"You must go home."
His boots sunk softly into the snow with each step, the whirling blizzard around him offering cover for both his body and the shuffling of his armor.
They told me this was home.
Far in the distance, before his eyes could see through the storm, he sensed them, as if something were pressing at the far reaches of his mind. An internal compass told him their direction, and roughly judged their distance.
"This is not home. This is a place of rest. Rest is for the dead."
The lifting of his mace to his shoulder caused his armor to clank loudly in protest at the weight. He was dimly aware that the sheer size of the weapon made him uncomfortable, but pushed the thought away.
"The mark of the North rests upon you. The North is a place of war unending."
He broke through the shroud. The snow that remained on his armor and cloak left his entire visage pale, and all that revealed him was the glowing of his armor against the backdrop of snow behind him. Here, the storm was thinner.
I will not remain like this. I am no use to anyone.
Heads turned, already slack jaws opened at the prospect of flesh, and from above the small raised platform, two Scourge necromancers gazed at him with glassy eyes, muttering their dark commands.
This man is dead. He must go back to the grave.
Forward came the ghouls, wild howls ripping from their throats, claws extended, bandaged feet laboring madly over the snow to reach their prey.
"It was you who let him live on."
He hefted his weapon. The strike missed, but it mattered not. The sheer weight of the mace's shaft colliding with two ghouls sent them barreling backwards into a line of their companions.
"As if you could not be you without him."
As their weak bodies caved beneath the weapon's weight, something woke with a jolt within him. Frost danced over his fingertips, and around he swung, hurling bolt after bolt of ice into the ranks of the oncoming swarm.
Walking in it now, as he once was... This world has no place for him.
He tore through the army of risen dead, leaving behind only brutalized remains. Bone shattered beneath each strike, flesh melting. When few remained, he heard a call, and the ghouls backed away. They fell, reduced to piles of bone, another sound replacing their howls and gurgles.
Daeyn Skysong is dead. I will let him rest in peace.
From the risen metal altar dropped three Death Knights, freshly risen. Runeblades of other, fallen champions held tightly in their hands. By the look in their eyes, he knew their hunger. He remembered it. They lashed out.
"Something must take his place. Amidst the bloodstained snow, have you found yourself?"
Three Initiates. Three schools of magic. The first struck out, swinging swiftly. Ice formed in the air around him, spike upon spike of it flying towards his target's body. The first, whose mace was decorated around ghoul-flesh, drew the ice in around the weapon's head. As the Disciple of Ice charged, he rose one weapon to parry the imminent mace strike.
I remember a monster. I remember a murderer of children and of women. One who broke the minds of fathers and made their daughters consume their flesh.
The first Disciple's blade broke against the weight of ice and mace, the shards of frost splitting and impaling his face. He fell to the ground as the second approached.
"You are not that monster. That monster served another."
The second Disciple came foreward, his blade soaked in rot, his pale, almsot greenish flesh giving enough allusion to his skill. The death knight lunged foreward, aiming for a knee joint, his putrid breath releasing a cloud of plague.
I remember a man. A guardian, who protected by spilling blood, but a slave to his absolution.
The man who had hunted this altar turned his back to the plague and stepped inwards, using his mace as a counterweight to his momentum. His right arm swung up, the mace following through. The sheer force and strike of one of the mace's scythes sent the Unholy Disciple's arm loose from its socket, and flying in another direction.
"You are not a man. Men live, men die. You do not walk in the world of the living, though you may love it."
The aggressor's fingers came up, index and middle striking into one of the festering wounds in the second Disciple's torso. The Disciple's body wretched, and his visage paled more deeply as his plague turned against him, putryifying wounds boiling over with pus as raging disease ate away at his mind.
I will not atone. I will not offer recompense. I will not grieve sins that were not mine, and I will not grieve sins commited in their defense.
The third Disciple, a Tauren wielding a double-headed axe, was not so quick to engage. Foreward he moved, aiming a mighty downward slash towards his target. The air sang out as it retreaded from the sharp edge of the blade, which met only snow.
I will defend their lives, but the quality of their lives is to them.
The mace-wielder struck out again. The cost of his contact was a glancing blow from the axe, and from the wound upon his shoulder, he felt blood flow, mixing with the crimson ribbon left behind by the Disciple of Blood's leg wound.
"Who are you?"
The next strike of the axe, a vertical slash, met with a clang against the shaft of Skyshatter. The mace's wielder forced the blow away, taking hold of the weapon's shaft with both hands and jamming it upwards, into the Tauren's face. Before the blood could be used, however, he struck out again, crushing the former Shu'halo's bent left knee.
I am Xynrael...
A final blow. The Tauren's skull collapsed, split straight down the middle and crushed in by Skyshatter's scythed head.
The Dawnbreaker.
As he mounted the altar, the exhausted necromancers retreated, weakly weaving spells against the approaching Death Knight.
"And where does the Dawnbreaker call home?"
As he drained the feeble remnants of life from the remaining necromancers, sucking their twisted souls into his runemace, he grinned.
The same for all creatures. Home is where the heart is. Home...
He turned away, the air before him splitting open in a portal to Acherus.
... Is where the -war- is.
Saturday, October 22, 2011
Thursday, September 29, 2011
In the Fires of War: Skyshatter
((This is the first installment of "In the Fires of War," a collection of stories about the tests and trials of war, the importance of the weapons used to fight them, and how it all effects the people who wield them. As usual, these are written from Xynrael's perspective, and about people he knows/weapons he's created or helped create. The first is about Skyshatter, his runemace. I hope you enjoy!))
No one can escape the effects of war. Even the civillian, many miles away, safe behind his city walls, is somehow or another taken prisoner by the rage of battle, though he may not know it. I do not believe in violence as a solution to everything, for this reason. It is the -final- solution. No one can escape it, and it settles all matters permenantly, when used correctly.
Contrary to popular belief, the Lich King did not employ this method exclusively. In several instances, fear was his primary method of battlefield domination, only using violence to achieve this end. However, there are certain times when we are forced, in one manner or another, to exercise violence against even those we care about.
The fires of the Forge of War are relentless, and a place where only the strongest can survive, and that which is not strong is often remade.
~From the journal of Xynrael Frostbane
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From the hills beyond Dawnhaven, Xynrael the Dawnbreaker watched the town burn. The ghouls had, but for a few, gone to join the ranks of the Scourge in Northrend, and the first part of his initial task complete. From the west, a risen rider had broughten him word of six Paladins of the Silver Hand fast approaching the smoldering wreckage of the Dawnbreaker's first conquest. Somewhere in the east, the sun was rising, but smoke and ash rising from the town blotted it out.
The day was darkened against the Light, precisely the way he liked it. With the dismissal of the rider, all the ghouls were gone, and the shadow of the hills hid him well enough for now.
The Dawnbreaker felt their approach before he saw it. The feeling of tingling, nagging at the back of his mind, alerted him to the presence of the Paladins before the sound of their hootbeats and shouting did. They had seen the town was abandoned from the road no doubt, and thought the Scourge had moved on.
The entire hillside fell into silence as the Paladins searched the houses, finding signs of the carnage that had ocurred a few hours earlier; snow and streets stained with blood, windows cracked, doors caved in, torn flesh and bone, but no corpses. The Death Knight moved from his perch on the hills and made his way into the town, cloaking himself in the shadows of the buildings.
In the back of his mind, Xynrael heard a lustful growling. It grew stronger as he approached the three pairings of Paladins now gathered in the square, discussing what they had found. By now, they had swept the perimeter of the town and conceeded that what looked to have been an ambush was simply the burning remains of a town the Scourge had used to replenish their numbers.
On the blades and shaft of the Dawnbreaker's mace, six runes shimmered, begging to be filled.
A tug of steelweave over his head, the replacement of his hood, and Xynrael stepped into the street, armor shuffling and scraping slightly as he walked. The Paladins turned, in ones and twos, to face the newcomer. At the head of them was one who held a massive mace in one hand, a libram chained to his side, and upon his back, a great-sword that would ordinarily have taken two men to lift.
This man was their leader. An animal among men. A zealot, Xynrael could feel, as the light crackled around the Paladin. His sword was ancient and powerful, most likely a runeblade as well, though not vampiric.
"Your down is gone. It's inhabitants are dead." Xynrael proclaimed, lifting his runemace to his shoulder. "The Light is all but departed, this place is now a house of death."
He could feel their blood pumping, adrenaline rushing through their veins, feel the sweat beginning to run down their flesh as if it was their own. He could -smell- their fear, as palpable as the ash hanging on the air, all of it clouding their vision and their judgement. The Dawnbreaker's face remained impassive as all this washed over him, his blue eyes the only thing visible in the shadow of his hood.
Somewhere, through the ash and against the roof of one of the houses, it began to hail.
"What manner of monster are you," asked one of the younger Paladins, his voice cracking as he growled, "that you could do this?"
"I am Xynrael the Dawnbreaker, Death Knight of the Scourge, and I did not do this. I killed only a handful myself, you see. After that, I turned them loose upon their own people. A giant of a man, a lumberjack, one of them. Though, really, I let his little girl kill him after I cut her open. Would you like to see?"
As he asked this, the Paladins looked on, momentarily rooted in place as they attempted to evaluate this new threat. From atop one of the houses, a small thing in a torn dress leaped, landing at Xynrael's feet. She bounded on all fours, knees bent like an ape, her face contorted and dessicated, but obviously that of a little girl.
The Paladins continued to watch as the Death Knight knelt, placing his hand on the little girl's head. She fell over almost immediately, the necromancy sustaining her suddenly gone. Her body struck the floor, and before them was simply the mutilated corpse of a small girl, as it would have looked after several hours of death by bleeding.
"Monster. The Light bind you!" One of the Paladins called out, rushing forewards, screaming out a litany of penance for the wicked. By his language, his rage, and his movement, this man was a novice, newly initiated into the ranks of the Silver Hand. And by their armor, so were the others, taken out of need more than skill, most likely.
The others followed, but at a distance; the man ahead of them was clearly the fastest of the bunch, and far more impulsive. On the back of his neck, Xynrael felt the runic ward begin to burn against his flesh, and grinned. The words fell upon his ears, but he did not understand them. The ward protected him against all but the Lich King's will, and deafened him to the commands of the Light.
Xynrael backed away as the first Paladin approached, and turned to dart down a side-street, not even made over with cobblestones, but grass and dirt between houses. The Paladins would have to come at him one at a time here, and sure enough, they did, the first rounding the corner not five steps behind Xynrael. The Death Knight rounded on his heel to face his first opponent.
The Paladin swung downwards, his hammer surging with the Holy Light. Xynrael stepped to the left and brought his mace down in an arc. The Paladin flew backwards as Skyshatter contacted with his stomach, his breastplate caved in, and blood pouring from his mouth. As the young Paladin hit the ground, the Dawnbreaker could feel the viel of the Light lift like a curtain, revealing the frightened, faithless young man beneath.
He shook only briefly as every blood vessel in his brain erupted.
By this time, a second Paladin, partner to the first, had reached striking distance of Xynrael. The second Paladin did not lunge foreward quite so readily, but instead stepped off and swung downwards from over his head. The blow was met by Xynrael's mace, catching just under the head of the Paladin's hammer. The Death Knight twisted the pommel of his mace upwards and around, over the shaft of his opponent's weapon, forcing it into the ground before slamming Skyshatter's spiked pommel into the second Paladin's throat.
Another twist of the mace brought one of the weapon's scythes into the Paladin's temple, killing him almost instantly and throwing him aside like a ragdoll.
The third that approached drew a shield from his back, deflecting the oncoming blow of Xynrael's mace and lashing out with a strike of his own. It glanced off of the slant of the Death Knight's chestplate, at which point the Dawnbreaker drew up his left arm, the runes tattooed into his flesh glowing brightly beneath the armor. A discharge of runic energy from the Death Knight's left palm seared the Paladin's face. When the smoke and Xynrael's hand pulled away, a grotesquely burned visage remained.
Xynrael stepped out of the way as the burned Paladin's shield began to glow. A side-step, twirl, and swing of Skyshatter brought the Paladin to the ground, neck shorn straight through by the weight behind the giant runemace's blades.
Three to the ground, and Xynrael's runemace howled with delight at their blood. It was a sound he knew only he could hear, but still he could feel the weapon's power grow. It had feasted on the souls of the innocent, and now it was gorging on the blood of the righteous. As the runes filled with the corrupted energy of their souls and blood, the Death Knight opened his mind. Skyshatter still hungered- it needed the power of the cold, and the power of death still, and each had to be achieved by the sundering of mortal flesh.
The size of the hail increased as it spread.
Suddenly, the runic wards on Xynrael's armor began to smoke and glow like sun striking a gem. Two of the three remaining Paladins had stopped and were reading from their librams, hammers slung back over their shoulders, hands extended, Light flowing from their fingers like a river.
Priests. Priests who had taken up the mantle of the Silver Hand, but Priests just the same.
Struggling with great difficulty under the weight of their rebuke, the Dawnbreaker raised his left hand. For the briefest of moments, the hail refocused on the two chanting Paladins, striking them heavily upon their exposed skin. In his peripheral vision, the Death Knight saw the leader of their party moving foreward with a determined step, as if the fate of the monstrosity before him was certain.
Then the Death Knight felt it. The chanting let up, for only a moment. The concentration of the former Priests broken, Xynrael reached out, swelling the blood in their throats and freezing that which ran through the veins in their heads.
They fell to the ground, spilling blood from ears, nostrils, and eye sockets onto the snow.
Finally, they were alone. The power of the other Paladins paled in comparison to the one that stood before the Dawnbreaker now, and it was visible. The giant hammer and runeblade this Paladin wielded glowed with the Light, and even the countenance of this living monstrosity seemed brighter. Though the ground at his feet was desecrated with innocent blood, the snow seemed to shake away.
Here was someone who could strike fear into the unbeating hearts of the fearmongers. A man to frighten death itself away.
Still the Paladin kept his steady pace, right hand tensing around his hammer's shaft. "I am Diomidus the Bright, I undo all that is unholy and bring the Light's justice to dark places. The blood of the innocent cries out to me; you have slain many good men, and I am their vengeance."
The aura around Diomidus grew as his foosteps thundered against the ground, boots leaving a dim glow of the Light in his path. His hammer appeared to crack, as if it were about to break apart, but the cracks filled with the Light and shined all the more brightly. His tremendous left paw drew up his libram, and Diomidus began to read.
"We who walk in darkness fear neither the shadow, nor the death, nor the evil that surrounds us..." The space between the cobblestones on the street began to glow as the Light filled them.
"We who go out among evil men shall fear not their forked tongues and wicked ways..."
The stones themselves took on the hue of molten steel as Diomidus chanted, glowing brightly beneath the ash and hail of Dawnhaven.
"And we, who are thine blade and thine shield and thine word of comfort, who slay the wicked, and protect the innocent, and heal the sick, shall not fear nor be turned astray from our path, for where we go the Light walks with us, illuminating before us and guarding behind us, banishing all evil from our way." The Paladin slammed his libram shut, the ground within the limits of Dawnhaven catching alight as it was purified and consecrated
The wards on Xynrael's armor shined brightly, even the tattoos carved and inked into his flesh smoking as they absorbed the Light. The Death Knight watched, an amused smirk tugging at his lips as he unstrapped the helmet from his left side and placed it firmly on his head. The single, ice-blue gem at the top of the helmet's center spike shimmered when he lifted his mace, and the smoking of his armor stopped.
"You are very powerful, Paladin. Your faith is strong indeed. It will be good to see you break." He challenged, setting his mace onto his shoulder.
"Not even if it could bring back the dead, bastard." Diomidus charged foreward with inhuman speed, raining blows the the swipes of a bear down upon his quarry.
