#longveilstories

[longveil]

The Book of Burdens

[ Photo by Taylor Flowe on Unsplash ]

In the months that followed the foxfire’s loss, Seraanna buried herself in the Scrollkeeper’s Sanctum. Ensconced within the Temple of the Jade Serpent, the library held works that pre-dated the Great Sundering itself - scrolls copied and recopied dutifully over the centuries, growing more ornate with each rendition as earlier parchment succumbed to the inevitability of age.

But it was writing of unexpected provenance, a children’s history, that sent the ren’dorei on a month-long journey across Pandaria. To Kun-Lai and the Townlong Steppes, Krasarang and the Vale of Eternal Summers, that wellspring still recovering from N’zoth’s ill-fated ascendancy.

From the mouths of babes.

Jun-Seo was seated at her desk within the Sanctum, glasses perched upon the aged monk’s nose as she transcribed one of several crumbling scrolls for preservation. She caught only a flicker of motion from the corner of her eye, looking up as a familiar form approached - trailing shadow and laden with intent.

“Scrollkeeper,” Seraanna murmured, “I would… give question to you.”

“Lady Longveil. What would you have of me?” Jun-Seo placed her quill aside and scattered a pawful of sand over the still-wet ink of her efforts before offering a shallow, seated bow to her guest. Then ren’dorei’s patronage of the Sanctum was no secret among the Temple’s monks, and it afforded her tolerance - and a modicum of respect. If only a modicum.

Seraanna drew closer, placing parchment of her own upon the monk’s desk. “I have been to study… the legacy of your Emperor Shaohao. The writings found at the temples of the Celestials that… detail his burden when faced with prophecy of the Great… Sundering.”

Jun-Seo nodded in acknowledgment. “He unburdened himself of doubt and despair, fear, anger, hatred, and violence, giving his last breath to protect his people from the doom,” deep brown eyes regarded Seraanna, “your people engendered.”

If only a modicum.

“… yes.” If Seraanna’s murmurings were softer, neither chose to comment. “But I have question of these… words.” Slender fingers gestured to the parchment, faint wisps following behind, to indicate a transcription rendered in Seraanna’s own graceful hand. For a moment, Jun-Seo was envious of the other woman’s artistry; the calligraphy even on this field transcription easily the match of any monk within the Sanctum. But the envy was released with a skill of born of long practice as Jun-Seo adjusted her glasses to read the flowing script, recognized immediately as a passage from the Book of Burdens:

…Shaohao meditated for three days and three nights, for the counsel of the Jade Serpent was unclear. How could one purge oneself of all doubt?

Weary of waiting, Shaohao’s traveling companion the Monkey King whittled a strange grimacing visage out of bamboo. He urged the Emperor to place the mask of doubt on his face…

While mischief was the Monkey King’s motivation, the mask worked - As Shaohao pulled the mask away, his doubts took on a physical form. For seven hours they fought, until the Sha of Doubt was buried.

“The… mask. All writings, all… temples speak the same.” The ren’dorei’s lambent gaze found Jun-Seo. “Masks, made of the Monkey King’s hand, which drew… forth shadow of… the Sha. Of the fallen god Y’shaarj.”

Jun-Seo frowned, one paw raised in an all-but-reflexive gesture of warding. “Do not speak the Old God’s name here, Lady Longveil. Your welcome is not without limits.”

Seraanna inclined her head, artfully tousled hair falling into her eyes. “My… apologies, Scrollkeeper,” she murmured. “Yet I would know if any still… practice this art, the making of such masks as… described of eld.”

“Few in recent history.” The monk’s attention went to the walls of the Sanctum, heavy with scrolls and tomes. “And none since your people both freed and defeated the Old God’s last remains. Only one. A Master Xyolo, lost to us before the Sha fell. He did take an apprentice - one of your own people, I’m told.”

Deep brown eyes fell back to Seraanna. “But she’s not been seen for years. However, Master Xyolo entrusted some of his writings to the Temple.” Jun-Seo beckoned to a younger pandaren garbed in unadorned robes, who scurried to the Scrollkeeper’s call. “Acolyte, see the Lady Longveil to the northern wing, eighth rack, second shelf.”

Jun-Seo’s attention returned to Seraanna. “You should find Master Xyolo’s writings there. They’re of his own hand, and are not to leave the Sanctum." The elder monk paused, then added, "I do hope you respect the deference the Temple has offered you, Lady Longveil.”

A faded smile drew at dark-painted lips as Seraanna coiled her own parchment. “Of… course, Scrollkeeper. It is not that I… would think of abusing your trust.” She turned lambent regard to the approaching acolyte before glancing back briefly to Jun-Seo. “Shadows guide your… path.”

The ren’dorei’s parting words were offered almost carelessly, her steps silent as she followed the acolyte to the Sanctum’s northern wing.

“And your patronage,” Jun-Seo muttered after Seraanna left earshot, “is appreciated moreso the less we must suffer it.”

With a deep sigh, the Scrollkeeper adjusted her glasses again and returned to her own transcription, pushing uncertain thoughts from her mind. Uneasily had the Temple borne the ren’dorei’s presence since her companion had... failed to return. Yet her patronage had seen many works preserved that might have otherwise crumbled to time, and thus was valued. Legend had it that Doubt was the first Sha defeated by Shaohao. In the wake of her Temple's patron, could Jun-Seo offer any less?

#longveilstories #| Masks | #Pandaria #mists and circles

[longveil-ffxiv]

Shortness of Breath

She heard it again. All of it.

The circle of stars, fourteen in her dreams. Seven joined, and one shrouded in dark.

“Ilfah kyth uhn'uthik. Yahf taag agthshi.” “Uull gag qi'yog zzof.”

Seraanna recoiled from harshness even as the voice’s words grated upon her mind. Speech of a dark god, insistent and grasping. Reaching, inexorably, for what had been promised. For her. For everything. She hung there, lost for a moment in the dark between the stars.

And then, her voice whispered. Soft and halting, murmurs reaching across distance unimagined. A cool, soothing anodyne to the rawness of her fear. Speaking of truths that her dream-self understood, accepted, embraced, even as they escaped her conscious knowing.

"It is rare... and beautiful..."

She awoke.

Seraanna struggled briefly to escape the twisted bedsheets, pushing tousled ash blonde hair from her face as she reached for the pen and pad she kept upon the nightstand - knowing full well the dream would escape before she could put ink to paper. As it had time and time and time before.

Tears of frustration welled in her eyes. "...I'd give anything to hear..."

It was several minutes of slow, calming breaths before she rose. Adjusted the mismatched sheets and padded across uneven floorboards to the tiny kitchenette. A plate of tepid anpan and a small vial of dark, viscous fluid awaited, a note attached: "Gone to the market."

Gone. When Seraa wished her most. Even her smug demeanor and the scent of alchemical ash would have have been a balm, in that moment.

She sighed, and instead took to the grounding ritual of heating water and steeping tea. Green leaves for the morning, mint and honey to ease the harshness of the vial's contents. The surcease of silence that the prodigy's creation granted her.

An hour passed by and found Seraanna dressed and coiffed. Teacup and vial both empty, and one less red bean bun remaining on the plate.

"Gone to the market."

The door, with its intricate lock at odds with the cheap rented room, closed soundly as she left for the cobbled streets of Kugane... * * *

With shortness of breath, you explained the infinite. How rare and beautiful it is to even exist.

