#tycil

(Art credit @lukelf)

Tycil did not move. She had been perched on the branch of an enormous tree that rose high above the pathways winding through Zul'Aman's forest. A lifetime of training kept her poised there, muscles relaxed; no body could hold tension for that long without betraying itself.

A small green lizard emerged from a knot in the wood and scampered along the branch. It paused beside her hand, flicking its tongue. Sensing no danger, it continued on. Tiny claws clicked softly against leather as it ran across her wrist, over her shoulder, and along the dark fabric covering her back. The creature crossed her neck, climbed over her black hair, and vanished into the foliage beyond.

A creek wound alongside it, fed by waterfalls higher in the mountains. Water rushed over smooth stones, carrying leaves and broken branches downstream. Dense vegetation crowded both banks. The humid air hummed with the sounds of insects, birds, and distant beasts, but Tycil ignored it all.

Across her lap rested two daggers. Their metal was nearly black, forged to betray no glimmer of light, even if the sun managed to pierce the canopy overhead. One blade sat comfortably in each hand, balanced and ready.

A faint rustle drifted through the undergrowth and Tycil's attention sharpened. Several moments later, a troll emerged from the greenery. She carried a staff across one shoulder and walked with the relaxed confidence of someone moving through familiar territory. Tycil watched her follow the path beside the creek,stopping near the water's edge just as she had every day for the past five days.

The troll crouched beside the creek and lowered a hand toward the water, preparing to wash her face. Her gaze drifted across the surface then he froze.Tycil saw the shock register as the water reflected eyes that faded from bright blue around the pupils to a deep, void-like purple at the edges of the iris. Fear flashed across the other woman’ features but it was too late.

Tycil moved, one moment she was part of the tree, the next she dropped from her perch. Air pushed her hood back past her hood as she descended, the  troll barely had time to begin turning before she slammed into him. Both daggers struck home, one burying itself into the left side of his neck, the other hilting as it slid through the space behind his collarbone.

The force of her descent drove him face-first into the muck at the creek's edge, a wet sucking sound escaped him as he choked on his blood. His hands clawed desperately toward his throat. Blood spilled between his fingers, dark against green skin. He struggled for breath, body convulsing as instinct fought against fatal wounds.

Tycil twisted both blades, the first severing his spine the other scraping against a rib as it tore into his lung. The troll's resistance vanished almost instantly. His body shuddered once, then went limp. The quick flash of death hadn't even disturbed the sounds of the forest around them, not acknowledging it more than it would have a falling leaf.

Tycil remained crouched over the corpse for several seconds, scanning the surrounding vegetation. Centuries had taught her caution, experience had taught her never to assume anyone was truly alone. 

Only when she was satisfied did she withdraw her blades.Blood dripped from the dark metal and she wiped them clean on the troll's clothing before sliding them into hidden sheaths.

Grasping the corpse by the arms and despite her slender frame, she possessed more than enough strength to drag the body into the creek. Water churned around exposed roots as she maneuvered it to float under one. Beneath the surface, movement caught her eye, the scavengers that hunted these waters had already sensed the meal she provided. 

A larger shape emerged from the depths, jaws snapped shut around the troll's arm before the creature vanished once more beneath the churning water. Tycil observed for a few moments longer. Nature was efficient, by morning, little would remain.

Another troll killed in Zul'Aman by her hand. She had lost count long ago, but the sense of satisfaction never faded, the only difference was that this one had belonged to the Twilight’s Blade.

Day 5 Restless/Faith @daily-writing-challenge and mention to @lukel-sunshadow @tycildawnwhisper and friends of the @theshieldedmind

The day had been quiet. Almost too quiet.

Tycil had held a few tired, crooked smiles as she leaned on the frame of her half-built doorway, wiping sawdust from her fingers. They’d replaced old beams, reinforced the second story. Vaelsnipe’s shoulders ached pleasantly from labor, but the ache couldn’t compete with the deeper thrum beneath his ribs. That old rhythm of watchfulness.

He left with the promise he’d be back before the week was out to help her some more. She nodded and turned back into the house that had finally begun to resemble more and more of a home.

The woods of Goldenbough Pass swallowed him whole as he walked on for the city. Birdsong filtered through the high boughs, and golden light traced slow arcs across the path. But to Vael, the peace felt paper-thin. A trick of surface tension.

