The noose was tight about his neck, not that it was doing much in the way of ending him. That day had long since passed. A lynching was a far easier end compared to the many years of death Alfred Klaudin had experienced.
His body alone was a testament to the years of service that he had given to both King and dark mistress. He didn't regret serving either of them, he honestly didn't know what it felt like or even if it mattered. Few things gave him any sense of feeling or pleasure. Most of it involved the sly smile of his Dark Lady or the wet feeling on his hands as he snuffed out a life.
These ones might give him that today.
"Swing you rotter!" Came the hoarse call of the man holding the rope, he was much like all the others of his kind in the hills of old Lordaeron. Young, angry, and wearing Scarlet. Or perhaps what they thought was Scarlet. It wasn't like the old days when he fought the radical light maniacs of the north. They had been all the things he just thought of, just better organized and far more deadly. Beside the man were three others, cheering with their own old swords and gear looking almost gleeful in their torture of the Forsaken.
It was fine. He could wait.
"Come on, Thomas," called the hoarse voiced kid again, holding tight to the rope with one of his other companions to keep him aloft as he swung. "Give em a good couple wacks! Then we'll burn him good!"
There was a laugh as another young man strode forward, he held a sturdy axe handle in both hands. He proceeded to give as he was told, each strike true and strong from a good farmhand's back. It felt like nothing as it ever did to Alfred. He merely held still and let them have their fun.
Fun time was solid chunk of time, the minutes passing as they always had in this world he was left too. The Cult of the Damned had been quick to raise their ranks from the dead that littered their path as they stormed throughout the countries pillaging, burning, and reinforcing the Scourge army. It wasn't surprising they'd found his shallow grave a from a few months earlier, nor was it that he took to this life as expected. The living had been good and the times had been grave as he marched with the Prince's army into the elven lands before boarding for the far north. Hunger had been his fuel and the meat had been plentiful.
Slack led to a thump as Alfred crashed into the earth, his bony legs collapsing under the sudden return to his weight as he fell to his battered knees. The rope coiled behind him as the heavy breathing of the gang laughed and cajoled one another at such a good showing. There was nothing from him still as he sat in a pile of bone, dried meat, and rubbish that had been left to him after his capture. They began to circle him.
"Alright, lads, think it's time we get the final cleanse for this fucker," the hoarse one spoke again, his place as their leader well established as he wiped sweat from his brow. He hadn't gotten to use the axe handle as much as his friends, but there was a seedy glow in his eyes at watching the violence done to the Forsaken. "Elios, grab the lantern."
A grunt of acknowledgment was given as he felt one of the warm bodies leave the circle, three left about Klaudin as he sat still as his body should be. The rope was still around his throat but his hands were loose at his sides, they had perhaps hoped he would struggle with the knots to free his breath. Breathing was a forgotten pastime to Alfred.
"Got it, Beren," Elios supplied as he arrived back at his spot before Alfred, the yellow and orange light bask his ruined face for all to see clearly. It also lit up their faces for him to see. Hungry, angry, and vile faces.
Beren took the lantern from Elios and held it aloft, his face the dark mask of sadistic hatred. Perhaps it was bred into him, learned from watching others in this back-country of the north. Maybe it had always been in him since a little boy rounding the wheat fields as he killed vermin or rooted out a nesting pheasant. Or perhaps he was just evil in his core.
It didn't matter to Alfred.
The only thing that did matter is they had left his hands free and it would make this all the more easier as he turned his wrist with a soft crack and pop. Breathers talked to much, laughed too much, and focused too much on their own beating hearts to pay any kind of close attention. It was always his advantage when dealing with them and generally their doom.
Beren had been in monologue, his mates glued to his fervor as they always seemed to be. The man would raise the lantern high as he spoke his final sermon. "And with this fire I do cleanse you, return to hence you came vile creature! We sentence you to the hell you came from and rejoice in the fr-"
"No."
It was the only sound Klaudin had made this whole evening and it rang like a bell in his head as his true power came to be, arm lifting to the side to a strange scraping noise as the foot long piece of rebar slid from within his radius and ulna to his clawed hand. A familiar move and gesture he'd done countless times before in situations with foolhardy creatures, it worked then and worked now. With the iron bar in hand he would swing fast bringing it to strike the lantern with a crash, sending glass and oil splashing about the nearest member of this merry band of torturers.
Elios caught quickly with a scream as he fell back in flames, his makeshift flamed tabard finding it's real mate quickly.
