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| Details |
| Author: | inkie |
| Summary: | Lena Shine arrives in Zouchin Village to join her husband (and Bun) and continue her investigation of the mogu (and Zandalari) motives. |
| Rating: | T for Teen |
The afternoon sunlight is pure, brilliant crystal beneath an azure sky. Everything about Zouchin Province, spread like a quilt beneath the balloon, is shockingly vivid after the mud and snow and barren rock reaches of the mountains. The land unfurls in emerald billows down toward the sapphire sea; blossoms mark the hills like strewn carnelians, and the sun flashes silver off river pools. Even the red-and-gold boats of the Zandalari pulled up on the ivory strand, and the inky char of fishing huts by the water, are vivid and picturesque from a height.
Shine is waiting by the balloon landing, Bun seated faithfully by his foot. Shine has shed the sturdy, drab leathers and fur he wore in the mountains. That is not to say he's not drab: he's Shine. But he is drab in his more usual hues, gray and black and a daring touch of almost black midnight blue.
Bun is not wearing anything but his own dark fur and handsome stripes, and seems pretty pleased with the world.
Shine shades his eye with one tattooed hand as his gaze follows the progress of the balloon carrying his wife.
Lena, up in the balloon, spots the welcome and raises a hand in greeting as the balloon descends. As it gets closer, it's clear she's shed her everyday sturdy wear as well. She wears a thick windwool cloak over a silky dress of deep blue, her blonde hair loosely braided against the wind. No crutches are in sight today.
When the balloon lands, the pandaren balloonist helps her out of the gondola and she walks over toward Shine (and Bun), more or less steadily.
Shine is already moving to meet her, a hand out for hers, a faint smile lifting the corner of his lips. "Lena," he says. "Ye look beautiful." He bends to kiss her.
Bun weaves happily and hazardously around their feet, perhaps hoping to make Lena's knee injury symmetrical.
As she steps in to return the kiss, Bun succeeds in the tripping (but not the symmetric knee injury) and Lena stumbles forward into Shine's arms. She laughs quietly, catching herself on his shoulders, and then she stretches up to kiss him with unrestrained ardor. The pandaren balloon man cheerfully turns back to his vehicle.
"I'm sorry I wasn't here," she says, when she pulls back. "That is, I know you're more than capable, you and your squad, but… I guess it's just… good to see you in person, know you came through alright. You and Bun."
Shine wraps his arm around Lena's waist when she stumbles into him — no doubt to catch her, but then he holds her pressed close as he answers the kiss with equal fervor.
When Lena draws back, he does not loosen his hold on her. "We're all right," he says. "Me and Bun. And the rest of the team. But the Zandalari… here, let's get ye down into the village and settled, and we can talk it all through."
He glances up again at the sheer cliffs towering over them. "Did ye see the… place, up there? The terraces, and the gate?"
"I did," Lena says solemnly, pressing a little closer to him with a faint shiver. "Puts me in the mind of that relief, up in the tombs. Likely what they're after, do you think? Or why attack a little village like this. But… well, let's get down off the balloon landing pad to compare notes."
"I do think," Shine agrees, and glances up at the peculiar mountainside edifice again. "But aye. The village, first."
He stoops to pick Bun up and drape the tanuki over his shoulders and then offers Lena his hand.
Lena takes his hand and lets him lead her down towards the village. She doesn't lean significant weight on him, this time — the knee really must be improving.
"I don't imagine we'll have seen the last of them," Lena says quietly, looking around at the village. It' peaceful now, but it still holds the evidence of battle. Damage here and there, and churned mud where combatants struggled. "Maybe we can fortify this place… somehow. For their own good and for overall strategy."
Shine nods. "We got them armed, did some combat training. Be better if they didn't need it, but the trolls are still about, even if they've learned some caution now. Whatever we can do to shore up the town's defenses — or discourage the trolls — we should." He squeezes her hand gently and then leads her up the stairs into North Wind Tavern. "Are you hungry?"
Bun is hungry.
"I could eat," Lena says. "And Bun looks hungry. We could grab something to take to the room?" She glances over toward the innkeeper and adds in a low voice. "Seems like what we've been doing everywhere. Arming and training the jinyu. Same for the pandaren at Westwind, same here. We are helping, aren't we?"
Shine frowns. "Ye mean, are we bringing the conflict, like that Shado-Pan said? Because I don't think so. The jinyu and hozen were at war before we got here, the jinyu on the verge of being wiped out. The mogu were already burning villages and taking slaves."
