Chapter 30: Climax
Zackel didn't know what the situation down in the basement was, but when he discovered the battered door lying on the ground in front of the stairs, knocked off its hinges by a blast of fire (though said door seemed to have held up better than the one that had allowed entry into his and Rielle's 'room'), he decided to take no chances and banged his staff against his chest. The radiant cold aura erupted from his body, Zackel directing it down the stairs with a gesture.
No sound came from below to indicate that his cold field had come into contact with anyone, but Zackel didn't lessen his precaution, holding his staff out to barrage anything that came up after him with ice. He made his way down the swiftly-freezing stairs, walking with a calm resoluteness.
His peripheral vision quickly picked up them up, but Zackel kept his head forward, only planning to look if he saw motion. In the end, none of the few adult male ogres did move, allowing Zackel to reach the bottom of the stairs and turn to face them.
There were three of them, all of them glaring at Zackel, two of them with weapons at the ready, but Zackel didn't have to be who he was to tell it was mostly a front. While the ogres didn't look thin, they definitely didn't look to be anywhere near their best. Mug'thol's brutal drive had clearly left them on their last legs.
Perhaps, if the women and children hadn't been peering with considerable apprehension and fear behind the ogres, said ogres might not have even tried to fight at all.
It suited Zackel fine. He hadn't come for a fight. He'd come to send a message, the source of it in his left hand, which he raised.
It took the ogres a few seconds to recognize the shattered wreck of Mug'thol's head, Zackel having had to drive an ice 'hook' into the skull to have something to grip. The caution and alarm in their faces increased, a rare sight for ogres, but they continued to stay quiet.
"Your leader is dead." Zackel said, dispersing with the deliberately slow speaking he'd used before. He was certain these ogres would understand him loud and clear. "I killed him. He sought to eat me, and I tore him to pieces. By the law of your kind, I am your leader. Let any who would challenge me step forth NOW."
Mug'thol's head bounced across the room as Zackel hurled it, stopping near one of the ogre's feet. Said ogre glanced at the head and then back at Zackel, who raised both arms and increased the cold field. The sight of several of the ogre children shivering in the back made him feel rotten, but he knew that for their sake, it would be best for him to adapt this front.
"Will no one challenge?" Zackel said. The ogres looked at each other and then back at the mage. The intent in their eyes was clear, but in another rare sight for ogres, so was something approaching sense. They were exhausted, and Zackel had killed their leader (a lie, but they didn't know that). If they fell, the fate of the women and children was unknown.
"So be it then. I am now the head of Crushridge Clan." Zackel said. "I now issue my first and only order. Lay down your weapons. There will be no more fighting today."
With grim reluctance, the male ogres did so. Zackel waited until they were on the ground before he lowered his own arms.
"…The storm will end soon. Within the next day or two." Zackel said. In the peace following the Star's destruction, Zackel had finally noticed that fact, though he had yet to tell Rielle. Apparently, all he'd needed to dispel it was to find some place (or some thing) to draw off and dump a fair bit of its energy. A small part of Zackel had wondered if the storm, once thought alive, did have SOME sort of knowledge that it would have been needed and had persisted in its trapping of Zackel and Rielle for that purpose: he'd met a member of the Bronze Dragonflight once in Stormwind and had come away from the meeting with the impression that time and fate sometimes worked in strange fashion. "When it does, you will take your people and leave this fortress."
"…What eat?" One of the ogres said.
"You will eat these." Zackel said, holding out his hand as he began manifesting more bread and water. "They will not taste good, but they will fill your bellies until you can escape, and give you strength to hunt. I will be returning above and sealing the door once again. If any of you attempt to come up there…I will kill you all. This is your only warning."
Anger crossed the face of the ogres, but it was clear that did not give them enough strength to change their minds.
