anya could not tell if she was ironic or vacant.
"You're always good to us, Lady Proudmoore, whether anyone tells you to or not." Anya answered without thinking. It earned her an amused look and the mage shook her head a little.
"Anya, are the others outside?"
"Lyana, Clea and Kitala. The rest are foraging."
"If it's alright, could you ask them to come in? I have something I want to say."
Anya whistled, and the three other rangers were inside in a blink.
"I…I'm very sorry for putting all of you in danger out there. It was irresponsible of me to act the way I did outside the keep."
There was a short silence, until Kitala burst out laughing.
"That was hilarious! 'Cold feet'…" she snickered.
"I think you handled it well. I would probably have put an arrow through his knee…" Clea whispered.
"You're not…angry with me?"
Anya was suddenly quite sure she could guess what Sylvanas and Lady Proudmoore had been talking about before she entered, and what Sylvanas had had to say about it.
"Lady Proudmoore" Anya said gently "you stood up for every dark ranger out there. None of us are going to be angry with you for that."
"You all formed up around me like that, instantly. You were all so protective, even though I'm not even Forsaken. Would…would you have fought hundreds of your own people over me?" She sounded like she couldn't believe that.
"Thousands."
"Nobody touches our mage." Lyana said with conviction.
"I will tell the others that you apologised, but I don't think anyone can be bothered to think less of you. But do warn us beforehand next time please, Lady Proudmoore." Anya smiled. "I will want to grab a seat with a good view."
"I really hope there won't be any next time but I promise I will. And thank you for…guarding me."
"Rangers, attention!" Anya called out and felt herself brimming with eagerness. They were actually going to do this. "We're going to clean up this hovel. Clea and Kitala, your first priority is bedrolls and blankets. After that, find me a couple of tents or tent canvas, preferably one of them smaller, and iron pegs that we can hammer into the walls to suspend them. Lyana, find me a brazier or something similar. The nights are getting chilly. Leave your cloaks here in the meantime – no, Lady Proudmoore, I will have no argument. We don't feel the cold but you do and down here you can't use your magic to help you."
"Well, you're right about that. I can't feel my mana. That is certainly strange."
Anya was very sure that "strange" was a polite way of saying "unsettling".
The dungeon was slightly below ground level and actually had a small opening set with multiple layers of iron bars. It did little to let in light but it did let in air and that was the most important thing. As far as Anya knew Lordaeron had handed most of it's magically gifted prisoners over to Dalaran, and seemed to in the meantime have treated them marginally better than average.
"We will set up a tent for you to sleep in to conserve your warmth, and one other to serve as your bathroom for now. In time it may be possible to tear out a portion of the wall and use the adjoining cell for that purpose. Later I also hope we can replace the brazier with a proper fireplace, and find some rugs for the floor. In the worst case we will heat up stones somewhere else and bring them in to warm your water and bed if nothing else. The door need not necessarily be closed all the time so ventilation should not pose a problem."
Anya realised that she might be getting slightly ahead of herself. Lady Proudmoore was looking at her with clear amusement. But she also looked happier than she had for days and that was worth everything.
"You are a strange dungeon keeper to offer to leave the door open, aren't you, Anya?"
"I think it would be fine if there are a couple of rangers with you inside – and I intend for it to always be two on guard. Or, if you would consent to be shackled to some sort of chain so that you couldn't run off I assume that would be enough of a safeguard for us to afford you some privacy without having to lock you up, Lady Proudmoore."
Lady Proudmoore tilted her head and looked at her so much like Velonara that it was downright eerie.
"Are you planning to chain me to the wall, lieutenant Eversong? Surely you would not be so harsh on a poor archmage?"
Belore, even the overly sweet voice was right.
"N-no, of course not, Lady Proudmoore. Not like that."
"Not like how?" the mage asked innocently.
"Not in any way that would make you uncomfortable. Though perhaps we will need to tie you to your bed from time to time to make sure that you actually get the rest you need." she added thoughtfully. "You are at times nearly as stubborn as the Dark Lady in your dedication to your tasks, Lady Proudmoore."
The mage laughed, and dead or not Anya's heart soared at the sound.
"Do you tie her to her bed as well?"
"Maybe I should have…" Anya muttered, too low to be clearly audible.
"Pardon?"
"Just something I remembered..."
"Well, while I appreciate the thoughtfulness, if it's alright I would very much prefer the company of dark rangers to that of chains and trust in the privacy of those tents you spoke of. So…where do you need a mana-less mage positioned, lieutenant Eversong?"
That was a good question. Anya hadn't spent too much time thinking about it, but what was Lady Proudmoore supposed to actually do in her waking time?
