Rask Stories

Accusations of curses and meddling had set her out of sorts, not because she doubted the truthfulness of the claims or because she’d forgotten about them, but because her mind had since leapt to a different train on a different track, and she had hoped that to be the last of it.

Perhaps it would be now, after their confrontation by the park. Haleth tried to keep her from it as best he could, but there was still work to be done that only she could do. Recorking a bottle of wine, as it were.

She was met with a withering stare from a succubus coiled like a spring atop her bed, the binding runes that kept her tongue well in her mouth glowing faintly against her skin. Elerva, whose words dripped with a mix of poison and honey, had lost the privilege to speak some time ago.

“Good evening, sweetheart.” Mary locked the door behind her. “You look like you’ve been busy.” Indeed she had. Papers and books lie scattered and upturned around the minimal room. Clothes, candles, crystals of all sorts, even the fel shards Cam had given her had been strewn across the floor. A constant reminder to the novice warlock that her grip on her demon was tenuous at best.

The mess was something to be dealt with later. Mary pulled a ring of keys from around her neck and moved to the squat little desk by the window, stepping over a dispersed pile of scrolls and tomes between them.

She could hear the succubus’ tail whip the bed behind her. Key in the lock of the top drawer. The contents inside were untouched, for the most part. Her grandmother’s tome, her mother’s wedding ring, a rabbit skull on a velvet band with a matching set of earrings. Only one thing was missing.

Whip.

Mary turned on her heel, eyes wide. There, on the bed, cradled by a pair of pale grey hands, was the dreamcatcher. Elerva grinned, her sharp, glistening teeth framed by thick, blackened lips.

It was undamaged, for the most part. Joe’s hair had been removed shortly after the curse was set, and any magic from her or Haleth would be little more than vapors. Even the repugnant Drust signature from which she’d plucked it would have gone inert. But if left alone in the hands of a succubus, especially one so hesitantly attached to a master, the most basic focus could become disastrous.

Mary stepped toward her hands outstretched. “That’s not for you, Elerva. Give it here.”

The succubus uncoiled, stretching her long legs out before her. Her lips curled into a delicate pout as she shook out her hair, holding the dreamcatcher close to her generous chest. She would have giggled and teased, had her voice not been threaded to the back of her throat.

“Elerva.” Mary moved closer, her hands emmenating a warmth all too familiar to servants of the Burning Legion. “You remember what happened last time you didn’t listen.”

Another binding spell. Defiant protests, when she could still speak. The feeling of an axe cutting away at her skin, again and again. The man’s idea: H A L E T H. She remembered. The hot searing of her flesh in fel fire, the swirling searching emptiness of the twisting nether before her body was called back to her again.

Elerva’s petulant pout turned to a snarl of hatred as Mary’s too-hot hands closed in on her. She held the dreamcatcher up before her in reluctant submission, all but flinging it at the warlock as she plucked it from her hands.

“Thank you.”

Mary stepped away from the bed. Wood and twine and bone began to smoke and burn beneath her fingers, casting a brilliant green light across the room. They kept their eyes on each other; pale green and blood red.

“I think it’s time we made some adjustments.” The warlock spoke softly, letting the smouldering remains of her focus crumble in her hands. The thought had already crossed her mind, earlier in the week when she spoke to Moz. She’d thought about it several times since then. Which demonologist she’d go to, how they would go about it, whether or not it was worth it to release her into someone else’s care or simply cut her loose. Or kill her.

Her leg throbbed despite the mist. Her leathers, burnt and torn by fire and shrapnel, clung to her like a second skin. Dried blood and dirt mingled together beneath her hands; beneath the water she poured over top. Paint on a tattered canvas.

She ran a thumb over the radio at her side, checking to be sure it was on and functioning, as she’d done a dozen times over the past hour. The wounded were stable, the dead tended to. Cinn had long since gone to check on her mechanical children. Out there, in the middle of the road, in the middle of the night, it seemed only she and the fireflies were awake.

Minutes passed. Maybe hours. It was hard to see the moon through the trees, and the quiet reverie of the forest stretched time out before her in a thick, uncomfortable tension. Scenes from the battle played themselves out in her head like nightmare. Fal reaching for his gun, his body bent and bloody. Serena collapsing behind the forge, too far to reach. Zeyad falling in the road as the bombs went off behind him. Lady Raysse’s voice booming over the din of battle.

