Dame Catherine Hildreth stood quietly in the courtyard outside Dornogal, flanked by two individuals - Inquisitor Donal Heskin, spear gripped tightly in his hand, and Chaiya Greenacre-Puretide, her face pinched in both pain and rage. The letter Catherine had received, signed “the penitent”, had requested them both to be present. Though she had no idea why, it was just as well that they had requested she bring companions; the paladin had no intention of meeting this anonymous letter writer alone. Anonymous requests to meet tended to be ambushes.
That feeling intensified once she saw the three figures approaching, and recognized one of them instantly: Vizka Goldtusk. She glanced at Donal, whose eyes had narrowed on seeing the Zandalari privateer, remembering the confrontation that had occurred aboard the Seaking just outside of Freehold. To her surprise, another there was an earthen, his silvery beard running down nearly to his knees. The gems in his body were glowing with fel energy, and he was escorted by a hulking felguard, carrying a massive hammer that Catherine recognized as being from the armory of Uldir in Zandalar. The central figure was a Nightborne, wearing what appeared to be nerubian-style robes, showing the arcane runes in his chest and arms as well as the glowing tips of his fingers. His face was shrouded by a veiled headdress. He tapped the ring on his right hand, and began to speak - and she heard his voice in perfect Common, even though he did not speak that tongue. “Warmaster Hildreth,” he said. “My companions and I have come to claim sanctuary with you and your allies… and I have personally come to ask the forgiveness of your comrades.”
Catherine’s eyebrow rose… and then she had a moment of realization, even as the figure before her removed his concealing headgear. “Relsyn,” she said coolly. At her other side, Chaiya’s eyes widened with rage. “Has the Eightfold Path come to its senses?”
Lord Aldos Relsyn shook his head. “No,” he admitted quietly. “But I have. As have my companions here.” He met her gaze evenly. “Perhaps perpetual conflict is inevitable; I will not dispute that. But I will not perpetuate it any further, either.”
“That did not stop you when you and your filth attacked us,” Chaiya snarled.
The Nightborne warlock bowed his head. “That was a mistake, Lady Puretide. I did not want that.”
“A mistake?” The pandaren mage’s voice was quiet, but shaking with fury… and then began to rise as she continued, “You consider the burning of my home, the killing of my husband, my brother-in-law, and Sir Eran… nearly killing me, my son, and our friends the Blunderwitzes… a simple MISTAKE?! How dare you!” She turned to Catherine. “Dame Catherine, let me incinerate this murdering scum now. I will not --”
“Let him speak.” Catherine and Chaiya turned in surprise to Donal, whom both had expected to put his spear through the man’s skull and be done with it. “Captain Goldtusk already risked the eredar’s wrath to aid us. Now he is here, together with his… employer. I would like to know why.”
“You have named a major reason, Inquisitor Heskin,” Relsyn replied. “The eredar. Kalimos.” He sighed and turned to the figure next to him. “Speaker Karaash found the grimoire of my former mentor, Professor Sputterspark… after he was killed in the Ringing Deeps by the Lady Blunderwitz. We had worked with a former member of the Sundered Flame, a dracthyr named Zaidu. He had approached me with the idea of containing Kalimos, using him as a battery for our magics.”
Catherine could guess what happened next. “He betrayed you.”
Relsyn nodded. “Zaidu had been… without a purpose before he came to us. Kalimos mentored him, just as he did Speaker Karaash when they meet in the Deeps.”
“I am appreciative of the knowledge he gave me,” the earthen replied, his voice surprisingly mellow. “And I thought him to be right, that the only way to endure the trials to come was to embrace the chaos they wrought. I may have forsaken the Edicts, but I will not forsake Azeroth. Kalimos cares nothing for our world. He would see it burn for his own pleasure.”
“So would Zaidu, as we soon discovered,” Relsyn added. “Like Sarkareth, he found his own path to power. That we escaped with our lives at all was… miraculous. The dracthyr possess great strength, and combined with fel magic - and the millennia of experience Kalimos wields - we had no chance.”
The paladin’s good eye was glaring. “You should have thought of that before resurrecting him, Relsyn. You traded the Corruptor, a tinpot dictator, for an eredar lord of the Burning Legion. Did you not stop and think that was probably a bad idea?”
Relsyn had the good sense to look ashamed. “No, I didn’t,” he admitted. “No more than I did when I remained loyal to Elisande.”
Catherine stared at him for a long moment, then turned to Donal. “What do you think?”
The young warrior gazed hard at all three of them. “It is difficult for me to believe, especially as I don’t trust them… but I do not think they lie, my lady.”
Nodding, Catherine turned to Chaiya, whose hands were clenched into fists, and gently put a hand on her shoulder. The pandaren looked first at Relsyn, hatred in her eyes… and then she sighed, and looked back to Catherine. “I do not like this, and I certainly do not like them,” she said. “But I will trust your judgment, Dame Catherine.”
Catherine smiled. “Thank you, my friend.” Her expression sobered as she turned back. “Very well, Lord Relsyn. If you and your companions wish a chance to prove your good intent, we will give it to you. And though this will be obvious to you, I will emphasize it by saying so aloud: You have a great deal to prove, and I am taking an incredible risk by trusting your goodwill. If I get so much as the slightest whiff of deception, I will kill you.”
Relsyn bowed his head in acceptance, as did Karaash and Vizka. “Understood.”