"So long as we aren't playing hide-and-seek we can do whatever you feel like, Lady Proudmoore." Anya said flippantly but immediately thought that it sounded extremely stupid. There was nothing in the room except a few bales of half-rotted straw in a corner that had served as a poor excuse for a bed. Anya was going to throw those out at the first available opportunity.
"No, I promise I do not want to hide from you, Anya." Lady Proudmoore suddenly had such a serious and sincere expression. Anya would bet her last arrow that there was something deeper that she was right now missing completely. "Since there doesn't seem to be much else to do right now I will take your subtle hint and get some rest all by myself. You'll have to tie me up some other time." the mage yawned and headed for the straw bed with the four ranger cloaks in hand.
"Do you want to be alone, Lady Proudmoore? I can keep watch by the door if you prefer it."
"No." Lady Proudmoore said in a low voice. "If it's all the same to you I would very much not like to be alone today."
As Anya helped Lady Proudmoore arrange two cloaks as bedsheets and the other two as blankets she almost wanted to tell her exactly how much it was not all the same to her. Right now, there was no other place on Azeroth where she would rather be than beside a bed of straw in a dimly lit dungeon beneath the Lordaeron Keep.
Sylvanas had found Kalira.
She was starting to wish that she hadn't.
"…so we have been pushed back to nearly within sight from the city walls or what's left of them. If it wasn't before, the Scourge is organised now. I have recalled our forces to prepare for a siege rather than attempt to hold territory for the sake of it, but that unfortunately means that the Scourge may be fortifying their positions close to us and assemble more of their local forces."
Kalira held nothing back, neither sugar coating nor exaggerating the things she had to say. Sylvanas knew that well enough. So when she did deliver bad news they came with a special weight to them.
Kalira's briefing was a summary, a quick overview of the developments of the last month. Sylvanas would have an imposing stack of reports to go through in detail later to absorb every excruciating aspect of their current predicament.
It was a mess.
Their diversion against the Scarlet Crusade had worked out well enough but the Scourge had missed the memorandum about nicely sitting still and letting it all play out before their bloodshot eyes. While the Forsaken exposed themselves to set the woods in the east aflame the Scourge launched an all-out attack from the south. Kalira had called for a retreat and conserved their manpower, but at the cost of territory painstakingly gained and kept. Sylvanas agreed with the decision though, it was the right call in Kalira's situation and she had been ordered to hold on first and foremost in preparation for Sylvanas' return and the good news that had been supposed to come with it.
While the Forsaken would not starve in the normal sense they needed herbs for the apothecaries' medicaments, raw materials for construction and metal for their blacksmiths. Without those their capabilities would diminish over time.
"What about the unrest among our people?" Sylvanas inquired.
"I believe you saw most of it at the keep."
"That was more than enough. I can not afford those kinds of spontaneous outbursts of idiocy. Gathering hundreds in a spot in the open like that is practically begging for someone to sneak artillery or a good spellcaster a little too close to the city. I need details."
"I see." Kalira paused for a moment. "I did not expect the reaction, not at that scale. So it stands to reason that I am not the best source of information about the sentiments of our people outside of the rangers. I think you should ask those questions to Varimathras."
Were it someone else, Sylvanas' might have had second thoughts about whether they were trying to dodge an uncomfortable question.
"I will have to do that, then."
Sylvanas' mind sorted through the information Kalira had given her and what to do next, what things could wait and what required her immediate attention, who she should speak to next and what she would have to inspect personally.
"I am putting Areiel back in charge of the rangers, report to her and resume command of your squadron for the time being."
"It shall be, Dark Lady."
"And Kalira…"
Kalira looked up.
"Thank you for holding the Undercity for us."
Kalira nodded, but remained on the spot.
"Is there something else?"
"Sylvanas… I am sorry."
Sylvanas froze. Kalira never, never used her first name when on duty.
"The Scarlets cut us off when we retreated in the smoke. They had paladins."
Kalira's voice had become hollow.
"I lost Cyndia."
Jaina woke up a couple of hours later, or so she would have guessed, and the rest of the day was a blur of activity. Clea and Kitala had moved a humongous pile of encampment materials to the middle of the room and Lyana had somehow managed to scrounge up not only a sooty iron brazier from a ruined tavern somewhere outside the city, but also a rusted pipe that they would be able to rig as a makeshift chimney through the bars of the window with only a few more unlikely feats of scavenging.
