The rooms of the Banshee Queen were dark and gloomy. Only a couple of candles offered the bare minimum of illumination. Sylvanas allowed herself no more, nor did she pay much attention to the fact. She could see well enough in the dark after all and might as well make use of it.
A knock on her door interrupted the mechanical regularity of her work.
"Dark Lady? Apothecary Putress is here." Alina was on watch today. Or if it was tonight. She was always polite. Not in the formal way, but civil. Considerate.
"Send him in." Sylvanas raised her voice to be heard through her door.
Putress. Sylvanas had not quite decided what she thought of him. He and Lyndon despised one another to an almost comical point, just like what…what Sylvanas had been told about the Kirin Tor's academic top. From what Sylvanas had seen and heard Putress was skilled enough and highly dedicated. He was the kind of Forsaken who seethed with vengefulness rather than sorrow, and Sylvanas found it easy to recognize herself in it.
He looked less than pleasant. It did not move Sylvanas much, she had seen worse and long since ceased to be surprised by the grotesque. But there was something about Putress, or the meeting with him here and now, that itched. The sort of itch that told you that there was something to be wary about.
Sylvanas put the thought away. Her instincts were not reliable anymore.
Putress entered and cautiously took his seat in front of Sylvanas.
"Apothecary Putress. I have read your paper with interest. Suffice to say that I trust the Royal Apothecary Society to have a substantial scientific reasoning to base this on. What I am now primarily interested in are the practical considerations of the suggested research and applications of this weapon. When, how and by how many could it be expected to be researched?"
Putress wet his lips. He radiated expectation.
"My Queen, we have as a starting point the blight as we now know it. It is harmful to all living things but beneficial to all undead. It is also distinctly magical in its form. We aim to deconstruct and de-mysticize what causes the Scourge's blight to spread and amplify its effects, presumably harnessing it in a concentrated form that can be deployed and disposed where and how we want it. That is the first stage of our research. The second stage is the harder, to modify this new blight into being able to harm undead instead of healing. If possible only Scourge undead."
Sylvanas nodded to him to go on.
"We have collected knowledge and a fairly rich material of observations and insight for the first stage of the research to expect rapid results. I have already drafted several hypothesises that I expect will be quick to prove or disprove that will take us a long way towards a solution. The Royal Apothecary Society can handle this research effectively on its own. The second stage will require far more practical tests which calls for raw materials, very likely an increase of our available space, and…test subjects."
"Test subjects." Sylvanas echoed tonelessly.
"Indeed, My Queen. The living are fragile and can be expected to be affected by a wide array of substances that are part of the strain of blight or can be mixed with it without neutralising its effects. However, we need to ensure that the method of application works quickly enough for it to be of actual use in battle and that it is simply powerful enough. The undead on the other hand lack many of the physical sensibilities but are also decrepit and thereby frail in several ways. Our search for a weakness to exploit will by necessity include a great deal of trial-and-error and thus a more or less steady supply of test subjects."
The idea was…distasteful.
Sylvanas had no difficulty grasping the logic behind Putress' words. It was not that. Nor was it any particular sense of compassion towards the Scourge. Or the Scarlets. But Sylvanas saw in her mind before her eyes a vision of herself forcing open the mouth of some desperately writhing human in her grasp. A Scarlet soldier, a knight or priest or paladin perhaps even. Yet the more she looked, the more the vague and undefined person shrunk and looked less and less like a remorseless fanatic and more and more like just a frightened human girl. A girl with golden hair and wide and terrified blue eyes.
"My Queen." Putress had evidently read more from her than Sylvanas would have preferred. "The swordsman may cut his enemy apart like a butcher, the archer may hunt him like helpless game in the woods. Are these methods not cruel enough on their own? But what remains for the common man? Those who were offered no training, who toiled so that others could spend their time to acquire the skills to defend themselves with the weapons they knew? The black powder is jealously guarded and complex to create. The arcane powers are gifted from birth to a few with utter fickleness. For us, the lowest, weakest ones, what choice is given but to die in accordance with someone else's rules?"
Putress knew his audience if nothing else, Sylvanas noted. Those arguments would find many receptive ears in the Undercity.
Not that he was wrong. Bows and blades had also been tested on living subjects, by their ancestors who determined that a sword and a spear were useful means in general to cause grievous harm. Those skilled at arms were ever prey to the arrogance that lay in forgetting that behind each of them were ten or a hundred others who forged their arms, farmed or fished their food, and built their houses. The elven rangers, who should know better, were no exception and each year had always brought their share of recruits with an aversion to honest labour that they needed to work off.
"If this long-term research is approved, what will it happen at the expense of? What alternative routes are available for the apothecaries to contribute forcefully to the war effort?"
Putress appeared to hold the alternative fields in less regard but he listed them conscientiously and as far as Sylvanas could tell with objectivity.
"The most obvious alternative is that we could divert more resources to the attempts at crafting abominations of our own. It will require significant raw materials but dead flesh is easily harvested. The Royal Apothecary Society can graft the things together but to animate them requires alchemy and magic combined and therefore services requisitioned from our casters."
"That could be arranged. And otherwise?"
"We could focus increasingly on the production of potions, as well as oils or similar incendiary concoctions. The industry is in all relevant aspects ongoing and it would just be a question of ramping up the production rate." Putress made a pause like he considered how to put what he was going to say next. "Focusing on potion production is guaranteed to yield results but they will be of limited significance. Our kind are helped by potions but they offer us no decisive advantages. The abominations, if they can be made to function and if they can be produced at a sufficient rate, would be of greater impact. Yet both options remain at best just advantages, that could well prove negligible in the long run. The blight however… My Queen, it could change everything. If we succeeded we would hold the key to the Scourge's destruction in our hands!"
