Misdirection and Propaganda

[Kittridge-sisters-of-elune]

Ever since that night in the Blue Recluse Tavern, Mersadie Kittridge had nursed a grudge. Just as she did now, sitting alone in her cabin aboard her ship, the Iron Shrike, in Tiragarde Sound, a glass of brandy in her hand.

Calling out serial traitors like these void elves and being assaulted by a stupid little girl playing paladin made her a villain, and they called their little toy policemen (she had no respect whatsoever for the Watch after that night) to escort her out when all she was trying to do was have a drink. What did they expect her to do when the honor of Kul Tiras was impugned by a bunch of ignorant little armchair soldiers - when that freak insulted her people, her homeland, and her Lord Admiral? Granted, she had not absolved Jaina for Daelin’s death - she never would - but she was the Lord Admiral, by all Kul Tiran law, and all who sailed under Kul Tiras’ flag were honor-bound to obey her.

She reminded them that they should be glad they weren’t in Boralus. If this scene had played out in the Snug Harbor, she would have shot them all dead (and most of the bar patrons would have probably joined her) for running their mouths, and she would have had them fed to the sharks. And the city guard - real soldiers, not these costumed cretins Stormwind employed - wouldn’t have minded one bit. She was a captain in the Kul Tiran navy, a veteran of three wars, a proud protector of Kul Tiras - and the Alliance, when it remembered why it existed in the first place. These things counted for something in Boralus. They obviously meant nothing to Stormwind, especially not to these traitors from Quel’Thalas.

She wondered, not for the first time, if the void elves were spies for Silvermoon, and their “exile” was just a ploy so they could infiltrate the Alliance and spread their poison. Light knew it had worked well enough in Stormwind, where such scum were protected while people like her were vilified. Elves were perennial backstabbers. They betrayed their allies against the Legion during the War of the Ancients, then they betrayed the Legion… they betrayed the Alliance, they betrayed the Horde… hell, they regularly betrayed each other. And yet they were considered more trustworthy than the good people of Kul Tiras?

Mersadie raised the glass to her lips… and froze. She felt something… moving in the cabin. Setting her glass down, she rose from her chair and reached over for her double-barrel blunderbuss, a gold-chased weapon of exquisite craftsmanship, given to her by the gnomish militia captain Englebert Blunderwitz. Before her hand could reach the stock to pick it up, however, an agonizing pain seared through her back, and she went rigid.

She swore she heard footsteps as she collapsed to the deck. Then she heard the voice of her first mate, Ian Blanky. “Captain… Sadie?!” The loyal old sailor knelt next to her. “Get the surgeon down here! Now!”

“Who…” Mersadie whispered, as she felt the footsteps through the deck. “What…?”

“Rest easy now, Cap’n.” That was the surgeon. “Limbs’re as stiff as planks. That’s gotta be some kinda poison. I’ll check me antivenins, but first…” He rummaged through his kit. “Pull that blade out quickish, Mr. Blanky, if’n ye would.” Another searing pain went through her as the blade came out. As she began to blank out, Mersadie saw the weapon in his hand.

It was a ren’dorei dagger.

“Damn… them,” she spat, as unconsciousness took her.

---

The assassin was indeed an elf, but not who Mersadie thought. She had snuck aboard the ship in the shallows, not minding the cold water one bit, and had snuck off just as silently as she came. She emerged from the shadows on the shore just southwest of Hatherford.

“Is it done?” her patron asked - unseen even to her trained eye… with a hint of an artificial echo in his tone.

“It will hurt, and the paralytic will keep her stuck for a time, but she’ll live. It will certainly muddy the waters a bit.”

“Good. Wish she’d have had a bit tighter rein on her feelings, until the time was right, but Kul Tirans are a tempermental people. Still… it will do, for our purposes.”

[Urgan-sisters-of-elune]

The Drunken Hozen was empty at this time of day; it would be several hours yet before the AAMS opened up shop. Urgan had been waiting for the better part of the last hour; he had been summoned here by a courier from the Council, and wondered who had the presumption to summon him - especially out here.

Let’s not get too high on our horse, he admonished himself. Your position is not as great as it used to be.

“Well, well… behold the Corruptor, master of the Modas il Toralar. How the mighty have fallen.”

Urgan turned at the sound of that voice… and laughed. “I should have suspected it would be you. Are you sure you want to be seen with me? I’m a filthy Horde, you know.”

“A filthy orc, maybe,” the other corrected as he sat down, activating a device on his person; Urgan sensed a bubble-like effect, and had a feeling it was a sound dampener, something to keep prying ears from listening in. “But I know and you know that just as I have no great love for the Alliance, you have no great love for the Horde. Not even when it looked like Sylvanas was leading it into the dark pit you knew and loved in the olden days.”

“You have me there,” the Corruptor admitted.

“And besides, the pandaren may be gossipy folks, but this place tends to be crammed with people from both sides anyway, so our meeting will not seem out of the ordinary, not even at this early hour… and they’ll see we want privacy, figuring we’re comrades or business partners or something. And in a way… we are.” He chuckled. “To the point, however. You and I, with all the differences we have, are very similar. We have no love for our respective factions, or for the opposite… and we profit from chaos and strife, regardless of who’s having to deal with it. Fair assessment so far?”

Urgan nodded. “It feels strange hearing it from another’s lips, especially yours… but go on.”

“Often the best conflicts are the ones that are started for particularly stupid reasons. Making mountains out of molehills. For instance, walking into a bar, having a nice conversation, and then it turns nasty. In the scenario I happened to hear of, it was a Kul Tiran captain, identifying herself as one of ‘Proudmoore’s finest’ in the Blue Recluse in Stormwind, and some void elf bimbo starts talking smack about Jaina Proudmoore because she ‘ruined Quel’Thalas’ chance of ever returning to the Alliance’, the purges in Dalaran, her supposed attempt to wipe Orgrimmar off the map, that sort of thing.”

“Some void elves were glad for their exile from Silvermoon, so they could ‘go home again’ to the Alliance,” the Corruptor agreed. “I can see why this particular void elf might think so.”

“Indeed. Now, for all that Jaina is looked on rather badly in Kul Tiras because of that whole business with her father in Theramore just after the Third War, by their law she is now their sovereign, their Lord Admiral. Their sailors are sworn to obey her and protect her honor… so a captain in their fleet would take it badly if someone started insulting her. It then turns into a tirade about elves and their perennial treachery, some physical assault is made by some human girl supporting the void elf, threats are hurled about, the Watch gets involved… hostility abounds. So, with such a tense brew in the air, an opportunity for conflict… what would you do?”

Urgan considered this for a moment. “Try and stir the pot, I suppose. Commit some act and make it look like…” He paused, glancing at his visitor with a hint of suspicion. “You’ve done it already, haven’t you?”

“I have. Which is why I’ve come to you. Gossip from Boralus Harbor indicates that the taverns try not to serve void elves when she’s in port… she believes they’re spies sent from Silvermoon, that the idea of exiling them was a ploy to insert them into the Alliance. She also points out that Alleria is Sylvanas’ sister, and believes that this tie is not as easily severed as she lets on. Sure, she supports the Alliance and hates the Horde… but what if it’s an act?”

Urgan shook his head. “I’m fairly sure it’s not.”