Each step stirred memories. A scream in the snow. The burn of void in the air. The vile smell of undeath creeiping up behind. The moment the gates of Silvermoon cracked once before when no one believed they could fall.

This forest watched us die once, he thought grimly. It could do so again.

He paused beneath an old tree, one he remembered climbing as a boy. A companion he hadn't though about for thousands of years perched above, tail curled, watching him carve arrowheads with Tycil. Now it just stood silent. Ancient. Unmoved.

The problem wasn’t the silence. The problem was how much he trusted it less and less.

He couldn’t shake it, the gnawing edge in his chest, like an arrow held taut but never loosed. Every time he looked at Tycil, at Lukel, even at the doctors gossiping in the city's clinic there it was.

What if it happens again? What if the next wound takes them? What if peace is just a delay, not a gift?

Silvermoon came into view, its spires gleaming in the fading sun. But even the light here felt brittle.

He passed through the gates, nodding once to the guards. They knew him now by sight, by name, by the wary look in his eyes. The city had returned to its rhythms, laughter echoing from balconies, music spilling from taverns. But he saw too clearly the fragile seams. The overconfidence. The ease that let danger in the first time.

It’s all so breakable, he thought. All of it. And no one wants to admit that.

He stopped just before the main thoroughfare, where the cobblestones turned from forest-shadowed to gold-tinged. The scent of lilacs drifted faintly in the air, he didn’t know if it was the gardens or just Lukel again, lingering in memory.

His pulse caught. Because that was what made it worse.

He cared now.

Tycil. Lukel. The quiet bonds he’d formed with people who made him laugh again, curse again, feel again. He had roots now. And that made him vulnerable in ways he had almost forgotten how to live with.

He tilted his head toward the sky, just for a moment. The city’s light painted his skin warm.

But still, the air tasted like prophecy.

Spoilers: Midnight Expansion, maybe, possibly

While Tycil worked at patching the wall, the dark-haired hunter had stripped down to simple linens. Her hair was pulled back into a low ponytail, her face streaked with off-white plaster where she’d brushed a dusty hand across her cheek.

Shadow stopped watching her and slipped free. It was easy, Shadow had done it many times before. Around the hill, down into the Ghostlands, along the coast, and then through the small portal hidden in a window of Windrunner Spire.

The transfer was effortless. It was home, after all. Shadow shifted from a cute fox into a drifting dark wisp, gliding through an archway to stop before its Master.

“You have done well,” the echoing voice intoned, layered with something like pride… or awe. “She is realizing her power. Happening upon her here was lucky for us, or perhaps for her. She is a creature of luck who has not yet reached the potential I built into her.”

Shadow remained silent; its Master disliked interruption.

“That she was delivered to my doorstep at the moment when I was not distracted, leaving Maqiri to fade back into existence without her… a perfect vessel.” He continued speaking as he ascended the stairs toward his tower in the Nether. Depending on his mood, the staircase could stretch on forever or end after a single floor. Today, lost in thought, the steps spiraled endlessly.

“Healing her with my magic let it seep beautifully into her. Now she is my hunter. The journey into the stars awakened her, and you guide her well.”

At last, the stairs opened into the library. A book lay open on a pedestal, its pages breathing faint light.

“There is a passage written long ago by the Oracle.” Why he insisted on reciting what Shadow could plainly read was beyond its understanding, but the Master always had his reasons, and Shadow had been made to obey.

“The Harbinger will shatter its cage, and the foundations of the Place of Sun will tremble.”

He rested a hand on the tome. “It is coming. She must prepare. Guard her well, guide her well. She fell into my lap, and a pleasant surprise she was. Now, we shall see how what lies planted in her withstands what approaches.”

He turned toward the dark wisp. “Go now.”

Shadow drifted out the window. Traveling in this form was easier than the four-legged one, though it would frighten her more. Near the house, it shifted back into the fox. Slipping inside, it curled against the wall opposite her and sighed.

Life would be better without Master. It liked it with her.

DWC May 2025 Day 3 - Linger/Gaze

She crouched beside the bed, then lowered to her belly to peer into the dim gap beneath the frame. “Shadow,” she called softly, drawing out the name like a lullaby. “Come on. I can see you.” Her tone was coaxing, laced with amusement and just a touch of frustration.

