She sat at the edge of one ruined yard and stared at the stream that had carved a path through the ruins of Silvermoon along with the rain. The same rain that soaked her clothes, sapping away her warmth and leaving a lingering sense of unhappiness.
Unhappiness bit away at her day, taking away the pieces she had built herself up with. Her clothes were wet, her makeup ran down her face and mud caked her boots.
But she still breathed. It wasn’t real after all. Stress and anxiety lied to her.
But it screamed it was true.
“Lies.” Windsong whispered, watching the small stream run.
She just had to keep breathing. Keep going. She knew it.
Ignore the screaming. Keep going. SImple enough when spoken aloud or written down.
But as the rain fell harder her head lowered and shoulders sagged.
It would take time before she returned to climb over the fences to her now- usual haunt. “Eventually.” She would eventually.
First to rebuild herself. Piece by broken piece until she was whole and had won her internal struggle.
Then she’d return to being bitter and angry again.
They hadn’t been involved in a long time but when Dawnfeather had lost his arm to Keeland’s diseased blood he’d revealed he was an empath. He could sense her guilt, even if he was unaware of the source. He’d seemed to melt into the shadows and within moments his presence vanished. The important thing, i tried to tell myself as I snuck out into the ally once more, was that I have a little over a day to find the killer before Silvermoon took action.
What was unexpected however, was the shadowy whisper that spoke into her ear. ‘You were wrong about the killings. There’s been several that took place in the Ghostlands. All ‘animal attacks’- torn apart and eaten. The most recent murder took place in the Court of the Sun.’
‘Several? And we weren’t told? Several killings didn’t make it into the reports that go to the city?” As Dawnfeather’s whisper finished she turned a hard left and wrapped her illusion around her, striding down the street. It was the same illusion she had grown so fond of during the Solidarity festival. The guide of a Magister with shoulders a touch to wide and average height. The red clothing remained the same but the face beneath the cloak, the hair, the hands- it all changed subtly as she moved. Blond hair became orange, and then changed to red in moments. It changed just enough to make someone question what they’d seen if they were following her, giving no hint to Windsong’s true identity beneath the illusion.
‘The Painter’s Quarterly’.
“Didn’t it get destroyed in the Festival?” The Painter’s Quarterly had been a popular art gallery for artists of the magical inclination. It had held works of art that were beautiful. Sculptures made of Light, mirrors that showed something about the one gazing inside it, marble sculpted so perfectly you could see the stone cloth as it it were truly real. In the chaos of the riots the second and third stories had burned and it had been declared unsafe. After the mess of the riots the students had begun to collect funds to repair it slowly.
Outside of the building a magical [Do not enter-CONDEMMED]sign was displayed on a shimmering barrier to keep out civilians and eager looters. Without glancing at the barrier I walked through, ignoring the feeling of the magic pressing against her until it just…vanished and I walked through the barrier. Being a Courtly Investigator had its perks- my hand pressed against the silver-wrought spider that hung from my necklace. Very few ‘official’ barriers and other magic in Quel’thalas would deny her entry as long as I had the spider. It had been made for me so I could do my duties unhindered.
Looking around the dusty and broken remains of the first floor I felt a feeling of warning making my shoulderblades itch. Several ruined paintings lay on the floor, light sculptures dim and flickering. Mechanical inventions fueled by mana struggled to work, seems like they weren’t able to be shut off. The workers that had come to start repairing and restoring the building had left buckets, cloth sheets, and several small arcane golems there.
‘Song, you’re stepping in blood’ Dawnfeather chided in her ear. “I don’t like how you’re doing that.” I complained to him as I stepped back. A lot of blood. Too much. I stepped back. It started where she had stood and looking as it it had spilled out across the room. “That’s to much for one elf.” There were three piles of what had once been elves. Piles of meat, torn cloth, and – ‘Arcane art supplies. We had guessed that some of the students had returned and tried to work on their own.’
“Are you inside my head?”
‘Yes.’
“Get out.” Now that i’d seen the blood and meat piles my stomach threatened to make me puke. I moved to the closest body, keeping away from the blood. "Tall arcane student… he had long hair once.” It had been removed. The student was curled up in a ball, arms over his head and attempting to cover his abdomen. Something had a field day with the student, had torn as much of it away as it could. his nose was gone, lips torn to the point I could see his bloodstained teeth. “…It sapped his mana.” I hadn’t seen a withered in a long time but I recognized the signs of withering.
Moving to the other pile of meat she found similar signs of withering, more claw marks. This student had short spikey hair in life, defense wounds on their forearms. They’d been gutted and she could see their innards. Thrown on top of the closest marble statue. ‘Don’t vomit on the evidence’ Dawnfeather’s voice whispered as the sickly rotting garbage sewer stench of death from the insides made her dry heave. “You didn’t come here because you didn’t want to do this.” I accused, pointing a finger at the doorway. Dawnfeather’s amusement rose up from somewhere in her mind. ‘Yes.’ “Gods, I hate you.” Somewhere Dawnfeather was chuckling. He was in the forefront of her mind, giving her some privacy. The inside that decorated the statue had clearly been placed with care. The elven maiden the statue was modeled after showed no signs of disgust at the flesh ornamentation. “Looks like they gave the statue a new dress.”
