Origins: Part 1
Ashes to Ashes
Mabestian wandered the docks of Booty Bay looking every bit as out of place as he felt. The wealthy Blood Elf trader had been on a ship back to Silvermoon when news of the Cataclysm and Deathwing’s rampage had reached them. The ship was diverted to Booty Bay, the nearest safe harbor, and anchored there indefinitley until it was deemed safe to leave port. Now he was stuck on the complete opposite end of the continent.
Cursing his bad fortune, he hurried along the docks, becoming increasingly aware of the kind of attention his fine robes and tall stature were earning him from the locals. Mabestian swallowed his anxiety and tried not to panic, when suddenly he felt a tugging on his sleeve. He looked down to find a young goblin smiling up at him.
Unlike the other smiles he saw on the faces of the goblins and miscreants on the docks, hers seemed genuinely friendly. Her ragged clothes although now filthy, looked as though they were once high quality. Her purple eyes shone bright, contrasting the dark grime on her face, and her auburn hair was tied into a messy ponytail.
“You lewast, mistah?” her heavy Kezani accent betraying the fact she could barely speak orcish. Mabestian breathed a sigh of relief “Yes, actually, could you kindly point me in the direction of the flight master?” The goblin stared blankly up at him. Mabestian looked around at the snickering faces of the goblins and pirates on the docks, their eyes staring hungrily at him like heyenas watching a wounded gazelle.
Mabestian looked helplessly at the friendly goblin and made a “flapping wings” gesture with his arms, sending a chorus of howling laughter from the riffraff on the docks and turning his face beet red. The young goblin giggled and put her hand on his hip, turning him around to face the direction of the tavern building across the harbor. She pointed to the top right side of the building and he could see a sign marking the flight master. A wave of relief washed over Mabestian. He had a way out of this horrible backwater town! He thanked the young goblin and hurried off towards the tavern. Maybe his bad luck was finally changing…
Senneca watched the tall Blood Elf hurry off down the dock and smiled. “This town’s gonna eat that mook alive” she thought to herself as she looked at the coinpurse she’d slipped from his pocket. She’d count her loot later, but judging from the way he was dressed and how heavy the weight of the purse, it seemed like a good score. This was her life now.
It had been about a week since she’d arrived in Booty Bay after Deathwing had destroyed her homeland. The shock was begining to wear off. She was one of the lucky ones who made it onto the ships evacuating goblins from the island, but when she arrived in Booty Bay she found herself and her fellow refugees unwelcome and unwanted. They settled into a makeshift refugee camp under the docks of the waterfront where former friends and neighbors now struggled in competition with one another for anything they could to survive.
The transition had been especially difficult for the young goblin. Back on Kezan, mere days ago she was Senneca Swiftsilver, heiress of the Swiftsilver mining empire and one of the most powerful goblins on the island. Overnight, her wealth and empire had been erased and now it seemed the Swiftsilver name carried no weight among the locals of Booty Bay, or her fellow refugees. She was forced to get by on her natural wits and charisma. Small time crimes of opportunity such as these were a means of survival, but she couldn’t live like this. Senneca Swiftsilver could never be a two-bit nobody.
Senneca turned and began walking the opposite direction of the elf. She didn’t get far before a handsome, well dressed goblin stepped into her path. Senneca didn’t recognize him from Kezan, and from the look of his expensive clothes he was clearly a local. He was tall for a goblin with an impish smile, and a gold ring in his left ear.
“Nice score, newbie.” said the stranger, eyeing the coinpurse in Senneca’s hand “Technique needs some work though, I clocked that lift from clear across the harbor.” Senneca tried to brush him off “Thanks for the tip.” she replied as she tried to step around him, but he stepped into her path and blocked her again. The stranger shook his head, still smiling impishly “I wasn’t offering free advice. Why don’t you hand that over, sweetheart? Consider it a lesson fee.”
Senneca could feel her temper rising. She pulled the coinpurse tight to her body and noticed three other goblins closing in to surround her. The bruisers who were supposed to be gaurding the dock had all conveniently disappeared. The stranger shook his head again “You’ve got a lot to learn about this town, newbie.” he said as he pulled his cloak back revealing a dagger at his hip. “These docks belong to the Swindle Street Gang. Hand over your loot, or we’ll just take it off your pretty little corpse. Your call, sweetheart.”
Senneca gritted her teeth with rage but knew it was hopeless. She was surrounded by armed thugs, there was nowhere to run, and no wsy she could fight them. “Catch!” she yelled as she hurled the bag towards their leaders face. His arms shot up instinctivley to catch the heavy object hurtling at him. Senneca used the brief moment of distraction to duck past him. She ran down the docks towards the refugee camp and melted into the crowd.
The three thugs ran to check on their leader “should we go after her, boss?” one of them asked. Their leader smiled and waved them off dismissively “What for? We got what we wanted.” He held the bag in his hand gauging it’s weight “Besides, I think our little friend learned her lesson.”
Back at the refugee camp beneth the docks, Senneca sat in her makeshift shelter crying tears of anger. Her stomach growled and she thought of the dinner those coins could have bought her. She thought of Kezan, how she’d been brought up to believe she was destined for wealth and power, and how as soon as she had it, it was all taken away from her, just like her tiny score had been taken away from her. She thought of the stranger with the dagger on his hip.
“Never again.” she swore to herself. Never again would she let someone take what was hers. She would be wealthy and powerful, that was her birthright. She swore she would take back everything that was taken from her as the face of the stranger with the earing grinned impishly in her memory. She’d take it all back, starting with that coinpurse. Senneca Swiftsilver could never be a two-bit nobody.
_next: part 2: https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/rp-hell-hath-no-fury/188718_