Chapter 17

Trials of the White Lady


X Ymirjar X

"Shush, she is waking!"

Balinda's brows dropped at the harsh whisper. A woman, a loud one at that, or very close though she couldn't feel the breath. Her eyes remained shut, but Balinda strained to remember what had happened to her. Malthon... Malthon something. There had been Ymirjar involved. A skirmish? Somewhere?

He blankets felt stiff and heavy, scratching her skin where it touched. She was naked. Why was she naked? She needed her armor, her weapons, to be ready to rally at the Light's call. She couldn't be vulnerable like this anymore. Never again would she be vulnerable...

Who was in her room? Balinda's head ached, pounding like a drum. Her mind remained in a heavy fog, unable to pick up from its slow drudge. Isn't that how it felt to wake up from unconsciousness? Had she fallen in battle?

Her eyes blinked open and closed. She saw nothing but bright light and too many blurs. After a moment, she tried again, straining to hold them open, and colors gained a more distinct shape. Nothing sensible, however.

"Gods, how hard did you hit this one?" a feminine voice asked. It sounded amused, but the question was sincere. Balinda wondered, Hit who?

"Near a hundred pounds of metal in a quick clock. Wasn't taking any chances on this one," a deeper, masculine voice returned. His sounded quieter, however. Like it was further away.

"I cannot see," Balinda mumble around a numb tongue. Her eyes refused to clear any further. Just blotches of light and color.

There was a pause, then a shuffling. A second white blotch joined the first, then it consumed the most of her vision. A moment later, she hissed at the feeling of shadows invading her body, wrapping her aches in their cool touch. Grudgingly, she admitted the cool touch was soothing.

The whiteness before her eyes cleared, focusing at once as it moved away – a massive white hand. Behind it were three faces, two pale and illuminated like the moon, and one a human with a beard too dark to be Malthon's. One white-faced woman, with her eyes covered in a blank mask, said in a scratchy voice, "Brain trauma is a difficult to mend, but that should clear the last of it. You bruised the back, the vision end, my liege."

Balinda stared for a moment longer. Memories seeped in, flashes of fighting, of watching Malthon engage a powerful foe. She remembered him walking near her in a lull, all of them watching, and then... blackness. She pieced it together as she recognized the val'kyr women and her current state.

Captured. By the Ymirjar.

Balinda cooled her expression and tightened her resolve. She'd show them no weakness. She was naked; the shock didn't show on her face, but she was naked and unarmed, bare but for a blanket before the enemy. She needed to tread on careful ground lest they kill her. Glancing again at the human among them, she added, Or something worse. The Light pooled into her body, comforting her.

Seeing her intent look, one of the val'kyr, black of hair and white of wing, nodded to herself. "We will leave you to your rewards, my liege. Try not to break her, for she is pretty."

The human nodded thoughtlessly as he sipped from an iron mug. The two val'kyr turned and left the room, down a short ramp and then out a large wooden door. It was warm in this longhouse, lit by simple braziers, and though sparsely decorated, the things of value were displayed with care, including the crossed swords and suit of heavy, heavy armor.

She recognized the Dragon by that, though his race was enough. This was the one Malthon had been battling, and she was his captive. War prize for bartering submission? Or something far more carnal? She looked back to the large man, seeing him reclined in a human-sized chair in nothing more than red scaled pants, peering into his cup.

Balinda tested her wrists. Something warped around them, something hard but not too cold under the blanket. Movement produced a rattle. Iron chains. Her ankles were wrapped by similar hardness, and she assumed them bound as well. Light knew she was in a difficult spot with this Dragon, and Light knew what the Ymirjar men, any vrykul really, did with their female captives.

No fear. Only righteous fury.

"On the field of battle," the human said, staring into his cup still, "you are called the White Lady. You are a bringer of graceful death, a lady of the sword, streaked with Light and trailing brilliant motes. Aptly named, and I have been given much honor for taking you war prize."

Balinda said nothing. Waiting. He still did not move or look to her, but he continued to speak: "You are my slave now, White Lady. Attempt to escape will prove quite fruitless, and you will be punished for it... harshly, and to the amusement of myself and my brothers. My two handmaidens will be keeping tabs on you, when their services are not otherwise required. Treat them well, for they are not as cruel as most vrykul can be."

He glanced at her, his dark eyes shadowed by the angle. Seeing her listening, he returned to the cup. "My name is Baelin Drekthac, also called the Dragon, and my clan is the Ymirjar. You may introduce yourself at your own choosing, but first I have questions for you."

"You are a fool for attacking the armies of King Malthon, when worse threats lurk beyond your walls," Balinda spat at him. She did not know whether to answer questions about their defenses, fortifications, and leadership because it was insignificant, or to reject him to add hardship to his dealings with her.

The man, Baelin, grunted a short laugh, then took another drink from his mug. Instead of rising to her words, he asked simply, "Are you the Fool King's woman?"

Balinda thought about lying to him, to secure a place of value she might otherwise not have. The Light chastised her for the thought, and she withheld a sigh. "I am not. I am Lady Balinda Crowngarde, royal defender and prime delegate of the King."

"Balinda," he repeated, seeming to roll the word around his mouth. He nodded. "It sounds nice. You may call me Drekthac. So if not the king's woman, then are you a wife of another? Pledged to someone still alive, waiting upon your return? You carry no ring, but is it within a lock box at your old bedside?"

"I am a maiden," she declared, with only a hint of dread. She did not like the sound of the truth to a man such as this. Her fears were confirmed as he stood and tipped his head back to finish his mug, then faced her with those awful eyes.

"Then you are no longer to call yourself such, Balinda Crowngarde. You are mine now, in all ways. I'd tell you not to fight your new state, but your choices are your own. My goal is not to break you, but you cannot overcome my strength."

Tension crept over Balinda's body as she watched him unbuckle his belt, then step out of pants in the final steps to the bed she was trapped on. Drekthac appeared as a shaggy wolf to her, one aged with battle and conflict. His body was thick and strong, and she could make out what seemed like countless scars over him, visible even through his body hair. His face was wild, feral, and predatory, and his intent with her was full-mast obvious.

One knee came to the edge of the vrykul-sized bed. Balinda waited with balled fists and tensed legs, desperately wishing she could keep the blanket between them. His hand came to it, however, and her knee tucked under her.

Drekthac yanked the blanket away from her body, unshielding her nudity to his eyes. But she did not give him the chance to leer, to climb atop her and claim what he thought was his. In the same instant, she used what leverage she could with the chains to plant her feet and leap up. The stiffness of the vrykul bed gave her stability, and though her feet could part no further than a few inches, she did not plan on grace.

The Judgment and Retribution of the Light were her talents, her burdens. She judged his behavior vile, sickly and repulsive to the Light, and it granted her the ability to serve its verdict. Her elbow, aiming for his jaw, was caught in a callused and bumpy palm, and he caught her weight easily.

It was as planned. Balinda reared her head back and smashed it into his nose, and his body shuddered in shock, muscles loosening their tension and strength. Balinda twirled on her heels to build the momentum to strike the right side of his jaw with her left elbow, then jumped with both feet, leaning back and knees tucked, to explode a double kick directly under his jaw.

The human warrior dropped like a sack of potatoes, left propped against the side of the bed awkwardly. Balinda scrambled forward and looped the chain of her cuffs around his neck, pulling sharply. It wasn't to choke him out, and indeed he recovered quickly and grabbed both of her slender wrists with his large, masculine hands.

Balinda felt a surge of satisfaction when he clamped down with a grip like a titan. She jumped forward, again keeping her legs tight together due to the short slack, and pulled with all the might the Light blessed her with. The warrior was pulled forward with her, and she tucked low in her landing, pulling hard, and she sent him over her head, despite his vastly superior size and strength, to crash onto the wooden ramp and tumble down the steps.

A few lady-like hops later, Balinda cupped her fists together into one unit and clubbed his head as he tried to find which way was up. Like her, his strength was only human outside of his enchanted armors, and the signs of dazing and flickering consciousness were clear from his eyes.

Balinda got behind him and caught his neck in the chains again. She couldn't kill this man – the Light's verdict was not execution – so she dragged him backwards via hops to the door of the longhouse, opened the wooden bar with her shoulder, then flung the naked man out into the snow with her hold over the chains. Swiftly, she shut and barred the doors again, also throwing down the iron latch, then dusted her hands, giving a righteous sniff in the direction the Dragon had fallen.

What kind of fool tried raping a Crowngarde? Let alone capturing one?

XxX

Drekthac wrestled in the slush pits with several Ymirjar men. He did it to try new things (not because a 130 pound, chained up woman had beaten him and locked him from his own home), and because he wanted to be certain he hadn't lost his touch in unarmed combat. After six victories, he had no excuse for what in Hela's flying fuck had happened in his own gods damned, crow begotten home.

It also helped the slush wrestling was an event always done nude (hence his explanations to his clansmen). He found a strange liking to it, though he did prefer combat of steel. The icy slush was a shock that cooled ones temper in the heat of battle. It left their naked bodies slick and difficult to grapple with, and throws were clumsy to the untrained and unfamiliar.

But he had to wonder who in their right mind invited women to such events? No self-respecting warrior could rightfully grasp, grapple, and strain over a slicked, nimble-bodied woman flush naked with him. It was a handicap of the worst kind.

The crowds it drew for two women wrestling were impressive.

After the matches, he refused Maldrid's offer of healing for his bruises. While he appreciated the touch for fatal or lasting wounds, it was coddling to not let a man live with any form of pain. The heated water for clearing the slush and grime felt heavenly on his body, and in watching the nearby val'kyr, he scheduled a long bath with Freydis in the near future. He couldn't do such in public – at least, it was more trouble than it was worth.

They had returned home only yesterday from the quick bouts with the Fool King. The small one armies scrambled madly since then, but they did not possess the stones to siege their walls. A pity, that, but ultimately a smart move. The Fool King himself was reported as being enraged. This Balinda girl might call herself only his defender, but she certainly held... value to the king.

Still, the female warriors washing off near him held him distracted, vrykul and frost vrykul alike, and he looked to Maldrid nearby. She had said nothing about his appearing outside his home, when he should have been with his new captive. Freydis, however, had been summoned back into the Val'kyr Halls, as the Arbiters of Valhalas were called together.

Recently denied and now teased by the women, he considered Maldrid – not for the first time – for pleasure. In their fifteen or twenty days together, they had yet to move their relationship to anything intimate. He had always taken Freydis to bed, as she was always available, though she had promised him he wouldn't be disappointed by a true handmaiden's service. Maldrid did not offer, expecting him to ask if he wanted her.

