A Wolf with a coat of Darkness – chapter 7

I do not own ASoIF/GoT or Warcaft/WoW

Rated M for everything wrong with the Cult of the Damned and the Scourge (including but not limited to cannibalism, human experimentation, murder, rape, slavery, torture, sadism)

The days stretched on, at times painfully so. With her fear of been unprepared, Sansa and by extension Myranda, have devoured all of the books provided to them long before any of what they had read was spoken in class. Seeing it in practice was still new, but they at times found it hard to remain awake. Especially as the initial fear of everything wore off, the two found themselves almost…comfortable.

Almost.

That night after their first reanimation lesson, Sansa was unable to fall asleep right away. The girl felt cold. More than once, she got up and put more and more wood into the fire, keeping it from dying. And then she stood, looking at the cracking flames, trying to warm herself. The reanimated dog always awoke when she moved, staring at her with confused blue glowing eyes. It playfully rubbed against her legs and tried to nip at her toes, but Sansa constantly moved away from it.

It was undead. It was…wrong. The talk with Myranda still echoed in her head.

"You cannot keep it!"

"Why not? It's a puppy. And I feel responsible for it, now!"

"It's undead!"

"It's not his fault! Do you think he wanted to be killed and then raised?"

"The teacher was going to put it back down."

"Yes, and done who knows what to it afterword! Just leave us alone!"

They had spent the rest of the day in silence, the girls even keeping a good distance from one another. Maybe this was why she was cold. Her only friend remaining with her back turned to her, even as she slept. As the dog tried to jump up her naked leg, reminding her of its presence, Sansa decided to try to make peace with her friend. 'I have sinned so much…what is one more?'

Bending down, she scratched the soft fur of the dogs' head, glowing blue eyes closing in content. Unseen by Sansa were the brown eyes in the darkness, peeking towards her from beneath the blankets, before they turned away and surrendered to sleep.

In the morning, as the two prepared in silence to go out into the rain and towards their classes, the two girls' eyes met and after a moment, they embraced, each asking the other for forgiveness.

When the trio of cultists finally left, they left the two girls quite a few things. Long cloaks for each of them as well as winter variants, gifts that Sansa almost immediately put to use. The long piece of fabric brough unimaginable comfort and warmth as it reached as far down as her lower legs. If she was to also put it properly over her shoulders instead of simply falling down her back, it would also cover her sides quite well. However, such an arrangement made movement quite difficult at times, especially with one of her arms occupied by a staff.

The two girls were also offered the bigger house, but refused, having grown accustomed to their current home. Nevertheless, the two men moved a few furniture pieces in, mainly a wardrobe and a desk. As they bid goodbye, the uncertainly weight heavy on her mind. The three cultists were going to Andorhal for relocation, but after that? A part of her was telling her to pull back a little, for she was almost attaching herself to everyone that showed her even a sliver of kindness or even decency. She had known them for maybe two weeks at most, but found them dear to her heart nonetheless.

The days turned to weeks. Sansa did not remember when, but at some point, she had stopped counting. Things were becoming cold, both figuratively and literally. Every day was almost the same. Get up, eat, go to classes, eat, sleep. While in the beginning she was disgusted and revolted by the idea of the undead dog, she found herself enjoying the little thing. Been happy that there was something awaiting their return each day, happy to see them. It almost made their house a home. Almost.

Surprisingly, Sansa was able to make money. The red-head was exceling in Runes and as such, on more than one occasion, her 'fellow' students had asked for her help. In the beginning, she vaguely agreed, if only for them to leave her alone, but when one student gave her money for her work, she started to charge people. And a week after that, she was able to buy a few items for herself and Myranda. Book pouches, a scabbard for her friend, a new pair of clothes for each of them. Unfortunately, she was still forces into a leotard, but at least this one was more suited for the approaching winter, or rather as suited as such a piece of cloth can be. At least the sleeves and the body were one piece, her shoulders covered.

Even now, weeks later, when she closed her eyes, she can still see the blue orbs of the first undead she had risen. How it looked at her with its hollow eyes. How her heart sank when she was able to command it with just a thought. Like a puppet on strings. That was not a human. Thinking, loving, dreaming. That…that was a thing. An unholy thing. She had known that ever since having gotten lost in this cursed land, but experiencing it first hand was different. Colder.

Flesh craft was almost pleasant at first, when they were learning dry theory, that is. The girl found herself very interested in the inner workings of her body and was frequently asking questions in class. This and her combination of Alchemy meant that when Myranda fell sick, Sansa was able to return her to her feet in but a day. That ability to heal almost convinced the red-head that maybe not all of it was bad. Almost. Then the practical Flesh craft started.

