The land was dying, and there was nothing Esheyn could do about it.
She could only watch helplessly as the gilded terrain of Quel'Thalas, deprived of the Eternal Spring that had blessed its sprawling forests and rolling hills for thousands of years, languished in Winter's unyielding grasp.
It had been a slow, but steady decline—first felt in early morning, before sunrise crept over the camp of crimson tents, when the Knight's breath left her lips in clouds of frozen fog. She noticed how the grass, glistening with frost, crunched under her boots as she marched alongside her comrades, the sound deafening in the chorus of a soldier's footsteps. Her upswept brows furrowed as bright yellow leaves descended from above as though a golden rain was falling, though there were no riches to be had in this, the death throes of ancient trees that had known only the gentle kiss of everlasting warmth from the time they had been planted so long ago.
And the flowers. Once vibrant in their endless array of colors, painting a masterpiece across the landscape, now faded to dull brown as they crumbled beneath the burden of a relentless chill. Try as she might, Esheyn could not restore them to their former glory, though she remained as stubborn as ever in her attempts to bring them back from their icy graves. What little energy she had that wasn't dispensed in blood and steel and Light on the fields of battle, was spent in the warmth of her tent, where she knelt on hardened earth to scrutinize the decaying sprouts that tried, and failed, to overcome such dire circumstances.
Nature was waging a war of its own in tandem with the Sunguard's armies, and both entities were becoming all too familiar with the bitter taste of defeat.
The Knight had maintained her composure despite these setbacks, these losses, of both her fellow soldiers and her seedlings. But she was left stunned, speechless, when the Rider came, brandishing a notice of grim tidings that she wasn't expecting; news of the untimely deaths of two comrades who she had been proud to call her friends. The tears that ran down her cheeks in that moment stung with an intensity that was made over-harsh with the cold, and in her grief, she brought clenched fists to the ground to send brittle soil flying in torrents around her.
Esheyn knew that Lirelle and Sederis had gone to fulfill a more urgent purpose, that they were more than ready to die for the sake of their homeland. So too was she aware that few others were as capable of emerging victorious in the face of adversity that only the Alliance could bring upon them—they needed to step up, because who else would? But a part of her, ashamed in its selfish desire, wished that they had not heeded the call, that they would have remained with the main army to fight another day.
And as her bleary eyes gazed upon the remnants of her botanical folly, there in the semi-darkness of her tent, Esheyn wondered if Lirelle could have made a breakthrough in this endeavor, where the Knight had fallen short.
It was a question that would remain unanswered, swept up in a sobering tide of things that would never be.
No more afternoon teas.
No more gardening.
No more spars.
They were gone.
She choked back another wave of tears as she rose to her feet, turning to reach for her well-worn leather bag—the one she was scarcely seen without, half-open and overflowing with the seeds that she had tried, in vain, to grow in the frozen earth.
Esheyn would honor her friends, and their deeds, in her own way.
With trembling hands, she rifled through her satchel's numerous pockets, until she finally found what she was looking for. Two seed packets, unmarked and sealed shut, but she knew what they contained. She held her breath as she labeled each one.
Cirsium 'Lirelle'
Lilium 'Sederis'
A small smile tugged at the corners of her mouth as she tucked the packets away. Perhaps she couldn't grow anything while Winter bared its fangs, but if—no, when—the time came for Quel'Thalas to bask in the glow of Eternal Spring once more, she would be ready to cultivate new life in the name of those who had made the ultimate sacrifice.
Prompt 11: World Building, First Person What if World of Warcraft took a different turn with its inspiration? What if the game was actually based entirely around science fantasy, particularly cyberpunk? I was a cheesy bitch and did The Modern AU(™). For a long piece, use what skills you’ve learned and practiced to narrate AS your character in this different world.
What would their occupation be? What is the world like? Factions? Races? Conflicts? Try to write about a normal or abnormal day for your character in this world—is their name different too? Write in your character’s perspective, and take on a very in-depth look of a different personality and worldview.
[I was very cheesy and went balls deep into a Modern AU story to exercise a more modern narrative style. Lots of references to others and events from World of Warcraft roleplay or Thanidiel’s background, try to catch them all. alsoimsorrythiswassolong.
“Alright, alright. Just, shut the fuck up for, like, I don’t know, an hour. Ethan, cradle your beer, you’re good at that. Elena… I don’t gotta tell you shit.
