#discorpse

Time had truly not treated the rogue death knight any good; gorges cut through his face, black and sickly, and his hair, matted and beyond repair.  Gone was the plate armor, the stains of his experiments.  No ghoul or geist slinked at his side, mouth open and drooling blight.  Instead, he sat bowed and trapped against his will, glowing runed chains binding him head and foot.  Through the greasy strands of dark hair, his lichfire eyes dimly stared at the stone tiles, a parody of the fervor that had fueled his defection and torture of souls.

He made not a sound as Rey approached, not a single shift of finger or muscle as the small death knight sat across from him.  For a moment, Rey simply watched, lips pursed and thoughts left to contemplate how different two Scourge knights had ended up so differently.  One, a shell of man bent to the will of the Undercity, and another, a phantom sundered from his power.

Maybe they weren’t so different after all.

Rey leaned forward, knees knocking into Solis’ but still not a flicker of life.  The closer he got, Rey could see the bones stretching skin, the blood dried to crust on rags and flesh.  One look at the man’s mouth had Rey biting back a frown and a swift glance towards the chains.  The measures the Undercity took to lock up death knights, huh.  Had to do something to keep them trapped and hungry.

And yet…The shadow clerics should have been able to take any information they wanted.  Was this a test?  Another trial to prove his worth and allegiance?  Rey frowned as he scanned Solis’ blank, slack face. Or was something more brewing under the surface?

Leaning back, Rey held a sigh back and let his eyes fall closed.  In the darkness, he let his body relax, muscle by muscle, until everything beat as one.  The silence drifted beside him like an old friend, and he reached out to the contained mind of Solis as gentle as a feather.  At once, it was like digging through molasses, through thick mud sucking him down at each step inward.  Sinking into the muck, Rey gritted his teeth and dragged his way through the mental decay.  One step.  It fought against him, slowing.  Second step.  His feet sunk down into the mire.  Third step.  The sludge clung to every inch of skin.

Rey stood still, straightening his back and eyes falling closed.  A single, unneeded breath.  Was this what stopped the clerics from searching through Solis’ mind?  Or was this the wreckage of their hunt, the scattered dark remnants of a mind picked clean by vultures?  No, they had to have done their work already then why suspect more?  The questions turned over in Rey’s quiet thoughts, Reya’s silence making the darkness ever more perturbing.

The sludge still sunk below his feet, dragging him down slowly into the unforgiving depths.  No doubt the others had panicked—ah.  Solis did have quite the fascination with fear.

Inch by inch, Rey let himself sink down, let the darkness pass over his hands up to his shoulders and finally to the very top of his head.  It sunk into his braided hair, filling every crevice.  It pulled him deeper, farther away from the surface.  It pressed against him from all sides, unforgiving.

Still, Rey held the singular spot of panic and fear tight and contained. Calm.  Solis might be strong.  Solis might be dangerous.  Solis might be a razed blade, bare and sharp under the mire.  It didn’t matter.

Rey opened his eyes.

Solis stared back.

Lichfire met lichfire.  Shallow, sickly, dim against bright, blazing fire.  Muck turned to dull darkness, their feet flat on a slick floor of shadow.  Gone was the oppressive barrier, leaving behind two death knights held aloft within the mindscape.  Rey did not look away, holding Solis’ gaze captive.  The mind reflected the body?  The body reflected the mind? The manic glint in Solis’ eyes did nothing to assuage his suspicions.

“You.”

Instinct caught Solis’ wrists.  His hands twisted like claws, scratching at Rey’s throat. Even injured, even broken, Solis was larger, heavier and this was his domain.  Rey gritted his teeth, feet sliding on the smooth floor.

Solis leaned in, eyes wide and face splitting with a snarl.  “You’re the one who betrayed me!  The one who tossed me to these foul dogs!”  His leg shot out and snapped Rey’s feet out from under him.  A heavy thump as they collided to the ground, vying for power. “You piece of shit—coming to me with fake names and shadows—“

Lunging, Solis struck Rey.  Biting back a growl, Rey twisted Solis off him.  Solis snapped his eyes back to Rey and roared, “You wanted the Scourge’s power returned too!  I see through your fucking lies!”

Rey hesitated.  In a flash, he could smell the ice, the shadows, the decay.  Nachtigall’s magic, burning, soul spilling through his fingers.  Dark, hollow steps in blackness—where?

SMACK.  