He had nothing against the val'kyr, and she had proven very loyal. He just had difficulty coming to terms with a handmaiden who wasn't Freydis, which was far from his envisioning of Ymirheim. He felt like any day Maldrid would just be gone out of his life, so hardly significant, but if he took her to bed, to him it seemed as something closer than the usual nightly catch, thus wouldn't be fair.

Idly scrubbing himself, he concluded he might as well accept her, bed her, and keep her as a second woman. Far more desirable than Hilda.

Two val'kyr stared at him in passing, whispering to themselves, and his frown outdid any heat of embarrassment. That fucking snake, Hilda...

The thought sent sensations, memories, pouring through his head. Drekthac growled, still cursing the spell that damned woman had woven over him. And the last thing he needed was a thousand glimpses of his time fucking Hilda! He still had not, and would not, return to accept her name in service.

"Maldrid," he called out lazily, but inside his frustration was mounting. The black-winged val'kyr approached, curious. "Got a private room somewhere?"

"My liege?" Maldrid started, and her wings stuttered their slow flapping. Her dark lips twitched towards a smile, but she arrested it quickly, remaining dispassionate and collected. "Your home, should you wish, is my only room of privacy. I have only public quarters at the Val'kyr Halls."

Drekthac grunted, dismissing the idea. He had been public enough on that subject, thanks to Hilda. Gods damn, blighted-!

He glanced over to his handmaiden, leering over her intently. A shame Maldrid wore the val'kyr mask, hiding whatever challenging look her eyes might gain – he had yet to see Maldrid's eyes, he realized – but the black-winged woman crossed her hands beneath her clothed breasts and waited, unreadable.

"See if you can't find us a room, Maldrid," he drawled, laying out his intent further. He tossed the bathing rag back into the bucket, sloshing the warm water, and stood up, nude. "I'm not having any repeats like with Hilda."

Though he couldn't tell her expression, her smile and throaty tone were enough, "You have nothing to be ashamed of, my liege. And every val'kyr knows it; those sensations were genuine."

That was gods damn accurate, that every blighted val'kyr knew of it. May Hela take Hilda in the black of Witching Hour! Drekthac discovered from Freydis that the val'kyr temptress had apparently broadcasted their entire tumble – every grunt, sigh, scream, and orgasm – to all of the val'kyr of Ymirheim. Not just the visuals but the sensations too, everything that Hilda did, felt, and saw. She made their sex the most public event in Ymirheim!

"I'm not a fucking spectacle," he growled, low, then faced the direction of his home. "I have something to take care of in the meanwhile."

XxX

Given the choice of knocking to enter his locked home, Drekthac braced himself and smashed the thick hinges in, then ripped the whole vrykul-sized door from the frame and tossed it behind him. He crossed the threshold pulling a thick splinter from his palm, looking to spot the one still inside.

The White Lady, Balinda Crowngarde, sat in the human sized chair with her arms crossed before her. Her expression was expectant and smoothed of emotion, apart from the raised eyebrow at his entrance. She had gone into his clothes drawers, he saw, noticing his own simple linen shirt and worn breeches, buckled tight to her slender shape. The chains of her cuffs had been broken, though her shackles remained upon her wrists and ankles.

"Welcome home, my liege," was the dry greeting from her. Her lips seemed to quirk at his state of dress, yet so somber was she that he felt it only a trick of the light.

He blew out his nostrils, sniffing dismissively, as he made for his drake-skin vest and leggings. "I see the Fool King chose his woman well, Lady Eyenhart."

It was a barbed comment, testing her response, yet the paladin slave gave no rise, beyond following him with her eyes as he passed her. As he recovered his pants, she did ask with continued indifference, "Not going to try again?"

"Only a fool mounts a stallion still wild. I had mistaken this one for a pony."

"So you will try to break me in? Tame me?" she asked coolly.

Drekthac smiled to himself, facing away from her, as he got his vest around his arms. "Break the King's woman? No, not if we expect to use them to fight the darklings." He faced her again, walking over.

This woman was a curious one. Her churning thoughts were visible on that pensive face. How many questions did she wish to ask? How many answers did she think she could pull from him, and when would she try?

As he approached, she peered back into his eyes with orbs of steely grey and demanded, "How many women have you raped?"

Drekthac thought to amuse her. This one would not take to submission easy, and he felt it wasn't worth the effort to enforce it all at once. Besides, how long had it been since he interacted with his fellow humans?

"How many homes have I broken into and taken a woman before her dying or dead husband? None. I wouldn't bed a taken woman, nor kill to take one, hence my opening questions, Lady Eyenhart."

"How noble," she snorted, arms still crossed, "but it does not answer my question. How many?"

"Why?" he asked instead. He turned from her to find his cup and casket of mead. After pouring for himself, he paused and added a second, then returned to offer it to her. He didn't watch to see if she decided to drank it, instead taking his own large drink.

"I'm deciding whether to kill you or not."

Drekthac snorted into his mug, almost spitting everything back out, but he forced it down in time to laugh. With a bright face and wide smile, he told her, "Such is not as easy as you think, paladin. If you think earlier is a sign of who will wear the pants here, I will welcome shattering your hubris."

"Answer." The repetition was flat.

He took his time drinking his mead, then shrugged and admitted, "I suppose you'd be the first."

Balinda watched him for a hard second, then slowly nodded to herself. "Lucky you." Drekthac grinned and found himself a second chair.

"I enjoy the very black and white world you paladins live in. So clean and righteous, always able to sleep well on your ideals," he told her. His mind screamed forth memories of black days, clawing through ceaseless hordes of blood-enraged orcs, breaking into villages and camps. The screams that followed as teams of soldiers swarmed into rugged homes. Women fighting as strong as men, pulled by their hair, him watched as their tusks were broken and their clothes were stripped.

The Blackrock War shaped much of who Drekthac was, he knew. The end of it had left a void in him that could never be filled. Not by retirement, not by modern Alliance military, not by tavern hopping and women laying, not by even the most decrepit gladiatorial arena. Only the vrykul had ended that hollow emptiness inside him.

Despite his last words to Balinda, he had seen what the Blackwar War had done to the holy Knights of the Silver Hand. None had come out clean; some had even lost the ability to see and touch the Light.

When Balinda said nothing, he continued, "The women left behind after their men are slaughtered and their towns burned... do you think leaving them is merciful? That stranding them to die alone is just?" Her eyes narrowed at him, while Drekthac threw his elbows over the back of his chair to rest them. "The Light knows I've never called myself right or just – I won't make excuses – but there is an act of mercy in taking those women of the enemy. How you treat them following is the reflection of your character, and that is where your judgments better reside."

There was a haughty air to her at the notion of judgment, but she did not add snarky input, saying, "Go on."

"Mmm?" Drekthac asked as he finished his mug. "What is there to say? Slavers hold action, brothels add goods, some throw them into pits to die against dogs or other slaves. I'd call that bad character. But say one soldier takes a woman for his own. He gives the slave home, feeds her, dresses her. There are obligations, and if he holds to them, I call that good character. Service is expected in return, in bedroom or out hardly matters because she belongs to him now. A captive won't know a husband or another man apart from her master."

"So that's how you justify it to yourself?" Balinda asked, unimpressed.

Drekthac raised an eyebrow at her. "Are you expecting fairytale romances, darlin'? It's damn obvious why a man would want to take a woman as slave. She becomes his property and a measure of his greatness, depending on the victory. What I am saying, however, is that he can otherwise treat her well. There's a difference between those who leave slaves chained with the dogs until they stumble over for a fucking and those who do right by them."

"Remind me where you're doing right by me again."

"You?" Drekthac laughed suddenly. "Darlin', I'm only telling you something I just remembered from before. The mumbles of a drunk. The Dragon captured the White Lady. She is his slave. That's what matters here. And I have nothing against taking fuck prize of a slave, excepting her taken by another, like yourself, Lady Eyenhart – and that's just preference. So judge me as you want, but you paladins won't fit in vrykul culture. Your only freedom now is your freedom of self, that's my only gift to you."

The woman appeared cross. It made Drekthac smile wider. "The only accuracy there seems to be your drunkenness," she accused shrewdly.

"I like your fight, spitfire," he told her. "You are allowed it. We'll see what the next few days will bring, but I advise you to realize an illusion of respect is in your best interest. My woman will not tolerate your cheek as I might." Balinda only regarded him with continued disdain.

XxX

In the days following Balinda's detainment, she came to learn much of the Ymirjar culture. The people were so proud, she knew, but the magnitude of witnessing it first-hand opened her eyes to it. The warriors did not just display it and hurt those that sought to damage it; they pursuit it in all ways. Pride was their cornerstone of society.

It invoked debts, it superseded conflicts. It led men to war and peace, to challenge and re-challenge. Men and women both grew from their pride, rather than fall stagnant, as it urged them to learn and do more, to become even better in every way. Tempered by honor, these people expanded in ways even humans did not by being so blighted proud. And that made their heads even bigger.

It was an insufferable chain to Balinda, but she grudgingly accepted its success.

The vrykul also had another way that got under her skin. They lived in anarchy, without a single regard to consequences. Kill a man, and he was brought back. Take his things, and you could win it in a duel. Take a woman, and if she could not fight her aggressor off, she deserved it. Worse was that here, women raped men. Balinda hadn't quite understood how that was done, until Drekthac had explained to her the case of Gerilda and Beodar.

Yet the culture thrived despite the lawless peoples and them exploiting the system at all chances. Honor sat on an unnamed throne here. There were things the warriors did not do here, because of pride and honor. What Ymirjar poisoned the food of a rival to kill him, rather than split his head like a log? She had asked the punishment if a man raped a married Ymirjar woman, and Drekthac had said it would not happen, seeming confused.

She insisted, proposing a "what if," and he had asked his historian-guide (she couldn't understand the relationship) named Maldrid. The val'kyr reported that the only time that had happened, knowing both the year and names involved, the assailant had been nailed upon their wall, stripped from the clan, and slain and revived each day for twenty years before feeding his body to the worgs, rather than burning on a pyre.

Balinda came to accept she could not understand the pervasive sexual immorality of Ymirheim, only loath it. Adding to the confusion were the ways of the women here. Explained to her from Freydis, vrykul women often refused the advances of men they desired because "if they truly wanted a woman, they'd take her regardless of invitation." It was a sign of strength and genuine desire, not whimsical lust, according to the second val'kyr. Balinda called it madness.

