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| Details |
| Author: | Athena |
| Summary: | Siamus seeks out the undead Sunstrikes to get an Expert Opinion on the undead state of his friend Bolvar Fordragon, the new Lich King, and to pluck at one of the formerly fallow states of the red strings connecting Lester Amerith to Kaela Mondragon. He has Syarra's careful courtesy and Roper's attention, which is always a bit of a mixed bag. 4800~ words. |
| Rating: | M for Mature 17+ |
Arc: Death Knight PR
Arc: The Red String Game
The home of Roper and Syarra Sunstrike might look - to someone unaware of the nature of its inhabitants - like a place inhabited by living people. There's an armor stand by the door, currently occupied by clean saronite armor, tidily stored. There's a bed against one wall flanked by stands with candles, as if these people need to sleep. Partially hidden behind a black paper screen, one might see that the sheet is slightly uneven at the top, as if it might have been used recently. In one corner is a side table, with a lockbox on top of it.
The low table at the center is surrounded by cushioned seats in the elvish fashion, but the ones there today are purple and silver - none of the few decorations in the room are any variations of red and gold. On the center of the table are cups and a carafe of cold coffee, ready for friendly guests. The other main decoration in the one-room home is a disturbing wooden nightmare carving that sits in a place of honor on a display shelf near the door.
Syarra Sunstrike sits at the table, waiting for the expected guest to arrive. Her hair is loose, a cascade of dark curls, and she is dressed in a long-sleeved, pale blue blouse with black pants and boots. The slight contrast of the shirt with her pale, greyish skin makes it clear that she is not alive, if the eyes of blue flame didn't give it away first.
Roper sits beside Syarra, already two cups of coffee in, and he never had any chance of being mistaken for alive, not in any forgiving lighting or carefully curated clothing. If not for the light of his eyes of blue, he could be mistaken for a relatively well-preserved Forsaken. Some days he capitalizes on that. Today, though, he wears his Cressidha Aspenwood made suit, black on gray, his hair styled neatly back from his face, and his hands covered by soft gloves. It's good that he wears them, so that the rapid, manic tapping of his left hand on the table is muted tump, tump, tump instead of a woodpecker drilling through their table.
Everything about the room and the death knights in it is aggressively clean. There are places where it shows in the wearing down of the wood like someone has torn away a layer of grime by sanding it violently down, as if at least one of the occupants cannot handle anything untidy, or abide by the dirt covering the true object beneath it.
From outside, the steady drumbeat of hooves becomes audible: faintly at first, and then clearly approaching. They slow as they draw nearer, and then a handsome, smoky-dappled horse reins in outside the little dwelling. There is a brief silence, perhaps as the rider surveys the place, and then Siamus Fallon dismounts and moves to secure Siroc to the nearby post.
He removes his tricorn hat and tucks it under his arm, drags a hand through his hair, and surveys the place again before approaching the door. He is dressed today in black — black greatcoat, breeches and boots, black waistcoat and charcoal cravat — possibly in concession to his hosts' aesthetic. Possibly it's just laundry day. One pocket of his coat is weighed down by an object of some kind.
He knocks courteously at the door.
Syarra takes a breath, flexing her fingers in preparation of putting on the act of small, subtle movements designed to put the living at ease. She glances to meet Roper's eyes, and then turns away as she rises to answer the door.
Roper finally halts his tapping at the knock, and watches Syarra move to answer it with an unblinking stare, a sharp focus that might have been unsettling for someone else.
There's no sign of surprise in her expression when it opens to reveal the Vice Admiral. He is expected. She doesn't smile, but nods politely and steps back to allow him to enter.
"Welcome, Lord Fallon," Syarra says carefully, still breathing regularly. "Would you like coffee?"
Siamus's slight, polite smile freezes for a moment — just for a moment — and then he inclines his head. "That's very kind, Mrs. Sunstrike," he says. Because it is very kind. Even if it's coffee. He nods past her to her husband — "Roper." — before stepping in, and reaches into his coat pocket. "I've brought ye something. Nothing ye need or will use, likely, but ye must forgive me being a traditional man."