Sansa preferred not to dwell too much on it, both Myranda and her doing the bare minimum to pass the classes. Even now she can feel and almost taste the bile in her throat at the thought of how they had to cut up a corpse and stitch it back together. It was somewhat interesting in theory. Realigning bones, attaching nerves, connecting or replacing blood vessels. But the practice…

The two of them had silently cried themselves to sleep on more than one occasion, huddled together under the blankets. Most of the times, the two tried to adhere to an out of sight – out of mind mindset.

Sorcery was…strange. While both were adequate and rarely outright failed, it usually took them several times to get something properly. Just as expected Jandice Barov was a good teacher, though less so because of any actual teaching capability and more out of a sheer drive to outshine her colleagues. Sansa found it almost strange how quickly things were progressing. But a month ago, she was back in Winterfell. If someone was to speak to her of wards, illusions, projectiles, portals and so on, she would have blinked owlishly before dismissing them as crazy, calling for her septa. Now, she understood it all, or rather, knew what it meant at least.

The more they progressed, the more the two of them branched off. Sansa started excelling at wards and as they approached what she imagined to be the two-month mark, the red-head was easily able to block a barrage of spells from their teacher. Myranda, on the other hand, was more into avoiding things entirely. The little brown-haired girl was able to maintain an illusion of herself and even have the illusion do things instead of simply stand still like Sansa's. The little one also became quite proficient in Blinks, able to do the short-range burst teleport spell quite a few times in rapid succession, her record so far been seven.

Runes and Alchemy were the subjects the two enjoyed the most. And to the surprise of the two, the two subjects actually intermixed quite nicely. To be precise, Alchemy mixed into Runes as the brewing craft was used to create some of the dyes used to write the symbol system. It did make sense, in a way. If any ordinary marks using ordinary ink caused magic, then things would have been far more spread and common. There were not that many runes, in truth. Maybe fifty basic ones in total. What made them hard were that each one had to be precisely written, maintaining strict ratios and undisturbed lines.

The two remembered in wonder and amazement as they chiseled the rune for unbreaking on one side and sharpness on the other side of Myranda's dagger, the process taking a whole day. Ofcourse, their teacher put the now runic blade through quite the punishing test, having an abomination slam its massive cleaver straight onto the edge of the dagger, the much tinier piece of metal not only surviving intact, but also digging into the cleaver.

They also liked runes for another reason. It was the most… normal of their classes. The whole class was barely ten students, all of them Sansa feeling to be like them – unwilling recruits. And the teacher, professor Petrova. The woman appeared to have little interest in of the darker aspects of the cult and was more of a closed off person. If it did not involve runes, she did not care. If anything, Sansa would describe her as meek. Round face, oversized glasses, soft, uncertain voice. Nevertheless, she felt at peace during runes. She felt…safe.

The two girls also spent a lot of their free times at the library, or rather, taking books out of the library. The perverted librarian did grumble at their constant taking as well as Sansa having covered up her behind with her new long cloak, but he nevertheless let them do as they pleased. The red-head did at times wonder why was he letting them have so much freedom, especially given that they had not returned the very first books they had taken out yet.

While many of the books revolved around things like advanced sorcery, fire magic, frost magic, ancient runes, the book that Sansa opened most often was an atlas. While the name meant little when she first saw it in the dim library, upon opening the book she was greeted with maps. Maps, maps, maps. Nothing but maps. Back in Winterfel, she was never one for maps. She had vague knowledge of the North and Westeros as a whole, but it was more of a knowledge she was forced to learn and have a bare minimum of. Yet now, every other night, under candle light she would study the maps in the atlas.

It had taken her half a day to find Andorhal and by extension – Caer Darrow. Despite having lost hope weeks ago, her mind nevertheless began looking around. Looking for a place to escape to. The problem, naturally, lay with the simple fact that those maps were old. They were from before the time of the Scourge. She had tried to discreetly ask for any information of the outside world, Myranda providing her with what little she knew as well.

Her tiny companion was able to tell her that everything north, east and west was a lost cause, though she knew little of things to the south. 'South it is…'

When she looked at a map of the Hinterlands, the land directly south over the mountains, it showed a mountain pass in a direct north-south passage, but when she looked at the mountains to the south, she was unable to see it. Looking at other routes, she found a road leading south through Alterac mountains, but that road passed right next to Andorhal. Sansa had only seen the city from afar, but given how Craig, the evil man from her first day, as well as her three friends were sent there, she imagine that the city was a bastion of strength for the Scourge. Nevertheless, she traced the road south. Around Andorhal, into the mountains till Strahnbrad, further south pass Tarren Mill and on to Southshore. Silently hoping that the Scourge had not reached that far south, she looked at other options.

