A/N: Sorry for the long delay, have been on holiday. Rain, rain and Flopper the Rabbit. Not cool.
The Brotherhood
Chapter 6
The staff was collapsible, lightweight and inconspicuous, but Marisa hated it nonetheless. Staves were the stereotype of mages- weak, frail mages, who sat dithering with portals and the like instead of using their power for the betterment of their allies. It reminded her that though she could do a great deal of damage with the sword belted to her hip, she would always come in second to those born with physical prowess. The rod was made of copper, a suitable conduit for magic, though poor at storing it, which was why most magi preferred wood with a crystal as a focus.
The Westfall earth hummed beneath her feet, distant tremors of the foundries that banged and scraped away, toiling to create the great Defias Zeppelin. There was a sick delight rising within her, urged to the surface as it was with minimal stimulation. It was just how she was, how she was wired. Complete lack of self-restraint made for a dangerous and unpredictable enemy.
She came to a stop as a gust of wind stirred the blood-red remnants of the soil, winding into a small twister, stinging her eyes beneath the heavy hide of her cloak. The sun, a boiling orb of grinning malice, shone down onto the caked earth, scalding the last vestiges of plant life that clung to the shady insides of the cracks that ran through the terrain, granting her passage. Over a mirage-blurred hill, she came upon her destination and smiled to herself, letting her lips curl into a sneer of disdain as she remembered the last time she was here.
Crops lay untilled, wild grasses choking the hops, the pervading air of death about the place, epitomized as it was by the dark outline of the farmhouse on the horizon, standing stark black in the reddish haze. Tentatively, feeling as though she was violating something, Marisa skirted around the field and into the residence, taking in the sight, sober this time. Not that she had been drinking before her band had destroyed the DeHayersae stead, but the sheer thrill of dominance that the girl had given her has clouded her mind, making her decisions for her. She remembered the muffled sobs coming from Conyeri as she had played her fingers, ghosts, over the exposed flesh of her shoulder, burning a trail of anguish and wanton desire down into her, an unseen scar that would never heal.
Gods, she got off on it.
"You left…" she muttered, running her hands over the ransacked chest of drawers, feeling the layer of dust that had since settled. Removing her hand, she walked upstairs quietly, remembering how the stairs had creaked that night as her men had trampled down them, and how she had lazily leant against the wall and waited for the pretty girl to come out of her room. She shook her head, blonde hair falling from the loose ponytail it was hastily put up in earlier.
She began rifling through the drawers, looking for something. Something with which she could cast both of the curses she wanted to. A hairbrush- good, but not perfect. She tucked it into her belt and moved down a drawer, pulling the soft wood out and rifling through the clothes. There, her eyes easily spotted a compartment, cut into the back. She removed the drawer and leaned in, prizing the door from the little box, only two or three inches square. The sense of foreboding increased. Whatever was in her certainly did not belong to Conyeri, and Marisa doubted she had ever known about it, or if she had, hadn't sought to find out. The compartment hadn't been opened for ten years or more.
From it, she pulled a small box, plain and made with odd, silver wood, inlaid with a single symbol, which she didn't recognize. It wasn't common, that was for sure. Curious, she opened the box and gasped slightly. It was a brooch, sparkling and clean even through the years when dust had ravaged the box. It was in the shape of a crescent moon, beautifully embellished with intertwining loops of what could be gold, but the metal felt foreign in her hands. Holding it, Marisa felt something shift within her- something subconscious before, now brought just close enough to notice, just too far away to put a finger on.
She switched her sight into the magical spectrum, expecting to see the artifact as the dazzling glow of swirling power. Instead, it remained as it was, cool and empty in her hands. Yet she felt magic from it. Radiating in soft pulses… the wooden box must be stopping it, at least a bit, because she did not feel it the night she had ransacked the house. Uneasy, she slipped it back in the box and put it into her satchel, thinking to find out more about it before she let it radiate its effect. The box would absorb some, yes, but Cony had slept in this room nearly seventeen years. That thing must have affected her so. Why did the DeHayersae family have such a thing, anyway?
She let the questions fall from her mind and onto more mundane things, like the two curses she was going to cast using Cony's hair as a reagent. The first, a self-cast, would change her appearance completely, to that of someone Conyeri had never seen. The second would do two things: place a magical marker on Conyeri that would shine like a beacon to Marisa if she got within ten miles of her, and would reveal the trail she was making, like a dog would follow a scent. Both would help her in what she was about to do. And both were black.
Being third in command of the Defias, she had expectations, duties, left to her when her father had died. She needed the Defias; they provided her home, her job, the food on her table, but she also needed to do this. Something was tugging at her, subtly, telling her to go north. Go north and wait, and though it was silly, she really felt compelled to. Cony was north, she knew instinctively, and she wanted Cony. A sick, warped and self-harming lust-turned-love that she harbored for the girl was eating up her inside, taking up her waking hours and sleeping minutes. Her habits, while uncouth, could no longer sustain her. Magic, sex, dominance- she needed those, but not as much as she needed to go north.
Pulling the stave to its full length, she twirled it idly in her long fingers a couple of times before setting it against the wall. From her satchel, she pulled three items: A black piece of chalk, a small bowl and a bottle of water. It reminded her that though she was a mage, this was a black curse- and black curses couldn't be done without sacrifice. Mages sacrificed mana for their spells, easily disposable as it was, and quick to replenish, too, but black magic wouldn't take just mana. She shivered slightly as she set the satchel down and walked to the clear space in the centre of Cony's room. It was deathly quiet, not even the cawing of crows or other carrion birds outside.
Carefully extracting Cony's hair from the brush, she began to braid it meticulously, until it was a thin string winding twice her height. Then, she wound it around her stave, her fingers pausing occasionally to check she'd done the knots right. With the staff finished, she brought it to the centre of the room, where she etched some simple runes in the black chalk onto the floor. After the first couple of years of training, mages didn't need runes at all when they cast complicated spells, but it helped Marisa as she didn't need the extra bother of holding runes in her head while casting. Finally, the bowl was filled with the water and placed just outside the casting area. She'd have to clean her hands in it pretty speedily afterwards to offset the repercussions of not using the proper sacrifice, though she could have.
The proper sacrifice being the blood of a virgin, and Marisa, without a shred of guilt, was not one. She doubted any of the Defias were, and there were no farmsteads with young daughters or sons around anymore for her to find one on. So, she was substituting it with her own blood, which would work, but only for the duration of the casting. Afterwards, she wouldn't be caught by the magic having the un-virgin blood, else it would kill her, and so she had to wash it completely off.
Ready, she stepped into the casting area and immediately the runes lit up a sickly red colour, protesting at their use in black magic, but they held. She held the stave out in from of her and concentrated, feeling Cony's aura emanate from the hair, though very thin it was. The reason that this appearance-changer was black was that it wasn't just an illusion. It would really change her body into a man or woman Cony didn't know. She felt the tendrils of magic grip at her and welcomed them, letting them suffuse her and expand beneath her skin, feeling light-headed. Snapping back on task, she coerced the magic into the use she needed, not the fix she desired. It was hard, but not impossible.