He takes from his pocket a small wooden box — the lid is inlaid and slides smoothly to one side to open, rather than lifting — and offers it to Syarra.
Syarra reaches out with both hands to take the box, a flicker of curiosity visible in the rising of her eyebrows. She slides the lid open to see what is inside.
The contents appear to be sea salt. That is because they are sea salt.
"As I said," Siamus says, "not a thing ye have use for yourself, I expect. But it's a housewarming custom on Stormsong."
Because even death knights should get housewarmings, apparently.
Roper raises a hand in greeting back, with a simple, "Hey." As the gift emerges from the slightly weighted down pocket, Roper's focus shifts to the wooden box, and intensifies. If not for Syarra, there might have been a moment where Roper would have turned the gift over and over in his hands, trying to guess at the insides first, like a dangerous large cat with a puzzle enrichment in his enclosure.
"I do bake sometimes, for living guests," Syarra says, staring at the salt like it might explain itself for a moment before she looks back up to Siamus, still unsmiling. "We had an oven in Kaskala. I will need to secure something similar here, before I am able to do so again. I used to… before. It is less easy for me now, but I am not unskilled in the process. If there is some manner of refreshment you would prefer on a future visit…" Syarra doesn't quite make that a question, but it hangs there for him to answer if he wants to.
She closes the box and moves back towards the table, gesturing towards the clearly-not-red cushions. "Please, make yourself comfortable."
Roper still seems intrigued at the salt itself, as now the puzzle is something else, part of another one, of the puzzle of who is Siamus Fallon. He leans over the table, setting his right arm across it, his left hand resting motionless for the moment. "I cook," Roper drawls, a faint rasp, and the echo hidden, in his dark voice. "And I may be an undead monstrosity of an abomination against life and the Light, but I'm not so far gone I don't properly salt my foods." A beat, before he seems to remember to say, "Thanks."
"Quite welcome," says Siamus, and moves to take a seat as indicated. "Friend of mine's been out this way — well, up in the Burning Steppes — wi' the Tennerow lass recently, working against the orcs. And I've another friend lives not far from here. Ye know Captain Tyrrell? I can't recall."
"The 'Tennerow lass' I believe we've met, unless there are many," Syarra says, smoothly resuming her own seat and resting her hands on the table. "I have not had the pleasure of meeting Captain Tyrrell. If we stay here long enough, I expect we will run into one another eventually." Or possibly not, as the death knights do generally take care to remain on the edges of society.
"Lady Dara Tennerow, third and youngest of House Tennerow, working with Lady Sophiette Valonforth, her fiancee from Lordaeron, occasionally her young brother Hugo Valonforth, and a one-eyed man named Costentyn Shine," Roper says, pronouncing Shine's name correctly, his voice clear of drawl, an Agent giving a Report. "And we know it's not 'Captain' Tyrrell anymore, it's 'Sergeant,' after he was demoted from getting cursed as a worgen up in the operations around Gilneas." How do they know that? Oh, well. He is a spy. "But no, we've never met."
Siamus smiles faintly and inclines his head. "It's 'Captain' for sentimental reasons of a sort. The man earned it well, and the demotion's a travesty." He considers for a moment. "Perhaps for the best if ye don't meet. He wasn't best pleased wi' the legislation when I put it forward; we had some words over it. And aye, Shine's my lieutenant, as was. A good friend. Done in the Steppes for now, though, I believe."
Syarra shrugs faintly. "Should Shine be in the area again, and in need of assistance of the sort we could offer, I hope you will not hesitate to send word." She pauses, measuring whether to say something or not, but finally offers, "As for your Captain, I have a… friend in his unit. But we will steer clear, if that is what's needed."
Siamus raises his eyebrows. "A friend in his unit? Who would that be, then? My sister's in the same."