Solis’ knuckles caught him in the cheek.  Snarling like a caged animal, he pounced, knocking Rey back and fingers closing on his vulnerable throat.  Where once Solis’ voice came from a single mortal mouth became a thunderous cacophony of threats and murderous intent.  He flung insults like daggers, accusations like swords, and his hands ever close tight.  No doubt he will bruise when he wakes, Rey noted, mind gone somewhere safe against the cold around his neck.  He’s thinking in poetry when Solis spat a question in his face.

“Who are you?!”

More comes tumbling after, words, words, and more words.  But Rey paid them no mind, instead lost in the simple question.  Had it been anyone else asking him, he knew his answer true but with Solis…

Something must have shown on his face because the pressure let up and air whistled back into his dead lungs.  He could feel the weight of Solis’ gaze upon him, pinpricks of fury and suspicion.  For a second, Rey thought of lying—if it could be called lying—and seeing the mischief wrought from it.

But—“Wraith.”

Solis snapped back like Rey’s skin was a white hot iron.  Suddenly, he was across the way, the landscape warping to his fear.  Rey slowly sat up, massaging his throat with a frown, and Solis uncurled from his crouch.  When Rey looked up, he felt his chest twist at the fear and the reverence whispering in Solis’ face, shadowed by shock and…disbelief?

Hands shaking, Solis breathed out, “You—You are Wraith?” Rey only stared and Solis burst out into a fit of hysterical laughter. “The knowledge, the drive, the things you taught me…it all makes sense but…”

The silence felt like a living thing, oppressive and tingling.  Rey stood carefully and Solis’ wide-eyed stare took him in from head to toe.  For once, Rey had no taunts on his tongue, no barbed words behind his well-crafted cage.  Yes, Solis.  Look at me.  And Rey watched as Solis’ suspicious stare turned thoughtful.

“They don’t know, do they?” Solis asked, voice cracking, and Rey stirred from his reverie with a jolt.  “Hah…You…I remember looking up to you.  Hearing whispers of your conquests and abilities, how could I not?

“But now.  Look at you now.” Solis’ lips curled viciously and Rey felt something rise in his throat like a cobra’s hiss.

Solis stepped forward, confident again and gloating. “You’re not the Wraith I knew.  You’re not the death knight who had my fellows tremble.  No.  You’re nothing and you’re in my domain.”

The ground trembled and rocked and split and Rey quickly side-stepped away from the growing crevice.  Solis followed him, spine bent and mouth ticking.  Another shattering rumble. Rey jumped.  Solis prowled.

“You! Playing pet to the Undercity!” Solis taunted, sending Rey smashing to the floor with a wave of his hand. “Weak!  Worthless! And ignoring your calling!”

Rey snapped his head up from the ground. “W-What?”  The feral grin on Solis’ face widened, a rictus smile on his hallow face.

“You’ve been away too long, Wraith.” Solis answered, dripping venom. “You’ve grown stagnant, a shade.  You truly fit your name. And look!  Easily thrown around like a puppet!  I wonder who holds your strings…”

A hand wrenched Rey up by his throat.  That seed of unbidden fear flared in his chest, memories flashing behind his eyes.  No gauntlets, no, not this time, no Light, no Light, no Light—

“Pretty little thing you’ve gotten tied around you.”  Rey stared at Solis’ grin, terror gripping him for a second.  He couldn’t possibly see Hael’s— “How long have you been leashed?”  

Oh.

Despite Solis’ words, relief nearly drowned out Rey’s senses. Mustering himself, Rey let a smirk slip onto his face and replied, “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

The hand on his throat tightened and Rey gritted his teeth against the fear.  Calm.  Calm.  Calm.

Solis spat in his face. “Powerful little Wraith brought low by a paladin—” No. “—Can’t even fight back against me!  How does it feel? Knowing he’s still captured you—” Get out. “—Maybe I should contact one of my friends and let them know where he is.  So they can bring him back—” No. “And spin that Light holding you anew—“

Rey opened his eyes and stood up, his hands striking towards Solis’ slack and unconscious face.  Gripping that horrid skull in his hands, Rey dug his nails in and shadows raged through his blood and there’s only a few ways to kill a death knight and this was one—

Screeching from its confines, Solis’ soul dripped from his hollow eyes, nostrils, and mouth.  A vacuum.  Rey reaped the soul from the air, his claws, his shadows, tearing it to pieces, shreds, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing—

Gone.

A knock on the door.  A screech as it opened.

“A little extravagant but well done.  Report’s due tomorrow evening.”

The door swung closed and Rey stared at his bloody hands and the hollow corpse.  Weak.  Pet.  Caged.  