Lena shakes her head, and draws a breath. "You're right. It's just starting to feel a pattern, us teaching them to embrace a more martial way of life. But its responding, its all responding to things we've nothing to do with. And we can't very well take on all the defense ourselves. It's just not feasible with our numbers, even if we'd wanted."
Shine nods. "Even when we get the numbers here, we're going to have to focus on the Horde, I expect. We haven't run afoul of them in the Valley or Kun-Lai, but Hellscream's got to just be biding his time. And they do have a camp in Kun-Lai, even if they're sitting put in it for now."
He crosses to the innkeeper, still holding Lena's hand. "Can we get a bowl of dumplings with chili sauce and some tea? I'll be back down in a few minutes to collect them." Bun adjusts his position on Shine's shoulder, his claws aggressive, and Shine pauses and then says, "And a red bean bun."
The innkeeper nods jovially.
Lena follows Shine up the stairs, not letting go of his hand. As they move out of the common room, she says quietly, "It is a bit odd they've not pulled anything against us recently, aside from being a general nuisance on the coast down south. Even those tauren in the Wilds didn't take any action against us, right? And they were there at Stoneplow. And now they sit tight in their camp here. Makes you wonder how much pull Hellscream really has with his people at this distance… or if he's just busy planning some new atrocity."
"Ye know my money's on the latter," Shine says low-voiced, and ushers Lena through a door at the top of the stairs into a small, neat inn room. "The tauren seemed willing enough to stand against the mogu and the mantid down south, but up here — well, they're kin to the yaungol, aren't they?"
"And the Horde do like invasions," Lena says, turning around to draw him closer, now that they're in private. "If they join the yaungol, though, that'll place the Shado-Pan with the Alliance. If they aren't already, after Dane's squad helped at the monastery."
Shine starts to lean in and Bun makes a noise of protest. With a twitch of exasperation, Shine straightens again, lifts the tanuki from his shoulders, and sets — okay, kind of drops — him on the floor. Then he steps close to Lena again to slide his hands around her waist and bend for a kiss.
"Aye," he says when he straightens. "If the Shado-Pan have any sense, they'll have seen what's best for Pandaria."
SQUEAKASQUEAKA says Bun (and Cricket).
"If they haven't yet, they will eventually," Lena says, firmly ignoring the squeaks. It's enriching. Or something. She rests against Shine's chest. "I expect our work is far from done here. I'm to meet with Gwen tomorrow to go over the translation, which I hope will give us more of an idea of what the mogu are planning next, at least. I hope I'm not recalled to the Blanche before we see this through." She pauses. "We can't defend all of Pandaria, but there might be ship movements, now we know of this threat."
"Might be," Shine agrees quietly, and slides a hand up into Lena's hair to hold her close. "But with only the three ships, Fallon has to know it would be suicide to take on the Zandalari. If he moves, he's likeliest to just send the Swift scouting, I expect, and report back to Stormwind."
He is quiet a moment and then sighs and drops a kiss on Lena's head. "I should go collect the food. Just be a minute."
Lena closes her eyes for a moment with the kiss, and then steps back. "I'll be here."
While Shine heads down to fetch the food, Lena gets settled in the small room. She doesn't unpack, but sets her bag by the wall and sits on the bed. With one hand, she tests the softness and creakiness of the bedding. It's an important thing to check. Then she steps back over to her bag, pulling out and unrolling a paper, a sketched copy of the map from the dead troll and mogu team in the snowy mountains.
Bun perks up and offers a SQUEAKA of greeting a moment before Shine steps back into the room and eases the door closed with his heel. He sets a tray containing a teapot and two cups, a bowl of steamed dumplings slicked with red-flecked chili oil, and a solitary red bean bun on a saucer down on the table, and then goes over to Lena to set his hands on her hips and kiss the back of her neck.
Lena arches her back slightly to lean against him, her expression melting into a vague smile. Still, though, she doesn't drop the map.
"We should eat, before Bun decides you brought it all for him," Lena murmurs with a brief, low laugh. "Do you think he'll follow us, when we leave this land?"
Shine squeezes her hips briefly and steps back with a glance at Bun. "Unless we can find locals to take him in, I think he'd better. I don't expect he'd manage on his own in the wild at this point, unless there's a place on the continent where dumplings grow on shrubs and there's no predator bigger than a cricket."