Xynrael matched him, each time catching Skyshatter's shaft below or aside the head of the Paladin's hammer. Each time the Death Knight threw off the blow and prepared to counter, another blow came, forcing him to parry or duck aside instead. For some minutes, the exchange of blow-parry-blow continued, until finally Xynrael was forced to take a step back to balance himself. The Paladin pressed his advantage and took the sword from his back, this time holding his hammer firmly against Xynrael's mace.
Protective though it was, the Death Knight's armor could not defend against the sheer force of the blow, and it sent him flying through the door of the nearest house, which splintered and fell in under his weight.
Diomidus growled with satisfaction and moved to enter the house. Before he could, a dim glow of eyes, helmet-gem, and shoulderplates burst from the door. Though he held with both weapons, the raw, unrelenting power of Undeath was not something to be parried endlessly. He stepped off after each attack landed, backing away and backing away until, finally, he was caught off-balance.
"By the Light!" Diomidus cried out as the head of Skyshatter fell upon him. The Light answered. Beneath the mace's head erupted a bright, thunderous shield, blooming over the Paladin's chest, where the killing strike would have landed. The Death Knight growled and pressed against the shield for only a moment longer, until Diomidus threw him off.
From the Paladin's runeblade erupted with the fire of the Holy Light, and again he swung, the power of his left arm sending Xynrael soaring back into the house from which he assault had begun.
He went through a wall this time, and did not return.
Diomidus charged blindly through the breach, only to find another, this one far more methodically smashed in, leading out the other side. He caught sight of the Death Knight's cloak disappearing into an alleyway, and gave chase, roaring like the bear he was when standing among men.
The pair erupted with a great crash and shower of splintered wood at the other side of Dawnhaven, where the Dawnbreaker vanished into the stalks of a wheat field. Diomidus' charge did neither halt nor slow, and he barreled on through until he came to a clearing in the field.
He stopped in his tracks, falling to one knee to keep from skidding foreward any further in the dirt.
The Paladin could see nothing beyond the horror of it all, his own rage and revulsion filling his vision with a red miasma like a veil of blood, his stomach swimming with bile.
In the clearing, still squirming and moaning and crying out ,were the twisted, broken, bloody forms of a hundred villagers, their flesh mounted upon metal spikes, arms and legs twisted around wooden crosses with bones protruding, jaws broken and dislocated to accomodate great stones that had been jammed into their mouths and were covered with blood from severed tongues.
The display was arranged in what from above would have looked like the form of a rune of death, and very slowly, down the spikes and crosses, blood dripped into a small trench that connected their mountings and formed the shape proper.
At the center of it all stood Xynrael the Dawnbreaker, mace point-down in the ground, drawing power from their blood. The second strike from Diomidus' sword had left neither dent nor gash, but a searing yellow streak of the Light, and that was now fading rapidly.
Beneath horror and disgust, doubt began to creep into the mind of Diomidus the Bright, and like a dagger in the night, it struck silently at his faith, though the rest of the fortress that was his mind remained unaware of it.
The Dawnbreaker, however, knew it well, and what little of his face could be seen beneath his helmet twisted upwards into a grin. It was not a friendly, pleasant thing, but the grin of a madman, a murderer, a rapist who has laid the perfect trap, and is now watching as his sickly artful creation snare its first victim.
That was enough to make Diomidus find his fury. Again he charged, drawing up both weapons over his head.
The Dawnbreaker remained impassive safe for the infuriating smirk. He spread his boots to shoulder-length and tensed his fingers around his mace, waiting as the Paladin closed distance, rushing forewards like a man possessed.
Then the base of the giant death rune rose up, a thousand hands of the other dead villagers, the company Xynrael had turned to help him destroy the down, even the arm of Long-John Leman, all grabbing and tearing at Diomidus' legs, ankles, and feet. It was inevitable that one would find purchase, And Diomidus fell just as he passed into the center of the rune, writhing and twisting and smashing against the ground to force the grasping arms of the dead from him.
Skyshatter fell upon his chest, and Diomidus the Bright was no more.
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Xynrael the Dawnbreaker stood alone amongst the dead and soon-to-be dead in the Dawnhaven fields. He could feel their heartbeats ceasing, and finally stopping one by one as the last drops of blood passed from their broken, twisted bodies. The souls and blood drained into Skyshatter, the souls drawn from the corpses and the blood from the ditch that formed the line connecing each point on the giant rune. The ditch ended in a pool under Diomidus' corpse, and from that pool the mace gorged itself on the power of blood and flesh and passing life.
Soon the mace would be full, and soon the Dawnbreaker would not be alone in the field.
He felt the last of the runes charge fully, and lifted his helmet from his head, placing it once more at his left hip. Then, satisfied that all was in order, he raised his left hand as if clutching something in it. Dark tendrils snapped from his fingertips and palms, seizing to the body of the Paladin, causing it to writhe and twist grotesquely in the sanguine pool beneath it.
"Diomidus the Bright," Xynrael called, as he felt the last of the bodies submit to the veil of death, "Rise, and hereafter known as Diomidus the Blight, Death Knight of the Scourge, servant of the Lich King. Rise, and be reborn!"
Diomidus jerked again, and placed his hands in the pool. He attempted to force himself up once, failed, and attempted again, coughing up blood and bile and flesh, and letting out a mighty roar. The pool turned dark as the former Paladin's blood mixed with it, and indeed, the ditch and river of blood still swirling within turned, as well.
Soon the unholy essence of the plague had crept up the crosses and spikes, corrupting dead flesh and giving it a sick, twisted version of new life.
As Diomidus rose, he took in his hands his blade and is libram, leaving the hammer beside the pool. As the plagued blood soaked into the libram, it changed. The words reformed as they were corrupted, the very make of the book turning into a giant patchwork of skin bound with bone.
His runeblade turned from a blade of gold to a far darker metal, and upon the hilt, gnashing teeth made of metal formed. He could feel its hunger deep within himself, a painful lust burning in his belly.
Then, last of all, from the cavity in his chest, new flesh grew. Pustules and twists od bone and masses of muscle erupted from the place where Skyshatter had struck, covering over his armor, splitting and entwining with old flesh to make new muscles and organs; the final culmination of the corruption of Diomidus' holy power, his former faith now twisted and forcing his body to mimick his new fervent passion.
The last and mightiest of Xynrael's runes filled as Diomidus was reborn. Runes of death.
Diomidus knelt before the Dawnbreaker and breathed his allegiance, plague pouring from the edges of his breath.
The Dawnbreaker grinned.
No one can escape the effects of war. Even the civillian, many miles away, safe behind his city walls, is somehow or another taken prisoner by the rage of battle, though he may not know it. I do not believe in violence as a solution to everything, for this reason. It is the -final- solution. No one can escape it, and it settles all matters permenantly, when used correctly.
Contrary to popular belief, the Lich King did not employ this method exclusively. In several instances, fear was his primary method of battlefield domination, only using violence to achieve this end. However, there are certain times when we are forced, in one manner or another, to exercise violence against even those we care about.
The fires of the Forge of War are relentless, and a place where only the strongest can survive, and that which is not strong is often remade.
~From the journal of Xynrael Frostbane
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From the hills beyond Dawnhaven, Xynrael the Dawnbreaker watched the town burn. The ghouls had, but for a few, gone to join the ranks of the Scourge in Northrend, and the first part of his initial task complete. From the west, a risen rider had broughten him word of six Paladins of the Silver Hand fast approaching the smoldering wreckage of the Dawnbreaker's first conquest. Somewhere in the east, the sun was rising, but smoke and ash rising from the town blotted it out.
The day was darkened against the Light, precisely the way he liked it. With the dismissal of the rider, all the ghouls were gone, and the shadow of the hills hid him well enough for now.
The Dawnbreaker felt their approach before he saw it. The feeling of tingling, nagging at the back of his mind, alerted him to the presence of the Paladins before the sound of their hootbeats and shouting did. They had seen the town was abandoned from the road no doubt, and thought the Scourge had moved on.
The entire hillside fell into silence as the Paladins searched the houses, finding signs of the carnage that had ocurred a few hours earlier; snow and streets stained with blood, windows cracked, doors caved in, torn flesh and bone, but no corpses. The Death Knight moved from his perch on the hills and made his way into the town, cloaking himself in the shadows of the buildings.
In the back of his mind, Xynrael heard a lustful growling. It grew stronger as he approached the three pairings of Paladins now gathered in the square, discussing what they had found. By now, they had swept the perimeter of the town and conceeded that what looked to have been an ambush was simply the burning remains of a town the Scourge had used to replenish their numbers.
On the blades and shaft of the Dawnbreaker's mace, six runes shimmered, begging to be filled.
A tug of steelweave over his head, the replacement of his hood, and Xynrael stepped into the street, armor shuffling and scraping slightly as he walked. The Paladins turned, in ones and twos, to face the newcomer. At the head of them was one who held a massive mace in one hand, a libram chained to his side, and upon his back, a great-sword that would ordinarily have taken two men to lift.
This man was their leader. An animal among men. A zealot, Xynrael could feel, as the light crackled around the Paladin. His sword was ancient and powerful, most likely a runeblade as well, though not vampiric.
"Your down is gone. It's inhabitants are dead." Xynrael proclaimed, lifting his runemace to his shoulder. "The Light is all but departed, this place is now a house of death."
He could feel their blood pumping, adrenaline rushing through their veins, feel the sweat beginning to run down their flesh as if it was their own. He could -smell- their fear, as palpable as the ash hanging on the air, all of it clouding their vision and their judgement. The Dawnbreaker's face remained impassive as all this washed over him, his blue eyes the only thing visible in the shadow of his hood.
Somewhere, through the ash and against the roof of one of the houses, it began to hail.
"What manner of monster are you," asked one of the younger Paladins, his voice cracking as he growled, "that you could do this?"
"I am Xynrael the Dawnbreaker, Death Knight of the Scourge, and I did not do this. I killed only a handful myself, you see. After that, I turned them loose upon their own people. A giant of a man, a lumberjack, one of them. Though, really, I let his little girl kill him after I cut her open. Would you like to see?"
As he asked this, the Paladins looked on, momentarily rooted in place as they attempted to evaluate this new threat. From atop one of the houses, a small thing in a torn dress leaped, landing at Xynrael's feet. She bounded on all fours, knees bent like an ape, her face contorted and dessicated, but obviously that of a little girl.
The Paladins continued to watch as the Death Knight knelt, placing his hand on the little girl's head. She fell over almost immediately, the necromancy sustaining her suddenly gone. Her body struck the floor, and before them was simply the mutilated corpse of a small girl, as it would have looked after several hours of death by bleeding.
"Monster. The Light bind you!" One of the Paladins called out, rushing forewards, screaming out a litany of penance for the wicked. By his language, his rage, and his movement, this man was a novice, newly initiated into the ranks of the Silver Hand. And by their armor, so were the others, taken out of need more than skill, most likely.
The others followed, but at a distance; the man ahead of them was clearly the fastest of the bunch, and far more impulsive. On the back of his neck, Xynrael felt the runic ward begin to burn against his flesh, and grinned. The words fell upon his ears, but he did not understand them. The ward protected him against all but the Lich King's will, and deafened him to the commands of the Light.
Xynrael backed away as the first Paladin approached, and turned to dart down a side-street, not even made over with cobblestones, but grass and dirt between houses. The Paladins would have to come at him one at a time here, and sure enough, they did, the first rounding the corner not five steps behind Xynrael. The Death Knight rounded on his heel to face his first opponent.
The Paladin swung downwards, his hammer surging with the Holy Light. Xynrael stepped to the left and brought his mace down in an arc. The Paladin flew backwards as Skyshatter contacted with his stomach, his breastplate caved in, and blood pouring from his mouth. As the young Paladin hit the ground, the Dawnbreaker could feel the viel of the Light lift like a curtain, revealing the frightened, faithless young man beneath.
He shook only briefly as every blood vessel in his brain erupted.
By this time, a second Paladin, partner to the first, had reached striking distance of Xynrael. The second Paladin did not lunge foreward quite so readily, but instead stepped off and swung downwards from over his head. The blow was met by Xynrael's mace, catching just under the head of the Paladin's hammer. The Death Knight twisted the pommel of his mace upwards and around, over the shaft of his opponent's weapon, forcing it into the ground before slamming Skyshatter's spiked pommel into the second Paladin's throat.
Another twist of the mace brought one of the weapon's scythes into the Paladin's temple, killing him almost instantly and throwing him aside like a ragdoll.
The third that approached drew a shield from his back, deflecting the oncoming blow of Xynrael's mace and lashing out with a strike of his own. It glanced off of the slant of the Death Knight's chestplate, at which point the Dawnbreaker drew up his left arm, the runes tattooed into his flesh glowing brightly beneath the armor. A discharge of runic energy from the Death Knight's left palm seared the Paladin's face. When the smoke and Xynrael's hand pulled away, a grotesquely burned visage remained.
Xynrael stepped out of the way as the burned Paladin's shield began to glow. A side-step, twirl, and swing of Skyshatter brought the Paladin to the ground, neck shorn straight through by the weight behind the giant runemace's blades.
Three to the ground, and Xynrael's runemace howled with delight at their blood. It was a sound he knew only he could hear, but still he could feel the weapon's power grow. It had feasted on the souls of the innocent, and now it was gorging on the blood of the righteous. As the runes filled with the corrupted energy of their souls and blood, the Death Knight opened his mind. Skyshatter still hungered- it needed the power of the cold, and the power of death still, and each had to be achieved by the sundering of mortal flesh.
The size of the hail increased as it spread.
Suddenly, the runic wards on Xynrael's armor began to smoke and glow like sun striking a gem. Two of the three remaining Paladins had stopped and were reading from their librams, hammers slung back over their shoulders, hands extended, Light flowing from their fingers like a river.
Priests. Priests who had taken up the mantle of the Silver Hand, but Priests just the same.
Struggling with great difficulty under the weight of their rebuke, the Dawnbreaker raised his left hand. For the briefest of moments, the hail refocused on the two chanting Paladins, striking them heavily upon their exposed skin. In his peripheral vision, the Death Knight saw the leader of their party moving foreward with a determined step, as if the fate of the monstrosity before him was certain.
Then the Death Knight felt it. The chanting let up, for only a moment. The concentration of the former Priests broken, Xynrael reached out, swelling the blood in their throats and freezing that which ran through the veins in their heads.
They fell to the ground, spilling blood from ears, nostrils, and eye sockets onto the snow.
Finally, they were alone. The power of the other Paladins paled in comparison to the one that stood before the Dawnbreaker now, and it was visible. The giant hammer and runeblade this Paladin wielded glowed with the Light, and even the countenance of this living monstrosity seemed brighter. Though the ground at his feet was desecrated with innocent blood, the snow seemed to shake away.
Here was someone who could strike fear into the unbeating hearts of the fearmongers. A man to frighten death itself away.
Still the Paladin kept his steady pace, right hand tensing around his hammer's shaft. "I am Diomidus the Bright, I undo all that is unholy and bring the Light's justice to dark places. The blood of the innocent cries out to me; you have slain many good men, and I am their vengeance."
The aura around Diomidus grew as his foosteps thundered against the ground, boots leaving a dim glow of the Light in his path. His hammer appeared to crack, as if it were about to break apart, but the cracks filled with the Light and shined all the more brightly. His tremendous left paw drew up his libram, and Diomidus began to read.
"We who walk in darkness fear neither the shadow, nor the death, nor the evil that surrounds us..." The space between the cobblestones on the street began to glow as the Light filled them.
"We who go out among evil men shall fear not their forked tongues and wicked ways..."
The stones themselves took on the hue of molten steel as Diomidus chanted, glowing brightly beneath the ash and hail of Dawnhaven.
"And we, who are thine blade and thine shield and thine word of comfort, who slay the wicked, and protect the innocent, and heal the sick, shall not fear nor be turned astray from our path, for where we go the Light walks with us, illuminating before us and guarding behind us, banishing all evil from our way." The Paladin slammed his libram shut, the ground within the limits of Dawnhaven catching alight as it was purified and consecrated
The wards on Xynrael's armor shined brightly, even the tattoos carved and inked into his flesh smoking as they absorbed the Light. The Death Knight watched, an amused smirk tugging at his lips as he unstrapped the helmet from his left side and placed it firmly on his head. The single, ice-blue gem at the top of the helmet's center spike shimmered when he lifted his mace, and the smoking of his armor stopped.