She was pulled from her thoughts by a rustle in the wood not far from her. She placed a protective hand over her radio, still silent, and clambored to her feet. It was harder than it should have been, and she winced, sucking in a sharp breath through her teeth.

Focus.

The man who stumbled out of the woods was barely recognizable. His face and sandy hair were caked in mud and blood, ash and grease from goblin engines. His shirt was torn in several places and she could see, by the silhouette from the gas lamp, that several pieces of armor were missing.

“Love.” His voice was rough and and low, warm and tired all at once. He stepped onto the road and Rae rushed to greet him, falling into his arms with a cry of relief.

“Malrek! You made it!”

“Streetwalker.” Mary gave the demon on her bed a disparaging look. “And I’m not going to squeeze anyone, Elerva. I can take care of myself.”

Elerva smiled, tucking her hooves beneath her as she sat up. She wore next to nothing as usual; everything boosted and primped and tucked appropriately, her smooth skin even paler than her master’s. She crooked a finger at the girl in the window.

“Come now, little witch. Even I can see you’re upset. Sit and tell me all about it.”

A tempting offer, and one she would have taken, months ago. The memory of her seared flesh, her silent screams, her hand frozen and clutching the stones in her hand. Picking through the remains of her temporary body outside of Haleth’s house.

The anger she’d shown being summoned back. The fear lurking just behind her eyes.

Mary pulled away from the window, leaving the shutter open to the street. The sound of hagglers and daytime drunks was covered by low, rolling thunder and the rustle of upturned leaves in the wind.

She stood in front of the room’s only mirror, fastening the buttons of her collar up to the neck and smoothing down the brocade pinafore that covered her front. Stockings up high, bare thighs, gloves still smudged with chalk from the night before. Who really cared if she dressed that way? This was Stormwind, not Duskwood.

“I’m going out.” She addressed Elerva without looking, pinning a cloak around her shoulders. “Don’t expect me back tonight. I’ll summon you if I need you.”

One last look in the mirror. I think she looks beautiful. Words like a candle flame in a room bereft of light. Mary smiled to herself, careful not to let the succubus see, and tucked the packet of papers from her nightstand under her arm.

“Mary?” Elerva asked, coiled like a snake on the bed. “What about the storm?”

“I know you, Malrek One-Eye, and I know your son and will let no harm come to you here.” said the Thornspeaker, “I know you come from the mountain to the east, and have seen the bright star that came before you, but just barely. To-morrow you may tell me how this came to be, but to-day I must make my way through Fallhaven and to the north, where there are other druids I must meet.”

His father took interest with the druids too, and the three of them traveled north for many more miles until they came upon a misty glen, where the druids of Hallowhearth made their home.

Seven of them sat around a long table, dressed in brown robes and wearing antlers on their heads. They said little but watched with great suspicion as the outsiders approached, and when Lorthanil reached out to them as little trees do, they did not answer.

The druids bade them sit except for his father, who was made to stand at the end of the table where a great drinking horn lay. “He is not a druid, and must be tested by the horn Gwenwyn before he is to join us in our feasting.”

His father could drink more than any man he had ever seen and had never lost a contest among the other Stewards, and Lorthanil was not worried that his father could not drain the horn before the druids of Hallowhearth.

The druids watched with their backs turned to the Thornspeaker, whose eyes glowed with the green of the forest. His father brought the horn to his lips and drank and drank until it was empty, and placed it on the table before him. “I have emptied the horn Gwenwyn.” said his father, “May I join you at your table?”

But the druids whispered among themselves and did not answer for some time, until his father grew impatient and reminded them of the custom of the land.

“You are not a druid. You must be tested by the knife Lleidr before joining us in our feasting.” A knife as black as the night sky was laid before him. Its blade was thinner than a blade of grass and finer than Eonar’s auburn hair, but the druids just laughed and settled back in their chairs. “Lleidr only cuts the skin of the unworthy, and all those who are unharmed by its bite may eat of the land’s bounty.”

Lorthanil, who knew his father was a good man, was not worried by this. He was honest, and all the time had been teaching Lorthanil how to behave unlike a tree and how to be good to the Stewards and the other fleshy things of the world.