I couldn’t help but ask For you to say it all again. I tried to write it down But I could never find a pen.

I’d give anything to hear You say it one more time, That the universe was made Just to be seen by my eyes.

-- Saturn, Sleeping At Last

#longveilstories

[longveil]

Questions of Order

[ Photo by Pierre Bamin on Unsplash ]

“It may be a topic which one ought not to discuss openly upon the Dragon Isles, let alone within the newly opened spires of Valdrakken. Yet it is one’s due, truly, to consider the message at the heart of the words spoken by the Primalists. By the Incarnates.

That in their insatiable quest for Order, the Titans do not carry in their hearts the best interests of the mortal denizens of Azeroth.

It is thought that Order, manifested of the Arcane, arose to contain the chaotic nature of Fel, itself a byproduct of the destruction engendered when Shadow and Light first impinged upon each other in the emptiness of the Twisting Nether.

Light. Embodying the arrogant assertion that it alone is the sole Truth of the cosmos, jealous and unbending. Inviolable and suffering no question, curiosity, or crisis of faith lest its followers be bereft of its embrace. Of course chaos would come of when Light met the Void, the Shadow that seeks every possible path and embraces all as Truth.

The Titans, then, exist to enforce Order. And Order is an ally of the Light, for how might Order be enforced save of exclusions? Of Shalts and Shall nots. Of rules. Of singular Truth.

And therein lies the question we must ask.

You would not exist, I would not exist, had the Titan’s grand design come to pass.

It was the Old Gods’ Curse of Flesh that rendered humans, dwarves, and gnomes from iron vrykul, earthen, and mechagnomes. The Well of Eternity, born of the Titan’s bungled attempts to dislodge the Old Gods from Azeroth, gave rise to the elven races. The madness which fell upon the Titan anointed as guardian, Sargeras, birthed the Burning Legion. Without which, the draenei and orc would never have come to our world.

Illidan Stormrage denied the Truth of the Light, sneered at the constrictions of Order, yet the Titans’ supposed victory at the Legion’s downfall would not have come without him.

The Titans have failed in more ways than they have succeeded. And we myriad races of Azeroth, embodying truths of many forms, exist in spite of their planned design, despite their efforts.

We are not the Titan’s success.

And so, no matter the flaws of the messengers, the many millennia of grievance that twist the hearts and minds of the Incarnates, the message is worthy of consideration.

Do the Titans lie? Do they allow untruths of exclusion, permitting us to assume that their care for our world, for Azeroth, is care for the mortals that exist of their failures? Or is it that, other than how we might aid their design, we are of no import to them?

A message, a question worthy of consideration only in venues carefully chosen. In quiet places, where the adherents of Order and a single Truth might not bring their outrage

Yet a question, nonetheless.”

Seraanna carefully set down her pen, capped the jar of midnight ink, and lightly scattered a fine sand across the page. She rose from her desk as the words dried, refilling her glass from a bottle that was still cold to the touch. Voidblend had long replaced port in her musing of the evening. A few steps took her to the window that looked out over Stormwind Harbor and the ren’dorei took a lingering sip of the dark between the stars.

The essay would never leave her carefully disordered table.

No matter what recognition she had found, no matter how nobles and diplomats offered artfully crafted smiles when she entered a room, Seraanna knew their truths all too well. Some questions were not tolerated within the city of Storm’s Wind. Not this close to the adherents of Light, not the place so closely aligned with Order’s arcane children.

Some things were best left where all paths were embraced as Truth.

In Shadow.

#seraanna #musings #longveilstories

[longveil]

A package appeared at the storefront of Vxyon Alchemical Co, addressed to the elder Parkhurst and borne by a most mundane and ordinary courier. No whispered hints, no secret smiles, only a bored and mildly disinterested demeanor until either of the siblings accepted. Then off he shuffled.

Within was a folded paper of fine vellum, its seal of crimson wax displaying the sunrise between two golden trees...

Most dear and vexing Fox,

Do not expect that I shall be present, in Stormwind or Valdrakken, for a time. This is not a pronouncement upon words shared in Valdrakken, nor retribution upon decisions made in fear. It is, of clear words, a statement of my departure for a time from the City of Storms. What promises that are uttered from my lips are not as easily forgotten as others. What was offered, what pledge was made, will be met. Though it is that other words given, be they spoken or borne of ink and paper, also request they be honored. And so my departure is sealed. It is that a return will be made, and chance aplenty for truths of remission. Walk carefully in my absence. Ware your new patron. And ought circumstance be dire, the kraken remains watchful.

– a Shadow, her own

Beneath the letter, wrapped carefully in fine silk, was a book. Its scent and texture spoke of age, its leather cover embossed with what was assumed a title - if one read draconic.

But within, o within. Pages that begged for a delicate touch, filled with drawings and notes written in ink faded with years. Decades. Perhaps centuries? Alternating draconic and common, though the common was of older, now-awkward dialect, it detailed the growing life of the Dragon Isles. Herbs and roots, berries and leaves. Mosses, fungus, bark and lichen. Their environment, their identification. Their safe handling and properties, and how they might change in response to admixture, reduction, or other processes. Invaluable research - in the right hands.

What library had this come from? What cache of knowledge? The author was unnamed, the provenance of the volume untold.

And, really, did it matter?

@maxparkhurst (because tumblr submissions are blargh)

#longveilstories #fox and shadow #letter and letters

[longveil]

These Dreams

[ Photo by Илья Мельниченко on Unsplash ]

Once we were lovers But somehow things have changed Now we're just lonely people Trying to forget each other's names Now we're just lonely people Trying to forget each other's names

What came between us? Maybe it was just too much to know But now and then I feel the same, And sometimes at night I think I hear you calling my name. Mm, mm, mm, these dreams Just won't leave me these days.

-- Jim Croce, "These Dreams." Life and Times

The dreams were green, a misted hue. The dreams were red, a smile of immolation. The dreams were midnight, stars reflected in deep ocean.

There was no transition from sleep to wakefulness, no sudden gasp of awareness, no retreating shadows or murmuration at the edge of her perception. Only knowledge that she was awake, her sleep disturbed by dreams of her own making.

Seraanna turned back the sheets and duvet, silk whispering against cotton as she slipped from her bed and moved to the window. A shadow that flowed from one place to the other with nary a whisper. The world was still and quiet beyond the frame of her window, Stormwind Harbor dimly lit only by starlight and flickering lamps. Even the White Lady and her Blue Child slumbered.

She found herself hoping to see the sleek lines and furled sails of the Arlya'diel at dockside. Surprised in her want to board her sister's ship and sail to other shores where these dreams, these echoes of matters unresolved, might not haunt her.

But her table called, nonetheless.

Unanswered missives, words in elegant script and thoughtful scrawl, paired with seals, gifts, and puzzles. Each of their own memory, each with their own kind insistence - no matter how gently couched - of her self.

"This seal shall serve as passage, Shadows keep you safe." "Shadows should not be forced to hide." "Pleasant shadow need not be made to wait."

I am my own.

She turned from the window, banishing thoughts of sleek vessels and other shores, and turned her attentions to the ordered chaos of her table. A lamp lit, a glass of starlight poured from the gift most recent to her doorstep. A memory of chiding words and their speaker's discomfort set aside as she settled into her chair at that table scattered with papers and notes and, still in her bedsilks, put quill to ink.