Let’s start with… the beginning.
So, let’s just get this shit out of the way. Auberry, up in Fresno County, California. Small-time fucking town. My dad was a new recruit to the police department, there. First-generation son to some Lithuanians that couldn’t read shit for English. My mom is a Mono Indian, from the Big Sandy Rancheria next door.
1990, Dad knocked her up when she was in town. I was the result, that she passed right back to Dad. Grew up happy without her, ran around just fine with myself, my Staffordshire, Ted, and all of the neighborhood backdoors left open. Grandparents were out of the picture by then, and Dad had shit hours, so it was up to the Abuelas and Grandma Sallys. Suited all of us just fine.
One day, Dad gets shot up breaking up a domestic dispute. I was six. And as much as we all want to think about those crazy stories up on Reddit and Facebook, no one fucking walks away from a hunting rifle. His coworkers stopped by, took me to the tribe headquarters in town to figure out what to do with me. Off to Big Sandy they sent my ass. I hear the Grandma next to us took Ted.
As much as I want to say things got more chill from there, it didn’t. See, my mom was half-white, already. Mix that with some straight-out-of-Europe dude, and you get a blue-eyed blonde haired kid running around with the Mono. Mom didn’t want me either, and she made that damned clear to the elders, so I was back to being a community effort on a new Grandma’s sofa.
Bless Grandma, she tried. Fed me. Taught me a handful of Monachi. Taught me how to fucking read and write English. Driving, eventually. Hooked me up with a new dog too when I got there, Tamuapaya, albino-assed thing. All of the good parental shit you’re supposed to do, with everything she had.
I ended up as black of a sheep as it gets, though. Scraped with the other kids whenever we crossed each other, dogs got in on it too. Adults couldn’t fucking stand me outside of Grandma ‘cause I didn’t think they deserved anything but lip. And, let me just say, it’s fucking awkward when you realize you’re a fag, hours out from a real city. I was never really accepted with them outside of cook-outs, but that was when you had to take everyone registered in the tribe.
Eventually, I get old enough to start itching to work. So I start the uphill battle of doing the most shit possible small-jobs for the most shit payout for these folk, and as you two know, I am stubborn as fucking shit about my work. So I did every bit of work they pissed at me, with fucking excellence.
Then that got too small when I was like, fifteen, and wanted some real fucking cash. The other black sheep got me then, and let me know it was easy money running drugs between us, peeps at the Casino, Auberry, and Fresno. Next thing I know, I’m sitting in a truck bed heading to Fres’ at 1 A.M. in the morning to pick up with them.
Didn’t take long for Grandma to figure out I wasn’t running off to catch friends at Auberry. She switched me more times than I can remember to try to beat it out of me. Didn’t work, and she didn’t have any full-on proof to get others in it, either - hid the FUCK out of the cash and what we were distributing.
So, eventually, I’m like… seventeen? And I’m passing crack to this military guy visiting relatives in Auberry and wanted some fun up by the Casino. And when he puts the cash in my hand and I put the bag in his, he doesn’t tell me to fuck off. He gives me a good look, asks how old I am, I tell him, and he asks me what the fuck am I going to do out here for another seventy years. I don’t even get to answer when he tells me I should get the fuck out of here, go talk to a recruiter at Fres’.
That got me thinking, so a year later, I’ve found all of my documents and shit in Grandma’s house. I have a pile of cash. And I want to get the fuck out of this shithole. I stuff it all into my backpack, I go with the boys to Fres’. I dump off all of my shit into Christian’s bag; free myself of it. I take a bus to get my ass right to the opposite end of the city. Spend my night in a homeless shelter with my backpack underneath my shirt and sweater, my arms wrapped around it, sleeping on my stomache, and a switch under the extra jacket I was using a pillow.
Next day, I get a free gym trial. I shower and make myself look as respectable as I need. After that, I open up a Bank of America and drop the eight-k. I had into my first savings. I keep three-hundred on me, I grab some Burger King, and I make my way to the Army recruiter.
Guy helps me get set up because it’s like the third time in my life I’ve done paperwork excluding the bank, which did like… everything, for me. After that, it’s floating between the shelter, gym, and getting odd jobs helping at taquerias and panaderias, with their dishes or pushing garbage and carts around for a month. Taking all of those damned test and then waiting for them to process. Grabbed an iPhone 3G during the wait, that was pretty cool.