She gritted her teeth as the magic responded, and she felt her skin tightening, her bones crunching and elongating, her jaw clicking into place. Though not the most pleasant of feelings, it wasn't half as painful as some things she had done before- transforming into animals was incredibly hard, as that branch of magic was left for druids most. Marisa had, a few years ago, spend two weeks as a giant eagle with one human foot. As abruptly as it had begun, the magic stopped and she was left standing there, reeling.
Without time to bother checking what she looked like, she now concentrated on the hard spell. With the pin of her cloak, she pricked a finger, glad to find that whoever she was, she was still female.
The blood came in a small well, and she smeared it on the top of her stave, making sure it didn't touch any of Cony's hair. Unlike, the changing spell, this one's magic was more noticed where it was aimed, so Marisa wouldn't feel the rush. Slowly, she eased her will into the stave, muttering some words, verbal catalysts, if you will. This could go really, really, wrong.
"DeHayersae Conyeri, ad neh," she told it, giving it a name to go and seek. If Cony had been given a more common name, she'd have to specify some things, but the DeHayersae family were small. "Egho trouveras'eras." The unfamiliar language rolled from her tongue like ash, making it dry. The staff, according to her will, glowed briefly with magic and faded, and at the same time, all of her runes gave, leaving her unprotected if whatever magic she was using decided she wasn't strong enough for it. She considered drawing some new ones, but shook the idea out of her head. She had to wait for the return of her spell.
It was a very tense minute and a half, but eventually, the stave glowed again with a dark green, informing her that her spell had been completed. Then, as expected, it hovered for a moment, looking her over as much as magic could. She ducked from the casting area and quickly washed her hands in the little bowl, watching in confidence as the green magic dissipated, gone to exact its revenge on the nearest non-virgin who was bleeding. Stupid.
-
Briefly, Conyeri considered turning back. The gates of Stormwind were huge, imposing, and open. The guard had been doubled, their heavy armour clanking as they patrolled up and down, looking very, very sinister all of a sudden. Under her cap, she gulped, feeling her nearly flat chest with apprehension. The carriage she was on trundled up to the gates, the men beginning to get rowdy as they saw Stormwind again. The cart was filled with goods for market, coming from eastern Elwyn. Conyeri had been picked up by it after Eva has fixed her up, and she had gone and talked to her daughter, Mary. Why that was such a chore, she hadn't understood at the time. Now, she admired how Eva kept her head up.
"And tell her we all still love her. You will, right?" Eva said, her wrinkled face lined with worry. "Tell her she's beautiful. She'll like that."
"Okay," Conyeri said, apprehensive. Eva had already disguised her as a boy, even though she had vehemently objected to having her hair cut. And quite handsome she was, too. That woman had more to her than met the eye. Through subtle magic, her curves were gone, and by nothing more than dressing the right way, she looked like a young gentleman. Maybe two or three years younger than she was as a girl, but plausibly male.
Eva had given her directions to a small, one-floored house just out of the immediate area of Darkshire. She found it odd that the woman would not go and see her daughter herself, but was all too thankful towards her to deny her this. There were dull lights glowing from the windows, and Conyeri knocked on the door, glancing over her shoulder. She didn't like how this place felt.
There was no answer at the door, so she knocked again, harder. At once, a piercing wail accosted her ears, and she clamped her hands over them in agony, her eyes scrunched up. Knocking again, she gritted her teeth against another wail, then another. Inhuman, they were, a screeching mockery of a real cry.
"Leave!" came a strangely stilted voice from the other side of the door, decidedly female, but not quite right. Conyeri stiffened and gathered her courage.
"Mary, I want to talk to you," she said, trying out her boy voice. It failed miserably, but she didn't start screeching again, which was taken as a good sign.
"Who are you?" she asked, voice wavering. "Why do you smell of my mother?"
"I've come to talk to you for her." Cony said nervously. A cold laugh came from behind the wooden door, which swung open to reveal a husk of a woman, her transparent skin whiter than Stormwind stone, horrifically warped into a shadow of the beauty she must have been.
"Why won't she talk to me herself!" she shrieked, gazing above Cony's head with unseeing eyes. "What a horrible creature I have become, that my own mother shan't dare look at me! So ugly am I that I cannot even behold myself! See my eyes, which I tore out with my own fingers, seeking to end my suffering? Is my suffering ended? No! Begone! Leave me to remain unseen!"
"Mary…" Conyeri's face painted a picture of pity that the ghost couldn't see. "Your mother still loves you very much."
"Then why can't she come and see me herself!" she glowered with empty sockets. "Answer me that, little boy!"
At least a blind, mad ghost thought she was a boy. "She can't leave Darkshire, Mary. She is old, too old to cope if anything attacked her. And besides, do you think it doesn't break her heart all over again to see you?"
The banshee began sobbing quietly, her spindly fingers tracing the dust that had accumulated on top of the furniture in her house. She spoke softly, her voice closer now to the melodious tune it must have once held. "She… she still loves me…?"
"Of course!" Conyeri exclaimed, seeing now not a spectre, but a woman in her middle years, twisted by powers beyond her control. "Mary, she did so much for me. She saved my life and gave me hope, and all she wanted to return the favour was for me to visit you. That is how much you are worth to her. Eva kept all your dresses, in the hope that one day you'd return and wear them. She just wants you to be at peace."
"Peace," she echoed, a forlorn look crossing her face. "Perhaps…" She turned her head back to Cony. "You have a dagger, boy, and a wit, I'd presume."
"I'd like to think so," she replied, slightly uneasy. She knew when she was about to be asked something.
"I was killed by a man, whose dark powers kept me in this ugly body. I don't want him dead, though I should. Sinking to his level is not justice, but petty revenge. All I want are my eyes back, so I may look upon these pictures again. How my memory fades…" she sobbed. "Find me some eyes, boy, and I might be more peaceful."
Eyes. How on earth was she going to find eyes for a banshee? She'd need first some actual eyes, then maybe a curse to attach them…
"Ask my daughter," she said, her voice lathered with emotion. "Ask my baby daughter. She'll know. I feel her mind from here."
Alyssa. Alyssa, with her sharp and suspicious eyes. Though she was not a baby any more. "I will," she promised, then remembered what Eva had told her. "You're beautiful, Mary."
The banshee snorted. "In life. Now, perhaps not."
"It must have been a while since you looked at yourself. When you get your eyes, don't think about yourself as what you've become, but what you were all along. Not outward beauty, but beauty of your soul,"
That sounded incredibly sappy, but Conyeri saw the softening of the banshee's face and decided it was worth it. "I'll go find Alyssa now."
She quietly closed the door. Back at Madame Eva's house, the three were seated around the table, looking apprehensive. "She wants eyes, and she told me that Alyssa could help."
They let out a collective breath. "I can," she said, her eyes shining with tears." Logh, get me some of those seeds you sell. The purplish ones from the grove." She got out of her seat and ran up to her room, coming down with a jar full of eyes.