You alone, she murmured to the night's silence, must attend to what you possess.

#longveilstories #many vague references #lyrics slightly changed

[longveil]

The Bridge

[Photo by Asap PANG on Unsplash]

Listen to the wind blow Down comes the night Break the silence Damn the dark, damn the light

Seraanna Longveil walked, her steps fluid and unhurried, across the arches of Windspire Bridge. A few wispy clouds drifted across the night sky, a gentler black overlaid upon the dark between the stars, pushed by soft gusts of cool ocean air. The ren’dorei’s gown and dark hair flowed and drifted, although an observant eye would note the movement did not heed the winds.

She had found quiet here. Quiet in the susurrous of scrolls and tomes that littered a small cottage, in the cries of serpents racing over the water, in the gentle scratch of a nib upon parchment, or the clatter and bubble of glass and admixture.

Found in the aged performance of a carefully-maintained record player and the rustle of cloth and feet to melodies of distant origin. In a laugh made low and warm by smoke, and the breathy, halting murmurs made in response. A dance of flame and shadow, foxfire all the brighter for the dark, shadow finding warmth in flicker flame.

But this night had been restless. Something flitted at the edges of her knowing, distant whispers murmuring uncertain deceit in contempt of the greater silence. Drew her from the comfort of her chair and the scrolls she studied to instead walk on this span that stretched over waters of reflected night.

Y̵w̸a̸q̸ ̵q̶i̶’̸g̸a̵g̵ ̵n̶a̴z̷a̷’̴q̴a̷m̶ (They will not return)

Her exhalation of breath might have been a snort of derision for one more expressive. The dance was one of nearness and distance, an ebb and flow accepted as the tide. What parted had returned before and would return again, for neither shadow nor flame abided honeyed lies.

Midspan, the bridge widened. A small, ornate pavilion offered shelter beneath the stars, chairs and a table for those who wished to look over the dark waters off Pandaria’s shores. All was weathered by the elements, but some seemed newer, recently made. A few among the thick wooden beams of the pavilion bore faint marks from some years-ago conflagration.

“Why did… my steps bring me here?” Seraanna drew her fingers over the blemished wood, scars as faded as the ones at her wrist.

A̵g̵a̶s̶h̸ ̸y̶y̸g̵f̷a̸r̵ ̵r̴a̷x̴ ̸p̸h̶i̵l̸f̴g̶s̴h̵ ̸a̴m̷q̸a̷ (The despair of the open sky comes)

“There is… no-”

Her voice faltered and fell silent. Across a distance that had ebbed and flowed, a memory of crimson and gold was relinquished. Released of a will, not of a failing. Shadow of Seraanna’s own self now shed by flame and returned. There would be no returning other. No foxfire within shadow.

“…why would...?”

Within the pavilion, the stars faded into memory, consumed by Shadow that fell from the open sky. The beams groaned in complaint as if they bore the full weight of the firmament and, though the gusts of wind had fallen still, the flow and drift of Seraanna’s hair and garments rose as if amidst a tempest.

I̷l̶f̸a̵ ̵q̵i̷’̶n̷a̵z̷a̶ ̴p̶r̵f̶a̵k̶t̶ ̴s̸j̵a̴n̸n̴a̵ ̸a̸k̶’̷a̵g̴a̶t̵h̶S̷h̴i̴ (Such comforts are not for you)

It would be so easy, to give into this hurt.

“Have you ever considered the wonder of capillary action?”

Why bear this? To come to rely on that which might be lost, that might bring the pain of a bond severed. Easier to be the vessel so many desired, allow all truths to manifest, to drown within the lightless deep.

Where the flames that burned as well as warmed could not reside.

Within the deep.

Yet Seraanna was not desolate, within her forest of mind.

A delicate voice murmured with her lips. A voice of skinny legs and elbows, pale skin, and long elfin ears poking out of unruly ash blonde hair. It hesitated, quavered, then spoke words of gentle, undeniable conviction.

𝐼 𝒶𝓂 𝓂𝓎 𝑜𝓌𝓃.

The whispers, gibbering in their insistence, quieted. The stars emerged slowly, tentatively, though the dark between was all the deeper for their brightness.

Again. Of her own voice, her own will.

“I am my own.”

And she turned. Turned from that which was lost, turned from the beckoning of the deep.

With fluid and unhurried steps, Seraanna left the pavilion and made her way back across the span. Towards the small cottage that would no longer hear the clatter and bubble of glass and admixture, or a laugh made low and warm by smoke.

Towards other truths.

I can still hear you saying You would never break the chain (never break the chain)

[Lyrics: “The Chain” by Fleetwood Mac]

#longveilstories #a bridge is a contrasting section that prepares for the return of the original material section #Also called a bridge-passage

[longveil]

Dear Seraanna,

I am glad to hear that you are doing well. Though it goes without saying, I would not pay any mind to what does or does not infuriate my sister. Over the years even I do not fully understand what earns her ire as it changes as frequently as the winds. Her attention appears to be elsewhere it would seem, but attempting to know her mind is as simple as solving a puzzle box.

The Armistice has been spoken little of here, I am afraid, though the war was never a large factor in continued isolation. My sister and those of renown in the village prefer not to bend a knee or pledge themselves into vassalage, nor pay the taxes that would come with entering the world at large. That said, her once iron grip on restricting trade and commerce has slowly loosened over the years, albeit not without great vetting and strict agreements.

I must admit you are correct when it comes to defining a home. A chosen place. Not a memory. Perhaps even I am not invulnerable to classic Gilnean stereotypes. We are happy here, the townsfolk and me, the girls of course roam, come and go as they see fit. I worry the child will become a mirror of my sister at times— refusing to choose a home, that is. But I digress, as I can control only myself and my happiness.

Consider this an invitation, if it pleases you. To be my guest and not hers. I have included within this envelope a card from one of the trade companies that are permitted to land. Show them the wax seal from any of my letters and it will suffice as a ticket for passage. Shadows keep you safe.

Respectfully, Jasper Hawke

From the desk of Seraanna Longveil-Morrowsun, Marquessa

Dearest Jasper,

It is hoped that you will forgive my long silence of words.

When I returned to Stormwind, in the wake of the Fourth War and years of Armistice that followed, I had hoped to find a place more measured, more possessing of introspection, than what memory recalled. I took willing part in the machinery of governance for a time, following - with no small irony - the footsteps of a distraction long past as I assumed the title of ambassador.

No more.

The City of Storms, lacking an adversary without, turns within to trivialities. And if such is the cause of your sister’s ire, gives cause for your elders to hesitate and give question to broader engagement beyond your borders, it cannot be said that I find ground for disagreement.

Yet it is not this place to which I am anchored. Chosen, instead, by my own sister when I was weak and in need of refuge. Yet our reach now extends further and, despite my fondness of where Light, Death, and Deep converge, of dear foxes and their kits which burrow into the shadows of this city, I find myself more drawn to reach to those other truths.

I have seen the spires of Valdrakken, Jasper. Supped where only dragons had before set foot, read from the ancient libraries of the Algeth’ar Academy. And still… there remains the elegant distinction of Suramar, the calm of the Jade Forest. All beyond the shores to which you, in your duty, have confined yourself.

All these places I speak of, and still it is that I hold a card of your trade partners and the wax seal which will gain passage to those confined shores. And I consider the truths which such represent.