Sylvanas held up a hand. She shared his fervent want for revenge and she knew that Putress knew that.
"Begin researching and compiling what is known about the Scourge's blight and its effects. Do not proceed with anything more unless I explicitly order it."
"Yes, My Queen." Putress said with satisfaction and bowed. "We shall begin immediately."
Sylvanas sat still in her chair after he had left.
Do not proceed with anything more unless I explicitly order it.
Putress would obviously hear it as until rather than unless. And expect that this until would not be a too long wait.
And why shouldn't he? What was the point of beginning a long-term project using crucial resources, if not to finish it? It would just be a waste, that the Forsaken could ill afford.
Yet still Sylvanas had issued that reservation.
She glanced involuntarily down at her desk and her hands moved compulsively to its haphazardly repaired drawer that got stuck half the times you tried to open it.
Sylvanas,
I write to tell you that I am back in Theramore. And in one piece I should likely add since there are ample reasons why teleportation spells over long distances…
She had told herself a hundred times that she would not respond, after she had found Jaina's letter lying on her desk. Not that she quite knew how but she suspected that if she left an answer in the same place Jaina would be able to find it one way or another. But Jaina would find no return letter.
It was better that way. She was home, and she was safe. Safe from Lordaeron, and Sylvanas, and everything that was wrong and turned out wrong no matter what. She would probably hate Sylvanas unless she did not already, and perhaps she was right to. And with time her hatred would fade and Jaina would move on with the life she still had before her, unless the Scourge claimed them all before that of course.
Jaina would move on. Jaina would… Jaina would… Jaina…would…
Jaina…
For one rare time Sylvanas appreciated the fact that she had no tears left. None would stain the letter she would be wise to throw away and burn, but could not bring herself to let come to harm.
She knew why she had hesitated about the blight. Why she still did.
What would Jaina think if she saw her?
Putress may be right. It may be what was necessary to defeat the Scourge one day. No one could tell that for certain.
And Sylvanas would be giving up all remaining shreds of decency for it. She would sanction torture and murder. She would make the Forsaken as vile as the Scourge in the eyes of every living. Every condescending, bigoted, conceited living that had let them suffer.
She would become exactly what Jaina had feared, feared to the point that she had thrown everything to the wind in a panicked attempt to prevent it.
Now it would not even matter. None of it.
Sylvanas realised that she was clenching her fists to the point where the leather in her armour creaked. She opened her left hand and saw the letter and how crumpled it had been. Regretfully, Sylvanas tried to smoothen it out again. How long she sat there and tried to make Jaina's letter good again she had no idea of.
…against my better judgement I am unable to let go of what you said to me during our last conversation. There is a small part of me beneath the greater part that feels hurt and disappointed, that can not stop itself from questioning how you acted. What was it truly that I witnessed when you sat looking at me like a living person at a ghost…
"Alina."
Only silence. Then, the door was opened so slowly it could only be called hesitant.
"Dark Lady? Did you call for me?"
"Send a message to Putress. He is to belay his current orders and focus on the abominations instead."
For Jaina, it was both natural and absurd to be back into her previous routine as head of Theramore. Not even back at it even, or rather she was back at something more akin to how it had been until her father's fleet was sighted in early spring. How it should be.
She spent a lot of time by her desk but she was no longer hiding away in her tower for the sake of hiding away and avoiding other people. There was so much to catch up with, to think about, and to find out more about.
Pained had not shied away from making one or two pointed comments about Jaina's still famously – famishly in her bodyguard's view – unreliable eating habits when she was caught up with something, but noted with satisfaction that someone had taught her lady to heed the calls for lunch and dinner without complaint. Jaina only brought with her a paper to read half the times or so.
Jaina was both busy, and pleased with keeping busy, and restless. After dinner, her thoughts would leave the day's and the next day's issues and return to Lordaeron and the Forsaken and their impossible queen.
Jaina had written her again. That had also become a routine.
It had been five times now. Sylvanas had not written back and Jaina shifted between disappointment that she hadn't, irritation and anger and wishing that she wouldn't, and hoping that she would. For all the times she found herself doubting the point of it all she kept penning letter after letter.
Sylvanas,
In addition to my previous letter I realise I had better be overly clear rather than leave room for another debacle of communications between heads of state. Let me therefore make it plain that as far as I am concerned we are still allies with the same goals and aspirations for our respective states as before I left. I hope and expect that the Kirin Tor will send you their response any day and their agreement to mutual efforts and cooperation against the Scourge.
What and how Theramore can contribute in the immediate future from the other side of the ocean I have no good answer for. Perhaps we will be wiser to let intermediaries work out those kinds of details when the time comes. Regardless, I will not let whatever I may personally think of you or anyone else put the safety of my city in jeopardy and expect that you share the sentiment.
Good night
Jaina Proudmoore
Jaina had sighed as she wrote that letter, dutifully to pre-empt whatever possible more misunderstandings or faulty assumptions that her return home may give rise to. It was a tiresome thought, because it invariably led one to the matter of more personal things that may or may have a part of either in them.
Sylvanas,
I hope that all the rangers and all the other Forsaken are well. Even your unpleasant chancellor since I know he is useful to you despite his lack of pleasant manners.
I would like to ask you to tell them – the rangers and Irizadan and the Baron – that I never wanted to leave them in this way without saying goodbye. I would have had to return home at some point, and quite possibly soon, but obviously it would not have needed to be in this manner…
That letter had been hard to finish. What would Anya be thinking of her? What would she be feeling right now?
Sylvanas,
Has the Kirin Tor gotten back to you? I do not intent to pry into your affairs but only ask since I was about to write to Dalaran and it got me thinking that I could remind them to do while I was at it, if needed.