The little creature had followed her from the nether. Not at first, but slowly, gradually. She began noticing the lingering shadows that danced just out of sight. Over time, those flickers coalesced into a shape, a fox-like thing, all big ears and impossible cuteness.

Black eyes with swirling voids gazed back at her from the darkness. The sleek shape shifted deeper under the bed, tail flicking with deliberate teasing. The void-being melted into the gloom like smoke into fog, a swirl of living darkness. 

“Oh, I see how it is,” she muttered. Her cheek pressed against the cool floor, hair fanning out in lazy waves. “You think this is a game. You know I won’t hurt you, I probably can’t hurt you.”

Shadow answered with a quiet chirp, playful and smug. Then it pounced, tapping her fingers with magically chilled paws and bounded back into the shadows, clearly delighted by this strange game of hide-and-seek. A laugh slipped out as she pulled her hand back, rubbing it. “You little trickster.”

With a sigh and a smile, she reached into her sweater pocket and retrieved the crinkly bag of solid arcane chips.The sound caught Shadow’s attention instantly. It inched forward, low to the ground, belly brushing the floor, eyes locked on the glowing treat. Tyce sat up and put one of the treats in front of her. “Just a little closer,” she whispered, breath held as it crept toward her. Her body sat relaxed, the hunter just wanted it to come out of the dark and sit with her, but Shadow batted the chip away with startling speed and vanished once again its tail a whisper of dusk.

Shaking her head, she broke into laughter. “Fine,” she groaned, “you win.” She had been trying to train her little watcher to stay longer in the light, hoping it might reveal more of itself. Why was it here? Was it merely a shard of void that recognized her? A watcher? A memory? Something else?

Shifting on the floor, she leaned her back against the bed and studied the corners of her home. It was brightly lit on purpose, the shadows were kept thin, their reach short. But sometimes, it still felt like the nether was reaching back for her. Sometimes she worried she was going mad.

Things flickered in her peripheral vision, shapes that vanished when she looked directly at them. Those... things had lived with her ever since she returned. Since her emergence. 

When her brother Vael came, she told him the truth. How she was still afraid. How she sometimes felt the nether still watched her from the corners. She welcomed him back not just out of love, but in hope that he might be her anchor, something to keep her tethered. Just like this house was.

Tyce had spent too long lost, in a place where nothing felt real, except, somehow, her. Even when her mind insisted it was just a dream, not her reality, down deep she knew she remained lost. There had been people she would meet off and on, like C, the man who helped her come home, but most of her time had been spent in solitude.

Still, there had always been a presence that lingered around her from the moment she awoke in that place: healed, but not whole. Something watched over her, an unseen companion that left little gifts for her to find in her travels. Something that never spoke, but was always there.

For the longest time, she thought Shadow was that presence. The same silent guardian, but now… she wasn’t sure.All she knew was that it was still with her.

Tycil’s boots crunched against the brittle leaves as she pushed the cabin door open. The hinges screamed their protest after decades of disuse, and stale air spilled out into the afternoon. She stood for a moment in the threshold, her nose wrinkling at the damp and dust, at the faint ammonia sting of vermin.

Her parents had brought her and Vael here often in their youth, centuries before the Scourge marched across Quel’thalas and brought its corruption. The wilds had always felt full of danger and opportunity, the cabin had been their home for weeks on end when on the hunt. Now, this one was nothing but a husk.

Shadow darted past her ankles, the small nether-born thing bouncing across the floor before vanishing into a corner. Its presence comforted her even when it shouldn’t. She followed it inside, lifted an old lantern, and frowned at its weightlessness. Empty. She found candles in a drawer instead and set them in holders. As the first flame caught, light crawled across the walls and revealed what she already suspected: chewed sacks, claw marks on beams, nests in the rafters.

Tycil sighed. Mice had made ruin of the place, and the mattresses had collapsed into dust. But there were no ghouls here, no lurking horrors. In the Ghostlands, that counted as fortune.

She rolled up her sleeves and set to work.