"You are very powerful, Paladin. Your faith is strong indeed. It will be good to see you break." He challenged, setting his mace onto his shoulder.
"Not even if it could bring back the dead, bastard." Diomidus charged foreward with inhuman speed, raining blows the the swipes of a bear down upon his quarry.
Xynrael matched him, each time catching Skyshatter's shaft below or aside the head of the Paladin's hammer. Each time the Death Knight threw off the blow and prepared to counter, another blow came, forcing him to parry or duck aside instead. For some minutes, the exchange of blow-parry-blow continued, until finally Xynrael was forced to take a step back to balance himself. The Paladin pressed his advantage and took the sword from his back, this time holding his hammer firmly against Xynrael's mace.
Protective though it was, the Death Knight's armor could not defend against the sheer force of the blow, and it sent him flying through the door of the nearest house, which splintered and fell in under his weight.
Diomidus growled with satisfaction and moved to enter the house. Before he could, a dim glow of eyes, helmet-gem, and shoulderplates burst from the door. Though he held with both weapons, the raw, unrelenting power of Undeath was not something to be parried endlessly. He stepped off after each attack landed, backing away and backing away until, finally, he was caught off-balance.
"By the Light!" Diomidus cried out as the head of Skyshatter fell upon him. The Light answered. Beneath the mace's head erupted a bright, thunderous shield, blooming over the Paladin's chest, where the killing strike would have landed. The Death Knight growled and pressed against the shield for only a moment longer, until Diomidus threw him off.
From the Paladin's runeblade erupted with the fire of the Holy Light, and again he swung, the power of his left arm sending Xynrael soaring back into the house from which he assault had begun.
He went through a wall this time, and did not return.
Diomidus charged blindly through the breach, only to find another, this one far more methodically smashed in, leading out the other side. He caught sight of the Death Knight's cloak disappearing into an alleyway, and gave chase, roaring like the bear he was when standing among men.
The pair erupted with a great crash and shower of splintered wood at the other side of Dawnhaven, where the Dawnbreaker vanished into the stalks of a wheat field. Diomidus' charge did neither halt nor slow, and he barreled on through until he came to a clearing in the field.
He stopped in his tracks, falling to one knee to keep from skidding foreward any further in the dirt.
The Paladin could see nothing beyond the horror of it all, his own rage and revulsion filling his vision with a red miasma like a veil of blood, his stomach swimming with bile.
In the clearing, still squirming and moaning and crying out ,were the twisted, broken, bloody forms of a hundred villagers, their flesh mounted upon metal spikes, arms and legs twisted around wooden crosses with bones protruding, jaws broken and dislocated to accomodate great stones that had been jammed into their mouths and were covered with blood from severed tongues.
The display was arranged in what from above would have looked like the form of a rune of death, and very slowly, down the spikes and crosses, blood dripped into a small trench that connected their mountings and formed the shape proper.
At the center of it all stood Xynrael the Dawnbreaker, mace point-down in the ground, drawing power from their blood. The second strike from Diomidus' sword had left neither dent nor gash, but a searing yellow streak of the Light, and that was now fading rapidly.
Beneath horror and disgust, doubt began to creep into the mind of Diomidus the Bright, and like a dagger in the night, it struck silently at his faith, though the rest of the fortress that was his mind remained unaware of it.
The Dawnbreaker, however, knew it well, and what little of his face could be seen beneath his helmet twisted upwards into a grin. It was not a friendly, pleasant thing, but the grin of a madman, a murderer, a rapist who has laid the perfect trap, and is now watching as his sickly artful creation snare its first victim.
That was enough to make Diomidus find his fury. Again he charged, drawing up both weapons over his head.
The Dawnbreaker remained impassive safe for the infuriating smirk. He spread his boots to shoulder-length and tensed his fingers around his mace, waiting as the Paladin closed distance, rushing forewards like a man possessed.
Then the base of the giant death rune rose up, a thousand hands of the other dead villagers, the company Xynrael had turned to help him destroy the down, even the arm of Long-John Leman, all grabbing and tearing at Diomidus' legs, ankles, and feet. It was inevitable that one would find purchase, And Diomidus fell just as he passed into the center of the rune, writhing and twisting and smashing against the ground to force the grasping arms of the dead from him.
Skyshatter fell upon his chest, and Diomidus the Bright was no more.
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Xynrael the Dawnbreaker stood alone amongst the dead and soon-to-be dead in the Dawnhaven fields. He could feel their heartbeats ceasing, and finally stopping one by one as the last drops of blood passed from their broken, twisted bodies. The souls and blood drained into Skyshatter, the souls drawn from the corpses and the blood from the ditch that formed the line connecing each point on the giant rune. The ditch ended in a pool under Diomidus' corpse, and from that pool the mace gorged itself on the power of blood and flesh and passing life.
Soon the mace would be full, and soon the Dawnbreaker would not be alone in the field.
He felt the last of the runes charge fully, and lifted his helmet from his head, placing it once more at his left hip. Then, satisfied that all was in order, he raised his left hand as if clutching something in it. Dark tendrils snapped from his fingertips and palms, seizing to the body of the Paladin, causing it to writhe and twist grotesquely in the sanguine pool beneath it.
"Diomidus the Bright," Xynrael called, as he felt the last of the bodies submit to the veil of death, "Rise, and hereafter known as Diomidus the Blight, Death Knight of the Scourge, servant of the Lich King. Rise, and be reborn!"
Diomidus jerked again, and placed his hands in the pool. He attempted to force himself up once, failed, and attempted again, coughing up blood and bile and flesh, and letting out a mighty roar. The pool turned dark as the former Paladin's blood mixed with it, and indeed, the ditch and river of blood still swirling within turned, as well.
Soon the unholy essence of the plague had crept up the crosses and spikes, corrupting dead flesh and giving it a sick, twisted version of new life.
As Diomidus rose, he took in his hands his blade and is libram, leaving the hammer beside the pool. As the plagued blood soaked into the libram, it changed. The words reformed as they were corrupted, the very make of the book turning into a giant patchwork of skin bound with bone.
His runeblade turned from a blade of gold to a far darker metal, and upon the hilt, gnashing teeth made of metal formed. He could feel its hunger deep within himself, a painful lust burning in his belly.
Then, last of all, from the cavity in his chest, new flesh grew. Pustules and twists od bone and masses of muscle erupted from the place where Skyshatter had struck, covering over his armor, splitting and entwining with old flesh to make new muscles and organs; the final culmination of the corruption of Diomidus' holy power, his former faith now twisted and forcing his body to mimick his new fervent passion.
The last and mightiest of Xynrael's runes filled as Diomidus was reborn. Runes of death.
Diomidus knelt before the Dawnbreaker and breathed his allegiance, plague pouring from the edges of his breath.
The Dawnbreaker grinned.
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
Marriage, Pirates, and Other Important Topics
I have lost track of how long I've been married, though I could easily recall the date- I prefer not to. Some balked at the idea- after all, I am more than somewhat deceased, presenting both a legal and religious obstacle to marriage.
However, my decision to marry was not taken in light of the desire for "holy matrimony" or the equal ownership of property... It was more as a contract, an acknowledgment, between myself and my wife. I told Knight-Master Duskbane that, in spite of all things, my wife and I accepted each other as we are; she with her "eccentricities," and me with my notable lack of pulse. This is, in retrospect, what makes our relationship function, and it is something I treasure.
Very recently, my sense of duty and her stubborn behavior clashed over the topic of her previous service as a Farstrider, resulting in her execution, resurrection, and disguise while efforts were made to clear her name. This, as can be imagined, had put quite a strain on our relationship. Until, one evening, she decided we should take a vacation.
~From the journal of Xynrael Frostbane
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The sun shone brightly over the horizon, its early-morning rays crossing the southerly heading of the Floating Treasure as the Goblin-owned luxury ship passed out of visual distance of Booty Bay. The shining of the sun caused the Death Knight standing on the starboard railing of the ship to shield his eyes.
The motion left him oblivious to the source of a distinct "clack" on the deck behind him- oblivious, that is, until a pair of arms wrapped around him from behind, long, powerful fingers interlocking on his chest, over the flesh his loose shirt left bare. He smiled a little at the familiar touch in these unfamiliar surroundings, knowing that she was only likely comfortable with the show of affection because most of the crew was still asleep.
Xynrael turned, noting a rope dangling all the way down from the crow's nest, where his wife had likely been enjoying the literal bird's-eye-view of Stranglethorn as they left it behind the horizon.
"Morning, love." Muttered Iliae Duskryder, as she lay her head against his chest. He wrapped his arms around her for a moment, leaving them about her waist where they had come to rest, until she lifted herself from him and began to walk the deck. He followed in silence, his eyes focused not on the sparkling ocean, but instead seeking out his wife's form, looking her over with a surprisingly lust-less appreciation.
The Death Knight had to remind himself that his wife's comparatively small and wiry body contained a surprising amount of strength and speed, the deception thereof perfect for a Ranger, and even better in a wife. When the two paused in their walk, he took a moment to reflect that although a small part of him enjoyed playing soldier at home, he didn't often have to worry about Iliae.
As she moved again, he started to follow, nearly slamming into her and knocking the Ranger over.
Iliae tapped him on the shoulder as she had during the few occasions where they had gone hunting together, indicating she had noticed something he was either oblivious to, or simply in a bad position to spot. Her finger led over the gently rolling sea, towards the horizon.
There, with the morning sun's rays as its shield, sailed a medium-sized vessel, probably easily capable of running circles around the Floating Treasure. At that distance, Xynrael could just barely make out the rapid lowering of a black flag, and found himself surprised his wife had noticed it at all. What replaced it was a larger Alliance flag, looking weather-worn and tired, with small holes and tears through it, by the unsteady way it flapped in the wind.
"That better not be what I think it is," Iliae growled, as if taking personal offense to this possible interruption to their vacation. Her hands fell to her daggers in the easy way they usually did when anticipating a threat.
Like a tiger about to flash its claws, Xynrael thought, somewhat amused. Aloud, he replied, "It looks like it. I'll go wake up the captain. Feel like going down to the powder room and loading up a few rifles?"
The Ranger shot him a glare that quite clearly said "No, and I want them to go away." Despite this, she voiced no reply, and instead disappeared down a staircase, towards the crew quarters.
As soon as Iliae left, Xynrael ran in the opposite direction, making for the captain's quarters. He pounded heavily on the door, attracting the attention of the present skeleton crew. They made for him, but not before a loud, nasally call of "WHAT" came from within.
"Pirates!" The Death Knight replied, eliciting some swearing and a small explosion from within the room.
The captain emerged a moment later, still tugging on his shirt. The little goblin darted out, his body breezing past with speed that Xynrael believed was disproportionate to the little man's legs.
Captain Boltplank immediately rushed to the port side of the ship, unfolding his spyglass to search the waters. "I don't see a DAMN thing!" He barked, after a moment.
The crew looked around as well, apparently quite puzzled at the alarm. By now, two or three more crew members had arrived on the deck and were gathering around to hear Captain Boltplank yelling at one of his guests about interrupting "private time."
Finally tiring of the so-called discussion, the larger of the pair simply leaned down, picked the captain up by his underarms, and turned him to face the starboard side of the vessel. By this time, the "Alliance" ship was in plain sight, though still some distance away. The captain seemed to consider the vessel for a moment, before waving a hand dismissively.
"It's an Alliance trading ship. We've got mixed passengers on-board; they'll leave us alone, friend. Don't wake me up again."
"That so? Then why are their broadsides opening?" Xynrael inquired, pointing towards the ship. The captain raised both brows, sticking his spyglass under one of them.
There was some commotion in the minutes that followed, including the rousing of the crew and the hurrying of all the passengers to the center of the ship. When finally the foreign craft approached, the captain thereof hailed quite loudly, and in a deceptively friendly manner.
"Ahoy!" Boltplank responded, after receiving word that food, supplies, and gold had been safely stowed away. "Whaddya want?"
"Food and fine goods! We're sailing from Stormwind to trade in the Bay, and thought ya might have somethin' to sell, master goblin!" The captain of the other ship, a middle-aged human in clothes only slightly less becoming those of a true merchant vessel's commanding officer. He removed his hat, a tattered, three-pointed affair, and held it to his chest, bowing slightly. "I'm Captain Armand, of the Stormwind Virtue, by way of name. Have ya anything to sell?"
"No! Go aw- Err... "
Xynrael could see the look of greed in the goblin's eyes as he spoke, and through the open hatches in the side of the vessel, he could also see cannons lurking, and hear the commotion from belowdecks. As the two captains continued their back-and-forth, the Death Knight closed his eyes. Beyond the salty air, the calling, and the creaking of ships, he could feel smaller life as it ran back and forth belowdecks on the other ship.
Powder boys.
It was then that Xynrael realized the ship upon which he was standing was a target of opportunity- they hadn't been prepared, and were likely coming back from another raid. There was a window, a very small one, where he might be able to shift the course of the encounter.
As if summoned, his wife appeared in the stairwell, holding several single-shot powder rifles, apparently loaded and ready to go. Iliae pressed her back against the doorway leading belowdecks, and tossed all but three of the rifles down half a flight to the landing. One she rested against the door, the other she lifted into her own hands, her eyes giving the Death Knight a questioning look.
A small jerk of the head was his response.
In that one instant, as it became clear that the two captains were getting nowhere, Iliae threw the rifle she was holding to Xynrael, then scooped one up for herself. Her husband reached for his belt, producing the dueling pistol that could usually be found hiding behind his cape. With one arm crossed under his shooting hand for balance, the Death Knight fired, striking Captain Armand in the left shoulder. At almost exactly the same time, another shot rang out from the doorway, striking the opposing ship's helmsman, whose throat exploded in a spray of blood.
"HOIST THE COLORS!" Someone called.
The entire process took south of two seconds, and Xynrael snatched the rifle Iliae had thrown him out of the air, dropping his pistol in the same moment. Both raised their firearms as the crew scurried to the stairwell to secure more rifles and powder. Two more shots rang out, followed immediately by the thundering of a broadside from the pirate vessel.
The decks of both ships lit up with gunfire as planks descended. From the Stormwind Virtue came a roar distinct from the cannons and gunfire- the roar of men preparing to charge.
"Over the side, boys! BOARD THEM!" Called Captain Armand, still shooting from where he was leaning, bleeding to death, against the upper deck of his vessel.
Sure enough, the raiders came, brandishing cutlass and pistol with wild abandon. In spite of the boarding, the cannons continued, this time from both sides, a single tremendous hole ripping out of the Virtue. Iliae had come out from her place in the stairwell, and knocked the first pirate she could find off of his gangplank. Rather than continue fighting, however, Xynrael watched as she ducked aside. It took him a moment to comprehend, but when he finally figured out her plan, he dove away as well.
A small explosion ripped off the railing of the Treasure in the area immediately around one plank, also knocking another off of its bearing. Several men hopped from the plank either back or forwards, onto the ships, but most on both planks fell into the sea.
Iliae rose, spewing throwing daggers with unnatural speed. Three found their mark, and three pirates likewise fell. Beside her, Xynrael drew the rapier at his left hip. A rather long-haired, ruddy sort of dwarf launched itself at him, and was immediately impaled, flung aside, and replaced by an orc- clearly, Captain Armand made no distinction of race when hiring his crew.
Amid all the commotion, the Death Knight heard a bloodcurdling yell from behind him. As he turned, he saw the head of a bald human erupt in a spray of red and gray, round shot piercing the man's skull and scattering bits of brain everywhere.