Life goes on in Theramore in rather much the same way as in the Undercity – meaning life as the comings-and-goings and daily chores of its inhabitants. While you build below ground, we build above, and I suppose Dalaran rebuilds on its ruins in the meantime…
Jaina was still angry. Of course she was. But it was not all she was. She no longer seethed with fury to the point where it drowned out everything else.
And this everything else was tricky.
"What troubles you, Jaina?"
"Am I that easy to read for everyone now?"
"Yes." Pained said patiently. "When you pace and try to act like you do not, and forcefully have to stop yourself from crumpling that innocent sheet of paper."
Jaina put down said piece of paper in a completely controlled manner.
"I don't know what I expected, or if I expected anything at all, when I wrote. But I suppose now I find that I would have liked an answer or at least to now that my letters were received. Am I stupid for letting it get to me?"
Pained looked up in earnest now from what she was reading.
"I do not know anything approaching the full picture of what happened between you, My Lady." her bodyguard begun somewhat carefully. "But if I had left under circumstances that upset me like they had upset you when you came back, I would probably very much prefer to be able to write back to this other person. And I must confess that I too belong to the eccentrics who in general prefers their mail to reach the recipient."
As usual Pained managed to make her smile, and feel better about herself. Jaina sat down next to her instead of not-pacing around the room.
"I just want to know they reached her, is all. I'd understand if she wanted to take her time before responding, especially since we parted on bad terms and my first letter was rather angry. But a small note saying she's got them and will write back later wouldn't have been out of place."
"Did you leave the later letters in the exact same spot as the earlier ones?"
"Yes… I guess so. It was on her desk."
"And were the previous letters still there?"
"No. No they weren't." Jaina felt foolish. "You are right. But what if someone else took them instead?"
"Is that a common occurrence? Other people checking the queen's desk for the eventuality that magically delivered mail would have one day appeared just there?"
"Of course not. She is a very private person when at work and take on far too much on her own just because she can."
"Hm. That type…" Pained said with a meaningful lack of expression. She was absolutely like…Areiel…when she did that, Jaina suddenly realised. Tides, those two should really have tea some day.
"So the most likely thing is that Sylvanas has actually gotten my letters." Jaina said partially to herself.
"There could be many things that occupy her time and attention. The Scourge neighbours for one thing."
"Very possible." Jaina sighed. "She could be away in the field on a new campaign, or the Undercity could have been attacked again for all I know."
"You are worried."
"It was close. The day they attacked the capital city. And the field battles – they could easily have gone far worse. If the Scourge come again with a force of that size…they'd have need of me."
"Theramore would also have needed you if the last three months had not been so mercifully calm and quiet for us." Pained pointed out forcefully. But then she softened. "It isn't easy, not being able to be everywhere you would need to be. I heard about some of what my people encountered on their expedition tracking Illidan across southern Lordaeron. It must be terrible there. Of course you are worried."
"I couldn't stand it eventually. I think that's what happened. It became too much."
Pained didn't say anything but she rubbed her hand over Jaina's back.
"They don't get to quit. They have nowhere else to go." Jaina continued saying out loud to no one. "They are still there, still stuck with all the horrors, all the danger… What will it do to you eventually…"
"That, you know more of than I do, My Lady."
"And still we ended up like this..." Jaina mumbled glumly and curled up in the corner of their couch with her knees under her chin while staring into the fireplace. The embers looked like red eyes that watched her and eventually she got up again to look for something to do that could occupy her.
Pained suddenly looked up after giving the matter some further thought.
"My Lady? Maybe this is an odd question but does the queen of the Forsaken undead know how to send you her reply?"
"Oh, that's nothing to worry about, she'd just have to put it on her desk for me to…" Jaina stopped right between two steps and froze. Then she clenched her eyes tight with what she assumed was a very pained expression.
"And the queen…is aware of this?"
"Possibly not." Jaina sighed. "Letters were one of the things we talked too little about. Very much too little."
"So she could in theory be intending to respond but consider herself without the practical means to do so."
"Uuuh…" Jaina groaned. "Tides, what a mess if that's the case… How we always manage to mess everything up…"
She was not sure if Sylvanas would be at loss about how to respond. On the one hand the Banshee Queen was very sharp of mind and possessed (yes, that phrasing…) both substantial experience and a solid understanding of how teleportation magic worked, and had her own junior mages and potentially Rhonin or someone else of Dalaran to ask for advice. Surely she would have thought of at least ruling out the possibility of leaving a reply in the same place as the letter had arrived?
On the other hand, who was Jaina kidding? Of course something completely, aggravatingly, mundane like this would happen and put a stop to even the smallest attempt at mending relations between them in any measure.
She sat herself down by her desk and picked up the sheet of paper she had absolutely not crumpled earlier. It totally smooth and even.
As Jaina started to think of how to formulate a reasonably phrased paragraph about the sending of arcane mail, she found herself thinking all the more of what she and Pained had talked about. Pained was right. Jaina sure wanted to be in several places at once right now. She wanted and needed to stay in Theramore, she wanted to look in on the Forsaken and see that everyone at least were safe, she wanted to check on the bordering territories inland of Theramore to ensure that no new catastrophes were brewing when she least expected it. And she would very much like to say hello to the night elves for that matter.
As a matter of fact Jaina found that she would very much more than say hello to Tyrande and Malfurion and the rest of them. She missed them terribly, and she missed Ashenvale with its wonders and its strange peace and quiet.
It was contradictive to travel again so soon after she had returned and it would lead to its fair number of raised eyebrows. But on the other hand, if Jaina had worried more than Theramore's population sick by disappearing then she had better put it right before any new crisis unfolded because of it.
And it wasn't just about her either.
