Author's Notes: Sorry for the slow pace here. I promise I've not forgotten about this, and now it's time to speed things up as far as the plot goes :). There will be 1-2 more chapters to Grace, and then I have a third installment planned, called Temperance. Thank you for reading!
Maerciless's gloved hand gripped her tight as the death knight led them forward. The subtle drop in temperature that one felt when one stepped too close to her seemed to spread out and envelope Shirelle as well, as if she had been assimilated into Maerciless's presence and the two were indistinguishable from each other. Earlier she would have felt a modicum of safety from it, knowing that the death knight was near, but now she felt more on edge than before.
She believed her, she absolutely did. Shirelle knew without a doubt that Maerciless had no idea who it was she has been attacking, and that thought gripped her heart in a vice. There had been no recognition in the death knight's cold blue eyes as she had swung her runeblade directly into her protective shield. Her face had been pulled back in a terrifying grimace, her entire body poised to inflict death on anything in her path. She knew that death knights were powerful, intimidating fighters, and that Maerciless herself was one of the most feared of their number. All of this was inherent, but right then, as she had found herself unexpectedly the target of the death knight's wrath, she felt fear as she had never experienced it before. She had been attacked directly in battle, although she avoided it the best she could, and she had faced other foes in training. It was always frightening, but she had never felt the full impact of such a powerful force of destruction bent on taking her life. She had looked into that cold, unwavering face, and had seen her own death.
Maerciless had sheltered her from this side of her, she suddenly realized. She was so used to seeing her dark face pensive, or brooding, or on very rare occasions serene. With a blink of her eyes, she could visualize the draenei's face in every shade of emotion she could think of, but she had never seen her with the intent to kill. Even when she had first met her, and had been terrified at how quickly she had captured Horace in the infirmary, the death knight had only revealed a shadow of her true ability. She had always thought highly of the death knight's control, and couldn't imagine how she had gained her terrifying reputation in battle. Now she had first-hand experience.
Shirelle stifled a shudder as they neared another turn in the maze. Maerciless did not turn to acknowledge her, but kept pushing through. She been reassuring and apologetic as soon as the mist had cleared from her mind, but something had hardened her face again before they had continued. She hadn't spoken a word since. Get it together, Shirelle, she ordered herself firmly as she tried to pull herself up taller. She had to keep all her wits about her in this maze. It was obvious that it was trying to divide them and set them against each other.
Maerciless slowed her steps as they neared the corner. Unlike the last one, this one looked like it had occupants: there were piles of leaves and twigs scattered about the ground, and the bushes looked ragged here, as if they had been plucked at by many little hands. Shirelle took a deep breath and prepared herself mentally. Maerciless turned to look at her, and her eyes were filled with a blue fire, and her face did not recognize her, and her stare was deadpan and terrifying...
No. Shirelle closed her eyes against the memory and prayed that the death knight had not seen her flinch. She was speaking in her low voice, and she could tell by the way the sound changed she had turned to look at her.
"...Shirelle?"
She made herself open her eyes and meet the death knight's gaze. Her eyes were piercing blue as always, and her face was stern, but calm and she felt a pang of guilt for thinking anything else. She shook her head and did everything in her power to focus on what was being said.
"Sorry, I didn't hear you. Go on please?"
"The way these sticks are arranged look similar to the forest sprites that infest certain dense areas of the woods."
She pointed to the piles, and Shirelle squinted her eyes. They did vaguely resemble circles and triangles, and Shirelle's shoulders relaxed. Forest sprites were troublesome, but they at least were not murderous. They were more likely to steal your gold or hex you into speaking Zandali than to kill you. She took a deep breath and blew it out her nose. There was nothing to be scared of here.
Maerciless seemed to echo her sentiment, for although she had drawn her sword, she kept it relaxed at her side as they started to navigate around the corner. Shirelle let herself be pulled along, and noticed a soft chittering noise as they drew closer to the bend in the wall. She frowned and leaned in closer to the death knight's ear to whisper.
"Do you hear that?"
Maerciless nodded once, her face a picture of concentration.
"Stay close."
The chittering grew louder, until it seemed to fill the corridor. Shirelle fought the urge to let go of the death knight's hand to cover her ears. She refused to be separated from her this time. The noise grew to an omnipresent volume, and Shirelle's hand gripped the other draenei's hand so tightly she thought it must be painful. As one, they stepped around the corner, and the noise stopped.