"I give you my word, as your now-leader, that the storm will end soon. Leave. Survive, and grow stronger. To find a new leader, and fight another day." Zackel said. He'd manifested a very large amount of food by the time he had finished speaking (an act that had drained him, though he doubted the ogres could tell that). He took one last look around the room, noting the massive hole in the wall that connected to the tunnel that Mug'thol and co had dug, before turning with a grim flourish.
"That was my only order. I am no longer your leader. Goodbye." Zackel said, and walked up the stairs, leaving the ogres in the basement. Once on top, he sealed the doorway and immediate stairs with a massive plug of dense ice. The ogres could probably break through, but he'd know it. And he meant what he'd said.
He'd given them all their chance.
Grimacing, Zackel lifted the basement door up off the ground with ice and inspected it. Said door was still in semi-decent shape. It would do.
Though when all was said and done, after Zackel had rejoined Rielle in their room and told her of what he'd done, he found that he could not fix the hinges of the door to get it to properly fit into the entranceway. Zackel ultimately settled for just freezing the door in place before turning to more important tasks, like dragging the remains of Mug'thol's body up the stairs via more ice manipulation. Tossing it over the edge of the roof, Zackel returned down to the main room to collect the dust of the Star. Casting it to the wind allowed a greater degree of peace to enter Zackel's soul.
"We're starting to run out of wood." Rielle said when Zackel returned. She'd been tidying some of the mess of the room while Zackel had been dealing with the ogres, and had moved to cleaning out the wrecked part of the fireplace when Zackel had been disposing of Mug'thol's corpse. Having finished that, she had moved to re-light the fire, the fireplace not having been damaged enough for it to lose its function.
"It's all right." Zackel said, kneeling down and lighting the wood. "The storm's finally about to die out."
"Really? Thank LIGHT." Rielle said. "If I had to spend another day with you, I think I'd go crazy."
"You haven't already?" Zackel said, piling more wood on.
"Just for that, YOU have to clean up the blood stain."
"I wouldn't trust you to do it anyway." Zackel said, picking up one of their canteens and drinking. "Speaking of clean…"
"Not tonight, Zackel. I'm not that well recovered." Rielle said, looking down at her still-quite-filthy form, which was quite evident even with her under-armor leathers back on. "Though if you'd be a dear and throw something together tomorrow…"
"Sounds like a plan. Might even have something left in my bag of tricks to do some laundry." Zackel said.
"…wait a second." Rielle said, an eyebrow arching. "You said you went through Grel'borg's bag for those healing potions…Zackel, did you find any Runes of Portals?"
"…oh fel." Zackel said. "That completely slipped my mind."
"Where's the bag?"
"…I tossed it over the side of the…roof…" Zackel said, gulping as a familiar fury bloomed in Rielle's eyes. "Uh…honest mistake?"
"Honestly? DON'T CARE." Rielle said, as she began to chase Zackel around the room. When she eventually tackled the mage, though, she settled for poking him repeatedly in the forehead before telling him to clean the bloodstain.
Zackel was just glad she had been too intent on showing her 'anger' over his mistake to notice anything that might have been poking her.
If she hadn't.
"Hey Jude…don't make it bad…Take a sad song and make it better…Remember to let her into your heart…Then you can start to make it better."
The next day had struck Zackel over the inherent power of normalcy. After such a period of deadly chaos that the previous day had been, the quiet that had settled back onto the fortress had seemed too good to be true. Yet Zackel sensed that it wasn't about to change. Or rather, that the only possible change was good.
From the remains of what chemicals and materials he'd had, Zackel had managed to put together some more alchemical soap and cleaning material. Fortunately, the washtub bin had somehow avoided being broken in the struggle between Rielle and Mug'thol; Zackel had filled it and the surviving buckets with water, and then set one aside for 'laundry' and boiled it. Rielle had not asked for help bathing this time, instead taking the soap, shaving material, and whatever else she needed and indicating for Zackel to look away. Zackel had walked across the room and sat down, quietly meditating and pondering certain issues while he semi-listened Rielle clean the accumulated grime and unpleasantness of her period of illness and her battle off herself. Rielle's only request during the time was for Zackel to dry her wet clothing, which Zackel did by closing his eyes, standing up, and walking over to Rielle's rough position before she put the clothing in his hand.
