The Scryers Tier

Consciousness came to Miria slowly, like syrup filling up her veins. The first thing she was aware of was the pounding in her head - a deep throbbing that went from the base of her horns all the way down the back of her neck. There was light wherever she was, and it didn’t help her headache. The inside of her mouth felt slimy, and she was willing to bet her breath was horrendous. She groaned and attempted to rub her head. She couldn’t move her arm. She cracked her eyes open, trying to keep the searing light out of them, and rolled her head to one side.

She was strapped down to a table of some kind, thick leather restraints holding her legs and arms immobile. Someone had removed her gauntlets and pauldrons, but thankfully the rest of her armor hadn’t been touched. Miria took a deep breath and gritted her teeth against the pain in her head, trying to work one of her wrists out of its restraint. While she did that, she took the opportunity to look around the room.

The light she’d noticed before she opened her eyes came from a small fireplace on the opposite end of the room. Most of the walls were covered with bookshelves, which carried an assortment of scrolls, books and tablets. Miria’s head hurt too badly to try and translate the titles - they were in Common, and while she spoke passable Common, reading it was far too much for her at the moment. There was a small table pushed against the wall. On its surface were carefully corked flasks, neatly labeled.

“Do you know how annoying it is to spend weeks tracking an experiment you are sure will run to a spectacular conclusion, only to have one’s hard work reversed by a chiming lightshow?” It was Kaster’s voice.

Miria jerked her head back, trying to see him. “What have you done with me?” she demanded.

He walked around the side of the table, coming into her vision and taking a seat next to the table full of vials. He began to re-arrange them as he spoke. “When I first met you, I couldn’t help but think you must be young for one of your kind,” he said. “A seasoned fighter would have taken the time to put her gear on, and wake her beast, before engaging. A seasoned fighter of the Alliance wouldn’t have flinched when confronted with someone of my disciplines. The draenei in the fort talked about you when you went out, did you know?”

“No,” Miria said, startled into answering.

Kaster nodded. “The commanders would talk about how sad the war made them, that draenei as young as you were sent out into the world to fight. That intrigued me. I never particularly thought about relative youth - Hesthea, come here.”

The last part of the sentence confused Miria until Kaster’s succubus crossed into her vision, her wings rustling as she walked, hips swinging, to the table. The eredar leaned over her master’s shoulders, winking at Miria with a sly smile. “Hesthea here tells me she has more centuries to her name than fingers to count them on,” Kaster continued. “How old did you say you were?” Hesthea said something in demonic, and Kaster said, “Ah yes - sixty seven thousand three hundred eight.”

Miria stared into the succubus’s glowing eyes. “That would mean you remember - you-”

“Hesthea calls Argus her homeworld. She was born there. You, though - you call Draenor your homeworld. That means you can’t be much older than twenty five thousand, but even then, most of the draenei commanders are that old, so your youth wouldn’t be remarkable to them. The way they made it sound, you were barely an adult.” The succubus chuckled and said something else in demonic. Kaster grinned at her, the same grin he had given Miria after blowing hydra heads up in Zangarmarsh.

“What does that have to do with anything?” Miria snarled. “I’m well old enough to take care of myself.”

“So I see,” Kaster said dryly, and Miria looked away, feeling her cheeks flush dark blue in fury. “I’ve been a warlock all my life, Miria. I’ve summoned and spoken with Hesthea for most of that time - and I admit I’ve always been curious about your people’s long, joint history.”

“The eredar are not our people any longer!” Miria said, turning her head back to glare at him and struggling against the restraints. “They chose power and corruption over their freedom and look at how it’s twisted them!”

Hesthea laughed, shaking her head at the draenei. Kaster’s grin didn’t leave his face. “Hesthea has said that the draenei were too weak to understand what Sargeras was offering them - but then, she serves me now, not Sargeras.” He leaned back and held the succubus’s eyes until the demon looked away, a sour look on her face. For a moment, Miria thought this must be what people felt like when they encountered Naru - supposedly a wild, dangerous beast tamed by her willpower. More than one person had told her she was asking for trouble, wandering around with wild animals. Hadn’t she told Kaster the same thing about the demons?