Drekthac had boasted that there were more greys to the world than paladins could see. Feeling tight-lipped, she excused it as grey only in the circumstances they had created, not how a society should be. His laughter burned in her ears. Five days she had been here now.

A plate of vomit-colored slop was tossed before Drekthac. He grabbed his fork and appeared delighted by it, glancing at her with a smile, "Mmm-mh! Human expulsion and pig waste yet again. My favorite."

Balinda did not know what was most frustrating to her, that this man reveled in his ways or that nothing she said or did could get a rise from him anymore. Apparently the Ymirjar had legendary feasting halls with the finest meals and meads in the land, yet each night he insisted she make him dinner.

So she did. Poorly. Just for him.

Drekthac sat at the head of the table, beginning to tear into the disgusting meal like a wolf into lamb, while she took a seat at the second human-sized chair at his left. She crossed her arms before her, feeling testy at his constantly barbed behavior around her, pricking her with every action or word.

She reminded herself, however, of his words the first day. The "drunken ramble" as he called it. It had not taken her long to realize the accuracy of his notion of good character or bad in the regard of a captive. In comparison to Freydis, his true woman, he could nearly be called a saint!

The val'kyr had ideas for a new captive, especially one of "her sort." Clothes left her too comfortable; a collar should be kept in place as reminder; like a dog, Balinda should eat scraps from the floor without her hands, bending over for both of their viewing pleasure; baths were a commodity to be earned; speaking without prior addressing should result in beatings; luxuries could only begin for her when she proved agreeable to sexual favors.

Hell's Bells, but Balinda had felt grateful to Drekthac for deflecting all of those points. Of course, should he have tried a one of them, she would resist – violently. She worried though that Drekthac could overcome her even if fighting with the Light; paladins were not invulnerable in combat, with the exception of maybe Malthon. Balinda was better than most, but she was not immortal. And getting the jump on Drekthac would not work every time.

"Gods, the salt compliments this so nicely. It nearly eliminates the aftertaste and the actual taste. Foretaste too, for that matter."

Balinda said nothing. She knew adding the salt would make the meal a tad more bearable, but she did it on whim. There were a thousand better things she could have made or used to improve this – her mother had trained her to be an excellent cook, kept secret from the estate servants – though she did not know why she had done that one.

Drekthac eventually finished his meal without much preamble, scraping it clean even, and left her to clean it, with a small token of thanks. Blighted man even sounded genuine during it, which only served to infuriate her. Apart from insisting he be present in the room when she took her baths, he had done nothing to warrant judgment or disdain. He still believed, against her word, that she was truly Lady Eyenhart, Malthon's wife.

The fool did not know a thing about law and her oaths. A Crowngarde could never marry into the crown. It would interfere with her duties. That was a possibility eliminated when Malthon promoted himself from lord to king. They would never wed, not public or private.

The reminder sent her into silence, even as Drekthac announced that he was leaving. The opening of the door reminded her of having to fix it. It had been her first truly required task, as his servant. Simple enough: purchase new wood and hinges for it, then nail them in, but Light, Freydis made an impossible taskmistress in overseeing its completion.

Alone in the longhouse now, Balinda sighed and moved her chair over to the brazier. Northrend was cold, and the vrykul never seemed to notice. Drekthac included. The blighted windows were even left open to allow a breeze, and she'd been forbidden to close them.

Only a short minute after Drekthac departed, the door opened again. Noticing the diminutive human shape from her peripheral, rather than a white-skinned giantess, she assumed he must have forgotten something and paid him no mind, keeping her hands near the fire.

There were a few seconds of silence, not even his heavy boots stomping over the wood floor. Balinda began to wonder at his meaning until a voice uttered softly, "Balinda..."

She froze. That was not Drekthac's voice. Light, but she could never forget that voice. Not Drekthac's, and not this one. The sunburst of elation quickly died to a rush of panic, and Balinda jumped to her feet, turning to the speaker. Seeing him confirmed it.

"Hell's Bells, what are you doing here, Malthon?" she cried, then quickly chastised herself. The Ymirjar were unbelievable scouts and detectors. Even non-Ymirjar villagers could likely pick up her words, understanding the name and meaning, and send warriors into the house.

"Balinda!" he repeated, now with obvious joy, and the fool lumbered towards her with swift feet and swept her into his strong arms.

The reunion tugged at Balinda's chest, and she caved in to the urge to hug him back. Light, but this wasn't the time for this. She came back to herself and pushed him away, frowning and feeling abuzz with anxiety. Had he been captured?

He wore no armor and carried no shield. Only simple linen shirt and breeches, like what she wore, covered by a blue-white cloak. At his hip was a long hunting knife that did not show through the cloak. What was he...?

"How did you get here?" she found herself asking, then paused, "Light, but why are you here?"

"I sneaked in. Cloudrend is waiting for us; I'm here to take you out," he said, smiling.

Balinda shook her head viciously. None of this made sense. Was she dreaming? Or was he really that much of a fool? "Malthon, the Light took me here. It wanted me to be captured by Drekthac, it let him take me without warning me away, and now I'm here for a purpose." Recalling the way it worked within him, it should never have let him get this far, against its own plan. "How on Azeroth did the Light let you come here?"

"I'm drunk," he told her earnestly, like a five-year-old admitting to redecorating his room. With a hammer.

Sniffing his breath, Balinda realized he was. Light, but her time with Drekthac made that stench a familiar one. She shook her head, pacing away from him. She heard soft leather boots trail after her. "Malthon, you Light-blasted lummox!" She spun on her heel, thrusting her face against his, and he blinked rapidly as he stumbled backward.

"Wha-?"

"Get out of here before a Ymirjar discovers you!" she hissed. "Leave me here, you idiot, and get back to safety. Hell's Bells!" She spun again, feeling her breathing growing faster with panic. His strong hand came to her arm, touching it gently yet backed by his great strength. Similar yet so different from when Drekthac touched her.

"Balinda, I won't leave without you."

Balinda closed her eyes at his tone. She steeled her resolve and whispered harshly, "There is a reason I'm here, Malthon. Damn it all, I cannot and will not leave with you, you fool."

He turned her about to face him, and his other hand came to her other arm. Balinda glared at him, but he was stern. "I do not care about the Light or its will," he intoned. It sent a shock through her. "I care about you. I won't fall for its plan this time. Not with you at stake. Light, Balinda, I'm taking you with me."

The lock of silver in Balinda's hair had fallen before her eyes, and she fought his grip to brush it aside. The reminder sent a cold wave through her, and she understood his meaning. The Light's will could come with a cost, for a good far greater than a personal one. They knew it; she had witnessed it tear Malthon apart before. That silver strand was testimony of it.

"Malthon," she started, feeling sympathetic. Inside her, the Light pulled, giving her the direction it never seemed to pass onto Malthon himself. His cross was the heaviest of all, she knew. Light, but she knew it. It was her turn to carry it for him, however. "No."

"Balinda?"

"Get. Out." Her words were colder than she meant, but she held firm. "I am staying with Drekthac, until I am taken elsewhere or until I die. Go back to the army and ready yourselves for war. Forget about me and focus on what you need to."

"No, I-"

Slap!

Malthon's eyes bulged and he wheeled back after being struck. Balinda took a steadying breath. "You listen to me, you lummox. I am not yours to demand about as you please. You haven't held a single connection to me since the Scourge took Lordaeron. Now get out of this longhouse before a Ymirjar wonders at this commotion or one of them come back. Drekthac will skin you a new one if he catches you drunk."

Malthon's hand dropped from his bearded cheek. Light, but he seemed so disheveled, and now so defeated. She had heard from report that Malthon had been frantic since her capture, but seeing him in this light made it real, not some fanciful idea of things outside Ymirheim's walls.

Very quietly, barely able to be heard, he asked with his eyes on the floor, "Do I really mean so little to you?"

Balinda came forward to push him towards the door, feeling more urgent than ever. The Light was warning her; someone was coming. "You mean as much to me as a king does to a Crowngarde," she whispered sharply. "Exactly as you wanted!" She shoved him hard, sending him stumbling. "Now get out!"

There was a second more of pause, and then he moved both swiftly and silent, as he did during their hunts in the forests as adolescents. He slipped outside with Balinda still watching, and the door closed behind him.

For a long moment, Balinda stared at that door, breathing audibly. Their brief conversation flashed through her head, her words and sharpness, and his responses. Quickly, she shoved it all out, throwing the final plate of steel up around her emotions. Malthon was a big boy; he'd take care of himself.

Despite all the times she took care of him.

Expressionless now, Balinda turned from the door and slowly walked back to the chair and brazier. She sat down, the only sound in the silent room, and her hands resumed their place in warming up.

Balinda sat in silence, alone and cold.

XxX

Drekthac concluded finally that he needed to make friends. The issue was not that he was especially socially inept or starved – he tended to find drinking buddies and those who would fight at his side easily enough – but it seemed the only one who took that place in Ymirheim was Britta.

"So wittle hooman stand on shoulders of smaller hooman," the blue giantess was shouting as she slapped her own bared shoulders, "and then big-head Drekthac maybe see Britta to eyes!" There was no joke there, Drekthac concluded sourly, yet she bellowed a hearty laugh at it.

He had a fine sense of humor; that just didn't seem to include Britta. At all. He wanted her replaced by someone far saner.

Perhaps her company would still be bearable if it weren't for the more domestic problems that had built up at home. His captive, the White Lady, abruptly turned into a bitter mess one night without explanation. She became... amiable. It repelled him in the worst way. No more fire, no words of judgment or conversation. She grunted single syllables always. Gods, she even cooked him decent meals without prompting.

The change unnerved Drekthac. Her lips proved tighter shut than her nethers in getting an explanation from her. Initially, Freydis had been pleased, thinking Balinda to have accepted her place. Of late, Freydis seemed to stay longer at the Val'kyr Halls than with him, pacing back and forth between here and Jotunheim. Despite the movement of the armies to merge with the Fool King's, it seemed a new Valhalas was to be held soon.

Even with the distance, Freydis had come to realize that the change wasn't right. Drekthac held a broken, useless shell as slave, not the graceful sword-dancer called the White Lady. Drekthac was to the point of wishing to offer her back her armor and weapons, so she could challenge him for freedom. Anything to breath the fight back in her.

Just today, Freydis had passed news to him through a reluctant tongue. The announcement took them both by surprise, but Drekthac did not experience Freydis' regret. Rather, he had laughed at the irony, pleased, and told her of the glory it might bring him still. The cost was a slave.

