Pain. The earth was soaked with it. Pain, riches, and the promise of a life made better for the risk taken.
So many had died in the initial strike when the sky cracked open and pillars of blue flame fell on our heads, followed by the very stars themselves crashing around us. There had been no warning, and truth be told: there didn't need to be. The risk was estimated upon this plan's hatching, but it was estimated **poorly.**
Those who survived barricaded themselves in the mine- the mine we had been sent to acquire in *her* name- and I was only made aware of the deceit not even a day before we deployed. I had no choice but to go along with it, lest I and my family be killed for whatever passed as treason to this.. now dubious mercenary company.
I promised my wife that it was just for the coin, and that I would get out of it as soon as we could afford a corner of the world we could call our own, somewhere far away from that accursed marshland.
I wish, now, that I could go back.
It smelled of dirt, stone, blood, and fear; and the only places to go were outside and face Shal'assan's wrath, or go deeper into the mine. Those whose plan this had been squabbled amongst themselves- blame being thrown back and forth in forced hushed tones so as not to induce a panic among the surviving conspirators. We had a hostage- a geologist hired by Lord Shal'assan to confirm the contents of the mine- someone more innocent than myself or anyone a part of this damnable company.
They were sent with a pair of hired hands - like myself, but not including myself- and a surly dark iron shaman who was the lynchpin and part and parcel the whole reason this company could potentially pull this heist off. I was tasked with staying above ground and keeping an eye on the entrance where the ground still smoldered in the wake of the initial retaliatory strike. It was quiet, but beyond the veil of smoke the sounds of distant voices reached my ears- soldiers relaying orders, if I had to guess. But they didn't move, nor did they send anyone to parley with the conspirators.
What I could see was unsettling. Soldiers in shining silver armor, faceplates like emotionless masks, daunting shields, and massive lances. Their formations made it clear they had no intention of letting anyone escape until justice for our betrayal was mete out. Regrets over my choice to join this mercenary company were beginning to overwhelm me- I wanted to be loyal, but.. to whom did I want to be loyal to? My family's home in the county once called Inkblot had been left in ruins, terrors upon terrors haunting the land that were simply no good for raising our family in.. but we couldn't afford anywhere else.
That's why I am here. That is why I will now die to the same people who helped save what they could in Sorrowmend: for coin. For a dishonorable cause, something that I would only be remembered by dearest beloved and the life growing within her- would she tell our child of me? Or would she tell them their father was someone who lived up to the ideals of a proper knight- not a bloody mercenary who betrayed their contracts in pursuit of simple, superficial riches.
I pray that I am remembered well. I wish that I could see their faces one last time.. Light, to hold her in my arms one last time, I beg of thee..
A scream brought me to my feet, prepared for the battle to come- the death I'd earned - but none from the perimeter of Shal'assan's lines charged or approached. Another scream- a pained one, terror and suffering made manifest through the shredding of ones vocals- but whose? And.. from where? I turned as I heard steps behind me, the conspirators at our backs now looking deeper into the mine.. where the screams were originating.
Then there was silence, for several heartstopping seconds there was silence.
Then footsteps from the elevator shaft in the depths of the mine.
We had a choice to make then: turn our backs to the formations of the Shattered Shields of Shal'assan, or face whatever terror lurked our way. We were doomed either way, but as was made mention before: the risks for undertaking this endeavor were estimated, and estimated poorly. I was personally called from guarding the entry to the mine- the two who were assigned to guide the dark iron shaman had returned- their armor covered in blood, their lips moving with incoherent rambling. One of the conspirators demanded I check them for injuries- our dubious clerics having fallen in the initial strike- to account for the blood- but I found no obvious signs of injury. Their gazes were distant, their voices hushed as they mumbled incoherently.
The only thing of note that stood out on their persons, clutched in their bloody hands were blueish white crystals.. as if someone had trapped the essence of a watercolor tapestry and hardened it into stone. No one knew what they were, Light.. they just seemed so..
A gargling whine met all our ears next, the dragging of steps across stone that sounded wet, and infantile. Someone else had stepped off of the mine shaft elevator. Torches were raised and then magnified to cast their light further down the tunnel, where revealed quivering in the shadows was the dark iron: and the source of the blood on my compatriots. The shaman's fingers had been mutilated, severed, only the thumb and forefinger of each hand remaining,
bloodied and seared stumps now residing where the previous appendages had once been. His gaze was naught but terror- his eyes wide and visage drained of any color- but they were focused, trained on the conspirators who called his name.
He pointed his remaining digits towards them.. then fell face down in a bloodied heap. No one dared approach the body as the shadows in the mine deepened, torchlight unable to pierce the swallowing darkness that crept ever forward.
I could feel it like I'd felt it so many times before, the imminence of death- but this was the first time it felt all but assured.