Anya's misplaced sense of propriety prevented Jaina – who apparently technically counted as a guest – from helping out with sweeping the floor, but she would not be turned away from rigging the tents and all rangers present did after all know from firsthand experience that she was at least as good as them with ropes and knots. Since she was not allowed to help out with the cleaning Jaina busied herself with arranging the bedrolls into a fairly luxurious floor bed for herself. She would sleep under the larger tent which acted as a canopy of sorts, placed close to the wall to catch the reflected heat from the brazier in front. All in all Jaina thought the setup mostly reminded her of an indoor tent castle she had helped Tandred build in his room when he was five.
With the unpleasant straw bales gone, the floor reasonably clean and a fire and some lanterns scattered to illuminate it, her dark dungeon felt like an entirely new room. Or technically rooms, she corrected herself, with all due respect to the efforts of putting up the smaller bathroom tent and the barrel of water beside it, coupled with the most precious clay bowl that was only a little dented. Anya had promised that she knew how to procure soap, but that it would take a little while.
Lyana and Clea had brought her some boiled roots and a few roasted rodents that Jaina thought looked like rats but decided not to ask about. Kitala had assured her that the other ranger squadron was still further out to hunt or fish in Lordamere Lake and Jaina's mood improved as she recounted all the sweetwater species of fish she knew to be found in Lordaeron while she downed her late lunch, or early dinner.
After she had eaten, Anya and Lyana left in search of more furniture and materials in accordance with Anya's extensive and specific plans. She was really being serious about renovating the keep's dungeons, Jaina noted.
Without anything else to occupy her mind with, Jaina had set herself a goal to at least take the opportunity in earnest to improve her Thalassian. When Clea and Kitala noted her aspirations they proved to be encouraging and enthusiastic teachers. Almost a little too enthusiastic, Jaina found herself thinking.
"You speak Thalassian like a book, Lady Proudmoore." Kitala commented without mercy.
"I am an archmage after all and therefore a licensed book-maggot…"
"Bookworm."
"…bookworm, so I must have drained it to the roots then. And as a matter of fact your Common is outdated by far." Jaina added snidely.
Kitala eyed her suspiciously.
"Quite ancient." Jaina continued. "There are cobwebs hanging from your adverbs and the dust is thickening on top of your intonation." She nodded sagely while trying to keep a straight face.
"How fortunate then that we are in civilised company and don't have to resort to the languages of barbarians and fools." Kitala huffed in such a perfectly snobbish Thalassian that Jaina's mask cracked at once.
"Seriously though" she continued once she had managed to get her giggles under control "shouldn't we teach each other then? You don't actually want to sound like grandmothers every time you address someone without pointy ears, do you?"
That hit home, she could tell.
"I can not talk loud, remember?" Clea's whisper reminded her.
"Come closer then." Jaina countered without hesitation and moved to sit down right next to Clea with Kitala on her other side. "Now, to start with I would recommend Professor Proudmoore's Introductory Course to Dalaran Slang, after which we will tackle Kul Tiran Sea Shanties for Beginners."
Both rangers were chuckling.
"And you, Lady Proudmoore, need to practice speaking Thalassian like you really mean it." Clea informed.
"How do you mean?" Jaina frowned.
"Speaking from your own heart and not only reading the words on a paper written by someone else." Kitala interjected. "Thalassian is more than it's words, it is melody and emotion. The wish to convey what you feel and not just what you say." She shifted to sit in front of Jaina and facing her. "Now, think of something nice to say to someone and try to focus on how it makes you feel to say it instead of the actual words."
Jaina thought she was getting what Kitala meant. It was just that she didn't think herself a very spontaneous person.
"Oh. Alright…" Jaina tried her best to concentrate on something suitable but it was hard to focus with Kitala's large eyes boring into her. "Kitala, you have very cute ears and I wish you were my cat." Jaina finally blurted out.
Right.
Great work, Jaina. A really suave and subtle example of Dalaran humour.
Clea burst out laughing. It was a bit of an odd experience since she did not make any more sound than a suppressed chuckle but her body shook with mirth all the same. But Kitala didn't so much as smile, and Jaina realised that she had managed to say something much worse than a silly or awkward compliment.
"Ear."
Kitala's tone felt so wrong all of a sudden. Stiff and just so devoid of emotion that she had instructed Jaina a moment ago that her language was not supposed to be.
"I'm sorry?" Jaina felt completely lost.
"Ear. Ears is the plural."
"Yes, I meant both. Mean." She suddenly caught on. "Because they are both cute."
"I see…"
"Kitala, please, what's the matter? What did I do wrong?"
"Nothing." Kitala sighed. "You did nothing wrong. Just…"
She shrugged.