Pained. You've not mentioned much about how you had it these months, both when I was gone and before. I know you've kept yourself busy but like you said it earlier, I also know that type. Even if you are a couple of thousand years old you deserve some time off in your own home. Or…especially since you are a couple of thousand years old? I think I will not say anything right now about that particular philosophical conundrum of elven age, hihihi...
"Pained?"
"Yes?"
"Don't get too worked up now, but I am seriously thinking of going away again for a short time…abroad, so to say."
"I suppose I should draw My Lady's attention to my ominously lowered brows." Pained pointed at the impression she made of a seriously displeased tauren. "Does the notably vague term 'abroad' in this case refer to Lordaeron?"
"No, as a matter of fact no." Jaina ignored the slight flush of her cheeks. "I was rather thinking of Ashenvale in fact. It strikes me that it was a long time since I last wrote to Tyrande and if she have found out that I have gone missing she may be very worried."
Pained cleared her throat and looked a little guilty.
"Hm, yes, that might be very prudent."
"Pained, if it was you who had disappeared I would send Tyrande a panicked letter within half a week."
"I assure you I delayed until at least a whole week after your disappearance. By which time I had received your not altogether reassuring note, My Lady."
"Considering the circumstances I assure you it was the best I was able to put together. Poor you, it can't have been easy waiting here without any way of knowing what went on with me in Lordaeron. Just being on the writing end and not knowing if anyone is actually reading is taxing enough."
"Well, so long as My Lady does not speak to any strange satyrs and remembers to notify the rest of the party when she feels the urge to stop to look at every interesting creature or flower…" Jaina tried to look stern but blushed too much for it to work. "…I see no reason why we could not pay a visit to my kin. You are very right in that there is much to tell them about."
"Great. I'll make arrangements tomorrow and think of a way to send word in advance that we're coming."
Sylvanas,
Earlier today Pained pointed out a very relevant detail regarding my correspondence that I find myself having overlooked completely. I have used a small scale portal to deposit my letters on your desk and while I have cast it as briefly as I was able, it is in all respects similar to any other two-way portal. In order to reply, should you want to, it would therefore be enough to leave a letter or an envelope addressed to me on your desk and I will notice it. The same would of course apply to any instructions to deliver future letters to another location.
I must apologise for the oversight and the frustration it must have caused if you found yourself unable to send a message back due to purely practical reasons. If that was the case I wish to assure you that it was not my intention. I do not intend to be petty or cause you unnecessary problems.
I plan to be travelling for some days and be gone from Theramore, should you wish to write back or have something already written. Upon my return I will look for it on your desk.
Jaina
"That one has your nose."
"That one definitely has your chin."
"And your belly."
"And your ass."
It was a cold, cloudy and windy day in Lordaeron. It did not bother anyone in the group especially much.
"They should both feel right at home then, shouldn't they?" Kalira remarked dryly over the habitual bickering. "When they join their respective ranger squadrons we would so hate for anyone to feel like they stood out, wouldn't we?"
Two squadrons' worth of rangers turned to look with palpable suspicion and not a little apallment at Cyndia's commander.
"Their uniforms will prove a hassle though…" Kalira continued to muse. "I guess we will simply have to stitch a dozen or so cloaks together. And then to stealth training…"
Now she was faced with more than one grimace.
"Noble Commander, it is all well and good that you have discovered this new sense of humour thing…" Lenara begun.
"…but could you make it just a little less twisted?" Nara filled in with a shudder. "Abominations in a ranger squadron is not something we joke about – ever, understand?"
Kalira looked at them with clear amusement.
"Goodness gracious, how squeamish we are today." their ranger lieutenant noted airily.
The Naras and Cyndia shared a long look. No one was quite used yet to this side of Kalira.
Though at present they would take every little morsel of fun they could get.
Cyndia glanced at Anya's squadron and mostly at Anya herself. Were things as they should then she and Velonara would be making up steadily more absurd jokes about abomination rangers by now. But things were anything but that and Anya just glared sullenly ahead while the rest of her squadron didn't know if they should join in the banter or just stay silent around her.
"Mindless constructs." Anya mumbled bitterly. "They will fit right in."
Not even Kalira knew quite what to respond to that. This acidic bitterness cut deeply when it came from Anya who would otherwise be the last ranger you'd expect to hear that from. It was not that she was out of line, and the Forsaken had to accept a damned deal worse from each other for very obvious reasons, but still it bloody hurt. So Cyndia thought while feeling the whole of that along with Vel'.
Could something just bloody happen that would take their minds off runaway mages and botched relations that Cyndia did not quite know the full extent or significance of? It was like they were just waiting when they should be doing so much. Sending flowers to Dalaran and start kicking the Scourge out of Silverpine Forest together, for instance.
"What is that?" Anya was not so vacant as she appeared to be. Cyndia was well aware of the fact that very few could match her hearing.
"Over there." Lyana pointed east roughly along the shoreline of Lordamere Lake.
Nine faces turned and concentrated on the dense grey sky where the clouds hung low and curtains of drifting rain hung from them like some dreary window.
"Whirring… Something is whirring. In the sky."
"The night we got you back, did you hear the sound from the goblin zeppelin that flew by us earlier?" Vel' asked.
"No, not much enough to think on it at least. I was pretty preoccupied at the time."
"Jaina said that zeppelin engines sounded more even. Not like the dwarven flying machines."
"Alright…?" Cyndia did not really get the point. She had no difficulty believing Jaina would know that and all sorts of other stuff about the Alliance but why did it matter now?
"Yes, that – that is not the same." Kitala said thoughtfully. "That one is not a goblin zeppelin."
"Nara, alert Sylvanas." Kalira sounded unusually hesitant when she continued to speak almost to herself. "Do you think…no, it couldn't possibly…or… Lenara…will you please ask Amora to bring her squadron here too."
The thing burst from the cloud in an instant, like a fish out of the water but the other way around.
