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| - Naiama had informed Creel she was going to visit her father; she knew it was ambiguous, sudden, and left him with a perplexed smirk. Now she sat on a bench next to the older elf, leaning against him. He hadn't had any recent outbursts, so it was reasonable to let him out for a walk to resemble a civilized being. Memories of Darkshore flooded her head then. A certain feeling of vagueness greeted her when she reached back to her childhood, like a misty veil over her eyes. It would not lift until her father spoke in their native tongue. As he spoke the hold she had on those events floated gently away as driftwood. “Child, forgive me. I have...felt so strange, so lost, without your mother. I fear I will never be the same again.” His word usage almost stuck Naiama to the quick. She was not fully adult by elven custom. Sometimes she felt at odds with the world, colliding with both Kaldorei and human culture. She turned her head to look up at Py'amus. His moments of clarity were almost as painful as his delusions and episodes. “Ah, Father. Don't fear for the past now. We must both seek...the future,” she hesitated as she spoke the words. This theme had entered her life on many occasions. Time never leaves, but would the time ever come? An endless spiral, a coil, a circle. The Kaldorei stared down at the blue parchment. Three months, she mused as she stroked an earlobe. And more silence. It's as if all those events have faded completely to silly dreams. Empty promises, luckily for me, she thought. As her father slept, Naiama continued to look down at her journal, the page blank and clearly not writing itself. Was there anything more to write? It didn't reveal any secrets to her, not now. Things were at a stand-still. Py'amus was not recovering, the Scourge were defeated for a time, her job was the same. Was it a stand-still or a slow decline? Or entropy? Even the nightmares had ceased, leaving Naiama's life eerily quiet. Those nightmares had kept her on edge, and in them she had observed her enemies far more than in real life. Could everything be lethargic? Night and day meshed in Darnassus, due to the timeless feel and her adjustments living in the kingdom of Stormwind. A torpidity slowly came over her. She carefully placed down her elven owl quill and watched her father across the open flat as he slept. It was eating him, it was plain to see. The grief and madness had given Py'amus a sunken, thin appearance, even though he was cared for by the priestesses. Naiama listened to his breathing and studied the rising and falling of her father's chest under the silk sheets of his bed. It happened too quickly for her to notice her mind slipping from alpha to beta and beyond. Nocturnal though she could be, sleep came as a late messenger to the fort. But rather than pounding on the door it simply broke down the wall. Her head dropped over the table and onto her open journal in a bout of this drowsiness. There was a strange flash, something on the last edge of consciousness. Reptilian, blazing red and blue. When her eyes opened and she lifted her head, a moment later to Naiama, hours later to the rest of the world, she was startled to see Py'amus kneeling beside her wooden bench. “Ah, fair sister, forgive me for disturbing you,” he said in a smooth and entreating voice. He sounded a hundred, if not a thousand, years younger. Naiama gave her father her signature frown in confusion, her brain trying to follow the body in the process of waking up. There was very little recognition on either of their faces. “I could not help but watch you. Maybe you've seen me before? For I do believe I've seen you, sister. Often.” He paused in his smooth, old elvish, expecting something. Now she was awake enough to realize Py'amus was again reliving his past. It was exhausting to fight it every time, and he usually became quite upset. It was shameful as well, especially his horrid display in front of Alkan when he confused the young human as Connolly, a man he met during the Third War. “Father, it's not –” she began. “I've seen you and your regiment guard the area. I know your sisters have been called to serve the druids in the Wastelands, but you are still here. Praise Elune,” his eyes glowed brighter and a roguish grin illuminated his face. “I am Py'amus Wildblade. I am swifter than the owl in its flight, more agile and more silent that the nightsabers...” he continued on in this courtly manner through expert elvish. Naiama distracted herself by desperately attempting to figure out the proper way of breaking her father from the dementia he was locked into. Then there was a small pause from him, as if someone was speaking to him in that moment. “Ah, most beautiful Arianis Greytree,” he whispered and bowed his head. His frustrated daughter sighed down at Py'amus as he took her hand in his. She narrowed her eyes then recoiled when he brushed his lips against the back of it. Naiama quickly stood from the bench and gathered her things. After slamming her journal shut, she shoved anything she had left out into the pouch at her waist. “Arianis,” he repeated dreamily. She looked up again, more purple in the face than previously. “Stop it! Enough of this, Father! Please!” she yelled louder than she had intended to. Py'amus' expression immediately contorted between a young lover, a withered old man filled with emptiness, and an enraged father. He finally stood and gazed darkly at Naiama. “Sister Sentinel, why do you reject me so cruelly?” he took a dangerous step toward his daughter and made to take ahold of her arm. A shadow was over his face; it was nothing she had ever in her life seen from him. It filled her with a dread she had only known from enemies. It dawned on her that this was far beyond an overreaction to the imagined rejection of the woman he was wooing. This was not like him. Naiama was younger and not worn down like he was; her body was agile and ready. She dodged away in time and hopped onto the side railing by the table, one arm extended and brandishing a small, shimmering skinning knife. “Father, you were right. You won't ever be the same. My prayers go unanswered and my love is crushed. Let it go. Let her go!” her voice strained, which she could barely hear over her own beating heart. Py'amus' upper lip curled and he stepped forward again, making Naiama flinch where she crouched on the railing. “I will never let you go. You are mine!” A shadow passed over his face, changing it even more. It became red and reptilian. Fangs appeared and he snarled, “MINE!” He leapt onto the railing in the same instant that Naiama jumped down and back. She barely gave her ankles time to absorb the shock and sprinted away with a furious roar. Darnassus felt different. It