Clea leaned over Jaina to take hold of Kitala's arm.
"Why don't you go and check on the corridor outside a bit? It's been a while since we had a look."
Kitala nodded and looked resigned as she rose and went outside. Jaina turned to Clea, now desperately wanting to know what it was all about.
"Clea, I'm so sorry but I can't figure out what I did that was so wrong. I always seem to make a mess out of things when I'm with you two. And I can never leave Kitala's ear alone. Is that the thing? I'm bothering her by always coming back to her ears, aren't I?"
What a nice way to repay someone who had stepped between herself and an angry mob the very same day.
"Lady Proudmoore, come and sit with me." Clea whispered softly. When Jaina leaned back against the wall next to her Clea gently pulled her closer and Jaina let herself be guided to sit down between Clea's spread legs and lean back against the dark ranger.
"First, you do not make a mess out of things when you're with us, or at least only slightly more than we do just as good on our own." It was actually very convenient to sit like this so that Clea was just about talking right into her ear. And…a lot more comfortable than leaning against the stone wall. "But is it possible that you actually do like Kitala's ears a little bit? Because you are a little fixated with them at times."
Jaina wondered if she could somehow will herself to turn into some sort of formless water elemental and quietly drip away through the cracks in the floor. She felt incredibly stupid, and far too warm.
"Maybe..." she whispered as quietly as Clea.
"Well, good. Then you did speak from your heart like Kitala asked you to, didn't you? But it might take a while before Kitala believes that."
"But why? Does she think I've been lying to her about something?"
"Don't be stupid, Lady Proudmoore, of course she doesn't."
Clea was silent for some time.
"What do you think happened to Kitala's left ear?" she asked slowly.
"Not sure, I suppose I'd guess a troll did it? A hungry lynx?"
"No. Elf."
Jaina stiffened and Clea sighed, or at least slumped a little as if she did.
"There was someone very close to Kitala, so close that you should be able to trust him or her without a second thought, that treated her very badly. That was before she was my ranging partner or in the same squadron. This person would keep telling her how useless and worthless she was and what a failure she was in everything she attempted. And it got to Kitala, deeply. At that time, she wasn't a great ranger and she did fail in some things that she took very hard, so she did not exactly need someone berating her further."
Clea shifted a little behind Jaina.
"She didn't share it with anyone. I understand she was too ashamed of herself and her situation, or she didn't trust anyone to treat her decently if she came clean. But being a ranger without fully trusting one another is hard. It didn't work out, and things escalated. Kitala and some of her squadmates got into fights. She got drunk, and made herself known as unruly and outright mean. Eventually she resigned. She made a living as a guard for hire – boring, lonely and thankless assignments where she had all the time in the world to brood and blame herself. And without the ranger exercises and patrols she had no respite from this other person. Kitala started drinking more and more and this person, well, didn't stop at abusing her verbally by that time."
"No…"
"Then there was one night when things got especially ugly and this person beat Kitala badly, and put a knife to her ear, telling her all the time how ridiculous she would look with half an ear and how everyone would either laugh or be repulsed by her. Ears are a prominent thing for us, it won't pass unnoticed if you lack one."
"But she was a ranger, why couldn't she…" Jaina began, unable to help herself. She knew she was being irrational in rooting for Kitala like a character in a play that had already been written.
"She could have defended herself. Pretty easily, I reckon."
"…but she thought she deserved it?" Jaina asked sadly. She thought of her mother's letter denouncing her and how that still hurt to even think about. What would it be like to hear those words spoken day by day?
She felt Clea nod into her hair.
"What happened then?"
"Sylvanas happened." There was a small tint of pride in Clea's whisper. "She was just about to become a ranger captain at that point, and not even in Kitala's company. At this time there was a lot of controversy about the rangers. A lot of people saw us as undisciplined irregulars, a band of wild thugs that couldn't work together with other units. So you understand how Kitala's outbursts and bad conduct could hardly have happened at a worse time. After she had been cut like that she became more violent, picking or starting fights and hurting people. Ironically, it wasn't until she actually hurt the person who had cut her in one of her fits of rage that she ended up behind bars. Most rangers hoped she would be locked away as quietly as possible and some wanted her judged harshly as an example, but Sylvanas thought the whole thing stunk. She made herself quite unpopular by questioning another company's rangers about Kitala and must have become convinced that something was off from what they told her. Sylvanas went to see her, and somehow managed to convince Kitala to tell her everything. She then threw every owed favour and every bit of influence she had into getting Kitala reinstated as a ranger under her. Some sort of penal servitude or community service thing that was most likely not by the book."