Before them was a veritable crowd of forest sprites. They all were staring at the pair of draenei as if they had never seen anyone else before in their life. Peering around the death knight's shoulder, Shirelle was unnerved how they all stood unmoving. Maerciless turned her head slightly, and caught her eye. She made a minute shrugging motion. She had no idea what to make of it.
Maerciless took a step forward. The sprites simply stared at her like a brown and green ruffled wall. She took her runesword, and made a sort of sweeping motion toward the first row. They all shuffled back without fear.
"Move along now," she said, and slowly waving her sword in front of, her, parted a path down the middle of the sprites. They all stepped obediently to the side, and watched as they passed. Shirelle had no idea why, but she was shaking with fear. She forced herself to take small measured steps behind the death knight, terrified that any sudden movement would send the creatures into a frenzy. They did nothing but watch the pair and shuffle in behind them as they advanced slowly down the hallway.
It was after the hole had closed up behind them, sealing off any chance of escape, that it happened. As a one, the forest sprites all opened their mouths in a terrifying scream and launched themselves at the two draenei. Shirelle shrieked as one buried its teeth into her neck, biting her viciously. Maerciless knocked it off of her, and Shirelle had the quick wit to throw a holy shield up around the both of them. It glimmered in the air in front of her eyes as Maerciless pulled them along, carving a bloody path through the teeming mass. Shirelle gasped as a forest sprite landed in front of her, nearly cleaved into two pieces from one shoulder to the other hip. As she stumbled past its bleeding corpse, she was astonished to see it flicker before her eyes: it wavered between arms and legs that could easily be mistaken for branches and a topknot of leafy hair, to a pile of black and white fur. She yanked on Maerciless's hand, trying to make her see, but a numbing, slowing pain had been creeping down her shoulder from where the sprite had bitten her, and to her horror her entire arm was now paralyzed. They're venomous, passed weakly through her mind as she released the death knight's hand. A dizzying wave of nausea rushed over her and she dropped to her knees. In desperation she tried to remember how to draw the Light for the purpose of cleansing. Through blurred vision, she could see Maerciless fighting through the thick of the forest sprites in front of her.
For a moment she could do nothing but watch: the death knight moved as a violent storm might rip through a populated town. Her eyes crackled in icy flames as she thrust her left hand to the side and a wave of frost, much like the one that had engulfed her earlier, pushed back a line of sprites and froze them to the ground. She did not waste one second more on them, but pivoted on her back foot and took the heads off two sprites in one swing. There was not a pause in her dance of death as she quickly and efficiently defended herself from the maelstrom of attackers. Shirelle felt herself sinking to the ground, the shield around her dimming, but she found her eyes drawn to the two creatures who Maerciless's blade had aggressively decapitated. One remained in its leafy form, but other one did the same as before: its shape shimmered into black and white fur.
Shock brought Shirelle's mind back in focus from the poison traveling through her body. She remembered the cleansing spell, and drawing the Light around her, channeled it into her arm and stiffening side. As she felt feeling return to her fingers, she peered down at her arm and gasped. Her hand was normal, and she could move it, but drawing back along the length of her arm was a brown leafy growth. As she watched, the growth disappeared as she removed the poison.
The sprites' venom turned you into a sprite.
Shirelle felt a scream gathering in her throat. She looked up in horror as Maerciless tore through the creatures attacking her.
Some of the sprites were pandaren children.
"Stop!" She leaped to her feet and ran at the death knight. Her shield came apart completely and she had to shove through a line of snarling creatures. Maerciless turned her head at her shout, and Shirelle threw herself past her fear, past a safe distance from her runesword, and nearly into the death knight's arms. The other draenei stumbled as she caught her awkwardly with one arm and knocked two sprites back with the other. Shirelle shielded both of them and put both of her hands on the death knight's face to draw her attention. Maerciless blinked as she looked down at her, and Shirelle watched her face go through a quick transformation from cold fury to irritated clarity.
"You can't kill them!"
Maerciless growled as she shoved one off of her arm and into a wall. Shirelle flinched, but it remained a sprite as it lay on the ground motionless.
"Stop, please!"