"How could she have known?" Cony said, astounded. Alyssa shrugged.
"There is a vendor who comes around about twice a year. He sells enchanted eyeballs… ever since I was little, I liked they way they looked at me. It was like they were watching me when I slept, keeping me safe. I never thought that there would be another use for them."
Loghan came back from the pantry with a handful of purplish seeds. Alyssa looked much older than ten years old, grinding them up and looking at the jar. She suddenly burst into tears.
"Aly…" Eva went over and put an arm around her. "What is it, love?"
"I…" she sniffed, hiccupping between her words. "I don't remember… what colour mum's eyes were…"
"Brown," she whispered quietly, into Alyssa's ear. "Just like yours."
She nodded softly and picked two matching brown ones from the jar, the liquid they were kept in wetting her hand. The powder from the seeds was sprinkled on them, and they lit up briefly, swiveling around to look at Alyssa, unblinking. Conyeri thought they were a bit creepy, but by the way that the little girl smiled, they obviously meant more to her than she was showing. She put them in a glass of water and held them tight to her. "I'm taking them, whatever grandma says," she said firmly. "I haven't seen my mother in seven years. Me, grandma and Loghan are going to be the first people she sees, whether you helped or not."
Conyeri smiled at her bossiness, a mask for her impending emotional explosion. "Of course," she said softly. "It's half of what you deserve."
Though Eva fussed about going out into Duskwood at this time, Cony assured her that she was well enough to fend off the weaker beasts around Darkshire. This was not enough, apparently, so a member of the Night Watch came with them. Once at Mary's house, Conyeri was to give her the eyes and then let Eva and the kids in.
She knocked on the door, and unlike earlier, it opened immediately. "Have you got them? Already?" she asked, her face full of urgent need.
"Yes," she offered the glass, which Mary took eagerly.
"Oh, my smart little Alyssa…" she crooned, pulling one of the eyes out. "Oh, my brave little Loghan. My wonderful mother. How I miss them so…" she set the glass down and took the other eye out, then fitted both of them into her sockets. They fit perfectly and she blinked many times as the magic took hold, re-making the tunnels from her eyes to her brains that were long dead. Cony stepped back and let the three of them shuffle in as the Night Watcher stood sentry outside.
"By the Light…" Mary exclaimed, seeing for the first time in seven years, looking at her family. "Oh, what torture this was…" she cried, flinging her arms over Eva, who held her just as tight, even though her body was only half-present in her undeath. Her eyes brimmed with tears as she beheld her two children, who were not repulsed, as she thought, but teary-eyed too. The love in the air was palpable.
Watching the scene as she was for the sidelines, Conyeri saw a look of content slip over Mary's face, and knew her time was nigh. As she beheld the scene, the banshee curse lifted from her, leaving a ghost, a beautiful woman in her thirties, dressed for an occasion, her brown hair shining in the evening light.
"I am sorry I couldn't be with you, my darlings," she held Alyssa and Loghan tighter, as her hands started to slip through them. "My time is finally up. I am free…" she breathed, giving her mother one last loving gaze before the light of ascension overcame her and she slowly faded from view, leaving them not with the vision of the twisted banshee, but the kind mother, beautiful inside and out.
-
A tear flowed down Cony's dirty cheek, unseen by the jaunty men she traveled with. She was so glad that she had been a part of Mary finally finding peace, and her children's last meeting with their mother.
Now was the time her disguise would be tested. Once on the streets of Stormwind, she'd be safer than in Darkshire- who looked twice at a stablehand or shoe-shiner, after all- but at the gates, security would be high. She was pretty high up in the middle area of the most wanted list at the moment. The cart trundled to the gates and immediately two guards came to inspect their cargo. "Business in Stormwind?" the taller one asked, addressing his question to the wagon driver, while looking under the protective waterproof tarpaulin that saved the merchandise from getting soaked.
"We be 'ere for th' market," he said, allowing the man to uncover his goods. "Cloth, linen an' leather goods, all from Eastvale or 'round them parts."
The shorter guard concentrated on the people. "These your sons, sir?"
"Nah, just this lad," she gestured to the brawny boy nearing adulthood who was feeding the horse. "The others are either comin' in from the country to make a livin', or I picked 'em up on the way, fer a couple silver."
"I see." The guard said shortly. "Caps off, please. We apologize for the raised security, but you can't be too careful these days."
"'Course," the merchant removed his cloth cap, showing his balding head. Conyeri did the same, and was relieved that another boy with the wagon also had long hair. Hers was tied at the nape of her neck in a little ponytail, as Eva had said was the style for young gentlemen these days.
"Your name, lad?" the guard asked her, his eyes bored but not disapproving.
"Connor, sir," she tried her best Stormwind accent, cultivated from Geylan.
"Okay, what's your business here? Or rather, back here?"
"I spent some time in the country with my aunt," she lied. "Dead sickly, I was, as a boy. Country air did me good."
The guard nodded. "That it does." He moved on to the other boy with long hair. His name was Allan, and he was seeking work after his village had been sacked. The others mostly had similar stories. After a couple more minutes, they were let through, and Cony put her cap back on, a small feeling of victory settling in her stomach.
The air in Stormwind was very different to that of anywhere she had been before- it was awash with different scents, all battling each other for supremacy, and thicker, too, with just a hint of pollution. She thanked the merchant and got off, tipping her hat as she was told boys did. Taking in the sights of the big city, she ambled around for a bit, quite reluctant to do much. The trade district drew her in, the blue roofs and whitewashed houses identical in stark contrast to the myriad of people that bustled around, selling this, buying that, waiting in the queue at the bank, excitedly receiving post. If she was going to make a living, this was where she would do it.
An inn sign caught her eye, and she walked towards it, fingering the bag of coins in her pocket, sparse as it was. The small change she had in it was from the money she had won about a week ago in a game of dice with Geylan, who was notoriously bad at the gambling game, and indeed gambling in general. It wasn't much, but it was enough for the ride here, and a night or two in an inn, she hoped.
The Gilded Rose was large and cushy, situated as it was in the trade district and thus the central hub of Stormwind. Relaxed on one of the chairs was a woman, about Mary's age, with vibrant red hair that fanned out from her head and wry eyes. She put down the glass of wine she was drinking and stood up.
"What can I do for you?' she asked, somewhat wary. Conyeri did realize that to this woman, she looked like a poor, dirty little boy.
"I was wondering if you had a room for the night," she said tentatively, her spirits dropping as the woman raised a skeptical eyebrow.
"I do, but now much money do you have?"
Conyeri checked her little coin bag. "Uh… seventy silver, about." The innkeeper snorted.
"Country boy, are you? Seventy silver won't buy you anything here, or at any other reputable inn in Stormwind. And, no offense, you'd be mauled in a disreputable one."
"Oh," she said, genuinely not knowing how expensive things were in capital cities. "Um, I'll just go then. Sorry."
"No, no wait up a moment," she studied Conyeri approvingly. "Are you good with animals?"