“And you’re probably right… but would an ignorant fool like that captain believe it?” His guest smiled. “In both Stormwind and Orgrimmar, and in all points beyond and between, there are people who believe they know everything, that they know better than their supposed leaders and ‘wise men’. Take some of your recent new allies, for instance. The Mag’har, the Nightborne, the Zandalari. It’s all peace and love now, or so it seems. But there are some who remember that the Mag’har used to be the Iron Horde. The Nightborne used to work with Gul’dan. The Zandalari propped up the Gurubashi and the Amani, tried to subvert the Darkspear, and resurrected Lei Shen in Pandaria. Oh, some will say, ‘it was the warlords who led the Iron Horde, they’re all dead’, or ‘it was just Elisande and her loyalists, Thalyssra and her people are okay’, or ‘it was Zul and his zealots, Talanji isn’t like that’. Hell… there’s still the Forsaken to consider, too. You could claim that Sylvanas abandoned them, that they’re not all like her. But will they believe it? That’s the key.”

Urgan could see where he was going. “Spread the suspicion around. Weaken the bonds.”

“Exactly. But keep it low-key, yes? Let it look natural, not like it’s being planned. That captain, for all that she’s probably got the right idea, went about it the wrong way. She made her contempt public. And I can tell you that’s never a good thing. You and I both know what that leads to. I’d rather not have that experience again.”

The Corruptor nodded emphatically. “Nor I.” His gaze took on hints of suspicion and curiosity. “What did you have in mind?”

“It always seems to be something about elves, I find. Now, the two factions of elves in the Alliance are not exactly friends… the night elves are suspicious of the Highborne in general, but void elves make them especially wary. But the two elven factions in the Horde - Suramar and Silvermoon - are like bosom buddies. Shared ancestry, shared experiences. But perhaps… something might weaken that bond, at least a little.”

“Like?”

“Well… with the captain, I made sure she would live, and continue spreading her bile. But here… perhaps a proper murder would be in order?”

[Darkfrost-cenarion-circle]

Magister Lianis Darkfrost had not lingered long in the Drunken Hozen, seeing as a solid half of the patrons were Theronite backstabbers from Silvermoon, and at least one of them was wearing the colors of the AAMS. Not for the first time, he wondered why he had left, given that his skin was now purplish and his hair had void tendrils in it… but after listening to those hedonistic twits, he was glad he had. Silvermoon was not what it had been when he had studied in the Magisters’ Terrace ages ago, nor when he had been… well, when Silvermoon had been in happier times.

He had gone upstairs with his wine to enjoy it in peace. Then he had taken a portal back to Dalaran, which was much quieter now than it had been before. No one came here anymore unless they had to.

As he entered his room, Lianis stopped short as he realized someone was in there. And furthermore, someone he recognized… the kaldorei assassin with the black eyes. The one who had served his late, more or less unlamented, mistress, Lady Tavira Nightswan. “Fine work you did in Nazjatar,” he said sarcastically. “I’m sure she was very proud of you.”

“At least I stayed,” was the short reply.

“Water under the bridge, my dear elves.” That voice came from some… thing standing on the chair at his desk. He recognized this one too. “Now I know your two little cliques don’t like each other much, but can we at least pretend to get along for the time being?”

Lianis’ eyes narrowed. “What do you want?”

“The same thing as you do, sir: Chaos for our enemies, foreign and domestic… and the power to wipe them all out. I know you’ve not adjusted very well to being among humans. As far as the Alliance is concerned, unless you’re a human or a dwarf, you don’t matter a damn. It’s why we’ve had to rely more or less on ourselves, and why our recent union was initiated by our own people. The little lion king prefers to play with rocks, cows, and frizzy-haired princelings these days.”

“Your point?”

“Well… I’ll admit that part of the reason I’m here is for your general welfare.”

Lianis snorted. “Given your reputation, I highly doubt that.”

“Oh, give me some credit, Magister. I’m not a complete monster.” He chuckled. “There’s been an… incident in Boralus. Apparently, one of your people snuck aboard a Kul Tiran battleship in Tiragarde Sound and attempted to assassinate the captain. They left their knife at the scene. And it appears that it will trace back to one of your late mistress’ retainers… and possibly, as the remaining senior, visible member of those retainers, to you.”

“One of our blades? But…” Lianis’ eyes went wide as he looked up at the night elf. “You.”

“It’s nothing personal,” the other went on, “but as I said… chaos among our enemies, foreign and domestic. Obviously this Alliance does your people, and mine, no good at all - so why not bring all the rabble-rousers out, so we can squash them? The Kul Tirans in particular seem bent on resolving every problem with pitchforks and torches. And not just the Drustvarians, either. Besides… do we really need friends the likes of Jaina Proudmoore? She has a tendency to betray friends and family when it suits her. You had friends in the Sunreavers, Magister. You remember.”

Lianis’ jaw clenched. “I do,” he hissed venomously. He had been in Silvermoon during the purge of Dalaran, but a number of his comrades - and even a fair few of his students - had been there. Many had ended up in the Violet Hold, and several had been killed. Jaina had never been taken to account for it… not by Dalaran, not even by Silvermoon.

“She has a proven track record of flip-flopping. She loves the Horde, she hates the Horde. She lets her father be murdered, and then honors his memory. And everyone steps back to let her take his place. But that’s nothing to all this peace and love nonsense Anduin spouts… he shows more honor to an orc savage than he does to his own father, or to the thousands who die following this ignorant child into war. What honor do the dead of Teldrassil and Tirisfal get?”

“What do you care?” Lianis countered. “You care nothing for the Alliance or for those who die. You don’t even care for your own people. I know damn well who you are. You betray your allies, too.”

“Someone like me doesn’t have allies,” his guest replied with cold logic. “He has tools.”

“So that’s it. Well, if you think you can use me for your sick little agenda, you can think again.”

“That’s the beauty of it, Magister. I already have. And you can do nothing about it.” His smile sent a chill down Lianis’ spine. “As I said… this was partly a check on your welfare, but it was mostly to remind you where things stand. Have a nice day.” And with that… he shimmered and vanished.

The kaldorei assassin picked up the disc sitting on the chair, and put it into her belt pouch. She gazed at him with her black, black eyes, and then vanished into the shadows.

Lianis sat down and, with slightly shaking hands, poured himself a glass of wine.

[Sunblade-sisters-of-elune]

Nor’taeron Sunblade had been resting on a divan couch on the porch of the Vendross estate, settled along Astravar Harbor in Suramar, when someone started shaking him awake. By instinct, his hand went to his sword, which was settled beside him, but he relaxed when he saw it was one of the house attendants. “What is it?”

“Master Summerlight believes we have intruders in the house, Master Sunblade. We’ve found one of our cooks dead… signs of an assassin.”

Nor’taeron’s eyes went wide as he rose from the couch, now taking his sword in hand as the attendant walked with him back into the house. “Lord Vendross?”

“He is aware. Master Summerlight and Master Velade, and some of their trainees, are with him and Lady Telisa. Mistress Nadiya is there as well. Lord Erdanel is at the Nighthold.”

“Gather what staff you can and get them out of the house. If we’ve got --” A gurgling in the attendant’s throat told him it was a little late for that. As the poor soul fell, Nor’taeron’s blade swung. Someone who had not been there a second ago… suddenly was. And now, was suddenly missing her head.

Upon seeing the body, Nor’taeron felt bile rise in his throat as he hurried into the house - he could hear signs of a conflict. His heart racing, he entered the inner hall… and stopped cold. Kirenna Summerlight lay on the floor in front of him, a crossbow quarrel right through her forehead… in fact, every blood elf in the room - all members of the House Guard - was dead, except for him. There were also a number of Nightborne, whom he recognized as trainees of the House Guard, dead as well… as well as two void elves. Just like the one he had killed in the hall.

Nor’taeron looked from the bodies up to the surviving Nightborne. Most of them were armed… and their weapons were trained on him. Lord Randarel raised his hand to forestall them from opening fire… and then turned his glare to Nor’taeron. “Explain this, Master Sunblade,” he demanded coldly, in Thalassian.