To the left of this scene, Iliae lowered her rifle, grinning at her husband before turning and flipping the weapon in her hands to use it like a staff. She struck a troll once between the eyes with the stock of the firearm, then once in the crotch, and used the whole of it to shove him over the edge of the ship.
From her position above the fresh hole, the Ranger could see the barrel of an un-manned cannon. An earlier broadside had apparently killed the men using it; one of them was presently hanging over the side of the ship, conspicuously absent an arm. In a fit of inspiration, Iliae Duskryder looked from the crew-less weapon, to her husband, whose veins were bulging a deep red with frozen blood. She watched as he picked one pirate up by the hand that held the very cutlass the man had been attempting to swing with, and then hurled him over the side of the ship. Iliae grinned as Xynrael took a glancing blow from another blade, turned, and ran the wielder of said blade through without flinching.
The Death Knight looked up, saw the grin on his companion's face, saw where she was standing, and raised a hand, even as he struck down another pirate.
"No," he proclaimed, quite loudly. "We are NOT doing that!"
"Get in the damn cannon!" Iliae called, already heading down the stairs.
Xynrael made a great deal of loud protesting, swearing, and cursing of the powers-that-be as he swung down through the hole in the deck, sliding easily into the already-loaded cannon. Sort of easily, anyway. He wedged a little on the way down, then gathered a thick coating of ice around himself. The sound of water trickling into the fuse surprised him, but in the darkness of the cannon's barrel, he grinned.
Iliae Duskryder was not as crazy as some thought.
The ice slicked enough to allow the Death Knight to exit with a resounding BOOM a moment later. One layer of ice shattered, splintering into the Virtue . Another cracked as he crashed through the solid wood hull of the pirate vessel, jarring him, but leaving him unharmed in his makeshift shell casing. As he passed through something like an improvised secondary hull, all the ice shattered, allowing him to land at a breakneck roll.
The pirates manning the Virtue's guns looked vaguely surprised, and one of them seemed offended that a projectile made out of Death Knight had landed on top of him. This last was promptly relieved of his nose, the cartilage and bone of which was sent crashing into his brain by the heel of Xynrael's boot.
Xynrael took up the man's cutlass and made for the powder room. Another volley tore through the Virtue's hull, and was responded to in kind, leaving the air thick with powder and the smell of burning flesh- the Goblin captain had fired an incendiary volley through his opponent's hull, and it was doing its job admirably.
Only four or so met the intruder as he moved for the powder room- the others were too focused on tearing the Treasure to ribbons to bother with a lone boarder. One , a human large enough to be a tauren, ran at Xynrael and attempted outright to tackle him. He was met with the edge of a cutlass, his entrails redecorating the room as Xynrael flung the man over his back.
The second and third met similar fates, one impaled, the other shot by his newly-skewered mate's pistol.
The fourth was a powder boy, who, having dropped his powder keg, drew something like a longknife, though certainly a sword to his hands. The gunpowder spilled across the floor, soaking through in a matter of moments from the spray of the ocean and the rocking of the ships as they traded fire. The boy was clearly scared, but determined to get in the way.
With a quick sweep of the blade and an upward twist, Xynrael disarmed the child, then knocked him to the floor and scooped him up by the collar, against a great deal of protesting, kicking, and biting. With one boot, the Death Knight rolled the powder keg the boy had dropped to the door of the powder room. As he kicked the door in, others began to turn and take notice, but not before he could nudge the barrel in and set a spark of unholy flame to the explosive trail left behind.
With powder monkey in tow, Xynrael made his way up the stairs, shoving and cutting his way on to the deck.
He threw the boy into a longboat and cut the ropes holding it in place with two quick slices. The deck was deserted of all but a few gunners and men at their cannons- the fire in the hold took precedence over all else, including the man who had set it, but he knew the fire would not be so easily doused with water.
Iliae was standing on the deck of the Treasure. She locked eyes with her husband, then pointed upwards. He immediately began to scramble up the ropeway leading towards the mast, needing no further indication of what his Ranger companion had planned.
Halfway up, Xynrael heard frantic yelling from below, signaling that he was out of time. Iliae was already walking along the mast of the Treasure, a rope in her hands. As the first explosion tore through the Virtue's hull, she broke into a run with balance perhaps only a cat or a monkey could match, swinging the rope around her head as she ran.
A second explosion shook the Virtue as it began to sink into the ocean, the Death Knight barely managing to hurl himself up onto the mast of the heaving vessel. A third explosion was imminent, he knew, and this one meant death if he wasn't clear. The Treasure was already pulling away.
He ran, blindly, for the edge of the mast, and swan-dove off the side.
Iliae threw, and the rope met his hands. From the corner of his eyes, he saw her hop down towards the deck he himself was headed for. Despite his superior physiology, the fall would kill him, and the rope was far too long.
For a moment.
Iliae still held one end of the rope, loosely draped over the Treasure's mast. As she fell, her momentum slowed him, until they balanced, and she began to rise again under his weight. She straightened, and landed atop the mast, boots planted firmly, the rope still entwined around her arms.
Her husband let out a frightful yell as he swung around the mast twice, then let go, sailing towards the helm and landing with a terrible crash.
When he awoke briefly, Iliae was standing over him, grinning.
He mustered enough energy to swear at her before the light of consciousness departed again.
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The Salty Sailor was winding down, as much as it could. The tavern was relatively empty- a few tavern wenches still sat comfortably in the laps of drunken sea-dogs, the latter of which appeared to be predominantly dog, rather than man.
In a darker corner of the bar, Xynrael held a mug of ale to the left side of his head, which had taken the end of his landing somewhat more violently than the rest of him.
Iliae was still grinning, though a bit less. She leaned forward, and drew the mug away from his head. "It does more to dull the pain if you drink it," the Ranger intoned, leaning across the table to steal a kiss. As soon as their lips had parted, she left the table, headed to the bar for another flask of Caraway Burnwine.
From her place at the bar, she could hear a new voice above the din, rising in coquettish laughter from what she judged to be relatively far away.
Iliae's fingers twitched slightly as she turned back towards her table, the polite but distant smile on her husband's face giving away the barmaid's intentions almost better than her recent attempt to seat herself in his lap and place her arms around his neck. This last he had replied to by simply lifting her up with one hand and placing her on the floor, which seemed only to encourage her. She sat instead in the chair opposite of him, and began speaking in a more hushed tone, her fingers batting gently at his arm.
The distance between Iliae and her husband disappeared quickly beneath thumping leather boots. A growl cut off in her throat as she heard her husband laugh in the polite, practiced tone usually reserved for politicians, followed immediately by another, more vocal reply, "... But, honestly, I'm not interested, and you had best leave."
The human woman leaned forwards, displaying an immodestly (and really, not at all) covered amount of cleavage, a soft grin passing over her lips. "Are you sure about that?" She asked.
Her head jerked forward suddenly, a small trickle of blood dotting the table where her nose had struck. Iliae removed her hand from the whore's hair and slipped foreward into the darkness in which her husband sat. An innocent grin tugged at lips as she sat down in Xynrael's arms.
After a moment of the privacy the shadows granted, she withdrew, and headed up the stairs, leaving her burnwine untouched.
Xynrael shook his head and followed her up to their rooms, pausing only to feel the pulse of the woman his wife had knocked out.
However, my decision to marry was not taken in light of the desire for "holy matrimony" or the equal ownership of property... It was more as a contract, an acknowledgment, between myself and my wife. I told Knight-Master Duskbane that, in spite of all things, my wife and I accepted each other as we are; she with her "eccentricities," and me with my notable lack of pulse. This is, in retrospect, what makes our relationship function, and it is something I treasure.
Very recently, my sense of duty and her stubborn behavior clashed over the topic of her previous service as a Farstrider, resulting in her execution, resurrection, and disguise while efforts were made to clear her name. This, as can be imagined, had put quite a strain on our relationship. Until, one evening, she decided we should take a vacation.
~From the journal of Xynrael Frostbane
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The sun shone brightly over the horizon, its early-morning rays crossing the southerly heading of the Floating Treasure as the Goblin-owned luxury ship passed out of visual distance of Booty Bay. The shining of the sun caused the Death Knight standing on the starboard railing of the ship to shield his eyes.
The motion left him oblivious to the source of a distinct "clack" on the deck behind him- oblivious, that is, until a pair of arms wrapped around him from behind, long, powerful fingers interlocking on his chest, over the flesh his loose shirt left bare. He smiled a little at the familiar touch in these unfamiliar surroundings, knowing that she was only likely comfortable with the show of affection because most of the crew was still asleep.
Xynrael turned, noting a rope dangling all the way down from the crow's nest, where his wife had likely been enjoying the literal bird's-eye-view of Stranglethorn as they left it behind the horizon.
"Morning, love." Muttered Iliae Duskryder, as she lay her head against his chest. He wrapped his arms around her for a moment, leaving them about her waist where they had come to rest, until she lifted herself from him and began to walk the deck. He followed in silence, his eyes focused not on the sparkling ocean, but instead seeking out his wife's form, looking her over with a surprisingly lust-less appreciation.
The Death Knight had to remind himself that his wife's comparatively small and wiry body contained a surprising amount of strength and speed, the deception thereof perfect for a Ranger, and even better in a wife. When the two paused in their walk, he took a moment to reflect that although a small part of him enjoyed playing soldier at home, he didn't often have to worry about Iliae.
As she moved again, he started to follow, nearly slamming into her and knocking the Ranger over.
Iliae tapped him on the shoulder as she had during the few occasions where they had gone hunting together, indicating she had noticed something he was either oblivious to, or simply in a bad position to spot. Her finger led over the gently rolling sea, towards the horizon.
There, with the morning sun's rays as its shield, sailed a medium-sized vessel, probably easily capable of running circles around the Floating Treasure. At that distance, Xynrael could just barely make out the rapid lowering of a black flag, and found himself surprised his wife had noticed it at all. What replaced it was a larger Alliance flag, looking weather-worn and tired, with small holes and tears through it, by the unsteady way it flapped in the wind.
"That better not be what I think it is," Iliae growled, as if taking personal offense to this possible interruption to their vacation. Her hands fell to her daggers in the easy way they usually did when anticipating a threat.
Like a tiger about to flash its claws, Xynrael thought, somewhat amused. Aloud, he replied, "It looks like it. I'll go wake up the captain. Feel like going down to the powder room and loading up a few rifles?"
The Ranger shot him a glare that quite clearly said "No, and I want them to go away." Despite this, she voiced no reply, and instead disappeared down a staircase, towards the crew quarters.
As soon as Iliae left, Xynrael ran in the opposite direction, making for the captain's quarters. He pounded heavily on the door, attracting the attention of the present skeleton crew. They made for him, but not before a loud, nasally call of "WHAT" came from within.
"Pirates!" The Death Knight replied, eliciting some swearing and a small explosion from within the room.
The captain emerged a moment later, still tugging on his shirt. The little goblin darted out, his body breezing past with speed that Xynrael believed was disproportionate to the little man's legs.
Captain Boltplank immediately rushed to the port side of the ship, unfolding his spyglass to search the waters. "I don't see a DAMN thing!" He barked, after a moment.
The crew looked around as well, apparently quite puzzled at the alarm. By now, two or three more crew members had arrived on the deck and were gathering around to hear Captain Boltplank yelling at one of his guests about interrupting "private time."
Finally tiring of the so-called discussion, the larger of the pair simply leaned down, picked the captain up by his underarms, and turned him to face the starboard side of the vessel. By this time, the "Alliance" ship was in plain sight, though still some distance away. The captain seemed to consider the vessel for a moment, before waving a hand dismissively.
"It's an Alliance trading ship. We've got mixed passengers on-board; they'll leave us alone, friend. Don't wake me up again."
"That so? Then why are their broadsides opening?" Xynrael inquired, pointing towards the ship. The captain raised both brows, sticking his spyglass under one of them.
There was some commotion in the minutes that followed, including the rousing of the crew and the hurrying of all the passengers to the center of the ship. When finally the foreign craft approached, the captain thereof hailed quite loudly, and in a deceptively friendly manner.
"Ahoy!" Boltplank responded, after receiving word that food, supplies, and gold had been safely stowed away. "Whaddya want?"
"Food and fine goods! We're sailing from Stormwind to trade in the Bay, and thought ya might have somethin' to sell, master goblin!" The captain of the other ship, a middle-aged human in clothes only slightly less becoming those of a true merchant vessel's commanding officer. He removed his hat, a tattered, three-pointed affair, and held it to his chest, bowing slightly. "I'm Captain Armand, of the Stormwind Virtue, by way of name. Have ya anything to sell?"
"No! Go aw- Err... "
Xynrael could see the look of greed in the goblin's eyes as he spoke, and through the open hatches in the side of the vessel, he could also see cannons lurking, and hear the commotion from belowdecks. As the two captains continued their back-and-forth, the Death Knight closed his eyes. Beyond the salty air, the calling, and the creaking of ships, he could feel smaller life as it ran back and forth belowdecks on the other ship.
Powder boys.
It was then that Xynrael realized the ship upon which he was standing was a target of opportunity- they hadn't been prepared, and were likely coming back from another raid. There was a window, a very small one, where he might be able to shift the course of the encounter.
As if summoned, his wife appeared in the stairwell, holding several single-shot powder rifles, apparently loaded and ready to go. Iliae pressed her back against the doorway leading belowdecks, and tossed all but three of the rifles down half a flight to the landing. One she rested against the door, the other she lifted into her own hands, her eyes giving the Death Knight a questioning look.
A small jerk of the head was his response.
In that one instant, as it became clear that the two captains were getting nowhere, Iliae threw the rifle she was holding to Xynrael, then scooped one up for herself. Her husband reached for his belt, producing the dueling pistol that could usually be found hiding behind his cape. With one arm crossed under his shooting hand for balance, the Death Knight fired, striking Captain Armand in the left shoulder. At almost exactly the same time, another shot rang out from the doorway, striking the opposing ship's helmsman, whose throat exploded in a spray of blood.
"HOIST THE COLORS!" Someone called.
The entire process took south of two seconds, and Xynrael snatched the rifle Iliae had thrown him out of the air, dropping his pistol in the same moment. Both raised their firearms as the crew scurried to the stairwell to secure more rifles and powder. Two more shots rang out, followed immediately by the thundering of a broadside from the pirate vessel.
The decks of both ships lit up with gunfire as planks descended. From the Stormwind Virtue came a roar distinct from the cannons and gunfire- the roar of men preparing to charge.
"Over the side, boys! BOARD THEM!" Called Captain Armand, still shooting from where he was leaning, bleeding to death, against the upper deck of his vessel.
Sure enough, the raiders came, brandishing cutlass and pistol with wild abandon. In spite of the boarding, the cannons continued, this time from both sides, a single tremendous hole ripping out of the Virtue. Iliae had come out from her place in the stairwell, and knocked the first pirate she could find off of his gangplank. Rather than continue fighting, however, Xynrael watched as she ducked aside. It took him a moment to comprehend, but when he finally figured out her plan, he dove away as well.
A small explosion ripped off the railing of the Treasure in the area immediately around one plank, also knocking another off of its bearing. Several men hopped from the plank either back or forwards, onto the ships, but most on both planks fell into the sea.
Iliae rose, spewing throwing daggers with unnatural speed. Three found their mark, and three pirates likewise fell. Beside her, Xynrael drew the rapier at his left hip. A rather long-haired, ruddy sort of dwarf launched itself at him, and was immediately impaled, flung aside, and replaced by an orc- clearly, Captain Armand made no distinction of race when hiring his crew.
Amid all the commotion, the Death Knight heard a bloodcurdling yell from behind him. As he turned, he saw the head of a bald human erupt in a spray of red and gray, round shot piercing the man's skull and scattering bits of brain everywhere.
To the left of this scene, Iliae lowered her rifle, grinning at her husband before turning and flipping the weapon in her hands to use it like a staff. She struck a troll once between the eyes with the stock of the firearm, then once in the crotch, and used the whole of it to shove him over the edge of the ship.