She has told me that, in time, missives alone will not cross those seas. That you may find reason to journey in place of written words. O, but I fear the disappointment you might find should this City of Storms be where you first set foot - though the duty of governance be its own unyielding truth.

So I will come. What matters were uncertain afore have been resolved - to a point. What obligation I held has been dispensed to my satisfaction. And though it is that I would rather stand the decks of my sister’s vessel, I will accept what invitation you offer.

Expect that I shall follow these inked words.

Mists keep you hidden ‘til such time.

– Seraanna

“That’s a dicey game, even for you.” Annadia lounged in Seranna’s embroidered armchair, a leg over the chair’s side and a glass of wine held loose in one hand, while her sister cast fine sand over the freshly inked letter and left it on her desk to dry.

Seraa left her desk and moved to the sideboard, pouring a glass of night from a bottle beaded with the Void’s chill. “So says the one who… sits well outside the Harbor’s bounds,” she murmured, “clearly abrogating the dispensation I worked so assiduously to attain.” Dark-painted lips curled into a faint smile. “Jasper is a most pleasing… distraction. What ire or distress our interactions cause… the Lady Director are mere,” she made an idle gesture with her free hand, shadows drifting behind. “What is the word? A lagniappe, I… believe.”

Annadia turned in her seat, a dull thump as her boots struck the floor.

“Well, you have your fun,” she tipped back the glass, setting it empty on the end table. “And extra points if you get him to agree to let the Aralya’diel dock in… wherever the fel his island is. The look on Miss Tightass’s face would be priceless.” The sin’dorei rose to her feet, picking up twin blades as she made for the door.

“Oh.” Annadia glanced over her shoulder, strapping the blades to her back. “What about the little fox, huh? You’re just going to go off? That’s awfully close to something the fel tease might’ve done, y’know.”

Seraa’s brows drew close, as near to a frown as she might express. “She took choice from…me, sister. Still I granted her the request of another evening, and such she… will be granted.” A lingering sip from the glass of night. “My words are not… forgotten, nor is such truth as I have chosen to embrace. Yet never was such stated to… be of a closeness in time.”

Buckles clicked as Annadia finished her adjustments, a low chuckle offered in reply. “Just checking.” The sin’dorei twisted a ring on her right hand, the gold-green of her eyes shifting to a quel’dorei blue, “What d’you think? Good enough for Stormwind streets?”

Dark wisps trailed Seraanna’s dismissive gesture. “Ask instead if Stormwind’s… streets are good enough for you, dear sister. Al diel shala.”

Annadia bowed mockingly low, the heavy sound of the door’s locks the only sound of her departure.

#seraanna #jasper #letters and missives #islands and mists #the fox #longveilstories

[longveil]

Report 638-05y: Claims to Title

[Photo by Mathias Reding on Unsplash]

Report 638-05y: Claims to Title, Seraanna Longveil

Seraanna Longveil (ren’dorei), and her younger sister Annadia (sin’dorei), are the only known survivors of the Morrowsun bloodline, a house once thought to have gone extinct in the Fall of Quel’thalas.

Morrowsun was a quel’dorei house of modest holdings on the southern borders - the Marches - of Quel’thalas. Almost a century before the First War, Lord Vaeran Morrowsun, formally addressed as Marquis, entered into an alliance of marriage with Telnia Roselight, the daughter of a well-placed merchant family. The Roselights received entry into title and nobility and all it entailed, while Morrowsun gained much-needed resources and an entry into finance.

It was an open secret that the marriage was one of alliance, not love, and that Vaeran kept a mistress, Aralya Longveil, known since his youth. Telnia gave birth to a son hailed as the Morrowsun heir, cementing the union of Morrowsun and Roselight. Meanwhile, the daughters of Vaeran’s mistress, Seraanna and Annadia, were considered illegitimate lest Roselight withdraw their alliance.

Arthas Menethil’s scourging of Quel’thalas ravaged Morrowsun lands, and the Morrowsun line was slaughtered in the ensuing carnage. Similarly, Aralya perished when the Lich King’s forces reached Silvermoon but her grown daughters, Seraanna and Annadia, survived the invasion and harsh times immediately thereafter (see historical report 001-06g). With House Morrowsun thought extinct, Kael’thas and his Magisters seized most of its assets and redistributed them to their allies as Quel’thalas attempted to rebuild.

Thirty-four years later, near the closing of the Fourth War, a packet of documents was presented to the offices of Regent Lord Lor’themar Theron. (Refer to report 631-12c regarding disturbance and fire in the Ghostlands.) Dated from the run-up to the Scourge invasions and bearing Vaeran Morrowsun’s witnessed seal, the documents conferred legitimacy upon Seraanna and Annadia as heirs of Morrowsun “should my house otherwise come to ruin.”

The solicitors involved, Vor’min and Alesstus Evercrown, presented a case that managed to survive the challenges of the noble houses that had profited from the fall of Morrowsun. Ultimately, the sisters were allowed to claim the house name, title, and remaining (uninhabitable) estate - on the condition of renouncing any claim to the lands and assets previously seized and redistributed.

Seraanna now holds the title of Marquessa (Lady of the Marches) of Morrowsun although she rarely uses the title and has shown little interest in noble machinations, particularly as ren’dorei remain unwelcome in Silvermoon. She owns, through legitimate agents, (vetted, no irregularities found) a controlling interest in a building on the edge of Stormwind Harbor where she often makes her residence. However, she’s spent most of the last three years near the Temple of the Jade Serpent in Pandaria’s Jade Forest (cross reference report 636-18m, subheading “Alchemist”)

Annadia, using her affected surname of Thorn, seems even even less inclined to politics and prefers her role as Captain of the Aralya’diel, a newly-christened clipper from the shipyards of Suramar (report 637-12e). Not only is it unusual to see a private vessel completed while both navies are still under reconstruction, the Aralya'diel has a difficult-to-obtain dispensation to dock in Alliance harbors (request permission to examine signing authorizations, cross-reference with financial transactions and spending patterns). Such dispensations are a recent development of the armistice; Horde crew or passengers of such vessels are limited to the docks and harbor only.

The brothers Evercrown remain as Morrowsun’s solicitors and representatives in matters of business and finance. (Background checks have not borne fruit, refer to assets in Dalaran and Suramar for further investigation.)

Queries submitted to Stormwind's intelligence agencies have resulted only in documents so redacted as to be useless. Similar queries to Silvermoon have returned only the registration of House Morrowsun upon the rolls, with no other matters addressed.

– Respectfully submitted, Agent C. Nath

Agent’s note: I understand that previous reports establish Longveil as a person of interest, and Thorn’s actions and associations as a potential infiltration risk, but neither seem to bear inclination or motive to pose meaningful threat. The Evercrowns are most notable for escaping notice but, while I expected them to have a more visible profile, they seem to operate only rarely within Alliance purvey. Permission requested to reduce priority of this line of research for higher priority subjects.

Response: Request denied. Continue research and observation.

#longveilstories #how to couch background in narrative #morrowsun #annadia thorn

[longveil]

Other Truths

[ Photo by Rowan Heuvel on Unsplash ]

Behind the cathedral, by steps that led to the quietude of the cemetery, an apartment overlooked the dark waters of Stormwind Harbor.

Where Light, Death, and the Deep met.