“I don’t understand, my lord,” Nor’taeron replied, genuinely confused.

“No? Out of nowhere, I have ren’dorei assassins seeking my blood, telling the sin’dorei in my household to ‘carry out the plan’… and your sister, the student you insisted I take, suddenly teleports away to safety. Explain this to me. Now.”

Nor’taeron felt relief that Nadiya was not among the dead, but did not at all understand what was going on. “My lord, I swear to you, I have no idea what has happened. I was resting on the porch. One of your house servants woke me to tell me Kirenna thought there were intruders in the house. One of your cooks was found dead, he said. I was telling him to gather the other servants and get out of the house, but he was killed by another void traitor, who I then killed myself.”

To Nor’taeron’s utter dismay, Randarel was not convinced. “And that is the story you choose to tell me?”

“It’s the truth! Randarel, please, you know me! You know us! Silvermoon would not collaborate with void filth, certainly not to murder a friend and ally! You must believe me!”

Randarel stared at him for a long moment. “No,” he said at last. “I don’t have to believe your words. We will come to the truth soon enough.” He gestured to his guards. “Take him to the Nighthold. Prepare an examiner. And if he resists… kill him.”

As he stood almost paralyzed with shock, Nor’taeron did not resist as he was taken away. He would prove his innocence and that of his kin. But as he thought this, a nagging question echoed in his mind.

What the hell is going on?

[Deathtide-sisters-of-elune]

Zhaoren Deathtide wrenched the blade of his scythe free from the massive faceless creature. Then he had a look around. “I think we are clear now, Sir Galen.”

“For the time being,” Sir Galen Tavener replied, axe held across his shoulder. “This foulness is unpredictable. Worse than dealing with the Scourge, back when we were… opposed.”

“You sound like you long for those days again.”

“At times I do,” the Forsaken admitted, as the two death knights began walking away from the scene. “But for now, like you, I make do with what I have… because like you, I know something else awaits us. Something that is more within our domain.”

“Sylvanas?”

“She is part of it, I’m sure. But the Lich King has never been concerned about her before… not even when he was Arthas, guided by the royal brat’s ego. Certainly he had expected her to be involved in the struggle to topple him years ago, but now…” Tavener shrugged. “I admit that whatever he has planned now is beyond my ken. And honestly, I prefer it to stay that way. I have enough problems with the plan as it is.”

Zhaoren gazed at him evenly from under his Shado-Pan headgear, his glowing eyes giving him an even more fearsome appearance than it would normally evoke. “Like me, you mean.” It was a discussion they had had before.

“Not personally, but… yes.” Tavener shook his head. “I know you have said you accept your lot, Zhaoren… you pandaren are probably the most emotionally centered people I’ve ever known. Given what happened with the Sha in Pandaria, you have to be.” Tavener suddenly froze, raising a hand. “Listen.” He looked around. “Something across the dune.”

Zhaoren listened… and then he heard it too. “Voices. Orcish, Zandali from the sounds of it… another I’m not familiar with. Sounds vaguely like yaungol, but less… guttural.”

“Taur-ahe,” Tavener confirmed. “And a familiar presence…” He hefted his axe. “Come on.”

The two death knights effortlessly climbed the dune, only to find a scene of butchery. There were four dead - two tauren, a Zandalari, and a Forsaken. Tavener knelt next to one of the tauren… and recoiled. “Ublaz,” he whispered. “He was one of ours.” He glanced at the other tauren. “And I’ve seen him, too. A Sunwalker. He was an emissary to Highmountain.” He gestured to the broken, blood-stained totem lying in the sand next to him. “He carried one of their totems.”

Zhaoren’s eyes took in the scene… and his eyes narrowed. “Ublaz has a Zandalari dagger in his chest,” he pointed out. “So does the other man.”

Tavener glanced first at the slain tauren death knight, then at his fellow Forsaken, cut nearly to pieces. “That priest?” he mused.

“He’s fanatical enough, to be sure. But…” Zhaoren paused.

Tavener looked up at him questioningly. “But?”

“I think this is a setup, Sir Galen. This was staged. It was like we were meant to find it. And I mean us, specifically.”

Realization dawned on the visible remnants of Tavener’s face. “You’re right… the Zandalari are cunning, especially their death-priests… but not like this.” He looked up just in time to see another knife fly. He batted it away easily with his axe… but he saw the shapes approaching. Zandalari, some of them, but… something was off about them. They were moving like… smaller men.

“Go, Zhaoren,” he said. “Return to Acherus. Warn them.”

“What about you?”

Tavener tapped the edge of his axe into the sand, and raised the skeletons free from the intact corpses. “I will hold my own. Now go, Zhaoren Deathtide… and suffer well.”

Zhaoren stared at him for a long moment… and then finally nodded, opening a death gate back to the Ebon Hold. The last thing he heard when he stepped through was Tavener’s voice:

“I should have known it would be you, Professor.”

[Ketiron-cenarion-circle]

“I’m not sure what else you want me to say. I don’t know who attacked her, and I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You can start telling me the truth, Ord’taeril, instead of whatever lies get whispered into your brain. You --”

“Now look here.” Ord’taeril Ketiron’s violet-tinged eyes glared angrily at his interrogator. “I didn’t ask for this, Admiral, and you damn well know it. I didn’t ask for this curse any more than you asked for yours. Or are you suggesting I let Sekhesmet kidnap me so I could support his little scheme?”

Admiral Eliphas Aximand glared right back at him… and then sighed tiredly. “No, of course not,” he conceded. “But you’re the only one I know of who would have inside knowledge.”

“Well, you’re wrong. I spend as little time in Telogrus as possible, especially now. And we’re not a club. We don’t keep tabs on what everyone does.”

Aximand snorted. “Convenient.”

Ord’taeril’s hands clenched in rage. “And if you make another crack like that,” he said, his tone deceptively quiet, “I will remove your head with my bare hands, and send it back in a box to your pals in Acherus. Or are you sticking to the story that you have nothing to do with them violating graves in Pandaria, Kul Tiras, Zandalar, so on?”

Aximand’s eyes narrowed. That shot had hit fairly close to home. “How dare you.”

Ord’taeril snorted. “Oh, it’s different when someone makes unsupported accusations about you, isn’t it? Void elves, oh no, they must be up to something, they hear voices and have tentacles in their hair, they must work for N’Zoth. But death knights, oh, we’re used to them, and we could always use more. Sure, they can dig up our corpses and violate them with dark magic. The Lich King’s a good guy now, it’s Bolvar, he won’t hurt us. No problem. It’s okay. As long as there’s no void involved.”

Aximand’s fist slammed down on his desk. “Alright, damn you!” he shouted. “You’ve made your point!”

“Good. So can I go now, or are you going to continue wasting my time with stupid questions?”

The admiral looked like he wanted to draw one of his swords and cut off his head. Ord’taeril wondered if he had prodded him too far. Finally, however, Aximand snarled, “Get off my ship.”

“Gladly.” Ord’taeril walked to the door. “And it’s not your ship. I think the captain would take some exception to that.” With that, he walked out onto the deck and stepped onto the back of the waiting gryphon to return to Boralus.

Now that he was out of Aximand’s sight, Ord’taeril’s expression was troubled. Contrary to what he had told the admiral - being a typical human, his mind was made up - he had indeed been to Telogrus, and heard of what was going on. He was aware of the exchange between Kittridge and the others in the Blue Recluse. There were also reports of ren’dorei assassins killed in Suramar attempting to murder a noble arcanist there. A number of sin’dorei members of the noble’s guard had been arrested by the noble’s order, amid accusations that the ren’dorei’s exile was a ploy, and that they were still taking orders from Silvermoon.