Jaina was getting so caught up in the story that she didn't pay any attention to how she relaxed against Clea and how Clea had put her arms around Jaina to keep her from sliding to the side.
"So, Sylvanas made a lot of people irritated and had to spend another year under Areiel until she could be promoted as she deserved. But Areiel was one of the very few who approved, and she's said that as far as she's concerned Sylvanas won her captaincy then and there. Sylvanas came to me and asked if I would take on Kitala as a ranging partner, and was transparent with how Kitala was a complete mess and the decision would not gain me any admirers."
"But you took her on?"
"We took on each other. I was a 'bow widow' at the time – a nickname for someone who has recently lost a very close ranging partner – and I had been assigned a green new ranger as an apprentice of sorts. And I wanted her to be my old ranging partner and act and grow and think like she had. It wasn't fair of me, and things weren't stellar between us. So when Sylvanas presented Kitala I felt like it might be best for everyone if I accepted. Sylvanas stressed the need for honesty between us and we took her by her word. Frankly, it was almost like Kitala and I attempted to scare each other off with our vivid descriptions of all our bad sides. But we stuck together despite arguing for the better part of a year until we got too tired of it and became friends. Kitala got better eventually and I had the new ranging partner I had needed."
"Not even death could keep you apart, then?"
Clea chuckled.
"No, neither death nor undeath kept us apart. Kitala is honest about what was done to her, and she can be ironic about it as you have seen, but actually believing that someone would sincerely like her ears is harder for her."
"How can I help? I really don't mean to, but it feels like all I do is stumble and step on people's toes."
"Perhaps we need someone to step on them from time to time to realise how much we are hurting, Lady Proudmoore. Do not try to change yourself. We need you the way you are."
Clea reached for the small knife that had served as Jaina's utensils earlier and threw it skilfully with the pommel first so it clattered noisily against the door.
"You too? I'll have to put up a sign." Jaina mumbled disapprovingly as Kitala appeared in the doorway with her cutlery, summoned by the noise.
"So, has Clea dragged you through the whole pitiful sob story of my past? I salute your patience Lady Proudmoore, it's an earful." Kitala greeted with corrosive self-irony. Jaina didn't quite know how to respond to that, but if Clea thought it was best that Jaina be herself she would answer as honestly as she could.
"If you happen to mean the absolutely ghastly horror story of someone who abused an elven woman in a terrible way, then yes. But I liked the happy ending very much at least." Jaina answered a little defiantly. "And for the record I think it was very thoughtful of Clea to share the story so that you wouldn't have to, and my opinion of your ears remains unchanged."
"So you still think I would make a better cat than elf?"
"NO, you silly ranger, just…" Tides, now Jaina was getting tired.
Kitala held up her hands placatingly.
"Sorry, forget it. I'm just acting weird. You must think us all a bunch of lunatics."
"Well, to tell the truth I've never heard of any other rangers known for making camp inside a dungeon." Jaina pointedly looked around and raised an eyebrow.
That, finally, made Kitala smile properly again. She sank down next to Jaina and Clea and they were silent for a while.
"When we were alive Clea used to stroke my ears when I got too sentimental." Kitala said. "Silly as hell. So maybe I would have made a decent cat."
"It's pronounced 'beautiful', not 'silly'." Jaina said cheekily. "Honestly, if you're going to teach me speaking Thalassian properly you will have to do better than that."
"Nice hit." Clea whispered in her ear, decidedly amused. Kitala just shook her head and looked… Tides, had Jaina finally managed to make a dark ranger feel embarrassed? That had to be a first.
"And why can't you do that now? It's not like you rangers let trifles like undeath stop you from doing anything else, is it?" Jaina suggested and tried to imitate Kitala's most innocent tone.
"Not a chance, I have my hands full." Clea smirked. "You'll just have to hope our archmage doesn't turn your ears into fluffy bunny ears while she's at it, I'm afraid." She teasingly beckoned at Kitala.
Kitala shook her head at them, but shrugged and layed down with her head in Jaina's lap. She lay facing the door so that her half left ear was up.
"Now" Clea whispered "I believe you were practicing how to speak Thalassian from your heart, Lady Proudmoore. Please say after me."
"Belore'Dorei."
"Belore'Dorei."
Kitala shuddered slightly when Jaina brushed her knuckles against the edge of her ear, as gently as she could.
"Vendel'o eranu."
"Vendel'o eranu."
Jaina looked down to see Kitala close her eyes and felt the elf become heavy against her. She was also almost sure that Clea hugged her a little harder now.