If Balinda Crowngarde-Eyenhart could not take heart in the call for her name in the Valhalas battle pit, to undergo the trials of worthiness, then she was already lost.

"You ignore me?" Britta's loud voice demanded. "Hooman peeg! Britta challenge you!"

Drekthac glanced at his current drinking companion. He saw one of her hands fingering one of her many throwing knives, her white-blue eyes glaring at him. He waited impassively until she reconsidered, instead throwing her elbow on the table with her hand up. Arm wrestling.

"Take it to the slush pits," he snorted, grabbing his mug and drinking deep. That was one way to make Britta bearable: Silence her ego, take off her clothes, and make her sing. With eyes on her again, he studied her lips and throat, recalled her alluring voice in song. He remembered what had him returning to her company and why he had sought her out today. Except she had only boasted today; no songs.

He spooked at the feel of something large pressing against his crotch, looking down to see her sandal precariously close to crushing something it shouldn't. Britta's sly, amused voice said in the vrykul tongue, "We both know you'd try slipping things into places they haven't earned, little one. You are not getting me into a pit, no matter what Helgrin sings of you."

"Sings?" Drekthac barked, eyes widening. The word was stark among the rest. "They've put it into fucking songs now?"

"Ja! Fooking songs!" Britta told him, grinning. "You ride Hilda and Hilda glory song."

"In Vrykul," he demanded. Between them, as they struggled to learn each others language, those two words (along with "In Coh-moon" from her) had popularized when they needed the clarification of words in spoken in their natural tongue. As Drekthac had mastered Vrykul well beyond she had Common, only his request seemed to be used.

Britta rolled her eyes, taking her time to finish her mug before answer. Drekthac realized he probably didn't want to know only after he had asked. "Breaking Hilda's abstinence is a legendary feat, and her glory has added to yours in your mounting. You ride on Hilda and her glory in the song." In Common: "Fooking hooman."

"Gods, you don't sound like a floundering fool in Vrykul. Can't you stay that way?" Drekthac mumbled, considering the notion of the song. Was "Bedder of Hilda" really going to be a fucking title of his? Noticing Britta's distant look, he realized she was still struggling over his words. His words came dry: "You in Vrykul, pretty. You in Common, ugly. Stay Vrykul."

Drunk Britta took it as a challenge, slapping the table and jutting a thick finger his way. "Fook you! Britta to learned Cah-moon good lo best, uh tis- till! best hooman jee-loose and Dragoon toongue be knoots!"

Persistent wench. Drekthac smiled into his mug.

"Oi, Hal!" Drekthac called out, and one of the vrykul present in the tavern looked, scowling. Drekthac jerked his thumb Britta's way. "Well knocked her mind dazed. Good mix." The brewer Ymirjar grinned, while Britta took up a sputtering rejection, voice enraged.

Throwing down a few silver marks from habit, Drekthac stood from his seat. Before Britta could fully grasp a sentence, he turned and caught the soft underside of her chin with his calloused finger. She froze at the pressure, allowing him to say warmly, "Improve my shooting soon, eh?" He winked and dragged his finger from under her chin, turning to leave.

Complementing while she was still insulted. Drekthac dared to guess he was taking a page from Hilda's book by it, but damn him if it didn't befuddle a good woman nicely. He looked forward to his next meeting with her, after letting the exchange settle. He had news to break to Balinda still.

XxX

"What good is a weak man?" Maldrid scoffed. In unison with her mood, her dark wings thumped to reaffirm her point.

Balinda remained stern faced, countering, "What good is a relationship without love?"

"Love? Hah!" Drekthac's handmaiden had surprising substance to her, when urged to speak. Balinda had discovered that in short order, yet with the man actually present, Maldrid's presence shrank to but a shadow. It must have been a servant thing that had her open to Balinda. "Who can define love? No one ever feels it the same way to different people. Even husbands with two wives feels differently for both, even if it may be called love either way!"

"You call it a moot point then?"

"Better to argue why the sun shines or the color of the Ghost Light! A good vrykul women does not fill her head with empty thoughts of love, but with solid desires of passion, human. Hate, lust, they are only manifestations of passion, and love can be found in it. Sweet words can seduce your heart, and that is disgusting. Think of deception! If a man wants a woman, he should earn her, and then she will consider him in earnest."

Balinda had abandoned the "arguing with a brick wall" analogy days ago. This was a fortress dressed in thorns and fire. With a blighted moat around it.

"And if it is a man you genuinely loath? He is both ugly and without honor, but he can overpower you. You will then consider that man, because he rapes you?"

"I would kill him in his sleep."

"But he already-"

"He took his prize, and he will be punished. It is no better to lament the thought of thief whom already consumed your foodstuff; you can only punish, then proceed."

Light, but Balinda was nearing a sour mood. How could she approach this topic with the woman? The Light offered no help.

Now, Maldrid questioned her, "So you humans really would take any man? He does not even need to prove his desire besides a few words and maybe a gift for "interest?" Your Malthon, how did he prove himself to you?"

If it blighted helps...! "He was brave and bold," Balinda burst, before she could even consider the implications. "He displayed honor in every action, no matter how much of a bullheaded fool he was being. When I was distressed, he showed care and kindness, and when he was lost, he showed me trust, just as I could place my trust in him. He became wise where most were fools, and he was strong where others were weak. Light, he deserved more than I could offer him, and I..." would do anything to ease his burdens.

Taking a breath to control her suddenly racing heart, Balinda finished coolly, "He did not need to climb atop me, ripping at my clothes, to prove himself worthy."

Maldrid nodded, though her helmet masked her expression. "Yes, he may be worthy, but where did he prove his desire for you? Where did he show that among all other prospects that he would take you, through any obstacle?"

By vrykul perspective, he didn't, Balinda realized. They had only agreed through words- "I do not care about the Light or its will. I care about you. I won't fall for its plan this time. Not with you at stake. Light, Balinda, I'm taking you with me." It was a drunken voice in her head, struggling but resolute. Through any obstacle, even the Light itself.

"Oh..." Balinda uttered, falling back from where she was addressing Maldrid. She stumbled into a chair. "Oh, Light..."

"What is it?" the val'kyr asked. Not with kindness, just curiosity.

Dare she say? Dare she reveal the boldness of the Fool King? Balinda couldn't help herself: "He came for me. Light, he came for me, Maldrid. Standing right where you are now, Malthon had come for me, through all of Ymirheim and its many Ymirjar, to take me away from here. Through any obstacle... and I turned him away."

For a long moment, Maldrid was silent. Shocked, likely, at the idea of someone getting that far through the city – perhaps testing her for a lie. Not with disdain, the val'kyr whispered, "You see then my point? Do not show regret, for if he had truly cared, he would have taken you against your word. That is love, that is desire."

A flash of self-loathing and urge to defend Malthon reached her. "Love is respect," she returned with equal quiet. More than desire. "And though he tried, I shut him down, made him respect my choice for staying."

How could she not have realized this before? Malthon, that Light-blessed and Light-damned man, had been so open and honest, so clean and clear, this whole while. It was not their past bond but their current one that he had striven for. More than old friends, she realized, Malthon still loved her. By the Light...

But if that was true, why did he raise himself to king? a wicked voice whispered with vulgar excuse. He knew that there could be nothing between a king and a Crowngarde. Another voice rose, arguing with the ardor of the Light: Remember the words of Lord Goldwind. Malthon was made to wear a crown he did not want. The Light grooms him to its charge, in necessity, and the day will come where he tosses it into the deepest ocean.

Balinda fought to shut out both voices. This was not the day or age to entertain such thoughts. She was sworn to celibacy, married to vengeance. Malthon knew that. Light, she had made sure he knew to stay away from her.

The sound of an iron latch drew their attention to the door of the longhouse. Drekthac had returned, seen in the snowy storm at the open doorway. He shut out the icy breeze before more heat could escape, then brushed at the snow on his cloaks. Balinda's conversation with Maldrid was over; the val'kyr would not speak in his presence without prompting.

His glance her way was careful, thick lips drawing thin before asking, "Any troubles?"

A flash of trepidation passed through her, as she realized that Maldrid could tell him about Malthon's visit. She did not know what Drekthac's reaction would be at almost losing his prize, but she worried it would make peace between them impossible. The val'kyr, however, only said, "None, my liege. She remains mopey and weak in heart." Though the val'kyr did not glance her way, Balinda recognized the deliberate pause at the end, letting Balinda know she would hold that secret for at least a spell longer.

"Like a child," Drekthac growled, unclasping his cloaks and throwing them onto their hooks. "Leave us. I will breathe the fight back into this one, while I believe you still have a private place to find."

Balinda noticed the quiver that passed through Maldrid's back muscles. The prospect excited her or left her nervous. From the deep way the handmaiden bowed and the pleased tone of her words, Balinda guessed the former: "You play games, my liege. This fool's task is a tease."

His approach had him passing the val'kyr, but he paused to set his hand on her hip and slide it around to her back, giving a small shove towards the door. "So find an empty house and break in, one waiting for a future Ymirjar or a recent slain one. If you don't prove creative, Maldrid, then you won't prove worthwhile."

With a morbid fascination, Balinda recognized the sexual tension between the two. Already, she had been made to sit through the sessions of his time with Freydis, but never had she witnessed any romantic ties between these two. With the conversation on vrykul courtship still in mind, she watched on silently.

"Such a place could be expected within an hour, my liege, but it is not my creativity that is lacking. It is you who has placed conditions without merit; are you not bold enough to have even Lady Hilda know? I do not serve a coward."

Until that comment, Drekthac's eyes and attention had been on Balinda. Eyebrows raising, he turned to the val'kyr, who only slowly moseyed her way to the door with a whimsical air. He took small, soundless steps towards her as he demanded, "Is that bite I hear from you? Mistaking insight for a simpering heart though, a dangerous challenge."

"Insight?" Maldrid questioned airily. "In running from legacy? Shall I sing you a song before I depart, my lie-!"

Even Balinda flinched at the powerful crack of his hand against Maldrid's buttocks. That strength against a human would leave her unable to sit for weeks, perhaps even fracture a bone. After the initial spook, Maldrid hummed in a deep voice while he drawled, "Catch your tongue, lest I occupy it otherwise, handmaiden. A spider's web is no more enjoyable to a dragon than a fly, if its venom remains fatal. Now find that bed before I have to find it for us."