Fort Jackson for a year, as it goes. Nothing significant in the grand scheme of things; shit was fresh hell, but nothing I couldn’t handle. For the most part. Met Casey there. My age. Actually graduated H.S., attending community nearby for sports medicine. It would still be another two years before fags could be open in the military, but we… got together. When we could. You could—… it was dating. We started dating when I was in B.C.T. And made it work after that.
After basic, I get hauled off all over the place. Okinawa, Hawaii, Ansbach. Mid-2011, they let us be out and loud in the U.S. military. Bad move for my career, but, first thing I did when I took my leave is fuck Casey and ask her to marry me. No ring or any big romantic gesture, we didn’t work like that. She said, yeah, sure. The process went underway, it’s all done by the time I’m heading back to like, Fort Irwin.
We’re separated for a while, then, like, she graduated, because she was a lot fucking smarter than me. And she started living with me on base. Which is fucking awesome. It’s not what I asked for, because she had all of this potential to work with back at home. But, hey, she wanted to travel too. We had our years, we were fucking twenty-years old. I let her come.
So we fucked around in South Korea, Alaska, Italy, it’s almost a blur after everything. Eventually, I get put out in Camp K.A.I.A. in Afghanistan. She’s back in Kansas, ‘cause, naturally, they’re hesitant on letting me drag a U.S. civy out there of all bases. It’s seven months into my deployment, she wants to visit and I let her.
April 28th, 2014. I took her out, a bit south of the airport in city proper for a meal, in the early morning. We were eating lamb korma with turnips— I still can’t fucking handle smelling and eating lamb. Or any soft fucking food: deuces to mashed potatoes and bolognese. God.
So we were eating—… we were eating that. And there was an airplane with a fucked engine that had been making its way towards the airport. It didn’t get close to the runaway. It veered and dropped, right into the city. The wing went right through our building.
I was sitting northward. She was sitting southward. My mind slowed down time, and I watched the way all of this debris and broken cable and a fucking airplane slammed into her back. She hits the table and it’s shooting off. All I see is blood and curry everywhere, then it hits me, too.
I wake up in the hospital two days later. My head feels like shit because my brain got ping-ponged. A sheet of metal opened up my torso from collar to hip, and a piece of flying drywall smashed my right cheek and orbital socket. They couldn’t save the eye. The ceiling falling after meant some heavy shit landed onto my left hand. They couldn’t save that either. And they couldn’t save Casey. She died on contact.
—I’m fine, by the way. Just pass over the whiskey. I’m not finished.
Cutting that long story of recovery short, I stabilize. They get to Landstuhl in Germany. Eventually, I end up back in the States. Sans eye and hand. A little ugly, now, too. Medical discharge. Sucks, but I’m hooked up with a nice prosthetic, at the least. That all takes about eight months to wrap up - not a lot of interest in keeping an uneducated, handless, soldier around.
And, you know, that’s where you come in, Ethan. I don’t think Elena knows this part about us, so bear with me. Ethan, here, was my Sergeant for a damned while. His ass phased out in ‘13. We always got along great, he kept up with us babies even when he was out. Group texts were a great invention; Snapchat groups even better. Now we both get to see all of the stupid shit the rest of those idiots are doing on deployment.
Ethan is basically like my fucking dad. So when fates aligned and I was in the Brooklyn military hospital, he started driving down from his apartment in the city, seeing me about once a week on his weekends. Then, when I was out, he offered me a place to stay, no costs. Naturally, I fucking took it. The last thing I was going to do now that I was out, was gonna walk my ass back to the Mono in that Cali shithole. Not fucking smart to be alone after the shit that had happened.
And, honestly? It worked really well. I used the time he’d be gone with his job at the nearby library to do… basically all of the adult shit I didn’t do in the military. Got my license, borrowing the car from his coworker and our close friend, Esther (nice girl, did volleyball and track for high-school and college, then decided she liked things quiet). Took the bus to therapy with a guy through the V.A., ‘till I grabbed a beat up 2009 Chevy truck from Craigslist. Eventually, started classes for a G.E.D. too. Collected my military checks, saved it all and got pocket-money with a part-time at some flower hippy’s cafe—and, you know, I never realized how fucking hard it is to make legit money in the ‘real world’ until then. Ethan, you’re a fucking saint. Like, three-hundred or whatever a week? Chump ass change compared to when I bounced with the kids in Fres’.