The sound of.. something, on the bloodied stone echoed out from within, then the sound of a woman humming rose from deeper still. My heart and mind felt as if they might explode or wither, respectively; my hand absently going to the firearm holstered at my hip. Others followed suit, and took aim at the shadows.
"Exquisite, is it not? The blood of traitors.."
The voice from the dark- feminine, malevolent, echoing with the ethereal quality of the darkness that enshrouded the speaker- but it was familiar to the conspirators.
"Fire.." one of them whispered through trembling lips. "F-FIRE! FIRE!" I turned my head from the conspirators to those lined up with me aiming our rifles, then into the shadows. I could feel the heat of their muzzles as triggers clicked and commands were repeated to fire. I froze as I turned my face forward and stared into the darkness, and into the eyes of she who stared back from within the churning abyss.
Brilliant blue hues, pinpricks of light amidst a consuming wall. Then, I watched as one by one animated runeblades emerged. Violet, fire, storm, and frost.. and suddenly I knew who it was that had come for us. The stories of their conquests, of their fight with the darkness that had taken Sorrowmend- my home. She who we had so foolishly betrayed in pursuit of personal gain.
I dropped my weapon as my comrades reloaded their weapons- the fatal flaw in their design versus the Lord-Archon- and I saw in the corners of my vision as her blades surged forward; impaling those foolish enough to keep fighting, slaying them where they stood. I fell to my knees, my firearm cradled by the bloodied ground, the throes of death washing over me as one by one we hired hands fell until none so armed could lift a finger in further betrayal.
I fell forward as color swam through my vision as the Lord of Shal'assan stepped from out of the shadows, rune blades aligning once again at her back- but the seething black blades of legend duly withdrew from their concealments. She was beautiful.. and terrible all at once. She was our doom.
I could just barely hear the retreat being called as the conspirators turned tail like the cowards only betrayers of their sort could truly be borne of.. But I knew even as consciousness gave out that there was nowhere for them to go, nowhere for them to hide: that the true estimation of their gamble had now been fully realized.
The warm embrace of unconsciousness took me- and I felt at last the release I knew was coming- that the ferriers of the dead would claim my soul soon.
I pray that I am remembered well, for who I was. Not this. Not this.
“Open your eyes.”
I awakened, and found myself prostrated in a kneeling posture, air rapidly inflating my lungs and pressing my chest against the constraints of my chainmail tunic and shredded company tabard. I blinked several times rapidly to clear the blurriness of light flooding my vision- shapes started to form, two humanoids before me- one standing, and one crouched.
“What form of coward is greater, do you think?” came a woman’s voice- HER voice.
“The kind who willingly betrays their contracts for personal gain? Or those who when caught in the midst of their consequence feigning their demise,” she said as my eyes locked on her vibrant arcanic hues. Her posture, crouched though she was, was casual in its manner considering the carnage around us that I could now see.
“Mmmnot a coward..” I tried to speak, only for the Lord of Shal’assan to reach forward to press a finger to my lips to silence me in as demeaning a manner as possible, then relaxing as she set her wrists atop her exposed knees; the skirt of her lordly raiment strewn around her. The figure at the elven lord’s back chuckled and shook their head, then headed back towards the mine behind them, where the smell of freshly shed gore rose.
“Appearances suggest otherwise,” the mage-lord replied lowly, the echoing bite of the ethereal now completely absent. She rose to her full height, her chest rising and falling with the exertion of a calmed breath. Her own appearance was impeccable, and one might never know the catastrophic loss of life that suffered beneath the icy heels where she tread. “Fortunately enough for you,” she says then as she drops something before me- “Your memories do not betray your heart.. Sir Sven Williamson.”
My name- I never told her my name. My eyes narrowed on her, and I opened my mouth to speak, but could only cough so forcefully as to send me sprawling forward onto my hands and knees, where I then saw what she had given me: a blueish white stone, just as she’d given the shaman’s guards. I tried to stand, to retreat- and I met no resistance to the notion save for a niggling curiosity as to what had happened to the others of my company.
I looked around me, to the desolation wrought from the sky’s opening and the raining of fire. Charred corpses were being gathered and assembled into piles by the same armored figures standing in opposition to us, containing us- trapping us with her. I looked further around, and saw as bodies were pulled from the mine behind the Lord of Shal’assan, whose piercing gaze did my soul feel the intrusion of. What had she meant by what she said? That.. my memories did not betray my heart?
