Threats

“I don’t think you deserve him,”

Lilliana closes the distance between them. A cold, metal-clad finger traces the priestess's cheek, "Why am I undeserving?"

“Because you are wicked, and you have no respect or compassion. Because he couldn’t possibly love you after you married another,” Malisson says softly.

SCORE. That will probably end with...

Light help her, I am being so wicked. The Abbess would be so ashamed.

Dishes, unfortunately, did not pack themselves. Lirriel wrapped each plate and stacked them carefully in the crate. Soon the house in Elwynn Forest would be finished. It would be nice, she thought, to be a local healer, watch her husband train young people for the militia—and start their family, finally, now that the world-ending threats of the Lich King and Deathwing were dealt with.

For now, a little voice in the back of her mind whispered, bringing with it a brief memory of cold, and burning eyes invoking a promise…She shook herself from those unpleasant thoughts, reaching for a bowl. She almost dropped it when someone knocked on the apartment’s door.

“You ignored my last few invitations, Ben.  I’m crushed.”  The woman dropped her cigarette into the snow and ground it out under her boot.

“Why’d you drag me out here?”  Harrigan glowered at her through narrowed eyes.   He unconsciously flexed the fingers of his right hand, aching for the sword that still rested in its scabbard.

“Because I can, Ben,” she laughed.  “And you hate it.”

Lirriel sighed as she looked over the letters she'd written. On the desk was an array of stamps and seals, signifiers of her positions in the Alliance's many faction. The petite priestess grimaced. She didn't like to exert the influence she'd gained simply by doing what was needed, what was right. But this was a case she couldn't ignore, not when a friend and colleague was being endangered.

So the annoying fly would get no where else to hide. Her own kind didn't want her, and Lirriel had already seen to it that Dalaran wasn't a safe place to run after a previous encounter. It seemed now that she was going to have to call in more favors to tighten the noose further.

The sun was setting over the walls of the city to the west. Alex's deadline was approaching for giving the mistress an answer. A part of her was still hoping that some mysterious third option would show up and give her a way out, but the reality of the situation was simply that there was no better option.

She walked into the small room that Videl used as an office and sat down on the chair placed in front of the desk.

Videl glanced up at Alex as she sat down. "Decided to wait till the last minute did we?"

Alex cracked a small smile before catching herself. "I just wanted to evaluate all of my options Mistress"

Videl took off her glasses and placed them down on the desk as she sat up in her chair. "Oh, and have we decided then?"

The warlock nodded. "I'll do as you wish, however I want the room across from yours."

Her hair smelled of bloodthissle, its soft texture pressed into my cheek, with an underlying smell of some sweet herb and the very subtle tangy scent of poison.  To the outward eye we looked like nothing more then two females sitting on a bench, locked in an embrace of either friends or lovers, my arm around her shoulders and neck, her back against my chest.  What lay hidden was the ever growing stain of red in the mid section of my shirt, and my fingernails embedded in her back, the skin there already twisted black with corruption.

“Tell me who you are.”  I whispered my lips along the edge of her ear, at each struggle I set my nails deeper, pushed a little more corruption into her skin… we had our violent confrontation close to the bridge of Silvermoon, it was over quickly, the girl hadn’t been sent here to kill me.

((Running a bit behind due to the Great Midwest Meddler Road Trip...))

This was not good.

Lormar didn't have time to regard the dead whore sprawled across the bed. He was too busy spinning around to parry the knife coming from the assassin still lurking behind the door.

'Master Barten, I will need any records you have of deaths in the area of Hangman Hill.'

Ben Barten, a man born to clerkhood, drywashed his hands as was his habit when thinking. 'Many people committed of murders there, Miss Devereaux. Why bother with convicts and murderers?'