All of that good shit. Plus, it was nice that we both had a drinking buddy. And we both had a way of navigating each other’s bullshit well. Like, Elena, you just heard my wife-story. And you’ve heard about the fire, too. It’s not the fucking same, but it worked out that we had about an inkling of what to do when the other dude’s fucked up.
Eventually, it’s the day for appointment hell. Check up, physical therapy, actual therapy, then likely, a stop by the pharmacist. It’s like, early ‘16, at this point. And before we even get started, the doctor sits me down. Starts talking about this experimental stem-cell research, for organ implantation. Taylor says it’s not at a complex enough stage to restore my hand, but my eye and facial scars would be within the window of possibility. Gives me a card for a Brianna Lalwani-Jindal if I’m interested in volunteering for it.
I get through the day. I finally catch a meal at Jersey Mike’s, and after me and Ethan talk about it over some Coors, like if I wanna do it and how it feels fucking weird, to like, erase what happened to Casey through this, I say, sure, I’ll call. It’s like, eight P.M. She answers like four seconds before it just shoots to her voicemail. The bitch fucking slurs out like she snorted too much Vico, “—yeah, I know I’m fucking late, I’ll be there, I prooomise.”
So me and Ethan pick our jaws off the floor hearing this shit and I’m like, “Nah, Tony Dawson. Doctor Taylor Woodson at the Brooklyn V.A. Hospital referred me to you, about your research trials with the organ implantation. Lalwani?”
There’s a gasp, a lot of shuffling, and a lot of me and Ethan passing around another beer can between us. Then she really starts spilling and it becomes a game of my fucking brain trying to comprehend this Indian accent mixed with that lightspeed fucking way people from those big cities talk, like “Oh shit, okay, okay, okay. Yeah, you’ve got me. Where do you live? What are you missing? When can I meet you? Tomorrow?”
So I tell her about my fucked-up face, but really, I want to know what the fuck I just got myself into with this chick. I don’t get the chance, she blurts out over me, “Sounds great! EYE will see you later, Tony. Tomorrow. Four P.M., Just… show back at the Hospital. We’ll find a vacant office. Ciao.” Then the fucker hangs up. Eventually, we decide that I should probably text the number back, at least. My ‘See you then.’ gets back a kissy-face and ‘I like coffee.’ Subtle.
A vanilla latte and unsweetened black tea, fifteen minutes of us wandering the Hospital, thirty minutes of her talking my ear off about a bunch of medical-scientific garbage, then five minutes of us filling out all of the paperwork, and I was Bri’s new, shiny, case study.
Skipping over all of the shit she ran my face through, we’ll sum it up as: I need contacts and I fucking hate it, but she did what she set out to do. The meetings themselves, were more interesting. I don’t know if she like, fucking sensed that I’d let her get away with her shit. But I’m going to assume that, since she still has her fucking job.
It got unprofessional, pretty fast. Like, beyond what she already hit me with. I’m not sure what got into me, honestly. I hadn’t even considered another girl since the crash. But I spent our introductions looking at her like a piece of meat whenever her back was turned. First real meeting, she’s prodding me about all of my personal interests and shit in some fucked small talk, starting to get into my dating life. I take a risk and just drop straight out that I dig chicks.
She gets a bit quiet, which doesn’t make much of a difference because it’s clear already that she’s a fucking loudmouth. But she gets curious, and keeps looking at me after that the whole time I’m there. Then the meeting after that, we ended up on some fucking talk about blindfolds for some reason, and let me just say that she got a little too into that before we started talking about how, like, I needed to turn down my drinking.
So the whole time I’m letting her and the other doctors Frankenstein my face, there is sexual tension to cut with at every goddamned interaction to be had. It never gets anywhere, because neither of us are fucking stupid. But, just, Jesus Christ.
Cut to a year later at the end of 2016. My face is put back together. Getting used to fucking contacts, getting used to checking my emails for interview requests out of the wazoo for five-hundred documentaries and news sites, after her team’s paper on me came out. By all accounts, I’m looking good and so is the implant. She’s onto new volunteers, my appointments are getting passed to another doctor on her team and stretched out to semi-annuals. That should be the end of the story.