A dot, rapidly taking shape from dark blur into a contraption both clumsy and primitive, compared to the grace of a dragonhawk and its rider, and ingenious and awe-inspiring because it was a thing that was made, and could fly.
A dwarven flying machine, the successor to the gyrocopter. Sylvanas had met the infuriating contraptions in the field outside of Dalaran, during her time as a Scourge. One large spinning thing had given way to two smaller, one on each side. It was hard to understand how something so peculiar could fly. Just look at those tiny, stubby rigid wings.
Although this steep descent did not speak volumes of its flying ability. If it had been a dragonhawk rider Sylvanas would have reckoned it was high time to pull the reins back and break out of the dive, unless the rider was practicing some very risky combat move.
What was the rider – no, pilot was the term they used – thinking? There were at least four squadron's worth of rangers with her along with several city guards and a good deal of bystanders attracted by the commotion and sound. If that machine crashed into them it would be a disaster. But no, the whirring sound rose along with a roar from the engines and the flying machine levelled out, however it still came very fast and now the sound shifted again to a hacking or sputtering together with the noise, as if the machinery was not working the way it should.
"Clear out!" Areiel shouted next to her.
The pilot seemed to be trying to reduce speed. Sylvanas wondered if it was more akin to sailing a small ship than riding a dragonhawk. Whatever the case it did not go as well as it would have had to and the flying machine swept past before their eyes, carried by the wind, and slid with a grating noise along the ground only to catch on to something and spin, and finally dig a deep furrow in the dirt with its one wing before it came to rest.
"Rangers to scout!" Sylvanas commanded and waved Kalira forward. "Everyone else stays back until we are sure it is safe to approach!"
She followed close behind Kalira's rangers. The noise from the engines was dying down, which she assumed was a good thing, and at least there was no smoke forming or any other sign of a fire.
Unless you counted signs of fiery temper of course.
"…absolutely worst possible landing in the history of landings!"
"Completely wrong. This could have gone way worse." Another voice grunted in return.
"Anything worse than this would have counted as a crash, not a landing, so my point stands."
"Really? Isn't a crash just depictive of a botched maneuver? A crash landing, or crash takeoff and so on?"
Somehow the two interlocutors had calmed down to turn their argument into a bickering about semantics.
"Next time we fly with our helmets on… Ow! Blasted…argh! Or better yet do not fly at all whatsoever…"
"How is Rattletusk?"
"Safe in my pocket. He at least had the good sense to take cover under some commendably thick padding."
"On second thought he is usually the wisest member of the party… I guess we should unload the gear and get our bearings."
There was definitely something vaguely familiar about those two voices.
Kalira was signing to her squadron to circle around the upturned machine. She kept herself strictly professional but Sylvanas could see the expectation among her rangers and Velonara indiscreetly waved at those behind them to come closer. Sylvanas decided to let it slide.
On the other side of the metal body were two dwarves busily preparing to unload luggage. One with light brown hair and beard, the other with black. Afraid of neither dark rangers nor banshee queens. Here. Contrary to all sense and reason, here.
"Runar." The dwarven spy patted his colleague's shoulder.
"Uh?" Runar looked up. "Oh, ah, good day Ranger Lieutenant Kalira. What a coincidence, running into you and your – squadron, was it? – like this. Although it could be argued that since we ran into each other last time then yours should be the one we are least surprised to be discovered by, I suppose…"
Sylvanas remained in the background and beheld the unlikely scene of two presumably half-mad dwarven adventurers – no other term sufficed – who were seemingly out of words, and of strict, harsh Ranger Lieutenant Kalira who was….smiling?
"We seem to have a knack for discovering lost dwarves, don't we, girls?"
"HIII!" Velonara interrupted her and waved.
"Vel', discipline!" Cyndia nagged insincerely. "We could still need to be suspicious."
"Bore. You can be that in my stead."
"Welcome back, Master Runar and Master Halvdan." Kalira said and restored some sense of propriety.
"Welcome back…do you mean we are actually back in your capital? I knew I saw something like a city when we went down – I mean landed." Halvdan asked expectantly.
In answer, Kalira stepped to the side and gestured invitingly for him to come around their downed vessel and take a look for himself.
"Ha!" Halvdan exclaimed triumphantly. "Right on the spot, eh?"
"Yes, we are all pleased that the pilot has performed his task in accordance with the expectations placed upon him." Runar said dryly but he was very clearly also relieved that they had not ended up somewhere else.
"You actually flew through this?" Cyndia pointed at the heavy sky.
"Apparently we did. Blast…" Halvdan grimaced as he looked at the murky soup above them.
The dwarves were taking note of the clusters of other Forsaken who were nearing the site. Some rangers, some guards and some of the general population who had just happened to be near. It was a stark contrast to how their previous stay had eloped, where they had remained secluded and under strict ranger guard.
They took it better than a young human girl who had been Wailed at the night before.
"Blimey…" Runar half whispered, half spoke.
"Agreed." Halvdan was even quieter.
"We rangers are fortunate to be more whole than most of the others. On the outside at least." Kalira noted solemnly.
"Does it, well – does it hurt? Or what do you say…"
Sylvanas wondered how she would answer such a question herself. Did being undead 'hurt'?
"Not in the sense of the word you refer to." Kalira answered for both of them. Sylvanas reckoned she had likely put it as concisely as it could be. "Just say hello. That is all we really ask."
"Do you want us to help with the luggage?" Velonara asked and sounded much less sure of herself. She was obviously discomfortable with the topic. "If you have a lot of it, that is, I just reckoned since you had a lot packed last time…"
"Could you, ah, keep close while we introduce ourselves? So nothing goes, hm, wrong." Runar clearly shared her feelings of awkwardness.
It was the right time for proper reintroductions, Sylvanas decided.