"Celaven Evensong, kaldorei healer, priest of Elune," Roper reports, idly flicking a coin into his right hand, dancing it across his knuckles, and then slipping it back away as he reaches out for the coffee pot to pour himself another cup. "Syarra knew him Before, and we've worked with him a few times since, including the assault on Icecrown Citadel. Wouldn't be saying much, given how many fucking people were there, but we had a few moments with him specifically, as an ally, and he's come to visit us out here, as a social call."
"Oh, aye. Ta's mentioned the man," Siamus says. "I was pleased to know they've got an Elunite priest in the unit." As opposed to, you know.
Syarra nods at Roper's accounting of the connection.
Roper's smile moves crookedly over his face, as he plucks another cup up, setting it at Siamus' place, and pouring more Void-dark cold brewed coffee into it with a strangely smooth pour, like a man who has spent time in service, a bar tending or catering to the nobility.
"So, you know about what happened then, at the top of the Citadel, at the fucking Frozen Throne, but not from the experts in Lich Kings, for who this isn't their first fucking rodeo." It's their second rodeo. Which still seems like a very small amount of rodeos for expertise, but it is also a full 200% more Lich King experience rodeos than most people get.
Syarra turns to stare at Siamus, eerily still as she forgets her breath and mannerisms for a moment.
Any trace of smile vanishes from Siamus's expression. "I have… heard it, yes. The news Fordring did not see fit to entrust to most of us. I have heard it from one source and confirmed it by two others, and I am curious as to your… particular perspective on the matter. I will tell ye right now that Bolvar Fordragon was a friend of mine, and a man to whom House Fallon owes a specific duty."
Syarra regards him steadily, and then draws breath to say, "If he is a man you trust, then who better to take control of the Scourge? You will have noticed that they are causing far less problems in Northrend. Pockets of the undead are still controlled by local powers in the Plaguelands, but that will likely grow less common as your friend grows used to his power."
Siamus turns his gaze on her mildly. "He is a man I trusted absolutely, among the living. But if he wears the Lich King's crown now, and sits on that throne — I'm not best positioned to assess that any longer, I don't think. The Fordragon I knew was a man of integrity, devotion to cause and kingdom, sterling character. I'd like to think he remains, but… I'd never have imagined the circumstances, nor do I know what effect they might have on a man. Arthas Menethil was not… the man he became, either."
He hesitates and glances down at his untouched coffee cup. "And I'm honest enough to confess I've grieved the man since the Wrathgate, and this news — and all the what-ifs that attend it — are fresh cuts into that same wound. In any other circumstance I'd look for reassurance that my friend… was well, but I know there's no such reassurance to be had here."
The metaphor is a little gory, but the death knights can also likely already taste the layers of grief and pain — and anger — like a miasma in the air.
Syarra does not seem to mind the gory metaphor at all. In fact, she leans ever so slightly towards Siamus, some of the stiffness of her muscles relaxing as the poke it, make it hurt more instinct kicks in, and the edges of her lips curl upwards in a soft smile that she can't quite hold back. But she doesn't do anything. Admire that control, please, Vice Admiral Fallon, and don't focus on how much she enjoys your pain.
Still, it takes her a few breaths before she can speak calmly in answer. "I have never been on your side of this particular equation, so I cannot advise or reassure. You might speak with my sister - she did not take the news well at the first, but she came around." Syarra pauses, swallowing once, and continues, "I would tell you that your friend volunteered, and that he saw the role as a sacrifice. Though he was not in a fit shape to return home, in any case, so that may have factored into his decision. On the other hand, Menethil only ever sought power over others. In that respect, they have started in very different places."
Roper breathes in a single deep breath, and then holds it, exhaling only as he speaks, and barely drawing enough breath to continue to do it. His own features are softer, more relaxed, and if not for the fact that he focuses his attention on flicking a silver Stormwind coin into his palm, and dancing it over his knuckles, staring at it rather than Siamus, it could almost be mistaken for sympathy.