Sylvanas handed out orders, listened to reports, listened to complaints and listened to requests. Belore, had she been gone for a year instead of a little over a month? It certainly felt like that, and like her vengeful people had conspired to gather all of their most tangled and twisted issues and items to dump them on her in one overwhelming surprise assault. If that was the case she of course commended their tactical thinking.
Their losses…stung.
Sylvanas had gambled and failed, and in the meantime her people had died without her at their side.
There was no excuse.
She reached for the roll of dark rangers in her service, almost a ceremonial thing, but she couldn't bring herself to strike out the name of Cyndia Hawkspear. Not today.
The banshee queen had been able to work day and night for months but found herself unable to even pick up her quill.
Sylvanas rose from her desk. She was currently of no use here. Maybe she wasn't used to working through the nights anymore, strange though the thought may be. She had apparently gotten far too accustomed to following her mage's daily rhythm (somewhat irregular though it may be) and spending her nights in silent vigil over her.
Sylvanas walked briskly along the winding paths of the Undercity – her masons had managed surprisingly much in her absence, she really had to offer her compliments later – and the steep stairs and ladders leading up to the surface. She did not want anyone interrupting her with a new myriad of questions to find an answer to.
She came up close to the keep. It was silent and shadowy in the setting sun, with grim deathguards posted around. Sylvanas found herself staring longingly at it.
Well, now that she was here anyway it couldn't hurt to check up on her mage.
The streets were deserted apart from her guards and the same was true about the inside of the keep. Maybe it would actually be worthwhile to some day repair the structure. The Forsaken were mostly from Lordaeron, and national symbols could prove quite inspiring. She could start with the parts near the library and the archives for example, those were the most intact.
The door to Proudmoore's cell - or her room, more like - was open, and warm light illuminated part of the corridor outside. Sylvanas slowed down as she approached, curiously listening to the sound of low voices speaking in Thalassian.
Sylvanas hadn't thought much about what to expect from Anya's plans for making the room inhabitable but she was definitely not prepared for the sight of the two tents suspended from the walls and a glowing brazier and lanterns illuminating the room. Where did Anya find these things?
Sylvanas moved back from the light to take a closer look without disturbing anything.
Clea was reclining against the wall, seated on a couple of bedrolls under the canopy of the largest tent. Proudmoore was leaning against her with Clea's arms around her middle and Kitala resting with closed eyes against her thigh, and stroking Kitala's damaged ear. Sylvanas needed no help to realise the implications of that. Her mage was eyeing Kitala with the tenderest look Sylvanas had ever seen on her while repeating every expression of Thalassian affection from Clea like she meant it with all her heart.
The memory of Kitala's bruised and hopeless face and badly bandaged ear before her centuries ago flashed in front of Sylvanas. Of Clea and Kitala yelling at each other and immediately quieting the moment she threatened to put them in different squadrons. Of watching Clea spend her free evenings training Kitala out of her insecurities. Of undeath and the Scourge's tyranny scarring Clea and Kitala like it had anyone else and her own despair over being unable to help them.
But maybe Sylvanas had their cure right in front of her.
Perhaps she should just leave quietly and let them have their moment undisturbed. It was plain obvious that escaping was currently the last thing on her mage's mind.
She was on the verge of turning and walking quietly away when she heard two sets of steps approaching, one of them very quiet and very familiar to her.
"Dark Lady." Anya whispered. "Is everything alright?"
The answer to that question was of course no. It always was. But she couldn't bear to rob Anya and Lyana of the rare and precious gift of this peaceful evening, and besides she knew Anya wasn't literally inquiring about the state of every single thing concerning the Forsaken.
"I certainly looks that way." Sylvanas smirked with a look at the doorway.
"Belore, that's sweet!" Lyana whispered after taking a quick look around the door. She was carrying something in her hands, Sylvanas noticed.
"Shall we go inside?" Anya asked.
"There is no need for me to disturb them. You obviously have everything well in hand here, lieutenant."
Anya was, of course, not buying that.
"And what will Lady Proudmoore think if you do not even come to visit, Dark Lady? Hardly the sign of a courteous host, is it?"
Sylvanas bowed her head. She would not deny Anya anything tonight. And she had to admit that she desired to, for lack of a better word, treat Lady Proudmoore decently after what she had put her through earlier this day. And, since they would be barging in no matter how, she could always try to have a little fun with her easily flustered mage.
"No, you are right, it would not do to leave our mage unattended. Let us go inside."
Sylvanas demonstratively took the lead and briskly marched up to the middle of the room and assumed her strictest stance with her hands clasped behind her back.