But, uh, couldn’t get her out of my head, frankly. Not for a lack of trying, either. By now, I was really amping the weights at gym to try to get my energy out. Quit the hippy cafe and lined up a new job in armed security. Did my registration for online classes at the community, for a Statistics program. Eventually, it’s like, I don’t know, two months, after the last time I saw her. Ethan drags me out to a bar. Ethan fucks off. I meet a girl, some rich one, named Valencia. We get to talking, for like, fifteen minutes. Next thing I know, I’m texting Ethan I’ll show up later and I spent the night at her place.
It’s fucking great, Valencia’s fucking great. But I’m texting Bri the next afternoon at Starbucks that I want to see her that goddamned night. She shoots me the address of another bar, says to bring friends. Naturally, that means I tag in Ethan and Esther. We show up, she has good ol’ Elena here.
Everyone clicks just like that. And that’s fucking great. Lots of material to work through, especially when Bri started going on about how she and Elena met; some wild case when she was a med. student and the Roma communities in the whole state were having outbreaks. Apparently Elena helped with her outreach a lot, a sort of guide between worlds. Then the two quiet girls started going on about their herb gardens, not to even mention all of the stupid military stories me and Ethan had. We hung out for a long ass while. Eventually, we’re all back at Bri’s place. And our BOI Ethan, here, finally communicates what’s up to you and Esther. So Esther ‘takes you two out to for fast food’ and out of our hairs.
Shit takes even shorter than Valencia. Bri locks the door, we fuck. Then I wake up in the morning, wake her up for another fuck. We sleep around, get some take-out for a late… brunch… hang out, I end up taking her with me to that huge football party Tim was hosting and meeting up with the whole friend group. Then it’s just straight back to her place for a repeat performance.
So, basically, it went from zero to like we had always been fucking dating. I practically moved in with her after the first two weeks. I know all of my stuff ended up in there by the fourth month. Then we put me on the lease entirely sometime during the seventh month when she was renewing it. It all flowed natural as shit too, I didn’t even know how ‘fast’ we were going ‘till about the third time I was throwing shit I needed into boxes to toss at Bri’s and Ethan called me the fuck out when he asked: I just said it’s convenient with how much closer to work she is.
And I know a lot of people were, and still do, giving me shit about it, or just about the whole relationship in general. Apparently we talk too hard at each other and act too casual for it to be serious. Looks like some sorta fling, especially considering our ‘differences’ as people put it. You know, racist people, or people who think I’m fucking stupid ‘cause I got a gun in the drawer.
But lemme just say that I think it takes some real fucking balls in a person, where the first time she ever woke up to me having a PTSD episode, is to slide her ass out of bed, rummage through my coat for my medication, and slap my benzos in front of me with leftover tea and a Crunch bar. All without a single word. It takes real balls, any other person, after getting that from her, is just a discount bitch.
It’s not all her pampering me, either. I realized quick she’s a ‘talker’ with her research. If she isn’t with one of us, she’s locked in the bedroom with a stack of journal articles and a Macbook talking off Luke’s ears like he can fucking bark back. So I started reading everything she had and really going over her team’s paper on me, plus whatever the fuck else her scholar databases had, and a lot of Dictionary.com. And, one weekend, she’s complaining to me over coffee and tea about her shit, I pop that shit right back at her, her jaw drops, she probably shits herself a little. And, from then on, I’m her new interactive rubber duck. And people think I’m fucking dumb.
I mean, not to mention all of the random shit I pay for that bitch, with all of the money I’ve been getting lately between disability, financial aid, and work.
So, we’re basically to the present now. There isn’t much detail to fill in after that besides that life is pretty fucking great and Bri is pretty fucking great, from then to now, the middle of Year of Our Lord, 2018. Which takes us to the crux of this whole ass speech I’ve been going on.
Now you two know my life-story. What I wanna know, now that we’re all open and drunk here, is your fucking thoughts on if I’d be making the best, or the worst, decision of my life if I asked her to hitch with me. I’ll be fucking real; I don’t fucking know what it’s like to make a good choice besides like, I don’t know, where to buy my graphics cards.”