"That will not be necessary for this will not go wrong." she stated more than said as she stepped out of the shadows and took command of the situation.
She let their visitors be suitably surprised and the greater part of the assembling crowd come within earshot before she continued.
"We received your notes from Khaz Modan and the Kirin Tor have told us of your visit to Dalaran." Sylvanas' statement was close to a declamation, to make sure the greater part of the audience got the message that they were welcoming back two persons who had lent the Forsaken useful aid. "It is pleasing to see our envoys in good health. Especially considering the manner of arrival."
Sylvanas cast a poignant and meaningful look at the no longer flying machine and after a couple of silent moments a few snickers and chuckles appeared here and there among the crowd.
The dwarves looked a bit flustered, and Belore knew if they did not start to redden a little too. Just like her mage would, although she had no beard to obscure it.
Their living mage had made enough of an impression and garnered enough affection that Sylvanas hoped some could spill over in a more accepting atmosphere for other living allies or potential allies. That was about to be put to the test.
No one had been told of the exact circumstances related to Jaina's departure, but the news that their formidable allied archmage had returned to her own city across the oceans had been enough to cause its fair share of distress and sullen misgivings. Where would they be without the ice storms and thunder the next time the city came under siege?
A large enough number of rangers knew enough to form their own opinions however. And they were not impressed. Sylvanas had known what to expect when being requested to come to the arena to 'help with maintaining their close combat skills' which was a polite way of saying 'beating the un-living daylights out of their commander'. Sylvanas had not had the shame to refuse, nor would it had served any purpose but to put up the reckoning she knew would come anyway.
But it was a blessing that undead healed quickly. From what Sylvanas could tell her rangers had little need for brushing up on their capacity for close quarter violence. They had in fact rarely seemed so vicious. Her right side still felt like Areiel had cracked something the sixth or seventh time she had beaten, kicked or thrown Sylvanas to the ground. It paled however, compared to the feeling of seeing her ranger captain towering over her with an expression of disappointment bordering on disgust.
Did I not beg you not to lose her, Sylvanas?
She would gladly have preferred seven more rounds instead.
Anya had not been there. Sylvanas had barely seen her since Jaina left.
She could not blame her.
But she would gladly have taken a hundred rounds.
She could now only try to do better for all of them, and cause as little harm as possible, until someone stepped up to replace her. Starting with making sure this unexpected meeting went as well as it could.
"So, Master Runar and Master Halvdan. How did your mission in Khaz Modan go?"
Sylvanas had already decided to spring whatever traps this conversation might hold. Better to let the city know any bad news firsthand along with her answers than later and muddled by hearsay.
"Mission accomplished, My Lady." Runar offered her a wide, and a tad smug, smile. "We have delivered your letter to King Magni who read it with great interest."
The dwarf spoke in normal conversational tone. Sylvanas gestured with her palm that he needed to speak up. They had an audience after all.
"And what was King Magni's answer?"
"You are looking at it, My Lady." Now most of the crowd would have been able to catch both the words and the triumphant tone. Sylvanas raised one eyebrow in question. "We are proud to present the newest emissaries of King Magni of Khaz Modan. Complete with full written and sealed credentials, which I am sure we packed…somewhere."
"You are the king's emissaries?" Of all possible answers this was certainly not one that Sylvanas had expected.
"As royal as they come." Runar nodded and then shrugged with very deliberate casualness. "We are emissaries by trade and thought that since being the queen's envoys worked out rather well we would stay in the business… So now we are the king's envoys instead, but hopefully we will with your permission set up some sort of embassy in Lordaeron since we obviously will have a great deal to discuss."
The dwarf now had the scene, no doubt about it.
"As we wrote in our note some time ago we held off delivering your letter of introduction until the circumstances would be more favourable, and after arranging more favourable circumstances it turned out that we were able to persuade the king to grant us the assignment as ambassadors." Runar brushed some immaterial dust from his sleeve and adjusted the collar of his shirt. "Naturally a primary issue would be to lay the groundwork for a military alliance against mutual enemies, and we are sure that King Magni will attach considerable importance to the reports of his personal embassy in Lordaeron in such matters."
Sylvanas was, for one of those rare times, speechless.
How in all the world had they managed this incredulous feat – had they gotten the dwarven king dead drunk? And also…why?
If the words were not enough to convince a disillusioned crowd of listeners, then the with difficulty suppressed merriment of Runar did its part too. The dwarf acted like he presented the finalization of a perfect plan, or plot, or prank, brought to dazzling execution. Which obviously was not without reason. Ingratiating themselves to the point of being named ambassadors before presenting Sylvanas' message was certainly…one way of rigging the game. It was not a little infectious, Sylvanas could objectively note even if she was not swept up in it herself.
Runar had taken her hint and turned more to the rest of the listeners than to herself, more serious and sombre now.
"This is not, I would like to underline, in any way contrary to the interests of Khaz Modan. The last laugh from the Scourge is the only reward anyone will reap for fighting amongst ourselves when we had better things to do. Let us all avoid that. We are honoured, to be welcomed back to your city."
Not too bad of a speech. Now Sylvanas should…
A high pitched squeak interrupted her. Out of somewhere in Runar's clothes scurried a…squirrel? In a blink it had climbed up to sit on his shoulder and take in the surroundings the way squirrels did, perched on a branch of a tree.
Velonara squeaked even higher.
"No waaay!"
Before anyone could mouth 'inappropriate' she had jumped down to kneel beside Runar and started clicking and chattering at the bewildered animal in her best imitation of squirrel language.
"This is Ratatosk, our scout and head tavern haggler." Runar explained and patted him with a finger.