Ord’taeril knew this to be complete nonsense. No one in Silvermoon wanted anything to do with him or his kind again. The Regent had declared the ren’dorei to be traitors, and Rommath considered them a grave threat to the sanctity of the Sunwell. That essentially barred them from ever returning to Quel’Thalas again.

As he stepped off the gryphon’s back, he looked up… and his eyes narrowed. “Magister Lianis,” he said coolly.

“Lord Ketiron,” Lianis returned, inclining his head.

“I’m no lord, Magister. I hold no pretenses here.” Ord’taeril gazed at him suspiciously. “What do you want?”

To his surprise, Lianis’ expression was… almost pleading. “I need your help.”

[Velade-sisters-of-elune]

“Something is not right here. Why would the sin’dorei suddenly work with their own exiles to try and kill us? It makes no sense. And yet Father has arrested Master Sunblade, and Nadiya is… here, somewhere.”

“You’re right, Telisa; it makes no sense at all. It’s not like your father to jump to conclusions. Something is up.”

Telisa looked uneasy. “I’m sorry for lumping you into this, Master, but I didn’t know who else…”

“I know. You did right, Telisa. We’ll get to the bottom of this, don’t you worry.”

The master cut an unusual figure for a Forsaken - she wore pandaren leather and the tabard of a Lorewalker, a gift from Lorewalker Puretide. A serpent-headed staff was slung across her back. Accompanied by her Nightborne student (many thousands of years older than she, but not nearly as experienced), she entered Sunfury Spire, and poked her head into the magisters’ sanctum, where they maintained a portal to Orgrimmar - the only direct route between Silvermoon and the rest of the Horde, with the Undercity fallen.

A magister looked up, his eyes narrowing on seeing the Forsaken here. “Yes?”

“Pardons for disturbing you, Magister. My name is Euphrati Velade; this is Telisa, daughter of Lord Randarel of House Vendross. We’re looking for Nadiya Sunblade. I understand she came back here in something of a panic.”

The magister’s suspicious gaze turned sympathetic. “Poor girl. Teleported here scared to death…” His eyebrows rose. “You are friends of hers?”

“Of a sort, yes. There’s been an… incident in House Vendross. A misunderstanding between your people and the Nightborne in the household. I’m hoping she can help us resolve it.”

“Velade… that name sounds familiar.” The magister’s suspicious look was back. “You are the Dark Father’s child. The one raised by Lord Whitehair, during the Outland war.”

Euphrati’s expression was grim. “I have made no secret of that, Magister. Nor of my desire to avoid becoming like my father… or sharing his fate.”

He stared at her for a long moment… and then finally nodded. “Follow me.” He led the two monks into the keep’s halls, coming up on a small dormitory room. Gesturing for them to wait, he rapped his knuckles on the door. “Are you up, Nadiya?” he asked in Thalassian. “You have visitors.”

“Who are they?” came the response in the same tongue, through the door.

Euphrati, although she understood some Thalassian, could not speak it very well. She replied in Orcish, the lingua franca of the Horde. “Nadiya, it’s Master Velade. I’m here with Telisa. Can we come in?”

“He sent you, didn’t he? He wants to lock me away or kill me like he did to Nor’taeron. I won’t let you!”

Well, we’re off to a good start, Euphrati thought worriedly. “We’re not here to hurt you or lock you up, Nadiya. Telisa and I are concerned for you. We know something has happened, and we want to find out, so we can maintain the bonds of friendship.”

“You don’t have to go back to Suramar yet, if you don’t want,” Telisa added, in Thalassian; like her father, she spoke the sin’dorei tongue fluently. “We just want to help.”

“You lie. Your guards killed Kirenna, and you probably killed Nor’taeron, too. And now you want to kill me.”

The magister looked alarmed at this, but Euphrati raised a hand to quiet him. “Nadiya, listen to me. Nor’taeron is not dead. Telisa tells me he is being held in the Nighthold for questioning, but he is not dead.”

“Liar!”

“I have no reason to lie to you. I know as a Forsaken, I’m probably even less trustworthy to you than others, but I want you to hear my voice, and know I’m telling you the truth. We just want to talk to you, find out what happened. Lord Randarel has made up his mind, but I think he’s made a serious mistake. So does Telisa.” She paused, not hearing a reply. “Someone is trying to divide us, Nadiya. I urge you, don’t let them. Let us in.”

Dead silence on the other side of the door. Euphrati glanced first to the magister, then to Telisa. All three of them had the same worried look. She then turned back to the door. “Nadiya, are you still there?”

Another long pause. Then, ever so slowly, the door began to open. Nadiya looked awful; her hair was unkempt and her eyes looked like she had been crying for days. With somewhat shaky movements, she opened the door to let the two monks in. Telisa helped her to sit down before she collapsed. Kneeling down in front of her, Euphrati gently grasped her hands, and Nadiya - although feeling somewhat repulsed at her dead flesh - did not break away from her.

“Tell me everything, Nadiya. Start from the beginning.”

[Blunderwitz-cenarion-circle]

Dr. Wilbert Blunderwitz, high mechpriest of Gnomeregan, sat quietly in the library of the Cathedral of Light in Stormwind. It was late at night, and the Cathedral was deserted. It was usually at this time of night that he chose to sit down and write in his libram - a collection of alchemical formulae, devotions of Light, and personal observations he had collected since taking up the priesthood during the Cataclysm. The book had been found, blank, in the Archivum of Ulduar, and given to him as a gift by his son Englebert, an officer in the Gnomeregan militia. Nowadays Englebert was part of the elite G.E.A.R. forces, who had participated in the liberation of Mechagon. The idea of “upgrades” appealed to Wilbert; although he was in relatively early old age for a gnome, there were days where he felt aches and pains like an old man.

“Hello, Wilbert.”

The old priest’s hand stopped for a second, having just added the period to the end of the sentence he was writing… which began to spread slightly across the page. After a moment, he lifted the pen from the page and set it back in the inkwell. Only then did he turn around, gazing at the speaker. He was very different from what Wilbert remembered, but the voice was unmistakable. As he had spoken in Gnomish, the priest replied in the same tongue. “Come to absolve your sins?”

To his lack of surprise, the response he got was a sneer. “I have done nothing to be absolved for.” He snorted. “Look at what you’ve become… a human pet chained to their will.”

“Look at what I’ve risen above,” Wilbert retorted calmly.

“When you decided to take up alchemy and medicine at Gearshaft University, I didn’t think you’d end up spouting scripture. A waste of a genius intellect.”

“Ironic.” Wilbert stepped down from his chair. “I often thought the same thing about you.” He appraised the other with a cool eye. “Is the rust a statement of how long you’ve been out of things?”

“One could see it that way. But this was just the body I happened to get. Some junk-peddler outside Rustbolt.” He stroked his beard with a pincer-like hand. “Think I should get all this polished?”

“The humans have a saying: ‘Polish a turd, it’s still a turd.’ I consider it somewhat appropriate.”

His guest chuckled. “Ah, Wilbert… how I’ve missed your wit.”

“A result of not having any yourself?” Wilbert’s hand rested on his wrench-like hammer, another gift from Englebert. “Why are you here, Rakeri? I understand you’re trying to turn over a new leaf as a legitimate businessman now… selling weapons. Even in your altruism, your business involves death and killing.” He shook his head. “You mentioned about how we were kids at Gearshaft… the gnome I knew at university was an engineer and a mage, a good one, too. I don’t know what happened to him.”