I'm good with Worgen, she though dryly. She supposed that worgen were like wolves, which were like dogs… animals couldn't be so hard. "Very, ma'am."
"Country folk always are," she smiled. "I you'd like, my stablemaster is looking for extra help since his sons were enlisted. Go around the back and he'll give you a trial."
"Thank you," she bowed and tipped her cap, excited. This had gone much better than planned… but there was something lingering. Her lack of purpose. Well, not exactly- what she was actually trying to do was to escape the Defias, but she had no aspiration, no greater goal. Had she ever? It had never really bothered her before, living in the present as she did, due to the security of her future. Now that was gone, shattered by the Defias, she again had to look to what came next, rather than what was happening now. It was something the made her frown.
For now, she would find somewhere to rest, and someone to talk to. Her heart panged as she thought of Geylan, and the long talks they had in his rooms late into the night, when Marisa was but a fairy tale and she could forget she had killed someone. How the would laugh and smile, how he was always insightful without being sagely. The night at carnie, when she had found out that Dez was more than a thug and Harrman was actually sharply intelligent. She smiled softly at the thoughts, outlined as they were in gold and silver in her memories, set as stark difference from the darkness that mired her life. Her parents. Marisa. The Defias, Alt.
She emerged from her musings and into the stable, a large building, with ten or more stalls, about half of which were filled. A corral was attached to it, small owing to the space the housing rising of their side allowed, and a ladder led up into a barn-like loft. A gruff-looking man was scraping dirt off a horse's hoof. He was a human, but very stocky, a thick head of grey hair and bulbous mustache making him look quite like a horse himself. He was dressed in simple overalls, with tough boots and gloves. When she entered, he looked up from his work and showed his twinkling grey eyes.
"The innkeeper sent me. She said you needed an assistant?" she said hopefully, her voice as low as she could get it without sounding comical. He set the horse's hoof down and stood up, stretching his muscles.
"She'd be right," he replied, taking her in, noting her dagger, her long hair, and her clothes. "What's a rich country boy like you doin' here then?" he asked gruffly. "Your clothes are very nice, soft linen, and under your dirt, you've had a bath recently. You stink of healing wounds, even over the horse smell in here, and the shit on your body is Darkshire soil."
"You can tell all that?" she asked, eyes wide. He chuckled and dusted his hands off.
"Easy," he held a newly slightly cleaner hand out for her to shake. "Darron Kinsdown, groom of the Gilded Rose."
She took it and marveled at how calloused it was. "Connor, sir."
"So, you're here for a job? Light knows I need some help around here. Let's see how you do with the horses, aye?" He led her over to the mare whose hooves he'd been cleaning. "How much d'you know about horses?"
"Quite a lot, sir," she said, thinking back to the horse they'd had on their farm, who'd tilled the fields. She enjoyed working with animals.
"And about rams? Tigers? Mechanostriders? Elekk?" he asked smugly, leading her from the mare to a majestic tiger, which was curled up and snoring in the stall.
"Not so much," she replied, gazing at the beast. She knew elves, and gnomes and a few dwarves… but never ones rich enough to own mounts. "But I'd like to learn."
"You'd like to," he grinned. "Okay, lets see how you are with horses in general first. Often, mounts have been ridden into the ground when eventually travelers reach Stormwind, and they're either on their last legs or very, very angry. Angry is hardest to deal with. I'm going to get this horse riled up, and I want you to calm her," he walked over to the mare and started agitating her, making her whinny and baulk. He then opened her pen and let her get out, which she did, snorting and very angry. Cony walked slowly up to her, and didn't even need to touch the beast before it turned to her and calmed, trotting over to her and nuzzling her neck. Surprised, she thought back to the Worgen, how they had not only apologized to her, but also taken her into their confidence and protected her.
It was rather strange.
"Amazing," he clapped for her. "Can you do other animals too?"
"Sure," she grinned, liking this, if not being incredibly comfortable with it. The compulsion, the magnetism that both animals and trouble seemed to feel towards her was something she hadn't really noticed until leaving her home, where there were precious few animals or little trouble to bother her, except the horse. Her parents had been crop farmers, not animal breeders. Darron led her over to a ram in the far corner, stamping impatiently, having seen the horse get poked. It raised its head curiously when Conyeri approached, stopping its stomping in favour of sniffing her. Like the horse, it fell placid, encouraging it to gently stroke its soft, wooly fur.
"That's some gift you have there," Darron said. "None of my boys has ever been that good."
"Thanks, sir," she said breathlessly, looking from him to the animals. There was something unnatural about it all that she just couldn't place, something slightly amiss, but, in-keeping with her new don't-bother-with-the-future philosophy, she brushed it aside and consented to be clapped on the shoulder by the groom.
-
Confusion was the central emotion rising from the fight, so tangled and unreserved were the participants. Geylan had one eye trained on Dez and Harrman, handling three or four bandits by themselves, and Geylan had two on him. The coachman, a wiry chap with less courage than a tapeworm, was crouched in the upturned carriage, probably soiling himself.
Bandits had attacked their small entourage on the way out of Loch Modan, stocky orcs with mottled grey skin and sharp swords, trained in the art of ambush. Geylan twisted one's blade out of his hands with, he realized, the same move he had been teaching Conyeri. Angered, he booted the Orc in the face and broke its skull, with no time to watch it topple down the sheer cliff on this side of the pass. He twirled around to the other one, parrying a slice at his neck and ducking low, bringing his sword up in a thrust straight at its belly. The orc careened to the side, narrowly missing the stab, so Geylan turned his upward drive into a quick leap, landing on top of a flat rock. From here, he noted that Dez and Harrman were easily beating the ones that were upon them, working in a furious flash of blades, back to back and leaving bloody orc in their wake.
Geylan's enemy came at him again, thinking to push him off his balance, but he jumped over the swung sword and used the Orc's shoulders to force it down, pinning it to the floor and finishing it with a swift beheading. Panting, he ran over to the remaining two orcs and backstabbed one, letting it fall to the floor in tandem with Dez's last one, grimly mutilated.
"Nice," the brawnier man said. "I got three."
"No!" Harrman protested. "Two! I got that one with the club!"
Geylan smiled at how the two of them could go from serious fighters to brotherly competitors in a mere second. "Well, I took four."
They both glared at him as he smirked. The coachman came out from under the upturned wagon and looked around. "Oh, sirs, how thankful I am you can fight…" he dabbed his brow with a grotty handkerchief. "I confess that I've never been attacked by worse than a singular highwayman…"
"Worry not," Harrman said, mock-posh accent full on as he rested his sword over his shoulder and posed. "We three followers of the Light shall ne'er fail thee."
The coachman, not understanding the joke, apologized profusely for nothing as they set about righting the cart and returning its strewn about contents.
"Harrman, the further north we go the more I get the willies," Dez said quietly. "It's like… somethin' wants us ter go north."
"Marisa?" Harrman asked lightly, but in truth, they all felt the same thing. "Perhaps it's Conyeri, calling for help?"