"Rangers, report!" she said sternly, and had to force herself to keep a straight face when all three of the room's occupants jolted and scrambled to get to their feet with varying levels of alarm written in their faces and Proudmoore turning red as a beet. One could be led to believe that Sylvanas had walked in on a trio of first-year ranger recruits playing cards over pieces of their uniforms in the ranger captain's office. Not that Areiel had ever walked in on Sylvanas in that manner, of course. Especially not that time when Vereesa had visited and managed to unwittingly invite Areiel herself to the game.
"Ranger Starshadow, relay your observations from watching the room during the latest half hour. Ranger Deathstrider, give me a quick summary of the routines of the guard."
Clea and Kitala both begun to stutter but before any of them could figure out a reasonable answer Sylvanas silenced them with a gesture.
"Lieutenant Eversong?"
"Yes, Dark Lady?" Anya answered neutrally, clearly playing along.
"It would appear that the magical wards of this room are failing. Two of my best rangers already appear to have fallen under the spell of a devious archmage."
"Oh no. Is there no hope for them?"
"I fear they are both too far gone. The mage is clearly one of surpassing skill and power."
"How wicked. What will you do with her when you find her?"
"I have not decided yet. She must obviously be disciplined for having the gall to steal my rangers from me." Sylvanas mused. Clea and Kitala were exchanging a quick questioning glance while Proudmoore looked half worried and half incredulous.
Her mage's hair did really look lovely in the fiery light of the room.
Sylvanas looked deeply into the bright blue eyes that had widened noticeably and struggled terribly to keep her own face set in stone. She parted her lips just enough to show off her fangs and could hear Proudmoore breathe quicker, almost like a quiet gasp.
Sylvanas let her lips part into a predatory smile.
"Yes, what am I to do with you, Lady Proudmoore…" she purred.
Then, slowly and deliberately, Sylvanas winked at all three of them.
"As you were, my kittens, do carry on by all means." she smirked. If they had been able to, Sylvanas was sure that Clea and Kitala would right now have matched her mage's blushing.
Sylvanas turned to Anya.
"At this rate my dungeons will put my private quarters to shame in a weeks time." Sylvanas smiled sincerely at her ranger's happy look. "Well done, Anya."
She turned towards Proudmoore, who had once again sat down next to Clea and Kitala. "My rangers' astounding efforts notwithstanding I apologise for being unable to offer you the quarters you deserve, Lady Proudmoore. As you have seen things are rather out of shape in my city currently."
"Oh, this is actually larger than my room, I don't even have a wardrobe." Proudmoore reassured her. Clea was subtly reeling her back in to be seated between her legs again and the mage did not seem to pay much heed to it, and when Clea discreetly but firmly pulled Kitala down to rest her head against the pillow of their adjoining thighs Proudmoore absently resumed slowly stroking the elf's ears. "What about your rooms, Dark…Lady Windrunner?"
"They are also…rather frugal at the moment." Sylvanas found the admission unexpectedly embarrassing and tried to hide it by sitting down against the other wall. Anya quietly joined her side and Lyana squatted next to them.
"Really? Where in the city do you live? I mean…dwell. Rest." Proudmoore corrected herself nervously.
Sylvanas flashed her a big grin.
"I un-live in the deepest and darkest corner of the Undercity, a place of evil and wickedness without end, Lady Proudmoore."
"You will excuse me if I find that hard to believe, Lady Windrunner. Or, maybe just a tad wickedness." Her mage was running her fingers through Kitala's hair now, and seemed aware of neither that nor of the way Kitala was looking right up at her from her lap.
"To tell the truth my room is not much larger than yours." Sylvanas found that she wanted Proudmoore to know that. "I have little apart from my armour stand, a desk and a bed."
Anya coughed.
Well, Sylvanas' sorry cot was technically a bed.
"I hope you'll invite me to it some day."
Five pairs of crimson eyes locked themselves onto Proudmoore who looked confused and then paled almost to the point of matching a dark ranger.
"Your room! I hope you will one day invite me to your room, of course!"
Sylvanas evilly kept her face impassive and raised one of her eyebrows.
"For a friendly, polite visit! Not anything..." Sylvanas welcomed the sight of white giving way to red on her mage's cheeks. It really looked much healthier on her.
"Of course." Anya's expression and tone was the picture of innocence. "You are always so friendly with us, Lady Proudmoore."
"And very polite." Lyana added. "You would never do anything like, say, drenching someone in cold water in a public place."
"Oh, stop it, I know that you know what I mean." Proudmoore tried to grumble at them, still flushed.
"Yes Lady Proudmoore, that we do." Lyana nodded amiably from her darker corner, for once looking up from what she was doing.