Professor Rakeri Sputterspark glared coldly with his mechanical eyes. “You know full well what happened to me, Wilbert. You also know that it was not my choice.”

“Being recursed with demon’s blood, no, that was not your choice,” the old priest conceded. “What you did afterward, however, was. Murder, torture, torment. You killed the Lady Ketiron, brutalized her husband… you ran a chamber of horrors in your fortress on Draenor, taking advantage of that pardon King Varian gave you to flaunt your corruption. You helped kill Saavedro to bring back Sekhesmet, and thus ensured a good man was corrupted.”

“A good man?” Rakeri’s voice was dangerously quiet. “You’ve forgotten so quickly?”

“I haven’t forgotten how you created a mountain from a molehill, Rakeri. How could he have known what you were? How could he have known you had been flesh when he found your broken mechanical form?”

“Saavedro of Stratholme was a swine and a hypocrite, just like his buddy Genevra. He played with shadows and tried to hide it, and lied about it to everyone around him. You didn’t see the real Saavedro until he truly became ‘Shankolin’, became Forsaken. He ended up swearing himself to the Old Gods in the end, before he got his comeuppance in Nazjatar… makes you wonder what the real Genevra Stoneheardt would look like, doesn’t it?”

Wilbert’s eyebrows rose. “For someone who was dead throughout that entire exchange, you know a lot. How?”

Rakeri shrugged. “I asked around.”

Wilbert rolled his eyes. He didn’t have time for this. “I have work to do, Rakeri. So unless there’s a point to this…”

“What, I can’t have a chat with an old friend and classmate? You wound me, Wilbert.”

“Rakeri Sputterspark was my friend and classmate,” Wilbert replied, anger evident in his tone. “He died serving gnomanity in Northrend. I don’t know who you are.”

Rakeri smiled coldly. “You will.” He inclined his head, and stepped out. Wilbert heard his metal feet - clamp, clamp, clamp - on the cobblestone floor, until it took him outside.

Sitting back up in his chair, Wilbert allowed the shudder he had been repressing to take hold. Rakeri was up to something… but Light help him, he had no idea what.

As if to answer, a silent shadow moved into the doorway behind him…

[Underwood-sisters-of-elune]

“I’m damned if I can make heads or tails of it all. There is something going on here, and I don’t think it’s the void elves suddenly going homicidal on us. I mean, the possibility was there, but… not like this. This is more your arena than mine… I’m just a ship captain, I don’t do intrigue.”

“And I do?”

“You’re an inquisitor, Gabriel. You not only ‘do’ intrigue, you hunt it down and burn it. I like that. Kinda wish we had more like you.”

Inquisitor Gabriel Underwood chuckled. “You give me too much credit, Mersadie. I’m just a man doing a job.” He gave a light shrug. “That one… Ketiron… he’s come to me a couple of times. For a void freak, he’s not bad.”

Mersadie Kittridge’s reply to that was a growled “hmph”. Gabriel looked at her curiously. “Not one to make exceptions?”

“I don’t see why I should. They’re all rotten to the core. Plus, I’m not inclined to give a void elf the benefit of the doubt when one of them very nearly killed me.”

“Yes, I talked to your surgeon when you arrived.” He was meeting with the captain near Carver’s Harbor in Drustvar, on the western edge of Tiragarde Sound. Her ship, the Iron Shrike, was anchored nearby. “The medical crap is beyond me, but he doesn’t think the attack was meant to kill you. It didn’t hit anything major, and the poison used was specifically meant to paralyze you, not kill you. If they had wanted you dead, with an attack like that, you would be.” Gabriel stroked his beard thoughtfully. “He and Mr. Blanky both think it was a setup.”

The captain was trying to wrap her brain around that. “So you’re saying someone’s trying to frame… void elves?”

“It certainly sounds that way…” He stopped as he picked up a noise, and glanced out towards the water.

Mersadie heard it too. “That sounds like gunfire… and it’s coming from aboard the Shrike!” She leapt immediately onto the back of her nearly gryphon, Brennagale.

Gabriel shifted forms into a wicker bird-looking thing, and flew over. As the captain descended to the deck, he circled around, spotting not only void elves, but blood elves too - working in unison. She was right, he thought, aghast at the idea. Cunning scum, these elves. Up on the multi-tiered aft section, just outside the captain’s quarters, he spotted Admiral Aximand, slashing with his jeweled Stormwind sword and Kul Tiran cutlass, raising what looked like a snowstorm on the deck.

Aximand saw him too, and gestured for him to come down closer. Gabriel did so. “Get to Boralus,” the admiral said, “and find the other ships in my flotilla. We need their marines to reinforce us. We’ll hold them off as best we --” His sentence was cut off as suddenly he was thrown to the deck by the force of a powerful blow… a boarding pike, from this ship’s own armory, hurled into his back with such force that it pinned him into the deck below.

With a screech, Gabriel flew over and graspect the pike in his talons, but it would not budge. He landed and shifted back into his human self, carefully putting one foot onto Aximand’s shoulder and pulling the weapon free. As he did, the entire ship shook, and Gabriel lost his balance and fell backwards to the deck. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Mersadie’s first mate, Ian Blanky, who held out a hand to help him up. As he rose, he noticed Aximand was not stirring at all. But he didn’t have time to think about that. “What the hell was that?”

“Below decks,” the first mate replied grimly. “They’re trying to blow the powder magazine.”

Gabriel’s eyes widened in horror; if they set off the gunpowder magazine, the explosion would blow the Iron Shrike to splinters. He looked up at Kittridge, her rifle in hand as she blasted another blood elf saboteur to the deck. “Captain! We need to --”

Before he could finish the warning, the world suddenly went white, and he felt himself flying again - and it took him a moment to realize he had not shapeshifted, just before he hit the water…

[Rakeri-sisters-of-elune]

“Well, that was unexpected.”

Professor Rakeri Sputterspark sat at the controls of his Mechagonian flyer, hovering over Tiragarde Sound. He had thought that the elven conspiracy angle would still go on to keep the captain busy… but to destroy the ship? He hadn’t foreseen that.

Still, it meant a number of potential thorns in his side were gone now. He couldn’t help but smile.

“Hope you’re happy.” The voice of his sister Marennia, hovering next to him on a clockwork drake Rakeri had put together (based on a recently-discovered schematic), was anything but happy. “You know, I had thought this whole process would have changed you, but you’re still…”

“Still me,” Rakeri finished, nodding. “You expected any different, Renni? Besides, there’s nothing that can tie this back to me. All the evidence is in about a million pieces floating in the harbor. They’ll probably find a few bodies, sure… but they’ll be elves.” He chuckled. “Thank the Makers for all these gizmos we have in Mechagon. This made the job a whole lot easier to sell. Just like in Suramar.” The attackers had all been void elves - formerly belonging to House Nightswan, just like that fool Lianis, but they’d accepted Rakeri’s gold far more willingly - and some of them had been disguised as “regular” blood elves using Mechagonian tech.

“Suramar?” Marennia looked surprised, or at least as surprised as someone could look with their face half made of metal. “What did you do in Suramar?”

“Just a little stirring of the pot, like we did here. Bit of killing involved too, to be sure, but…” Rakeri shrugged. “Nothing to worry yourself about, dear sister. Besides, it’s not like anyone will care, Suramar’s part of the Horde now.”

“So is that orc warlock, the ‘Corruptor’. Doesn’t stop you from playing nice with him.”

Rakeri glared at her. “How did you know about that?”

Marennia glared right back. “I’m not stupid, Rakeri.”