Despite the heat he called to dry them, Zackel was distinctively aware of another kind of heat, and it wasn't his own or the fire. He tried to play it cool as best he could, mostly hoping Rielle didn't notice. If she had, when she'd taken her clothing back and gotten dressed, she gave no sign. In fact, she'd been oddly quiet that day, though she told him when he inquired that she'd been with him so long that she'd run out of insults for how lacking he was and needed some time to think up new ones.
Zackel had swapped out the water, making one last trip up the stairs to the roof to dump Rielle's dirty leavings. It was his final confirmation that the storm was almost dead: he barely felt the wind at all. Despite all it had done, its nearly-gone-quiet presence made him strangely saddened. Though he made a point not to mention that to Rielle when he came back downstairs. He had a feeling she wouldn't share his opinion.
"My turn." Zackel said, summoning more ice to melt into cleaning water. "Now don't peek. I'd hate after all you'd endured to bust a gut laughing."
"Well I wouldn't…hey!" Rielle said. "You don't get to insult yourself! I hate feeling redundant!"
"Feel free to explicate."
"Oh you'd like that, wouldn't you." Rielle said, semi-stalking across the room and sitting down. "Don't take too long! If I get bored, I'm going to go over there and stick a gold piece in your…something, I don't know. Just hurry up!"
"…right." Zackel said, glad Rielle was facing away from him and couldn't see his face. He started stripping off, glancing once to look at the Draenei. She was facing away as he himself had been, and Zackel paid her little mind as he cleaned up and shaved, glad his gnome device hadn't been damaged in the process. Well, Rielle hadn't complained when she'd assumingly used it. Fortunately for him, most of his dirt had ended up on his immensely battered robe, and he was able to put his pants back on as he tried to clean it.
"Rielle?" Zackel said, swirling the robe around in the washtub with his staff.
"Mmmm?"
"You all right over there?"
"Yeah I'm fine. Just…thinking." Rielle said, glancing backwards at Zackel. "When you're done, clean up the room some more, could you Zackel? Still a little…messy."
"And you can't because?"
"Don't think I've forgotten our work agreement, mage! Just be glad I accepted your shoddy door repairs!" Rielle said. Zackel didn't press the issue, and after removing his robe and hanging it to dry (he did not trust rapid-drying here: the cloth was so worn down such a process could cause it to crumble), he put his shirt back on and moved to follow Rielle's request. Rielle moved back to the fireplace, taking a few dried pieces of meat from Zackel's bags and chewing on them as Zackel worked.
In a way, he had glad he'd been tasked to do it alone, based on what he found. In another, he was quite glad when it was done and he was able to re-join Rielle on their gathered furs. She'd stripped out of her 'clothing' while he'd been working, apparently having found the under-armor leathers too stiff after all the time they'd been unused, and hence uncomfortable. Zackel tried not to pay too much attention to the fact.
"Night time?" Rielle said, offering Zackel food.
"Think so. Time flies, though fun, it seems, is optional." Zackel said, taking it. The two ate in silence, finishing most of the remains of Zackel's natural food.
"…well. The food may be starting to turn, but the company more than makes up for it." Zackel said.
"Flattery will get you nowhere." Rielle said, flicking Zackel in the forehead. "Now, what are we going to do after you broke your damn Thrust board? I suppose you could recite poetry to me. Might make me fall asleep quicker."
"Actually, I have something we could do." Zackel said, producing the lost healing potion, having stumbled over it during his cleaning.
"…not in the mood for PT Zack…"
"No no. Not that." Zackel said, reaching into his pocket. "Found something."
Rielle stared at her horn, Zackel having located the broken off piece. A slight smile crossed her face before she shook her head.