Zaas Glados Devereaux glanced up from her paperwork with a polite expression on her features. 'The dead require justice for their crimes... As do the living, Master Barten.'

~~~~~

Dalaran was everything I had heard it would be, a teaming city of far too many bodies, far too many parties, and the delicious promise of violence. Night had already made its way over the city by the time I had arrived, but a lamp lit city has always been my preference, and it was the very same promising warm glows that lead me into a shop stacked from wall to ceiling with glass incased scrolls, but it wasn’t the shop itself I had wanted to see, it was what I heard was above it. 

(( Tips for translating: maki = kill, om = it/him/her, wio = will. It's written mostly phonetically so if you run into troubles, read it out loud ))

Frenz nat iat frenz.

Artisania Marveloso, barefoot and in her nightgown, did her best to catch her breath.

"Lay in your grave already, Librarian!" Eberict Silverleaf cried out from under the stairs, "You suck the air as though we have limitless ether!"

Artisania Marveloso moved.

Her body curled gently, to fit in accordance to the similarly curled figure of the smaller elf with whom she slept.  Teledriath's petite frame nestled against her, warm and breathing deep and rhythmically, the ebb and flow of her respiration against her breast like a gentle wave.   Artisania sighed a little, embraced by the familiar comfort of their own bed in the Thunder Bluff loft, sleep washing over her to ease away the trials of the week past.

Artisania Marveloso gently closed the book.

With a sigh she rubbed her fingers over her eyes, feeling certain she'd done enough reading for the night; she blinked a few times at the low lamplight cast over the work table. Beyond the cover of the book gems glinted, little sparks of color and light, red, yellow, bright blue, gleaming green. She smiled, a close, personal smile, one of slow and savored thoughts, drawing her to turn in her chair to look behind her to where Teledriath lay sleeping, curled beneath the red blanket on their bed.

"Was it true? Had that artist Rossetti really gone mad and killed himself in the Gallery?

I did not pay much attention to the rumours at first. These people -- my people, I need to remind myself, more often as time goes on -- are always twittering about something. It was not until I heard the deceased man's full name, Maudlin Rosetti, that I took notice.

Kharris and Artisania have both warned me about this Lady Everbloom and her suspicious art collection. So, what to do about it? I do not think I am in any danger. She is unbalanced, I think, but not dangerous. That she dyed her hair to look like mine is flattering, I suppose. It might even be a little unsettling. But does it cross a line? And what of her hiring Heulwen to investigate me? I have done the same, and I meant no harm, although harm may yet come from it.

I would not have thought that any of this indicated any danger to me, but as I told Kharris, we all have blind spots. One warning I might dismiss as an overprotective friend. Two warnings, and I would be a fool not to pay attention.

The sixth day of the eleventh month of the year 28

I seem to be doomed to hurt everyone I love. I’d better start getting used to that, especially since it’s my blood that will kill them all.

(( You may want to read Where the cat has been. ))

The warlock stepped briskly as she made her way from Farstriders' Square to Murder Row. The fading daylight painted the walls and archways in orange and gold, the sun making even this disreputable neighborhood beautiful.

She waited outside The Golden Horn, a lounge where patrons could drink watered-down liquor while watching attractive young men and women dance on a stage. A moment later, a buxom young lady dressed as a waitress stepped out of a shadow. The warlock and the buxom waitress exchanged whispers, after which the warlock nodded, and followed the other woman into the club.

{{ Repost }}

The 26th day of the 9th month of the year 26

My manuscript has been sent, Sashai is still sleeping, the sun won't rise for hours, and I'm staring at a pair of vials. One contains a vile-looking specimen of a plant and the other ... the other a final gift from Arielle. Her blood. Blood will separate within hours, leaving a dark-red layer of sludge beneath a red-tinged layer of water. I've had this for three days now, and it's still mixed; the Plague is maintaining it.

Lilly's head hit the ground with a soft thud.  She heard Fiyonna soft gasp as she hit the ground also.  They had been talking in the Valley of Heros, randomly running into each other after so long.  Lilly had just told Fiy that Gray had returned to the Monastary to report in person, when suddenly she felt herself tossed to the ground.