"They are attacking us, I am merely defending us from them." Her low voice grated through her teeth, but the death knight lowered her sword. She kicked one that got too close, and it rolled across the ground. Shirelle tried to grab at a nearby sprite, but perhaps mindful of their fallen numbers, the creatures were starting to be more wary, and circled the pair cautiously. One rushed in, and Maerciless made a yanking motion at it. Icy chains rose from the ground and held it fast as it shrieked indignantly. Shirelle sank down to her knees, and grabbed the sprite's arm. It buried its teeth into the back of her hand, but she bit her lip and ignored it. She opened the blossom of Light at her heart and channeled cleansing through her hand, down into the sprite. It screamed, a terrifying sound, but Shirelle's guess was correct: the leafy brown covering began to shimmer, and within moments a pandaren cub was revealed, being held upright only by the ice gripping its legs. Maerciless gestured, and the ice retreated as Shirelle caught the child. She felt his neck: he was unconscious, but still alive. The death knight crouched beside her as she leaned him up against the wall.
"They're...children?"
She caught a glimpse of the other draenei's stricken face as she glanced around the carnage that she had wrought, and she hurried to reassure her. "Not all of them. The jade witch must have enslaved the local sprites, and turned them venomous. I guess she didn't want all of the cubs as statues."
Watching the transformation of one of their own caught the attention of their attackers and stopped them cold. What was left of the forest sprites were huddled together nervously in the center of the corridor. As Shirelle took a step toward them, they broke ranks and tried to scatter. There was a movement behind her and all of the sprites froze to the ground. Maerciless's voice strained with the effort of dividing her concentration among so many.
"I will hold them, you cure them."
Shirelle rushed to cleanse the nearest cub.
It took quite a while to sort out the sprites from the children. Shirelle would pick one, and it would scream and try to scrabble away as she held tight to it and tried to cleanse it. Sometimes it would bite her in retaliation, and she would have to deal with that wound as well. Maerciless didn't like the strain that clearly showed on the priest's face as she was a vessel for the Light over and over again, but there was no way she could ask her to stop or take a break. Maerciless's hands shook as she concentrated on keeping the remaining sprites bound by ice. She was nearly at the end of her reserves as well.
Shirelle released a sprite from her grip, shaking her head. She took two long steps back and Maerciless quickly dispatched it with a swing from her runesword. Maerciless had noticed her cringe the first few times she had taken down a sprite, but now her face was an exhausted mask. She wiped her brow with the edge of her sleeve, and crouched down next to another. Only four more sprites left.
Maerciless spared a glance at the growing sea of black and white behind her. The pandaren cubs they were cleansing were not faring too well either. There was no way to tell how long some of them had been cursed into forest sprites. Too many of them passed immediately. Of the ones that remained, some were so barely alive Maerciless didn't expect them to live long enough to be rescued. There were a few that were strong, and she was determined to bring them safely home. She was already sickened enough by the ones that had died on her blade.
"No, no, please stay, no," Shirelle whispered, her voice rising in desperation as she tried to channel Light into the cub laying on the ground in front of her. Maerciless could see from here that the gesture was useless: the cub was already past saving. She took a deep breath, and from some reserve she didn't know she had, pulled tighter on the ice chains she had manifested around the final three sprites' legs. They shrieked in pain, but she ignored them as she knelt down beside the other draenei. She sheathed her runesword, and put her hand on Shirelle's shoulder.
"He's already gone," she said quietly. The priest's shoulders slumped as she stopped trying to bring him back.
"I know," she replied, her voice barely audible. She swept a hand across her wet cheeks and when she looked up, meeting Maerciless's gaze, her eyes were full of the worst kind of pain. It was continuous disappointment mixed with a desperate hope that this time, she would succeed, and save a life. It was the definition of Shirelle boiled down to a single glance, it was agonizing to see her lose so many patients at once, no matter the odds against them. Looking into her face hurt the scar in her chest, but she tried not to show it as she smoothed her hair back from her forehead and then pulled her into her embrace. The other draenei took a shaky breath and leaned her head onto the death knight's shoulder.
"I just have to try. Every single one, I have to give it my all. All of them have to have a chance."
Maerciless felt the chains slip, and she clenched her hand tighter, trying to channel some of her physical strength into holding them as her runic magic ran dry. Shirelle felt the movement, and left her arms to tend to the remaining creatures. Maerciless gritted her teeth. She did not know if she would have the ability to hold them until the end.
"Do we have any rope?" Shirelle asked as she held one down and tried to cure it. She was pushing herself faster, her own hands shaking as she tried to draw the poison out enough to see if it was a pandaren or not. Maerciless shook her head.
"They will chew through it."
Shirelle made a frustrated noise as she gave up on that sprite, but instead of moving so the death knight could kill it, she held out her hand.
"Give me your dagger."