“You are the first draenei I’ve encountered that I can read - most of them are so infernally old they’ve learned to hide their feelings behind impassivity, or religious dedication - enough stoicism to make me vomit. You, though - you were agitated, depressed, on the verge of hopelessness. Your home planet is not a pretty sight. I have been here since the campaign was in full swing, and I’ve seen draenei fall to the broken sickness. But always wondered - what truly separated the draenei from the eredar?”

He rose from his chair, shrugging Hesthea off his shoulders as he came to stand beside the table, looking down at Miria. “I challenged myself, with you. I told myself to be subtle, to simply watch the land and the plight of your people work on your spirit until the anger started to overtake the friendliness, until survival started to replace honor - I admit I pushed, a little.”

“You were trying to make me - you were trying to see if I would become eredar?” Miria could hardly believe the words coming from her lips. “You can’t... Sargeras was a powerful entity - a god! You can’t hope to be able to do what he did merely through manipulation and-” she snapped her mouth shut, suddenly acutely aware of her position and the many flasks on that table.

“So now you see where you are,” Kaster said, smirking down at her. “Thanks to your cursed Naaru, all my work on your emotional state was handily eroded in five minutes. My indirect approach failed, but fortunately, I’m an alchemist. I can move on to the direct approach.” He gestured to Hesthea, and the succubus ran her finger over the labels on the vials until she found one that suited her. Kaster took it from her, uncorking it.

A vile smell permeated the room, the stench of swamp gas and old blood. Miria gave all her restraints a mighty wrench at once, straining against the leather, her teeth clenched. “Hesthea,” Kaster said, and Miria felt the demon’s hands close on either side of her head.

“No!” she screamed, thrashing as hard as she could. One of her fangs closed on the side of her tongue, filling her mouth with the tasted of blood. The succubus’s nails dug into her cheeks and the demon hissed something at her - the language was similar enough to her own that she understood the command to hold still. She answered with a stream of shouted curses.

“That won’t do,” Kaster said sourly, putting the vial aside. “We’ll have to gag her or someone will hear.” That made Miria scream louder in hopes that someone - anyone - would hear her before she was forced to drink whatever was in that vial. “Hesthea, shut her up!”

The succubus rolled her eyes and tried to clamp a hand over Miria’s mouth. Miria sank her fangs into the first finger to come close, glaring up at the demon and refusing to let go. Hesthea cursed at her and freed the whip from her belt. She cracked it in the air above the table and a wave of pink magic settled over Miria’s body. Unnatural warmth spread through her from horns to hooves, the hair on her scalp prickling. She opened her mouth and let go of Hesthea’s hand entirely against her will. No matter how hard she tried to force herself, she couldn’t keep screaming.

“Much better,” Kaster said, coming back to the table with the vial again in his hand. Hesthea examined her long black nails. “Now hold still, it was hard enough to find the components for this the first time. I do hope you live through it.”

A guttural roar broke the succubus’s hold on her just as Kaster tipped the potion - she clamped her mouth shut and jerked her head to the side, screaming through her teeth as it splashed against her cheek and ear - it burned like salt in an open wound. Hot breath washed across her face and she heard Kaster yell, then a thump and the sound of breaking glass. She thrashed her head side to side, trying to wipe the potion off her face so she could open her eyes.

“What in the name of the Light is going on here? Get her unstrapped from that table! You - restrain that beast!”

Miria was spitting and flailing as hands fell to her restraints. Someone wiped her face with a soft towel and she opened her eyes, clutching at the person’s gauntlets as they helped her to sit up.

The death knight from the bar - Madhav - had her by the shoulders. His mouth was tight in concern, his grip a little too tight. “Are you all right?” he asked.

“I didn’t drink any of it,” Miria said in a rush. “I didn’t drink any of it.”

“You can thank your beast for that,” the death knight said. “It might be best to call her off.”

Miria looked over and found two draenei guards attempting to wrestle her bear off Kaster. The succubus seemed to have vanished into the other room or the twisting nether - Miria couldn’t see her at all.

“I ought to let her kill him,” she said, and Naru snarled in agreement, trying to shake the guards off her with renewed fury.

“If it comes to that, I shall take his life,” Madhav said, his hand closing on the hilt of his runeblade and a dark, cold smile stealing over his face. It vanished as soon as she saw it but it still made her shiver.