From her position above the fresh hole, the Ranger could see the barrel of an un-manned cannon. An earlier broadside had apparently killed the men using it; one of them was presently hanging over the side of the ship, conspicuously absent an arm. In a fit of inspiration, Iliae Duskryder looked from the crew-less weapon, to her husband, whose veins were bulging a deep red with frozen blood. She watched as he picked one pirate up by the hand that held the very cutlass the man had been attempting to swing with, and then hurled him over the side of the ship. Iliae grinned as Xynrael took a glancing blow from another blade, turned, and ran the wielder of said blade through without flinching.
The Death Knight looked up, saw the grin on his companion's face, saw where she was standing, and raised a hand, even as he struck down another pirate.
"No," he proclaimed, quite loudly. "We are NOT doing that!"
"Get in the damn cannon!" Iliae called, already heading down the stairs.
Xynrael made a great deal of loud protesting, swearing, and cursing of the powers-that-be as he swung down through the hole in the deck, sliding easily into the already-loaded cannon. Sort of easily, anyway. He wedged a little on the way down, then gathered a thick coating of ice around himself. The sound of water trickling into the fuse surprised him, but in the darkness of the cannon's barrel, he grinned.
Iliae Duskryder was not as crazy as some thought.
The ice slicked enough to allow the Death Knight to exit with a resounding BOOM a moment later. One layer of ice shattered, splintering into the Virtue . Another cracked as he crashed through the solid wood hull of the pirate vessel, jarring him, but leaving him unharmed in his makeshift shell casing. As he passed through something like an improvised secondary hull, all the ice shattered, allowing him to land at a breakneck roll.
The pirates manning the Virtue's guns looked vaguely surprised, and one of them seemed offended that a projectile made out of Death Knight had landed on top of him. This last was promptly relieved of his nose, the cartilage and bone of which was sent crashing into his brain by the heel of Xynrael's boot.
Xynrael took up the man's cutlass and made for the powder room. Another volley tore through the Virtue's hull, and was responded to in kind, leaving the air thick with powder and the smell of burning flesh- the Goblin captain had fired an incendiary volley through his opponent's hull, and it was doing its job admirably.
Only four or so met the intruder as he moved for the powder room- the others were too focused on tearing the Treasure to ribbons to bother with a lone boarder. One , a human large enough to be a tauren, ran at Xynrael and attempted outright to tackle him. He was met with the edge of a cutlass, his entrails redecorating the room as Xynrael flung the man over his back.
The second and third met similar fates, one impaled, the other shot by his newly-skewered mate's pistol.
The fourth was a powder boy, who, having dropped his powder keg, drew something like a longknife, though certainly a sword to his hands. The gunpowder spilled across the floor, soaking through in a matter of moments from the spray of the ocean and the rocking of the ships as they traded fire. The boy was clearly scared, but determined to get in the way.
With a quick sweep of the blade and an upward twist, Xynrael disarmed the child, then knocked him to the floor and scooped him up by the collar, against a great deal of protesting, kicking, and biting. With one boot, the Death Knight rolled the powder keg the boy had dropped to the door of the powder room. As he kicked the door in, others began to turn and take notice, but not before he could nudge the barrel in and set a spark of unholy flame to the explosive trail left behind.
With powder monkey in tow, Xynrael made his way up the stairs, shoving and cutting his way on to the deck.
He threw the boy into a longboat and cut the ropes holding it in place with two quick slices. The deck was deserted of all but a few gunners and men at their cannons- the fire in the hold took precedence over all else, including the man who had set it, but he knew the fire would not be so easily doused with water.
Iliae was standing on the deck of the Treasure. She locked eyes with her husband, then pointed upwards. He immediately began to scramble up the ropeway leading towards the mast, needing no further indication of what his Ranger companion had planned.
Halfway up, Xynrael heard frantic yelling from below, signaling that he was out of time. Iliae was already walking along the mast of the Treasure, a rope in her hands. As the first explosion tore through the Virtue's hull, she broke into a run with balance perhaps only a cat or a monkey could match, swinging the rope around her head as she ran.
A second explosion shook the Virtue as it began to sink into the ocean, the Death Knight barely managing to hurl himself up onto the mast of the heaving vessel. A third explosion was imminent, he knew, and this one meant death if he wasn't clear. The Treasure was already pulling away.
He ran, blindly, for the edge of the mast, and swan-dove off the side.
Iliae threw, and the rope met his hands. From the corner of his eyes, he saw her hop down towards the deck he himself was headed for. Despite his superior physiology, the fall would kill him, and the rope was far too long.
For a moment.
Iliae still held one end of the rope, loosely draped over the Treasure's mast. As she fell, her momentum slowed him, until they balanced, and she began to rise again under his weight. She straightened, and landed atop the mast, boots planted firmly, the rope still entwined around her arms.
Her husband let out a frightful yell as he swung around the mast twice, then let go, sailing towards the helm and landing with a terrible crash.
When he awoke briefly, Iliae was standing over him, grinning.
He mustered enough energy to swear at her before the light of consciousness departed again.
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The Salty Sailor was winding down, as much as it could. The tavern was relatively empty- a few tavern wenches still sat comfortably in the laps of drunken sea-dogs, the latter of which appeared to be predominantly dog, rather than man.
In a darker corner of the bar, Xynrael held a mug of ale to the left side of his head, which had taken the end of his landing somewhat more violently than the rest of him.
Iliae was still grinning, though a bit less. She leaned forward, and drew the mug away from his head. "It does more to dull the pain if you drink it," the Ranger intoned, leaning across the table to steal a kiss. As soon as their lips had parted, she left the table, headed to the bar for another flask of Caraway Burnwine.
From her place at the bar, she could hear a new voice above the din, rising in coquettish laughter from what she judged to be relatively far away.
Iliae's fingers twitched slightly as she turned back towards her table, the polite but distant smile on her husband's face giving away the barmaid's intentions almost better than her recent attempt to seat herself in his lap and place her arms around his neck. This last he had replied to by simply lifting her up with one hand and placing her on the floor, which seemed only to encourage her. She sat instead in the chair opposite of him, and began speaking in a more hushed tone, her fingers batting gently at his arm.
The distance between Iliae and her husband disappeared quickly beneath thumping leather boots. A growl cut off in her throat as she heard her husband laugh in the polite, practiced tone usually reserved for politicians, followed immediately by another, more vocal reply, "... But, honestly, I'm not interested, and you had best leave."
The human woman leaned forwards, displaying an immodestly (and really, not at all) covered amount of cleavage, a soft grin passing over her lips. "Are you sure about that?" She asked.
Her head jerked forward suddenly, a small trickle of blood dotting the table where her nose had struck. Iliae removed her hand from the whore's hair and slipped foreward into the darkness in which her husband sat. An innocent grin tugged at lips as she sat down in Xynrael's arms.
After a moment of the privacy the shadows granted, she withdrew, and headed up the stairs, leaving her burnwine untouched.
Xynrael shook his head and followed her up to their rooms, pausing only to feel the pulse of the woman his wife had knocked out.
Monday, July 4, 2011
[Image]The Bane Theory
((So, this picture requires some explanation. My friend Jessie, who is a very talented artist, does a sort of cartoony, Disney-style art that I absolutely love. We met through Warcraft about two years ago, thanks to a theory we affectionately nicknamed "The Bane Magnet." How it works is this: Blood Elf names in Warcraft, generally speaking, have a noun-adjective combination, typically suited to the character by their creator. Sometimes there's a story behind it, and other naming conventions are used.
So, some two years ago, we were staring at eachothers' roleplay addons from across the Bazaar in Silvermoon City, and, upon realizing we had eachother targeted, her character, Eriene Duskbane, proceeded to demand of mine (whose name is Xynrael Frostbane), "Is there something I can DO for you, Death Knight?" As most people shouldn't have at the time, considering the game's story to date, she didn't particularly ENJOY the company of Death Knights, or anything else Undead. The reason for this initiation of RP?
Rather than make an ass of himself like most Death Knights tend to, Xynrael proceeded to be fairly polite and cordial, with just a hint of sarcasm. Eriene took this as an opportunity to verbally beat him with a brick stick. After the RP took place, Jessie sent me a private message out-of-character, rather hurriedly explaining that "I'M REALLY NOT THIS MEAN OUT OF CHARACTER I PROMISE." Rather than pursue that, I laughed it off and asked what made her decide to initiate RP with me. After a moment of silence, she gave the literary equivalent of a shrug and replied "IDK. Her name is Duskbane. His is Frostbane. I just had to."
Thus began one of the most interesting friendships I've ever had with anyone, and a VERY strange one for our characters. Some of the details are revealed here in my blog some we keep to ourselves. However, for my birthday, Jessie drew me a picture that very well exemplifies their attitudes towards eachother- a hesitant closeness with a lot of glaring.
Easily one of the best birthday gifts I've ever gotten. I hope you all enjoy this image as much as I do.))
Saturday, June 18, 2011
((This story completed to "This is War" by 30 Seconds to Mars- the theme for Seana Aesire, now Seana Shadestalker, and "You're Going Down" - Sick Puppies, which was playing in my head while I was envisioning the fight scene. Welcome to Wyrmrest, Seana!))
There is a time during every friendship, every association, every alliance, every relationship, where we come dangerously close to rage or even violence with those on the other side of it. It is very seldom that any of these START in such a way and end up as any of the aforementioned peaceful relationships.
I was recently re-acquainted with a former Knight-Lord for whom I harbor great respect. She has reminded me of the ever-changing nature of our world by accepting me not only as I am now, but as I was. Or, at the very least, acknowledging each in its own light. She is an oddity- a former Blood Knight with a sense of duty and honor.
Her name is Seana Shadestalker.
~ From the journal of Xynrael Frostbane
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A single pair of plate-covered leather boots stalked through the streets of Stratholme, the sound hidden by the roar of the ever-burning flame and the groaning of the Undead. The young Blood Knight initiate to whom the boots belonged clutched tightly at his ranseur, his fingers drumming nervously over the weapon's shaft as if to assure himself of both his grip and the presence of his armament.
Thus far, the Scourge had made no attempt to impede his path. In fact, not a one of them had even stood directly before him since he entered the city. The Blood Knight reflected on this as he neared his objective: A small chapel where Uther the Lightbringer had been blessed as the first Paladin.
Well, he thought, blessed is a subjective term.
The young man snickered as he approached the door of the church, straightening up. He had reached his objective and now-
The sound of a pair of heavy boots on the cobblestone street behind him made him freeze. The shifting crunch of plate armor scraping and settling, however, broke the Blood Knight out of his shock. With ranseur raised, he turned, the weapon's point coming to rest against the chest of a rather large man in frightening blue plate.
Runes danced on the mace held over the man's armor, and beneath his hood, a pair of rime-laced blue eyes poured their unholy glow. What of this man's face was not covered by his hood was curved in a lopsided, arrogant smirk. He also seemed not to be breathing, his pale skin not retracting or twitching in the slightest, nose unmoving, lips held loosely together, but still completely shut.
It took several moments for the Blood Knight to put all of this together, and when he did, it didn't quite come out right. "D...D..ea... You're a..." he began, sputtering and taking several steps back, his hands wringing tensely over the shaft of his polearm, choking up on it
"Death Knight," the man responded, smirk spreading. "So? What're you supposed to be?" He asked, swatting the Blood Knight's ranseur aside with a sweep of his left arm and taking an all-too-easy step foreward.
The Sin'dorei backpedaled a ways towards the chapel's entrance, but straightened up. "I am Tadrian Kal'dar, Blood Knight of Silvermoon," he declared, far more bravely than he felt. "And I am here to complete my initiation as a Knight-Master by def-"
The Death Knight cut him off with another wave of the hand. "I don't rightly give a damn why you think you're here. The Light is strange about you, boy. There is no faith- it waxes and wanes the faster your heart beats. I had the way cleared for you so that you could explain this; I've been stalking you since the Thalassian Pass."
With a panicked gaze, the Blood Knight realized the implications of his Undead opposite's words. The Undead had begun closing in around him, and the streets were once again flooded by their number. Creatures that looked like some sick combination of spiders, ants, and perhaps a praying mantis for a grandfather had come skittering down from the buildings. He was completely surrounded, and suddenly not at ALL certain of himself.
As he opened his mouth, Knight-Adept Kal'dar's burning aura began to wane. "We... We do not beg the Light to come and let it desert us where it wills," he stammered, raising his weapon again. "We command it to come. We choke it out. We are not weak like the Paladins of the Silver Hand, like Uther and Arthas. We dominate it by our will and our might."
The Death Knight inclined his head in something of a respectful nod. "Fair enough," he asserted, eliciting a surprised stare from the Blood Knight. "You're free to go if you can answer this question, then."
Tadrian's brows raised practically to the sky, though he felt his whole body tense. "Al... right... What?" As the words left his lips, the Adept felt his breath begin to come short. His grip tightened further, terrified at the thought of losing his weapon to a panic attack.
A single, red-fringed rune on the Death Knight's mace glimmered, his grin turning feral as his left hand lifted, fingers closing as if he were strangling someone or perhaps crushing a small mammal in his grip.
"How strong is your will, Tadrian Kal'dar... And where is your Light now?"
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The sound of hoofbeats on worn stone gave stoic report of the red-and-black clad Knights who were riding through what was once the easternmost extension of the kingdom of Lordaeron. At the center of the group of three, astride a great Thalassian charger, sat Knight-Master Seana Aesire. In her left hand, she held the beast's reins, and in her left, an ichor-caked axe. She and the two assigned to ride with her had just cut a swath of holy fire through the Western half of the Plaguelands, and were now riding east to the burning ruins of Stratholme.
"Remind me again why we're out here?" The Knight-Adept on her left, called Aestas Elurial, shouted over the din of thumping hooves and shifting plate.
Aesire shot back, "Because Knight-Lord Bloodvalor commanded it, Adept!" Her tone was sharp, cold... As if the answer should have been obvious to an infant, much more so to a Knight-Adept. The companion on her left fell silent.
The man on her right, however, called out to her in turn. "I think he means that if Tad was the third adept to go missing in the Plaguelands this week, why is Bloodvalor only sending the three of us? It seems a little redund-"
"YOU are being redundant, adept! The answer remains the same. Our brothers were lost, we know where one might be, and we're going to retreive him." Mentally, she added, "Or his corpse." Rather than add this aloud, however, she cast her eyes foreward.
The path before Knight-Master Aesire and the accompanying Adepts was clear by comparison of the road behind them; only plagued ground and giant mushrooms oozing spores decorated the road ahead. Seana reigned in her charger, brow furrowing as she caught sight of smoke rising from the ever-burning city. "This is too easy," she muttered, under her breath.
The Adepts came to a halt a little behind but otherwise directly beside her, looking around. She noted silently that the pair were at least experienced enough to get their bearings and notice that something was out of place. In a land inhabited by the Scourge, there should at least be ghouls, and possibly other monsters. Ahead of them, on the road to Stratholme, was nothing. Around them, all was eerily still.
"I don't like this." Elurial remarked, illiciting a nervous snicker from Relion Tarsus, whom flanked Seana on the right.
"You never like anything... But, it is quiet. I wonder where they went?" Tarsus asked, reaching for a loaded crossbow that sat in a sling behind his saddle.
Aesire, snapped fully out of her reverie by their commentary, hefted her axe and urged her charger foreward at a trot. The others followed suit as she barked at them. "You complain that we're sent here, then complain when the task before us becomes significantly easier. We go. Now, while the road is clear." With a heavy kick, she urged her beast into a mad dash.
The other two had to shout their chargers on to convince them to keep up.
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The gates of Stratholme were completely clear of Undead, much as the road leading up to them had been. As Seana reigned her charger in, she reached back for her axe, and swung out of the saddle, her feet hitting the ground just as the warhorse's hooves came to a complete start. She straightened up, armor shuffling in protest.
Always a step behind, the Knight-Adepts planted their boots on the road leading to the city gates, and crossed the thin line that signaled the beginning of Stratholme's bridge.