"Of course, my liege," Maldrid returned in a low, dangerous voice. Light, but it burned with both pleasure and anger, Balinda recognized. Maldrid had incited that reaction deliberately. At the turn of the masked head at the doorway, Balinda realized that Maldrid had done it for her. Those dark painted lips were set with satisfied. Then she faced the door again and left.

The Dragon kept a fond smile aimed at Maldrid's departure for a moment longer before returning his intent on Balinda. She steeled herself for however he might come at her, be it argument, demand, or another attempt at sexual favor. Instead, he lifted one of the human-sized chairs in passing and slammed it down before him, straddling it backwards and facing her.

"Let's talk," he said, leaning against the wooden back.

Balinda's own chair was only a few feet past his, leaving them faced for a conversation. Though she wished to turn away, Balinda remained seated and met his gaze, impassive. The scent of alcohol from his breath reached her.

In reply, she shrugged. "We have exhausted our words already. Like a fool, you will not accompany King Malthon, and now they begin to march towards Storm Peaks alone."

"Always back to the Fool King," he remarked. "Why don't you ever concern yourself with yourself?"

The purpose of this chat could be anyone's guess. Balinda did not rise to the question, only uttering, "Hm."

"And there it is again," he sighed, shaking his head. "Noncommittal. Vague. Nothing more than a lifeless husk. It is absolutely miserable for us both, you know." Balinda did not care, but she assumed she knew what his goal was now.

Her thoughts turned inward, however. The Light had taken her here. It had taken her as one of the one hundred companions to Malthon's attack, and it had let her be captured at its conclusion. Malthon even had to get drunk to try for a rescue. Yes, she was supposed to be here in Ymirheim, but for what purpose, she did not know.

From the start, she had tried explaining Malthon and his intents to Drekthac, thinking the man might be swayed that way. That illusion had been ripped apart with each clashing conversation. Some other factor had to be in motion before the Dragon would commit Ymirheim to the war; he was waiting for something.

Those thick lips of his were pursed with thought in his regard for her now. Eventually, he stood from the chair, so soon after sitting, and made to her right. He spoke while moving, "In all of my home, only one chest has remaining locked. I presume you know by now what lies within." From his waist, bouncing between the skulls, he withdrew a key and knelt before the one chest in question.

Balinda assumed she did. The whole longhouse had been ransacked in search of her equipment beforehand. At the absence, she took it to mean he either discarded it or kept it within that chest. Hours had been spent trying to bypass that lock, whenever she could spare a private moment, but it was not meant to be. Not yet.

The iron lock fell and the aged hinged creaked as the lid yawned open. Balinda had a brief vision of a dragon's maw, opening to spew a bellyful of fire, but then it cleared, revealing the orange glow as something enchanted within. With hardly a moment's hesitation, Drekthac scooped his hands in and tossed out a clanking pile of metal and blue.

Her armor, all of it, even the heavy shield. Reaching in again, he lifted out a straight sword, pale as moonlight and nearly as radiant. A blessed blade, Balinda's own. The warrior tested the steel in his hand, finding a firm hold on the grip, and he turned it about, then swung. Gently, he let the tip touched the ground, holding it steady by the pommel.

"A blade that can slay Ymirjar. Cherish this steel dearly, paladin, for when all else is lost, even Light, it will remain faithful to you." Balinda's only warning was a flash from the Light. Drekthac scraped the end up over the stone floor to hurl the sword her way. Light guiding her, Balinda's hand snatched out and found the leather grip, catching it before she would be gutted.

He was smiling then, nodding in a satisfied way. "I had news for you, but that can wait. Dress yourself, White Lady. We shall cross arms."

Balinda hesitated for a long moment, turning her sword over in her hands. She recognized his tribute to the creed of steel, echoing similar words from her father. Krassin Crowngarde had been a knight before the Order of the Silver Hand was founded, then one of the first paladins trained with Uther and Tirion. He knew the ways of steel before the ways of Light, yet neither could save him when the Prince betrayed the King. The King had been slain right before his helpless hands that day, with him soon to follow, claimed by Frostmourne.

Gentle urgings within her moved Balinda finally. She began to dress, slow as it was for a paladin, while Drekthac moved away to find his own armor. He meant for this to be a serious duel, to the death if she understood these Ymirjar properly. Val'kyr- nay, vrykul magic would return the loser, she suspected.

It felt right to be dressed in steel again. Balinda felt it burrow deeper than clothing, penetrating her skin and soul. It armored every part of her, and she became one with the steel around her. The tension in her lower back relaxed away, adjusting to carrying her new weight, while the Light flooded through her iron pores to fill her entire being. Balinda basked in the moment, her hand finding her sword again.

Looking down, she saw only her blue plumed centurion helmet remained, and she knelt to retrieve it. It was her crown, her duty, burden, and purpose. To wear that was to leave behind Balinda and become the Crowngarde. That was how she always saw it; the armor she could wear to any occasion, yet the helmet was only for battle.

With steady hands, she lifted the helmet and set it over her head, angled just so to keep her hair pinned behind her head, away from her face and eyes. The leather strap beneath her chin was tightened, securing it, and she stood with the lazy grace that she was known for, ready for war.

Horns blared.

Balinda faced Drekthac, cool in expression beneath her helmet, but the warrior – similarly suited – was facing the door with alarm. Neither of his massive swords budged in their sheaths as he took several rapid, heavy steps to his door, then hesitated.

"What is it?" she asked despite herself. Her mind was clear and sharp, her arm ready to draw, and the Light buzzed with energy, as it did in battle.

"Something is attacking our walls," he answered simply. Balinda knew that was not all; no attack phased the Ymirjar, as had been seen in the last two years of warring. He sensed her question, adding as he undid the latch, "And the scouts are requesting aid."

The scouts never requested aid.

"Stay here," he growled, then sprinted out the door with a speed that did not match the bulk he carried.

Balinda stared at the open door in his absence, seeing the swirling snow dancing in a great storm. The Light within matched the weather, telling her it was time to fight. She could not ignore its call. The White Lady followed, unchained and armed.

XxX

When the Ymirjar toyed with the human army, they were given a fresh taste of the new foes that bubbled out of Storm Peaks like bad froth. If Drekthac needed further verification of the threat of the darklings, he received it there. The intrigue of this foe had the vrykul bubbling with excitement... and unease. This foe was unnatural; superstition and tales of old left them wary.

Nearly all of the Ymirjar had returned to Ymirheim now, leaving them near six hundred even after the losses against the Fool King. The changed world had them wanting unity, now more than ever. They wanted the strength of the clan behind them, to weather the storm or to battle it should the horns be blown.

They battled it now.

From their taste, they recognized two varieties to the darklings: the basic and those with their eyes cut out. The latter were marked by a vast difference in strength, unhindered by their apparent disability. Bad omens, the Ymirjar murmured. Like Hela-spawn, even the defeated darklings had the final laugh as their deaths prompted eruptions of guts and blood, some violent and wide, that sizzled away flesh and steel alike on contact.

When Drekthac reached the gate, clamoring among his reckless brothers and sisters, they realized how dire the current threat was. The gate had been seized against them. From its vast heights, darklings leapt unnaturally far to tackle down the val'kyr, shredding their wings and breaking their astral bodies. They were killing the val'kyr, in their home city!

Drekthac's voice was not alone in its furious roar. The Ymirjar machine lost its cold control. Heroes, champions, the finest fighters ever produced lost their poise and screamed for murder. Scores of eyeless darklings met their advanced, as hungry as the Ymirjar in the lust for blood.

It was a battle like Drekthac had never experienced before. He had charged siege machines, faced arrow hail and musket sweeps, routed cavalry advances by foot – even faced the worst orcish hordes with employed goblin landminers. The awesome power of the vrykuls proved reminiscent to lumbering ogres, yet it remained focused, disciplined, and utterly ruthless. The spells were not exchanges of lobbed orbs or bolts – flesh and earth alike ripped apart like the shattering of glass.

In return, the eyeless fought like Hela incarnates. Extra limbs, heads, fanciful weapons of bone or black steel lashed back with sharp efficiency, wielded like they were masters of their own bodies. Scaled carapaces worked like armor, and skin like robust shields – yet with the dark, unfocused appearance of them, it was impossible to tell the attributes of ones opponent.

With the explosive nature of darkling deaths, their spirits claimed as if by angry gods heedless of whom was around, Drekthac found it as mad as charging fields of land mines or cannon-armed lines. Bodies, viscera, guts and glory flung through the air with ear-numbing booms, mixing with the screams of the killing and dying. The Ymirjar plowed through it.

Here, a Ymirjar raised his axe with a bellow to shake mountains, yet as the axe fell, the darkling sprang forward, clawing for his belly. A raised knee kept it back, finding rake marks through the thigh and calf, and then the axe cracked the hard shell of its back, slicing down. Tentacles slipped into the warrior's arms, blood spilling around the boneless appendages, until all at once they burst out at separate points and pulled both arms off. The man roared louder, and he stomped a foot over the back of the axe, sending it the rest of the way through the darkling.

Both figures vanished in the following eruption.

There, a huntress and her worg wrestled down a nathrazim-shaped darkling nearly twice her size, with its wings buffeting in frustration. The battle-worn animal had it pinned, latched onto its neck from behind and clawing with its legs, using its weight to keep the winged darkling stumbling. Black hooves sought purchase over the snow, while the huntress sent bolts into its face, throat – anywhere the thick black armor couldn't be perceived. Barely, the worg released it in time to escape the death throes.

Drekthac found his own opponent. Four arms with four swords, the blades nearly eight feet in length and slender. Standing at fifteen feet, it also had reach he couldn't match. He met it in a lunge, seeking the heart. Blades came for him, ready, yet they scraped off his shoulders, bracers, and guarding swords until he thrust one into its chest. Drekthac growled as he saw two hidden tentacles brew forth from the black chest and wrap up his sword towards his body.

Kicking off the stomach, he fell to the ground, rolling aside, then spun to cleave off a leg. He found his feet a second later, blades up defensively as he paced aside. He watched, disgusted, as the two reaching tentacles froze in the air, then one shut back inward, impaling its leaking hole to plug the wound, while the other snapped downward into the ground to stabilize it, acting like a new leg.

The arms struck the instant it was balanced. The darkling bent at the waist to reach his height, while Drekthac dodged back, waiting. Once the forth blade missed, he lunged in, accepting one to scrape over his shoulder again, and swung up to carve a good foot into its torso from beneath. Whatever genitals it had spilled out behind him, and it shrieked inhumanly.

