Elrin

((As with any of my blogs about Anka, she wasn't warned beforehand.  As always, if there's anything she doesn't approve of, it will be remedied.  And, as you should know by now, I have no artistic skill and so big thanks to Lorith/Echo, for drawing me a picture while I beat my computer with a hammer))

Continued from Sadie and preceding the search for Hron.

I tripped on the hem of the oversized cultist’s robe, and Elrin turned to hiss, “Shhh.” Lifting the hem off the ground, I jogged to catch up with the line of recruits winding their way through the bowels of Grim Batol. A strand of hair escaped Hron's hat to swing across my cheek, sprinkling sweat in its wake. The recruits followed a narrow path along the canal of lava, and the smoke made my eyes water. I pulled the robe up to cover my nose and continued walking.

Kast decided to take a break. He didn’t look at me as he walked out of the room, and I didn’t look at him. He can be an ugly man sometimes. This business was some of the ugliest, and sure wouldn’t do much to improve his looks.
 
I snapped my fingers at my side, answered by the huff and scuff of Gus rising from where he had been lying against the wall. The basement was dark enough the hyena’s hoary coat barely muddied the shadows, but his eyes gleamed in what light there was. Funny how I treated him like a dog. In many ways, he wasn’t like a dog at all. All the better for this. People get used to dogs.

“Get away from her!” 

Onyxia ignored me and approached Verisimi. 

Continued From... 

"I always feel better when there's a dwarf around," Echo said, sitting back in her chair after swallowing a particularly refreshing mouthful of ale.  Decompressing with Credence on Friday nights had become a cherished routine: a light supper on the table, plenty of ale, and a patient smile accompanying a listening ear. Her sooty armor hung on its rack, far enough away that the scent of creosote didn't tingle their noses, and her bare feet rested in Credence's lap. As those kind fingers worked the tension from her toes, the ale tempted further musings from her lips.

My study of relics brings me to that great old wall.

As I sift the dust and fragments, I find my own crest, fallen from armor I once wore.

I take a news clipping out of my pocket, staring at it, and the crest.

I came looking for history.

This place holds my history too.

I opened one sticky eye and looked out, as usual, on Hadeel's mess.

It looked like she'd come in from wherever in Creation she'd been this time and dumped her stuff in a heap on the floor.  At least she'd managed to get out of her armor before she fell asleep.  I prodded the chain hauberk that lay crumpled by the bed.  It was stained with dirt, ash, and blood of unguessable origin.  Couldn't the little slob at least clean her gear?

Oh well.  I dragged myself upright and stretched.  Muscles weren't sore, and that was sad.  Too many days of inactivity.  I needed to get out and run, or fight, or something.  I wished Hadeel would exercise too, but that wasn't likely - little miss "I can turn into a ghost wolf and move like the wind itself".  Sun filtered in through the crack in the shutters, and I flung them open and let the fresh air in.

((Written on a keypad smaller than most blood elf waist lines, here's a look at my 3 mains.))

The first tremor knocked a man out of his bed. He thumped to the floor, growling at the shaking ground. Grabbing the nearest weapon he threw open the door.

"Oh...shit."

---

She pumped the ignition, bellowing the gas pedal with her foot. "Haaaaaaaahaaaaaa!". Clouds sped past, the ground growing closer and closer. Her little game. Stall out and start before she slammed into the ground. The flying machine spluttered, coughed and rattled to life. "Haaahaaaa--whhaaaaaa--". Deathwing blew past on his mission of destruction, leaving death, fire and a little scared gnome in his wake.

---

The elf vomited into the grasses that grew on the heights of Thunder Bluff. He retched and gagged. Coughed. Stood. Burst into tears.

"Not again...not again." He begged in the old tongue.

He'd nearly passed out, lost his vision, but someone, or something had kept agging him on. The Soldiers around him pushing on his heavy plate covered form. The loss of blood had made him weak...he wasn't even sure he could make it...and then the world went black. 

Echo’s lungs burned.  Every footfall rang like an explosion through her legs, but they kept pumping nevertheless.  She flung back her hair and looked behind her; Kast, Rothmal and Malifor had planted themselves around the steamtank, the last of their loyal soldiers sweeping around them like parted waters.  The cultists were hot on their heels.

Shit shit shit... They wouldn’t last long, especially if the cultists found a moment to summon up another round of elementals.  With a shaking hand, Echo fumbled at her belt, trying to loosen a flare.  If she could just reach the arch of the bridge she’d shoot it up, with every hope that some patrol from Hammerfall or Refuge Pointe would see it.  Then she’d turn and get back behind Kast and hold back the Cult as long as she could.

Echo always remembered the obstacle course.