Dez mumbled something, but disagreed and hefted a chest back onto the coach roof. "I dunno what it is, but we shud be wary of it."
"Agreed," Geylan entered the conversation, eyeing the coachman suspiciously. "Though such things are better talked upon in private."
They returned to the road an hour or so after that, entering the dwarvern passes, solemn and stony. Geylan thought on their mission, rolling potential plans around his head. Marzy had been frank and said the same general thing as Marisa, that they were spying on the Syndicate. From a base in Southshore, Geylan and Harrman would do as much sneaking around as they could, while Dez would act as a distraction, making the Syndicate think that he was the only aggressor. Ravenholdt were going to give them backup if necessary, but they were wary of allying with the Defias. Not stupid enough, though, that they'd risk Syndicate encroachment just because the Defias were anti-Alliance. They were capitalists first and foremost.
Geylan was Jaken, a cobbler, sharing his small shop with Harrman, his brother Enrik. Dez was, in true thug fashion, Zed, a brawler-turned-bouncer who had some bones to pick with the Syndicate. Together they would spend perhaps a month or two finding out the full scope of Syndicate expansion, and then report back to the Defias, who would file it away and not worry about it until they had to, because Hillsbrad was really too far north to worry them at this stage. Marisa really was trying to get rid of anyone who could potentially try to recover Conyeri.
Now angry, Geylan began one of his favourite hobbies: thinking of different ways to kill Marisa. Sick though it was, he honestly hated the woman more than he probably should. Her smug, self-satisfied face, her power over the Defias, and her complete nonchalance at having completely buggered Conyeri's life up, all of them made her a hate figure to him. And now, likely, she would be doing some spell to find out where she was, and then she'd swoop down like an overgrown gargoyle and pluck her from the safe place in which she was hiding and ensnare her again in her web of desire. Geylan had no problem with free sexuality, though admittedly he did not fancy men at all, as some of the Defias openly did, but the thought of Marisa's greedy hands roaming Conyeri's body was more than he could bear.
Disturbed and having come down from his post-battle elation, Geylan frowned and looked at the horizon. It was dark and brooding, like his mind, foretelling a storm. They would soon be in the Wetlands, where a single storm could flood and entire marsh, so he called the carriage to a stop as it left one of the dwarvern tunnels, and they camped in a small shelter build for such, bearing the insignia of the Loch Modan Mountaineers. This place was safe from orcs and other things that lurked in the mountains.
In the night, Geylan watched, miserable, as the rain pelted down, jagged arms of lightning and rolling thunder preventing his rest. He felt unsure, young, for the first time in many years, uncomfortable with himself. He did not question his values and morals: after all that he had done, he'd just depress himself, but he did think on relationships. He was not, by nature, a friendly man, seeking the company of poisons and ranking skill in higher regard than charisma, but he felt himself warming. Since he had met Conyeri, people didn't just salute him, they now smiled at him, started conversation with him. He has friends, good friends he could count on to watch his back in a fight not because they would be paid to, but because they genuinely held his safety in regard. Dez, more than the thug he looked, and Harrman, scarily intelligent under his childish arrogance.
"Conyeri…" her name disappeared into the rain, smothered, like her spirit, alive only in his memories. She had shown him fun, taught him how to make friends, and most importantly, how to keep his head up. He came from a much easier, by comparison, background than her, and she still smiled, still ploughed on with life, even if she was overtaken by doubts. The Defias had stabbed her in the front then let her wound scar over before opening it again and again; opening to her a life she baulked at, and still she had grinned through the training, made the effort to make friends. How sorely he missed her…
"Shaw," Dez came up behind him, putting a hand on his shoulder. "No use, my friend, no use. Let 'er come."
"Why do you think I'm thinking about her?" he asked glumly, looking into Dez's dark eyes, filled his wisdom his body belied.
He shield softly. "Ya think not much else, ter be honest." He blushed a bit and returned to his vacant staring.
"Do you think we'll find anything up north?" he asked idly, his hair falling into his eyes. "Or are we just there so Marisa can catch Cony without interference?"
"I think a bit of both," he answered truthfully. "Marisa may be the Monster, but she's Marisa too. Per'aps she'll realize whut she'd doin'. Per'aps not. I kno' 'ow awful this sounds, Shaw, but you've gotta trust 'er te make the right choice."
"Trust Marisa Du'Paige to think with her head and not her-"
"Shuddup…" Harrman yawned. "Sleepy-time now, gents. We have aaaages to go tomorrow."
Dez turned and apologized to him, returning to speaking with Geylan, his voice lower. "I wouldn't bet any money on that, Shaw, but that's 'ow it goes."
Geylan sighed and returned to his blanket, where he had a dream that Marisa chased Conyeri around the Eastern Kingdoms while he sat in a gloomy house in Southshore, selling shoes. Marisa caught Conyeri, laughing, sultry, pulling her to bed, and Conyeri looked back at Geylan and smiled at him.
"This is what I want, Geylan. Don't stop me." She said, kissing Marisa tenderly. "We're friends, Geylan, good friends. Best friends… but I don't love you." Marisa laughed at him again, undoing Conyeri's shirt.
"This is what she wants, Master Shaw. Not you. She wants me. Only me. She's mine, Master Shaw…"
Despaired, he left the room, thoughts haunted by the sounds of lovemaking, tears streaming down his cheeks. Oh, why was he affected so? It was a lie, a lie in a dream made from negative thoughts. He would find Cony and they would be happy, laughing and sparring, eating in the refectory… wouldn't they?
"Wake up, you lump!" Harrman shook him roughly and pried his warm covers from his hands. By the Light, it was cold. Everything was damp. Geylan groaned and roused himself, standing on shaky feet with crusty eyes. Dez and Harrman were ready to leave; the Coachman was even just putting an extra pair of socks on. He quickly dressed himself in thicker clothes and rubbed the sleep from his eyes, looking at the mountains. The rain had frozen and the paths were thick with ice. Traveling would be treacherous until they reached the Wetlands. Grumbling, he helped feed and harness the horse before they set off, slow and careful. His head hurt with thinking and dreaming things that displeased him.
"Not a particularly nice night?" Dez sympathized with him, chewing some long-life bread, tough as the leather breastplate he wore. Geylan agreed and nibbled his own rations, thinking they tasted like ash in his mouth. He wanted to see Conyeri, or maybe Rosea, or someone tender and, well, female. He wasn't wanton in his desires as a good proportion of the Defias were, but he still appreciated the female form and missed it. He was a man after all, such things were ingrained in his nature. Thinking on nature he let his mind fly again to the lands he would be visiting, thinking of lush forests and trees and lands full of animals, like Elwyn but wilder. What he would find there, he didn't know, and how everything would turn out he could only plan for. Jaken the cobbler was a man he would have to get to know as himself in time.
-
"It's awfully dirty, the city," Lady Ashcroft sniffed and held her nose, looking from the carriage window. "Though I suspect we can find a nice inn for a night or so, which is as long as I will stay here."