Shocked face had no time to react as the warrior was upon them without another spoken word. In stories, there's banter or words of glory from heroes or villains as they escape terrible situations. Calling out to their captors of how they never stood a chance or they would pay for their crimes in the eyes of whatever god. Alfred Klaudin did not need to stay anything.
His brutality spoke clearly enough for him.
A backhand of the iron bar crashed into the side of Beren's head, an audible crack resounding as he flew a foot and landed in a heap. Crimson aplenty pour from his ear and eye from the blow. The others were starting to react now with two of their comrades down, but Alfred was already shifting his bar again to stab with unyielding strength through the third man's belly. Blunt as the bar may be, it was still a fine piece of metal and wielded by a creature who had no care of how it killed. Only that it did. The iron went easily through soft flesh and out the back as the human screamed in agony to fall on his knees holding the end of the bar.
The final one standing had drawn a knife, it was all he had at quick as he brought it down into the back of Alfred. The blade sunk easily through rotted flesh and into bone, sticking out with what should have been a killing blow. He took a few steps back expecting the Forsaken to fall down, watching with hopeful gulps of air that perhaps he would be the tragic hero in this story. To tell his fellow gang members of how they took down a Forsaken soldier in the name of the Light. As much as he was terrified of his friends' deaths, there was a secret place the looked forward to seeing the praise rain upon him.
All he saw next was the bony clawed fingers flash forward to slash through his eyes and tear his nose off with a sickening slurp of flesh and blood. He could barely scream as the blood flowed down his face, his hands flying up in hopes of staunching the ragged wounds. The wet screams only matched those of Elios and the impaled man, which were growing fainter as the smell of sweet meat would fill the wet night air. There was only a few more moments of screaming before the same knife that was used on Klaudin was rammed through the top of his head ending his pain.
Tim, the impaled man, leaned back on the wet grass hands tight about the iron bar through his stomach as he struggled to wrap his head around what he was witnessing. Beren had never moved again from the blow, Elios was silent now as the flames continued to flick on his body, and Jonas had been mutilated before him. His mouth tasted like copper coins as he moaned from the pain, not sure what to do or what to say to the creature that was hobbling toward him now. He felt cold, but he knew his hands were warm and slick. The undead stopped in front of him, slowly crouching down to stare at him with his empty black eyes.
"Please, I'm sorry," Tim gasped out as he shook in his spot, praying for some kind of mercy from the undead. But it just continued to stare at him, not moving or saying a word. Just watching. And waiting.
It took a long time for Tim to die.
And when he had finally grown cold the grey clouds of morning had begun to burn away. Alfred Klaudin would reach forward to yank his hidden baton from the belly of the cold dead, the sucking noise sending a shower to feed the earth below the corpse. He barely noticed as he began to slide it back inside of his forearm, easier now with the lubricant.
No word was spoken. No motion to hide the horrific events. Only the crude tabards were pulled, wrapped, folded, and tied away. The Deathstalkers would be pleased.
Alfred was not. He just was. Hefting the axe handle and slipping the knife away in his now makeshift rope belt, he began to limp his way to the road. South back to the Undercity. For the Dark Lady.
DWC August 2024 - Day 2 - Tenderness/Violence - Khaeris
The sand felt soft as it waterfalled out of her palm and between her fingers. The grains were so fine... Thaldraszus looked much like it had when she had been working at Eon’s Fringe. She had come alone. Her eyes lifted toward the Temporal Conflux. She had stayed away from that conclave.
Instead, Khaeris had found herself finding the more sympathetic Infinites that tended to pocket around the area, learning how to integrate with their siblings in the Bronzeflight. These Infinites had not found her unsettling nor felt she needed Correction. There were still Bronze dragons that itched to ~fix~ Khaeris and send her back to her original timeline.
Khaeris stood up from where she’d sat, brushing sand away from her skirts and hands. Everyone was busy these days. With these Radiant Echoes and memories. People of all races and creeds were hearing the Radiant Song. The notes of which seemed to be on everyone’s lips in titillated whispers.
Her head tilted, like she might hear it, if she listened close enough. So many were now. Pollux was. Fiorenze. The waitress who had served her tea at the Everywhen Inn.
No, she did not hear the Radiant Song. She was not of this place; not of this time.
Even so, she saw ~something~.
Khaeris closed her eyes. The air was still and her skirts hung around her legs. With her eyes closed and her mind stilled, the elven woman thought she could feel the wind and a storm sending stinging grains of sand into her legs. Images recalled were hazy, shifting, as if watched through a screen of moving sand. When she let her mind wander, let her soul relax, she had the constant susurrus of shifting sand in her ears. They had first come as dreams, and still seemed to find her easiest there. The voice had started soft, tender around her name, before the interference of the sandstorm had drowned the thin call.