Still with forward momentum, Drekthac stomped a foot to catch all of his force, pivoting as he did – and barely keeping from slipping over the icy ground – and then planted his other to lunge up again. His body roared at the stain, turning all that momentum backwards so quickly, but his feet left the ground a final time for him to swing both blades down its broad back.

On the ground again, he noticed the telltale convulsing and retreated, watching its body snap apart like a firestick. A second eyeless charged through the spray of acid-blood, unharmed, to jump on the Ymirjar still shielding herself from it.

Gods, but this was a foe worthy of the Ymirjar! An army of the eyeless!

"Take the gate!" he roared out, already charging forward – between several advancing darklings – to meet the one behind. That would advance their line, if he could live. This was how he changed the pace of wars. Advance them, live, and advance again. Claim the objectives as they needed. Always, it worked best if stout men had his back for it. Any Ymirjar would do.

Above, watching val'kyr repeated the command for him in Vrykul, and the clan clamored to do just that. However, only a few seconds later the voices changed to screaming, "Man the harpoons! Shoot them down!"

It took Drekthac several seconds to translate the panicked, screaming Vrykul while fighting, but once he did, he noticed the shadows passing overhead. Looking, he saw scores of flying darklings passing over the gate, aiming for the val'kyr.

"FOR THE EMPRESS AND THE MASTER!"

The victorious scream sounded as if of insects, but those were no nerubians Drekthac had encountered, not even with the vagueness of the darklings. Since the first few exchanges, they had noticed darklings usually were shaped similar to some familiar species, but these were too fey to pinpoint them.

Drekthac shoved back his foe, scoffing at the clawmarks his breastplate gained from it, then got his fingers in his mouth, whistling. The val'kyr would not stand a chance, though he felt far too late for this. Slamming the ground, he created a shockwave powerful enough to stagger and stun even these foes, then retreated back to let the siege-breaking behemoths take his place.

These flying darklings hurled towards the val'kyr. Ymirjar marksmen, harpooners, and spell-weavers dropped them like flies, rank after rank, but still they pushed. The val'kyr readied themselves for combat – no one in Ymirheim was an invalid in combat – but then one swooped before them all. She seemed to tower over even her sisters, with wings of white stretching wide as she gathered power before and around her.

It took Drekthac a long moment to recognize Hilda before the val'kyr. He had never seen her in the face mask before, nor in armor. Yet the presence was unforgettable, radiant as her pale form burst with illuminations from her power. Whatever rune-spell she was conjuring proved complex, needing time as thousands of symbols blossomed around her, until the darklings were nearly to her.

It came in a torrent of shadow. Like the waves of the ocean, it pealed up and high, swelling with its wrath, and then lunged forward into the darkling horde, swallowing them whole. Just then, a green proto-drake, Coralhide, landed before Drekthac and screeched, and he made the leap into the saddle despite his armor.

The instant Drekthac had his hands around the reigns, he felt someone massive slip behind him, pressing close. "Go!" a feminine voice demanded in Vrykul, and he snapped them. Coralhide roared and took to the sky, though he was slower with the weight. Drekthac noticed dozens of other drake riders already barreling into the flying darklings – not even Hilda's spell had wiped out all it had hit. The val'kyr were in total combat.

As soon as Coralhide was level in the air, Drekthac's riding partner jumped from the saddle. He looked back with wide eyes, seeing Britta now balancing on her toes, crouched, with several arrows clenched between her teeth. Seeing his look, she winked at him, then took one arrow and set it to the string of her bow, drawing.

Laughing at the insane huntress, Drekthac felt relieved it was she at his back, and he urged Coralhide directly into the pit of the flying darklings. As a Ymirjar of old – at least twenty-five years before the Long Slumber – Britta the Blood Maid would have attempted to excel in every field she could. Drekthac had to trust that fighting from drake-back was one field as they met the first flying, insectoid darkling.

Coralhide jumped up in the air a few feet higher to claw at the black of one, and in the sudden bank to the side, Drekthac leaped to the side – holding on by one of the handles of the saddle – to decapitate another. Bolts shot past his head into other targets, the whistle loud by his ear. It joined the many other dozens already piercing the sky from nearly every angle.

Coralhide had character, Drekthac had come to learn. It was a bloody complainer: always shrieking, always loud, annoyed when he didn't ride it and annoyed when he did. Once, the drake had sent its head through his window while he and Freydis were in bed, demanding to be fed. But for all its faults, the drake proved exceptional in the air. It was strong, resilient, and fierce. The Overthane had gifted him a princely drake.

Now, Coralhide proved himself again. While he hung off the right side, Britta – well over his weight in balance – set aside her bow to lunge to the left side of the drake, still biting shafts of arrows between her teeth, and slashed with her curved knife at a darkling coming in from the flank. The creature bounded off the empty saddle – barely missing Drekthac – then exploded in the air just beyond, spraying acidic mist upon those fighting on the ground.

Despite the weight of their scrambling around over the proto-drake, Coralhide maintained his position and even fought himself, breathing fire. A bloody fine drake.

Shortly into the combat, Drekthac peered towards the gate, wondering how his kin were faring. Before he could catch a visual, something grabbed him by the back and heaved him up and off the handle hold. He swung his sword, hoping to cleave his captor, yet found it stopped by a steady parry from Britta.

Gods, but she was beautiful. Many of the trophies that feathered her hair had blown out in the billowing gusts of the sky, leaving her appearing more wild than usual. Her soft blue skin, interrupted on one side with a series of tattoos. At that moment, her face was set with fiery determination, unphased by his attack that she held at bay.

"Helgrin og Maldrid," she told him curtly, then looked pointedly over her shoulder.

Drekthac eased off his strike, letting his feet find their place on the saddle again, while he followed her look. In the sea of white and black bodies, two in particular stood out, fighting nearly back to back. In the swift moving way of aerial fighting, that was an impossibility, but it was clear the two covered each other in the same way.

Against them were a score, trapping them outside of the main body of val'kyr. Maldrid, his val'kyr. Helgrin, Britta's. He found it odd that those two especially fought together, like he and Britta did, but did not debate the matter further. Britta released him, and Drekthac carefully sat in the saddle again, taking up the reigns and guiding Coralhide their way. He could not balance on the beast like her feet could.

The proto-drake swept by the val'kyr, smashing apart those that pressed against that side. By a particularly loud scream, Drekthac knew Coralhide had been wounded for it, but they fought on. Against these numbers, and a foe far more suited to aerial combat, Drekthac realized their fight was a losing one.

The val'kyr and proto-drakes needed a rallying point. Gods, but did that work in the air? He had no experience in fights up here, only what he did on the ground. He liked to work as a damage sink, letting everything mob him while the rest struck the enemy from behind, and he always lived through the worst situations.

The rage was thick in his blood, building with no way to vent. His armor kept it boiling.

"Britta!" he roared while severing the wings from one passing darkling. They looked like mantises, with scythe-like arms, but it was difficult to tell all of their details.

The huntress screamed back, "Ja?"

He did not know what to say, but he knew they needed a better plan. Another darkling came at them, yet immediately Drekthac noticed a difference. It was eyeless, like the rest, yet something about it seemed bigger, swifter, deadlier. Its arms began to slice and dice rapidly before it even got to him, creating a wall of thorns for him.

Drekthac thrust his blade into it, hoping to halt the arms, yet the darkling seemed to intend on that, for with two touches, it twisted his sword out of his hands entirely, leaving him defenseless. His gauntlets and bracers should be able to block them, but would it have a way to take the arm?

Drekthac had no time to think. He trusted his braces, thrusting his arm against the blades. Deep furrows cut into the metal, appearing near instantly between the blurred blades, with sounds like shrieks and sprays of sparks. The arm was turned aside similar to the sword, slamming into the bracers when reaching the extremities. The solid metal strained, but the angle also left the soft parts of his armpit and opposite the elbow vulnerable.

The scythes took the advantage, burying into the joint of his elbow. Drekthac roared in pain but mostly frustration. The darkling purred in pleasure, tugging back to claim the limb. The bracers stopped the attempt, but then Drekthac was stuck clinging to Coralhide in one hand and fully suspended in the air by the other. Something about his nerves prevented him from pulling in right arm, no matter his strength.

"Fooking hooman!" Britta screamed, appearing from the other end of the drake with her bow already drawn. She fired off two arrows in quick succession, fitting arrows instantly and without looking, and the darkling hissed at them appearing in its face.

The scythe was pried out of his arm, and Drekthac quickly scrambled back to Coralhide, his right arm flaring with angry pain. The rage was creating a red haze in his mind, and he struggled to keep his wits about him for once. If he didn't, the rage would send him hurling his body into the flying foes, to claim as many as he could before falling to death.

He achieved his vent only a moment later, seeing a darkling approaching Britta from behind. Yanking his second sword from the holster on his back, he cleaved it apart in an eye blink on the draw. Britta thumped his back with an elbow when she saw the parts of it fly past her, quickly combusting.

"Rally!" he roared finally, in Vrykul. He had learned that word recently from the many war games. Maldrid and Helgrin, bleeding but alive, both heard, though they spared no glance for him. Drekthac grasped the reigns in his left hand, holding his massive sword between knee and chest, and felt like a fool as he commanded Coralhide to bank back towards the many body of val'kyr. It led the charge into the backs of those still advancing.

"Rally!" the val'kyr cried in turn, squeezing together to eliminate the black from their ranks, and the booming voice of Hilda gave them center. Spear-Wives, they were called. Ladies of the Spear. Though not Ymirjar, the val'kyr lived among them, observed the strategies and genius of the realm's finest champions and heroes. Given solace now, they formed up in files.

Two high and many thick, the val'kyr became. The darklings could no longer gain purchase against them, swarming around at all sides. Like wolves the darklings bled them and harried them, attacking from flanks, hamstringing from behind, yet the force of them was inpenetrable, defensive – delaying.

Meanwhile, the harpooners took advantage of the enemy being forced to the outside the body of the val'kyr. They skewered them from the air, sending them tumbling out of the sky. Masterful shots, all of them, between experience and vrykul technologies. In short order, it was over, with the val'kyr – surrounded by proto-drakes now – none the worse.

As the final darkling fell from the sky, claimed by arrows and the vengeful spell-bolt of Hilda, they took up cheer, celebrating the victory and war. A glorious foe had been bested this day.

While Britta hooted and hollared from behind Drekthac, waving her bow about, he aimed them for the gate, intending to continue the fight. He stopped in the air when he noticed that it was already over. The gate had been retaken, and upon it were cheering and chanting vrykul. The death song and war songs rose up, as Drekthac realized the aerial battle had been the last to finish.