The butler smiled warily, used to his mistress's complaining. Stormwind was a city of beauty, but a newer beauty, not the antiquity they were used to up in Alterac. "There is a top-class Inn known as the Gilded Rose just around the corner, my Lady."
"We'll see how top-quality it is." She sniffed, insufferably posh. "When we get there, order them to send a messenger out to Rebecca, telling her I've arrived and where we are. Cefflan should be with her."
"Yes, my Lady." He acquiesced, dusting off his pressed uniform. Only once every five or so years did Lady Ashcroft deign to visit Stormwind to take her children back to Manor Ashcroft in Alterac, preferring to have them taken up to meet her. The master of the house said that she should see more of the city, though, so she had dutifully come down from the far north by carriage. They stopped outside a nice, up-market Inn with a beautiful painted sign and she visibly relaxed, smiling at the innkeeper, a woman a little younger than her with a straight back and a nice premises. As soon as she stepped out, the groom and his boy came to take her carriage and horses in. He regarded them- you could always tell a good inn by the class of its grooms. The man was ageing but firm, with strong eyes, and his boy was handsome, with an air of kindness about him that you saw in so few boys around Southshore. She decided she would send him to get Rebecca.
"Boy," she beckoned to him after she had paid her night's board. The menu looked delicious, the fragrances drifting from the kitchen supporting the butler's claim. He came over, a graceful walk, quiet and obedient, smiling at her with sincerity. If only he was high-born, son or cousin of a Lord, perhaps, he would make a fine husband for her daughter one day. "Are you free to perform a task for me? Need I pay you?"
"Of course, my Lady. You have already paid us more than we could ever take by entrusting your beautiful horses to us," he gestured to the two purebred stallions, one of which clip-clopped over to him and nuzzled him affectionately. He must be very skilled with animals.
"Indeed they are lords amongst horses," she agreed, quite taken with his politeness and cultivated air. "I would ask of you, when they are properly stabled, to venture to the Mage Quarter and seek out my children, currently of study there, and direct them back here." She took a small piece of paper from her handbag and wrote something on it in beautiful, loopy handwriting. "Show this to the mages of the tower and they'll let you in to fetch them. Ask after Rebecca and Cefflan Ashcroft." The groom-boy bowed low and took the paper in soft hands, reading it swiftly. Literacy was good, also, but Lady Ashcroft stopped herself before she started checking her mental list of attributes in a potential husband.
"T'would be my honour, my Lady," he said and slipped the paper in his pocket, bowing again before returning to the horses. They really loved him.
"Connor, if you can prepare our two best stalls. Nice fresh hay, two troughs, finest only for such beasts," the groom in charge asked him. He obliged and disappeared down the side of the inn, presumably where the stables were. The groom unharnessed the horses gently and sized up the carriage. "Boy!" he shouted, and Connor popped back.
"Yes, Darron?" he asked, his shirt billowing as he slid to a stop.
"While you're there, tell Mary we'll need some more black paint. The trip had not been fair on their carriage." Indeed, the weather down from Alterac had been truly horrific, rain and sleet and huge thunderstorms. Rebecca would no doubt explain what it meant in magery in full tonight. Connor, the groom-boy, nodded and disappeared again, leaving Lady Ashcroft to move her personal effects to her room, which meant having the butler do it. The coachman had waddled off to the nearest tavern already, drunken lout. She really must fire him soon.
Never one to miss an excuse to use the horses, Conyeri took two of them out of the stable after she had tended to the two impressive stallions that Lady Too-Posh had come with, grimacing at being sent to pick up a couple of kids. Politeness sold rooms, Allison reminded her, so she had dutifully smiled and been a young gentleman about it, though now she was quite enjoying herself. She rode Kestor, a strong bay, who belonged to Darron but was scarce ridden enough these busy winter months, and held the reigns of another horse, affectionately nicknamed Horsey. This was because he really was just a horse… not short or tall, not meek or strong, not one-eyed or limp-hoofed, just normal.
The air was cold and she hadn't stopped to pick up her overcoat before leaving, so she trotted at pace, entering the mage quarter with its odd, grassy streets and purple houses. Three weeks and four days had she lived in the loft over the stables of the Gilded Rose, and after only one she was yearning to be out of the city. Country girl at heart, she missed open fields, and her friends, even if they were all wanted criminals of the Defias. It wasn't as though there weren't children her age in Stormwind, because there were plenty, but she couldn't get too close to them for fear of being discovered as a girl. She had slipped into a male persona easily enough, though she couldn't manage gruff or manly, so she settled for gentlemanly. It made teasing news out of the gossiping girls who met in the sitting rooms of the Gilded Rose easy.
She came into the centre of the mage quarter and dismounted, knocking on the lowest door of the large tower that dominated it. Telling the horses to stay there, she showed the paper to a gnome in apprentice robes and was ushered in, the cold draughts of early winter not sitting well with the sensitive mages. Conyeri didn't like mages; they reminded her of Marisa.
"You'll find her in her rooms, just up a floor, the door with all of the cleaning notices on," the gnome said, rolling his eyes. This Rebecca was obviously a messy one, like Geylan. Taking the steps two by two, she reached the second floor and clearly saw Rebecca's door, covered in sheets of parchment warning her to tidy her room or she'd be on extra kitchen duty for a week, then a month, and the newest one said three months. She chortled a bit, thinking the mages were not so good at enforcing their rules.
She knocked and there was a crash from behind the door, followed by a moan and bare feet crunching on paper. The door swung open to reveal a very rushed-looking girl, about Conyeri's age, her auburn hair askew and a pair of reading glasses perched on her nose. She gave Conyeri a once-over and blushed. "Um, hello."
"I've come to fetch you, from your mother," she explained, voice cool. "Your brother, also."
"Oh, yes, yes." She said as though she'd forgotten. "Come in, come in, I'll be not a minute and that corridor is awfully draughty."
Not one to point out she slept in a draughty loft over a barn, Conyeri entered and politely stood in the corner, taking in the sight. Her room was small but grand, littered with papers and homework and books. So many books! An alchemy set sat on a table, while a writing desk had been pushed to one wall to make room for a huge star chart, spread out to at least two meters by three. Clothes sat about the place in various states, some in piles fresh from the wash, others discarded long ago. Cony felt sad at now much it reminded her of Geylan's cubby in Camp RUTN, but forced herself to bring up memories of all the horrible things that had happened there, drowning her sadness in anger and spite.
Rebecca abruptly pulled the dress she was wearing completely off and Conyeri nearly forgot to be intensely embarrassed (because she was a boy) but caught herself and wheeled around, to hide the blush that she didn't have.
"Oh, please, a handsome boy like you will have seen many girls in less than there underclothes," she sighed from behind Conyeri. "If you're so inclined, you can leave and get my brother. He'll be in his room, just opposite mine."
She 'gladly' left and found that when Rebecca said opposite, she really meant three doors down and in a dorm. Cefflan was short and sandy-haired, buff for an eleven-year old and wouldn't stop talking about being a battle-mage. Rebecca chastised him when she had changed into something less creased for his babbling and marched him back into his dorm, forcing him into 'proper mum clothes', which she guessed were to please their aristocratic mother. Looking at them interact was funny; Conyeri had never had siblings herself. Finally, they were ready and she led them back out to the horses.