“Naru,” she said, calling the bear to her.

“What is the meaning of this?!” a new voice cried, and Miria squeezed her eyes shut, feeling her head start to pound again. Three blood elves had squeezed into the room’s small space. They all stood with weapons drawn, and suddenly everyone’s weapon was in hand. “You are not permitted on the Scryer’s Tier!”

“Oh?” A paladin wearing the tabard of the Hand of Argus stepped in front of the rest, hefting a large mace with the Light shining from it. “You are not permitted to kidnap draenei citizens!”

The blood elf leader cast an eye around the room, taking in the scene. His eyes found Kaster against a smashed bookshelf, standing still and tense, and he glared. “Kaster-clan-Raven,” he said. “Have we not already had a discussion about the appropriate way to conduct experiments within the city?”

Kaster cleared his throat, his eyes darting back and forth. Every eye in the room was on him, and Naru growled. “She was a volunteer?”

“I most certainly was not!” Miria shouted, jumping to her hooves. Madhav grabbed her shoulder like he was afraid she’d fling herself at the warlock.

“She hardly looks like a volunteer to me,” the blood elf said snidely. “Pack your laboratory - I want you out of our section of the city in three hours. You have made it highly politically inconvenient for us.”

“Politically inconvenient?” the paladin said like she couldn’t believe it. “He was trying to poison her!”

The blood elf raised his eyebrow. “He is a member of our order and he answers to our laws within the walls of the city - or should I need to remind you of our treaty again?” He turned back to Kaster. “You see what you’ve done here?”

The warlock shrugged, his face unreadable. Miria couldn’t help herself - she broke out of Madhav’s hold and shoved past the paladin, grabbing him by the front of his robes. “Where is the rest of my armor you treacherous piece of larva?”

Kaster didn’t even look worried. “At the foot of the specimen table if you’d care to look - ow!” she shook him, smashing his head into the bookcase. The paladin grabbed her wrists and pulled her away.

“I’d much rather let you shoot him,” she said, “but as they so handily phrased it, that would be politically inconvenient.”

Miria found her gear exactly where Kaster said it would be. When she struggled with the buckles, Madhav brushed her hands away and cinched them tight.

“You were leaving?” the blood elf said. None of them had lowered their weapons.

“Right now,” the paladin said stiffly, gesturing to the guards. They fell in behind her, and Madhav practically dragged Miria out of the room and away from Kaster.

“I am glad we found you,” he said. “When I did not see you about in the morning I wondered. When word reached me there was a bear menacing the elevator to the Scryer’s Tier, I gathered help.”

Miria shuddered. She didn’t want to think about what might have happened if they hadn’t come when they did.

“I was just glad to see you off your barstool, my friend,” the paladin said, and Madhav looked away from her. She sighed. “I am Lanaara of the Hand of Argus,” she said to Miria. Her skin was very pale, almost white in color. Her horns stood out from the sides of her head before curving down, unlike Miria’s which swept back from her brow and curved along her temples. “Madhav fetched me on the Aldor Rise and told me you’d left the bar with a shady character. He said you were traveling with him, but that he didn’t look trustworthy.”

“He isn’t,” Miria said firmly. “I’m sorry I ever thought he was.”

“Why were you travling with a warlock of all people?” Lanaara asked, wrinkling her nose. “That’s hardly proper company for someone of your-”

“If you say someone of my age, so help me I will push you off the elevator,” Miria said. Lanaara stared at her, suprised, and she took a deep breath. “I’m sorry. Everyone I have met has commented on how young I am - you don’t think I know it?” She shrugged. “You fight for our people, can’t I?”

Lanaara exhanged a look with Madhav, smiling wryly. “I won’t mention it again,” she said. “I am glad to meet you - I’m glad to meet anyone that can make this one come out of his shell.” She clapped the death knight on the back. “If you really want to fight for our people’s survival, though, you should be in Northrend.”

“Lanaara,” Madhav rumbled, a warning note in his echoing voice.

“You have orders the same as I do,” Lanaara said. “Don’t think I haven’t seen you staring at them as you drink.”

“They will not send someone to drag me to the front when they are required to come all the way here first,” Madhav said, waving it off.