He sighed. She had a point… he had to stop making the mistake of underestimating her. “He’s about as much a member of the Horde as I am of the Alliance: not really. It’s convenience, or guilt by association, more than anything else.” Another shrug. “Besides, nothing I do will change people’s minds, so why shouldn’t I act as expected? And on top of that… it’s not like the Stormwind lot will care. If anything, there might be some celebratory drinks in the Blue Recluse when they found out she’s dead.”

“You don’t know that. Humans never act --”

“Rationally, yes, I know.” Rakeri waved that off. “But as I said, there’s no need to worry now. A tragedy has occurred, a veteran crew with veteran leaders blown up by traitors. Let that be the narrative.”

With that, he turned the controls of his machine and flew back towards Boralus, with Marennia’s mecha-drake following suit. They did not notice the dark figure standing on the shore, gazing at them from under a wide-brimmed hat… with glowing blue eyes.

[Deathtide-sisters-of-elune]

Zhaoren Deathtide glared up at the two mechagnomes as they made their way back to Boralus. In life, he had heard from Yatiri Stormwatcher, a monk from the Wandering Isle that Zhaoren’s father had brought into the Shado-Pan, about Professor Sputterspark - “Rakeri the Feltouched” as he was also known, a sadistic murderer, torturer, and manipulator. Zhaoren had heard later that he was killed on the time-warped Draenor… but where warlocks were concerned, nothing surprised him. And as a man brought back from the dead himself, he could appreciate the irony.

It made sense now. The last thing he had heard Sir Galen say as he stepped through the death gate back to Acherus. The old Forsaken knight had called his antagonist “Professor”. It was him. Zhaoren was sure of it.

But that would be a problem for another time. For now…

Four knights - a human, a goblin, a blood elf, and a Dark Iron dwarf - stood behind him in the dark of the night. The nearest town was Fallhaven, and they were likely to keep their doors bolted tight on hearing noises in the dark. Kul Tirans were superstitious people, but the people of Drustvar were far more so. “Do you think we’ll get anything out of this wreck?” the human asked.

“He says we will,” Zhaoren replied shortly. With Galen dead, he had been tasked with taking up some “recruiting” duties. He had proved to the Lich King and the Ebon Blade that death had not hampered his old fighting skills, nor had the heavy armor he now wore - reddish-gold plate with draconic motifs, a tribute to his fallen mentor, matching the blood-red scythe he carried.

Walking along the shoreline, Zhaoren spotted the ragged remnants of a bicorn hat, and lying in the sand nearby were a jeweled sword with a lion’s head on the hilt, and a Kul Tiran cutlass. Both blades were carved with frost runes. Nearby was a body, or at least part of one - the torso, one arm, and most of his head. A leg lay nearby, being torn up by the crabs. Zhaoren tipped the torso over with his footpaw to see the face, noting that he wore the ragged remnants of the tabard of the 7th Legion. It was Eliphas Aximand… what was left of him, anyway. The explosion had torn him apart in such a way that not even a death knight could survive.

“Is he who we were sent to retrieve?” the human knight asked.

Zhaoren looked down at the broken corpse of the admiral, a man that Sir Galen had condemned as a coward and a traitor for abandoning the Ebon Blade. “No,” he said after a moment. “But she is near.”

“She?” the blood elf asked. “You know who it is?”

Zhaoren simply smiled cryptically behind his face-scarf. “We will all know soon.”

As they walked down the beach, Zhaoren could hear a low moan of agony, and knew that he had found who he was looking for. Her body was in one piece, but her flesh was torn all over, and most of her bones were broken. Remarkably, she was still alive - and just as remarkably, her naval coat was more or less still intact. He knelt next to her. “Can you hear me?” he asked gently.

Her one good eye - the other shredded by shrapnel - opened, and she looked up at him. “You,” she rasped. “Brother… Lorewalker… asked about you.”

“I know. He does not understand or want to accept what I am.” Zhaoren shrugged. “A discussion for another time.”

She laughed. “I’m… dying… you idiot.”

“Yes, you are. But…” Zhaoren gazed at her, a very picture of serenity. “You know what I’m offering you, Captain.”

She shook her head vehemently, despite the pain. “No.”

“Hear me out, please. I know you’re not fond of the idea. No one should be. I know you don’t like undead, and that you’re not fond of the Horde either. I won’t lie, I do associate with them - partly because of my late mentor. But the Ebon Blade exists beyond this ongoing blood feud… to fight the real war, against the real foe.”

Her eye narrowed. “Syl… vanas?”

Zhaoren nodded. “She is involved, yes. We will hunt her down in time, when he gives the command. But for now… we must gather our numbers. You are a combat veteran, and we need people of experience like you.” He paused for a moment. “And you can also avenge what has become of your ship and your crew.”

That got her attention, as he knew it would. “You… you know who?”

“I know who.” Zhaoren put a hand on her shoulder. “I said before I won’t lie… you may not like what you become. And most certainly, neither will your people. Which is why I am giving you the choice that my comrades and I were not given. If you refuse, we will ensure that you are returned to the sea. But if you agree… you will become one of us. And there will be no going back.”

As the last vestige of life ebbed from her broken body, Mersadie Kittridge’s one-eyed gaze never wavered. Finally, with her last breath, she said two words.

“Do it.”

[Underwood-sisters-of-elune]

Gabriel awoke to a pounding headache and the sight of a man leaning over him. He was wearing the attire of a Tidesage. “Still with us, lad?”

“More or less,” he croaked. Light, his throat was so dry… then he remembered. “The Iron Shrike. Someone was --”

“We know, lad, we know. Take it easy.” He gently raised the portly inquisitor’s head up to take a little water.

Between the dribbling from his slack lips and the sudden coughing fit, he didn’t know how much of it actually went down, but he could feel a little moisture returning to his throat. “Where the hell am I?”

“Boralus. You’ve been here two days or so. That explosion was ‘eard from the other side of the harbor wall. They’ve been there since documentin’ the damage, finding the bodies… you were the only live 'un they’ve found. You were lucky. You took a nasty hit to the 'ead, and you nearly drowned before the searchers realized you were alive, but… that’s one up on the rest of 'em.”

“I was…” Gabriel coughed again. “I was thrown clear, I think.” It dawned on him what the healer was saying. “Dead? All of them?”

The healer shook his head. “Not heard fer sure, but if they’d found anyone else, they would’ve sent them 'ere by now.”

They both looked up as a stern-looking captain of the Proudmoore guard entered, her helmet held under one arm. “Inquisitor Underwood?”

“Yes, ma’am. The crew, did you find anyone?”

She raised her hand to quiet him. “A couple of questions first, just to set the scene here. You were onboard the Iron Shrike at the time it exploded?”

“I was.”

“For?”

“I had been having an onshore meeting with Captain Kittridge. We were discussing current events… such as the recent attempt on her life by a void elf. Certain members of her crew expressed the belief that the attack was staged.”

“Staged how?”

“The first mate, Mr. Blanky, had expressed the thought that since they didn’t detect the assassin until the actual assassination attempt, the attack was specifically meant to be non-lethal. They could have very easily killed her by hitting her in a more vital area, or using a more lethal poison. They didn’t. The ship’s surgeon agreed.”

“And now something changed?”

“So it would seem. The last thing I remember was going aboard with the captain; we had heard gunfire onboard the ship from where we were standing. She flew her gryphon, and I took… my own route.”

“Took your own route… care to explain that?”

Gabriel smiled a little. “I am a Thornspeaker, Captain. A druid, you might say.”

Her eyebrows rose. “A shape-changer.”