"You WOULD be that sentimental." Rielle said. "You think the healing stuff will re-attach it?"
"Should. Come here." Zackel said. Rielle slid in close, Zackel raising his hand and trying to carefully place the length of horn on the broken knob extending from Rielle's head.
"…breath's not bad, for once." Rielle said.
"I made a point to use some of that chemical I mixed up earlier. After yesterday, it was nagging at me." Zackel said, trying to focus on his task and not Rielle's face and her closeness.
"…so. We haven't talked much today."
"Well…yeah. I did tend towards…introspection, after turning points in my life. Sorry if I gave the wrong impression."
"Please. Like my impression of you has changed ever since you got me stuck in here with your dumb ass." Rielle said. "Except that's not true, is it?"
Zackel almost fumbled his chosen horn-placing position, though not due to surprise. He felt heat began to crawl up his neck, a sensation he'd been having more and more lately during this day. Swallowing, he began dripping the healing potion onto the broken horn, hearing a faint hiss as the hard tissues were knit back together. With his task done, Zackel had no choice to look at Rielle's face.
"…thank you." Rielle said, reaching up and feeling her horn. "Your work…like your eyes…like you. Exceptional."
Zackel wanted to toss another quip back, but found he couldn't think of anything. All he could do was look at the soft glow of her eyes. At the spark that lay there.
He waited for a few seconds. Waited for something to happen. For a knot in the wood on the fire to explode. For himself to get a stomachache. For the roof to abruptly cave in. For something to come along and snatch the moment away…
Nothing came.
Nothing was left.
"Hey Jude…don't let me down…You have found her, now go and get her…Remember to let her into your heart…Then you can start to make it better."
"Zackel?"
"Yes?" Zackel said quietly.
"When the storm's over…what do you want to do?"
"…well…once I attend to the basics…I need to get back onto the path. I've remembered why I got on, and I need to pick up the pace." Zackel said. "Maybe go to Silithus. Then any of the remaining issues in Outland. Then…maybe I'll get up to Northrend. If you haven't already won the war single-handedly."
Rielle chuckled softly, though the usual sardonic edge in her laughter was gone.
"….Zackel?" She said again. "What do you want?"
Zackel blinked once, then again. No words came to mind.
So he acted.
Rielle's lips were soft, with a faint hint of some unknown exotic quality. He heard, and felt the Draenei draw a slight breath, even as her lips parted slightly under his own. He savored their touch for a few more seconds before drawing away, opening his eyes and taking the hand he'd placed on her cheek away a few inches.
Rielle's own eyes remained closed another second before they opened. In them, Zackel saw more of the Draenei he'd come to love, the edge and the strength, the take-no-shit-from-ANYONE will that would carry her far. But he also saw in her a blooming happiness, a joy that she perhaps never felt before, or not for a long time.
"…oh you stupid mage." Rielle said, before she placed her own hand on Zackel's hand and drew him back to her. For a brief speck of forever, Zackel only knew the kiss and the sensation of Rielle's presence.
Before the Draenei lightly bit Zackel's lower lip, making him start and open his eyes. The silken smile was back on her face, tinged with the same wicked lilt that made it so much more, as she traced her tongue over her upper lip.
"…I guess you win, mage." Rielle said.
"…More than I ever thought possible." Zackel said. "The Light works in mysterious ways."
"Maybe." Rielle said, drawing a hand around Zackel's shoulders to pull him back to her. "Ready to come in from the cold?"
Zackel's sole response was to resume the kiss, even as he brought his hands to her laced undershirt and slipped his fingers beneath it, drawing it open even as Rielle drew him down to the furs.
Outside, for one last period of unrelenting fierceness, the blizzard howled.
"Nah…nah nah nah nah nah nah…nah nah nah nah…hey Jude…"
"Nah…nah nah nah nah nah nah…nah nah nah nah…hey Jude…"