"Let's finish this before the bruisers catch wind of it," one of the other pirates added.
"They won't be around this way for awhile yet," the first snarled. "But 'tis true I don't fancy payin' the watch off with what we get, eh?"
They converged on their intended victim.
She would give them one more chance. "You don't wish to do this. Life is valuable, violence is not. Let us have peace between us...."
One of the lesser buccaneers, a balding, skeleton of a man, hesitated. "Maybe she's right, Dargo. Why don't we just leave her be—"
He immediately received a sharp, back-handed strike across the jaw from the leader. Dargo glared at him. "What's gotten into you, you son of a sea cow?"
The other brigand blinked. "Dunno..." He stared in shock at the tall female. "She done somethin'!"
Gritting his teeth, Dargo turned on her. "Damned mage! That's the last o' your tricks!"
"That is not my calling," she explained, but neither Dargo nor his friends were listening. The buccaneers ran at her, trying with swiftness to avoid any more spells. Common sense would have dictated that they flee from any caster, but common sense was clearly in short supply among these brigands.
A hand—a light blue hand covered in part by an array of copper-colored metal strands—thrust out of the left sleeve. She muttered a prayer for her foes in her glorious native tongue, too long unheard by her from any other's lips.
The leader was again predictable. He thrust the blade at her chest.
She easily dodged aside his clumsy strike without even moving from her position. As he fell forward, she touched him on the arm and used his momentum to send him flying past her and onto the hard wood of the nearest dock.
As he hit, his thin companion drew his cutlass and made a slash at her outstretched arm. The stranger gracefully pulled her limb from danger, then kicked at his midsection with what was not a foot, but rather a large and very tough cloven hoof.
As if struck by a barreling tauren, the second pirate went tumbling back like a missile into the third brigand, a stouter pirate with a bent nose. The pair collided hard, then collapsed in a jumble of arms and legs.
She spun about, the shifting of the two tendrils coming from behind her ears and lining her slim but beautiful features the only outward sign of her emotions. Her hand caught Dargo's wrist as he came at her from the dock and turned his force back against his arm.
The buccaneer let out a howl as his shoulder cracked. With his path already leading to the ground, it was a simple matter for her to let the villain fall face first at her feet.
Atop the crate, Dizzywig chortled. "Hah! Draenei women make for some tough customers, don't they? Tough and pretty, that is!"
Glancing at the goblin, she sensed no malevolent intent in his comments. With his occupation, it was not entirely surprising that Dizzywig had apparently seen or heard of her race at some point in the past. At the moment, he sounded honestly curious about her— curious and amused—but nothing more.
The wharfmaster had maintained a neutral stance during the confrontation, an understandable choice. If not her preferred one. The draenei had wanted to keep her activities secret. She was not where her kind should be.
But her oath and her quest demanded otherwise.
Leaning down to Dargo, she whispered, "The bone is not broken."
The anguished brigand seemed not to appreciate that gesture. In truth, she had done as much as she could to avoid injuring any of them, regardless of their wicked ways. Unfortunately, these three had demanded of her a brief exhibition.
But now the trio was more malleable to her advice... and abilities. In a level voice, the draenei declared, "It would be best if you all departed and forgot this incident."
The abilities granted her calling added weight to her words. Dargo and his companions scrambled to their feet and scurried off as if hounds with their tails on fire, leaving their weapons behind.
She turned back to Dizzywig. The goblin simply nodded. "Can't make out much under that robe, but you've got the smell of a priest about you...."
"I’am of that calling."
Dizzywig grinned. "Priest, mage, monster, man, don't matter to me none just so I get paid. The red boat there," he indicated with a crooked finger. "That's a good craft. If you've got the money."
"I have." The pouch materialized from the depths of her sleeve. "If I can trust that the boat will sail."
"Yeah, It will... but not with me in it. You want a crew, you should've held on to that sorry trio, heh!"
She shrugged. "I only need a serviceable craft. I'll make it on my own, if that is what is destined for me."
The draenei tossed him the pouch, which Dizzywig immediately opened. The goblin poured out the coins, his eyes wide with pleasure.
"That'll do... just," he said with a larger grin.
Without another word, the priestess strode toward the boat indicated. Its sides were more green than red due to layers of algae, and the wood was well worn, but she saw no weakness in the thick hull. A strong, single mast with a mainsail-foresail combination gave the fifty-foot-long sloop its only source of movement. Climbing in, she also found two sorry emergency oars resting in the hooks on the inside walls of the hull.
Dizzywig no doubt expected her to ask for supplies, but she was growing uncharacteristically impatient and did not want to spend time bartering for what she did not believe that she needed. Bad enough that she had spent futile weeks following a false trail. Secreted on her person was enough sustenance for the journey across.
The wharfmaster chuckled again, and although she no longer faced him, the draenei knew that he wondered what she would do next. For Dizzywig, the stranger was a good night's entertainment, indeed.
Wondering whether he would be disappointed with what she now intended, the priestess extended her hand... and began working the lines and the sail for departure with the practiced skill of one familiar with the sea, albeit no sea as the goblin would have known.