Maerciless hesitated in the act of handing it over, and the last two sprites chose that moment to lunge against their bonds. Ice splintered on the ground, and Maerciless dropped the dagger to use her other hand. Pretty soon she would have to hold them with her bare hands, and that made her angry. She channeled that cold rage into her runic magic and somehow, she held them tight. To her right she heard the other draenei retrieve her dagger, and the sickening wet sound as it plunged into the heart of the forest creature. Shirelle made a sort of strangled noise in her throat, but Maerciless could no longer spare her attention to look. She could not see the priest's face as she grabbed the next creature and held him down to cleanse him. This one was no more than a sprite as well, and Shirelle only hesitated a moment to turn her head as she took his life.
Shards of ice flew into the air as Maerciless finally lost her grip on the last sprite, and Shirelle flung herself at it as it made a mad dash down the corridor. They grappled for the moment it took her to reach them, and she grabbed the creature's head and held it still as Shirelle held its arms and started to draw out the poison. It flailed against them, and Maerciless, never patient under ordinary circumstances, growled at it under her breath.
"Hold still, or I will crush you."
Shirelle's eyes flickered up at her briefly, but she kept up the flow of energy and the creature ceased its struggling. This one was a pandaren, and as soon as the venom fully left its body, it gasped and opened its eyes.
"-help, please! Help, they've got me!" it shrieked, and Shirelle held its arms and spoke soothingly to the frightened cub.
"It's alright, you're free now, the forest sprites are all gone." The priest's eyes shone as she tried to calm the child down. Her face broke into a relieved smile, and Maerciless felt a bit of the same: no matter what had happened today, this cub was alive, and would make it.
She retrieved her dagger from where Shirelle had dropped it beside the corpse of the sprite, and wiped the blood off of it as she surveyed the results of the last few hours. Piles of dead creatures. A thankfully smaller pile of still black and white fur, but a very tiny group of survivors. She stretched her arm and shook the ache out of it as she paced the line of unconscious cubs. She had drained all of her energy holding the chains so Shirelle could cleanse them, and for this dismal result. She shoved the dagger back into its sheath forcefully, feeling a stirring of exhausted anger inside of her. Unlike the monster that had existed under the control of the Lich King, this was a spark of white hot anger that she could focus where she willed. She ran a gloved hand through her unruly hair, and squatted down next to the surviving cubs. Plans and tactics raced through her mind as she allowed her body to regain its energy.
She had taken on this quest to rescue some pandaren children from what was essentially a folktale. Every since she had stepped inside this maze, however, it had turned her world upside down. She had been the victim of strange magic that she didn't understand. She had attacked the person she cared for the most. She had been deceived into taking the lives of children in cold blood. She felt like every step she took, she was breaking this vow or throwing away this remaining shred of humanity. She yanked at the bottom of her ill-fitting breastplate with an irritated snarl. She was tired of playing by someone else's rules. It was time to make her own.
Presently Shirelle joined her, leading the now calm cub over to sit by her kin. She settled her in, and checked the others. One more had passed, and she moved it away from the rest of them. Her hands shook, but she continued to fuss over her patients until Maerciless put a hand on her arm and gently led her over to the wall.
"You must rest too. If you collapse, you can't help them."
Shirelle sank down against the wall and laid her forehead on her knees. Maerciless still had that hot blade of anger burning inside of her, and she felt her strength rapidly returning. She paced back and forth in front of the priest, flexing one hand on the pommel of her sword.
"How many did we end up with?"
"Six." Shirelle lifted her tear-stained face and stared unseeing in front of her. "Six cubs saved, out of more than thirty." She took a shaky breath and rubbed her face clean with the sleeve of her robe. "Two I don't think will make it back to the village. They had been changed so long, I don't know what to do for them."
Her voice trailed off, and Maerciless stopped pacing abruptly and knelt down in front the priest. Her face was torn between guilt and despair and it made her even angrier. She gripped her shoulders tightly.
"You did not curse those cubs. You did not create monstrosities and hoard them inside a trap of your own devising. You did not kidnap children to use as your playthings." She spit the last word in disgust. She released Shirelle and continued pacing. She felt the priest's eyes on her and she slowed her steps, finally coming to a conclusion. She stopped, and turned to face the wall, Shirelle leaned up against it, and small huddle of surviving pandaren.
"There is only one person to blame for all this. And I think it's time we take the fight directly to her."
Deep inside the maze, the Jade Witch startled awake from a nap. Her eyes glowed bright green as her mouth slowly spread open in a smile.