Miria couldn’t help but think about the promise she’d made to Treize, that she would stay away from Northrend and the war with the Scourge. She stepped off the elevator with her hand on Naru’s broad head. Nether rays went soaring over their heads as they walked toward the center of the city, and she saw gryphons in the air all around them. She quickened her pace a little, pulling out in front of Madhav and Lanaara. Now that she was rid of that annoying warlock, she could do what she’d wanted to do since she walked through the Dark Portal. “I don’t know about going to war,” she said, “but before I make a decision, I need to know how to fly.”

Ebon Watch

Laiza Rottedsprocket galloped away from Light’s Breach, her ghoul running along beside her. She wouldn’t admit it out loud, but she was glad to put both Necrothirst and his pet worgen at her back. The former sometimes looked at her like he wanted to kick her out of the saddle for the amusement, and the latter’s fangs were around neck height when they rode together. It was enough to make a girl plain unsettled.

It wasn’t that she preferred being alone - just the opposite. When the assignment had come up, Laiza had jumped at it, hearing that she’d be with a squad. For the past few months since she’d been raised, she had mostly been sent on solo missions. She cleared scourge away from the Argent Dawn’s watchtowers in the plaguelands, bore messages back and forth between Acherus and Stormwind - all manner of tediously dull tasks that took her out into the wilds with nothing but her Deathcharger and her ghoul, neither of which could really be called company. Granted, Necrothirst and Kyladriss couldn’t be counted as company either, but the others were well enough. Like all Knights of the Ebon Blade, they carried their past heavily on their shoulders. Laiza made it a point not to ask, and neither did they. It was a good arrangement - one that was tacitly understood by all death knights.

The other thing this assignment brought was a change of scenery. For the last year of her life and the few months of her undeath, Laiza spent most of her time among the crusaders of the Eastern Plaguelands. Before her death and reanimation it hadn’t been much of a problem - she was an engineer, and every war effort needed more people who knew their way around siege engines. Aside from that, her previous specialty as an arcane mage made her incredibly handy in a pinch, when the forward line was under fire and their forces needed to be evacuated quickly. Now, though, that land held nothing but bitterness and unhappy memories. Zul’Drak was unpleasant, but at least it was unfamiliar.

Lazia crested a small hill and immediately drew her Deathcharger’s reins short, causing the undead animal to rear at the sudden command to halt. She sidled into a stand of bushes at the foot of a twisted, dead tree. Above her, barely visible through the thorny tree branches, floated a necropolis.

The gnome ground her teeth and opened her traveler’s map, spreading it out as well as she could across the saddlehorn and her mount’s neck. What she saw made her swallow. Light’s Breach wasn’t only within spitting distance of Drak’Tharon Keep, now in enemy hands. It was also a stone’s throw from the necropolis hovering above her. It was placed directly between Light’s Breach and the Ebon Watch - purposefully, unless Laiza missed her guess. It would be like Arthas to place things like that, cutting off his enemies from each other.

“Well here’s a wonderful pickle,” Laiza muttered to herself. She couldn’t swing south - that would bring her far too close to Drak’Tharon, and she definitely didn’t want to run into any scourged troll berserkers - not on her own. The map made it look like there was a low wall bordering this field to the north, meaning that if Laiza took that road she would have to hope nothing spotted her and fenced her in.

She edged her mount forward. Her ghoul, a mess of oddly-angled joints and rotting flesh, staggered to its feet to follow. Ahead of her through the trees, Laiza could see that the necropolis was not the only line of defense there. Scourge swarmed across the ground, and just ahead she could see that the soil had taken on the sickly orange tinge that meant Plague had been dumped there. “Straight through’s not an option either then. No wonder they haven’t heard from Ebon Watch.”

Her ghoul grunted like he agreed, but when she looked down she found that the useless sack of meat was chewing on its own foot. She kicked it, but misjudged the force of her kick enough that it sent the ghoul’s head rolling clear of its shoulders. “Wonderful,” she said, and waved her sword. The ghoul collapsed into an inanimate pile of bones. She’d summon another one later if she needed it. Sometimes she thought they were more trouble than they were worth.