The returning warmth of Reya’s presence restrained him from further bloodshed.  Absently, Rey massaged his throat, feeling the bruises left by Solis’ creeping fingers.  Feeling the scar ringing his throat like a collar.  The runeblade felt like an anvil against his back.  Somewhere, he recalled hollow steps on black ice and a glow and a gate and an offer.

But first…

He sits at the table for hours, trying to figure out how to make it work, and he just can’t, and he feels like a student again.

Or maybe that’s because everything lately has been reminding him of school, of being a student– of how stupid he–

Of Langdon.

It all comes back to that, to him.

Dahl sits at the table leaning over the spread carcass of a pigeon construct he has yet to roll together into an activated mechanical creature. Is it a carcass if it’s in the process of being created? It certainly looks like an unravelled dead thing.

He feels a memory overtake him, of being seated like this over something nearly finished but not, head in his hands, and of a warm body standing behind him. He feels abruptly younger, both more and less insecure, feels the memories of hands on his hips, that solid body pressed flush against his back, hot breath against his sensitive ear as the man asks what he’s having trouble with.

“My little genius,” he remembers, alongside the thrill of being touched by the only person whose touch he’d wanted more of– remembers never getting more than this, but wanting it. The slow tease, flirting, seduction, the touching, all of which had felt like barely restrained desire at the time.

Or at least he’d hoped that’s what it was.

His mind, disjointed and tired, superimposes the memories of Langdon’s hands and warmth and breath over the reality of working on a metal construct at a table. The memory warms him, makes him feel teased and young all over again, which in turn makes him hate himself.

He wonders if there will ever be a time when he isn’t pathetic, wonders what he’d do if Langdon showed up now.

Would he hate the man who ruined his life? Would he be able to hate him in person the way he can from afar? Because he does. He hates Langdon. It’s a cold crystallizing hatred, ice cold fury that makes certain words and thoughts and actions freeze as they leave him. “Teacher,” he only ever spits before it freezes on his tongue. He can’t go to school, can’t take classes, take mentors, for fear of freezing solid on the spot.

He’d finally managed to return to Dalaran a few times after years of avoiding it, and he’d died there. Nothing to do with Langdon, he knows, but it feels related anyway. A lesson that he’s right to be wary, to avoid the things that hurt. Overcoming your fears gets you killed, his mind tells him, in the same breath it tells him that overcoming fears is the only way he’s gotten to where he is, to being happy, to feeling anything like free.

Being killed wasn’t so bad, he reminds himself, and dying is always an option. It’s always an option.

He shakes his head to clear that sticky clinging impulse from the forefront. Nothing he can do to rid it completely. It’s like a misbehaving pet inside his mind. “Dying would be easier than whatever it is you’re doing,” it says, every day, as he corrals it back into the mostly soundproof room he’s built at the back of his mind. “It sure would,” he says, every day, as he locks it away and returns to the difficult tasks that make up his life. Most of them, these days, are worth doing. Even if they’re hard.

A thought flits through his mind, not for the first time, that perhaps that little suicidal monster in his mind was weaker before Langdon. He knows it existed, but he wonders how much Langdon fed it, how much it grew, and if the time between then and now has fully reverted it to the level of power it had over him before, or if some part of its growth was permanent.

A thought: how much of that damage is permanent?

He’s been working through some things, finally, talking to Dyrihm and Nae and realizing the ways Langdon affected him. Realizing that Langdon’s faked seduction, his manipulation and secret hatred, has wrecked Dahl in ways he never wanted to consider. Realizing that he wasted years he could have been with Dyr thinking that no matter what it seemed like, no one was ever going to see him the way he wanted, and least of all a man Dahl was already interested in. Least of all a man who laughed with him, and worked with him, and touched him gently in simple but implying ways– a hand against his hip, a body pressed flush to his back as he showed Dahl how to fight, breath in his ear–

He feels like he shouldn’t enjoy those things anymore, like they should have been ruined by a man who warped them to use him, all to take his creations and sell them behind his back. Somehow they aren’t ruined, and Dahl feels strange about that, too, like maybe it all wasn’t so bad if it didn’t thoroughly traumatize him. Or like maybe he’s just that stupid, that even though Langdon pretended to want him, faked desire, touched him constantly and hated the whole of it, all for rights to mechanical designs– all for money– that even despite it all Dahl would still lean into the touch if it returned.

And when he’d caught Langdon doing it, the man had made an excuse– said he was going to tell Dahl– said it was meant to be a surprise, so, Surprise! He was able to sell them because his name was known. Dahl wouldn’t have had such luck selling his own creations. Doesn’t Dahl see? It was all for him.

And Dahl, well.

Dahl’s stupid.

He’d believed it.

That wasn’t the falling out. That wasn’t the end.