But one point stood out among the hordes. Vrykul were dark figures, always in iron, furs, and other blackened garb. Among the wall was one who shone more brilliantly than the val'kyr. The white around it stood as a beacon, luminous, as it raised a sword above its head and called attention upon its diminutive self. Drekthac recognized the figure alright: the White Lady stood upon the top of the wall, center of a dozen corpses.

It was then he noticed three val'kyr closing around him, at the sides. Britta's excited, lustful voice broke into quick chatter to Helgrin. He didn't try to translate it, noticing Freydis to his left. Her attention was on Balinda as she intoned, "More than ever, we are certain: the White Lady carries the soul of a Ymirjar. Have you told her of her call to Valhalas?"

"Not bloody yet," he said. He noticed a white-winged val'kyr approaching his slave. No matter her armor, the visible thong told him enough of her identity.

Freydis explained, "Hilda has suggested we hold her trials now. Suggestions from Hilda are not to be ignored." The two below spoke to each other, not nearly close enough to be heard, as they watched on.

XxX

"Take the gate!"

Balinda heard the Dragon's bellow, as one of the only Common announcements in the confusion. From the chatter of the val'kyr above, she assumed them to be repeating it. Her focus remained forward, taking the plan to heart, letting Ymirjar attention slide off her in favor of their hate for the darklings. She was ignored, even when calling brilliant blessings and motes of Light around her.

Once she reached the front lines, seeing the Dragon already deep in the throes of the enemy while the Ymirjar pushed after him, Balinda noticed the val'kyr screaming something else, sounding panicked. Her narrow focus did not change when shadows flew over her head, knowing she could do nothing about flying foes.

In the final few paces before her first engagement, Balinda did notice the val'kyr were not intoning the names of the legends who fell here. It was different from the skirmishes with Malthon, far more intent and ruthless, about butchering not glorifying. Seeing the identity of the attack – a host solely of eyeless Skinless – Balinda realized why, and she noticed the efficiency in which the enraged Ymirjar machine was tearing through them.

Drekthac passed her by without notice, running towards the Ymirjar body. The thought barely passed through her head, as she reached the Skinless he left behind. The Light guided her blade, her body, using all the skill and finesse she had honed through her years. Tentacles, legs, and other extremities were severed by quick sweeps of her blade, not slowing her momentum. Her shield rose as she spun, blocking something effortlessly and without looking, and then she plunged her blade into the gut of a foe, whipping it out an instant later to find the next.

The Light remained steady within her, unlike their first encounter with this foe. It was startling how, as their engagements continued and the paladins continued to overcome the Sightless, the Light seemed to grow emboldened, as if it was learning. The sentience of the Light was a matter long in debate, but given its ability to see into the future, to guide those who sought it to right and purpose, never had the Light wavered in confidence, not even if it was that time for the servant of the Light to spill his blood.

Though Balinda wished to leave such thoughts to theorists, the Archbishop, and other scholarly figures in the Light, she couldn't help but wonder if something of this foe blinded the Light from its intended future, leaving it uncertain, and now it watched over them personally, by each individual rather than the whole.

The sunburst of warmth Balinda felt within, following that thought, nearly sent a startled shock through her, but her arms continued unabated in slaying her foes.

"White Lady!" a rumbling vrykul voice roared, sounding elated. Several others took it up, and then the Skinless pressing behind her, trying to have her surrounded, were smashed away by the sudden horde of Ymirjar following her. Light, but they were massive, even for vrykul – even for Ymirjar!

The vrykul who followed her then stood nearly fourteen feet tall each, thick as orcs, and seemed to trust their own thick skin more than armor. They carried long, heavy two-handers she doubted three humans could carry if working together. With single sweeps of those, the Skinless were sent scattered, many crushed on the spot, and... Light, but were all four of them identical brothers?

Balinda did not bother trying to kill the Skinless. She incapacitated them, cutting off limbs in passing, and built up forward momentum for them, approaching the Gates of Ymirheim. Those one-man siege engines behind her, those behemoths, finished off the wounded Skinless as easily as they could smash open iron gates.

Faced with several leaping at her at once, Balinda rolled aside, coming up to strike down the one following – though its deceptive tentacles tried to stop her, the Light guided her wrist, and her sword plunged in at an awkward, if utterly effective, angle unhindered. A burst of warning spun Balinda, backpedaling now with her shield up, as black thorns tinged off her shield like throwing knives. She stopped when her back touched cold wood.

They had reached the Gates!

Looking for the ramp or ladder up, Balinda realized there were none. Vrykul-sized platforms were spaced far enough that even vrykul must reach or leap to grasp the next before pulling themselves up. No one but vrykul could get up there.

The siege-breaking brothers reached her, sizzling blood still dripping from their maces and axes, and they roared victoriously, putting their backs to the wall to face the remaining horde. Only a few Skinless still poured in from the open gate to their left.

As they readied themselves to fight again, one brother abruptly stumbled forward, and they could see a smaller eyeless fiend clinging to his back with long claws, teeth gnashing for his thick bull neck. It had leapt down from the heights of the Gates. Once they wrestled the darkling off, smashing it in a heavy blow and kicking it away before it could explode acidic viscera on them, Balinda shouted to them:

"I need to get on top!"

They looked her, blinking stupidly. Men!

Jumping in her armor for reference, Balinda pointed to the top of the Gates. The brothers looked up, shielding their eyes to the brighter Northrend sky – the sun was not quite breaching the clouds, but it cast a bright outline. One seemed to get it – thank the Light – and he slapped his brothers' shoulders, saying something in that nearly-Dwarven Vrykul language.

At once, they all grinned, and two turned to face the horde again, watching their backs, while the others approached Balinda. She felt a nervous twinge, just before their meaty hands grabbed at her waist and heaved her off the snow. Barely, she bit back a cry of surprise, while the Light flooded her with a sudden rush of comfort.

What are they-

The two brothers threw her. Balinda's head whipped at the strength those two, hearing a rush of wind around her as she plummeted upwards. She wanted to keep her eyes closed against the sickening sensation, but the Light urged her to open them, and she did to see a Skinless falling down, in reach to flay her apart.

She prayed a Divine Shield around her, lettings its claws scrape by harmlessly, then found her momentum ending for a cold moment of suspension, now cresting the top of the bloody Gates by a good five feet. Clawing and kicking the air like her first time trying to swim, Balinda felt herself approaching that rampart, and she landed on her feet, stumbling towards a group of three eyeless Skinless, alone.

Light!

The object of her complaint lifted her hand, however, and Balinda felt a change to the Holy Shock she sent their way. Instead of burning rays, a wave of force flung all three backwards, over the far edge of the wall. Her fist gripped her sword hilt tighter as she noticed others already approaching, cackling in raspy voices.

Malthon, forgive her, for she suspected she would not live through this assault.

Her aegis felt too heavy, even with the Light's fortitude. Balinda let it slide off her wrist, the buckles loose where they needed to be, then gripped her blessed sword with both hands. Her Divine Shield flickered out. They came.

"Swordplay, dear, is a bit like dancing."

This memory, now? Balinda watched it with her mind's eye, letting mindless instinct and the Light control her body as she reached the first Skinless.

A young Balinda had frowned at the comment, then asked her mother, "Dancing? What would you know about fighting, mother?"

"Grace, my child, and not just that which the Light has offered us. To live as a noble is a dangerous life, and the wife of a Crowngarde is always a target. We must be strong and able, while the Lord Crowngarde is away, to defend ourselves as if he were here in body."

So young and foolish then, Balinda was, as she grew excited enough to bounce in place and clap. "So you can fight too, mother? Oh, do show me, please!"

"I shall, my child. But to understand how to match men in the games of arms, you must first learn to move as a dancer does. So come, dear, and dance with me."

Balinda danced, both then as a child and now. It was much later that her mother told her that an elven blade mistress had taught her swordplay, and Balinda had learned that style – adopted its state of mind, truly – from her mother, before she learned the sword forms from her father. The ways of steel, of a Crowngarde, along with her training in the churchyard as a paladin.

Men, warriors, they took to foes like hammers to anvils. They smashed and crushed them in heavy blows, testing strength against strength. Women could not do the same. They were not the same physically. No, they had other advantages, in natural limberness and fluidity. Why parry when a simple step aside cleared her from harms way? Why swing where you knew an opponent could block?

It was a game of dancing, a swift game of step and counting. Balinda struck when she was certain of a score, even mild ones, always bleeding and debilitating what she was faced against. The Light gave her awareness of every direction, and always she remained one step above her foes. She knew this dance better than they.

Dip in, pry out. Spin, bow, sweep, and rise. Step, step, clap. Step, step, clap. The crescendo-! Her sword buried deep in the chest of a Skinless, and Balinda forced her body to move as it had not in years, dropping in the splits just in time to avoid the sweeping blows of behind. She drove aside, rolling smoothly, while her hand snagged her sword back in time, and she spun to her feet and faced the group in time to avoid the following explosion.

Balinda knew this dance so painfully well. She was a Crowngarde. She was a paladin, a lady, a defender, a warrior. An upholder. Her place was not to guide the blind or embolden the meek. Judgment and retribution, those were her marks, her sigil. In a world were atrocities like the Scourge were commonplace, she had been called as an upholder to defend what was right by destroying what was not.

Unlike the Scarlet zealots, she knew restraint, proper judgment, and compassion. The Light must guide her hand, not her heart or mind, for only one of those was free of bias or deception. It had spared Baelin Drekthac when she had wished him dead, and it had taken Malthon when she wanted him where he was. Its plan, not hers.

A burst of frustration clenched within Balinda's chest, and she nearly screamed as she took the opportunity to behead the Skinless before her. It's claws raked her breastplate, too late to stop her, and while still panting, she kicked the convulsing body off the ramparts with her heavy boot.

Balinda spun, sword up, seeing the twirl of her blue cloak as she prepared to defend herself against the next foe. There were no more. Rays of Light spilled around her, illuminating her place and much around her. Across the ramparts, the only figures were the vrykul, including some she recognized as the behemoths that had thrown her up there.

With the snapping explosion of that last blind beast, heard echoing up from over the edge of the wall, the only noise came from the violent clash in the air. The val'kyr had formed a hovering cube of spears, all angled outward, while the drake riders encircled them, grappling and engaging the hornet's nest of Skinless that encircled the square ranks. Harpooners from the buildings and now wall, combined with archers and spell-weavers on the ground, dropped them from the sky like flies.