The heavy brass door knocker shaped in a Kraken’s form (or was it the form of something more ancient and ominous?) had long been removed. The elaborate lock had been exchanged for something simple, something more appropriate to whoever might next occupy the space. Gone as well was the vague sense of unease, of unwelcome, that often had passers-by taking their steps just the slightest bit faster. The wards upon the entry, the others that guarded the residence from scrying eyes - were no longer present.

Not to mention some of the more... questionable items... that had once been kept within.

Past the door, beyond the stairs, the apartment itself was all but bare. The wooden floors waxed, the walls devoid of even the most carefully chosen decorations. Bookshelves and wardrobes, a painting of spires that reached high above a lush forest’s boughs, even the treasured armchair embroidered in red and gold.

All had been removed.

Only a bottle of voidblend on the counter remained, and two sisters left to regard the empty shell of two years with glasses in hand.

“Last chance, Seraa. You sure?” Annadia took a healthy swig from her wineglass. She pursed her lips after swallowing, glaring wordlessly at the dark contents.

Seraanna’s sip was more leisurely, yet no less deep. There was faint melancholy in her eyes as she looked about the empty space.

“This has been a pleasing truth of... its time, and there is no portion of the path traveled that fully carries my regret,” she mused. “The Harbor, the House, the Hall. Whether brief or long, all have... made their contribution and been embraced in turn. But their truths are not what make... this choice.”

Seraa held up her glass, considering the liquid within. Filled with the dark between the stars. “Shadow seeks all paths and embraces them as truth, Annadia. Yet it does not require that all... truths be palatable. Some truths require distance, and this I shall... take. And for all the exquisite... distractions that remain, the butterflies and serpents left behind, there are yet other paths. Shapes yet unformed, limned in the foxfire of... myriad truths.”

Annadia snorted. “Fuck ‘em. Fuck all this lot. And any still in this shithole of a city.”

“...no.” Seraanna slowly shook her head, dark tousled hair shifting with the motion. “Do not judge... their truth. It is neither yours nor... mine. But for me, I will seek elsewhere. And perhaps find,” she offered a faded smirk, taking another small sip from her glass, “a truth warmed by crimson... flame. What is Shadow without Light to cast it, sister? And a coruscating... flame casts more than a single Truth by its... dancing shape.”

“Anyone else,” the sin’dorei muttered, “I’d say something about moths. But you? She better guard that flame.”

“The foxfire thrives... amidst Shadow.” A final sip and Seraanna left her empty glass on the counter next to the half-full bottle of voidblend. “A gift, for whomsoever finds this place. It is time... we took our leave, sister.”

Annadia tossed back the last of the voidblend, grimacing at the taste as she placed her glass next to Seraa’s. “You know, back when I was ah, training, in Murder Row? There was one guy that went out on his own after he’d passed his trials. The rest of us were just, ‘You’re made - why are you leaving?’ And I still remember what he said. ‘There’s other things out there. I can always come back if I don’t like it, if it doesn’t work out. But if I don’t go? I can’t ever come back.’”

A cant to Seraanna’s head as she peered at the sin’dorei rogue. “Always my... dearest sister, feigning the shallows yet surprising in her depths.”

“Don’t tell anyone, huh?” Anna offered a crooked arm. “Come on, let’s go.”

“...yes. To other... truths.”

#longveilstories #coda #other truths

[longveil]

Post No Bills

It started, much like the arrival of the mortals themselves, with a trickle. A lone sheet of parchment posted on a wall of the Idyllia in Oribos, bearing a carefully drawn portrait of an orc woman with her hair in long braids:

Korva of Clan Stonefist. Killed by the Mantid in Pandaria. I want to tell her I was wrong. Have you seen her soul?

And just as with the mortals that came into Oribos, the trickle grew. The one flyer joined by another, then three, then ten, then scores. Orcish, Common, so many in Darnassian. The living hoping to find the souls of those passed into the Shadowlands, wanting a final word or a last question. Reassurance that those loved in life didn't languish in the Maw.

As it grew, as word of the seekers and their messages spread through the Covenants, a few flyers were posted by proxies. Ones that sought the living. Souls begging mortals to bear their messages to those they had left behind in life, as more heard of the broken Veil between Life and Death. Almost always carried to Oribos by mortals, for the Covenant's denizens - the Venthyr and Kyrian in particular - disapproved of such attachment to life among the souls charged to their realms.

Yet for each one that found its target, dozens remained. And none were found within or reached out from the Maw...

#headcanon #wow rp #shadowlands #oribos #you know this would happen #feel free to use #longveilstories

[longveil]

Interlude: Waygates

“Self-righteous fools, so easy to manipulate.”

Haverty muttered to himself as he shuffled through Oribos, the hood of his robes drawn low over his features. Not that they were his features, any more than this was his body. But after his deaths, the Apothecary had come to regard bodies more as - clothing. This one was not as comfortable as what he was born into before Lordaeron was scourged. Or how that same body had grown awkward with rot and decrepitude as one of the Forsaken, until his second death at his prize’s hands.

It didn’t even have the charisma of the tall, lean body he’d been given to recruit the Renovator, Uvexius Grimm. Madriga had been far less generous after that death, granting him this body only reluctantly when he promised to deliver his rediscovered prize to her. For her Master's use.

“Ah, Attendant.” Haverty gave his voice a pleasant, if uncertain, quaver as he approached one of the imposing guards of Oribos. “It has been so long since I have seen these halls. Where is the Waygate to Maldraxxus found?”

The armor construct peered down at the hunched, robed form. Just another Maldraxxi acolyte from the House of Rituals. At least that’s where Haverty assumed the body he wore had been harvested.

“Take the pad to Ring of Transference,” the attendant protector intoned, “the Pathscribe will see you on your way, Maldraxxi.”

“My thanks, Attendant. Keep to the Purpose.” Haverty nodded and moved in the direction indicated. The attendant none the wiser.

A shame Madriga had been equally frugal with the Mawsworn she assigned to his task. So new to the Jailer’s service that Haverty could have sworn the former Kyrian was still blue behind the ears. Still, he’d almost been surprised when word came that the Mawsworn had failed to return with his prize, both of them lost somewhere above Revendreth.

Almost. She’d killed him before, hadn’t she? And if she could kill him, why couldn’t the conduit, his prize, not be able to dispatch a single, inexperienced Mawsworn? Haverty smiled a rictus grin under his hood and stepped onto the pad that took him to the Ring of Transference. His prize had grown in his absence. He was almost pleased.

Still, Madriga’s wrath was the more immediate danger - the Herald believed in her Service and would undoubtedly make good on her threat to cast him into a soulforge for this failure. And so, even as word of the loss made its way up the chain of command, Haverty took the action he’d learned was most effective when jaws were closing upon him. He ran closer - into the depths of Torghast’s twisting corridors.

“Listen to yer father, William,” his father had told the child that became the Apothecary, “a dog bites you, you don’t run, you don’t pull away. That’s what it expects, what it’s built for. You push in, son. It ain’t expecting that. Make it choke. Then you can get away.”

Haverty had expected to lose himself in the tower’s labyrinthine depths, beyond the Herald’s reach in a place she would not think to look. To plot his next move and await opportunity. He did not expect, in his wildest flights of fancy, for that opportunity to arrive in the form of a Maw Walker.