Despite herself, the female Blood Knight let out a miniscule shudder. As the ash and smoke trickled into her nostrils, she pressed back the urge to sneeze, instead satisfying the desire by rubbing her index finger under her nose. The sneeze came out anyway, and much to her embarassment, but it wasn't the indignity of it that mortified her.
In the moment where she leaned her head foreward and her eyes slammed shut, Knight-Master Aesire felt something cold standing on the fringe of her senses, as if a strange wind had suddenly blown against her skin through her armor. The chill was accompanied by a single, distinct voice, and an echoing call of "Light bless you!"
Seana looked up, vaguely surprised. Her eyes searched 'round and 'round, but found nothing. Finally, a tap on her shoulder, accompanied by a red-and-black-clad arm pointing up to the top of the city gates directed her attention to the speaker.
On top of Stratholme, one boot lifted, knee bent and perched upon the battlements, stood a Death Knight in heavy saronite plate. A cruel-looking mace sat over his shoulder, and he was looking down on the group of Blood Knights from beneath the shadow of a large cowl, one Seana Aesire was all too familiar with. In theory, at least. The Death Knight tossed off a sarcastic-looking salute with two fingers.
Seana could -feel- her eyes narrow as she stared up at him. Still, despite her blood already beginning to boil with anger, she had to be sure. "You are the Dawnbreaker!" She declared. It had been meant as a question, but in her rage, it came out as a blatantly obvious statement. The Blood Knight's fingers curled around the shaft of her axe, almost hard enough to crack the polished wood. Light crackled around the weapon's head, and she found herself wishing he were just a few feet closer.
"Ten gold pieces for reaching the obvious conclusion faster than all the other Blood Knights, but minus several million for ignoring the little feeling in your gut saying this was a trap," the Dawnbreaker replied, half-turning and reaching behind himself for something.
As their harasser turned away, one of Seana's companions (her frustration deafened her as to which) whispered "What the hell do we do now?"
For a moment, she wanted to bite his head right off, but this moment ended as a body impaled on a spear sailed through the air and landed with a metallic scrape on the ground before them. The two Knight-Adepts recoiled, but Seana stepped foreward. It was a far lesser manifestation of her desire to lunge at the Death Knight despite the distance between them.
"By the Sunwell," one of the Adepts muttered. "It's Tadrian."
"I KNOW WHO IT IS." Seana bellowed in reply.
"SHE KNOWS WHO IT IS." The Death Knight roared, the unnatural echo of his voice carrying the statement much further. An arrogant smirk tugged at his lips, the infuriating grin the only thing besides his eyes clearly visible beneath the shadow of his hood.
"Come down here and mock me, coward." Seana whispered this under her breath. To the two Knight-Adepts, however, she gave a clear order: "Retrieve the body."
The Death Knight shifted his runemace, and lifted his other boot onto the battlements. "Leaving so soon?" He asked, motioning to the body. "I'd just properly set your friend to be roasted."
Knight-Master Aesire opened her mouth to reply, but the words left her as she noticed the -manner- in which Tadrian Kal'dan's body had been impaled; the spear's head stuffed directly into his intestinal tract, and out the top of his head. "...Get that thing out of him," she ordered, upon seeing the spear's placement.
With both eyes fixed on the Death Knight, the two adepts advanced in unison. He moved to neither blink nor breathe until they were fifteen steps or so from the body that had landed on the bridge. The moment their boots crossed that invisible line, he lept into the air, armor glimmering with a fresh coast of frost.
At the sound of rustling plate and their new opponent's cloak fluttering against the momentum, the Blood Knights drew their weapons. There was a brief confusion as the Dawnbreaker landed and the layer of ice protecting him shattered, but when the confusion ended, the Undead had parried two blows and was standing between the group of Blood Knights and their fallen companion.
The two Adepts backed away, Elurial rolling his left shoulder. The force of the counter-attack had caused him no small amount of discomfort, and through gritten teeth, he asked, "What do we do?"
Seana stepped foreward, an aura of burning Light enveloping her as she lifted her axe. "Retrieve. The. Body." She repeated.
Tarsus swung out his crossbow to loose a bolt at the Death Knight, but their quarry raised his left hand just as quickly. The bolt froze in place, and the bowstring snapped under its own tension. Rather than stare dumbfoundedly at the weapon, the Blood Knight tossed it aside and reached for his mace and shield.
Elurial and Tarsus raced forewards, their own bodies erupting with the Light. In face of Seana's command, they were clearly attempting to cover their fear in zeal, and it worked.
Too well.
Knight-Adept Aestas Elurial raised his massive broadsword over his head to make an exaggerated, but potentially deadly downward strike aimed directly for their opponent's head. Despite Seana's attempt to shout him down, the Blood Knight carried foreward, and was struck immediately in the stomach.
The Dawnbreaker shifted his mace forewards, not even lifting it from his shoulder. Rather, he dipped his right shoulder forewards and brought the enormous, spiked pommel of the mace down into the Adept's stomach. The spike stabbed straight through the Knight's tabard, pierced and caved his plate armor inwards, and punctured his kidney. Aestas' sword fell backwards, and as the Death Knight removed the spike, the other man staggered and fell forewards.
From Xynrael's left, Relion Tarsus let out a mighty cry, and brought his own, smaller mace down on the Death Knight. Knight-Master Aesire rushed forewards, attempting to close distance and take advantage of the momentary disruption as the Dawnbreaker lifted his mace to defend against the blow. Tarsus rammed his shield foreward, but failed to disrupt his opponent, who quickly stood.
Apparently unimpressed by the shorter man's blow, Xynrael shoved himself to his feet, hood falling back from the jerking leap he had taken to get himself upright. Along the now-revealed skin, Seana could see that the Death Knight's veins were turning a sort of cobalt blue. While she wasn't entirely certain what it meant, he seemed immune to any attempt to displace or shake him. This fact was accented as Elurial made one last attempt to aid his comrades- a hammer of light formed above the Death Knight's head, fell, and was shrugged off as if it were a pebble.
Tarsus spun away, the blow from his shield deflected, and aimed instead to strike Xynrael with his mace. Seana brought her axe down, but her target had moved forewards more quickly than she had expected, and shoved his boot against Knight-Adept Tarsus' back as the man spun.
The Adept fell foreward into the pool of his friend's blood. Seana turned to strike again, but the blow halted in mid-air. She cringed at the demonic screech and spray of blood that spread into the air as the scythes that rimmed the Dawnbreaker's mace cleaved into Tarsus' back and shred his armor. He cried out as Xynrael attempted to shake him from the mace. Rather than yank it out, however, the Death Knight lifted the weapon with its most recent sheath still attached, and flung the man over his shoulder as if he were a ragdoll.
The Adept flew back onto the floor, leaving a streak of blood behind him as he skidded to a halt. His abdomen was nearly split from the force of the strike, and he had left splashes of blood all over the bridge as he soared to his new resting place.
Seana now stood between Xynrael and the initial corpse. Her hands stll held tightly to the hilt of her axe, which was the only thing besides air between her and the Death Knight. He turned slowly, lifting his brows at her. She took a step backwards, partially out of a sense of self-preservation, but also to another end. Silently, the Knight-Master prayed that he would believe her actions to be entirely out of fear. She made no attempt to interrupt as he started to speak.
"You Blood Knights... You're not even Paladins properly, are you?" He asked, lifting his bloodied mace back onto his shoulder. She noted, still in silence, that the frost wisping from his eyes had grown brighter since he made the kills of her comrades.
"There is no blind faith protecting you- the moment you start to fear, your strength wanes. You tried to take the Light, like adolescents throwing a tantrum so you wouldn't have to subject yourself to anything but your own rules. It's cute, but as you can see, useless. Your Light is weak. Frail." He smirked that infuriating smirk, fingers drumming on the shaft of his mace. "Run home, little girl, and beg forgiveness from the Light you've tried to- GRAH."
Seana was right. He hadn't seen what she was moving for. As he spoke, she had slowly backed away. In one fluid motion, just as she sensed his speech about to end, the Blood Knight took hold of her dead brother's spear, ripped it from his flesh, and flung it at her tormentor. There was little force behind the blow, but the Dawnbreaker was close enough that dodging it would have been a minor miracle. Instead, it landeded just below his right pauldron and stuck. She charged, her weapon crackling with the Light, and gave a blind swing as she closed the distance.
The blow of her axe met with the shaft of the Death Knight's mace, held in both hands. Clearly, the ranseur's head had not buried as deeply as she'd hoped.
Rather than back down, Seana slid her left hand up on the axe's shaft and, with her right, grabbed the ranseur's pommel and shoved. Her efforts were rewarded with a deep growl, followed immediately by a heavy kick to the stomach. The Blood Knight stumbled backwards- the blow had hurt, even through the armor. There was a moment of relative calm between them as the Dawkbreaker tore the spear from his flesh and his living opponent recovered.
They stood at odds, regarding eachother. This time, it was Seana's turn to talk.
"You are an abomination, Dawnbreaker," he began, glancing over him. Her eyes flicked back and forth beneath the veil of their Felfire glow, searching him up and down for any weak spot in his armor or his stance. "The Scourge have no place in this world."
"So, what are you going to do?" He replied, hefting his mace back onto his shoulder. "Purge us with fire?"
"Yes." The Knight-Master rushed forewards again, seperating her left palm from her axe's shaft. Light crackled and seared the air around her hand as the glow surged towards her tormentor.
The Light washed over him as it struck, and the blade of Seana's axe followed quickly after, announcing its upwards cut with a single note of violent song.
Only, the Dawnbreaker wasn't there. He had stepped aside. Seana kept moving; he was either going to counterattack, or do nothing and continue to mock her, but either way, she didn't intend to sit still for it. As she spun to face him, her eyes caught the last of the glow washing away, a sickly green color following in its wake.
Eight feet now stood between them, fingers of the Death Knight's right gauntlet drumming idly on the shaft of the mace that rested upon his shoulder. On his face lay an amused-looking grin. It was there, in that moment of observation, that she realized the hopelessness of her situation. She was standing alone, shoulder-deep in the Plaguelands, surrounded by nothing but empty space and a forest that the Undead knew far better than she knew it. And he was toying with her.
With a groan, she rolled her left shoulder, reaching up to place her hand directly over the clasp that held her cloak in place. As she moved, the Blood Knight noticed a distinct, dull ache in her ribcage from the initial assault. No time to heal it now- would take too much time, too much focus. Instead, Seana kept her focus on the Death Knight, and on buying time.
In the moment she made her decision, the tension holding them apart broke like a string. Each Knight charged foreward. Seana's axe camp up, the Dawnbreaker's mace came down. There was a brief, sickening scream of metal scraping metal. They seperated, met, and seperated again. Seana whirled. Dawnbreaker's left hand came up. The Light surged and thundered around the Blood Knight, and fell short against a runic barrier.
Then, something happened she did not expect. Around her opponent, a sickly yellow glow erupted, then surged foreward. From his outstretched palm shot a bolt of the Light. It solidified in the form of a hammer, much as she attempted to do to him before it had been deflected. The hammer connected solidly with her chest, picking the Knight-Master up off her feet and sending her backwards. She landed on her back and rolled twice, pressing herself up to her feet almost immediately. In the excitement, Seana had not relinquished her axe.
"How..." She coughed, as she rose, lifting her axe to prepare for the inevitable attempt at a finishing blow.
The Dawnbreaker smiled and opened his mouth to speak, but fell silent at the sound of blaring horns from the treeline.
Seana heard the call only a moment before he did.
"FOR THE ARGENT DAWN! FOR LORDAERON!"
Through the trees came a group of soldiers at least twenty strong, all bearing tabards of the Argent Dawn.
In spite of the sudden change of circumstances, the Dawnbreaker again surprised Seana by broadening his grin. "You are a tricky one, Blood Knight. But you still have much to learn. I will leave you be to learn it." He called to her, as the Argents closed distance.
As he turned away, the three dead Knight-Adepts rose to their feet. Elurial clawed his way from most of his own armor, then his skin, then some of his muscle tissue. Seana's reinforcements were nearly upon her by the time the freshly-born ghouls had charged. With a single sweep of her axe, she dispatched the Undead, and set herself ahead of the white-clad soldiers.
Knight-Master Aesire's eyes stuck dead ahead, focused on the departing Death Knight. nother bolt of Light tore from her as she ran at him, this time from the head of her axe, and aimed itself straight for her quarry. She could hear him grunt as he staggered and set himself to a jog towards the gates. Seana raised her axe.
Her furious downswing at the Dawnbreaker's back met instead with the falling iron gates of Stratholme. The Blood Knight staggered backwards, roaring above the fire and clamor of boots and shuffling armor, "AND YOU HAVE MUCH TO ANSWER FOR."
Seana slammed her fist against the insult of the gate as the Dawnbreaker disappeared into the city.
Under her breath, the Knight-Master growled, "We will meet again. And we will see whose faith is stronger."
There is a time during every friendship, every association, every alliance, every relationship, where we come dangerously close to rage or even violence with those on the other side of it. It is very seldom that any of these START in such a way and end up as any of the aforementioned peaceful relationships.
I was recently re-acquainted with a former Knight-Lord for whom I harbor great respect. She has reminded me of the ever-changing nature of our world by accepting me not only as I am now, but as I was. Or, at the very least, acknowledging each in its own light. She is an oddity- a former Blood Knight with a sense of duty and honor.
Her name is Seana Shadestalker.
~ From the journal of Xynrael Frostbane
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A single pair of plate-covered leather boots stalked through the streets of Stratholme, the sound hidden by the roar of the ever-burning flame and the groaning of the Undead. The young Blood Knight initiate to whom the boots belonged clutched tightly at his ranseur, his fingers drumming nervously over the weapon's shaft as if to assure himself of both his grip and the presence of his armament.
Thus far, the Scourge had made no attempt to impede his path. In fact, not a one of them had even stood directly before him since he entered the city. The Blood Knight reflected on this as he neared his objective: A small chapel where Uther the Lightbringer had been blessed as the first Paladin.
Well, he thought, blessed is a subjective term.
The young man snickered as he approached the door of the church, straightening up. He had reached his objective and now-
The sound of a pair of heavy boots on the cobblestone street behind him made him freeze. The shifting crunch of plate armor scraping and settling, however, broke the Blood Knight out of his shock. With ranseur raised, he turned, the weapon's point coming to rest against the chest of a rather large man in frightening blue plate.
Runes danced on the mace held over the man's armor, and beneath his hood, a pair of rime-laced blue eyes poured their unholy glow. What of this man's face was not covered by his hood was curved in a lopsided, arrogant smirk. He also seemed not to be breathing, his pale skin not retracting or twitching in the slightest, nose unmoving, lips held loosely together, but still completely shut.
It took several moments for the Blood Knight to put all of this together, and when he did, it didn't quite come out right. "D...D..ea... You're a..." he began, sputtering and taking several steps back, his hands wringing tensely over the shaft of his polearm, choking up on it
"Death Knight," the man responded, smirk spreading. "So? What're you supposed to be?" He asked, swatting the Blood Knight's ranseur aside with a sweep of his left arm and taking an all-too-easy step foreward.
The Sin'dorei backpedaled a ways towards the chapel's entrance, but straightened up. "I am Tadrian Kal'dar, Blood Knight of Silvermoon," he declared, far more bravely than he felt. "And I am here to complete my initiation as a Knight-Master by def-"
The Death Knight cut him off with another wave of the hand. "I don't rightly give a damn why you think you're here. The Light is strange about you, boy. There is no faith- it waxes and wanes the faster your heart beats. I had the way cleared for you so that you could explain this; I've been stalking you since the Thalassian Pass."
With a panicked gaze, the Blood Knight realized the implications of his Undead opposite's words. The Undead had begun closing in around him, and the streets were once again flooded by their number. Creatures that looked like some sick combination of spiders, ants, and perhaps a praying mantis for a grandfather had come skittering down from the buildings. He was completely surrounded, and suddenly not at ALL certain of himself.