But the druids laughed amongst themselves and spoke of blood for the land, so sure were they in their triumph. They turned away from the Thornspeaker, whose eyes flashed with the green of the forest.

His father took the knife in hand and ran it along his skin, but not a drop of blood was spilled. Again and again he drew the blade across his palm, but no matter how many times he tried it refused to cut. The druids gnashed their teeth and stood from their chairs.

“I’ve cut my skin with the knife Lleidr and drawn no blood, and emptied the horn Gwenwyn.” said his father, “May I join you at your table?”

But the druids were not satisfied. They threw themselves upon his father, binding him in rope and carrying him to their cooking fire. “You are not a druid! You will be tested by the flame Newyn! If you burn, you are unworthy to join us at our table!”

Lorthanil, being a small and simple ancient, was afraid for his father, and hid behind the Thornspeaker’s great body as it rose from the chair. It whispered buds and blooms in his own language, and calmed his quaking branches.

He watched from behind stone and vine as his father was thrown into the fire. The druids called for more wood to be placed around him and it was, and the fire grew higher and hotter. They stood around it in a circle, delighted to have set a living man there and being sure of their victory.

Malrek One-Eye did not scream. When the fire died down and the wood was all burned away, he stood in a pile of ash and fixed his fearsome gaze upon the druids. The rope fell from his body and he stepped out of the fire pit with his greatsword in hand.

The druids rushed to him and found their bodies frozen, held to the ground by stinging brambles that cut their flesh. The Thornspeaker rose above them all, its voice the deep rumble of the earth itself, and spoke without speaking.

“Witches of the Hallowhearth coven, be expelled from this land! You have earned the ire of the spirit of the forest, and will be welcome here no longer! Begone, false druids!”

Lorthanil watched as his father struck the head of the tallest witch from its neck and sent it tumbling back onto the feasting table. The remaining company howled and tore their skin on the thorns, shrinking away until they became beasts and fled into the wood.

His father, as he knew him, was a giant man with a greatsword at his back and a patch covering his right eye. He was gone from them more often than not, but when he was home he would sit the little Ancient on his knee, and ask him questions he couldn’t answer and tell him stories of the world outside.

One day, early in the morning before the sun was up, Lorthanil saw his father readying his armor for a long journey. He saw the dried meat, the cheese, the hard bread wrapped and stored safely in his leather bag. He saw the beaten chestplate polished and repaired, strapped across father’s chest. He saw the sword oiled and sharpened.

His father was quiet. He heard his mother say his name in her sleep, but it was not in the old language, and meant nothing of acorns and seasons and the budding leaves, so Lorthanil forgot it frequently.

He followed his father into the breaking dawn. “I’m going to be gone for a little while.” he said, in his quiet voice. “You have to look after Rae for me until I get back.”

This was how it usually went. His father would leave before the sun was truly up, his mother would wake, and sigh, and the two of them would take to the Hill and look after the other Stewards and each other until his adventure was done and he returned home.

But it was spring now, thought Lorthantil, looking around their home. The ground was wet from rain, the earliest flowers had already begun to bloom, and the trees that stood tall against the sky opened their eyes and groaned and creaked and shook the snow from their branches.

It was time for an Ancient to have adventures too.

Lorthanil followed his father into the mountain, many paces behind so he would not be seen. When his father grew suspicious and turned to look, he would freeze, and raise his branches to the sun, and bloom with delicate spring blossoms to fit in with the other trees. His father must not have noticed, because he kept going and did not say anything at all.

Their way was through a pass in the mountain, where the snow was still thick and the wind cut through to the bone. They had been walking for many hours, and Lorthanil saw his father stoop with hunger and weariness. It was then that they came upon the cave of a hill ettin, sitting on a rock outside of his home by a meager fire.

“My name is Malrek,” said his father, “I’ve come a very long way from Vigil Hill and am tired, and hungry after so many miles. Could you spare me a seat, and some of the food you’re cooking at your fire?”

The ettin told him he could sit by his fire and enjoy his company, but the broth he was cooking was too thin, and there was not enough meat to share with human travelers who wandered up into the mountain.