I watch the two shitfaces in front of me process what the fuck I just said. Elena brightens like the Irish daisy she is, pressing her hands together, abso-fucking-lutely wiggling in her seat. Her purple scarf slides off the back of the chair in the process. Ethan is still stretched out across the whole damned table like he’s gonna pass out, with the dopiest smile stretching across his face, but as usual, he’s the ‘loud’ one of the two and starts to talk over Elena’s vague ‘Oh… oh…!’
“Dude? That’s… that’s great. That’s really fucking great. I… Man. Fucking, just fucking go for—”
“So are we just a homeless shelter now, or like, is this a reverse Alcoholics Anonymous?” The door slams shut, Luke is rushing off of the couch, and all four of us are just JEERING (barking) Bri’s name back at her, like it makes it fucking better that these idiots are still in the apartment.
“I was thinking homeless shelter and giving them the living room.”
“Cool. Maybe the floor’ll delay Ethan breaking his back another day.”
“Hey… hey, man. I ain’t that old.”
“Oh! Don’t say that - what if it does happen?”
Twiddle Gray and Twiddle Orange are both looking at me funny right now, considering what was cut into, and Bri is starting to pick that up as she’s putting her keys and shit away.
“So! What were you all talking about? Are you finally leaving me?”
“Food, actually. We were thinking that Himalayan place you like. They can eat the basic bitch shit, I was gonna grab us fried okra and tandoori.”
“I hope you aren’t expecting me to pick my ass up from the couch, now. That shit, ain’t happening. Long day working with by-the-book dunderfucks.”
The Twiddles give each a look, then, and then Ethan launches in.
“Nah… naaaaah. You know what? You sit there. You hang out. The three of us will walk down, sober up.”
“With how you made my fucking apartment smell, not sure if that’s gonna happen. But ‘kay. Have fun, leave me all alone. After I just came back from work. A l o n e.”
The three of us are already draining our waters and grabbing our jackets and wallets. I push Elena towards the door and Ethan is right after her as I shoot back at her,
“Shut the fuck up, you whiny bitch. Thirty minutes. You’d be spending it ignoring us and doing your shitty Buzzfeed quizzes anyway.”
“I mean - you’re right. But you’re still leaving me alone. Shit friends. Shit girlfriend,” she sighs, “What a shit life.”
Elena is the one pushing me through the door now by my arm, forcing me and Ethan’s fat asses into the hallway as she tries to assure Bri.
NICKNAME(S): Esh, Sprout (used only by her father)
TITLE(S): Dawnward of the Sunguard, Knight-Champion of the Blood Knight Order (formerly)
AGE: 275
BIRTHDAY: April 22nd
RACE: Sin’dorei
GENDER: Female
MARITAL/RELATIONSHIP STATUS: Romantically involved with Taliori Dewblossom
Physical Appearance——
HAIR: Burgundy, thick and curly, usually tied back in a low bun or long braid
EYES: Fel Green
HEIGHT: 6'2"
BUILD: Athletic, with broad shoulders and thick legs
DISTINGUISHING MARKS: A long, jagged scar that runs diagonally across her abdomen. A large puncture scar just below her left collarbone that runs down to her sternum. A rope-like scar that wraps around her lower right leg.
TATTOOS: None
PIERCINGS: None
COMMON ACCESSORIES: A worn leather satchel that is typically overflowing with herbs and flowers
Personal Information——
PROFESSION: Botanist, Soldier
HOBBIES: Gardening, reading, sparring
SKILL(S): Extensive knowledge of botanical sciences, Horse-riding, Light-based offensive magics, Military strategy and tactics, Potion-making, Weapon proficiency (swords, spears, and shields)
While the rest of the Guard dedicated their energies in the aftermath of the Battle of the Dawnspire to recovery and repair, Thanidiel Highdawn had supplied only two days’ worth of efforts before she had taken her horses and mourning clothes to make for Quel’thalas’ Capitol. It seemed almost as though the Blood Knight had wiped her hands entirely of the Guard and their affairs in favour of preparing for her coming duties with the Blood Watch - if it were not for the presence of a Blood Knight cadre later in the week, leaping over debris and navigating broken city streets to make delivery on the Lightward’s behalf from the backs of their rounceys.