"You are all terrible, do you know that?"
"It must have been that wicked mage." Kitala mumbled. "We were all such good girls until we fell under her spell."
Proudmoore reached down and pinched her nose.
"Ow!" Kitala startled, more out of surprise than pain.
"Nose-pinching charm. That's what every wicked mage learns after mastering troll curses."
"Kitala." Lyana admonished. "Now you woke him up."
"Wait, woke who up?" Proudmoore asked.
"Are you afraid of spiders, Lady Proudmoore?"
"Uh, I suppose I'm alright with them. So long as they're not crawling into my clothes or biting me."
"No, of course not! Kitthix is really well behaved. Look!"
Lyana lowered her hands to the floor. Out from them crawled an eight-legged and eight-eyed ball of fur about the size of a rabbit.
"Say hello, Kitthix." Lyana urged her spider. "There, shake paws with the nice Lady of Theramoore. Good boy!"
Sylvanas watched Proudmoore swallow visibly but bravely put forth a finger to touch one of the outstretched legs of Lyana's pet. Lyana scratched what Sylvanas supposed counted as the spider's back and proceeded to encourage him to leap between the palms of her hands and up onto her head where he seated himself as some very misshaped fur cap while Lyana went to work to impart the crucial knowledge of all known and unknown facts about spiders and their many virtues and uses.
"…and did you know that not only can spiders choose to spin sticky or smooth threads, but the forest tarantulas are famous for the varying thickness of their threads. Spider silk is as you know a wonderful material and when freshly spun it is also very clean. If spiders could be trained to spin on request it would be a perfect material for surgical and medical uses like…"
Sylvanas tried to picture Lyana obliviously presenting the spider to some wounded and tired patient while blissfully going on in this manner. Nurse Kitthix, the thought…
The wall behind Sylvanas had warmed from the brazier and wasn't so cold and damp anymore. She found herself enjoying the reflected warmth, unnecessary though it may be. Sylvanas closed her eyes and leaned back, content with listening to Lyana's happy prattle and thinking of nothing in particular.
Apparently so was Anya. Though she was actually leaning against Sylvanas rather than the wall.
"Look." Anya whispered.
Her mage was snoring softly in Clea's arms, with one hand still nestled in Kitala's hair.
"Well done, Anya." Sylvanas used the arm halfway behind Anya to pull her closer and her other hand to cup her lovely cheek.
"Well done indeed." Sylvanas leaned forward, and captured Anya's lips with her own.
She wondered if her skull had actually cracked when the hammer swept her aside like nothing. Did she actually have a brain anymore or was her head just full of disordered threads of necromancy? That would explain why her thoughts were so tangled and tricky to follow.
No, not follow. Not follow the thoughts.
Only watch. Watch them from a distance.
Not think. Not feel.
Not hurt.
Not listen. No, not listen!
"I know you can hear us, thing. It is time for you to wake up now…"
Not think!
Not feel!
Cyndia screamed and in her scream opened her eyes wide.
There was faint smoke drifting in front of her eyes. Her smoke. Tangled smoke. Tangled threads of smoke.
Not follow the threads. Watch them. Watch them from a distance.
"See, Westley… This thing is a sly one. You can't let it disappear back inside that pretty little head again, then you'll have to start over…"
New name. Not heard it before.
Not think.
Only look. Watch from a distance.
Her vision was blurry. Why was it blurry? Maybe the hammer had cracked her skull after all. Then tangled thoughts could fly out of it and escape. Cyndia could escape.
Why could she not fly? Where was her banshee form?
No. Anger hurt. Not think. Not hurt.
Only watch. Watch from a distance.
Straw-coloured hair. Dirty shirt.
"Westley! I'm talking to you!"
Tall. Reaching over the one in red.
Little. Doubling over from the punch in his stomach.
"You will listen to me, you little shit! Get me brother Gessel and tell him he can have another go with his Light-forsaken attempts."
Forsaken. Funny. Not think. Only watch.
Big eyes. Staring. Disbelieving.
Funny. Scarlet Crusaders should be good at believing, shouldn't they?
"Or do you wanna warm it up instead? Or…is that it? You don't like it down here, do you, Westley?"
Bad. Bad voice. Bad sign.
Run.
Run, Bad-At-Believing Westley.
"You think that thing should be spared, is that it? Is that it?! SPEAK! No, don't actually. Take up the poker. Put the fear of the Light back inside it."
Little. Doubling over.
Sick. Retching.
"You disgust me. Worthless little rat. Keep to the muck in the stables then, boy. That's the only thing you're good for."
Watch. Watch from a distance.