was no longer welcoming. Her true family, dead or insane. She wanted to leave, she wanted to be away; she did not bother to look behind her in case of pursuit. Naiama ran away from her father, hoping to lose whatever she had seen. It was ironic that the last time she remembered running in this city she was seeking Py'amus out. Through the magic portal and to the port village of Rut'theran she ran, all the way to the long, bending piers. She didn't stop until she hopped the nearest cargo ship heading for Auberdine, shins and hands colliding with the wood boards as it moved out to the Veiled Sea. She collapsed on a hammock below decks and tried to catch her breath. She closed her eyes for an instant longer than a moment. Behind her eyelids there was another flash of the same being. Had she imagined the metamorphosis of her father's face? Leaning her elbows on her knees, she let her head hang in her hands. It felt like something was catching up to her, but she didn't understand what. Her brain began to pick at the recent events. Her father had never meant her harm before. But that face, once in a her dream, then....She thought again if she could be as delusional as Py'amus. The rhythm of the dark, grey waters beneath the ship made her sway on the hammock. No, it was real, she told herself. But was that really her father? He wasn't himself, she decided, close to what she had stated aloud earlier, yet she hesitated from thinking the same harsh claim – that all prayers were lost. The young elf didn't have much more for Py'amus except an expiring offer from the Magistrate Poynard to “have a look at him” that made her a tad uneasy. Her glowing eyes wandered around the dimly lit room, almost certain her large ears had picked up a hissing voice. Sleep it off, she commanded herself. Sleep it off. Decide what to do after you've calmed down. After you've rested. Yes, sleeeep. The area was filled with blood, but the chair across from her was still empty – there was no one standing there; there was no one and nothing. It started to bob up and down in the sticky iron liquid. Perhaps an invitation was still needed, but she would never give one. Now the table, the vast plane that extended, became an orb. In the cold darkness it glittered. Encircled by Things. Things more empty than dark, floating chaotically around the orb, like moths to a lantern. The orb turned slightly, then grew larger. A shadow passed over it, much the way her father's face had disappeared. Only this shadow could wrap around it and squeeze it tightly. So it did. The orb was wrapped in dark coils, where no light could pass through. Appendages like scythes reached out from over the coils. Encircling all, and approaching closer and closer. Closer these black claws came to wrapping themselves around an insignificant form. A similar feeling...forever falling. Downward, down, down, down. Spiraling down. A deja vu of sinking eternally down into the deep. Naiama awoke when she felt the thud of her body hit the wood deck. She had fallen from the hammock during the crossing, but that wasn't all. The elf shuddered and stood with a wobble as the boat moved to and fro with the waves. Stepping out to deck, she blinked at the orange ball of the sun balanced over the grey sky and black sea. Darkshore. Apparently the crew didn't notice her, nor care. Apparently they were already docked and unloaded. She wandered off the merchant ship, minding the gap between it and the pier. It was unreal to her; to be running away from her own father one moment and waking up to an empty ship another. As she walked up the pier to Auberdine, the elf inhaled the old combined smell of sea and forest. It was what she grew up by, when most others were at the heights of Hyjal. Bare feet pressed into the moist sand. Crabs crawled back and forth between the sand and receding water, but they were none too eager to get between Naiama and the ground as she meandered down the beach. Peace of mind... Naiama immediately dropped her black boots from her hands and pulled out her skinning knife, as if it could protect her from a voice. She spun around, eyes darting from the trees to the ocean; she felt nothing. No outwordly presences, only the beasts and the relentless murlocs over the grassy dunes. It was decided by Naiama that the forest was more preferable. Warily, she lowered the knife and turned east. She didn't fear the beasts, even if they were tainted. Once she reached the path, the huntress sat to wipe her feet and replace her boots. Stones were rougher than sand. Still she viewed the environment around her, not desiring to be taken inadvertently by anyone or anything. At some point she received a message from Elithe about Creel, but she did not retrieve her hearthstone from her pouch. She needed this time to be absolutely alone. After an hour or so of strolling down the path, albeit more tensely than before, she paused. Were there any snakes around? No. There weren't. Not of her own volition, the elf collapsed on the spot in a sudden wave of sleep. MINE! The coils were no longer around the orb. They were around her. Squeezing the blood from her body, pouring from her ears, eyes, nose, and mouth. The scaled coils were blood red themselves. Naiama screamed as loud as she could, shouting out to Elune for help. She clawed the scales with her own nails, tried to attack was holding her down. The kaldorei tore her eyes open with a dreadful scream as a fanged reptile's face hovered dangerously close to hers. It took a moment for her to recognize her faithful windserpent. Kethinal brought his blue head closer to hers and nudged her cheek. He fluttered backwards to coil over her arm and body, like he often did. But this time, Naiama burst into tears. His feathered head caressed her cheek and his serpent eyes watched her passively as she wept. After some time, she began to calm down and understand her surroundings once more. Slowly she sat up, Kethinal close by with wings folded. Her mind began to rationalize the terrors. Dreams lie, she reminded herself. Kethinal only meant well, he only meant to comfort her. He was always close by. Always. She inspected her body and the immediate area. Leaves and dirt were strewn about from some kind of struggle. Her trembling hands were covered in dirt, down underneath the fingernails. Glimpsing at Kethinal, she hissed in a high-pitched tone to signal him and started to head north for Auberdine. That is, once she found the path. Her last memory was telling herself not to fall asleep on the path. Still shaking, she pulled out her hearthstone then but didn't bother activating it. More time was needed to let the events from the end of the week settle. ((For the days of July 11th-21st, 2006.))
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