Buffeted by winds no one else could feel, Khaeris could feel the pull. Toward her own timeline, toward whatever world soul might have lived there. Rumors of Karesh were being circulated here. Was the timeline she was from dealing with a threat, too? Had it already fallen?
She opened her eyes and frowned. Khaeris absently reached up and brushed glittering temporal sand from her shoulder.
@daily-writing-challenge
@daily-writing-challenge - Aug 2024 - Day 2 - Tenderness
Nahi sat comfortably on one of the log benches nearer to the back of the circle arranged for this special gathering, legs stretched out in front of her, heels digging into the snow and gravel. As probably half the tournament knew by this point, she had no problem being out front proudly sharing her enthusiasm for the performers, but this gathering was for the hosts and that dimmed the vibrancy her excitement through the week sparked.
Trist called Kon and Tal not-dads, which made her laugh, but in many ways they exuded that quality, even this gathering fit the description of family meals she heard others talk about. The welcoming warmth of dinner for their friends was something she felt every time she was with them… Uncles maybe? Big brothers? No label was really needed, but they were locking themselves into special place in her heart.
Her recognition this week that she was missing intimacy in her life was eased by the welcoming nature of this group and others she was getting to know better within the performance community. Nahi had known once she and her mother left the keep, that she would be isolating herself, she let Iren in, but she had little choice in that because his love for her mother ended up enveloping her. The decision to step from her comfort zone of Dalaran to begin performing at the Hearts of Tenacity Festival had born fruit in this unexpected way and altered much of her exterior life.
The whole week so far made her brain spark with community, it was on the edge of overwhelming, even for her outgoing nature. There were so many talented people she wanted to sit and talk to. She loved listening to the creative souls, with her newly recovered desire to open up some of her life, she had tried to initiate a way to get to know as many as she could. It was a hard line to find and not cross, the desire to get to know someone in this way versus her wanting to get to know the beautiful bartender at the Orchid club in Dalaran.
Trist’s arrival pulled her from the woolgathering and people watching she had been doing to begin to chat, they were one of the people she had been thinking about. A budding friendship to help color a life she had not realized had drained to grayscale
(A big thank you to the supportive performing community that showed out at ToA! I was very proud to be counted among your ranks this year.)
(Edit: Tagging @konietzko-sylvoran and @talthorn-sylvoran for their wonderful inspiration in this and their support in so much! And @tristayranambrosio because, much love always)
Pyraelia smoothed her left hand across the weathered old map that Hilarie, one of her research assistants, had pulled out of the archive. It was a delicate thing, worth taking care with. One of the younger students — a bright star from Redridge who had managed to make it to the university on a scholarship — furrowed his brow as he looked at the inked in features, “Is that really Dalaran?”
“Yes, the Dalaran I moved to well over a century ago, back when it was still fully in the ground,” she smiled fondly as she pointed a prosthetic finger at an outer ring that no longer existed, “It was never a sprawling city like some others, keeping it compact meant it was able to be protected by the Council easier. A thriving settlement existed outside the protective wards, and it was left behind when the city was lifted into the air.”
The Violet Crown had been no stranger to violence; even before her generation, before her parents even, and theirs, threat upon threat had been made to the magocratic jewel.
Was the present any different?
She muttered a quiet thank you to Odille, her other research assistant, as the woman draped another large and much more modern map over the older one.
They’d lost so much.
She missed the candy shop, and the whimsy bar. Others had stepped in to take their place, but they couldn’t hold a candle to the charm of those that had been left behind. It wouldn’t do to let the gaggle of young people before her see the weight this put on her shoulders — but it had to be done, just in case.
Pyraelia straightened up to her full six foot stature and cleared her throat to get their attention. She had never considered herself to be someone who could command a room — that was always Fiorenze’s arena, but the young students and scholars all immediately hushed their conversations and looked to her for guidance. “Alright, class. You all know the histories, you have heard of the trials and tribulations that have befallen our beautiful city. The High Archivists of every ward have instructed us to pass a message along.”
Her hand waved, tracing small runes in the air over the beautifully painted parchment which caused glowing waypoints to pop up in every district, “If something should happen, there will be dedicated portal specialists in each one of these locations to get you and anyone you have here with you out of the city.”