"We all get fucked up at the core of it, including whatever Fordragon did to put on the crown. But he survived with enough to do it, after Menethil put his whole fucking repertoire into wrecking him. Means he kept enough of whoever he was intact. Something of the man you knew is still in there. Pieces probably broken off, or warped. A fucked up mirror image.
"Now, you could wonder if it was all a power play, not a sacrifice, a sly agenda to take the throne out from under Fordring's own bid," Roper continues, and his expression shifts with his words, tics of a half smile, a twitch of his brow. Roper definitely has wondered this. "But he had a shot at seizing a ruling power when he did. He didn't. Still isn't. Just like he didn't with a malleable prince when he was regent. And he had a fucking black dragon whispering in his ear the whole time. A little preview maybe of what he's got going now. Black shadows of whispers in his head. How long he can keep it up is anyone's guess. But I'd bet longer than Menethil did."
"None of us are well." Roper balances the coin lightly on a finger tip, staring at it rather than Siamus. "The Hunger sees to that. Whatever Fordragon had done to him, he'll suffer in it. But for some of us, it's not about being comfortable, or inflicting enough pain to never feel it ourselves. Beating the game. Purpose. Those are better. Right now, Fordragon wins the game against the Scourge, and his purpose saves the whole fucking world every day he keeps his ass on the throne. For a paladin stuck in this, that's about as good as it gets."
Syarra, on the other hand, continues to stare at Siamus with intensity as Roper speaks, paying no attention to the coin manipulation. Her focus could almost be flattering, the attention she's paying to the tiniest movements of Siamus's expression, with that faint smile still on her lips. An observant person would note the coldness under the attention, though, and the predatorial gleam in her eyes. Still, she isn't doing anything. She's just looking - and waiting to see if there's more pain on offer.
Unfortunately, Syarra, in an unlikely turn of events, the pain diminishes. Evidently Roper has offered some genuine comfort. No one saw that coming.
Siamus nods heavily. "That's — aye. That sounds… ye couldn't have found a man of finer character. When he was — before."
Syarra sits back, and her expression fades back into blankness. "Then you might trust in who he is after, however damaged, however unwell. The soul attached to that body on the throne is the same one he had before. You must have seen that is true for us as well. My sister sees it in me, and Westwind sees it in Mourn."
Roper spins his coin up in the air, and catches it between his fingers as he looks over at Siamus. That's the thing about a guy who specializes in mental anguish and taunting — the coin flips both ways, to know what to press on each side of pain, and how to avoid it. "So there's your answer on that. And while Fordragon buys us however much time he can, we got other problems to solve, up and down. Here, orcs making a play for Redridge, so we're holding a bulwark while they thin out. North, the Fucking Forsaken and their bullshit. And elsewhere, those fucking Twilight's Hammer are making it clear that cultist purple is the new black."
Siamus turns grim. "Aye. Not to mention Hellscream's efforts in Kalimdor and the Baradin Bay. No shortage of occupation for us at present." He adjusts his cup of still-untouched coffee on the table, possibly in an effort to make it look like he's totally drinking and/or going to drink it.
Syarra nods just slightly as he touches the coffee cup, and does not seem bothered that he isn't drinking it. All the social rituals are entirely symbolic to her, after all. Check mark - hospitality was offered and accepted. She's doing it right.
"We have a place here for now," Syarra says evenly, looking back up to meet Siamus's gaze. "But if our particular talents are needed elsewhere, I hope that you know to ask."
Roper's talents being the lesser known spy rogue with a subclass of undead berserker, which isn't the usual meta build, but it comes in handy from time to time.
"Yeah, and with the way that cult is going, if they take a page out of the fucking Cult of the Damned, they'll be working on infiltrating wherever they can. Push things the way they want them. Sneak their propaganda into all the little cracks to weaken the foundation for a strike." That's the paranoia talking, but here we are. "There's no way SI:7 isn't watching and getting dossiers on every fucking person they can, but that doesn't mean they'll tell you specifically fuck all."
Unlike, say, Roper who loves trading tasty information for benefits.