She remembered the smell of sweat on warm skin, bare earth, well-trod grass.  She remembered the whisking little black flies that hovered around her eyes in the summer heat, swarming in clouds over some fallow field outside Southshore.  She remembered the ache in her thighs at the hurdles, the tear in her shirt as she pulled herself under barbed wire, the desperate lunge over the top of the wall.  Most of all she remembered the white chalk line in the dirt and the grass, smeared by the other young recruits as they passed over.  All she had to do was reach it -

He watched the troll move from person to person, doling out succor for Horde and Alliance both. After all, everyone here was now fighting against the same enemy, the same threat. With their resources pooled, they stood the best chance at another day.

Down the echoing hall, the rough human’s crass tongue was spreading platitudes and encouraging words, rallying the stone-dumb orcs and the equally stone-dumb humans to value their pitiful lives long enough to make one final push for freedom.

How did these short-lived races fool themselves into such a delusion of self-worth?

When the troll priest knelt before a wounded orc blademaster, Xelarus could see with his fel-green eyes two women – one dead, one living – as they embraced with more passion than any two sisters-in-arms. Plum-painted lips curled in a smirk.

Echo’s hands clutched her head, covered her ears, though still the bounding screams and repeating clashes would not leave her, nor the smell of death, nor the irritating buzz of panic throbbing between her temples.  Her eyes shut tight and her teeth clenched, but it had a hold of her, the bone-shaking fear of doom closing in, of no way out, of -

“Joo need da juju, eh, ba’tah?”

“What th -”  Echo whirled around as Kast jerked the flare from her belt, but he was already off, jogging toward the center of the fray.  Her eyes moved swiftly from him to the clash between Malifor and Krauss, then suddenly she was bowled over.  Sharp pain slid over her side, bruising her ribs.  What was that? Longsword? Lance? Totem?

He stood on the muddy ground, hooves dug in, both hands gripped the leather bound grip of his large axe. Krauss stood no more than mere yards across the way. Mortars exploded around them, spells fly about in wild elaborate flashes. "You could end all this death, Krauss. Look around! This is your doing!" 

He hadn't truly expected Krauss would be reasoned with, but he'd try. Krauss' response was slightly predictable. "I will end this, and you along with it. I"ll have you and that orc mounted on my wall when I'm done here." Much to his suprise, Krauss moved first. 

Echo watched the courier ride away, over the Arathi hillsides.  His horse left laden with half of the supplies of their camp, including the luxurious tent; the rest had been packed up on her horse and Credence’s odd, haunted steed. She glanced down at the letter in her hands, delivered from the House at Wyntersmere, and frowned as she read it again.

“More elemental activity up in Alterac.  There’s rumors of cultists out in the cities, setting up camps outside.”  Echo folded the note and slipped it into a pocket, turning her attention to tying down the cultist flung over the back of her horse.  He’d been out for so long she was sure he was a goner by now, but she was still going to deliver him to Kast anyway.  “Looks like things are starting to happen all over.”

He could feel the heavy breathing of the Charger underneath him. The larger than average horse dug into the mud harshly, almost clawing as if it's very life depended on it. The alliance soldier's spread, as he moved through their ranks. He snorted through his plate helm...time seemed to stop. His bright eyes saw Elrin Kast....saw Marshal Krauss...No. He couldn't let it go like this...Kast had taken too much of the burden. Compassion...It was that weakness Krauss had spoke of...he'd soon find out how much he has. 

So seldom did she come to light, the archmage of Dalaran, the Lady of Names.  She was dead, after all, or disposed of, not to be seen again since that fateful day in the Third War when she boldly marched out to meet the Prince.  The quiet woman in heavy dark robes, a deep cowl shadowing her face, presented little evidence of the Lady’s vivacious life, intrepid spirit, or consummate power.

Credence pulled back the hood, settling herself beside the cultist’s body in the antechamber of their tent.  Strands of raven-black hair fell from her loose ponytail to streak her pale cheeks, eyes sweeping the figure in quick examination. The cool Arathi winds buffeted the canvas of the tent, but Credence appeared immune to distraction.  Echo stood opposite, holding the fletching of an arrow recently stuck into the unconscious man’s shoulder.  After a moment or two she withdrew the arrow, wiping blood off the tip with a handkerchief before replacing it in her quiver.

“There we go.  That should keep him out overnight, at least.”  

Dawn rose hesitantly, thin beams of bland sunlight struggling to pierce the low clouds.  Echo rose with about as much enthusiasm, groaning as she pulled herself from her bedroll, holding her eyes tight against a lingering headache.  Good morning, indeed.

The overcast dampness was getting to her, she had to admit.  Even though her camp on the hillsides was a bit dryer than the muck the army trudged through below, the air was still chill in the morning and humid throughout the day.  Washing up in a cold stream proved refreshing and got her blinking again, the headache ebbing away.  With a sigh she pulled on her gear, checked on her horse, and stumbled about getting her things together for a trip down into the encampment.  At very least, she needed to find a courier.  