As he opened his mouth, Knight-Adept Kal'dar's burning aura began to wane. "We... We do not beg the Light to come and let it desert us where it wills," he stammered, raising his weapon again. "We command it to come. We choke it out. We are not weak like the Paladins of the Silver Hand, like Uther and Arthas. We dominate it by our will and our might."
The Death Knight inclined his head in something of a respectful nod. "Fair enough," he asserted, eliciting a surprised stare from the Blood Knight. "You're free to go if you can answer this question, then."
Tadrian's brows raised practically to the sky, though he felt his whole body tense. "Al... right... What?" As the words left his lips, the Adept felt his breath begin to come short. His grip tightened further, terrified at the thought of losing his weapon to a panic attack.
A single, red-fringed rune on the Death Knight's mace glimmered, his grin turning feral as his left hand lifted, fingers closing as if he were strangling someone or perhaps crushing a small mammal in his grip.
"How strong is your will, Tadrian Kal'dar... And where is your Light now?"
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The sound of hoofbeats on worn stone gave stoic report of the red-and-black clad Knights who were riding through what was once the easternmost extension of the kingdom of Lordaeron. At the center of the group of three, astride a great Thalassian charger, sat Knight-Master Seana Aesire. In her left hand, she held the beast's reins, and in her left, an ichor-caked axe. She and the two assigned to ride with her had just cut a swath of holy fire through the Western half of the Plaguelands, and were now riding east to the burning ruins of Stratholme.
"Remind me again why we're out here?" The Knight-Adept on her left, called Aestas Elurial, shouted over the din of thumping hooves and shifting plate.
Aesire shot back, "Because Knight-Lord Bloodvalor commanded it, Adept!" Her tone was sharp, cold... As if the answer should have been obvious to an infant, much more so to a Knight-Adept. The companion on her left fell silent.
The man on her right, however, called out to her in turn. "I think he means that if Tad was the third adept to go missing in the Plaguelands this week, why is Bloodvalor only sending the three of us? It seems a little redund-"
"YOU are being redundant, adept! The answer remains the same. Our brothers were lost, we know where one might be, and we're going to retreive him." Mentally, she added, "Or his corpse." Rather than add this aloud, however, she cast her eyes foreward.
The path before Knight-Master Aesire and the accompanying Adepts was clear by comparison of the road behind them; only plagued ground and giant mushrooms oozing spores decorated the road ahead. Seana reigned in her charger, brow furrowing as she caught sight of smoke rising from the ever-burning city. "This is too easy," she muttered, under her breath.
The Adepts came to a halt a little behind but otherwise directly beside her, looking around. She noted silently that the pair were at least experienced enough to get their bearings and notice that something was out of place. In a land inhabited by the Scourge, there should at least be ghouls, and possibly other monsters. Ahead of them, on the road to Stratholme, was nothing. Around them, all was eerily still.
"I don't like this." Elurial remarked, illiciting a nervous snicker from Relion Tarsus, whom flanked Seana on the right.
"You never like anything... But, it is quiet. I wonder where they went?" Tarsus asked, reaching for a loaded crossbow that sat in a sling behind his saddle.
Aesire, snapped fully out of her reverie by their commentary, hefted her axe and urged her charger foreward at a trot. The others followed suit as she barked at them. "You complain that we're sent here, then complain when the task before us becomes significantly easier. We go. Now, while the road is clear." With a heavy kick, she urged her beast into a mad dash.
The other two had to shout their chargers on to convince them to keep up.
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The gates of Stratholme were completely clear of Undead, much as the road leading up to them had been. As Seana reigned her charger in, she reached back for her axe, and swung out of the saddle, her feet hitting the ground just as the warhorse's hooves came to a complete start. She straightened up, armor shuffling in protest.
Always a step behind, the Knight-Adepts planted their boots on the road leading to the city gates, and crossed the thin line that signaled the beginning of Stratholme's bridge.
Despite herself, the female Blood Knight let out a miniscule shudder. As the ash and smoke trickled into her nostrils, she pressed back the urge to sneeze, instead satisfying the desire by rubbing her index finger under her nose. The sneeze came out anyway, and much to her embarassment, but it wasn't the indignity of it that mortified her.
In the moment where she leaned her head foreward and her eyes slammed shut, Knight-Master Aesire felt something cold standing on the fringe of her senses, as if a strange wind had suddenly blown against her skin through her armor. The chill was accompanied by a single, distinct voice, and an echoing call of "Light bless you!"
Seana looked up, vaguely surprised. Her eyes searched 'round and 'round, but found nothing. Finally, a tap on her shoulder, accompanied by a red-and-black-clad arm pointing up to the top of the city gates directed her attention to the speaker.
On top of Stratholme, one boot lifted, knee bent and perched upon the battlements, stood a Death Knight in heavy saronite plate. A cruel-looking mace sat over his shoulder, and he was looking down on the group of Blood Knights from beneath the shadow of a large cowl, one Seana Aesire was all too familiar with. In theory, at least. The Death Knight tossed off a sarcastic-looking salute with two fingers.
Seana could -feel- her eyes narrow as she stared up at him. Still, despite her blood already beginning to boil with anger, she had to be sure. "You are the Dawnbreaker!" She declared. It had been meant as a question, but in her rage, it came out as a blatantly obvious statement. The Blood Knight's fingers curled around the shaft of her axe, almost hard enough to crack the polished wood. Light crackled around the weapon's head, and she found herself wishing he were just a few feet closer.
"Ten gold pieces for reaching the obvious conclusion faster than all the other Blood Knights, but minus several million for ignoring the little feeling in your gut saying this was a trap," the Dawnbreaker replied, half-turning and reaching behind himself for something.
As their harasser turned away, one of Seana's companions (her frustration deafened her as to which) whispered "What the hell do we do now?"
For a moment, she wanted to bite his head right off, but this moment ended as a body impaled on a spear sailed through the air and landed with a metallic scrape on the ground before them. The two Knight-Adepts recoiled, but Seana stepped foreward. It was a far lesser manifestation of her desire to lunge at the Death Knight despite the distance between them.
"By the Sunwell," one of the Adepts muttered. "It's Tadrian."
"I KNOW WHO IT IS." Seana bellowed in reply.
"SHE KNOWS WHO IT IS." The Death Knight roared, the unnatural echo of his voice carrying the statement much further. An arrogant smirk tugged at his lips, the infuriating grin the only thing besides his eyes clearly visible beneath the shadow of his hood.
"Come down here and mock me, coward." Seana whispered this under her breath. To the two Knight-Adepts, however, she gave a clear order: "Retrieve the body."
The Death Knight shifted his runemace, and lifted his other boot onto the battlements. "Leaving so soon?" He asked, motioning to the body. "I'd just properly set your friend to be roasted."
Knight-Master Aesire opened her mouth to reply, but the words left her as she noticed the -manner- in which Tadrian Kal'dan's body had been impaled; the spear's head stuffed directly into his intestinal tract, and out the top of his head. "...Get that thing out of him," she ordered, upon seeing the spear's placement.
With both eyes fixed on the Death Knight, the two adepts advanced in unison. He moved to neither blink nor breathe until they were fifteen steps or so from the body that had landed on the bridge. The moment their boots crossed that invisible line, he lept into the air, armor glimmering with a fresh coast of frost.
At the sound of rustling plate and their new opponent's cloak fluttering against the momentum, the Blood Knights drew their weapons. There was a brief confusion as the Dawnbreaker landed and the layer of ice protecting him shattered, but when the confusion ended, the Undead had parried two blows and was standing between the group of Blood Knights and their fallen companion.
The two Adepts backed away, Elurial rolling his left shoulder. The force of the counter-attack had caused him no small amount of discomfort, and through gritten teeth, he asked, "What do we do?"
Seana stepped foreward, an aura of burning Light enveloping her as she lifted her axe. "Retrieve. The. Body." She repeated.
Tarsus swung out his crossbow to loose a bolt at the Death Knight, but their quarry raised his left hand just as quickly. The bolt froze in place, and the bowstring snapped under its own tension. Rather than stare dumbfoundedly at the weapon, the Blood Knight tossed it aside and reached for his mace and shield.
Elurial and Tarsus raced forewards, their own bodies erupting with the Light. In face of Seana's command, they were clearly attempting to cover their fear in zeal, and it worked.
Too well.
Knight-Adept Aestas Elurial raised his massive broadsword over his head to make an exaggerated, but potentially deadly downward strike aimed directly for their opponent's head. Despite Seana's attempt to shout him down, the Blood Knight carried foreward, and was struck immediately in the stomach.
The Dawnbreaker shifted his mace forewards, not even lifting it from his shoulder. Rather, he dipped his right shoulder forewards and brought the enormous, spiked pommel of the mace down into the Adept's stomach. The spike stabbed straight through the Knight's tabard, pierced and caved his plate armor inwards, and punctured his kidney. Aestas' sword fell backwards, and as the Death Knight removed the spike, the other man staggered and fell forewards.
From Xynrael's left, Relion Tarsus let out a mighty cry, and brought his own, smaller mace down on the Death Knight. Knight-Master Aesire rushed forewards, attempting to close distance and take advantage of the momentary disruption as the Dawnbreaker lifted his mace to defend against the blow. Tarsus rammed his shield foreward, but failed to disrupt his opponent, who quickly stood.
Apparently unimpressed by the shorter man's blow, Xynrael shoved himself to his feet, hood falling back from the jerking leap he had taken to get himself upright. Along the now-revealed skin, Seana could see that the Death Knight's veins were turning a sort of cobalt blue. While she wasn't entirely certain what it meant, he seemed immune to any attempt to displace or shake him. This fact was accented as Elurial made one last attempt to aid his comrades- a hammer of light formed above the Death Knight's head, fell, and was shrugged off as if it were a pebble.
Tarsus spun away, the blow from his shield deflected, and aimed instead to strike Xynrael with his mace. Seana brought her axe down, but her target had moved forewards more quickly than she had expected, and shoved his boot against Knight-Adept Tarsus' back as the man spun.
The Adept fell foreward into the pool of his friend's blood. Seana turned to strike again, but the blow halted in mid-air. She cringed at the demonic screech and spray of blood that spread into the air as the scythes that rimmed the Dawnbreaker's mace cleaved into Tarsus' back and shred his armor. He cried out as Xynrael attempted to shake him from the mace. Rather than yank it out, however, the Death Knight lifted the weapon with its most recent sheath still attached, and flung the man over his shoulder as if he were a ragdoll.
The Adept flew back onto the floor, leaving a streak of blood behind him as he skidded to a halt. His abdomen was nearly split from the force of the strike, and he had left splashes of blood all over the bridge as he soared to his new resting place.
Seana now stood between Xynrael and the initial corpse. Her hands stll held tightly to the hilt of her axe, which was the only thing besides air between her and the Death Knight. He turned slowly, lifting his brows at her. She took a step backwards, partially out of a sense of self-preservation, but also to another end. Silently, the Knight-Master prayed that he would believe her actions to be entirely out of fear. She made no attempt to interrupt as he started to speak.
"You Blood Knights... You're not even Paladins properly, are you?" He asked, lifting his bloodied mace back onto his shoulder. She noted, still in silence, that the frost wisping from his eyes had grown brighter since he made the kills of her comrades.
"There is no blind faith protecting you- the moment you start to fear, your strength wanes. You tried to take the Light, like adolescents throwing a tantrum so you wouldn't have to subject yourself to anything but your own rules. It's cute, but as you can see, useless. Your Light is weak. Frail." He smirked that infuriating smirk, fingers drumming on the shaft of his mace. "Run home, little girl, and beg forgiveness from the Light you've tried to- GRAH."
Seana was right. He hadn't seen what she was moving for. As he spoke, she had slowly backed away. In one fluid motion, just as she sensed his speech about to end, the Blood Knight took hold of her dead brother's spear, ripped it from his flesh, and flung it at her tormentor. There was little force behind the blow, but the Dawnbreaker was close enough that dodging it would have been a minor miracle. Instead, it landeded just below his right pauldron and stuck. She charged, her weapon crackling with the Light, and gave a blind swing as she closed the distance.
The blow of her axe met with the shaft of the Death Knight's mace, held in both hands. Clearly, the ranseur's head had not buried as deeply as she'd hoped.
Rather than back down, Seana slid her left hand up on the axe's shaft and, with her right, grabbed the ranseur's pommel and shoved. Her efforts were rewarded with a deep growl, followed immediately by a heavy kick to the stomach. The Blood Knight stumbled backwards- the blow had hurt, even through the armor. There was a moment of relative calm between them as the Dawkbreaker tore the spear from his flesh and his living opponent recovered.
They stood at odds, regarding eachother. This time, it was Seana's turn to talk.
"You are an abomination, Dawnbreaker," he began, glancing over him. Her eyes flicked back and forth beneath the veil of their Felfire glow, searching him up and down for any weak spot in his armor or his stance. "The Scourge have no place in this world."
"So, what are you going to do?" He replied, hefting his mace back onto his shoulder. "Purge us with fire?"
"Yes." The Knight-Master rushed forewards again, seperating her left palm from her axe's shaft. Light crackled and seared the air around her hand as the glow surged towards her tormentor.
The Light washed over him as it struck, and the blade of Seana's axe followed quickly after, announcing its upwards cut with a single note of violent song.
Only, the Dawnbreaker wasn't there. He had stepped aside. Seana kept moving; he was either going to counterattack, or do nothing and continue to mock her, but either way, she didn't intend to sit still for it. As she spun to face him, her eyes caught the last of the glow washing away, a sickly green color following in its wake.
Eight feet now stood between them, fingers of the Death Knight's right gauntlet drumming idly on the shaft of the mace that rested upon his shoulder. On his face lay an amused-looking grin. It was there, in that moment of observation, that she realized the hopelessness of her situation. She was standing alone, shoulder-deep in the Plaguelands, surrounded by nothing but empty space and a forest that the Undead knew far better than she knew it. And he was toying with her.
With a groan, she rolled her left shoulder, reaching up to place her hand directly over the clasp that held her cloak in place. As she moved, the Blood Knight noticed a distinct, dull ache in her ribcage from the initial assault. No time to heal it now- would take too much time, too much focus. Instead, Seana kept her focus on the Death Knight, and on buying time.
In the moment she made her decision, the tension holding them apart broke like a string. Each Knight charged foreward. Seana's axe camp up, the Dawnbreaker's mace came down. There was a brief, sickening scream of metal scraping metal. They seperated, met, and seperated again. Seana whirled. Dawnbreaker's left hand came up. The Light surged and thundered around the Blood Knight, and fell short against a runic barrier.
Then, something happened she did not expect. Around her opponent, a sickly yellow glow erupted, then surged foreward. From his outstretched palm shot a bolt of the Light. It solidified in the form of a hammer, much as she attempted to do to him before it had been deflected. The hammer connected solidly with her chest, picking the Knight-Master up off her feet and sending her backwards. She landed on her back and rolled twice, pressing herself up to her feet almost immediately. In the excitement, Seana had not relinquished her axe.
"How..." She coughed, as she rose, lifting her axe to prepare for the inevitable attempt at a finishing blow.
The Dawnbreaker smiled and opened his mouth to speak, but fell silent at the sound of blaring horns from the treeline.
Seana heard the call only a moment before he did.
"FOR THE ARGENT DAWN! FOR LORDAERON!"
Through the trees came a group of soldiers at least twenty strong, all bearing tabards of the Argent Dawn.
In spite of the sudden change of circumstances, the Dawnbreaker again surprised Seana by broadening his grin. "You are a tricky one, Blood Knight. But you still have much to learn. I will leave you be to learn it." He called to her, as the Argents closed distance.
As he turned away, the three dead Knight-Adepts rose to their feet. Elurial clawed his way from most of his own armor, then his skin, then some of his muscle tissue. Seana's reinforcements were nearly upon her by the time the freshly-born ghouls had charged. With a single sweep of her axe, she dispatched the Undead, and set herself ahead of the white-clad soldiers.