Siamus makes a sour face. "Bloody nest of spiders." It's conceivable he's talking about the Twilight's Hammer or the Cult of the — no, no. He's definitely talking about SI:7. "And it's an odd segue, I know, but as ye raise dossiers and information-sharing: I don't suppose ye recall that mage ye were looking into after the Voldrune incident? Did ye keep any notes beyond what ye wrote to me at the time?"
Roper's left hand taps a slow beat once or twice on the table, as his head cocks to one side, his eyes unblinking at Siamus. "Yeah, I remember him. Mental notes. There's not much more than what I told you. By the time I got there, the trail was already dead corpse fucking cold, and getting colder and deader by the day. I had to pick who to chase down, the mage or the buyer of the cannon, and the person who started it was the more important one." He stares at Siamus, but more like through him as he lists off information in a detached, agent-reporting way.
"Mage. Definitely Kirin Tor, that's where the trail hit a wall. I didn't have a way to access their records for a name. Spell was cast with prior knowledge of where it was sent to, and it came out of Elywnn, which means local. Amerith, that crazy badgerfucker, got it from the Darkmoon Faire there. The information of who knew what, and how it got there, and where paper trails stopped, and who didn't see things is what tells me that Amerith probably had blackmail on the mage, either before, or definitely after, because the mage ran and wasn't seen again after transporting it directly to Voldrune, not through the established portals. I lost him around Dalaran." There's a lift of his lip of disgust, or frustration, or both.
"But," Roper continues, as he focuses back on Siamus for real. "The good news is that the amount of mages who could cast outside the leylines like this one did is a short fucking list. He won't be as hard to find than any just decent smuggler who could have just brought it in disguised as other cargo for other reasons under the blanket of war time. Amerith's flare for the fucking dramatic like a fucking amateur will screw him over, if someone has the resources to pull hard enough on that string."
Siamus' smile is cold and humorless. "Someone has." He takes out his by-now-omnipresent notebook, flips to a new page, and begins jotting in his weird half-math shorthand. "Blackmail. Dalaran… outside leylines," he murmurs to himself.
He nods once, sharply, looks up, and tucks the notebook back into his pocket. "Obliged to ye."
Syarra watches this interaction with quiet attentiveness.
Roper eyes the notebook with a sharp glance, curiosity sparking around his brows, but by the time Siamus looks back at him, it's masked behind a twist of a smile as Roper spreads out his arms in an open, magnanimous seeming gesture. "Information, that's what I'm here for. If you're looking for concrete dirt on Amerith, it's a place to start, although with her conveniently dead, Amerith's got a waiting excuse of being tricked by that 'Lady Ravendusk' waiting for him to slip the noose on that one."
He adopts Lester's voice, and mannerisms, all too well, as if he's spent a lot of time around the nobleman, in some way. "'I was but an unlucky pawn in her raven hair and raven eyed game. How could any gentleman refuse the wish of his lady, and a man's weakness for a lady shrouded in such mystery must beg the indulgence of others.'" Roper drops Lester, and flicks his brows up and down, as he watches Siamus with that cold, focused stare.
Syarra does not seem remotely startled by Roper's excellent mimicry. In fact, her face is a careful blank mask, and she gives no reaction at all. She has dropped again the small movements to make herself seem more alive, and simply sits on her cushion like an inanimate statue.
Siamus blinks once and cants his head slightly at the impression, though the mask of his own expression remains in place. When Roper is finished, he says very dryly, "Aye, the late, lamented Lady Ravendusk," and tucks the notebook back into his pocket.
Roper's left hand taps slowly once on the tap, as he reaches for his cold coffee, in less of a mimicry and more of a movement to actually drink it, although he doesn't — just holds it up near his face, as if he were in some sort of drink stand off to prove it isn't poisoned and waiting just a moment more before he'll commit to the first sip. "She end up one of the late and lamented walking corpses after all?"
Syarra waits quietly for the answer.
"No," says Siamus, still dryly. "She was spared that fate."
