~*~ Author's Notes ~*~

You ever get a chapter where you know what is suppose to happen but the damn thing just doesn't want to be written? This chapter is that way; more chatty and less yell-y than I intended.

~*~ Chapter 26 ~*~

Kayas swept threw the door, threw the bag at the meditating Priest's feet and went back to the bedroom. The confrontation with the Queen of the Forsaken had worn her down on many levels she needed to break for a bit. The looks and whispers from every Forsaken she passed on the way back to town had frayed her nerves a bit. Yes, she was shaggy and gray and bony with ugly green streaks in her fur, and yellow eyes sunk into her skull… but did everyone have to point. It. Out?

The large, black Mr. Meows was on her bed already, awaiting her return. He purred in greeting, flexing one paw against the sheets as a kneading kitten does. Kayas shifted to her feline form and leap upon the bed, curled up and shuttered for a few moments. The other feline eagerly began licking her back and neck, cleaning away the traces dirt and grime from her fur.

There came a soft tap on the door, "Care to talk about it?" the Priest asked. The politeness was window dressing; it was his dwelling and he may go anywhere in it he wished.

Kayas growled hoping to scare him away again, but this time it failed. The door opened and the Priest invited himself in. He waiting for her to turn and face him over one shoulder and tried not to look too deeply into her eyes.

Shifting into her elfin form she spat out, "I'm Horde now apparently. What do I have to do to get in on this 're-education'? Maybe if I convince myself the sin'dorie are actually the victims I wont feel so bad about betraying my people to help that… that… thing."

"Sylvanas can take a leap off the Thandol Span for all I care." There was a careful carelessness in the tone, "She has my Warlock; she doesn't get my Druid as well." He made to sit at the bed, touching her chin lightly with his fingertips so she would raise her head.

The though of resisting occurred, but were as swept away as hope of returning home. That he didn't try to defend his people and had betrayed his dislike of the Banshee Queen to her were as surprising as the burn of his fingers over her bruises. Plague-tainted flesh did not like being touched by the Light.

"She threatened my village if I don't find a way to create more of the dorie trees."

The Priest anticipated this, lowered her chin and gazed into her eyes, "Sylvanas doesn't own you; I do. Whereas she would take at least a week to track down which village you came from, I already know. She would spend another week carefully detailing the strategy of how to take the town with minimal losses to her troops; I already know. And she may be fel-bound and scary to look at with the angry red eyes, but it's the pretty ones you need to look out for amongst the quel and sin'dorie."

"Yes, let me back it into a corner and then piss it off…" After a moment she realize exactly what he just admitted*. 'Subtle, Priest… very subtle.' The look of his innocent face indicated his pleasure in her understanding.

"Can I ask you a question?" Weighing the possible questions she would ask, he nodded after a moment. "What were you doing in Ashenvale when you took me? And when do I get to go home?"

"That is two questions…" He sighted, having known this was coming for quite some time. "And to answer them as best I can would take all day- and I have things to do," he rushed over her argument, "and so the short of it is that I wanted a specific Druid and so I went to Ashenvale. End of story. You can go home if and when I run out of uses for you."

She was disgusted; "You went all the way to Ashenvale from Silvermoon just to get me? Specifically me? Or did you merely kidnap the first Druid you saw?"

He laughed, smiling from ear to pointed ear, "Quite. And a lovely one to be certain; no one looks bad in leather." He winked; she flushed, turning away to hide her face behind the wild swell of hair.

In her mind there was nothing remotely attractive about death-shaded skin and frizzy black hair but… considering he keeps company with Forsaken, maybe that were the kind of thing that floated his boat.

The Priest frowned then, leaning close and looking at her cheek. Startled she pulled back, hand going to her cold face in an instant to heal it. Then she stopped, locking eyes with him in understanding.

His lament outside Zul'aman over not picking the right path soon enough to save the people he loved from the Scourge; Sylvanas angered at her healing the Sentinels; the comments Corrosa kept making about her being lousy at the feral arts- though she knew this to be out of meanness and not truth- and the planting of the dorie trees…

"To find a healing Druid? You think I'm to be a restorer?" Somewhere deep in her soul denial welled up. She knew her talents and they did not lie in standing back and channeling magic.

He held up his hands to stop her, "What you are to be is for you to decide. Know that some of us are just pawns in a larger game – but well-placed pawn have toppled kingdoms." These words were deliberate; his anger at the Banshee who had marked her was unmistakable.