"We rescued him from a band of trolls outside of Ironforge. And it is supposed to be 'Rattletusk'. I was talking with my mouth full at the time." Halvdan filled in. He had retrieved some sort of package or bundle from their luggage. Whatever it was, it was wrapped in blankets and he carried it with extreme care.
Velonara paid little attention to the semantics of names where she sat down on the ground and looked overly doe-eyed – or squirrel-eyed perhaps – at him. Rattletusk had scurried down to the ground and stopped to look even more curiously at the dark ranger. Velonara in turn bent down forward so she would be as close to eye level with the squirrel, while sticking her backside out at her squadron and especially Kalira, who looked like she was about to roll her eyes.
"We, uh, used to call him Voo at first but it got confusing. Ratatosk is as it happens an expert wooer of barmaids far and wide for discounts and extra nuts…"
"Nuts?" Velonara echoed eagerly. "We have plenty of nuts in store!"
Sylvanas was sure she could see Rattletusk come to attention when hearing the word 'nuts'. Velonara nodded encouragingly and stretched out her open hand. Rattletusk ran forward, then stopped and sniffed at it.
"Inside." the dark ranger explained. "I will show you."
Sylvanas shrugged. At least nobody would take any threat of dwarves with squirrels in their pockets very seriously.
"Velonara is correct, we are in fact far better provisioned these days to accommodate living guests. Would you like to come inside?"
"Very much so. But first we would like to speak to Lady Alina. Is she here?" Halvdan asked. "Is she…alright?"
He added it like someone who fears the answer.
"On your right, by the edge of the crowd." Sylvanas reassured him. She had noted Amora there and Alina nearly hiding in her shadow.
"Alright."
Halvdan swallowed, and sat down to slowly unwind the layers of protective cloth with Runar's help. Inside was a smooth elongated case that appeared elven in design. The kind you would expect to contain something very valuable.
Halvdan unlocked and opened it to peek inside.
"It…looks like it's still in one piece, right?"
"It looks just fine. We did it." Runar said. "Only the scary part left."
Halvdan gave him a long glare and closed the case and rose. They started to walk towards where Amora's squadron stood, with Sylvanas in tow. On her nodded command the nearby guards parted and gave way, and made the other bystanders follow their example.
Amora almost nudged Alina out in front of her. Almost.
"Hello, Lady Alina." Halvdan mumbled.
"Hello. But I don't want to be Lady Alina again. I liked it more when you just called me Alina." Alina said to both of them.
"That you did, right… Er…"
"We sort of…happened to…come across this." Runar said and failed miserably to sound casual. It was evident that whatever was inside they had likely flown across half of Azeroth to get it.
"We figured that since, well, you are a ranger and obviously expert with the bow, we'd get you another one. Kind of." Halvdan cleared his throat as he offered up the case.
"For me?"
He nodded.
Alina tentatively unclasped it. She opened the case very slowly and went wide-eyed with awe and fright combined.
"I'm going to break it." she whispered as she took a step back. "I'll drop it, or, or… It's too valuable. It's too..."
"Left untouched it is not valuable. It is worthless. It is less than worthless."
"I can't… I can't…anymore…"
Amora bent down to whisper something into her ear. Insistent hissing in Thalassian.
Sylvanas watched Alina step back forward and slowly, painfully slowly, she reached inside to take hold of something. She closed her eyes briefly, almost like something had hurt her, and then even more carefully retracted herself. In her hands she held a masterfully crafted violin. And its…bow.
Halvdan had put the case down and only had eyes for the dark ranger.
"You said – before – that you used to play for the other rangers so we figured… Neither of us has very much experience with musical instruments, I hope it isn't wrongly balanced or something…" he rambled as if he needed to explain himself.
"I mentioned it once!" Alina sounded like it was unfathomable how anyone could put the slightest importance in what she had said. "And I said it didn't matter anymore…"
"Yes?" Halvdan sounded equally incredulous about how anyone could fail to place the greatest importance in what she had said. "Well, I think it matters very much."
Alina looked at him like he was completely insane. Then Amora nudged her gently in the side.
If Alina would have been alive Sylvanas was convinced she would have swallowed and trembled. Now she was just still as a statue, until she slowly placed the bow against the strings.
It let out the sort of horrifying grating shriek that only violins could. Alina twitched and retracted the bow, then closed her eyes and slowly redid it.
And for the first time in more than two miserable years she played again.
Eyes closed, posture relaxed and her chin placed almost lovingly against the wood. And Alina, so troubled and haunted and broken, looked like she was peaceful.
No one spoke. No one moved.
The last notes of a hauntingly beautiful melody faded away and Alina opened her eyes again to look right at Halvdan.
"Invaluable." Halvdan whispered at her.
Sylvanas reckoned anyone else around them might as well have been a rock or tree for all that the dwarven spy and elven ranger seemed to care. She mumbled out of the corner of her mouth towards Runar who had discreetly vanished to the background.
"Even with the gold you were given you would not have been able to pay for a fraction of all of this, surely? How have you been able to afford this treasure trove? And that flying contraption on top of everything."
"Oh…" Runar shrugged casually while they watched Alina with her violin. "…with a rogue handling the treasury you can't expect anything less than a tad of fiddling with the figures…"
Somewhere behind them, Areiel laughed.
Sylvanas sighed and pinched her nose.
Alina was dreaming.
She dreamed of Quel'thalas' warm forests, of sunshine that felt real on her skin, of laughter and happiness that was not denied her and not marred by horrors and memories. She dreamed and dreamed as she played and the echoing laughter of the Lich King could not touch her. It was drowned out – no, more than drowned out, repelled – and reduced to an ugly insignificant past thing that did not deserve anyone's thoughts dwelling upon it.
Mira and Marrah walked on either side of her and gently guided her and kept her from tripping. They were walking next to a small caravan of rangers carrying a striking amount of dwarven luggage. The way so much had been stowed away into their small flying vessel stretched credulity.
