#izuldriah

The letter had arrived by courier, which by all accounts may as well herald the heavy words within. It was much alike when they had first met, how their words were formal, terse, yet yearning. Then he wrote with an eager pen, putting to paper words he had experienced for the first time. When she was mysterious, dangerous, and when by all accounts he was content as a paramour. But that was many years ago, different letters and a different author.

“My lord,” began the servant, a woman of fine breeding, who by all accounts would have been a handmaiden for his betrothed should she have resided with him in the Netherholde. Now she was a woman, dedicated to a foreign mistress whom she had never met. “Would you wish me to read you the letter?”

Izulde had half a heart to deny her, to leave the letter on the table, or if he was in a greater penchant of melancholy to toss it into the flames. They were connected, Azriah and he, by a link more significant than anyone could ever know. Yet in their absence, there was not even a single pull at the tether. He had wished her to come after him, yet that was not her way. Her way began with formality. “Dearest Lord Izulde Netherstar,” began the servant, speaking for his beloved, which sounded more strange than his heart could bare.

As she continued, to read the letter aloud, Izulde sank deeper into his leather chair. His thoughts had begun to drown out her words. He yearned to analyze, to put away feelings and weigh considerations. Yet there was something deeper within him that subdued reason and gave heart to emotion. The feeling was not that of love, for he knew well enough the sharp and bitter twang of Azriah’s love, but something else. He heard the words read aloud, knowing deep down there was part of him missing, that was so close he could reach it.

“If you do not attend me, I will assume you have settled in your decision … and we will part ways … though it pains me to face that reality.” There was a pause, a hanging moment in the air as the servant wishes for her lord’s response. “My Lord, shall I prepare your departure to Dalaran?” The pause continued and the silence hung like the heavy mist of the Emberlight. A silence too dark for someone to see.

“My lord, what will you respond? My lord?”

Delivered to the estates of the Netherholde -

Lord Netherstar,

Tonight, I address you as Mari’thur of Quel’thalas. You have earned this title for your tireless devotion to our proud nation and eternal commitment to protecting her borders.

I call upon you now to answer the call of our high home. I speak to you from the front lines of the Thalassian Pass, where such a force of Legion gathers as to blot out the horizon. 

The Sunguard was successful in preserving Tyr’s Hand, but it came at the cost of our Argent allies. It is with great regret and seething rage that I say I knew this would come to pass. Reddings’ loyalties were plain enough in the Winter of Woe, and it was a great gamble to hope that such might have changed.

She has withdrawn from the accord, and with it our support for the Thalassian Pass is gone. We stand alone now at the gates to our homeland.

I do not often use this word, but I will now to hopefully illustrate to you the gravity of this situation. Please send troops. Rally your Blacksuns, the Bloodied Squall, your SIlverdawns and other banner houses. 

I once thought that I might live to see a thousand years in this plane of existence.

I know naught now.

Signed,

Postscript: Whatever warmth my heart stands to hold is yours now and always. I love you.

This is an RP log between @felthier and I that we decided to share! 

Lady Azriah Thelryn rested her hands on the balcony railing as she stood overlooking the sprawling lake behind Goldenshade Manse. Long shadows were cast beneath the trees, and the last streaks of golden light twinkled on the wind-blown waters as the sun was setting beyond the mountains. That same breeze rippled through her midnight hair, and stirred the silken skirts around her ankles. Her jewelry sparkled with the last threads of light, though her left ring-finger was notably bare. She wore something hovering between melancholy and longing on her lovely features, with those full lips turned slightly down at the corners and those chartreuse eyes gazing off into the distance. Her long ears pricked and flickered at every passing sound, though each was absent of the familiar tread of the Lord Izulde Netherstar.

It had been a long journey, one made by saddle from the misty vales of the Emberlight, to the warm spring boughs of Goldenshade. The journey could have been aided by magics of teleportation, but Izulde chose to abstain. Magic was in his blood, their blood, and despite all of this their bond had remained. It was much alike a long tether pulled taunt, where the slightest flick of emotion sent a ripple across the wire. He had felt it, felt the dour melancholy that had plagued them both. He arrived, both to welcome and quiet contemplation, where the servants wondered if this would be his last visit. By all accounts he could not rightly answer that question, but as he ascended into her solar, he found her waiting, overlooking the lake where they had spent their summer. She was lovely then, as she always was, but his eyes saw her once more, just as he had seen her the first time. “Azriah,” he called, his voice cutting through the distant silence that had been between them these many weeks.

“My dearest Azriah,

I hope this letter finds you well rested after your expedition to the Broken Isles. From what I have gathered you’ve begun the process of returning to your office within the Dawnspire. No doubt you have already heard what my nephew wishes to plan and we have already begun negotiations of financing. I will spare you the details, but home and prestige have remained intact and the young Archon is free to conduct warfare as he chooses.

Though our last meeting has been months apart, I will attempt my best to give you an update of what has kept me so preoccupied. The first snows have begun to set within the Emberlight and Lady Idrya has seen to the closure of the Blacksun Gate. The eastern villages of Heartsong and Leabel have both begun to empty as they do each year and the populations hide away into the mountainous Blacksun Citadel until first thaw. I do wish that one year you will permit Aeriana to winter here in the Netherholde, she will not find a more majestic view in all of Quel’Thalas than looking over the Whispwinter Mountains.