"Young Sir, if you'd ride with me," she offered him a leg up an immediately regretted it, seeing him puff up.
"I can ride a horse!" he said, indignant, and to prove it, swung himself up onto Horsey with ease, smiling down at her. "And it's just Cefflan, thanks. My sister can't ride a horse, let her on yours."
As Horsey wasn't big enough for two riders and Cefflan was adamant he would ride alone, Conyeri hefted Rebecca onto Kestor, which was difficult as she was scared. Conyeri now had very little patience with people who were not natural with animals as she was, and watching the mage dither was annoying her. After she had been secured enough, the groom herself leapt up and instructed Rebecca to hold her waist while they trotted at pace through the mage quarter. She did realize that Rebecca thought she was a boy and had called her handsome and was probably entertaining some odd thoughts, but she let the hands on her stomach press into her, quite conscious that she'd have to stop the girl if anything got out of hand. Since she'd become 'one of the boys', bodily contact was expected and something she had learned now to live with, breaking the barriers Marisa had put there, and admittedly she was much happier for it. The gossiping girls often hugged her or put their hands on her shoulder in gestures of affection that she knew now were normal for people, and really their fondness for her was of her own doing. Flirting she found very fun since she was out from under Marisa's shadow.
She did miss Geylan, though.
"You smell of horses," Rebecca said, pressed to Conyeri's back.
"I'm a groom," she replied. "I smell of tigers and rams and elekk sometimes, too."
"A groom?" she asked, eyes wide. "But you're so… refined."
Cefflan snorted and even Kestor whinnied, both of whom could probably tell that Conyeri was anything but refined under her customer-seducing façade. Kestor had heard her swearing, certainly, and Cefflan was a boy himself. He knew boys.
"Indeed," she said wryly as they came into the trade district. The sun dipped behind the horizon just at that moment and the shadows lengthened as nigh fell. Rebecca shivered, and being 'refined' and also having picked up a good number of techniques to receive a big tip, she balanced on Kestor and pulled her jacket off, offering it to her over her head. Though not an overcoat, it was warm from being worn. Rebecca took it with mumbled thanks and draped it over her shoulders, stopping her chattering teeth. From Horsey's back, Cefflan raised an eyebrow at her and she raised one right back, challenging him.
After another five or so minutes the Gilded Rose came into sight, Conyeri relived, since Rebecca's grip was tightening and roaming dangerously near her belt. Now wise in the ways of young people, she was not surprised. Being stuck in the mage tower denied a girl (or boy) certain things that were widely wanted… though Conyeri didn't wish to be there when Rebecca sated them, considering that the taking off of any of her clothes would reveal her womanhood and then all hell would break loose.
Dismounting and helping the young Ashcroft daughter to do the same, she led the horses behind and handed them to Darron who peeked around at Rebecca wearing her jacket and gave her a pat on the back. She returned and led them in.
"Rebecca! Cefflan!" Lady Ashcroft rose from an armchair near the fire where she had been sipping fine wine and hugged her two children. "Dear, you smell of horses."
Rebecca took the jacket off and handed it back to Conyeri. "This chivalrous groom lent it to me as I was so cold," she smiled as the 'chivalrous groom' took it back and slipped it on. Allison gave her a wink from where she was doing tallies, and Conyeri rolled her eyes.
Lady Ashcroft regarded her. "Thank you for being so swift. I would have not liked my children in Stormwind in the night."
"It was my honour, Lady Ashcroft," Conyeri said, voice saccharine. Cefflan again gave her the eyebrow, to which she gave a mild look and a smile.
"You may retire now, though I shall have need of you in the morning," she was dismissed. What did that mean; 'I shall have need of you in the morning'? She'd harness the horses to the cart, yes, but what other need was there for her than that? She thought not on it, retiring to the loft with a bow.
"So, are you to add young miss Ashcroft to your list of sexual conquests?" Darron asked, mocking Conyeri's habit of flirting. They were well suited to each other- she almost felt that she had replaced one of his sons, and he her lost father, though she was vehement that her parents' places would not be taken.
"Of course, Darron." She said sarcastically, clapping him on the shoulder. "I'm tired and it's cold and Lady Up-Stuck wants me in the morning."
"Say that to her face."
"I would if I could look at her without shriveling," they laughed and Darron wished her goodnight. Climbing the ladder, Conyeri entered the loft and kicked her boots off, quickly changing into her nightclothes. Then, from her vantage point, she snuck a peek through the loft window, into the inn proper, and saw Lady Ashcroft boring the socks off her children. Poor them, she thought, they'd have to spend the next month or so in her company.
She put the kettle on the small stove that had been lit earlier to keep the loft warm and made herself some hot chocolate, sleepy as she let the hot, thick liquid slide down her throat. Subdued, she shuffled into her bed, downy and soft. Not quite as nice as the one she'd had in Marisa's cubby, she thought, but the company didn't rape her, which was a great plus. But she was being pulled north, and she knew it. She needed to get out of the city, to find whatever was missing. It was an unsettling tug that she often forgot in times of action, but alone in her bed, she felt it strongly.
Dawn broke and the stamping of cold horses woke Conyeri before Darron, and she dressed quickly in her winter clothes, which she had had the sense to but with her first week's wage, which was not meager by any means. Chilled, she descended the ladder and went to tend to the horse in question, one of Lady Ashcroft's black stallions. Since they were not named, which Conyeri considered very rude, she gave them the title of the Thane and the Baron, noble as they were. She fed the Baron, who was pawing for some exercise, so she took him around the corral and rode him a little, marveling at his strength. These were beasts not to be trifled with.
"You seemed an early riser," came a voice from the entrance to the stables, but Conyeri had heard the footsteps coming, good as her senses were. She dismounted the Baron and led him back to his stall while Rebecca entered tentatively, not comfortable around horses, obviously.
"Your horse woke me," she smiled, patting the Baron and then tending to his friend, the Thane, who had woken and demanded food. "Your mother will not like you up so early, since she kept you awake so late last night."
"You know that?" she frowned, pulling her coat tighter around herself, her breath rising in a misty cloud.
Flirting mode fully on, Conyeri turned to her and smiled lazily. "The grooms have eyes everywhere."
"I would have hoped not in my rooms," she returned, "though they were indeed very nice. This inn is warm and cozy, and has very handsome stablehands. I shall ask my mother to leave a large tip."
Here came the tricky part, dissuading her from actually doing anything while still remaining charming. A change of subject usually did it, but it had to be natural, inkeeping with a subject of conversation previously mentioned. "Your mother wishes to speak with me this morning."
"I heard." She said. "I don't know what she wants of you, if that's what you're about to ask."
"I will find out in due time, anyway," Conyeri said pleasantly, grabbing some fresh oats for the waking horses, who would undoubtedly be hungry. "So, your are a noble of Alterac?"