Alina had no idea what the majority of it was but she assumed they would have been wise to prepare for any eventuality. Perhaps it was some set of tools, or maybe sensitive spare parts for the engines, that had caused that loud clanking sound that seemed to be the cause of such a commotion right now?
"…nothing special?" Alina could hear Cyndia echoing sceptically. "But what is this? It weighs like an ogre's kettle."
Alina put her violin and bow down and opened her eyes properly. She was actually getting curious now like Cyndia and the Naras seemed to be.
"You're not wrong about that…although I haven't had the pleasure of meeting any kettle-bearing ogre." Runar muttered.
"What seems to be the issue?" Sylvanas asked sternly.
"Your helpful dark rangers have taken a great sudden interest in our luggage, My Lady."
Sylvanas was looking at Cyndia and Velonara.
"It's clanking, it's secret and it's heavy." Velonara explained as if that was more than enough reason to justify anyone being curious about visiting dwarves' luggage.
"Is this where you would demand to inspect our cargo?" Runar asked just a little dryly.
"I trust you to have the common sense to inform me of anything volatile or otherwise dangerous." Sylvanas looked evaluatingly at Kaliras' squadron and the interested onlookers they had attracted. "Although, speaking not as queen but simply as someone used to dark rangers, it may be easiest for you to just let them have a look inside and save yourselves the storm of probing questions for the rest of the day."
"That so? Fine then…" Runar walked over to open the wooden box that Cyndia and Velonara had been carrying. "See? Nothing out of the ordinary here. Just some…wait, no, don't take it out…"
It was already too late. Velonara picked out a heavy dwarven helmet and immediately tried it on, or rather she tried to try it on but her ears had nowhere to go.
Kalira let hear an appreciative whistle. Inside the box was the rest of a complete suit of plate armour and a round shield. It looked extremely expensive. And durable.
"You have to pack for all weathers. Rain, snow, angry ghouls who want to eat you…" Halvdan tried to put things into perspective.
Now the rangers were on the scent. No amount of eye-rolling and counter-arguments that it would be better if they were allowed to unpack in an orderly way once inside, had any effect and eventually Runar and Halvdan were looking meaningfully at each other and then collectively sighing. Alina was sure they were not really irritated with her and her sisters, otherwise she would have said something.
Then began a peculiar sort of spectacle, a little like when they had returned with the loot from Hearthglen and presented it to the rest of the city for display.
First was another suit of heavy-looking armour. Alina hoped it was as strong as it seemed. The idea of any of the dwarves wearing that still made her uneasy. Because it meant battle.
"Oh, baby…" Velonara whistled when the next box was opened.
"Paws off." Runar admonished. "That one is mine."
It was the largest, and most complex, crossbow Alina had seen. It was part of a set with quivers, spare parts and a tripod support to steady the thing on. The elves had never favoured that kind of weapon as a personal arm but the field ballistae of their army were basically the same thing.
Runar picked it up and inspected it out of habit it looked like, while Velonara looked on with unmitigated envy.
"Is this how 'dwarven diplomacy' is usually conducted?" Sylvanas asked evenly as the next two boxes revealed a second smaller crossbow, but also with some mechanical oddities, together with glimmering dwarven weaponry.
"We are of course in favour of civilised negotiations…" Runar muttered while hefting a blue-shimmering hammer. "…but sometimes in our trade you have to hammer the point in..."
The Dark Lady was casting him a very long glare. It was just like how she often looked at dark rangers in fact, Alina noted.
Halvdan meanwhile was looking over the edge of an axe, with the blade balanced by a long spike. Cracking thick armours open seemed to have been on their minds for some time.
"Death knight heads should serve equal purpose…"
Then, in the next blink, Halvdan remembered himself. Alina could see every minute movement when his eyes widened and he looked at her with fear. He dropped the axe beside him and leapt over the box to run up to her.
Arthas.
Most accursed of names. A hated thing. A dreaded thing.
A thing that last they met had been enough to cast Alina back into the past and all its horrors.
And still Halvdan was running to her and not from her.
Alina didn't quite know what to think or do, but she held out her arms unconsciously so she wouldn't risk harming the violin. A small part of registered Amora snatching it out of her hand.
"Please Alina, don't go back there, don't go back…" he was mumbling insistently…with his arms around her.
Alina closed her eyes and felt. There was really nothing there. Her thoughts were there, and she hated Arthas and all he stood for and all that the Scourge was, and it was a raging inferno inside its corner of her mind. And in another corner was her friends and in particular a stark mad dwarf with black hair and kind eyes whose first instinct had been to run to a Wailing banshee rather than from her.
She opened her eyes and smiled at him.
"I am still here. I am still me."
She was looking into the world's reddest dwarf.
"I'm…I…excuse me…I thought…" Halvdan apologised to her feet. He did not get any further before Alina hugged him the hardest she could.
"You are right. It was like that. And still you run to me."
"Where else would I…"
"I – it – is better now. When I have Amora. And my ranger sisters. And my scarf-giving dwarves who gave me my music back and would battle death knights on my account."
"I had this thought, that if you rode a gryphon, and you could teach it to pick up the bugger in its claws, and then fly and drop him into some deep part of the sea…"
"Could I sit behind you in the saddle?"
"Always. I mean, if you sit in front of me I will probably not see very much other than your cloak so it would probably be best if you held the reins in that case…"
Alina did not need warmth to survive any longer. Cold weather could do nothing to her. But she had really, really missed the feeling of warm skin against her cheek.
From somewhere outside that warmth she could hear Sylvanas' voice.
"Name whatever is in my power that does not harm or endanger my people or my allies, and you can have it."
The Dark Lady did not sound like her usual self.