(2022-11-29) Paper Dancing

Details

Author:	Athena
Summary:	Syarra visits Roper for a Tuesday Night Candle, wearing something that better conforms to the dress code, and they discuss what they're going to do about the Death Knight Team, what they could do with Syarra's house, and if they would survive getting Amal'thazad to dance. 8400-ish words.
Rating:	M for Mature 17+

+ Show additional content warnings

contains death knight, references to past child abuse

It's Tuesday evening, and yet again a dark figure moves towards the curtained cage in Acherus. This time, though, her hair is loose, a dark cascade that is neatly brushed out and holds a loose curl. She's wearing a dark purple cloak that seems almost black in the dim light of the necropolis, and she seems too slight to be wearing her usual saronite armor underneath.

She comes up to the door and shakes it lightly as a knock.

There’s a sound of a chair hitting the ground, and a beat. “Syarra. It’s open.”

Syarra pushes the door open, and steps through, pulling it closed firmly behind her. There's a flicker of something silver beneath her cloak as she moves her arms. She turns to look at Roper.

The cage room continues to evolve. An armor stand has been added to the direct right of the door, where Roper’s saronite armor now is set up neatly onto it, and the cot has been pushed into the direct left corner from the door, still made properly in such an exactly way as it was last time that it suggests it still has not actually been used. There is, however, no dust on the blanket or pillow at all. The two chairs have been moved to be next to the crates. There are only a handful of candles lit, and most are on the crate closer to the back of the cage.

Roper is sitting in that chair near the crate with the greater number of candles, the legs of it still on the ground, his right hand idly flipping a gold coin, his left hand beating out a rapid beat. In place of the suit, Roper wears a deep red mageweave turtleneck, with a very nice black netherweave jacket that is not quite as formal as the suit, but is so expertly tailored to him that it looks even more expensive than it is (and it is, in fact, very expensive). The slacks are very nice, as are the shiny black shoes that were absolutely made to look good, not feel good, and he cuts a somewhat dashing figure with his hair swept back from his face. He wears no gloves on his hands.

"Hey." Up goes the coin in an expert flip he's not really watching, his eyes on Syarra's hair.

Syarra loosens the tie of her cloak and slides it off. After a slight pause, she hangs the cloak on a spike of Roper's armor. Beneath the cloak, she's wearing what appears to be a dark purple dress shot through with silver thread. It seems like it once might have been tailored to fit her, but now it hangs slightly loose on her frame. The sleeves are sheer, but they at least obscure the muscles well-defined by death and dehydration. Her usual moonstone necklace hangs at her neck.

"I couldn't really walk around the Ebon Hold like this," she says, moving to sit in the other chair, "but I didn't want to break the dress code."

Roper blinks at the sight of the dress and hair combination, his face going a little slack, as he stares…and keeps staring…he misses the coin catch entirely – the coin drops to the floor, making a sound that seems to startle the Death Knight into remembering what it is he’s doing. He looks down at it like he’s surprised it got there, and leans forward to scoop it up as he says in a deep drawl, without looking at Syarra, "Well, we have to think about the aesthetic, of course. Can't go around looking all twilight night-sky when we're deathsky blackness. What will the ghouls think."

There's a slight pause in Syarra's step as she notices Roper's stare, and a faint smile turns up the corners of her lips. She slides into the chair, looking down and adjusting her skirt, and glances up at Roper, briefly startled, when the coin hits the ground.

"I would have gone for entirely black, of course," Syarra says, the faint smile back on her lips. "I'm afraid I am limited by my former choices of fashion.

Roper sits back in the chair, watching Syarra out the corner of his eye as he starts up an idle coin walk across his knuckles, his left hand completely still on his leg. "Yeah, well. At least you have some things left." Roper shrugs, and leans back into the chair, starting to tip it. "None of mine survived the caches I found, but it wouldn't have mattered even if they had. They wouldn't have fit. I was a lot smaller the last time I wore them." Roper gestures to himself as he keeps walking the coin over his knuckles. "I had to get like this for the military. Look like a soldier."

"And any soldier clothes you might find would certainly be less suited to you than…" Syarra glances over his latest outfit. "She seems to be a remarkable tailor."

Roper looks down at it, raising his brows. "I asked for her best, and I gotta say, I'm impressed. I figured, noblewoman, so odds were good it was just one of those things where she does it and no one can say anything about it, but fuck. She's good." Roper tilts his head back to look at Syarra, a faint smile on his face. "I'm not a real soldier though. Not like you were. I was always just hiding in it." The smile moves into a brief grin. "And I was hiding as a bad one."

"A bad one," Syarra gives a brief exhale of a laugh. "I can't imagine you enjoying pretending incompetence. Though maybe it is the opposite, the competence of being able to convincingly fake incompetence."

Roper laughs, a slow, deep chuckle. "The fun was always in the game of it. Can I make them believe what I want them to see?" Roper flips his right hand, the coin disappearing, as he turns more fully to Syarra.