By the time the sun would have fallen behind the city walls of Silvermoon, the cabin looked habitable again. Spartan, but clean. She filled a pot from the creek, set it to boil over a rekindled hearth, and steeped tea so strong it bit the back of her throat. She sipped, staring out the window at the deepening night, her mind slowly rolling over the one thing in her mind.

The void.

Not within her, never within her, but pressing at the edges of her memories, as if her breath itself had to be drug back from her past. The sensation drove her back to the lonely years she had survived in the nether, hunted by shadows that always seemed to know where she was. She had adapted then, learned to hide even from what could not be hidden from, learned to strike unseen.

The news had reached her in Silvermoon before she returned here: Tazavesh. A great market in peril, a call to arms, whispers of void-born threats stirring in distant lands.

The moment she heard, the pulse had begun in her ears, slow, insistent, inescapable. It was the same rhythm she felt now, rattling her bones as though the Ghostlands themselves reverberated with it.

The people of Azeroth had answered the call. So would she. But she was not ready. Hunting beasts for meat was one thing. Standing against the void again was another.

And yet, the hunt always began the same way: with her bow in her hand.

(Divider by @ /sister-lucifer )

She slipped into the woods as night deepened, climbing a hunting stand she had built years ago and letting the familiar vantage calm her pulse. The Ghostlands sprawled before her: black trees, ruins overtaken by vines, silence broken only by the distant cry of carrion birds.

Through her spyglass she saw them.

Shadowpine trolls.

The campfires of their village burned, surrounded by crude hides stretched on racks and bones picked clean. Six of them, armed and restless, their guttural voices carrying up into the night. The sight tightened something deep inside her chest. 

Tycil’s hand drifted to her bow. She did not carry the polished one her husband had made, but the one she had recovered from the scar, the bow she had once given her youngest son long before the Scourge took him. The string hummed under her fingers.

The first troll never saw her. The arrow struck deep in his throat, silencing his laughter before it could break into alarm. He fell into the dirt with a choked gargle, and the others jerked to their feet.

Tycil waited. Patient. Listening to their confusion, to their fear.

One troll left the circle, muttering curses as he stumbled toward the bushes. Tycil dropped silently from her perch, drawing the hunting knife from her belt. She shadowed him for three steps before her blade flashed once across his throat. He collapsed, gurgling into silence, his blood dark against the pale grass.

She dragged his body into the underbrush, then returned to her vantage.

Five remained.

Her next arrow took the sleeping one. The rest roared in alarm, axes flashing in the firelight, tusked mouths twisting into war cries that seemed to echo from the ruins themselves.

The night filled with the snap of bowstrings, the hiss of arrows, and the guttural shouts of trolls falling one by one. Tycil circled, loosed, vanished, and struck again, her movements flowing with a precision honed in darker places than this cursed forest.

When at last silence returned to the clearing, she stood at its edge, bow lowered. Troll corpses smoldered in the firelight, their camp broken. Shadow flickered into being at her side, restless, almost eager.

Tycil brushed the bow’s curve, thinking of her sons, of her family’s legacy of hunters. She thought of Tazavesh, of the pulse of the void’s corruption there demanding she act.

Tycil pulled each weed carefully, giving attention to even the invasive nuisances. Some she laid aside for the forest creatures who would still happily eat them; the rest she piled for compost. The small rituals grounded her.

It felt good to be home. There was still a great deal of work to be done on the property beyond the garden cleanup, and she knew she was delaying putting the roof on the sleeping quarters she was building for herself. But the sun felt too good to leave.

Shadow played along the edges of the house, the strange little entity that had followed her out of the Twisted Nether. It could shape itself into anything, but it chose the form of an impossibly cute fox. Sometimes it conjured a shimmering butterfly just to chase it through the darker corners of the yard.

“You are a goof,” she told it, and it flicked its tail in amusement.

When Tycil went to K’aresh, the politics meant nothing to her. She recognized manipulation when she saw it. Whenever that barefoot witch drifted close, Tycil raised her bow and nocked an arrow. People insisted they could trust Xal’atath that she was the lesser of two evils but Tyc knew better. Old God minions only ever played at loyalty long enough to make the betrayal matter.

She had heard the whispers back in the Nether: promises, threats, invitations with teeth. Sometimes she let them brush against her thoughts, what did she have to lose?

But on K’aresh, she ignored them.

Instead, she hunted.