Knight-Master Aesire's eyes stuck dead ahead, focused on the departing Death Knight. nother bolt of Light tore from her as she ran at him, this time from the head of her axe, and aimed itself straight for her quarry. She could hear him grunt as he staggered and set himself to a jog towards the gates. Seana raised her axe.
Her furious downswing at the Dawnbreaker's back met instead with the falling iron gates of Stratholme. The Blood Knight staggered backwards, roaring above the fire and clamor of boots and shuffling armor, "AND YOU HAVE MUCH TO ANSWER FOR."
Seana slammed her fist against the insult of the gate as the Dawnbreaker disappeared into the city.
Under her breath, the Knight-Master growled, "We will meet again. And we will see whose faith is stronger."
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
7. Suns and Daughters
They broke like a wave crashing upon the shore, overwhelming bulwarks of sand and packed earth. The men who stood against them fought the breaking tide like toy soldiers trying to stand against the pull of the water. When all had receeded, Daeyn Skysong found himself with thirty men, where moments before he had had forty-two.
"Check for wounded and clear out the dead!" the Paladin called. He reached up to his chest, where moments before the glaive of an undead soldier had grazed his armor, producing a spark and a sickening noise like a scream. Without looking, he pressed his fingers straight through a rip in the tabard of the Silver Hand that adorned his chest. Nothing for it now- he was surprised the entire thing hadn't been shorn from his body.
Skysong was now a member of a largely Human order, whom had all but deserted their Quel'dorei members... And allies. As he drew his gauntlet away from the rip, he noted with some sense of irony that the glaive had shorn almost perfectly through the middle of the hammer's head at an arc that also cut off the shaft quite cleanly. It was appropriate- the lion's head of the armor he wore shone quite cleanly through the cut.
He ripped the center of the tabard off and threw it by the wayside of the road the Undead Scourge had already begun to cut through Eversong Wood. The call that came over his shoulder distracted him, but did not tear his eyes away as the remnants of the tabard fluttered in the breeze. After slinging his hammer over his back, Daeyn turned, instead drawing the long, runed family blade and shield from his back.
The blade was long and broad, with a single edge- one was all it needed. The sheer weight of it carried it past most armor and even the dull edge was dangerous,and the runes that allowed it to channel the Light in or out of someone's body empowered his magic for anything that COULD stand a blow from the weapon. The kite shield that accompanied it was well over the size of the Paladin's torso and boasted a border of gleaming gold, with blue metalworking of his family's crest- two hawks, facing eachother, one on the left holding a flute and olive wreath in its talons, the other on the right carrying the glaive favored by the Quel'dorei spellbreakers.
Daeyn Skysong was snapped out of his admiration for the shield's handiwork by the call of a junior sergeant in one of the House guards, a young man whom, he presumed, was now his most senior officer among this group of volunteers.
"Lord Skysong," the man bellowed, reminding Daeyn rather painfully of the fact that his father, the previous Lord Skysong, had not returned from attempting to evacuate one of the Blackened Woods' southernmost villages. None of his detachment had. The poor boy's next words were even more unwelcomed than his greeting had been. "House Amil's guard captain is dead. Our own guards now make up about half of the remainder, with three from House Springsun and another handful from House Amil."
The new Lord Skysong rolled his shoulders and stared heavenward. The Blackened Wood had earned its name, now also for the great swath of destruction that ran through it as much as for its distinct lack of light. He could see the sky and the trees all well enough, but no sunlight shone through, despite the fact that they sky was clear.
The guard sergeant droned on, and Daeyn caught only something about the last caravan of evacuees being prepared to leave. The Paladin motioned weakly in the direction of the Waystation he and his volunteers had set themselves to protecting. It was the last functioning one he was aware of; at least, the last functioning one this side of the Elrendar River. Skysong's mind was elsewhere, somewhere across the river, where his wife and two little sisters-in-law resided.
Or so he thought.
Before the head of the caravan began marching through the waystation, Daeyn heard the thunderous crescendo that announced first one, then two, and finally, after several more times, a fifth -incoming- teleport. The captain of the Farstrider squadron that had situated itself back near the hastily-erected palaside proclaimed, quite loudly, "Out of the way! Make way for Lady Kavei Springsun and her priestesses! MAKE WAY!"
Daeyn's brows shot up as he first heard the name of, and then recognized, his wife. She leaned over near one of the Farstriders, who added, again very boisterously, "Bring out your sick and wounded to be checked for the Plague of Undeath! Quickly!"
He wanted to rush to her, but refrained. She had a job to do, as did he. In silence, he watched, leather-covered palm crushing against his shield's handle, as his wife made the rounds about the caravan. Finally, she came to him, shifting uncomfortably in her robes. She seemed to be waiting for something.
With an embarassed chuckle, Daeyn lifted his sword and shield away from his body, opening his arms to her in a way that wouldn't keep her out of reach or impaled, unlike his previous posture would have. Kavei flung her arms around his waist and leaned up to kiss him. It was a brief, soft gesture, but as she pulled away, he felt refreshed and somewhat more secure in her presence. For a moment, he breathed easily.
But, only for a moment. Kavei introduced her priestesses, those who could be gathered with enough haste to lend aid to the mixed unit of House guards, deserted Farstriders, and civillian militia. Of all of them, Daeyn would later remember only one name, both because he had seen her before, and because that name would later become of great importance to him.
"...And this," Kavei said, as her husband offered a nod to the last priestess, "is Marilla Duskbane." The priestess offered a nod in reply, and Daeyn chuckled.
"Perhaps you'll bring us luck, my lady. Darkness is certainly what we're facing here. Even the light of the sun has deserted us." He muttered, waving his shield broadly in the direction of the sky.
The priestess Duskbane merely offered him a small, friendly grin. Kavei replanted her staff in the ground, and turned her eyes down the Scar that cut through the Blackened Wood. In her eyes, her husband saw a look he did not recognize- one he hadn't seen before, and would never see again.
Some years later, when he re-thought the gaze she cast the evacuees immediately after averting her eyes, he realized the look was resignation. She had known their fate before he had, but in that moment, h knew only that the Scourge must be fought back, and survivors of their onslaught protected.
Just as the last of the caravan passed through the gate, Daeyn's ears perked. The sound of more hissing, moaning, and pounding feet could be heard in the distance. To one of the Farstriders, who had perched himself high in the nearest tree, off to the left of the troop of volunteers, the Paladin called "Do you see anyone else coming?"
"No!" The reply came just as quickly as the man had finished scanning through the forest with his spyglass.
Daeyn set his eyes upong the Waygate, and thought for a moment about giving the order to retreat. But, if they did, the Scourge would gain still more ground, and a crossing point to the river that now impeded their path.
He turned back to his men, and called out "Form ranks! Two deep, Farstriders take the right flank, and keep your glaives ready, they'll close distance fast! Explosive shots on the first wave!" Lord Skysong flipped his sword vertically in his hand, and moved to stand in front of the rows of tower shields and glaives that were forming behind what palasides remained.
Through the darkness of the forest, he could just make out the first pair of glowing eyes break from the treeline. Behind a wall of fetid corpses and skeletons, a row of spiders reared up, already spewing venom into the air. The House guards raised their shields reflexively, and found themselves encircled by protective barriers of the Light. Daeyn spared Kavei a knowing smirk, then set his eyes upon their rapidly-advancing foe.
"My turn," he muttered under his breath.
Then, more loudly, "FIRE!"
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It was another seven years after that day before I saw my beloved Kavei again. What happened to her, I dare not put to pen. I miss her terribly.
The young sergeat-at-arms I encountered, and fought at least twice thereafter- I know not if it was the Scourge invasion, or the destruction of our city, but in my personal opinion, the cause is irrelevent. He was driven mad. May his name be a a curse upon the earth for the things he plotted and the evil he did.
Marilla Duskbane I never saw again, and it was to be nine years after the invasion that I fully understood the impact her life had on mine. She died on the Scar, and was buried between waves of Arthas' onslaught. We buried her and the other Priestesses beneath the tree on which that young man stood, and consecrated the ground there, that they might not be raised in the service of the Lich King.
That morning, I started out with fifty of Silvermoon's finest sons and daughters under my command. Only three survived to see the city burn.
For whomever reads this, understand.. the Light of the Sun did not forsake us that day. It gave strength to the young men and women who died to save the lives of their fellow Quel'dorei. Their faith remains unshaken, and death is their reward.
May it forever be so.
-From the journal of Xynrael Frostbane
"Check for wounded and clear out the dead!" the Paladin called. He reached up to his chest, where moments before the glaive of an undead soldier had grazed his armor, producing a spark and a sickening noise like a scream. Without looking, he pressed his fingers straight through a rip in the tabard of the Silver Hand that adorned his chest. Nothing for it now- he was surprised the entire thing hadn't been shorn from his body.
Skysong was now a member of a largely Human order, whom had all but deserted their Quel'dorei members... And allies. As he drew his gauntlet away from the rip, he noted with some sense of irony that the glaive had shorn almost perfectly through the middle of the hammer's head at an arc that also cut off the shaft quite cleanly. It was appropriate- the lion's head of the armor he wore shone quite cleanly through the cut.
He ripped the center of the tabard off and threw it by the wayside of the road the Undead Scourge had already begun to cut through Eversong Wood. The call that came over his shoulder distracted him, but did not tear his eyes away as the remnants of the tabard fluttered in the breeze. After slinging his hammer over his back, Daeyn turned, instead drawing the long, runed family blade and shield from his back.
The blade was long and broad, with a single edge- one was all it needed. The sheer weight of it carried it past most armor and even the dull edge was dangerous,and the runes that allowed it to channel the Light in or out of someone's body empowered his magic for anything that COULD stand a blow from the weapon. The kite shield that accompanied it was well over the size of the Paladin's torso and boasted a border of gleaming gold, with blue metalworking of his family's crest- two hawks, facing eachother, one on the left holding a flute and olive wreath in its talons, the other on the right carrying the glaive favored by the Quel'dorei spellbreakers.
Daeyn Skysong was snapped out of his admiration for the shield's handiwork by the call of a junior sergeant in one of the House guards, a young man whom, he presumed, was now his most senior officer among this group of volunteers.
"Lord Skysong," the man bellowed, reminding Daeyn rather painfully of the fact that his father, the previous Lord Skysong, had not returned from attempting to evacuate one of the Blackened Woods' southernmost villages. None of his detachment had. The poor boy's next words were even more unwelcomed than his greeting had been. "House Amil's guard captain is dead. Our own guards now make up about half of the remainder, with three from House Springsun and another handful from House Amil."
The new Lord Skysong rolled his shoulders and stared heavenward. The Blackened Wood had earned its name, now also for the great swath of destruction that ran through it as much as for its distinct lack of light. He could see the sky and the trees all well enough, but no sunlight shone through, despite the fact that they sky was clear.
The guard sergeant droned on, and Daeyn caught only something about the last caravan of evacuees being prepared to leave. The Paladin motioned weakly in the direction of the Waystation he and his volunteers had set themselves to protecting. It was the last functioning one he was aware of; at least, the last functioning one this side of the Elrendar River. Skysong's mind was elsewhere, somewhere across the river, where his wife and two little sisters-in-law resided.
Or so he thought.
Before the head of the caravan began marching through the waystation, Daeyn heard the thunderous crescendo that announced first one, then two, and finally, after several more times, a fifth -incoming- teleport. The captain of the Farstrider squadron that had situated itself back near the hastily-erected palaside proclaimed, quite loudly, "Out of the way! Make way for Lady Kavei Springsun and her priestesses! MAKE WAY!"
Daeyn's brows shot up as he first heard the name of, and then recognized, his wife. She leaned over near one of the Farstriders, who added, again very boisterously, "Bring out your sick and wounded to be checked for the Plague of Undeath! Quickly!"
He wanted to rush to her, but refrained. She had a job to do, as did he. In silence, he watched, leather-covered palm crushing against his shield's handle, as his wife made the rounds about the caravan. Finally, she came to him, shifting uncomfortably in her robes. She seemed to be waiting for something.
With an embarassed chuckle, Daeyn lifted his sword and shield away from his body, opening his arms to her in a way that wouldn't keep her out of reach or impaled, unlike his previous posture would have. Kavei flung her arms around his waist and leaned up to kiss him. It was a brief, soft gesture, but as she pulled away, he felt refreshed and somewhat more secure in her presence. For a moment, he breathed easily.
But, only for a moment. Kavei introduced her priestesses, those who could be gathered with enough haste to lend aid to the mixed unit of House guards, deserted Farstriders, and civillian militia. Of all of them, Daeyn would later remember only one name, both because he had seen her before, and because that name would later become of great importance to him.
"...And this," Kavei said, as her husband offered a nod to the last priestess, "is Marilla Duskbane." The priestess offered a nod in reply, and Daeyn chuckled.
"Perhaps you'll bring us luck, my lady. Darkness is certainly what we're facing here. Even the light of the sun has deserted us." He muttered, waving his shield broadly in the direction of the sky.
The priestess Duskbane merely offered him a small, friendly grin. Kavei replanted her staff in the ground, and turned her eyes down the Scar that cut through the Blackened Wood. In her eyes, her husband saw a look he did not recognize- one he hadn't seen before, and would never see again.
Some years later, when he re-thought the gaze she cast the evacuees immediately after averting her eyes, he realized the look was resignation. She had known their fate before he had, but in that moment, h knew only that the Scourge must be fought back, and survivors of their onslaught protected.
Just as the last of the caravan passed through the gate, Daeyn's ears perked. The sound of more hissing, moaning, and pounding feet could be heard in the distance. To one of the Farstriders, who had perched himself high in the nearest tree, off to the left of the troop of volunteers, the Paladin called "Do you see anyone else coming?"
"No!" The reply came just as quickly as the man had finished scanning through the forest with his spyglass.
Daeyn set his eyes upong the Waygate, and thought for a moment about giving the order to retreat. But, if they did, the Scourge would gain still more ground, and a crossing point to the river that now impeded their path.
He turned back to his men, and called out "Form ranks! Two deep, Farstriders take the right flank, and keep your glaives ready, they'll close distance fast! Explosive shots on the first wave!" Lord Skysong flipped his sword vertically in his hand, and moved to stand in front of the rows of tower shields and glaives that were forming behind what palasides remained.
Through the darkness of the forest, he could just make out the first pair of glowing eyes break from the treeline. Behind a wall of fetid corpses and skeletons, a row of spiders reared up, already spewing venom into the air. The House guards raised their shields reflexively, and found themselves encircled by protective barriers of the Light. Daeyn spared Kavei a knowing smirk, then set his eyes upon their rapidly-advancing foe.
"My turn," he muttered under his breath.
Then, more loudly, "FIRE!"
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It was another seven years after that day before I saw my beloved Kavei again. What happened to her, I dare not put to pen. I miss her terribly.
The young sergeat-at-arms I encountered, and fought at least twice thereafter- I know not if it was the Scourge invasion, or the destruction of our city, but in my personal opinion, the cause is irrelevent. He was driven mad. May his name be a a curse upon the earth for the things he plotted and the evil he did.
Marilla Duskbane I never saw again, and it was to be nine years after the invasion that I fully understood the impact her life had on mine. She died on the Scar, and was buried between waves of Arthas' onslaught. We buried her and the other Priestesses beneath the tree on which that young man stood, and consecrated the ground there, that they might not be raised in the service of the Lich King.
That morning, I started out with fifty of Silvermoon's finest sons and daughters under my command. Only three survived to see the city burn.
For whomever reads this, understand.. the Light of the Sun did not forsake us that day. It gave strength to the young men and women who died to save the lives of their fellow Quel'dorei. Their faith remains unshaken, and death is their reward.
May it forever be so.
-From the journal of Xynrael Frostbane
Monday, April 11, 2011
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