There was a palpable feeling of unease as she watched each student fixate on a different point of light, each one’s posture changing as they realized what this lesson was. She’d received similar briefings from the university and her Head Archivist each year she’d lived here, but it certainly hit different now that the Radiant Song had been touching more and more with each passing week. It was her job to help, not cause more anxiety, “You’re all the brightest of your age, dear students. I’ll be the first to tell you that we’ve received no direct threats to the city, but we want you all to be able to protect yourselves just in case.”
That seemed to relax them. A younger elven woman raised her hand, as if she needed to request permission, before speaking out, “Is there a plan for the books and scrolls, too?”
Pyraelia smiled, “Yes, we have plans for all manner of potential issues; I’m on one of the committees to keep our archives secured. We revisit our contingencies annually and have agreements with various kingdoms and cities. I’m afraid I can’t disclose more than that — even who we have agreements with is a well guarded secret.”
After all, who could they trust? Especially now that the Council had become strange, even to her. She had her own contingencies, too, even if they would get her into trouble later.
Someone would forgive her — even if she had to beg for it in whatever potential aftermath lay ahead in the infinite timelines that diverged from this exact moment.
A World of Warcraft fanfiction focusing on my Death Knight character Victoria for @daily-writing-challenge event Daily Writing Challenge August 2024 day 2 prompt violence.
Victoria try to fight against the violence demands in her head such she was free from the Lich King control.
(Kaistrae x Elliott. Art by @/Minko_Draws on Twitter.)
"Perfectly imperfect."
Two creatures made of strife, sin and vice. Years of tenuous back and forth and tenebrous passing. Words unspoken. Feelings unrequited. A game of cat and mouse that was so laden with insecurity and a narrative that neither knew how to navigate that it almost seemed to knock the very wind out of her lungs when he had uttered those words in Orgrimmar.
A heavy sentiment and a fanciful admission that she’d ached to hear for years and had never felt that she would ever earn. She had desperately wanted to be -that- person to him but she had never wanted to cage him. It had always been made clear that he was not the one to settle in one place and she very boldly proclaimed the same.
Hearts are a funny thing, though. They beat fiercely for the right people and he had always set her heart racing in her chest with every fleeting reunion. Stole her breath away with the collar of a strong hand wrapped around her throat. Sins of the flesh and marks worn for weeks after they would separate again. And the hollow emptiness that followed as she sat alone in her home and found ways to pass her time.
It always hurt. But it was a familiar kind of feeling and she had to tell herself that she would need to accept the scraps of indulgence and attention when it was permitted. She had to pretend to care about others when she loved -him- so deeply, never truly giving her time or attention to anyone that tried. Not in any way that was ever fair to the ones that did.
They weren’t him.
Elliott laid quietly with her partner. The soft ambience of a fall morning breeze drifted in where the heavy, dark curtains were split open ever so slightly. It was early enough that the sun didn’t shine through and it was late enough that the two had yet to find sleep. It was the quiet times that she savored the most. His intimacy. His tenderness.
It was hers. She was his.
Her body draped over his, laid idly between his legs with her head rested against his chest with the warmth of his skin as a comfort. Pressed together and tangled in the sheets, the vibrant fel-tinged gaze peered down at the girl. A half-lidded glance as possessive hands roamed over the skin that he could touch. She was silent and still, her eyes closed as calloused fingers traced over her shoulders, one hand moving gently up to favor her scalp with gentle attention.
Elliott stirred slightly, a soft but still audible sound that denoted her satisfaction when he doted upon her. Pointed ears wiggled as she turned her face down to press her lips against his chest, feeling his heartbeat against them as she followed with her forehead rested there. The man’s touch traipsed along the nape of her neck and squeezed reassuringly and her arms tightened around him in bed.
There were a few more moments of quiet before she shifted and pushed herself up. Careful as she climbed up the expanse of his body in a sinuous way and the tiny elf wrapped her arms around his neck and shoulders to bury her face against the side of his neck. The sheet slipped free of her form as she did so, pale skin on display in the waning light of the solitary lamp whose flame flickered low. Elliott mounted Kaistrae and the girl tugged roughly, offsetting her weight to shift their position and pull him over and on top of her with a weary and affectionate smile.
Her fingertips pressed into his back where scars formed the map of his physique, taut muscle and a powerful frame. She peered up into his eyes with an impish expression, lying beneath the man and toying with the strands of blonde hair that fell forward, loose and wild. She pulled him down and breathed in deep, holding him tightly as though she might wake up from a dream.
It was a raspy growl. A possessive murmuring of a single word with his lips against her skin and his teeth following to mark the spot.
“Mine.”
And Elliott grinned with the sting of his bite, eyes fluttering closed with the welcome weight of her partner atop her.