“Oh, I love marshes.”  Echo grinned as she skipped down from the rocky hillside and through a shallow rivulet, carefully stepping up onto a mound of mossy fen.  “Harlie, get over here with your thing.”

“Coming, coming!”  The little gnome gave an enthusiastic “Hhhmph!” as he leaped the rivulet, splashing water up over his goggles and through his green hair.  Not that it hampered him at all - little wipers flashed across the lenses, clearing his vision as he joined Echo over a perfect boot-print in the mud.  He reached into a belt pouch and withdrew a spidery little mechanism, setting it firmly in the center of the track.  Tiny metal legs reached out to the edges of the print, and dials and gears ground and whirred.

The silence of a siege.  Behind the barricades of Dun Modr the Horde sat, stubbornly digging in.  Before the barricades, Alliance soldiers picked through the mud to pull out bodies.  They put their own on carts to take back to the encampment.  They lined the Horde fallen before Dun Modr, as a wrathful reminder.  A chill Wetlands rain spattered both the living and dead, and the mud was tinged red and black and stank worse than ever.  Now and then an arrow with rugged plainstrider fletching would zip through the Alliance soldiers from some hidden sniper in the Dun Modr buildings; a mortar would be fired in return, sending up a cloud of smoke to be beaten down again by the fog.  

He spat mud and Sophia finally slowed as she crested one of the many hills overlooking Dun Modr.  Elrin swung down from the saddle, tugging the reins to point her at one of the many streams intersecting the Wetlands and nodded at her. “Go on, getcha drink.” Slow and heavy with fatigue, she plodded down the hill towards the water.

Below the road curved where it forked to wind up to Dun Modr while its other branch lead to the right, over the Thandol Span. To the left, safely tucked behind the hills and cliffs that surrounded Dun Modr sat the Alliance army, abuzz with their pre-battle preperations. Elrin stretched his legs and lit a cigarette, all the while gazing intently down at the Alliance forces.

A small force was mustering. Two and a half score. A testing force. He spat again and exhaled. Hoof-steps behind spun him around, his sword coming to hand as he whirled.

 The basement of The Slaughtered Lamb looked cold.  It reminded her of the tomb she first woke up in years ago in Deathknell.  Fitting, she thought, considering she'll be leaving this undeath behind and waking again into a new life, light willing.

Elrin Kast was standing near the pit that held the demon summoning circle young warlocks used to practice their lessons.  He was taller than she thought he'd be.  "Kast, I assume?"

Elrin nodded.  "DeSerrat?"

Sophia's hooves rung out across the burning plains of the Steppes, kicking up ash and dust into the acrid air of the volcanic land. Thanks to his steed's swift hooves, he'd been able to long ago eliminate the pursuing guardsmen and break into uncontrolled territories. Now he just rode as hard as he safely could to return to the North and hopefully get things back under control, before anyone he called friend could get themselves hurt.

Only the barest glint of light on metal gave away his attacker's position as he twisted in the saddle, just barely managing to dodge the flying attacker who'd flung at him from the rocks above. The shallow canyon  he'd ridden into had been a decent place for an ambush, but the Blackrock orcs had never been ones for such subtlety, and the Dark Iron activity in the region had been all but non-existant, so that left...

The voice was quiet in the middle of the night, but it was still loud enough to be heard over the sound of paperwork.

"Shaw."

The man looked up, eyes reflexively narrowing to speed the transition between paper and candlelight.  He turned this way and that, slowly, smoothly, not telegraphing his movements.

"Always the professional, Shaw.  I'll make this fast and painless, for old time's sake."

His hand gripped the arm of his chair as he slowly swiveled about, fingers tightening on the trigger mounted under the leather-covered oak.  He'd get a shot off, but only if he saw her first.  That's how the game was always played.

"You keep using wanted posters this way, they're going to send the wrong message.  This is the third time you've put up a price on our heads.  You're making yourself look a fool if you don't bring us in.  I don't think Matty Shaw wants to be the court fool."

I went to Stormwind for roses.  The early Alterac frosts had withered those I planted outside House deWynter, the last blooms dropping petal after petal.  Stormwind always has fresh roses, and a beautiful variety.  Cassie deserves roses every day of the year.

We have no certain date or time to call our anniversary, but we both remember the music and festivities of Brewfest ringing around certain words that could not be unsaid.  No, the brews of the season were not involved.  Our exchanges are clear in memory, if not in exact time.  For the day, for the week, for the month, I will bring her roses. Red ones. White ones. Black ones hinted with the deep violet of her soul.