Lorthanil sat by a bramble off the path from them, resting his limbs and drinking in the sunlight that dipped below the mountain tops and cast long shadows along the snow and rock. He listened to them speak of many things. He listened to the ettin speak of things he understood: The change of the rivers at the turn of the seasons; of the newness of the elk and kits and bear cubs that took their first steps; of birds returning to the island from the mainland to the south. He listened to his father talk of blood and battle and the rolling tide; of his woman back home and the days stretched out before them like a woodland path.

He watched the ettin watch his father, and stir his pot of too-thin broth, and marveled at the size of his limbs and brow, not much smaller than an Ancient’s.

The two of them sat and talked until the sun went down completely, and the ettin climbed to his feet and stretched his arms over his head. “You have been very good company, Malrek of Vigil Hill, but my soup is not yet done, and I have no other meat to keep my belly full. You are unfortunate in that there are many dangers in the mountain, and when I am done eating you, there will be no bones or flesh to find.”

The ettin reached for his club, but Malrek was much faster. He had his greatsword in his hand before he was on his feet; a gleam of steel under the growing moonlight. Lorthanil watched between his branches as the two circled one another, his father dancing out of the way at the ettin’s heavy swings.

It was hardly more than a moment, it seemed, that the ettin stumbled, and turned too late, and his father drove his blade into the giant’s eye. The mountains echoed with its howling cry, and the rumble of earth and rock as it fell to its knees in pain and defeat.

“Don’t kill me!” The ettin begged. “Take your blade from my eye and leave me. I have nothing to offer you, but if you let me live you may travel unhindered, and the mountain will be good to you, and bother you no longer.”

Lorthanil knew there was good in this. The mountain had many dangers, those visible to humans and not. The snows and trees could bury his father forever if they wanted to, he knew. But a promise of safety from the ettins of the mountain could let him rest for awhile, and regain his strength, and be bothered no longer.

His father saw this too, for he was wise about these things. When he pulled his blade from the ettin, its eye came with it, glittering and black like ice.

He saw a family, a mother with her daughter and husband nearby, wading into the water with so many others to cry for help. Even the boats were on fire. The clung to each other, eyes wide, looking for a way out. The very banks of the river seemed to snap at them with unforgiving jaws and all of them, huddled close, stood still and waited for hope to come back to them.

Charred bodies littered the road. Cracks in the marble once lined with moss now glowed red, and burned the bottoms of his feet as he ran. He could feel the soles of his shoes sticking to the stone, eyes filled with tears from the stinging smoke.

The archway to the temple was flooded with people, shoving and elbowing their way through to the portals. He saw the priestesses standing above them, his sister among them, begging their patience and order as they held the way open.

Her silvery eyes fixed on him as he pushed closer and she hopped down off the rim of the moonwell, lily-white hair clinging to her face with sweat.

“You must go.” He heard her voice far away. “Into the portal with the rest of them, please.”

She pulled him down to her height, planting a kiss on his forehead with chapped lips. “Elune guide your path, Corvis. I will find you when everyone is safe.”

He looked behind him. He could still see them in the water, pressed against the stone, begging for help. Their cries followed him as he stepped through the portal, sick to his stomach, wondering if he should have gone back.

A whimper of pain escaped his lips when he tried to move. He could see bandages on his arms, crawling up his arms and chest, and he couldn’t move. Please no, he tried to speak. Not the fire, please.

“Oh?” An unfamiliar voice drew closer. “You shouldn’t be awake just yet, Mr. Snowcloak. You suffered some pretty nasty burns last night. It’s best you sleep through the worst of it.”

He tried to shake his head. He was dreaming, just dreaming, but he didn’t want to go back. He could still see his sister climbing back to the moonwell, shoulder to shoulder with the other priestesses, hurrying people to a safety they themselves would never reach.

“Just count to ten for me and you’ll be back under, alright? One… two… three…”

Not again. Corvis shook his head. I don’t want to dream anymore.

“Four… five… six…”

The protest died on his lips. Heavy lids, breathing steady, bandaged hands curled in defiant fists.

There would have been the canal in the heart of the city. There would have been the marble walk, the pillars of the temple, the staggering ancients that swayed their ivy beards from side to side while they walked. There would have been the winding wooden towers of the craftsman’s terrace, and the howling oak that the worgen called their home. The tree shaped like a roaring bear where the boardwalk connected. There would have been sentinels at the eastern gate, practicing with their glaives.