But there he’d been. Swathed in armor and self-confidence, brimming with power borrowed from the Covenants. Striding through the corridors of Torghast as if the Jailer was already laid at his feet. Self-righteous purpose in the eyes behind his helm. So like Madriga.

“You’re a long way from home, Maldraxxi,” the armored figure boomed, and Haverty almost gagged on the condescending beneficence in the “hero’s” tone. But he forced thankfulness and subservience into his own voice nonetheless.

“You-you’re a Maw Walker. You must be.” The Apothecary stepped forward, forcing himself to grasp at his “savior’s” arm. “I’ve been here so long, tormented here. You can help me escape this place, can’t you?”

“I need to press forward, see what souls I can save from this dark place. But you?” He pressed a small, enscrived stone into Haverty’s mock-trembling hand. “Take that. It’s attuned to the Waygate. Follow the trail of bodies back; you’ll be safe.”

“Thank you. I don’t deserve this.” And Haverty was grateful, just not for the reasons his “rescuer” might have thought.

The armored figure gestured to the carnage left behind him, “Nobody deserves this. Now go.” And without a glance backward, the Maw Walker strode deeper into Torghast. Haverty could feel the bile rising in his throat.

“More deserve this than you think,” he’d murmured once the Maw Walker was out of hearing. “Self-righteous fool.” And followed the trail as directed. Out of Torghast. To the ancient Waygate of the First Ones, to Oribos.

“Where does the Purpose take you?”

The Pathscribe’s impassive question drew Haverty from his reverie, a biting rejoinder silenced before he could speak it. Not yet. There was still a part to be played.

“Maldraxxus. I have been here long enough.”

#interlude #longveilstories #haverty #torghast #maw walker

[longveil]

Summons

[ The Story To Date ]

A carriage came to a rattling stop before the manor, and a dredger scurried forward to place a set of wooden steps on the ground before opening the carriage door. The Baroness Vucrysa, her expression equal parts haughty and pensive, stepped out and made her way to the small collection of Venthyr, Stoneborn, and dredgers that waited in the courtyard.

Petrov offered his patron a formal bow, all of his millennia among the Venthyr rendering his form impeccable.“Milady, we trust your time in Sinfall was pleasant?”

“Prince Renethal’s scheming continues apace.” Her tone was clipped as she swept her retinue, acknowledging them with a shallow nod as they bowed in her passing. But it was the Nightblade Petrov who commanded a position of honor at her right elbow. “Still, Renethal is first made among the Venthyr, and he was the one to see clear through Denathrius’ treachery. And so I have pledged myself, and this house, to his fledgling Court and its purpose.”

“You have always been astute in your navigation of such matters, milady,” Petrov demurred, a half-pace behind her as she entered the manor - the doors held open by a pair of imposing stoneborn guards.

Vucrysa handed off her overcoat almost absently to a waiting dredger, accepting a glass of swirling crimson offered by another. “That may be so, but there is a cost to any such alliance. How does the mortal fare?”

“Which one, Baroness? They’ve become so numerous.”

Petrov’s attempt at repartee was rewarded with a dismissive glare and a sheet of paper thrust into his hands. “You know quite well. Do not abuse your favored status.”

“She has been lucid for nearly a week of her time, since shortly after you left for Sinfall.” Petrov took the paper into his grasp, but the Venthyr’s gaze remained fixed on his patron.

The Baroness’ glare turned curious before she turned to move deeper into the manse, “and what has brought about this change?”

“After you left for Sinfall, Vishra took her to the Ritualists. You’ve seen the mortal’s Sinstone; pride of that magnitude is rare in a soul, let alone one still living. The Soulcaster thought that atonement, even though she was a mortal, might render her more - balanced.”

“And was Vishra correct?”

“In a fashion, but not... quite... as expected,” he snorted with faint amusement. “The Ritualists were already tending to a soul when they arrived, one fiercely loathe to release its dearly-held transgressions. Even in her fugue, the mortal was fascinated by their efforts, and Vishra allowed her to approach. It was the first thing she’d shown conscious interest in since we recovered her.”

Petrov looked to Vucrysa, catching his Baroness’s eye. “Milady, she stepped forward and drew out that soul’s sins in a manner so adept I would have thought her among the first ascended. The Ritualists were aghast, of course. But the mortal? Since then, she’s brought forth more anima than any Avowed of this house; and regained a portion of her strength with each soul tended. What you hold in your hand,” a nod to the glass in his Baroness’ hand, “is bounty she has provided.”

The Baroness paused in her steps to meet other Venthyr’s gaze before taking a careful drink from the glass of swirling crimson. “This is a potent draught,” she mused, taking a second lingering sip.

Petrov nodded his agreement. “She seems drawn to souls whose emotion has driven their sins. Rage, lust, grief, and so on. It’s driven her recovery almost as much as the anima itself. She’s no longer the half-mad thing we coaxed from the shadows of the Ember Ward. Not to say that her words are always clear in their meaning, but she has an unexpected poise to her.” He smirked, “and she looks simply marvelous in velvet.”

“No wonder she is sought, then. Read that.” A nod towards the paper still held in the Nightblade’s hands.

Petrov finally dropped his gaze to the sheet that had been thrust into his hands. A rough illustration of a shapely elf in robes and a name – Seraanna Longveil – along with the proclamation of a rather sizable sum for her return. “This is her likeness and the name she has given. From where does this come? It does not bear,” he paused for a dramatic sniff, “the scent of that which fell with her.”

“From Renethal’s court,” the Baroness replied. “Another mortal, this one a Maw Walker who believes he can order about the denizens of Revendreth for his purposes. Can you believe that he even implied threat? The arrogance...” she shook her head and continued. “Nevertheless, he has called a hunt for her, offered a significant reward. But this mortal is under our protection, Petrov. Prince Renethal may look to the mortals for his allies, but I still hold to the duty for which we were made. Bring this Seraanna Longveil to my reception chamber. I would speak with her if she’s recovered as you say. Let us hear what she might have in response to the summons of this Maw Walker.”

The Nightblade bowed, his form once again impeccable. “I will have her brought to your reception at once, milady. I do not believe you will be disappointed; she has become... quite well-spoken.”

A peremptory nod was Vucrysa’s only response before she swept from the foyer, a serving dredger scurrying behind her and up the stairway to the Baroness’ private chambers.

“Well, Miss Longveil,” Petrov muttered to the empty foyer, “I hope you’ve had time enough to gather your strength...”

#the humbling #seraanna #revendreth #wow rp #longveilstories

[longveil]

✿ - DECAY - an old memory, from childhood perhaps

[ Photo by Nelson Wong on Unsplash ]

“They are your daughters!”

Minn’da’s voice echoed up the stairway, angry and amplified by too much wine. Seraanna, a girl of pale skin and ashen hair, all skinny legs and elbows, crouched in the shadows atop the stairs. Finger over her lips, she turned back to her younger sister to motion quiet only to receive a frown from the dark-haired child. Annadia was already far more devious and needed no such reminder to silence.

“They are my gift to you, surfal. But you know I cannot be their father; they cannot be my daughters.” A masculine voice now, one the girls had heard before. Calm and even, attempting to be a voice of reason despite the unintended hint of condescension. “Don’t I see that you are all cared for, that they’ll never worry for want?”

“What they want is to know their ann'da! You know I never needed any of this - we were happy without it, Vaeran, just you and I. It could have been so simple, we could have been so happy...”

