It taunted her for over a week.
A faded, tan envelope leaned lazily against the side of her designated, make-shift post-box in Miwana’s Longhouse. Rudi anxiously ground her teeth in thought. The rough corner of a new, amateurishly applied plate on the left side of her jaw dug into what remained of her bottom lip.
After the chaos caused by the fall of Lordaeron, many efforts had been made by the undead community to establish points of contact. So many that had scrambled to escape the stormed city barely made it out - and few groups remained together. All aiding mages had desperately created portals to the first city their minds had locked upon. There were so many faces Rudiania had yet to catch sight of. So many new friends she had brought into her life now unaccounted for. Therefor she hadn’t hesitated when Miwana offered her business as a meeting hub for the scattered Forsaken. Of course Rudi’s pride had insisted she pay a small fee (which Miwana graciously accepted).
It wasn’t until later she realized - maybe she didn’t want to be so readily found.
Long nights of picking up guard shifts, building makeshift shelters, and brewing the mid-range healing items she was capable of for their allies had allowed a thought to take root.
She did not wish to fight for this “Queen” - a Queen that seemed to only have a hair’s breath of difference between herself and the royalty that had wrecked the city they had abandoned to plague.
So she had avoided the letter. If they were orders to regroup with the unit she had been lended to, she wanted no part of it. If it wasn’t? Well... if it wasn’t...
So she watched. Whatever time she did not pledge to recovery efforts, she kept eyes on the Longhouse. If she had been declared AWOL surely they would have sent officers to correct the offense. In this time of need every arm was needed. After the week had passed, her very finger tips seemed to itch. Minutes to hours, hours to days. Her eyes bore holes into the stationary from her place on the mat across the room.
Rudi soon gripped the corner of the nearby support beam and heaved herself to her feet with a grunt. She couldn’t draw it out for long. If she remained in the city to help her people, she would be brought to heel sooner or later. That’s what she told herself as she crossed the floor to the rickety set of cubbyholes, removing her gauntlets.
A solid lump formed in her throat as she read the return address. She tentatively broke the wax seal upon it’s back, as if it might have some goblin booby-trap.
I have sent many letters, in the hopes that one of them finds you. I have never before so cursed my powerlessness as I have now, hearing about the events at the Undercity while I was stationed at the Fjord, rotting away. I only wish I could have been there; I would have killed a thousand of them by myself to protect my home. What happened during the battle? I have heard rumors - horrible things - but I dare not believe them. Most rumors are lies, anyways.
I long to see you soon, now more than ever, to hold you in my arms again and know that not all is lost. I write these letters knowing that you are alive; there's no way you could die. You're tough as nails, and I don't know what I would do without you. I've sent these letters to every major city, in hopes that something can find you somewhere. You can direct your replies to the military office in Tranquillien, or better yet, find me there. I want to see you as soon as possible.
The edges of the parchment crumpled as her fingers clung desperately to the letter, the all familiar feeling of sludge-like ichor swelling into her eyes.
He hadn’t been there. His unit hadn’t even been pulled from the frozen north. A mixture of anger and relief went through her. Ertrig had been spared. If his unit hadn’t been recalled - how many others had not been pulled to protect Lordaeron: The Forsaken people’s capital, their home? Had it been the Banshee’s intent to abandon the city from the beginning?
She shoved that line of thinking from her thoughts. She had to bring her Captain up to date. She had to tell him what their Queen had done. One hand fumbled the letter into a belt pouch while the other wiped at her face. Her boots quickly carried her to her hawkstrider hitched outside. She had a portal to pop through.