The remaining student was the luckiest of them all. Their neck was at an unnatural angle. They had been gutted as well but I only saw one set of innards decorating the place. They hadn’t bled as much as the others, the pool of blood much smaller. ‘Look around more Song. Use your divination if you need.’ “No. To see how they died might kill me. The mind is a stupid thing Dawnfeather. If I see how they died it might kill me to.” Leaving the corpses of the students I looked around the room. Careful and soft steps from my enchanted boots sounded profane in the silence of the room and in the glowing magelight the blood had a sickly shine to it. At the edge of the room, almost obscured by a torn curtain there was no dust or ash. It was surprisingly clean.
A glint of bronze showed beneath the curtain and I picked it up. A ring. Holding it carefully I pulled the curtain open. The stairs had seen a thorough cleansing recently.
“Well this can’t go wrong.” I told Dawnfeather and after testing the stairway I carefully began to go up the stairs.
It was stupid to keep going forward. But she was angry, furious enough that it drowned out the fear and healthy self-preservation. Keeping low she moved through the derelict building, sticking close to the walls until she could see light outlining an open doorway. It burned her eyes, stabbed her mind with needles as she moved towards the doorway, red light pouring around her. It was stupid to keep the spell up as she moved, focusing on that one possibility she wanted so much she didn’t see
The blow coming that drove her to the ground, concrete pressing against her chest, gravel digging into her ribs. The spell broke with her concentration and immediately the world felt better as the burning pain faded from her eyes and needles stopped stabbing her mind as it no longer needed to process countless maybes. The cold sharp tip of a sword was pressed against the back of her neck. “Let go of the daggers and keep your hands where I can see them.”
Windsong was stupid but it had its limits when a sword was pressed into her neck. Slowly she held her hands out, setting the daggers down and kept her fingers straight. “Hands behind your back.” He said coldly and she barely had time to move her hands before something cold grabbed them, encasing them in ice and tugging her hands behind her back, arms pressed together until her elbows touched. The sword lifted from her neck and she was roughly turned over as. “Song?” Windsong squinted upwards, recognizing the voice. “Hello Dawnfeather. Nice to see you out of the infirmary. Did you miss me?” “I can’t believe you.” His voice was harsh as he sheathed his sword and with a snap of his fingers the shadow priest’s magic dissolved. “What were you doing here? This place was shut down.” She rolled her shoulders now that they were freed, taking Dawnfeather’s offered hand and pulling herself up with it. “Following a lead on the hottest new killer in town.” The end of the Solidarity festival had brought relief to the city as chaotic elements briefly subsided, slipping into shadow. It was a pyrric victory at best. The state had tried to clean house. But Murder’s Row, with all the loss, was thriving, albeit quietly. Much of the chaos might have subsided but it had also drawn other things from the scum. A serial killer was on the loose.
“Dammit Song. Nobody left the building.” Dawnfeather’s pocketed face turned to look around the alley. “Did you check the roof?” He turned and went into the building, not seeming to need a light to make his way through the darkness. “Hey, Dawnfeather, you can’t follow them and take him on. It’s not just a deranged blood shaper this time or some necromancer.” “Them? Who is doing it then if not ashaper or necromancer?” He stopped and looked at her. Even with one arm and the breathing problems he retained from the incident Dawnfeather was still a force to be reckoned with among the inquisitors. He listened to her summary of the murders with a grim face, purple eyes serious. They had started in Eversong, at first simply chalked up to animals. But the Farstriders had investigated, finding evidence to connected them and the trail leading towards Silvermoon. Nobody had liked what they had sent in their report. “Worgen? We have a list of known infected but they’re kept watched. Can you find anything? We’ll need whatever we can get before we start-.” “I saw the worgen.” She interrupted, cutting him off. “ The last scene where the body was strung up and partially consumed was where I found blood by the broken window. I used the blood to try and find the killer and it’s lead me on a merry go-round trail all over the city. But we can’t start harassing the infected. The city already tried to clean unwanted elements from it.”
He looked around the dark room, one arm moving to rest over his chest. Violety eyes were as hard as gemstones as he looked up to her. “The city will clean them out for good if it’s discovered a worgen is involved and it’s not the purist’s gone mad.” “Which is why I need you to search quietly and buy some time for me. If the city starts purging the infected we’ll lose good people. People with families that already comply with the demands the city makes of them.” Dawnfeather knew her to well, could sense her emotions. “What will you do if I can buy you time then?” “You haven’t been out towards Gilneas Dawnfeather. You have no idea, none at all, how dangerous they can be. A worgen can lop faster than you can ride your hawkstrider through Silvermoon. It’s jaw can snap your bones with one jerk of muscle. It can see the heat of your body and with only starlight could count the stray hairs on your head forty paces away. The worgen only needs to be half that close to hear your heartbeat. They’re six feet tall and their claws can tear through the best leather armor.” “Learning about how easily the worgen kills doesn’t help convince me to buy you time Song.” He didn’t say it but they both looked to his left arm, missing just below the upper arm. Ignoring the guilt that rose up in her chest she sighed. “Because this worgen is eating them. They’ll play with their victims like cats and paint the area with ribbons of flesh and blood. This one went unnoticed in the forest because of the chaos from the Solidarity festival. But it didn’t have a reason to move here and it certainly didn’t lop through the front gates. Whatever is going on it’s not another ‘they got bit and went mad’ cases. I don’t need a lot of time. I just need some time.”
“Fine. But only until tomorrow evening. If you can’t show me anything by then I’ll have to report and look at the list of infected. But you will have to bring me that information so we can catch the killer before anyone else dies.”
Tyleril Silversword 