"So what is to be done then? She said-"

"I know what she said." He was thinking for a moment, used to his companion knowing what this simple admission meant. Her puzzled look brought him back; he grinned sheepishly. "The collar, you see. It lets me know when you're in danger. I heard her speaking and listened to what she had to say."

Kayas had not known the collar could do that. So many tricks in such a small and thin thing, it really was getting annoying. "Thank you for coming to my rescue while she was smacking me around. Again."

The sheepish grin was back, "I was, just didn't get there before she was done. Hearthstone." He pulled the enchanted rock from his pocket, a fairly small and scarred one at that, and tossed it up a couple times. "She's going to be hard-pressed to explain to the Warchief why she programmed Orcish into a Night Elf's stone." Way too much pleasure glittering in his eyes. If Blood Elves could be Druids, this one would be as feral as her own heart.

The Priest stood and she noticed his bare feet again for some reason. "Come now. It's quite a heavy bag you brought back so lets see what you got me."

Kayas decided, as she followed the Priest out of the room, that this must be what it is like to be immortal. One simply let a great many things slide that bothered less long-lived people. Mr. Meows followed, yawning sleepily and curling up by the spindly fire.

For instance, she mused as she dumped the contents of the bag onto the table, he was at once loyal to Sylvanas as any Forsaken and yet there was the undeniable doubt that it was a loyalty of convenience. They were both pawns in the other's scheming and immortality meant it was going to be a long game. And lost pawns regenerated over time, came back from the dead, and rose to add another set of pieces to the board, vying for their own space and right's to exist.

"By the Light, what on Azeroth did you bring me?" The Priest was picking threw the bits of meat with a stick, steaks and chops and wings and non-edibles, trying to place them in piles. He was far too much of a Noble, despite his surroundings, to touch such slimy things, but the randomness had him far too interested.

Kayas shooed him away from the table, quickly and efficiently separating everything into their own piles. All the inedible things were lined up across the mantle of the fireplace to dry out. The Priest studied the object without touching them. The cloying scent of fresh and befouled meat filled the little house.

She pointed to each pile of meat and listed them off. His eyebrows went up as she them off, especially impressed with the bats though she didn't know why.

The Priest went to the broken windows and pulled the tattered curtains in place with an attempt to shield prying eyes as to what was going on inside the house. The Druid stood confused until he returned to the table. Taking what she knew as his healing stance, she watched in awe as he stretched out a hand over the meant, glowed brightly with Holy energy and drove out the blight from the bits of flesh. When the light faded, what had been gray and green hunks of meat were at once appetizing looking and quite edible pieces.

"Now," the Priest said, "Corrosa isn't here… so you get to cook it." He was smiling; she was scowling. The Warlock, for all her blasphemy and murderous presence, was one hell of a cook.

The Druid had been quite dismayed to find out the woman was good at anything else than being joyfully wicked. If one is evil, Kayas mused, it didn't make sense that they should also have domestic skills as well. Not that she had ever sampled the Warlock's food, but the comments of everyone who had were enough to convince Kayas of the superior skill. "I can't cook."

Now he frowned, "What kind of self-respecting woman can't-"

He shut his mouth and took a step back giving her a look like he just witnessed a Night Elf turn into a demon.

"I don't know how things work where you're from," she hissed, sitting down beside Mr. Meows, "But where I'm from the person who hunts it is not expected to cook it as well." She was pushing him, seeing what she could get away with. However high and mighty he was in his own lands, he had gone out of his way to seem as if he were insignificant and less in this place. Why is what she was interested in discovering. "Pull your weight."

Elegantly manicured eyebrows puckered as he looked at the meat in dismay. Then back at her. Then at the meat. Then at Mr. Meows. "But I can't cook…"

The pathetic look on his face almost convinced her to try but she turned away, arms crossed and quipped, "Then we have a problem, don't we?"

"I'm hungry…" By Elune, that voice could tempt the Scourge to set a feast!

"Correction," she grinned, taking pleasure in causing him this little bit of grief, "you have a problem." Her feline self landed on the table inhaling the spider meat before he remembered she could eat it raw.

He tackled her off the table, fel bent that if he couldn't eat – neither would she!

~*~End Note~*~

*For those slow on the uptake, he admitted to having though up similar blackmail to prevent her either running away (if she ever got the chance) or betraying him to anyone who might remove the collar.