South, following the river…maybe…It was a river that drained from their lake all the way to the sea next to the fabled Southshore.

'Ugh, this is hopeless!' she raged in her mind 'I-I can't do that! This is too much! And just how much of a distance is it to Southshore?!'

On one otherwise normal day, another crazy idea appeared in her mind. Teleport.

They had learned the basics of it, both teleport as well as portal. After all, going in and out of a necropolis was done using teleportation, though Sansa was yet to see an actual necropolis. The idea did grow on her. Why shouldn't be they able to do it, after all? Blink was a short-range teleport in the end and Myranda was able to do it. Multiple times at that. And the theory was not that hard, as well. You only need to picture a place where you want to go, preferably someplace you have already been to and as long as you have the required energy, conduit and ritual circle, you would be able to do it.

Of course, having scoured the Atlas from end to end, Sansa did not once find something that resembled Westeros. A part of her was beginning to think it was on another world.

That too was a new concept to grasp. Worlds.

Like continents, separated by…magic, almost. There was no way to travel between worlds without magic. And the people here spoke of other worlds with such certainty. Especially of this Outland place. The homeland of the orcs and ogres. More and more things which the red-head knew nothing of. In the end, that only meant that if Westeros was indeed on another world, simple teleport would not be enough.

Special regents, special circles, special spells.

Nevertheless, the days dredged on in a dull monotony. Myranda, now able to read, albeit slowly, brough new books to their home every day, though she rarely did actually open any of them. The little one simply browsed the library, liked a title and took the book. The girls dragged in two old chests from another of the houses nearby if only to keep the books organized as opposed to scattered all over the floor.

Despite her scamp clothing, when the first snowflakes appeared in the sky, Sansa quickly embraced the weather. It had happened in the evening, the red-head reading a book in the candlelight by the sole window of the house as Myranda played with their dog on the bed. As she rolled her neck and accidently saw a snowflake fly by outside, she was almost in shock. The weather had been getting colder, but somehow, she never expected snow. She put the book down and exited the house, Myranda looking at her weirdly as she followed her to the door.

Sansa took a few steps in the dark night, the cold embracing her. She spread her arms wide and looked up, closing her eyes shortly after. The cold, damp weather caressed her exposed skin, the gentle feeling of snowflakes landing on her flesh soothing her beyond imagining. Never before had she embraced the winter like that. Previously, she had always dreamed of summer and endless sunshine. But the cold, quiet snowy night was more soothing than any sunray. Myranda came to stand next to her, looking slightly confused. As a child, she too did enjoy winter, but her friend appeared almost religious.

The next morning, the snow had already stopped but not before piling up a little. Naturally, most of it did melt by the afternoon, but nevertheless, Sansa was in the best mood she had been after getting to this cursed land.

The girls had tried to give a proper send off to their "gifts" from the very first day, though with little success. They had tried to burn them with both wood and rudimentary fire magic, though in the end, only blackened skulls remained. And until they decided how to send them off properly, they simply kept them. A burial of only a head did not seem right.

As the days slowly got shorter, the two began to develop a crazy idea how get out as they lazed around in their small house in what little spare time they had. An undead abomination of their very own. It seemed a simple enough idea, at first. They would craft such a thing, have it fight its way out for them and then, they would slip away, leaving it behind as a distraction. On the whole island there were maybe only two more of the disgusting flesh constructs and they were all in the school, deep underground. Outside, there were only sparse skeletons and ghouls. It took some time for Sansa to even bring up this idea to Myranda, what little morals left inside of her screaming at her in revolt and disgust.

When she did, for a moment the little girl looked disbelieving, her mouth agape. Sansa was preparing for the barrage of angry shouts and outrage, yet nothing came. The girl kept on petting the dog that was in her arms for a few moments that felt like minutes before getting up and moving to a shelf where the two skulls stood, a small lit candle in front each of them.

"What if they helped us?" asked the girl.

"N-"Momentarily taken aghast, Sansa was about to argue against it. Creating a random mindless, soulless abomination was one thing. Using the skulls of those two, the ones that willingly died so that they may live was another. Of course, cold, hard logic began to prevail in her mind as she stood up and went to stand next to Myranda. On the way there, her eyes never left the skull of the knight. 'No soul.' She was telling herself, trying to justify it. To justify using them, as well as creating an abomination. To justify staining her soul even more.