"Don't remind me." She grimaced. "Manor Ashcroft is insufferably drear. Nobody ever comes to visit, I'm not allowed in the library and my sister is in Dalaran all year. Holidays are so boring up there."
She smiled guardedly at Rebecca, pulling her cap off her head. The ponytail she had held up there came down and she softened the fabric, which had gotten damp somehow and frozen overnight, making her head feel like she had stuck it in a lake.
"Oh!" she said, a small noise of delight. "You have long hair…" Conyeri knew this was semi-normal for boys around her age these days, and she would not have it cut off by Eva. She loved her thick, curly brown hair. The gossiping girls sometimes cooed over it.
"Why yes, I do." She said. "You like it?"
"Very much," Rebecca said, looking apprehensively at Horsey, who had just woken up. "You like horses?"
"Would I be here if I didn't?" Conyeri replied with another question, walking to tend to Horsey, which closed the space between them. "Animals like me."
"You have a country accent," she said, keeping the conversation going despite the cold and the early hour. "Where were you raised?"
"Westfall," she said truthfully, confident of her back-story, which was really less of a lie than it should be. "My parents were killed by the Defias."
"I'm sorry," she said, as did everyone when you told him or her that. "Were they farmers, then?"
"Yes, crop farmers," bending down to put some oats into Horsey's trough, she saw his water was nearly empty and went to refill it. "And you are a mage."
"An apprentice mage," she corrected 'him', chancing to stroke Horsey. "Honestly, so are my sister and my brother. Our family has always been into magic, right back to my ancestors."
"Nice," Conyeri said, thinking of Marisa. At least now she knew all mages weren't insane. "I have a… friend who is a mage."
"In Stormwind?"
"No, she, uh… she works freelance."
Rebecca snorted and decided that she liked Horsey, because he was normal and not scary like the Thane and the Baron. "You don't think much of freelance mages?" Cony asked.
"Without proper regulation they get addicted," she said coldly. "I'd rather not talk about that side of magic, though."
"Fair enough. The cooks will be up now, would you like an early breakfast?"
Rebecca nodded and Conyeri led her through the back door to the kitchens, where breakfast was already on the go. Rebecca, she had a feeling, was important. Rebecca would get her north, or something, she could rely on her to begin the next phase of the odd journey she had planned out in her head. The Ashcroft in question was looking around the kitchens, mesmerized. "You'd think you've never seen a kitchen before," she joked, but Rebecca looked at her, deadly serious.
"I haven't, except the Mage's Tower ones, and then only the washing up bit. This is amazing! So many pots with different things in, so many ways to cook…"
"I'm afraid if you eat with me you don't get the posh breakfast." Conyeri warned, but Rebecca just said she'd like to eat normal food and they sat in the little servant's dining room and ate pastries, fresh from the over, golden yellow and slathered in butter, steaming and filled with a centre of chocolate. From the look on Rebecca's face, she was in heaven.
"What are those things?" she asked after they finished. "I want more."
"Specialty of the Gilded Rose, butter buns with chocolate. You can get posher ones in bakeries but they're never straight out of the oven like here."
"I'll have to tell the cook when I get back to the Manor," she went sad at this. "I don't want to go back, really."
Conyeri thought she looked very cheerless at the thought of returning to her home and offered her a consoling hand on her shoulder. "It can't be that bad."
"It is," she touched Conyeri's hand with cold fingers. "I should return to my rooms now before my mother wakes up and finds me gone."
"Yes, I'll not want to be held accountable for her wrath," She smiled. Rebecca, before Conyeri could walk away, leaned in and kissed her softly, then blushed and left.
The kitchen staff gave a collective cheer and a wolf whistle but she glared at them and went back to the stable, cursing her luck. Why was it always the girls? What had she done to attract them?
Well, she was dressed as a boy, but still, she wiped her mouth and frowned, thinking now she'd have to avoid Rebecca, which she didn't really want to, since the girl was decent conversation. Gossip would travel fast and now the kitchen staff would heckle her. Darron would be insufferable…
She took several of the horses and one ram for a quick exercise and then, at Darron's indication, brought the Thane and the Baron out front. They harnessed the carriage and once the sun was properly risen, Lady Ashcroft appeared at the doorway. "Ah, groom-boy." She said. "I would have a word with you."
Obligingly she stepped from the horses, though the coachman was not yet present, to talk to her, but a messenger boy came around the corner and skidded to a halt in front of them before she could say anything. "Missus, there's been a brawl- a man is dead, or very wounded. They said Lady Ashcroft was his employer, I was sent to get you."
"Oh, dear," Lady Ashcroft said. "You say my coachman is unable to return me home?"
"Yesmissus, he's very hurt."
"Tell him he's fired for drinking on the job." She said, relieved that such an opportunity had come to get rid of him.
"Yesmissus," the boy said, scuttling off.
"What did you do that for, mother? Now we'll have to hire a new coachman, the ones here are so expensive…" Rebecca whined from the doorway, spotting Conyeri and blushing again.
"Do not fear, Becca. If he is willing, I have a fine replacement for half a coachman's fare." Her eyes fell on Conyeri. This was it; she thought excitedly, this was her way north, why Rebecca was important. She was going to drive the Ashcroft carriage.
"Me, my lady?" she said, concealing her excitement. "I am but a humble groom."
"You work with animals so well," she said, looking at Darron, who nodded, a little sad. "Allison tells me you've been here less than a month and already have many friends. That old man was grumpy and lazy, and now I need a new driver and stablehand. A young man like yourself would surely find life in the beautiful Alterac valleys to your liking?"
"I would so, my Lady," she said. "I would be honoured if Darron and Allison would allow it."
"Shame as it is to loose you, Connor, traveling is what a young lad like yourself should be doing! The horses will miss you." Darron tipped his hat to her in acceptance.
"As much as I enjoy employing you, bigger things await Connor the stablehand." Allison smiled and winked. "Though the kitchen staff will find you running off after this morning a fond fireside tale."
"Settled, is it?" Lady Ashcroft interrupted their sentiment. "We can settle money on our journey, which is long. My daughter and son will surely enjoy young company at the manor, also."
"Thank you, Lady Ashcroft," Conyeri bowed. "I'll fetch my things swiftly."
It did strike her, though, that she'd be spending a long coach journey with Rebecca… and however long she had to stay at the manor with Rebecca… but she'd cross that bridge when she came to it.
She couldn't shake the feeling that, as she waved goodbye to the Gilded Rose, perhaps forever, she was going towards something familiar and away from something, too. Perhaps it was just her mind.
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A/N: longer than usual but I wanted to get that done. I know this is quite late but I have been on holiday with no Internet to put this up. And I don't know a great deal about horses, so sorry if I made some mistake in their care or treatment.
Let me know what you think… Conyeri is pulled north, just like Geylan and Marisa… what could be going down? What did Marisa find in Cony's room? Will she catch Cony before Cony gets to Geylan? Where has the discernable plot gone? What about the Defias zeppelin?
Find out in the next couple of chapters of The Brotherhood.