He settles into something, his expression lightening in a way she's never seen before, his eyes going wider, brighter, a sense of innocence to him, as he gives her a shy smile, his body language telegraphing something soft and vulnerable, as he brings a hand up to tuck some hair behind his ear. "Gosh, I do wish I'd brought something for you," Roper says, in Tibault's soft voice, a faint lisp on the s-sounds, his voice free of any rasp, his eyes limpid and hand pressed sincerely to his chest. "A lovely flower for a pretty lady, a star plucked from the deep well of nature's bounty, fit for that dark cascade of your hair, to adorn the natural ideal with nature's brooch."

A blink, and there's Roper again, wearing a bitter, lopsided grin, as he rasps, "It used to be fun."

Syarra shakes her head, the smile growing. "Was that who Theris knew? Who he expected to find here?" She rests one arm on the crate and leans slightly towards Roper, her hair falling over one shoulder. "Maybe I should have worn the armor. I imagine I look prepared for a coffin, like this."

Roper grins, moving the chair a little to face Syarra more directly. "Yeah. That was 'Tibault Beringer.' Once I knew the one, I could find the fit of it. And then he got to meet me." Roper snorts, as he flicks the coin back into his hand. "Talk about a fucking wake up call."

He shakes his head, looking carefully at the coin and not Syarra as he says, his voice a soft husky sound, "No. You look nice. You could go out like that, a little make up maybe for some color, the right lightning, something covering your eyes, and no one would even fucking know. Could be useful, if you were trying to sell it that you're not just 'a corpse.' And gods know people get stupid around a pretty girl."

"Maybe, if it's dark enough," Syarra shifts a little, looking down to touch the slightly loose fabric at her waist. "If it's something we could use. Anyway, I prefer you here than Tibault Beringer."

Roper chuckles, flipping the coin and catching it. "'Tibault Beringer' would have never fucking gotten here. But," Roper flicks his eyes to Syarra. "It's good to know." He taps his left hand in a slow tap. tap. tap.

"I made it into Outland, which is — and I mean this straight from my unbeating dead fucking heart — bullshit." There is a wealth of emphasis in the word, uttered in a dark rasp. "It's not even a fucking planet, it's just a rock, sitting there, waiting to be finished getting sucked into the fucking Twisting Nether and everyone's just standing around going, oh, man, sure would be nice if there were fewer ghosts here." Roper tosses the coin up high. "You know what else you could do? Just leave the fucking rock for a planet."

Syarra moves back in the chair, just a touch. "I suppose I could have warned you. I was only there for a short time, and I went straight to Shattrath. I… didn't spend a lot of time looking over the Twisting Nether. Did you get the things for the tailor?"

"Yeah, which I'm not doing a second time alone, because fuck that." Roper tilts the chair sideways, balancing it on two legs as he runs the coin over his knuckles. "And I got something else. Kept getting real dirty looks from some of the old guard in a lovely place they call 'Hellfire' probably because a fucking paladin named it. Traced back some of the source to our…" Roper shrugs, the chair wobbling slightly before he corrects it. "Whatever you want to think of them as. Older cousins? The Knights before us. They fucked some shit up there, and it's what they're seeing when they look at us. And that sounds like our kind of problem. And a specific one, which means it's time to talk to Forge."

Syarra's expression turns serious. "What shit exactly did they fuck up? Something we can fix, or are we simply stuck trying to adjust an impression that's lasted decades?"

Roper shakes his head. "Don't know. Couldn't get more details without actually talking to them, and I didn't have enough time to figure out the approach of who would talk to me about it. It was like pulling fucking teeth just getting them to point me in the right direction of where to get the materials I wanted, and I'm pretty sure they didn't expect I was coming back." He smirks, bouncing his brows at Syarra. "It wasn't enough of a problem to fuck with them for though. And I don't know if it's a fixable thing, but then again, I don't know shit about curses and the arcane, and Forge is a Draenei." Roper spreads his hands wide, the coin disappearing as he does.

"I didn't really talk much to anyone, while I was there," Syarra admits, meeting Roper's gaze with an apologetic glance. "Only enough to be pointed in the direction of Shattrath, then I rode. There was an unusual… mushroom forest… along the way. Was Forge with you, then? Or are you thinking this might be the concrete thing we need to get him on board?"

"No, I haven't seen him since the Battle. But, if I'm right about him, then this is the hook for him," Roper says, tilting his head back as he stares into some middle distance. "I want you to see if you can get him, see if you can lean on what you've already built with him. I've gotta chase down a gnome, someone named," Roper holds up three fingers, and tucks them down one at a time as he intones in a deep drawl, "'Keeple,' 'Kepel' or 'Kiekeel.' The Draenei couldn't fucking remember the name, but she sure as shit remembered the armor. And he left a good impression, which means I want him. If I can fucking find him."