First, they make to locate Knight-Lord Ethalarian Dawnstalker. Presented to him, is a sturdy, simple claymore at face-value. Deeper study proves the weapon to be a masterful reforging of the blade he had shattered in Thanidiel’s hands on the morning of their first spar. Blood-red mineral has been worked into the grey steel; staining it with the Order’s favoured colour. Unsheathed, a note spills from the oiled lynx-leather scabbard.
“Everything of Elven-make proves stronger when it is reborn.”
@trained-trainwreck
Second, they make for the main triaging center to locate Elleynah Stormsummer. To her, the Blood Knights supply a good set of iron horseshoes meant for long journeys and a square saddle-blanket of a well-padded wool quilt. For Brightdawn, of course. She earns lengthier words from Thanidiel,
“The Feast of Winter’s Veil was one of the most favoured holidays amongst us who lived in Quel’thalas’ most severe backcountry. In all of my years, I’ve yet to experience anything quite as endearing as soldiers warding away the bone-chill of the air, our stomaches half-full, and still managing to find camaraderie in the dark nights with what we could scavenge for one another - or hoard earlier in the year - in our winter migrations.
I find it only fit to maintain such military traditions when blackness seems to be a trend of Dawnspire winters.”
@stormandozone
In the same vein, they make to locate Prisa Violette amongst the medical staff. In broken Common the transfer of an old book of Thalassian-Common translation predating the Second War to the Human is made. She manages to earn a note from Thanidiel, too.
“Stop listening to Bricini.”
@pyrar
To Zalin, his gift of sharpening-stone for a favoured blade is countered with a tin of a dozen cigars of a unique blend - tobacco and bloodthistle rolled in silverleaf. No words are left for the Sentinel as their dedication to their work speaks enough on its own.
@curiouslich
After that, the Knights seek out Ithanar. For the closer from whom the Lightward would call comrades, he is given… a shirt. It’s a good shirt. Comfortable in its fit and fabric for the large man. But, uh, the design has managed to -exactly- mimick Islesun’s favourite red-shirt. What kind of sick joke.
“Your last one is started to grow ragged like you.”
@captainswingbeard
From Ithanar, they spring to Esheyn and provide to her a potted plant. Shimmering arcana guarantees the bonsai-specimen to last an eternity. The unique twisting form hints at a Suramarian origin although manipulation has turned its leaves crimson and its bark pale in a Thalassian twist.
“You have a better heart for these pretty things than I do. Take what would be wasted on me.”
@kinari
Kyranyx, too, is found by Thanidiel’s Knights. To her, the soldiers endow a simple mantle of an orange lynx’s coat. The ruggedness hints that it was not bought - but a creature hunted down by the Lightward’s spear itself. Running one’s fingers through it, the undercoat shimmers in a paler shade of gold.
@commander-ryther
Lastly, they make for the outskirts of the Dawnspire, hunting down Kaltaia through the bold signals of her presence. To her… she is presented with a long length of Legion-forged chain; one of the dozens used to enwrap and take down the Ultimate Weapon early into the assault by Baal’s vanguard. The Construct’s red paint intermixed with Mo’arg blood still marrs the metal. No words, nor announcement, come from the Knights. They make their delivery swiftly and ride equally swift back to the Main Road. Another ‘gift’ reminiscent of the bloodied spear from Tyr’s Hand.
@azriah
The services of Thanidiel’s Blood Knights are dismissed for the time-being after that. However, one last gift is imparted by the woman. Awaiting in the mail of Bricini’s residence when she, too, eventually concludes her services to the Dawnspire for the time being, is a letter enclosed by the waxen seal of the Thalassian Magisterium.
To Doctor Bricini Lightwing,
Your research in the field of regenerative medicine has not gone unseen by the State. The potential in your work, as observed with your treatment of a Lazarus Redmorn and Thanidiel Highdawn, has been noted.
In light of the State’s Will and Desire to encourage the powerful innovations of its citizenry for the good of our Kingdom, you have been granted credit in the worth of three-thousand gold coins by the Magisterium.
This credit will be used solely in the pursuit of your research as relating to the medical-field. Should you continue to display excellence and potential of great service to our People, you may see more substantial reward. It is to be stressed that any fraudulent misuse is highly unadvised.
The same Hand that feeds you has the same potential to gouge out your cheeks in an instance.
Hand of Belore Renalays Bloodhallow of the Inquisition; Magistrix of Quel’thalas