Laiza turned her mount north. If she were in command of that necropolis, she would order scouts to patrol the lands around it, especially where a messenger might cross from the crusaders to the Ebon Watch. Wary of those patrols, Laiza didn’t dare gallop. Instead she nudged her mount into a quick walk, moving not in a straight line, but from tree to tree. As long as she could stay hidden from the Scourge forces of the necropolis, she should be okay.

She passed signs of the war on her way to the wall. Bodies, presumably purified by the Light and unable to be raised, littered the ground. Bones and bits of ragged flesh, what remained when a Scourge soldier was slain, were far more numerous than the whole bodies of the Crusaders. Every now and again Laiza passed a Scourge catapult, broken and abandoned. The catapults showed signs of holy fire on their carriages.

A broken stone structure stuck out of the ground ahead of her. Despite the way the map made it look, it wasn’t a wall in the traditional sense. The sides were sloped enough that a sure-footed mount could climb them, and it was wide and flat on top, paved with stones. Laiza would lay money down that this had been a major thoroughfare for the Drakkari before they fell to the Lich King’s might.

The gnome hid in the shadow of another thorny tree, watching the surface of the road. Did she dare try for it? Most of the Scourge were mindless, and wouldn’t know a road from any other path on the ground. They knew only hunger, cold and pain. Still, they’d said Drak’Tharon was producing death knights, and they would know to watch the road.

“Better safe than dead. Again,” Laiza said, only a little bitterness making its way into her tone. She did not climb the wall to chance the road, but rather rode parallel to it, keeping to the shadows of the trees and picking her way carefully over the broken, rocky ground.

She had not gone ten feet when she felt a vibration come up through her Deathcharger’s hooves. Another followed, in a rhythm very like footsteps. Laiza backed her mount into a bush, ignoring its snort of protest. An enormous shadow glided over her just before the source came into view.

It was a flesh giant, larger than any Laiza had ever seen raised. She would barely clear its big toe, and Necrothirst would be lucky to come up to its ankle. Its footfalls shook the earth enough to disturb her mount, who shook its head and stamped. Laiza stroked its neck, trying to keep it from making noise. Her skin prickled as the hair on the back of her neck stood up. Massive bolts were driven through its shoulders and knees, likely to hold the thing together, and it had a metal jaw. “Sweet Light above us,” Laiza whispered to herself. The thing didn’t even glance down. It could have crushed her with one boot if it chose. “I’m lucky I decided not to take the road.”

Laiza waited until the flesh giant passed, until she could no longer feel the vibrations of its footfalls. No wonder she hadn’t seen any riders on the road. Why use riders to patrol when you had that? She shuddered despite herself, resuming her course at a quicker pace. She wanted to get to the Ebon Watch before that thing turned around.

The trees gave way to an expanse of hilly ground leading up to the foot of the mountains that separated Zul’Drak from Dragonblight to the south and Crystalsong Forest to the west. On the other side of the open ground, Laiza could see a small camp with a fire burning. Tattered banners with the sigil of the Ebon Blade flapped in the breeze.

Lumbering troll corpses jerked across the open ground aimlessly. They would have been raised by Plague quickly after their deaths, en masse. Death knights took time and concentration to raise properly, to bind their former intelligence, skill and will into the body. These were merely zombies.

Laiza shifted in her saddle, trying to think quickly. Now that she was waiting for it, she felt the faint vibration of the giant’s footfalls returning. “Aw, damn,” she muttered, and pointed her runeblade at the dirt.

A tattered, fleshless ghoul climbed out of the earth and scrambled to follow her as she broke into a gallop. The zombies weren’t aware enough to swarm her, but when she passed close enough to one its head jerked around and it began shambling in her wake. Laiza rode straight for the camp at a hard gallop, leaned low over her Deathcharger.

A tall, willowy figure stood abruptly from where she was crouched. She pulled a large axe off her back and stood at the ready to receive Laiza’s pursuers. Another death knight jumped to his feet near the back of the camp, running to the gap in their fence, unsheathing his sword as he went.

Laiza dismissed her mount, skidding into camp with the forward momentum. She turned, bringing her sword to bear, and pointed it at the ground in front of her. An unholy rune went chasing down the blade and a circle of red corruption boiled up from the earth.

The zombies staggered into it, their glassy eyes fixed in Laiza’s direction. “Sorry about the company,” she said to the two death knights on either side of her. “There didn’t look to be a clear path anywhere.”