When she was done with that, the draenei leapt out. Judging the mass of the craft, she gripped one part of it and shoved.
Dizzywig let out a hmmph of surprise. It should have taken two or three brawny men to break the boat completely free. Fortunately, the priestess had not relied on brute strength, but a careful measurement of balance.
The boat silently slid the rest of the way into the water. The draenei leapt aboard, thanking those who had trained her.
"The sea's no safer than the land, these days. Just remember that!" the goblin called jovially. Then, with another chuckle, he added, "Enjoy your trip!"
She did not need the wharfmaster to warn her of the dangers. Over the past weeks, the priestess had confronted more than her share of the darkness seeking to engulf this world. More than once, she had nearly been killed during her pursuit, but, by the grace of the naaru, she had survived to continue the chase.
But as Ratchet, as all Kalimdor, rapidly dwindled in the dark and the sea enveloped her craft, the draenei felt that she had only tasted the least of dangers thus far. Now that the priestess knew that she followed the true trail, she was also aware that at some point, those she hunted would note her approach.
Note it and do what they could to slay her.
So it must be... the draenei thought. After all, she had taken up this quest of her own volition, her own desire.
Taken it up even though all who knew her now thought her utterly mad...
THREE
“They're gone!" the blood elf snapped vehemently. "They're gone!"
The woman in black stared at him from behind her veil. Although he was taller than her by an inch or two, it was he who seemed to have to look up at her, not the other way around.
It was also he who suddenly stifled his anger under her dread gaze.
"An obvious observation, Zendarin, as is the fact that we need not concern ourselves with them. The dear ones have their fates already destined; you know that very well."
"But there was much to lea
rn, much to explore with their making! Much magic of a sort none has ever witnessed!"
The avarice in his gleaming orbs when Zendarin spoke of magic made his companion smile in disdain. "A trifle, blood elf." She gently stroked the veil covering her scorched side. "A trifle to what I will ultimately achieve."
He bowed to her wisdom and her dark glory, but added, "What we’ll ultimately achieve, my lady."
"Yes... what we will achieve, my ambitious mage." The lady in black turned away without another word. The two stood at the mouth of one of the upper cave passages riddling Grim Batol. Despite its location well above the base of the mountain, this entrance was more accessible to the interior than most below—provided one was welcome within. Those who were not would find the path wrought with hidden pitfalls, including sentinels masked by Zendarin's magic.
And woe betide any of those intruders should they be spellcasters themselves...
The blood elf took one last glance over the landscape surrounding Grim Batol. Beyond the immediate desolation surrounding the mountain's base, the Wetlands had returned in force since the years of the red dragons' captivity to the orcs. The lush lands were misleading, though, for they held many natural and unnatural threats that acted as a good buffer against too many intruders. Six-legged crocolisks hunted in the waters, and tribes of gnolls—all fearful of Zendarin and the lady—also kept watch for fools venturing too close. Among the more horrific guardians were the monstrous oozes, gelatinous fiends that absorbed any animal in reach and, in the drier lands to the northwest, saurian raptors that stalked any and all fresh meat.
So full of life, so full of death, thought Zendarin. It was a far cry from the glorious wooded realm to which he was used, a realm to which he looked forward to returning once he had gained all that he sought.
Smothering a curse at the trials he had to suffer for his arts, Zendarin followed the veiled woman. He and the drakonid had spent the last night pursuing prizes he considered so valuable that he had let the remaining dwarves scurry back into their secret burrows like the frightened rabbits that they were. That, after swearing to his mistress that he would eradicate the pests once and for all. The dwarves had become a grand nuisance of late and while both he and she agreed that they could not possibly threaten the ultimate success of the pair's experiments, they could slow it. That was why he had devised this plan, this perfect plan.
But Zendarin could not have possibly known that two of those experiments would choose that very moment to escape Grim Batol.
"How did it happen? How did it happen?" he asked, barely able to keep his tongue civil despite being aware of just what she could do to him if merely riled. She had already slain two able assistants for minor infractions, and while she very much needed his skills, he knew that he had to tread warily. Zendarin's companion was very much insane... but that did not preclude her also being brilliant.
"The dragonspawn watching them were careless. They were told that the two might be immune to some of the binding spells and that at the slightest hint of that, the guards should alert me. The fools apparently were not satisfied that the danger yet warranted that alert."
The blood elf cursed the guards. Dragonspawn were brutishly-efficient in causing carnage and generally excellent at obeying orders. True, they were not as skilled and cunning as drakonid, but that should have not mattered in this situation. The dragonspawn had handled far more difficult tasks than keeping sentry. He could not believe their great error. "I'll tear out their black hearts for this...."
"You need not bother. There wasn't much left of them after the escape. The children saw to that." She tsked. again stroking the veil as she walked serenely through the caverns like a queen in her castle. "Besides, this will all make for an interesting test."
"'Test? My lady, they'll wreak havoc that'll bring someone of power investigating. Someone from Dalaran perhaps or—or worse!" Zendarln could imagine quite well just what "worse" might entail. There were powers existing on Azeroth that were greater than all the wizards left in Dalaran or even among his own people combined.