"Two humans, one sin'dorei, one gnome and one draenei," Syarra taps her fingers one by one against the crate. "This is either going to be an excellent multicultural group for raising our reputation, or the setup for a joke. I'll hope for the former." She taps her fingers one at a time, once more. "I'm not sure I have much built yet with Forge, but I can try. And who was the draenei who met the gnome? Someone I should know?"

Roper laughs at the potential joke set up, grinning briefly. He leans forward, his left hand setting up a slow tapping on his leg. "Tailor in Honor Hold, name of Hama. I got her to talk to me by throwing Cressidha Aspenwood's name at her, and she mentioned a gnome Death Knight, something of a tailor. I got her to laugh a few times, so we'll see if she ends up being useful as a contact there." Roper shrugs, a graceful roll. "This is what I do. I will find this shit. But getting these people to all work together? That's gonna be your problem." He gives Syarra a lazy sort of lopsided smile. "And that's what you're good at."

"Of course," Syarra says, squaring her shoulders toward Roper. "I would imagine Knights of the Ebon Blade are often not very… group-oriented. But I'll work with what we get. Whatever else can be said of him, Theris seems cooperative."

Roper inhales and exhales in a harsh sigh, tipping the chair back to the floor, and rolling his wrists in a gesture. "For now. He's still not all here. It's coming, though. He was getting sharper after those cultists. But, he's also a fucking noble, and my angle is I want him for the Alliance side of laws." Roper's eyes are cold and calculating as he looks at Syarra. "I'm working on getting him re-established as a member of his house, on paper, forcing Stormwind to acknowledge him as 'living' enough for the fucking law. If it's something he wants, to be able to 'go home' again, then it's what we do to keep him in."

"You mean to not have him in combat?" Syarra presses her lips together for a moment. "He has to fight. Whatever else is true, he can't stay here long-term without feeding the hunger, same as any of us."

"No, I want him out there, that's just not where he's going to be the most useful. He barely fucking knows what he's doing. He's gonna have to stay with at least one of us for awhile," Roper says, gesturing with his hand to Syarra and then himself. "The others, you could send them out on their own, once they're on board, but he's gonna be on our heels for a bit. What I mean is that what he is now doesn't feel like what we're gonna get when he's all the way 'awake.'" Roper taps his left hand in a rapid beat as he stares at the curtains, a frown on his face. "When we were in Stratholme, he was listening, carefully. But he said — a heart defect. And Alaisa mentioned their father, the kind of man who always has to be right. No, I think he's used to being quiet and learning how to use that. But I don't know that he's gonna stay that way, once he's fully fledged, and he's past whatever he did to himself living on fucking fish for months."

"It might take a while," Syarra says, nodding. "He'll need to realize he doesn't need to be that Theris anymore. That none of the limitations hold. Though, of course, we'll see if we can help him keep the benefits. That's going to be a lot better than having ties to Stormwind nobles. Having literal Stormwind nobles."

"Exactly." Roper works his jaw back and forth. "The problem's gonna be the father. The mother will flip, if we can bring enough of her 'son' back to her. And Alaisa will use her pull for it, but it's going to be messy, no matter how I fucking play it. But that's in more than a few moves." Roper looks back at Syarra, and his eyes linger on her hair for a moment before he flicks them to her face. "You ready to meet Alaisa?"

Syarra's eyebrows raise. "Is she ready to meet me?"

Roper moves his right hand in a vague gesture. "She wants to meet you."

"She wants to?" Syarra looks to Roper in surprise. "Then yes. I'm curious to see what kind of person she is. When do you want to do this? I'm…. mostly free, beyond Tuesdays. Nothing else that can't be moved."

There's something pleased in Roper's expression that he covers by rotating in place, adjusting a candle needlessly on the crate to a slightly different position. "As soon as tomorrow. All I have to do is send word. She'll…" There's a flicker of something around his brows, almost confusion. "She'll get here." He stares at the candle flame, as though it's communicating something to him.

Syarra looks at the candle as well, trying to see what he sees, but she says, "Should we meet her in that same spot by the tomb near Chillwind Camp? I admit I begin to think we need to find a more comfortable meeting spot. For building rapport, if nothing else."

Roper shakes his head. "Yeah, for the ones we know aren't gonna be a problem. Alaisa's one of those — she'll be putting on a good face for it. So, this one we'll be doing closer to the Argents, where they can see it, but not close enough to hear it. I have the place. As long as no one is fucking shouting, they won't hear anything, but they'll see her talking with us. You and her facing them. I've gotta be the one with my back to them," Roper says, and it's clear from the way his face moves in disgust, that he's not happy about that fact.

"Why does any of us need to have our back to them?" Syarra looks at him, puzzled.

Roper tips his head back, staring up at the top of the cage, his voice a husky scrape of sound. "Because I don't want them seeing under the hood, and I can't fucking see everything I want to if I keep my head down."