Some politicking has kept me busy as of late. I was given the privilege, if one could call it such, to attend a masked affair last weekend in City. I believe I told you of the ball some weeks back and your silence on the subject of our ball only makes me suppose your curiosity is too great for words. I did not wish you to feel the need to attend so I made adequate excuses for your absence, speaking praises on your zeal and love for country. There was one Lady Swallowsong, who dared to treat me some newly mourning widow, whose wife’s departure from his life in society might as well been the signal for an opportunity to win the graces of the Emberlight, or my fortune. She was pretty enough, blessed in both amiable assets but obviously the victim of poor tutelage at a young age. I took pity on her for there is no honor in disliking someone whose brain is so different than your own. Luckily enough the party was well attended and my arm was freed from her clutch.

You know how I adore masked affairs, there is some much allure and mystery, and while others choose to believe their mask might hide who they are, my agents worked tirelessly for me to memorize attires, colors, and voices, even those who wished to dye their hair to give secrecy at who they are behind the mask. Oh my love, we would have shared such a banter of whispers and I could have felt your hunting gaze even from afar.

Lord Flamewood attempted to lecture me the importance of my duty in the House of Nobles, but I reminded him that the woman of which he has carried on a torrid affair was being necked by some besaron from Quel’Danas. He gave me a huff and carried himself away, swearing the whip the both of them.  

There was another Lady Sol’thoel, who by all accounts is a woman deserving of praise, who drank too much and danced to freely. Her husband, some fifth son who inherited after the fall, was nothing to note, despite his unfortunate voice and even worse ability to carry a conversation. One could tell that it was not he who would free his lady wife from her bodice later that eve.

In the gardens, outside those lovers who thought to slip away from the dance unnoticed were interrupted by two gallant errants eager to win their renown by a display of swordsmanship. If I would not have sworn to be on my best behavior, perhaps I would have given them a show that you would have heard about prior to my letter, but I was content to drink my wine and critique their form. Some bravo from the Evergrove wished to outstrip a city knight of his honor and the two quarreled for the better part of an hour before the guardsmen pulled them away. No doubt their great strut of feathers had earned someone’s affection to lick their wounds.

I did my fair share of dancing, eager to remind my world that I both adept with my footwork as I am with my pen. My partners were gracious enough, if not too eager for the embrace and to slow to transition from my arms. Towards the end, I met with an agent of mine who I had come to see in the first place. There is a treatise about that I need to discuss with you for great length and am in need of your skills in a particular area that I dread to say outstrips my own. A quarter till two I summoned my carriage to depart alone, to the woe of many.

I am reminded at last of how cold the mountains here are in the winter. Even behind stone walls and paned glass, there is a chill in the emptiness of my bed. I know your Archon will soon declare war, but I believe you have a free night to spare before you are spirited away once again to those forsaken isles in the sea. Should you come, I believe you will find yourself well delighted.

Always yours,

Izulde”

Entry 05. What are the most meaningful relationships in your character’s life? Who, or what, are they with, and how does your character show it?

Five years of glorious sex, soul-baring conversations, endless gifts, fights to rival the Nether's worst tempests, a child, a marriage, and a blood oath. Five years that felt impossibly long even to a near-immortal soul. Five years, and Lady Azriah Thelryn still has not yet declared "I love you" to Lord Izulde Netherstar.

Not once.

Years ago she let him see that corner of her thoughts that beheld those words and felt nothing but revulsion. Love is a weakness, she had said. The surest way to grant another unending power over you.

Those scars she wore from Hadrian Illythien were old and deep. Never again, she promised herself. Promised herself, promised herself, promised herself, until her heart was as smooth and opaque as water-sculpted stone.

The sea whittled away the stone, abrasive and destructive. The mist-heavy mountains gave her clean air to breathe and space to heal, but she could never ensure that the surface would be as smooth and immaculate as it had been before the sea left her choking and gasping.

Entry 01. Describe a time when your character felt it was kinder to lie to someone they cared about than to reveal a painful or upsetting truth.

"How I see you in her, darling." Those words slid like velvet from Lady Azriah's carmine lips. The matriarch of the Goldenshade grounds they dwelled upon shifted her eyes from her cackling, shrieking daughter to regard Lord Izulde Netherstar, where he sat poised like a mountain lion atop the chaise with one of his favorite tomes. His chartreuse eyes snapped up from the ancient pages to meet the similarly vibrant gaze of his beloved, and he flicked a dark brow upward. "Does she?" He prompted tentatively. "Oh, yes, indeed." Azriah assured him, though her attention was drawn back to those onyx curls whipping about the two year old as she ran, and the adventurous flame bright in her teal eyes. Her mind's eye drifted toward the memory of a certain Captain at the helm of his ship, dark curls rustling in the wind. "You see how she has your sense of entitlement," She said with a smirk, and waved a moon-white hand in the direction of Aeriana as she gloated over the toy she stole from her playmate. In short order, a great wail rose up from the other child, hastiy quelled by a well-placed soothing spell. Izulde trailed his gaze along the direction of the gesture and bit back the ghost of a smile. He rolled his eyes. "Aeriana, does that belong to you?" He questioned with a pointed look at the horse figurine in her tiny hands. "Yes," She lied with a devilish grin on her face. "No," She teased. Azriah knew someone who liked to take things that did not belong to him, and he was not the lordling at her side. She pushed the thought of the Captain away as she turned to regard Izulde, leaving the task of playing bad cop entirely up to him. "Then you know it is wrong to steal." He continued in that mild tone. "We do not take, we earn. Perhaps Avela will share her toy with youif you earn it by asking for it nicely." His voice caught an edge that sufficed to sort the toddler out. She returned the toy in short order with something of a grumble and found something else to do. At last, Izulde shifted his attention back to Azriah only to find those lovely features deep in contemplation. Regardless of whose firebrand blood Aeriana possessed, Azriah decided, Izulde had earned his place as her father.

Telchis? No, he’s very loyal to the person he’s with. In the past perhaps but with all the changes he’s been through, he doesn’t particularly desire to be in that type of situation.