The sands there shimmered under a sunless sky. The air felt thin yet weighted, humming with unseen power crawling beneath the surface. Her void-rimmed eyes caught the faint glimmer of corruption before it fully revealed itself, threads of indigo weaving through the half-light. She moved silently through the dunes, her footsteps lost, the void tainted unable to sense her.

When the creatures appeared, their forms were twisted beyond recognition. Sometimes she raised her bow and let a single arrow fly; sometimes she conserved arrows and simply closed the distance. The voidspawn barely had time to turn before she struck. Their blood clung when it touched her skin, thick and dark, sinking into the sand and staining her hands long after their shapes had crumbled.

Each kill quieted the whispers, but silence brought its own weight.

Now she was home. Finally settled. She let the sunshine pour over her skin, her dark hair drinking in the warmth, heat she hadn’t truly felt since that day in Terokkar. She had thought she would find warmth when she returned home from the Nether, but she remained distanced from everything instead of letting nature welcome her.

It was here, in the open sun. She realized she had not let the light truly touch her in a long time. Now she knew her purpose. Yes, she still jumped at shadows; the void didn’t simply release its grip. But now she knew she could fight it, and she would.

Taking care, she removed another weed, afterall only way to prevent them from spreading was to tear them out by the roots.

The fire had long since burned to embers, and Virelith lay curled at his side, her slow breath the only sound in the stillness beyond the whisper of trees. A few seeds and herbs collected and ready to be taken to Tycil. The stag he’d brought down earlier still hung in the trees, quartered, skinned, and salted for the next day’s work. Clean and quiet, just as he liked it.

Or used to…

Vael lay on his back, eyes fixed on the sky. The stars above were silver needles sewn through a black velvet sky. Familiar and old, the kind of sky he’d once found comfort in before everything.

Returning to Silvermoon. Tyc…

He’d gone back, hadn’t he? After decades of running from the ruins of his life, he’d stepped across those blood-stained thresholds again. And she was still there rebuilding a life, even if it trembled like frost on glass. She was still breathing. And him? He still didn’t know what kind of brother he was, or if it was too late to be one in the way she wanted, but he’d sat with her. Let her lean on him. Let her hurt out loud even as they worked on her home together.

And then Lukel… Stars, Lukel.

Vael exhaled through his nose, rubbing a thumb along the edge of his rifle where it lay beside him like a loyal old dog. He should’ve felt relief out here. That familiar hush of the wilds and the certainty of the hunt. And yet… something was missing.

The fire, too quiet, even Virelith’s warmth wasn’t the same as the weight he was missing. It was all too fast, or it should have been. He knew damn well why he wasn’t second guessing himself, but should he be? His fingers flexed against the cool earth, restlessness running beneath his skin. He was supposed to find peace out here. He used to. This kind of silence had once been his solace. But now…

Now, it felt hollow.

He hadn’t expected to miss him this badly. It made him feel young and even a bit ridiculous It was maddening, how the man lingered behind his eyelids even with several forests between them. And now, here he was. Alone. The way he preferred to spend his life. And that same world felt quieter. Colder.

He rolled onto his side, curling closer to Virelith. He should’ve asked him to come. He swallowed thickly, eyes fixed on the dying embers. For the first time it wasn’t the hunt he missed, it was a heartbeat beside his.

A breeze passed through the clearing, brushing his hair like fingers. He closed his eyes. Next time, he promised himself in the quiet, he’s coming with me. Or I’m not going at all.

It was right after she realized that she wasn’t going to get that rebuild of the family she hoped for once she and Vael reconnected. They had a fight right after they reunited and everything just became more and more distant between them after that. The fault wasn’t on either of them, they just had become very different people in their time apart. The Amani paid for her pain with death as she spent a couple weeks straight doing nothing but stalking and killing them (this new treaty with the Amani is going to be very difficult for her). On her return home, she stood outside looking at the progress she and Vael had made on her house together and began to cry, time passed, and she couldn’t have said how much, before she had no tears left. Off and on for a couple days she would be struck with that deep ache for everything she has lost in her life, and tears would start again. it was then she made the decision to go to K’aresh, fully expecting to die there. Instead she began to hone her ability to track traces of the void having no idea how valuable that skill would become.

Thank you for the question @theconstructsworld