“You have before you,” she says, raising two fingers as she spoke to me, wiggling them as a mother might while speaking to a child, “Two choices, Sir Sven Williamson,” she says while deftly approaching me, no sounds coming from beneath her steps save for the soft grinding of her icy heels into stone. “Your memories- and your actions- while not necessarily in service to anyone but you and yours do speak to the veracity of your intentions. You can die here, as forgotten as the rest of these traitors- your lifeforce harvested and used in pursuit of our nobler cause.” The Lord of Shal’assan then shrugged, tilting her chin upwards in the most vile and despicable manner all nobility used to look down their noses at those deemed lesser- ohhh how I was starting to hate her!
Rage swelled in my breast, my fists clenching- one around the gifted mysterious stone- and the other around the pommel of the dagger hidden in my bracer. She had no guards attending to her, and while I knew my odds of surviving were all but a forfeiture of my future- there was nothing I wanted more than to just try to carve her lips from her face. The look in her eyes had a knowing quality to them that I couldn’t quite explain- nor did I care to either as I stepped forward, and staggered as pain wracked through my person.
“Or..” she lowers one finger, holding up a solitary index digit, paying as little mind to my stumble as someone who expected it might. “You return to Sorrowmend with a renewed purpose. To your family. Take with you the lessons learned here- and consider very carefully the future you wish to tread, friend.” Her own gaze narrowed on mine, and the memory of what transpired in the mine.. However long ago that it was, surfaced in the fore of my mind. My anger quelled just as her head tilted forward, replacing her demeaning expression with one that bespoke.. Something else. My grip on my blade laxed, and the tension all at once eased.
“I have made many orphans in my time: I would just as well wish not to take away your child’s father,” she said then as she stepped towards me, gently placing her hand on my shoulder. Her gaze goes just beyond me, to steps approaching from behind- her hand outstretched towards them. A masked soldier placed in her hand a bloodied satchel, which she then offered to me. I looked- and saw seven kneeling figures- the conspirators, all summarily and judiciously slain- and while seven haunting robed and hooded figures held bowls beneath their slit throats.
The blood of traitors..
My fingers closed around the satchel, which was heavy with the weight of the slain conspirator’s coins. “Why,” I started, softly shaking my head as I held more wealth in my hand than I’d ever possessed throughout my thirty odd years of life. “Why.. here, why this place?” I asked the Lord of Shal’assan as she meandered further still past me. I turned, watching their grotesque fascination as whoever the robed figures were concluded their work.
“What, in a mine, contributes to the greediness of a scoundrel’s heart, you mean?” the magus replied as she turned back towards me, her lips pulled into a violet painted line.
“Yes,” I replied truthfully- I had not been a part of the conspiracy after all, and somehow Lord Shal’assan already knew as much.
The pause that followed my response was pregnant with an air of skepticism, as if despite however which way she already knew.. Doubts still gnawed at her for whatever reason. “Please, I just.. I only-”
“I know why you are here- I know what purpose you sought- I know how it simultaneously contrasted and aligned with your compatriots. You need not justify your position, Sir Sven,” the magus interjected brusquely in stark contrast to the soft imposing glow of her countenance. I fell silent as her gaze narrowed on me once more, at which point I realized I would not know why so many had to needlessly die for this imminently remote mining settlement.
That silence carried further on amidst the disposal of the conspirator’s remains- their bodies consumed in the same blue flame that had fallen upon us at the sky’s splitting. I watched as the husks of their forms withered into ash, leaving naught but armor scraps to be pilfered behind.
“You have yet to make your decision, Sir Sven,” Shakiena said to the rhythm of caution- the silence between us shattered in remembrance for the same memories the Lord of Shal’assan referenced- why I lived, why I was here, and why I was now holding the means with which a future could be made possible.
“I… will return,” I replied, much to the mage-lord’s satisfaction as tension seemed to evaporate as quickly as it had built. “Thank you..”
Lord Shal’assan remained silent, simply acknowledging my gratitude with a slow nod of her head. One of the mages nearby offered to return me to Shal’assan- where I would be directed to the gate that linked the Northrend realm to Sorrowmend, my home. I returned, still wearing the chainmail and shredded tabard, firearm back in its holster, dagger still in its concealment. I both loved and hated this place- but the former now tasted much sweeter on the tongue, knowing that despite the nightmares haunting the shadows still- love was what brought me here, and had inspired me to take up arms as I had.
I was barraged with questions upon walking through my own front door, my wife panicked by my appearance, my shredded tabard, but above all else: the blood. She asked where it had come from, if I was hurt- to which I assured her and showed no significant injury on my person.
“Then whose blood is it?” she asked, concern incapable of vacating her expression. All I could do was smile, and remember the hunched forms of the conspirators as their blood was collected in sanguine basins. I huffed a breathless laugh, earning my wife’s confusion and tentative smile- Light, how I loved her smile.
I simply left the bloodstained satchel on the kitchen table, and went to wash up for supper. The conspirators' coins spilled out and clattered against the wood, saying everything else that needed to be said.