Langdon had put his hands on Dahl’s hips– not his shoulders like a normal person, but his hips– and bent down to look into Dahl’s eyes, and lied easily directly to his face. His eyes had crinkled with what Dahl thought was affection, what he now knew to be a different kind of joy. A delight not at Dahl’s presence but at how easy he was to convince, to manipulate.

And everything lately is reminding him.

The obvious reminders– Nae ran off to try to kill Langdon, failed, came home injured; Langdon’s name came up again, and again; the nightmare from Rey of Langdon’s face; one of Dahl’s constructs at the party, sold by Langdon, and the receipt they’d found that proved it; Dyrihm wanting to know more; Frost should know about it too; Thadric asking how Dahl wants Langdon to die, and offering to help. The less obvious ones too, like Thor’del constantly reminding him of teachers from that school; having to go to Thor’del to ask for help with something he desperately wants to be able to fix for himself but can’t; and Picklet– just… just Picklet. Picklet, whose mannerisms, or attitude, or maybe just his face reminds Dahl of Langdon, which isn’t fair to anyone, least of all Picklet.

Even the way he can’t seem to get this fucking pigeon right reminds him of school.

It’s hard to do metal work without a workshop. He’s adjusted his prosthetics so that his left elbow works like a bolt cutter, and his fingertips double as screwdrivers, and he can use his fingers as pliers or a makeshift socket wrench as needed. He owns a small goblin-made blow torch and hand drill, and a set of magical metal-cutting scissors that he knows he could design a better version of if he still had magic. But he doesn’t own a bandsaw, or a sander, or a drill press, or a hundred other things, and the lack of these tools makes the work harder.

There are things Langdon didn’t lie about.

He was fortunate to have access to the school’s workshop, and without Langdon’s approval he wouldn’t have been allowed to use it at his own discretion, on his own time table, for his own projects. The fact that Langdon’s approval was only given because Langdon benefitted from the arrangement at least as much as Dahl did… well.

The worst part–

That’s not true. It’s not the worst part. But it still stings, still feels raw to know that Langdon wasn’t even a very good liar. He certainly isn’t the best liar Dahl has ever met, nor even the best liar he’s fallen for.

Dyr is objectively a better liar than Langdon ever was.

In hindsight Dahl can see Langdon’s lies. His eyes crinkling could have been genuine affection– and Dahl tells himself no one would be able to tell the difference in the same breath he tells himself he’s the only one who was fooled by it– but in hindsight it was smug delight.

In stark contrast Dahl remembers the first time he truly witnessed Dyr lie, an easy story to a stranger to elicit a desired reaction. The story was perfectly fragmented, with laughter, facial expressions, body language all right and timed without feeling scripted or forced in any way, woven so there was no hint of untruth. No reason to doubt. Eyes crinkling at memories that weren’t real– not at the reaction he elicited, but by the memories fabricated on the spot. Dahl was as taken in by it as anyone, as the stranger, as Nae. Everyone believed it, and later Dahl asked Dyr for more information, to know more. Dyr blinked, laughed, shook his head. “Oh, no, that was bullshit,” he’d said, and Dahl had to sit down to process that.

And because Dahl is stupid, it changed nothing. He trusts Dyr still, though to his knowledge Dyr has never made him regret loving a better liar.

Once you’ve had certain types of people in your life, you’re supposed to know how to deal with them. You’re supposed to know not to trust them. But Dahl’s trust is everywhere and nowhere. Don’t trust the people you want to, only the people who’ve been vouched for. Only trust the people Dyrihm trusts. A better judge of character. A better, more complete person, with a better sense of who to trust. He wonders if liars can sense other liars, and know better than anyone to steer clear of them. He wonders if everyone is a liar, and if that word even means anything at this point.

Dyr’s not A Liar, he tells himself. Dyr’s just a person who knows how to lie better than anyone else he’s ever met. But he doesn’t lie for fun, for cruelty, for the things Langdon lied for. He lies easy, but careful.

“I don’t lie to you,” Dyr would surely say, and Dahl knows that. He knows that. Or he believes that– but that’s the thing. He always believes that. He’s always ready to believe that he’s the exception to the rule, despite knowing that that’s not how rules work.

He truly believes that Dyr is honest with him, which is unchanged by the knowledge that he truly believed the exact same thing of Langdon. And maybe he’s right this time– he certainly thinks he’s right this time– but how is anyone ever able to prove that subjective truth isn’t a lie? Especially when people lie to themselves as well. Dahl does it all the time– who’s to say Dyr doesn’t do it too?

At what point is it actually smarter to just admit you’re stupid and move on?