Soon it was over, and around her, the vrykul took up cheer. Balinda felt the same elation, standing there among the hollow-exploded corpses of ten Skinless, holding only her sword. With them, she raised it and cheered. The hulking brothers noticed her, cheering louder. It was a roar of victory, of the winning side – against hundreds of eyeless Skinless.

It was then Balinda realized the awesome power of the Ymirjar, and she knew Malthon needed their support in the war. The champions of every age, held together in one city – heroes like those the Ashbringer took into the Citadel, those who laid low the Beast of a Thousand Maws, those who slew the Betrayer. It was a force not unlike Malthon's army of full paladins.

"White Lady," a voice addressed, one both wanton and formal. Balinda beheld an armored val'kyr, her overlapping plates more covering than the usual (and scandalous) winged breastplate, and her smooth face-mask was marred by engraved runes. Thick, painted lips were set with amusement.

As the roaring crowd began to quite, Balinda noticed the attention on her. This val'kyr commanded a different presence, even among the Ymirjar. Was she not a servant of them? Nearly, Balinda wished she had participated in Drekthac's conversations. Was she to face justice for taking up arms, rebellious to her position? A stroke of divine irony, she realized, that she should be the one to face justice. Perhaps this was her purpose here, to martyrdom herself like this, yet prove the worth of the humans to the Ymirjar.

The Light remained warm and comforting within.

This val'kyr spoke: "I fear Drekthac the Immortal, in his bullheaded way, has neglected to tell you a matter of honor concerning you. Where there may have been doubt before, you banished it in taking up arms here. Word of the White Lady and her combat prowess has spread through vrykul lands, and your name has passed the tongues of many warriors and those who watch warriors. Now, you have been summoned to the greatest of vrykul battle pits: Valhalas, to undergo the trials of worthiness."

"To die there?" Balinda found herself asking. That was to be her execution, death in spectated battle? The name was familiar, however. Valhalas...

The val'kyr laughed, the sound soft as velvet. "Should you fail. Succeed, and you will have proved yourself worthy of combat within the sacred confines of Valhalas." It struck Balinda then, where she had heard that. Those proven worthy of combat within Valhalas... were worthy of passing the gates she stood upon. "Prove your worth, White Lady, and you join your brothers and sisters of Ymirheim, to have your name renowned for ages to come."

Oh, Light.

"If I refuse the call?" she questioned. The Light admonished her, and Balinda felt a chastised chill sweep past her spine. She was meant to fight there. And win? To join these people?

"Then you remain a slave to Baelin Drekthac." There was suggestion to her words, of the mistake in staying here. "The time has come to decide, White Lady. Will you remain a slave, or will you prove yourself as something worthy?"

Balinda turned away from the regal val'kyr, pacing along the wall with hundreds of eyes upon her. She saw Drekthac, on his proto-drake, with his val'kyr beside him. She recognized the massive Ymirjar brothers whom had fought with her. She saw the harpooners on their towers and longhouse roofs, the banded val'kyr, the forces on the ground. All of them watched her at that moment.

The Light opened her mouth. "I fight for King Malthon!" Balinda felt fierce passion as she shouted, hoping that her words now could pierce the thick skulls of these blighted brutes. "We humans, we small ones, offer the Ymirjar alliance, to fight together in the bloodiest, most glorious war Azeroth has seen in an age! The honor of combat here, now, is not to belong to any one name! Ymirheim, Jotunheim, Stormwind, Lordaeron – all have their claim in this war!

"If you doubted our skill and strength, you have met us already on the field of battle! If you doubted our valor and honor, you have seen me fight here, for your city! If you doubt our stake in this war, you have seen them siege our walls! If you doubt your own stake in this war, you have seen them take the Gates of Ymirheim from you! They took your Gates, from the Ymirjar! And you have seen me fight to assist in reclaiming it!

"And if you doubt our hearts, as humans, you will see me undergo the trials of worth in the ring of Valhalas! The Dragon, Drekthac the Immortal, is but one human, and you will see that we are not so different! Fight with my King, Ymirjar, and you will see that the glory of this war can be shared between our peoples, and we will crush whomever was foolish enough to strike these walls and kill your val'kyr! Fight with the Fool King of Northrend, Ymirjar, and you will find glory for ages to come!"

With the final heave of words, Balinda felt her strength – and the Light – leave her. She slumped, exhausted, and now worried at the absence of the Light's hand. Had that been her purpose, this speech? Would she perish in Valhalas? No answer reached her. She noticed the armored val'kyr, smirking in a satisfied way, call a proto-drake over.

As it landed on the ramparts beside her, that powerful val'kyr told her, "The arbiters will accompany you to the battle pit, and they will explain both the rules and your rights." Balinda sheathed her sword and attached her shield to her back again, then mounted the drake. "May your blade feast in the coming day, White Lady."

The amused Scourge harpy sent her off, and Balinda noticed many val'kyr leave the huddle to escort her flight. To Valhalas, she flew.

XxX

"So, Baelin, what do you propose the Ymirjar do next?" Hilda asked, stopping her flight before him on Coralhide. Freydis had departed with the other Arbiters, leaving him with only Britta and Maldrid at the parting of Balinda.

His replying grunt was amused. "I don't know about the rest of the clan, but I'm off to see what the Fool King intends with the darklings. And I won't be appeased until the one who leads them lies broken before my blades."

That loathsome val'kyr "queen" gained a wide smile. He mentally scoffed at her dress: armored body, yet still showing off cleavage, and her leg plates only reached upper thigh, leaving her ass and front covered only by the cloth thong. With sly tones, she pressed, "And will your thirst for appeasement persist through death, Ymirjar? Will you take with you Maldrid, to continue her duties away from home?'

Gods, this was the moment she had planned for. Drekthac had the choice of publicly throwing his support behind her plan, urging the Ymirjar machine to continue to war with the protection of the val'kyr, or to remain with tradition, to allow the champions who died in the coming war to find the rest they had sought. Yet, unlike how he foresaw this moment, she left the choice to him. No deceptions, no tricks, no persuasion.

Hilda's choice in that, to trust him to decide, was perhaps the most persuasive incentive of it all, for Drekthac felt an obligation of honor to reward her turn from trickery. "You are gods damn right I will take Maldrid! I will not allow myself to enter Valhal without the skulls of a thousand darklings to pave the way! I could not bear the shame of meeting my brothers and sisters without the head of the darkling's master bouncing at my hip! No, I will not rest until the day I see my foe shattered, broken, and enslaved by my strength!"

Clever, simple Britta behind him was silent, but he could hear Helgrin repeating his words in Vrykul to her. His friend would realize the significance of what he was saying, the turn from tradition – certainly none of the clan slain at this battle would be raised from the dead – yet she did not speak for or against him.

The silence bit at Drekthac, reminding him of the wrong he was suggesting. Hilda, smiling still, could had led him right into this trap, to leave him dishonored and scorned by the clan, cutting off his perceived leadership and wringing him dry. With a beat of her wings, she spun in the air to face the rest of the horde, and she bellowed in sweet Vrykul, "And for you, Ymirjar! Will you rest before you find the glory in defeating this foe? After seeing them strike at your city, seeing them slay your handmaidens instead of warriors, will you lay low only a score and say, "I have done well!" Could you face your brothers in Valhal with that death?"

Yes, they could, Drekthac knew. That was the way of the Ymirjar – had these enemies any honor, they could undergo the trials of worthiness themselves. In its place, the Ymirjar would gladly die to these worthy foes. Yet, the offer to stay alive was tempting. A dishonor had been cast this day, and it was within a vrykul's right to see it repaired, through death if needed. Not the Ymirjar way, but it was a vrykul way.

Britta was the first to crumble to the demand, roaring hate and fury – and nothing else in that unintelligible shout. On the wall, on the other drakes, below them, on the towers, the rest of the Ymirjar took it up, bellowing and shouting their fury, not yet vanquished though no darkling remained. Drekthac remained silent during it, lips draw in a slight frown beneath his helmet.

Hilda faced him in the midst of it, and he could see the pleasure and victory at seeing her plan realized. Hela take her, but it was not even a gloat. Hilda regarded him fondly in that moment, dipping her head in thanks, and then swooped by to rejoin her sister val'kyr.

Drekthac spat off the side of Coralhide, gripping the reigns tighter, but he noticed Maldrid had moved closer. She offered him his lost sword between her large hands. The blade was ruined by the blood of the darklings, bubbled by acid and stroked with deep furrows, but she had cleaned it before offering it to him now. He accepted it wordlessly, throwing it into the sheath against his back with the other.

In the lingering moment, still with many vrykul roaring, she questioned, "My liege?"

"Yes?" he demanded, unintentionally sharp.

"Thank you."

Drekthac grunted, quieter. Vrykul did not thank people. It was a heavily underused gesture, because it wounded pride – thanking for aid meant that aid was either needed or preferred, signs of weakness and dependance. He would not dishonor her further by making a point of it, but he kept her gesture in mind.

Absent of both Balinda and Freydis now, Drekthac felt he needed a strong drink. And a good fucking lay. The beds of Ymirheim would see much use this night, after so many of the clan were called into true and honest combat. It was the victors' right, and Maldrid was right here.

He stopped himself from asking her to his bed. She still had her task to accomplish first; he wouldn't dishonor either of them by discarding it. Yet, from the look she was giving him, it was clear she had something to say. His attention returned to her, and upon noticing, Maldrid opened her mouth, "My liege-"

"Forgive me, Spear-Wife," Britta's pleasant voice interrupted, "but the day has been bloody, and I have feasted well. My shield-brother and I will be retiring to the Hall of Heroes."

"Of course, Ymirjar," Maldrid agreed immediately, bowing her head. She turned to the west and began to fly, with Helgrin accompanying her.

Drekthac frowned at the interruption, but he certainly noticed Britta squeeze her hips closer to him, and the way her strong, long arms reached around him to take the reigns from his hands. She guided Coralhide to the same direction.

With his right arm still ruined at the elbow, Drekthac allowed her command, but he asked in Vrykul, "Plan?"

Britta sounded amused. "You don't fight with female vrykul often, do you?" She stuck with Vrykul, leaving her voice and words far smoother than her attempts at Common. He frowned though, while still removing his helmet with one hand. Once it was off, he felt her lean down to him, breath touching his ears despite the wind of their flight. "I saved your life, you saved mine, and we shared our glory. Tonight, we'll drink, we'll sing, and then we'll celebrate as champions do, when the moons are high. You understand, aye?"

Drekthac supposed he did, once he had it all translated. The night just might end better than he expected after all.