“Yes, ma’am. It scares the hell out of people sometimes; our forms are somewhat frightening, especially to the unwary.” Gabriel chuckled. “It certainly scared the willies out of me the first time I saw it done.” He sobered. “After we got aboard, I saw one of the ship’s boarding pikes hurled into Admiral Aximand’s back. As I got it free, the entire ship shook. Mr. Blanky said they were hitting the powder magazine. I was shouting up to the captain to abandon when it blew. I remember flying, and not shape-changed that time. Then I woke up here.”

The guard captain stared at him for a long moment… and then finally nodded. “Thank you, Inquisitor. I’ll leave you to rest now.”

“Wait, Captain…” Gabriel winced as he shifted his weight. “What about the crew? The healer said I was the only one you found living.”

The captain took a deep breath. “We found probably three or four dead blood elves onboard, or at least what’s left of them… one was carrying some kind of weird techno-gizmo. Ever since we opened up the connection to Mechagon, we’ve had weird gadgets going in and out of Boralus all day.” Her expression became grimmer. “As for the bodies… the Shrike carried a crew of over a hundred. It’s hard to tell if any of them are alive, because almost none of them are intact. Only a handful of the bodies had any distinguishing marks to identify them at all, including Admiral Aximand and First Mate Blanky. We’re… fairly sure that the entire crew is dead, though. Just from the number of… limbs we’ve recovered, I think we can get a proper headcount.” Then her expression became somewhat confused. “There is one body we haven’t found hide or hair of. We found a weapon, fairly sure it’s connected, but…”

Even as Gabriel asked, he was sure he knew. “Who?”

Sure enough, it was who he expected. “Captain Kittridge.”

[Araen-sisters-of-elune]

Araen Warpwalker was one of those void elves who had not come from Silvermoon first before embracing the darkness. In what seemed like an age before, she had been a ranger in Alleria Windrunner’s company, which had followed Lord Khadgar and General Turalyon through the Dark Portal to Draenor. After the world was broken and became known as Outland, she had been trapped there for nearly twenty years, all the while thinking her captain lost.

But fate, as she came to realize, was whimsical. At least stuck in Outland, she had not had to deal with what had become of Quel’Thalas… of King Anasterian, slain by the Fallen Prince, or of his son Kael’thas, who had given his soul to the demons that had empowered the Scourge in the first place… and of those people remaining in their broken land who had become “blood elves”, and made their own deal with the devil.

By her estimation, dealing with voices from beyond in your head was a small price to pay. At least she wasn’t part of the Horde. She never had been, nor ever would be. Discovering Alleria - and her mate, Turalyon - alive on Argus, and learning of what Alleria had become, had been the catalyst that led her to what she was now. And she had no regrets.

Araen knelt on the shoreline near Carver’s Harbor in Drustvar, metal-tipped gauntlets tapping against her legplate in a rhythmic pattern as she observed the Boralus guard investigating the destruction of the Iron Shrike. She had been approached by Inquisitor Underwood at the suggestion of Ord’taeril Ketiron, to check into the “elven angle” of the crime. Ord’taeril had known her only by reputation, but believed her ranger’s patience made her a better investigator than he was. The Boralus guard were hesitant to involve her, given what had occurred on the Shrike earlier, but a look at her tabard - the falcon symbol of Honor Hold, worn by those who had served on Draenor/Outland… heroes even here, in Kul Tiras - had quelled any potential protest.

Her first request was to see the bodies of the elves, which the Boralus guard believed to have been blood elves - but they had found a gizmo of some sort of Mechagonian origin, which they did not know about and were reluctant to mess with. Although engineering was beyond her ken too, Araen suspected there was more to them than met the eye.

The inquisitor was standing behind her, still somewhat shaky on his feet while he recovered from the explosion, as she reached out to the device. As she did, she noticed a shimmering above what was left of the blood elf’s skin. She frowned, hesitating only for a moment, and then found what looked to be an activation switch… and pressed it. Instantly, the corpse shimmered… and darkened.

“A void elf,” Gabriel said, eyes narrowing. “Captain Kittridge was right.”

Araen noted an insignia worn on their tunic, which had been hidden by the mechanical illusion. “Not just any void elf, Inquisitor,” she said. She looked at the other bodies, and found similar shrouding devices, intact in spite of everything. Disabling them also revealed their true race, and one more of them had the same crest - but she was sure they were all part of it. “Zealots from House Nightswan.”

“Nightswan? That psychotic warlock who called for the ‘black flag’ war?”

“The very same,” Araen confirmed, nodding. “Even dead, it seems, Lady Tavira inspires loyalty. But attacking a Kul Tiran ship, commanded by someone who was just as anti-Horde as their dead matriarch? It makes no sense.” She looked up at the guard captain, the one who had approached Gabriel in Boralus a couple of days earlier. “The blade taken from the captain also bore the Nightswan crest, you said?”

“It did,” the captain confirmed. “But Inquisitor Underwood also mentioned that he had spoken to members of the crew, particularly the first mate, Mr. Blanky, and the ship’s surgeon… they thought it strange too. Almost like it had been staged.”

“To turn us against your people,” Gabriel added. “You can see why some people would be… prejudiced.”

Araen saw all too well. Were it not for Alleria, the fact that she was a hero of the Alliance and wed to probably the greatest living human paladin on Azeroth, the void elves would probably have been cast out from the Alliance, just as those who had tapped into that power had been cast out from Silvermoon. “Stirring the pot,” she mused, looking up at Gabriel. “What the hell for? If this is somebody’s plan… what’s the endgame?”

Gabriel said nothing, but Araen could see he was thinking the same thing she was: And how many more people will get killed before we get there?

[Rakeri-sisters-of-elune]

Rakeri’s pincer hand tightened on his knife hilt upon hearing the name. “Are you sure?”

“I saw them meeting myself, just after he met with Aximand.”

“Bah.” The professor began to pace, muttering curses in his native tongue. Other than the absence of Mekkatorque, Ironforge’s Tinker Town had not changed much since he’d been gone. Probably because all the tinkering was going on in the “New Tinkertown” settlement above Gnomeregan. Which would probably be abandoned, now that they had Mechagon intact…

Dismissing his drifting thoughts, he returned to Common for his guest’s benefit. “I should have killed the little bastard along with his mother. And his father too, come to that. The Modas screwed up royally with that… something I’ll have to have a word with my ‘colleague’ about…”

“He seems to have connections in Kul Tiras,” his guest added. “Some inquisitor from the Drustvar witch-hunters… and one of Alleria’s bloodhounds, a ranger from the Sons of Lothar.”

Rakeri blanched. The Sons of Lothar were heroes in the Alliance; this was getting out of his control, fast. “I think something a bit closer to home is in order. I think it’s time we involve the Watch. An execution, public and brutal. How good at you at play-acting as a Kul Tiran, my dear?”

“As well as I can be with your illusionary gizmos, Professor.”

“Yeah, well, don’t get too comfortable with them. Mechagonian technology is becoming common, and we’re not dealing with idiots here. Orwyn is clever. A smug little twerp otherwise, but he’s probably sharper than most blades. If he doesn’t know something, he has people who do.” He stroked his beard thoughtfully. “One more won’t hurt, though, at least I hope not… and they never did find the captain’s body.” Privately, that detail bothered him, because it made him remember the stories of recent grave robberies… and new death knights from among the Kul Tirans, the Zandalari, even the pandaren. He had seen one with Galen Tavener before taking his head (and his soul) to that Zandalari priest. He would be seeing her again, of that he was all but certain. “Arrange a meeting with our friend in Stormwind. Make sure you are seen ‘properly’, arriving and leaving… and let his blood soak into the cobblestones.”

“It will be done.” She vanished into the shadows, leaving him alone.

