Chapter Two - A Blade in the Dark

I woke up next morning to hear my man, Dalfors, making the deuce of a row at the smoking-room door. This chap was a friend, for whom I'd done a good turn when I was in Dustwallow Marsh and he'd followed me just about everywhere, and agreed to become my manservant when I told him was settling down in Stormwind. He had about as much gift of the gab as a kodo, and wasn't a great hand at valeting (added was an unfortunate tendency to blow off his cash as soon as he got it), but I knew I could count on his loyalty.

"Dalfors, stop that row," I said. "There's a friend of mine, Captain - Captain" (I couldn't remember the infernal name) "dossing down in there. Get breakfast for two and then come and speak to me."

I told Dalfors a fine story about how my friend was a great swell, with his nerves pretty bad from overwork, who wanted absolute rest and stillness. Nobody had got to know he was here, or he would be besieged by communications from the Argent Crusade and his cure would be ruined. And Salren played up his role brilliantly when he came down to breakfast, I must admit. He fixed Dalfors with his Monocle, just like an old officer, asked him about the Shattered Sun Offensive, and slung out at me a lot of stuff about imaginary pals. Dalfors couldn't learn to call me "sir", but he "sirred" Salren as if his life depended on it.

I left him with a box of cigars and a newspaper, and went into the City till lunchtime. When I got back, the landlady had an important face.

"Nawsty business 'ere this morning, sah. Gent in No. 15 been and killed 'isself. They've just took 'im to the mortiary. The Guard are up there now."

I ascended to No. 15, and found a couple of Guards and a chap called Officer Brody busy in examining the place. I asked a few idiotic questions and they soon kicked me out. Then I found Salren's valet, and pumped him, but I could see he knew zero. He was a whining fellow with a churchyard face, and a coin of gold went a long way to console him.

I attended the investigation next day. A partner of some Real-Estate firm in Elwynn gave evidence that the 'deceased' had brought him some land propositions in Darkshore, and he had been, he believed, a freelancer. The officials decided it was probably a case of unsound mind and suicide, and the few personal effects were handed over to the High Elven Consul to deal with. I gave Salren a full account of the matter, and it amused him greatly. He said he wished he could have attended the investigation, for he reckoned it would have been about as spicy as to read one's own obituary notice.

The first two days he stayed with me in that back-room he was very peaceful. He read a lot, smoke a bit, and every night he played Chess and Cards with me, and at which he beat me hollow. I think he was nursing his nerves back to health, for he had had a pretty trying time. But on the third day, he began to get restless.

He fixed up a list of days till June 15th, and ticked each off with a red pencil, making remarks in shorthand against each day. I would find him sunk in a brown chintz chair, with his sharp eyes all foggy, and after those spells of meditation he was apt to be very despondent.

Then I could see he was beginning to get edgy again. He listened for little noises, and was always asking me if Dalfors could be trusted. Once or twice he got pretty irritable, and apologized for it. I didn't blame him, really - it was one heck of a stiff job he'd taken on, and I made every allowance for that.

It was not the safety of his own skin that mattered to him, but the success of whatever plan he'd made out. This Elf was clean and hard as steel all through, without a soft spot in him. It was worth admiring, really. One night, he got pretty solemn. "Say, Hannay," he said, "I judge I should let you a bit more deep into this business. I should just hate to go out without leaving somebody else to put up a fight." And he began to tell me in detail what I had only heard from him vaguely.

I confess I did not give him very close attention. The fact is, I was more interested in his own adventures rather than in his high politics. At that point, I though Thrall and his problems were not in my purview, leaving that to him. So a lot that he said slipped clean out of my mind. I do remember some points though - that the danger to him wouldn't begin until the Earthen Ring invited him, and that it came from the very highest quarters, where there would be no draught of suspicion. He mentioned the name of a Human woman - Julia Czechenyi - as having something to do with the matter. I gathered that she would either be a decoy, or the assassin, to get him out of the reach of his Kor'Kron. He talked to, about a Twilight Hammer and a Blood Elf who lisped in his speech, and he described very particularly somebody that he never referred to without a palpable trace fear - an old dwarf with a young voice who could hood his eyelids like a hawk.

He spoke a great deal about death too. He was mortally anxious about winning through with his job, but he didn't give a damn about his own life. "I reckon, it's like going to sleep when you're pretty well tired out, and waking up to find a summer's day with the scent of hay coming in through the window. I used to thank the Light for such mornings way back in Eversong Woods, and I guess I'll thank the Light when I wake up in it's realm."

The next day he was much more cheerful, and read about the life of Anduin Lothar much of the time. I went out to dinner with an Engineering officer I had got to see on business, and came back in about half-past ten in time for our games of Chess and Cards before turning in.

I had a cigar in my mouth, I remember, as I pushed open the smoking-room door. The lights were not lit, which struck me as odd. I wondered if Salren had turned in early. I lit the lamp on the ceiling, but there was nobody there. Then I saw something in the corner of the room which made me drop my cigar and fall into a cold sweat.

Salren Dawnstrike, my guest, was lying sprawled in the corner. his heart had been ripped out, He was splattered with blood, as were the floor and walls around him, and there was a knife through his throat which skewered him to the wall. The knife had the sigil of a rising sun and hammer on the hilt.