His declaration only made her smile again, albeit this time in cold anticipation. "Yes... someone will very likely investigate... someone very likely will..."
Before he could question her comment, the pair entered the upper level of the vast cavern in which their gargantuan prisoner and the focus of their work still struggled against his magical bonds. The skardyn feverishly tolled around the shimmering leviathan, ever checking both the strands keeping the nether dragon in place and adjusting the new white crystals that their mistress had just set in place for the next attempt.
"Filthy creatures," murmured Zendarin. A blood elf was still an elf when it came to aesthetics. His long nose wrinkled as one of the hooded creatures rushed up to the mistress and handed her a small cube laced with cerulean stripes along each face.
"Obedient creatures," she corrected, dismissing the skardyn. As the dwarven form scurried back to its comrades, she held the cubetoward Zendarln. "You see? Just as I required of them."
His disgust gave way to renewed avarice. Zendarin's eyes glowed a fierce green. "Then, it's only the matter of an egg?"
"Isn't it always? Aaah... here they bring it now..."
Four skardyn appeared below, the scaly dwarves grunting from effort as they held aloft a huge, oval egg... an egg stretching nearly a yard in length. It was thick, gray, and covered in a slick, oily substance that dripped down on its bearers. There was no mistaking just what kind of egg it was.
A dragon's.
"They should make haste!" urged Zendarin, aware of the fragility of the prize regardless of how massive it was. "The egg will not remain fresh long..."
His companion began to descend to the cavern floor, her lack of concern well evident. "The coating of myatis will preserve it. Myatis preserves everything soaked in it, no matter how long."
Aware of how old this egg actually was and the value of it to their work. Zendarin marveled. Indeed, none of what they hoped to accomplish would have been at all possible if this egg had not been preserved through the dark arts in the first place.
Not for the first time, her skills astounded him, he who had lived so many centuries and accomplished so much.
He joined her below. Just as the skardyn placed the egg on a stone platform set up in front of the bound nether dragon. The imprisoned behemoth managed a muffled growl, much to the amusement of the lady in black.
"Temper, temper..." she cooed, as if to an infant.
Relieved of their burden, the skardyn retreated. The platform was much akin to an altar, the top a rectangular slab of ebony-streaked granite that matched in substance the rounded base. The four legs thrusting up from the base to the slab had been carved to resemble dragons rising on their back legs. Where the mistress had originally gained the platform, Zendarin did not know, but he could sense its incredible age and the many spells that had been cast usingit. Latent magical energies saturated its stone form, tantalizing the blood elf. The platform had seen much use over its long existence, especially spells that had called for the lives of the innocent if the pale red stains on the top were any indication to go by.
That his own part in this work had required the sacrifice of others did not in any manner disturb Zendarin. Despite everything, he did not consider his acts heinous in the least. Ambitious, yes. Of necessity, yes... but not heinous. Like so many of his kind, he was driven by the hunger, the need, to seek out magic... at all costs. He considered all he did necessary to achieving that goal.
And that many others would still have to perish in the process was simply a matter that he could not help... not that he cared. After all, they were only dwarves, humans, and other lesser creatures.
The lady in black studied the egg for several seconds, as if able to see within its thick shell. She placed the cerulean cube before the egg. Then, with a smile to the captive leviathan, she ran her long, tapering fingers across the protective layer.
The myatis coating sizzled away.
"Join me, dear Zendarin...."
He eagerly stepped to her side, summoning the magic at his command to blend with hers. It was the very nature of his abilities as a blood elf that made him so precious to her and permitted Zendarin to voice, at least to a point, his frustrations. He brought to the mistress a magic uniquely qualified to aid her, for it was based in the almost vampiric siphoning of power from demons and other denizens of the Twisting Nether. Zendarin was exceptionally proficient in that skill, and thus his might was currently at its height.
It also helped that he had at his command those who brought to him other sources of magical energy. Invaluable servants whom the lady in black could not rip from his control without losing them and him in the process. That was another reason that she tolerated his impatience.
He stood next to her, his hands splayed over the egg in identical fashion to hers. Silently, they linked their magic together, binding it into one unique form. As they did, both the cube and the white crystals burned bright.
Zendarin's companion stretched forth her left hand toward the captive nether dragon.
The white crystals let out a sinister hum. From each emanated a light that struck the nether dragon.
Blue tendrils of energy shot forth from the struggling beast wherever the light of the crystals burned him. Despite the silver strands binding his maw, his agonized moans shook the cavern.
Guided by the sorceress, the blue tendrils dove down, striking the egg in the center. The egg shook and swelled to twice its original size. The shell took on an azure hue.
"Now..." she murmured to Zendarin.
As one, the pair threw their own contributions deeper into the matrix of the spell, mixing them with the stolen forces of the nether dragon. The cavern was suddenly ablaze in a wicked storm of violent energies whose focus was the egg. Although immune from most magic through the skillful work of their mistress, the skardyn scrambled to the farthest corners. Still dwarves at their core, they were rightly wary of a possible collapse of the cavern, but wise enough to know the punishment that they would receive if they fled the cavern at this critical moment.
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