"A knight." She whispered out, her eyes shifting from the skull of her…hero towards the little girl next to her. "Not an abomination, but a knight. A knight in shining armor."

There was a pile of discarded armors near an abandoned smithy of the first level and over the course of the next few weeks, the two girls carried out a piece of armor daily. They took only one each day, trying not to draw too much attention to themselves. Some days, when it had snowed, they took nothing for they would have had to rummage to uncover just what lay beneath the snow. Others, they discovered that they had taken a piece that they already had. With none of them actually knowing how an armor was supposed to fit together, they settled for outlying a humanoid shape on the floor with charcoal in a nearby house and aligning the pieces there. Despite not yet having all the pieces needed, the two began to etch runic circles on the inside of them, linking segments together. While the runes themselves were simple, the two had to be careful to only link pieces that went together and avoid linking those that had no actual contact with one another.

And one day, in the dead of winter, the two thought they were done. Maybe they had placed pieces where they were not supposed to, but right now, it mattered little to them. It was done. Myranda had even taken on herself to put several pieces of old grey drapes from the nearby houses inside the armor.

"He needs clothes!" she had stated as if it was the most obvious of things and Sansa was unable to argue, a smile on her face. All that remained was a helmet and the sword. They had procured both, but decided there was no actual need to link them with the rest. The sword was a massive thing that the two of them barely dragged to their home, the rusted piece of metal easily taller than Sansa. They did engraved several runes onto it, but nothing overly special. Unbreaking and Sharpness. They had also placed several unbreaking and magic resistance runes on the larger of armor pieces, but both knew that since they had not actually used souls, the runes would not be that strong.

As the day surrendered to night, Sansa took the knight's skull from the shelf, holding it gently, almost lovingly in her arms. As she brough it into their makeshift workshop, the red-head started caressing the skull, hesitating. Could she really do that? To him? Over the weeks if not months at this point, she had almost started to idolized the man. Her savior. Her gaze shifted to the arranged pieces of armor, the rune-etched sword and helmet laying nearby. 'We have come this far...'

With reluctance, she turned the skull within her arms so that the back of it faced her. As Myranda came to stand on her side, her brown eyes filled with understanding. She placed a hand on the red-heads' shoulders as she handed her the etching tools with the other. Bringing the chisel to rest on the skull, she again hesitated before closing her eyes as they brimmed with tears. 'Enough tears!' she said to herself and slowly and methodically began her work.

Sansa worked painfully slow, her etching almost gentle, the girl barely leaving a mark. She had to make sure this was right, for there was no second attempt. This was a skull, not a discarded piece of armor. The minutes dragged on, Myranda holding a candle near to give more light, sitting in silent observation.

Finished, she got up and slowly placed the head in its intended place within the armor arrangement, muttering a simple "Forgive me" as she did so. Then, the two took a position on each side of the armor and began chanting. It was the simplest of body revival spells, but both wanted to have control over their creation. The chanting took some time, both circling their creation as dark purple tendrils left their fingertips and entered all the crocks and cracks of their knight with most pooling towards the skull.

After finishing the spell, they awaited with held breath as the almost gentle blue glow appeared in the empty eye sockets. A momentarily flash of light signaled the beginning as the cloth and armor pieces began expanding to their intended shape. Even as the entire body was normalizing, she knight was already trying to get up, swiftly moving to a seated position before continuing on.

In awe did the two girls watch as the knight stood to its full height, the skull almost touching the ceiling. Their creation was well over two times taller than Myranda and quite a few heads taller than Sansa. The rusted armor creaked and screeched with every little move the giant made. The two had not intended for it to be this big, but having alighted things on the ground instead of in an upright position, they did not really have a sense of size. When Myranda ran to grab the helmet and handed it to the creature, it put it on without either of them having to say a word. And in that moment, Sansa was surprised. It looked almost human. A very, very massive human, but a human nonetheless. The armor and the cloth sealed everything, every little nook and cranny. Even the helm fully concealed the skull, giving a frightening, dreadful appearance.

As she looked at their dread knight, Sansa mused in her mind that if normal people knew just what was under the armor, any fear they might have felt would have been increased a hundred-fold.

The first of the more "sped up" chapters.

I put up a little poll on my page concerning the next step in the story, quite possibly even very the next chapter.

Thank you for reading.