Syarra's gaze moves to Roper's face, what she can see of it from her angle. "Why do you always hide it? To be harder to read?"

There's a hesitation, and Roper narrows his eyes, his jaw tightening for a moment. He inhales and exhales a hard sigh, looking at Syarra, his left hand starting up an odd beat. "Some of it is that I don't know who fucking knows me. That fucking paladin that tried to kill me? He got that fucking close because I didn't know if he did fucking know me. And not me, fucking anyone I used to be. Someone might recognize me, but I won't know who I'm supposed to be, and I'm not gonna figure that out fast enough."

Roper tongues a tooth, as though he's considering leaving it there, and then gestures angrily to his face as he moves his gaze to the candle. "The rest is just…I'm not like you. Or fucking poster boy Theris. Before, gods, I was so fucking ordinary. I could be anyone I wanted. They'd see what I wanted them to see. Now?" A harsh sound, too bitter, too cold to be a laugh, the temperature of the room dropping a degree or two. "All they're gonna see is a disgusting corpse. That's the first impression I'm going to make, every time. Better to hide it, and let them fucking wonder."

"You think people don't look at me and see a disgusting corpse? Or Theris?" She shakes her head. "The security I can understand, and you are conveniently inscrutable, with the hood, but…" she reaches one hand out along the crate towards him. "You look like Roper. And this Roper is the one that matters to me, not any of the people you might have been before."

Roper looks at Syarra's hand like it's something interesting that's happened, his head tilting. He glances from her face to the hand, and then with the same attitude of someone placing a bet at a casino table, moves his left hand and sets it on top of hers, watching her face. His skin is cold — much colder than it should be even in Acherus.

"They see a Death Knight. And that's what I want them to see. They get to talk to me because the Hunger makes it so I can't be fucking anyone else for long enough for it to matter." Roper narrows his eyes, even as a smile tugs at his lips, his voice a low rasp. "Are you ever gonna actually ask me about my hands, or are you just gonna keep wondering?"

Syarra doesn't react to the cold, and she doesn't flinch or move her hand away. There's a moment of uncertainty in her face, but then it fades away into her usual impassivity.

"I was probably just gonna keep wondering," she echoes him, and then looks back at him evenly as she says, "Something to do with the forge, I think. The swords, over and over."

Roper removes his hand as he rolls into a stand with a faint sound like a chuckle. "I told you — you want information, you just have to ask," Roper says, his voice a dark burr of sound. He sticks his right hand in his pocket as he holds up his left, his face in profile over his shoulder as he looks at it. "Yeah. Something like that. Everything about them tells a fucked up story."

His voice goes softer, more of a rasp of a loud whisper. "They're old. Really old. I know to account for them, know to wear gloves, know to hide them. There's nothing on the palms — which means I wasn't trying to defend myself. They're on the backs, and I…" Roper closes his eyes. "Dark hair, dark eyes, her breath like a brewery, yelling at me, wanting to know where the money is. And there's something hot on my skin, and there's the smell of roasting meat and I'm so fucking hungry that it smells good. Meat pies in the dark." Roper opens his eyes and looks at Syarra. "Someone hurt me, over and over. Someone I trusted. And they left their fucking fingerprints all over me."

Syarra watches his expression through all of his words, not his hands. Those, she's seen, and they haven't changed. She doesn't move from the chair, but she lifts her own hand, calloused but otherwise unmarked, from the crate to a loose fist on the dark fabric over her thigh.

"Not too far off from my guess, then," she says, looking up at him from her seat, something darker than usual in her face. After a longer pause, she adds, "I would offer my assistance with vengeance, but if they're that old… I suspect you've already taken whatever vengeance was possible."

Roper strips off the jacket like maybe that was what he really stood up for, turning back to the chair to sling the jacket over the back. The turtleneck underneath clings to his form in a way that both softens the lines of it, and showcases the tight muscular build of the soldier he once pretended to be.

He sits back down in what looks like a lazy sprawl in the chair, his left arm hanging over the back of the chair as he gives Syarra a smile with bitter eyes. "I have no fucking idea. I don't remember. And most of it doesn't feel like anything I did. It's not burned, it's just a fucking wasteland. It didn't come back at all. I don't know what I did, or didn't do." He holds up his right hand, studying the back. "But they used to be one of my liabilities. Now…" He scoffs, and looks back at Syarra, his eyes glowing bright. "Somehow I don't think they're what's going to grab people's attention anymore," he drawls.

Syarra cups her hair in both hands and pulls it back over her shoulders, as her gaze drifts from jacket to turtleneck, and then back up to Roper's eyes. Her posture softens in the chair and she leans back, but she does not mirror Roper's sprawl. "I can see that, juggling so many identities with distinguishing marks that exist between all of them. And those marks as scars of… such remembered pain and betrayal. Is that something you want to track down? Or something better forgotten?"