“We were young, Aralya, but you knew. You always knew my House would make its demands.” A silence, the sound of fine silks moving below. “We still have each other. The families have what they want, the deals are met; she has my name, but you still have me. I would not allow that to be taken.”

“And don’t the girls deserve that?” Their mother’s voice was quieter now, almost pleading, “to know their father? They’re your own blood, Vaeren. You held them when they were born, kissed each of them. Why won’t you be their father?”

“Her son - my son - cannot be contested. An heir was agreed, and all would be lost if he were challenged. Morrowsun would be crushed by the breaking of the accords; we would be paupers. The girls,” he emphasized gently, “would grow up with nothing, Aralya. I can give them everything, but they cannot be my daughters.”

A long silence, the two girls shifting uncomfortably in their hiding place before the sound of quiet sobbing drifted up from below.

“...damn you.”

“Come out to the balcony, love. The night air will do us both good before I have to leave.”

Annadia nudged her Seraa’s shoulder, blue eyes lambent in the shadows atop the stairs. “That’s ann’da?” she whispered, “I want to see!”

“No, Minn’da will be sad if we’re up.” Seraanna turned to gently push her sister back towards their bedroom. She was only a few years older, but more knowing of people than her brash sibling. “Come on.”

A hushed whine from the younger child, “Seraa...”

Seraa only raised a finger to her lips again and nudged Anna back to their rooms.

#decay #old memories #daughters of the mistress #longveilstories #finally answering an old ask #thank you for being patient!

[longveil]

From Torment, A Bargain

[ The Wrong Way - REYKAT ]

Souls wept as Madriga walked the halls of Torghast.

The Jailer’s great Tower of the Damned had once been reserved only for the vilest of souls cast into the Maw, and every time she was summoned it filled the Herald with disgust, caused her to draw her dark wings close to her body as if they could protect her. But Madriga was Mawsworn, no longer Ascended. Bound to the suffering of the Banished One, sworn to undo the deceptions of the Archon.

This was her Service now.

That service returned her to Torghast, which no longer housed only the most irredeemable souls of the Maw but those of interest to the Jailer. Those whom he might use. Those who had earned his wrath. Those who had failed him.

Madriga stepped into a rough-hewn passage, ignoring the cries left in her wake, to stop before a gibbet bound in runes to torment the soul within. But, even under the misery of the runes, the soul didn’t cry out, didn’t beg for mercy. She could feel it watching her. Waiting in its agony.

“Your suffering has been deemed adequate for your failure,” she intoned with an air of formality, the words ringing hollow off the broken stone walls. “You will return to serve.” One gauntleted hand slowly moved over the runes, darkening them one by one.

“My failure?” The soul’s voice, ethereal with the lacking of a corporeal form, still managed to convey disdain, each word growing clearer as Madriga darkened the runes of torment. “I told you the necromancer would be useless. Too much zealot, not enough vision. His little tantrum should’ve been expected.”

The soul gave a distant sigh of relief as Madriga’s hand passed over the last rune. “I’m only sorry I didn’t get a better chance to try out that body before he destroyed it. Lovely work, it put my former mortal colleagues to shame.”

“Cease your prattling,” Madriga snapped, taking a soulkeeper crystal from her robes. “You were sent to gain the necromancer’s aid in the mortal realm, not wallow in the flesh, and suffered for failing Him. Be thankful you were remembered in Her eyes.”

“Wait now, wait,” the reply came quickly, the soul backing away from the crystal’s draw. “I’m not the only one who was punished for this, was I? You’re here yourself, Madriga, not some lackey sent in your name. One failed mortal soul, even as accomplished as I am, doesn’t merit a Herald’s personal attention.” Insubstantial words grew calculating, “You’ve been diminished as well. What if I could bring you back into their favor?”

Madriga’s hand stopped, the crystal held in abeyance. “Speak.”

“He’s so focused on his chosen weapon of Light. Yes, the whispers reach even here,” the soul’s ethereal words were almost dismissive. “But you remember what the Void did to your former realm, don’t you, Herald? How Shadow almost brought Bastion to its knees. What if I could get you a... conduit? Hmm? Something to draw Shadow like roots draw water from the ground? What a present that would be for your Master, a gift of Void approaching his precious bearer of Light. He’d be grateful.”

“I can deliver this to you, Madriga. You’d like to be elevated again, wouldn’t you?”

There was a long silence before the Herald spoke again. “What do you need?”

“Another body, and one of your Mawsworn for the fetching,” the soul’s words were more a demand than a request, laced with arrogance. “I knew the feel of her before your pitiful necromancer sent me back here, and I can tell them where the conduit can be found. Come now, Herald, you know you want to see Bastion fall for what they did to you. How better than to fall to Shadow? Let me... help you.”

The Herald abruptly thrust the soulkeeper crystal forward, drawing the soul within despite its wordless protests and struggling. Madriga held it in her hand for a long moment, the crystal glowing with a sickly green instead of the expected amber warmth. “You will get what you need, but don’t forget your place. I am still a Herald, once of the Ascended. You are merely a mortal soul, no matter what taint is upon you. Fail again, and I’ll see you cast into a soulforge myself.”

She returned the crystal to her robes, turning her back on the empty gibbet as she strode out of Torghast.

“Then you will truly know torment, Haverty.”

#longveilstories #the humbling #the maw #madriga #haverty's baaaack

[longveil]

Wings and Chains

[ Not long after From Torment, A Bargain. ]

It was not often that Seraanna woke before the sun.

But the night had been unexpectedly calming. Her sleep silent and restful, no matter that Mary dozed on her couch in the adjoining room of Seraa’s apartment, all but buried in a nest of blankets and pillows taken spare from Seraa’s bed.

The two had talked long into the previous night, Mary growing tipsy on wine that never seemed to affect Seraa, the warlock wrapped in a warm bathrobe after accepting welcome and lingering in Seraa’s bath. They spoke in a way Seraanna had not realized she missed, the conversation drifting like evening shadows, reminding her of days before so much else had occurred. Before she was Morrowsun. Before the Baron’s hall had come to consume so much time. Quieter days in the wake of the Fourth War, before other things had risen. Before truths had been shattered in the north. Comforting days, despite the losses that had followed.

The time itself a reminder of why she found the young woman so endearing. A friend, one of few and rare.

And so Seraa had insisted that she stay the night rather than take to Stormwind’s street at the late hour, and seen Mary comfortably ensconced on the sofa. As she saw to her guest’s comfort, Seraa silenced the whispers that urged a long-empty bed be made warm, ignored those that gave doubt such would ever come again. Who would wish to find solace in a Shadow, they murmured. None are worthy, came another. A̸̰͝l̸͎͚͗̐l̸̥̕̚ ̵̮̚s̵͖̍ḣ̵̯o̷͔͋ű̸͍͖͘ľ̴̳̕ḑ̸̚ ̵͑͊͜b̴̹͙̍ò̷͔w̸̦͇̾.̵̦͗

Seraanna murmured softly and patted Mary’s shoulder good night, wished her the Shadow’s warding, and found her own rest in the other room. The stars outside her window, and the dark between, were more eternal, more insistent than any whisper.

