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.”