"Depends on if I can use it or not, or it's gonna be a fucking problem." Roper rotates his wrist, covering his skin in a coating of frost, and then rotates it back, the frost disappearing as quickly as it came. "Alaisa said I did a good fucking job disappearing, before. Left nothing behind, a fucking ghost in the wind. If she's not lying, and I don't think she is because that does sound like me, then trying to use what I was before is going to be fucking futile. And I've got better hands to play." Roper looks at Syarra with a lopsided smirk.

"Right," Syarra smirks back at him. "I can't imagine you leaving anything half-destroyed."

Roper shrugs his right shoulder, setting his right hand on his leg. "I would if it would get me something I need, but…if I knew I was supposed to disappear, I wouldn't have half-assed it." He frowns, staring at the curtains. "I left caches behind, of stuff for me, things I'd need if I ever had to cut and run. I found three of them. There should be two more but I can't get to them because one of them is now in 'Horde' territory, and the other is occupied by someone and I have no fucking idea if I did that on purpose, and he knows me, or not."

"Horde territory?" Syarra raises an eyebrow. "Where? Something I could pick up for you?"

Roper pauses, as he considers it, his left hand tapping a beat on the chair. "That might depend. How good are you at scaling sheer cliffs?" He raises his brows to Syarra, a hint of a smile on his face.

"I can climb," Syarra says, moving her right hand to rest on her left upper arm, where the lines of lean muscle are faintly visible beneath the cloth. "Do you expect it to be any worse now than it was when you put it there?"

Roper exhales a short breath of an almost-laugh. "Yeah, I'm expecting it might be a little worse for the wear," he drawls. "Considering that it should be in a tiny hole under a ledge in the cliffs on the western edge of Silvermoon, right where they meet the shoreline."

Syarra winces. "You put it there before it was in ruins, didn't you? It may well have been crushed by now. I can certainly look, though."

"Wouldn't be the first one. I had one out in Dun Morogh, near the gnome city, and it was nothing but a pile of rubble. The other lost the good fight to the fucking swamp out in Theramore." Roper shrugs, unbothered by this. "It's not going to have much, if you can get to it." He flicks a key into his hand, and stretches to open the breadbox. "I can show you the map of it, and describe where it was. I don't know how much might have changed in the cliff in the past six or so years that it's been since I put it there though."

Syarra nods. "If you would, I'll recover it if it can be recovered. I imagine it would have what you thought you might need in the future… is any of it still relevant?"

Roper sifts through several papers in the box, all of them folded into cute, tiny shapes, until he finds one folded into a crane, pulling it out and unfolding it. "All of them had the same things — a change of clothing appropriate for the climate it was hidden in, a lighter, tinder, money, a knife, and paperwork. The paperwork will be fucking useless, but the rest has some use."

The crane unfolds into a map of Silvermoon as it is now, drawn in a light hand in pencil. It looks as though it was copied from another map, possibly traced over it directly. He frowns at it, before moving his hand near his waist, a graphite pencil appearing in his hand.

"Did you draw that?" Syarra leans forward, looking at the paper. "We didn't see enough of the area to scout out how it is now, when we went there."

"Copied it," Roper says, in a light rasp. Roper sets it on the table, moving to mark the map with a dot, on a high cliff on the western edge of what are now the ruins of Silvermoon. "Some people are stupid enough to have maps out where someone can take them for a few minutes and no one fucking notices," Roper drawls, flicking his eyes up to Syarra. "Don't worry. I put it back. I'm not a thief."

"I hope it's up to date," Syarra says, her eyes on the map. "It looks recent. And I was all over that area, not long after the fall. I should be able to find my way around. And the other. Do you need someone not-you to check out their memories?"

"Alaisa might know," Roper says, folding the map back up into the crane shape with fast, deft movements, holding it out to Syarra in a way that will make it difficult to avoid touching his hand to take it. "But it's not essential, yet. If it is someone who knew a version of me, I'd need to know which one of these fuckers in my head it was. If all I want is the cache, Alaisa can do it. But, I want to know why I put it there. Because that's likely more useful than anything that's in it."

"I don't know how to refold this, just so you know." Syarra reaches out to take the paper crane, touching his hand with hers in the process. She looks up from the crane to catch his gaze. "Silvermoon, I assume it would be the same reason you speak Thalassian, and that you know the right mannerisms."

Roper gives her a lopsided grin, withdrawing his hand slowly. "I wish I could actually tell you why," he says, the husky note deeper in voice. "I'm sure it was a fucking good story. But I don't remember. It's all without context." He sits back into the chair, waving his hand in the air. "Everything I know how to say says 'military operation.'" He frowns a little, concentrating, his accent decent, but not a native speaker's, "[I am getting into position.]" He shrugs. "And I know tactical shit, like a guard rotation that sure as fuck isn't useful now, and a layout of the city. But I don't know why. I can't even tell how long ago it was."

Roper blinks slowly, flicking his eyes from the crane and back up to Syarra. "Do you want me to show you how to fold that back up." It's not really said like a question, but it seems like it's supposed to be.