Bun, as per Lena's prediction, is standing on his hind legs and gazing longingly up at the table where his bun (and dumplings, surely) has been placed out of reach.
"If we do manage the Mogu and Zandalari and the rest, there may well be," Lena says, turning to take a seat at the table. "Maybe an outdoor pet at Fallon house? Siamus surely wouldn't mind that, and the countryside's relatively safe. He'd feel demoted, but he'd get used to it."
"Would he, though?" Shine asks dubiously, gazing down at the tanuki.
Would he, though? Bun gazes up despondently at Lena, his beady black gaze agleam with sorrow. He has never been fed in his life. He has no idea how to find food. He is but a helpless babe-in-arms. Babe-on-the-floor, at least.
Shine takes the seat opposite Lena's and pours tea for them both. (Shine and Lena, not Lena and Bun.) "I suppose he wouldn't have natural predators there, at least. And as we'd be bringing him by himself, we wouldn't be infesting Elwynn with invasive tanuki."
Lena hands down the saucer with the bun and a generous bonus pair of dumplings for Bun on the floor before she turns to her own dinner. She doesn't seem bothered in the least by a wild-but-tamed creature eating indoors on the floor of her room. This probably wouldn't fly at Fallon House.
"There's wolves and things in Elwynn, but he's survived worse here," Lena says, thinking, as she claims her cup and takes a sip of tea. "And surely no wolves close to Fallon House, really. Her Grace would make sure of that, for the children."
"No, aye, the wolves don't come out of the forest to the coast." He pauses. "… I wonder what he and Lady Ery would make of each other." He smiles very slowly.
Siamus would hate that smile.
Bun sneezes. Someone put chili sauce on his dumplings.
Lena suppresses a smile for a moment, and then raises her hand to her mouth to laugh. "They'd be a right symphony, wouldn't they? Squeak and clack. And if they got on really well — I wonder how Siamus would feel about pets if it was his own little one doing the wheedling?"
"I believe," says Shine thoughtfully, "that he would literally keel-haul me." He eats a dumpling and says with his cheek full, "But he'd let Ery keep the tanuki."
"Well, maybe we don't sacrifice my husband's life to Bun's comfort," Lena says, with a wry twist of a smile as she reaches out to touch his hand. "I imagine she'd like him, though. Children love playful, furry creatures. Which might sound as well like an argument for pandaren nannies. Provided, of course, that we're all on good terms by the end of this. That no one — " she doesn't say the Horde, but she doesn't have to " — poisons the water, so to speak."
Shine's expression shifts briefly at that, and then smooths again. "I'd say it's an argument against pandaren nannies, because Lady Ery would treat a pandaren nanny like a pet, but as that's how she treats everyone already…." He shrugs. "Sometimes I feel like we must be close to sorting this place out — like how Atley's squad just defeated the sha in the monastery, or we learned the Zandalari plan — and then I recollect we haven't even laid eyes on the Horde hostiles since Jade Forest, and there was that whole business in Stoneplow with the mantid, and for all I know we could be another decade here. Not sure if the navy finally showing up will make things better or worse. Though I wouldn't tell Fallon that."
Lena falls silent at that thought, and she reaches out to take Shine's hand. "I trust the navy will help, and as for the work here… if it goes on for a decade, you and I have got to — maybe we should set a deadline? I'd like Ery not to be a teenager by the time she meets our child."
Shine gazes at her softly. After a moment he squeezes her fingers. "Aye, of course. We'll set a time, and go home for the child. Ye only tell me when, princess."
"Let's say, by the time the year is out?" Lena says, studying his expression. "If we're still here, and still at war."
Shine nods. "That's it, then. By the time the year is out. The war will have to spare us a while." The double-meaning is probably not deliberate.
"It'll have to," Lena says, with a faint steel under her voice. "In any case, there's a chance the mantid might just do their usual raiding, as far as I understand it, and back off. Though it seems like they're not on the usual timing, so who can say how far they'll push things?"
"Can't know that until we know what's driving them," Shine says. "Because something is. But between mogu, trolls, and Horde, our dance card is already pretty full."
"As much as I think our work here is important," Lena says, looking over at Shine, "I hope there's some actual dancing in our dance card sometime in the future."
He smiles back at her. "Ye know I'm your partner. Anytime."
Bun sneezes again. Chili sauce!