And there would have been fire. So much fire, and the stink of death. Every time he closed his eyes.

“Rae?” Quiet, soft, thick with sleep. Malrek shuffled up behind her, resting a calloused hand on her hip.

“You’re up.” She smiled, busying herself with the packs. He’d come in with the ships that morning, when dawn’s rosy fingers stretched out across the harbour and paved the streets with new light. He stank of tar and sweat and brine.

Malrek cleared his throat. “Any coffee?” He slipped away from her, crossing the floor to paw through their food stores by the hearth. “And what are you doing?”

The drawback of a wayward man. He’d left on some salvaging mission before she was awake nearly a week earlier; hunting down rumors off the coast of Kul Tiras aboard a schooner he’d talked his way onto. The Lady’s Piety, or something like that. A privateer vessel bought out by a merchant several years before. The name, no doubt, was a shabby attempt at currying the favor of the tidesages, upon whose blessings a crew would gladly sail.

The Inquisitor had missed a lot sailing with the jacks, and more than that acting as a forward scout in Zuldazar the week before. And skulking around Stormwind in beggar’s clothes the week before that. A litany of felt absences that picked away at her, flickering in and out like the radio static that kept them connected.

“We’re trying a new approach, shona.” She heard him hum behind her, smiling at the familiar nickname. “One for Dave, one for Raysse, two extras for anyone who wants one. Maybe Acinovath? He’s my new boss, you know.”

Two mugs set on the table. A kettle by the fire. “I’m your boss.”

“One of many.”

“Don’t be crabby, babe.” His tone was almost playful.

“I’m not being crabby!” Rae tilted her head to the side, a little pout growing on her lips. “I’m just worried.”

“About what?” Malrek’s became serious. He was at her back again, arms around her waist, planting kisses along the nape of her neck.

“About this.”

She tied the first pack off with a leather cord, setting it aside at the other end of the table. It occurred to her that she could stitch names into each of them if she really wanted. Your name, your pack. Don’t lose it. No exceptions.

“We can’t let another patrol like that happen again.” she said, “We have to be more careful.”

“We will be.” Kisses on the back of her neck. “I’ll be there.”

“Yeah?”

“Mhm.”

“You promise?”

He stopped, looking over her carefully organized supplies. The empty, expensive bags. The kettle was boiling behind them, two lonesome mugs waiting on the counter. The basin out back she’d insisted he wash in as soon as he got there.

Orange and red, sunset rays like summer roses, cast a warm glow over her skin. He pulled her closer.

They were pushing recruits through faster these days. He knew it. Almost everyone in his squad knew it. Between the blood trolls and the saber-rattling of the Alliance, the rank and file were dropping faster than they had in years. “Fresh meat”, they called the new boys, and each of them barely spent a month in training before they were given an armband, swore an oath to the King, and shuffled off to their post.

Jia’tul was smaller than most trolls his age. He was slender and a little short; more like a Darkspear than a Zandalari, and he’d heard a lifetime of that since the day they all started getting their growth spurts.  Good for ridicule, but… also good for scouting.

He left the warport on foot earlier than day. Raptors were too obvious that close, and he had to scale a fair bit of rock to get to the post they’d carved out long ago. All he had with him was his knife, his rope, his bedroll and enough salted saurolisk meat to last him the two days he was meant to stay.

It wasn’t safe, but at least it was short. Every scout camp back with a similar report: More men, more supplies, more barricades. They weren’t building a fortress down in Xibala, but they definitely weren’t prepared to abandon it. It sounded to him like they just wanted to keep an eye on things. Not so bad. Not like the way they built their ships was a secret, after all.

The little scout looked up at the canopy, shielding his eyes from the dying sun. It’d be darker on this side of the cliff than anywhere else. A boon to him, but it also meant he had to prepare things a little early. No fires, of course. Try to do your best work when you don’t have a shadow. Stash yourself during the day when it’s bright.

Jia’tul pulled a strand of beads from his belt, sliding them one by one through his fingers. The little skull at the end swayed with every movement; its wide, unblinking eyes staring back at him as he prayed.