The distant sound of wings awoke her, feathers upon the wind in the harbor, where the sky was only just beginning to lighten from indigo-black. The memory of her guest drew Seraanna from her bed, had her dress in a warm, simple gown against the morning’s chill. She slipped on a cloak and shoes before drifting silently past where Mary still slept, out the door and to streets below.

It was quiet in the dim morning light, the sun still hidden behind the eastern mountains. Stormwind’s cobbled streets were yet empty; only a few sounds of early tradesmen echoed in the distance. There was a bakery she recalled near the Mage District, and Serannaa almost smiled at the thought of warm sweetbreads in the morning. Mary might enjoy them as well - when she finally awoke.

Almost to the archway leading to King’s Rest, Seraa paused above Stormwind Harbor as the heavy echo of wings caught her attention once more. When had it grown dark? When had clouds rolled over the morning sky? Shadow fell thick about her feet even as the air grew suddenly chill.

She felt more than heard the next wingbeat, a clap of air like a physical blow as a dark figure burst through the gathering clouds to dive low on black-feathered wings. Even as Seraanna wreathed herself in Shadow, chains coalesced around her waist, encircled her wrists. Held her, though her fury and fear writhed against their constraint. One wingbeat pulled the chains taunt, and the next pulled her from the ground, thick trails of shadow writhing behind her, grasping and twisting as the priestess was drawn into the darkened sky.

The clouds swallowed them both before parting, the sun finally rising above the eastern mountains to warm the day.

[ @foxglovethings for mentions ]

#longveilstories #the humbling #the maw

[longveil]

Found

(See Chasing Wisps for previous context...)

On the third night, Uvexius Grimm was found amidst nothing.

Fortified by a meal of venison and brandied wine, Seraanna settled again into the embrace of Kat’s leather armchair, enclosed by the book-laden walls of the woman’s isolated study.

It was tempting to explore the desk, the volumes she kept - what secrets they might imply. The study, set high in a manor on a distant island, had been offered as sanctuary while Seraanna took up the other woman’s task, and so much could be discerned by the things one kept... in a safe space.

I do not have time to wade through the myriad of truths and lies, Kat had said.

No. Kat’s secrets, the hidden things that might offer insight, would remain. There were ways beyond counting to adhere to the human’s constraints and still find this place’s knowledge again. For now, there was a task, willingly taken, to be done.

Legs curled beneath her, shadows coming to wreath about her slender form, Seraanna turned her Sight outwards.

To Redridge.

* * *

The minds of the guards at Three Corners were weary, filled with trepidation of the undead. Tired near to the point of exhaustion, kept on their feet with little more than will and coffee, they were scarcely aware of Seraa’s gently shadowed touch upon their minds. Yet it was curious, Seraanna thought, that they looked for an intrusion to the east as often as they looked west, towards Stormwind.

Further then, towards Lakeshire. Bakers already awake before the morning, guardsmen yawning upon the docks. A more distinct fear in their minds as they hoped and strained for normalcy. Echoes in that dread of a more deliberate threat, a huntswoman speaking to a guard of something seen in the moonlit night, more significant and more purposeful than any mindless ghoul.

But when Seraa looked east, she saw... nothing. There were no minds, there was no intent. Nothing that might engender the worry held in Lakeshire, that might embody the threat of Kat’s chosen prey. But the lacking itself - spoke volumes. Where Seraanna might expect to find minds, there was nothing. Where she might expect to sense the murmuring noise of animals, of lesser thoughts - there was nothing. A silence as conspicuous as any shouted affirmation. And most silent were the ruins of Stonewatch Keep, seeming free of any eyes that she might take for her own Sight.

Yet there were lesser minds... close, if not within. A kobold, candle in hand, was unresisting to her intrusions.

East, she silently urged. Danger. No go east. East. Stone place. No want stone place. Dark things. Scary things. Food things. Shiny things. Shinies? PREDATOR COMING. RUN FOR HIDING. BAD THING?!? RUN!

The kobold scampered east, almost tripping over stones and rubble in its panic, the atmosphere seeming to grow thicker and more oppressive as it approached the Keep - fleeing the threat that Seraanna had placed within the dim creature’s mind. Up the hill, the Keep grew near, and there was the sense of tripping over nothing, of running into a clinging veil, but the fear Seraanna instilled drove it forward through the unseen barrier.

There.

No longer empty. No longer silent. The kobold’s panic drove it through the wards that obscured the ruined Keep, and it abruptly found itself amid shambling ghouls and undead. The imaginary threat Seraanna had imposed was forgotten as it skidded to an abrupt stop.

“Uh, no take candle?”

The guarding abominations set upon the kobold with clubs and rusted pikes, but Seraanna had already moved her Sight to a lethargic risen mind even as her vessel fell, betrayed. The ward penetrated, the Keep was now clear to her. No longer silent to her, a presence - a fearsome will - was located within. This had to be the sanctum Grimm had chosen, the place her quarry had taken to orchestrate his ruin.

I’d ask you to find exactly where the menace is, Kat had said.

Seraanna cast her Sight into the Keep.

* * *

The minds of undead, lacking the will of Forsaken, were easy to ride. Simple to influence. Once past the veiling ward, it did not take Seraa long to make her way - mind by mind - to the better-maintained core of the Keep. A rug on the stone floor, lit iron sconces on the wall, books and scrolls scattered on a desk. Against the back wall, a table that strangely resembled an altar was strewn with gore and half-assembled body parts.

And in the center of the room stood a burly human with a greying beard and ice-blue eyes. Even seen through the cataract-blurred vision of a risen guard, the resemblance to the dossier was undeniable.

Uvexius Grimm.

But it was his visitor who prevented Seraanna from immediately withdrawing to inform Kat of her find. Another man, tall and lean, spoke with Grimm. The words were unclear, the Sight did not convey sound, but this other man moved in a strangely familiar fashion, attempting in equal parts to both intimidate and cajole the necromancer. Expansive gestured motioned towards the parts on the gore-strewn table, west towards Stormwind, even towards the risen guards at the door - finding Seraanna’s vessel for one strange moment.

Seraanna did not need to hear Grimm’s words to know the cold, unwelcoming, and fatal response given in return. And even as the other threw his head back in laughter, Seraa’s vessel and another pierced the visitor’s body with sword and spear, and the necromancer himself cast dark energies to rip the life from his unwelcome guest’s body.

As lifeless flesh fell to the floor, a departing soul lingered to take in the scene of its failure. Its attention fell on Seraanna’s vessel with abrupt surprise and frightening clarity.

My dear, darling prize? Even in the distant refuge of Kat’s study, Seraa curled in on herself with the wrenching  familiarity of the tone. Not since Silvermoon had she heard those intonations.

Oh, the use I could make of you. This was no failure after all.

Then the soul was gone, drawn away to darker realms, and Grimm’s cold gaze settled on Seraanna’s vessel. There was only the faintest sensation of its rotting flesh being rent asunder as she withdrew, making herself crooked to escape the necromancer’s newfound recognition and rage, fleeing from the Keep, from beneath the veiled wards; returning to herself in the study with a quickness that provided harsh, jarring solace.

For a long moment she remained still, curled close in the armchair’s warm embrace. The study was quiet, illuminated only by the half moon’s fading light through the window.

It took an effort of will for her to gather shadow and reach out once more. To seek the talisman she had granted Kat to serve as anchor.

“He... is found.”

( @kat-hawke​ )

#longveilstories #storming scourge #seraanna #kat hawke