Syarra considers the crane in her hands and nods. "It's an interesting organizational system. How many different shapes can you make?"

"Not sure. At least thirty, that I've tried. It's…" Roper makes a harsh sound of almost disgust as he deep drawls. "It's without context. Like fucking everything. I have to sort of just…start, not think about it. Let it happen. My hands know what they're doing, and it just…clicks and I remember what I'm doing, if not fucking why. My fucking echoes."

Roper opens up the breadbox, and removes a paper covered with the Common alphabet written over and over in five different handwritings from beneath a collection of folded papers, and he rolls off the chair to kneel by the crate, shifting several of the candles out of the way. "Here. Crane is easy."

"Still, useful skills," Syarra says with a shrug of one shoulder. Then she slips off the chair to kneel next to him, with the easy grace of someone used to moving in skirts as well as armor. She leans one hand on the crate and shifts closer, looking over at the paper.

Roper laughs, and there's something amused and bitter all at once. "They used to be, probably. Not so much now. Like dancing. Sure, I could do it, I know…fuck, I don't even know how many, but when is that going to be fucking useful now, unless it turns out that's how to fucking charm Instructor Amal'thazad," Roper drawls. "I'm sure he's just hovering like that waiting for someone to ask him to dance." As he speaks, Roper folds the edges of the paper to make a square, and tears off the edge.

"You never know," Syarra says, and her voice sounds perfectly serious. "He could be secretly longing for someone to take him for turn of Amar'uel." The corner of her lips twitches up. "But then again, the only skill a person will definitely never use is the one they don't have."

Roper makes a louder ha, a lopsided grin on his face. "I was real fucking good at that one. But, I don't think I ever danced it without aiming to get someone to bed, and I'm pretty sure that's how I die again if I try that with him," Roper drawls.

"Okay. First parts, easy. Fold here, then flip, and fold again." Roper starts folding the paper, flipping it over, and folding it again, going through two steps, and then he undoes it and slides it over to Syarra. "Just like that."

"Now that brings back memories," Syarra makes a low chuckle in her throat, and says, "Maybe he's just waiting for someone to get past the 'I will murder you' demeanor."

She takes the paper and starts to try to recreate the folds. It doesn't look quite right.

"Aren't we all," Roper drawls, as he shakes his head, watching Syarra fold it. "No, not like that. This." There's a smirk he's not bothering hiding as he moves to set his hands on hers to stop them from the fold, to correct it. "You were a dancer? Or was it another thing you did so you wouldn't draw attention from not doing it?"

Syarra pauses, letting him take her hands and move them into the correct position.

She glances at him sidelong and says, "I liked dancing, I think. It was another thing that was more my sister's than mine, but… it wasn't for appearances."

Roper guides her hands through the folds as he hesitates for a moment. He keeps going, into the next steps of the crane, staring at the paper. His voice is low, and dark, the husky note pronounced. "I loved it. I can feel it, layers of memories not attached to anyone at all. Just music and movement."

"Would you still, do you think, if you had the chance?" Syarra asks, letting him move her hands through the crane's creation without resistance.

Roper works his jaw back and forth, a look of something almost like anger on his face, even as he drawls, "Somehow I think it wouldn't have quite the same effect showing up to a club and hitting the dance floor. I just don't have the right clothes for it." He side-eyes Syarra, before he looks back at the paper. "Form the X, turn it over. And then it's just…" He flips and folds it, moving through it slowly but without significant instruction, clearly more of a teach by doing than by explaining type of person.

"Yeah. I would," he admits. "Not sure it would be the same, now. But, that might depend on who I'm dancing with, and where."

Syarra keeps her eyes on the crane, memorizing each step, as she says, "Maybe not a club, no. Unless it were a very particular type. But you never know, circumstances might arise. Though maybe not with Amal'Thazad."

"Not with that attitude," Roper deep drawls, a half-smile on his face.

Syarra glances quickly at Roper, and then back at the finishing crane, a faint smile at the corner of her lips. "Now that sounds almost like a challenge. But for once, I do not accept. Not for that partner."

Roper laughs, a brief dark sort of sound. "Well, you wouldn't have to, would you? You've got the makings for your own fucking club if you want it, once your sister gives back what's yours," Roper says, his eyes flicking to Syarra as he starts in on the finer details of the folding, moving her fingers with an odd sort of gentleness into the finer points of the folding. "Could charge admission and fund the unending blizzard inside, real theme of 'no living allowed, one way or another.'"

"Knights of the Ebon Dance Club," Syarra murmurs, deadpan, leaning forward to watch more carefully.

Roper grins, as he leans closer to better control the motion as the folds get increasingly complex. "Now you pull it up, like this, along the creases. That's what all folding was for, so that it bends like this, into the shape. Then fold here, and flip again. Once you're here, it's easy," Roper says, with the confidence of someone who has done this way too many times and lost all sense of how difficult it may be.