And is that the lesson he should take from this? Accept that Langdon was right, and he’s stupid, but take it one further and accept that it’s better to be stupid than to be like Langdon? Is that the lesson? Is there a lesson? Or is it all just bullshit. Is it all just cruelty, and he should be working to rid himself of the poison Langdon left in his mind, rather than simply accepting it as fact and slowly letting it kill him.

Langdon wanted Dahl’s ‘genius’– a term Dahl’s never been able to feel comfortable with or fully relate to himself, despite others using it to describe him. They don’t anymore, but they used to. Gifted, a prodigy, a genius, the smartest one in his class. His teachers hated him, apparently, because he was smarter than most of them.

Langdon wanted Dahl’s inventions, wanted to use his genius for his own gain, and everything about Dahl made it easy for him. When the other teachers were mostly stuffy high class elves, who resented his intellect and looked down their noses at his background, who treated him poorly and tried to make him “push his boundaries” in all the least helpful ways– it was easy for Langdon to be the nice one. It was easy to be the friendliest face.

Dahl wonders even now why he took it so far. He could have just been a mentor, a friend. He didn’t need to pretend to–

He didn’t need to.

Dahl was eager enough to please without the touching, without what he still can only call flirting. It was flirting, whether Langdon secretly hated doing it or not.

And he supposes maybe Langdon didn’t hate doing it; only hated the idea of going further with it. Only hated Dahl for enjoying it, for hoping it was real. Maybe manipulating him with touches and words and smiles had been as fun for him as it had been exciting for Dahl. Maybe that’s part of why he did it.

He can’t think on that for long before he starts to wonder if Langdon is somewhere in Dalaran right now, thinking of him, missing him even in some twisted, vile way.

He can’t think on that.

When he’d caught Langdon– not caught him selling Dahl’s work, but really truly caught him, months later. Caught him one evening speaking Thalassian with the other teachers, telling them how pathetic Dahl was, how strange, how stupid. That he was gullible and eager to please and desperate. “If I asked him to kneel for me, he’d open his mouth. Or maybe just skip it and spread his legs,” and “I just have to smile at the stupid fuck and he’ll do anything I want for a month.” And they were laughing. All of them, with the door wide open.

If they’d been speaking common, Dahl would never had known. He wonders now how many conversations about him he walked in on before that, and had no idea.

Dahl had confronted him then, only then, and to this day he has to think of it as their ‘falling out’, because it wasn’t a breakup, and it wasn’t an argument, and it wasn’t getting fired, or expelled. It was all of those, and none.

He’d confronted him, and Langdon hadn’t shown a shred of guilt, no remorse. Dahl grew up with Nae; he knows what that looks like on a person. Langdon didn’t think he’d done anything wrong, continued laughing right at Dahl’s face even when the other teachers had the grace to look embarrassed, nervous, upset.

Langdon showed none of those, instead turned nastier and meaner by the second, telling Dahl in detail how disgusting he’d found Dahl’s interest. It flowed out of him like he’d been holding it in, resisting for years the urge to lash out and strike Dahl to the core. It seemed a relief to finally say it all.

“–How can you be so smart and still so fucking stupid–”

Dahl had taken his things and left. Left the room, the school, Dalaran, Langdon. He hadn’t seen him since, nor heard from him.  

And the worst part–

Maybe it really is the worst part, that Dahl still doesn’t know what he’d do if Langdon showed up. Rey created a nightmare vision of Dahl’s own fears and anxieties for him to practice escaping from, and front and center was Langdon, disappointed in him. After all this time, that’s still so high on the list? Next to being in that house when it felt so empty after Dyr–? Next to his sister, bloody and dead or dying on the floor? Dahl hadn’t been able to move, to leave, to scream or rage against him.

He’d wanted to; wanted to hurt him, wanted to demand answers. But mostly he’d wanted to beg forgiveness, to cling and cry and apologize for leaving even if he’d been right to, even if Langdon was objectively in the wrong, and it’s been years, and it wasn’t even real.

The worst part is knowing that’s probably how he’d react, if Langdon showed up for real. Knowing he’d want to invite him in, want to ask if Langdon had missed him, hold himself at arm’s reach for fear of making the man uncomfortable as though such consideration had ever crossed Langdon’s mind. Knowing that while he wants Langdon to be dead, if he were present for the death, he might try to stop it.

Thadric asked him if he had fantasies of how Langdon would die, and Dahl had told the truth. “I imagine a world without him in it.” What a cheap way of not admitting that imagining Langdon’s last breath still makes his chest tighten.

Part of him wants to be the one to do it.