He deliberates for a silent moment and then adds in the interest of free and mutual disclosure, "She's not dead."
There's a humorless ha before Roper drinks his coffee like a man whose paranoia pays off so often that he has to keep drinking to it, that tic of another tap of his left hand a softened papt on the table from his gloved fingers. "Not that I'm one to point any fucking fingers, but back in my living days, felt like dead people stayed dead a lot more than they do now. Didn't realize we'd become such trendsetters," he drawls, a faint echo edging into his voice. "You chasing her, or you chasing Amerith." It doesn't sound quite like a question, but it probably is.
"I'll let ye know when I've sorted that out myself," Siamus says.
"Amerith is visible," Syarra says quietly. "Ravendusk has removed herself from view. Sometimes those we see are a diversion from those we should be watching."
Siamus tilts his head at Syarra in grim concession. "Just so."
Roper's grin and subsequent low laugh are strangely alive, for just a moment, a brief glimpse at the man he was, as he breaks his stare at Siamus to gaze at Syarra, a flash of real affection and appreciation softening his features. And then they grow cold again, the moment passed, and he drains his coffee dry.
Syarra almost smiles back at him, a lightening of her blank expression, before it fades and she turns back to Siamus. "Information is not my strength, as it is Roper's. But I will also keep my eyes and ears open."
"Thank ye kindly, Mrs. Sunstrike." Siamus nods to her again. "And will ye be coming to visit your sister, or she be coming out here to visit you, during her stay at Fallon House?"
Roper sets his coffee mug down. "You got Westwind still living with you last I heard, which means we're better off not darkening your doorstep. No reason to poke that hissing honeybadger, no matter how good the tea and cakes might be." He spreads out his right hand in a suggestion of a shrug gesture. "Aze knows where we are, and at least with Azuredown out here, it's safer for an elf to walk around and not get a Fuck You, Horde Scum welcome on first glance." That may, in fact, be one of the reasons they're out there. "She's in Outland right now, and we might stop in, but we won't leave Redridge unprotected long. That's our agreement with Tennerow out here. We'll let him know when we're moving on, but otherwise, he and the army out here can count this pass as fucking impenetrable."
Syarra nods agreement, setting her hands one over the other on the table. "I would not presume a welcome for myself. Aze will come to visit me, as she has before. She has agreed to that much."
Siamus nods equably. "Aye, all right, then." He pauses and then asks mildly, "Can ye feel him? In your heads? As with… before?"
Syarra doesn't react to the question in her facial expression, but she clenches her left hand. Roper would notice the low pulse of pain from her ring finger.
Roper's expression goes so sharp that it's like a dark blade, and the smile that twists his face shows a flash of teeth, and another slow, hard tap on the table from his hand. "Well, well. Looks like Mourn is a little less cautious than some of us know to be," he says. It's a good leap of a guess of what death knight Siamus would have heard it from, given the circle Siamus has. "Tsk, tsk. Someone might have to talk to him about how loose his lips should get." There's a midnight darkness in his voice, a touch of a threat directed at Harvey. (Sorry, Harv.)
He leans back, his hands still visible on the table, as he palms a silver coin back into his hand, dancing it wildly over his fingers in a near frantic movement, the rest of him a little too still, as he meets Siamus' eyes with that unblinking stare.
"Yeah. We can feel him. The transfer of power snapped the fucking chains back on. It's how we know Fordragon hasn't fucking lost it yet. He's not doing what fucking Arthas did. There's no control over our thoughts that we can feel. No yoke of slavish worship to him. But he has us all. So, if he ever turns." He flips the coin up, high, nearly to the ceiling, and waits for it to drop back into his palm, eyes blazing. "So do we." An ominous pause as he closes his fingers over the coin in a hard grip strong enough to build up the pain on himself, in echo of Syarra's. "Unless someone breaks us free again."
"Until that time, I hope you remember," Syarra says, in a distant voice, looking less at Siamus than through him. "While we have a choice, we have chosen to serve the Alliance."