"You could do it. If you wanted to. Sell the useless furniture we don't need, open the space up. Make dancing a Team Building Exercise," he drawls. "Although I imagine smuggling the gnome into Silvermoon's gonna be it's own fucking team building exercise. Maybe we recruit a fucking dwarf and just have him stand on their shoulders to make one fucked up looking Sin'dorei."

"Easy," Syarra mutters, as Roper moves her hands through the motions. "If only I could get a portal set up there, like a permanent death gate." She glances up at Roper and adds, "I'm fairly certain that would have bad consequences for our reputation, if anyone found out."

"Yeah, no shit," Roper agrees, looking at Syarra. There's a pause as he gets a faraway look in his eyes, his hands going still on the folding for a moment before he picks back up, moving slowly and deliberately through the final steps of forming the wings of the crane. "But if you had a pet warlock with their own little gateway…" Roper's brows go up.

"Mm," Syarra's eyebrows raise in an unconscious mirror, looking at Roper. "Not really the kind of people I used to know, and anyway I suspect even the warlocks of the sin'dorei are a little too protective of Silvermoon right now for that. But… if I could find a pet Forsaken warlock. They're bound to be a little more… legally flexible."

"And less prone to dying in an unending blizzard," Roper drawls. There's a faint look of disgust on his face as he looks at the crane, gently pressing the folds of the wings into place. "I always hated warlocks. Everything about them. But I don't have the fucking luxury of hating anything anymore if it's gonna be useful. And that…that would solve a lot of problems for managing a place that isn't Acherus but is safe for your hand picked teams."

Syarra nods. "If I can find one that would be… trustworthy." She winces and draws in breath in a low hiss. "No, that's too much of an ask. But one we could get leverage on. No one would look at me twice in the Undercity. I can ask around."

Roper guides them through the last little bit of forming the neck of the crane, smoothing it out, and doesn't immediately lift his hands from Syarra's even with the finished crane. "Keep it slow. If you get me some actual names, I can work with that. Figure out which one might have the right combination." He inhales deliberately just to make to a harsh sigh. "Fucking Forsaken." It's not uttered with the same venom as usual, just an annoyed, resigned rasp.

"But they're the best play here," Syarra says, the lack of enthusiasm clear from the reluctance in her voice. She examines the crane, turning it back and forth between their hands. "It may not be as tidy before I've had some practice, but I think I can refold the map now."

"Just follow the folds." Roper looks between their hands and there's an expression of something on his face, before it's covered by a bitter look as he turns more to face Syarra, his hands rotating inwards as though he's trying to hide the scarring in a way that seems more automatic than deliberate. "You really don't, by the way, look like you're 'prepared for a coffin.' You can still use it as another weapon, even if you're not trying to pass for the living. You can make them see what you want them to see — Celaven, Aze, that fucking bureaucrat in Silvermoon, anyone you want to entice into seeing something else with the monster, you can." A hint of a scoff, a twist of his lips.

"Like I said, anyone can get stupid around a pretty girl," Roper says in a midnight voice, the husky note deep and scraping. He reaches out a hand to Syarra's hair, lifting it up and letting it flow over his palm as he moves his hand beneath it, before he stands up abruptly in a smooth, silent motion, closing the breadbox, face turned away from Syarra.

Syarra meets Roper's eyes as he talks at first, something skeptical and maybe faintly amused in her face. When he reaches for her hair, she tenses her shoulders slightly and her lips part in surprise, but doesn't pull away. She kneels there for a moment longer, paper crane nestled in her hand, looking at Roper's back with a question in her eyes that doesn't seem to find any answer. Then she sets the crane down gently, re-tucks her hair behind one ear, and uses one hand on the crate to push herself back up to standing.

"I'll keep that in mind," Syarra says quietly, looking down at the crane. "Another weapon, though I wouldn't depend on it. In any case, I'll get those names. For the warlock."

Roper relocks the box. "Don't rush on it. Forge, Colson, and Celaven first. But if you happen to stop by the fucking Forsaken on your way to Silvermoon for your noble connection, then there's no reason not to linger for a bit, just in case." Roper's jaw is tight as he stares at the breadbox of papers. "And if you did like them tall, pretty, and Holy before, be careful with Colson. He's as much of those as they come."

Syarra exhales a faintly bitter laugh, and says, "I think I'm probably safe there. Warlocks were not my people, but neither were the holy. Not even as a blood knight. It wasn't… probably how you imagine a paladin order."

"What, you weren't filled with guilt over your perceived sins, trying to embody some sort of fucking standard of perfection you held yourself up to, stomping through the world with a righteous belief in what you were doing was for the greater good?" Roper drawls, turning his face in profile to Syarra, looking at her out of the corner of his eye.

"Are we talking about me or the order?" Syarra asks, raising an eyebrow. "You know me. But no, mostly it was people who wanted power, not holiness."