[Vendross-sisters-of-elune]

“You’re sure?”

“High Priest Zulimbasha and the arcanists in the Nighthold confirm everything Telisa and Master Velade have told us, Father. The Sunblades are innocent. So was Master Summerlight.”

“Stars preserve me.” Randarel sunk into his chair, eyes closed. He had been in his study at his estate along Astravar Harbor in Suramar City, waiting for this news… and hoping not to realize he had made a dreadful mistake. “What have I done?”

His son, Erdanel, was silent, unsure what to say - or perhaps feeling nothing had to be said. His father’s anguish was enough. Finally, Randarel looked up at him. “Are they still here?” At his son’s nod, he then said in a quiet voice, “Let them go. They will not want to be here anymore, not after what I…” His expression was equal parts shame at what he had done, and rage at how it had come to that. “They’ll not want anything to do with me.”

“If that were the case, my lord, we would have left already.” Randarel looked up at that voice, a hint of tired amusement in the tone. It was Nor’taeron Sunblade. Next to him, looking somewhat hesitant, was his sister, Nadiya - ostensibly someone Randarel was supposed to teach. Behind them were Randarel’s daughter, Telisa, and her mentor, the Forsaken monk Euphrati Velade.

“You are not the first person I’ve worked with who has been deceived, my lord,” the Blood Knight continued. “And alas, you are not likely to be the last.”

Randarel nodded grimly. “Perhaps,” he agreed. “But it does not make it less… humbling.” He rose and knelt in front of Nadiya, taking her hand. “Forgive me, child. For all of it.”

“I echo my brother’s sentiment, my lord,” Nadiya said with a hint of a quiver in her voice. “Although… it took some convincing.” She glanced behind her at Telisa, who smiled at her.

Randarel looked up at his only daughter, expressing his pride in her in a mere look. “For us all, I think,” he agreed. “Come, everyone, sit down.” He rose and occupied his usual armchair, while the others sat on chairs or couches. “So…”

“I had a look at some of the void elves who were killed in the estate that night,” Euphrati said. “Their insignias all marked them as part of House Nightswan. Even from the grave, Lady Tavira seems hell-bent on causing trouble.”

The Forsaken monk’s tone indicated her skepticism, and Randarel didn’t miss it. “You think it’s someone else?”

“I suspect as much, but I can’t prove it. She’s dead, so she can’t defend herself, and she was hardly the only void elf who hates the idea of Silvermoon being in the Horde…” She paused for a moment. “I’d like to reach out to Lorewalker Puretide. He has a student over in the Alliance, you might know of him… he’s one of them, yes, but he’s a good one. With any luck, he might be able to figure out what the hell is going on.”

Randarel did indeed know who she meant. “Do you think it will help?”

“I think it’s worth a shot.”

The ancient arcanist pondered this, his gaze going around the room - to his children, and to the Sunblade siblings. They all gave a solemn nod. “Very well, Master Velade,” he said finally. “Do what you can.” Euphrati bowed and made her way out. Once she was gone, he turned to Nadiya. “There is something I have been holding onto, a gift from a dear friend and comrade from your homeland, that I think you should have…”

[Deathtide-sisters-of-elune]

Not so long ago, it seemed, Zhaoren had stood where they all stood now, new to the idea of undeath and preparing for the task the Lich King had had them raised for. Not for invading the realms of the living, but to protect it. Against what, he didn’t know; none of them did. Only the Lich King himself knew for certain what lay ahead, and Zhaoren figured they would find out when the time was right.

In the meantime, the work continued.

“You’ve taken to this rather well, I think.” Zhaoren turned to hear that voice, seeing a human woman behind him. She was rather short and looked barely out of her teens, yet she had the hard stare of a seasoned veteran. Her plate armor was of lighter weight than his own, and showed signs of years of hard use, as did the large-looking blades she wore at each hip, but she moved gracefully, as if unencumbered by the weight of the metal. He happened to notice the stitches around her neck, something he had often seen among Forsaken, but never in a “human-looking” corpse.

“Did I have much of a choice?” he asked.

“Of course you did. Unlike me, you were raised with free will. And when we got ours back after Light’s Hope, there were quite a few who chose to end it all rather than exist like this. Like that Zandalari did, the day you arrived.” Her gaze went to the training arena in the middle of the Ebon Hold’s upper floor. “She seems to have embraced the curse just as willingly as you did. I understand you had a role in that?”

“Partly,” Zhaoren admitted. “I assured the captain that I knew who was responsible for her demise. As much as we tried to contain negative feelings in Pandaria, I understand the desire for revenge quite well. She was killed by the machinations of the one who I believe killed Sir Galen in Uldum. A mechagnome warlock, Professor Rakeri Sputterspark.”

The human’s eyes widened at that name. “Talk about someone who won’t stay dead. And a mechagnome?” She chuckled. “I’m surprised he went that route, considering.”

Zhaoren tilted his head curiously. “You know him?”

“I know of him. When we were freed from Arthas’ control, a lot of us joined Alliance or Horde forces during the invasion of Northrend. I went from Stormwind to the Borean Tundra, where the Fizzcrank base was set up. They found Gearmaster Mechazod wedged in a pipe when they built the oil rig… and when they rebuilt and reactivated him, he ‘decursed’ a big chunk of the gnomish workforce. The professor was one of them. He ended up in the Storm Peaks, and was found in pieces near the big Titan facilities across the chasm from Ulduar… Saavedro couldn’t have known he had been a flesh-and-blood gnome.”

Zhaoren knew that name too. “My father and I met him in Pandaria, I think. He was a paladin.”

“Who became a lot worse, thanks partly to the professor.” She shook her head. “So far as we knew, none of the ones in the Storm Peaks had been living gnomes; when they’re robots like that, it’s hard to tell the difference. He put robo-Rakeri to work as a robot butler, a ‘Jeeves’ model. Someone knew about him, though, and ‘recursed’ him with a bit of demon’s blood in the mix. He became obsessed, believing Saavedro ‘enslaved’ him on purpose, and was hell-bent on destroying him.” She chuckled grimly. “He seemed to inspire that in a lot of people. The Corruptor, Sekhesmet… if he’s behind this whole mess here, it begs the question why.”

“He’s insane,” Zhaoren said bluntly.

“True, but even lunatics have a purpose. You just have to be as crazy as they are to divine it sometimes. And I think we of the walking dead have our moments of insanity, wouldn’t you agree?”

Zhaoren pondered this, his gaze going back to the ring. His new “recruit” had favored firearms over blades, but she seemed reasonably competent; he assumed that she had used boarding pikes or some similar weapon in her time as a sailor. “There are times I lose myself to the thrill of the fight, a feeling I never had in life,” he admitted after a moment. “But I always make sure to find my way back.”

“Which is more than some of us can do,” she assured him. She followed his look. “You need a hand?”

Another moment of silence, then Zhaoren shook his head. “I will take care of it, Master Swiftblade. I am responsible for bringing her here; I will make sure she is capable of handling herself out there.”

“I thought you might say so. Still, figured I’d ask.” Nyssha Swiftblade smiled… and then remembered something. “By the way… one of our knights recovered something from the desert in Uldum, I think you may find a use for it.” She gestured to the skeletal armorer behind her, who brought a weapon forward. Zhaoren’s eyes widened as he recognized it. It was the axe Sir Galen had been carrying when he was killed. “I recall that Admiral Aximand had been the one who forged this weapon, for old man Devaneaux back in the day. I think she might appreciate it.”

Zhaoren accepted the offered weapon, gazing for a moment at the runes carved into the blade. “I think she might,” he agreed.