“Just gotta stay de one night, an I’m all done.” He sighed, holding the skull at eye level. “If Bwonsamdi be seein it fit to let me alone out here, ya? Just gotta keep me spirit outta him sights. Not as hard as I t--”

It took him a moment to register what happened. The pain was slow, spreading out from the palm of his hand like fire, a steady stream of blood pouring down the palm of his hand. Jia’tul let out a piercing howl, clutching at the arrow shaft protruding from just below his knuckles.

He staggered to his feet just in time to get hit again, another arrow embedding itself in his shoulder. The fletching. Blue and black, just like his beads. Just like the flames in the eyes of his little skull, discarded in the dirt.

The third one hit him in the stomach and he stumbled back, a cry for help caught in his throat. Something jumped from a tree maybe thirty paces in front of him, dressed in black and gold and carrying, what, a longbow? How had he not seen?

The night elf made his way up the secluded path, knocking an arrow as he grew closer. A smile split by a scar on the upper lip. He looked too cheerful for this. Jia’tul slumped forward.

“Well now, old boy. Very nice to say hello.” The ranger spoke to him in broken orcish, his voice low and soft; almost soothing. Jia’tul reached out, groping in the dirt for his prayer beads. The empty eyes of the skull seemed bigger, then.

The ranger nudged them closer with his foot. “I will not deny you that.” He cooed, still holding his arrow at the ready. “Where you’re headed, you’re going to want them with you.”

Somewhere, far off, Jia’tul heard the deep laughter of the Loa mix with the sound of a tightening bowstring, and felt Bwonsamdi’s cold fingers around his neck as the ranger drew the fletching to his cheek.

This is the end, he thought, clutching the beads to his chest. What was the point of all those prayers? What was the point of any of it, if you could draw the short straw one morning and end up dead by evening? Where was the mercy he’d asked for, made offerings for, all his life? What a waste. What a waste.

The ranger released his arrow.

Last night she had a dream. Her brother in his knight’s armor, auburn hair tied at the back of his neck. He was standing on the shores of Northrend; so cold the icicles clung to his nose and eyelashes. She saw his sword in his hand, shield gone. His left arm hung limp at his side. The great dark figure that tore through the ice towards him was fiercely hungry, and its roars like an avalanche echoed off the white cliffs.

She yelled for him to run, but her voice never reached him. He crumpled like a doll into the sand, stained red, a cry for home caught in his throat.

Did they see it the way she had? She wondered. The way her brother had? Sequestered in the safety of Eversong, her greatest threat the dwindling Shadowpine tribe to the south of the city. The twisting curling spread of red-gold fingers above fair tree trunks. The bleed into deep green, into sickly blue, into the gate that forbade them from traveling into the Plaguelands.

Did they see the elves that fought beside them in Northrend? At the gates of Icecrown where fathers and sons, orcs and humans, were no different from one another in the bulwark they formed against cruelty and death? Or did they just see the banner of the Horde, black on red, snapping in the icy wind?

If what they said was true, those sturdy and steadfast soldiers of the Alliance, they could not have seen it more differently. Wistful dreams of revenge against their most hated enemies, even those who stood shoulder to shoulder with them in another time. “They hurt you,” she heard in his voice, “and they hurt me too.” Their nightmare both did and did not include her, then and now, and it was hard not to feel it settling in her chest.

A low murmur pulled her back to reality; to the ragged outpost at the northern point of the swamp. To the damp ground and the hum of bugs above the water, the spit of wood in a fire, to the muffled chatter of the night watch.

Malrek mumbled something in his sleep, some nonsense, and ran his hand down her side before letting it fall, without ceremony, back into the mess of blankets. A strand of sandy blonde hair obscured the spider web of scars across his eye; an empty socket where the other was brilliant blue, and as familiar to her as her own skin. She brushed it out of the way.

Maybe it mattered, maybe it didn’t. The ties she had back home, all but severed. The dead lain still in their graves, unable to protest or approve. The willowy spectre of battles seared into the minds of those who lived through them, unable to recall exactly whose faces looked back from across the field.

Eventually they’d all have to come to terms with the damage done by others, to themselves, to the world they lived in. Eventually more ties would have to be cut and remade, wounds healed, memories recognized as just that. It was inevitable, she thought, and necessary. For their past; for their future.  But not right now.

Rae settled down in the blankets, safe in a pair of arms that pulled her closer.