"I know you," Roper says, picking up the jacket from the chair, and moving to the wardrobe in the corner, his back to Syarra. "I don't know enough about The Other Syarra, and maybe she was a lone paladin among the fucking power hungry wolves, I can't be sure, and at this point I don't care because you're not that anymore. The only things I care about with her are what I can use." He opens the wardrobe, filled with a collection of high quality clothing, and takes out a hanger to hang up the jacket, closing the wardrobe once more. "I've used The Other Syarra to leverage Colson, creating rapport with an asset — he wanted to know about how the Other Syarra died, and not for himself. Aze wanted to know, and so he asked the person who would know. I gave it to him."

Roper turns in place, looking at Syarra with an even expression, both hands in his pockets. "I didn't fucking give him Enaliya. That's yours, not hers. And the only reason I'll give it to him is if I can use him to stand between Aze and Enaliya, to keep her from taking it from you."

Syarra glances over at the armor stand she used as a cloak-rack, as Roper hangs up his jacket like a civilized undead person. When he mentions what he told Colson, though, her manner drops back to seriousness. "If you didn't give him Enaliya's name, what exactly did you tell him? That it was some death knight? Roper, if he sets her on a path…"

"What? If he sets her on a path to come out here to the Plaguelands, talking to the Argent Crusade about you trying to figure out the final piece of the puzzle, and standing right on our fucking doorstep while she does it?" Roper drawls, as he tilts his head with a smirk. "Yeah, I wonder how we could possibly use that." He blinks slowly at Syarra, expression growing only slightly more serious. "I told him about her team being taken out by a Death Knight, and that she died in some way that left her intact at the end of a fight with a Death Knight to take her body back to be raised. He's a paladin. He filled in the blanks."

"You're imagining a very useful scenario. But in another one, she doesn't listen very carefully, she hears 'death knights killed my sister', and she makes herself a problem," Syarra closes her eyes for a moment, and then looks back at Roper. "In that scenario, she's after blood, not puzzle pieces. I just… I need to keep a closer eye on her, somehow, or she's going to get herself killed."

Roper raises his brows. "Is she that fucking reckless, to put herself out there openly against us when she's a walking target as a part-demon herself, in our fucking stronghold?" Roper's lips curl in a faint disgust before he tips his head back, sinking more onto his heels. "Do we need to see if I set Colson in her path sooner rather than later? I don't know that he's got the leverage, but I'm betting his husband does. If I have to pull that string now, I will."

"Maybe I don't know, now," Syarra sighs. "She's survived in Outland for years. Before, I would have said the answer to any 'is she that fucking reckless' question was probably yes, but it never came up when the stakes were that high. Just, if she was looking for what killed me, then I couldn't guess what she'd get into her head to do about it."

Roper shakes his head. "If you think there's even a chance that she plays it that badly, that we end up with her attacking random members of the Ebon Blade, it's time to set a fucking paladin in her way," he says, and there's a sound of deep irritation in his voice. "We need her to talk to you, but we don't need her poking the fucking sleeping giants of anyone in the armor."

"This is the sister who attacked me with my own knife while drunk and unarmed," Syarra says dryly. "She is truly a tactical genius, that one. Yes, then, maybe put a paladin in her way, to be safe. If she's not planning anything, it won't make a difference."

"And yet, someone thought she was worth promoting over you," Roper says, and there's an undercurrent of anger in his voice even with a dark drawl. "Which means she's not the only one who isn't a fucking tactical genius in your people's military." He looks into some middle distance, tilting his head back. "Then I pull Colson into place. And I get your journal back, one way or another. If I can't get it through him, I pull it the other way. It'll take longer, but you'll get it back in some form or another, that I can guarantee."

"Thanks," Syarra says, moving over toward her cloak. "The sooner we can get her on our side, the better."

Roper nods, and moves to the chair by the crate, watching Syarra with a guarded expression. "And Syarra?"

"What, something else he knows about me?" Syarra asks, swirling the cloak to settle around her shoulders.

"No," Roper says, and there's a tightness around his eyes as he looks away from Syarra, the husky note a harsh scrape in his voice. "His sister. She's in the positive, and she said to contact her again if there's something more I want. I'll be getting her here to enchant your things as soon as I have more of what she needs. If you decide you want some new things to match the aesthetic, I'll make that happen." It's a good thing his eyes only look like they're on fire, or he'd be burning a hole through the drapes, as he avoids looking at Syarra, his hands deep in his pockets.

Syarra's expression softens just a touch, and she nods at Roper. "I may take you up on that. I don't have that much left… red and gold are really not my colors anymore."

"No," Roper agrees, glancing at her with a hint of a smile before he turns his head to the breadbox again. He opens it again, as he drawls, "Maybe they aren't. I'll come get you to meet Alaisa, tomorrow if she can make it. The dress code will be armor, not because she's going to stab you. It's just that you look good in black."