One of the zombies, festering with the shadow disease from Laiza’s circle of death and decay, reached out to claw her. She knocked its flailing arms aside and chopped, runes and shadow magic flickering over her blade. The sword cut deep into the zombie’s chest, and Laiza used it to hold the thing at a distance while she sent more runes flowing down her sword. More disease crawled over the zombie, and she made a shoving gesture with one hand. Streams of shadow leapt out of the impaled zombie and streaked toward the others, infecting them as well.

“Come from the Argent Stand?” that was from the human death knight to her right. He had summoned a bone shield and was cleaving the undead into multiple pieces with a grim smile.

“Light’s Breach,” Laiza said. “I’m fresh out of Ebon Hold.”

“Just what we need,” the sin’dorei next to her said sourly, her lip curling. “More fresh corpses for the battlefield.” Her axe flickered with frost runes - one of the few frost death knights Laiza had seen who weilded a two-handed weapon. She froze the enemy and shattered them with the edge of her blade.

“I’m just a scout,” Laiza said. “There are six of us all told - well, five and a feral worgen.”

“Feral worgen?” the human asked. “A worgen death knight?”

“I was as surprised as you are,” Laiza said with a shrug. “I’ve never heard of it before. We practically have to keep her chained up, except our commander’s managed to make her obey him somehow.” The last of the zombies fell to Laiza’s ghoul, who immediately began devouring the corpses. Laiza returned her runeblade to her back. “Anyway, I’ve been sent to check in. Light’s Breach wants to know how you’re set for personnel.”

“It’s just us,” the human said. “For now, at least. I heard Highlord Mograine was sending us a small squad - that wouldn’t be you?”

Laiza shook her head. “Our orders are to facilitate communication between the Sunreavers and the Silver Covenant. Our commander speaks Zandali.”

His jaw clenched. “Of course. Of course you aren’t our reinforcements.” He shook his head. “Stefan Vadu. This charmer is Bloodrose Datura.”

The blood elf glared at them and returned to her side of the camp, sitting down in front of a tent. She began to sharpen her runeaxe. Laiza rolled her eyes, reminded of Necrothirst. Not that she wasn’t bitter about her own undeath, but she didn’t see the point of wasting energy being angry about it all the time.

“So my report will be yes, you do need reinforcements. Should I have Light’s Breach send-”

“No Crusaders!” Bloodrose hissed, leaping to her feet with her axe brandished. “Self-righteous, brainwashing cretins.”

“Oookay then, no Crusaders,” Laiza said, turning back to Stefan. “I suppose you’ll just have to wait for whoever Highlord Mograine sends.”

“That would be wise,” Bloodrose said. Stefan shook his head at Laiza, indicating that the subject was closed. The blood elf turned stiffly away from them and leaned forward, glaring fiercely into the distance. “It would seem your commander keeps you on a short leash.”

“What’s that?” Laiza said, climbing up on a nearby supply box. She jumped up and down, trying to see whatever Bloodrose saw on the horizon.

Stefan squinted in the same direction. “Yes, that’s the signal fire from the Argent Stand,” he said. “You’ll have to go. We can’t answer the signal fire, and it’s more than likely for you anyway.” He escorted her out of the fence line, glancing back at the blood elf. “Make a truthful report. Commander Falstaav will send reinforcements, whether she likes it or not. We’re dangerously close to losing this camp.”

Laiza summoned her Deathcharger, scowling. “If I wanted to run all over scourge-infested wilderness I would have signed up for that,” she complained. “I was supposed to be with a squad, not scouting.”

Stefan smiled humorlessly. “What else are gnomes good for?” he asked, and smacked her Deathcharger’s rump.

The animal leapt forward with a shuddering neigh of equine fury, and Laiza was forced to wrestle for control, cursing blackly. The zombies still hadn’t adjusted their shambling patterns to protect the hole she’d carved in their ranks, so at least she made the road easily. Argent Stand was past Light’s Breach in the direction she’d already come, meaning she’d have to skirt the road and that unnerving flesh giant’s patrol path. Again.

“If I wasn’t sure before that the Light hated me, I surely am now,” Laiza grumbled, and nudged her mount on. Whatever Necrothirst wanted, she hoped it was important.