Acolyte Demia raised her head with a soft laugh, as the small cauldron before her began to glow, its contents pulsating with a foul, pervasive red.

“How much time, Piztog?” she asked, not moving her eyes.

The imp, swarthy for his species, looked up from the gigantic spellbook across his lap, adjusted his spectacles, and examined the pocketwatch at his side. “Three minutes, Mistress.” He answered in his slow, heavy voice.

Demia reached forward, straddling the cauldron with both hands, her truncheon clanking against its side. “Excellent,” she mused. "Once we’re done here, Farsan will have no choice but to accept me back into his circle. We’ll be able to bring even him to his knees!”

Piztog returned his attention to the spellbook. “Yes, Mistress.” He studiously turned a page. “I believe it might be best to add the fadeleaf compound now.”

Demia had completely forgotten it. She picked up the small burlap pouch on the table, and pitched the whole thing into the cauldron. The glowing liquid came immediately to a boil, and the incandescence intensified. The whole of her small hut was bathed in crimson; the light shone out her windows, likely made her visible from even Ambermill. But she didn’t care. By the time those stuffy sorcerers arrived all they were like to find find were a few empty vials and a light stench of sulfur.

Without any sound or ceremony at all, a glowing, violet rune appeared on the rim of the cauldron. With a gasp, Demia released it, and backed away. “It’s working!”

“Yes Mistress,” Piztog nodded, lost in the spellbook. He looked up, suddenly. “Do you hear that, Mistress?”

Demia was too enthralled in the cauldron as a second rune appeared. “Hear what?”

Piztog closed the book and sprang to his feet, clambering up onto the windowsill. He removed and delicately folded his spectacles. “Someone approaches, Mistress.”

He instantly had her full attention. “What? One of the Ambermill magi?”

“No,” he replied with a snarl. “It is the undead.”

Demia roughly pushed Piztog aside to look out the window. Sure enough, a lone, undead human woman was riding a skeletal horse straight towards them. Demia spun about. “How much longer?” she asked, glancing at the cauldron, where there were not five runes glowing.

Piztog scrambled over the floor to the pocketwatch. “A minute and a half.”

“Then we’ll need to make short work of her,” Demia concluded, walking towards the door. She raised her truncheon. “To me!” she snapped, and Piztog hopped up on the table and leapt across to land lightly on Demia’s shoulder. Demia threw open the door, and immediately began to gather her energies. The horse was running, at a slightly staggered gallop, directly towards the door, his rider beating the reins wildly. Her face, hidden as it was behind a criss-cross of leather straps, was impossible to read. Demia heard Piztog muttering his incantations as he coalesced a fireball in his palm.

Just as she was about to release a spell against her attacker, the horse suddenly veered away, and the rider threw herself off. She released something from her fist, and Demia and Piztog were blinded by a bright flash.

When her sight returned to Demia, the rider was nowhere to be seen, and the horse was galloping brokenly into the forest.

“I have lost her,” said Piztog grimly.

“We don’t have time for this!” Demia shrieked, glancing back at the cauldron, where eight of the runes had materialized. “Get back to the cauldron! I’ll watch the door.”

Piztog leapt from her shoulder and landed at a skid on the table, jarring the vessel.

“Be careful!” she chided.

Piztog nodded, and steadied the cauldron. “We have ten runes, Mistress,” he reported. “It’s nearly complete.”

Just as he finished speaking, a hand shot up from behind the table, and snatched Piztog by the ears. He groaned, tried to struggle away, as the undead assassin stood up, and impaled him through the heart on her twisted dagger.

“No! You can’t!” Demia screamed, turning around, and with a swing of her truncheon, lobbed a black, shadowy bolt at the assassin. She quickly moved the imp, still in the midst of his spastic death throes, to catch the bolt in his face. In doing so, she smashed him into the cauldron, which flew from the tabletop, crashing to the floor and spilling its contents. The red fluid turned clear, exposing the shining trinket beneath.

Demia’s eyes went wide, and she stared in horror as the runes along the cauldron’s edge vanished as silently as they had appeared. She shrieked, and raised her truncheon again, gathering her will to launch another magical bolt. Noticing this, the assassin put her hands on the table and hoisted herself over it, jumping across to kick Demia in the chest. The warlock grunted, and fell backward into the corner, dropping her truncheon, crashing into a barrel and dislodging a shelf full of empty clay bowls from the wall. They fell onto her and the floor, smashing to pieces.

The undead assassin readied her daggers, but Demia merely sat there, and whimpered, tears brimming in her eyes. “You... you’ve ruined everything!” she sobbed. “And for what? How does this concern your kind?”

The assassin sheathed her daggers, and bent down to pick up the small glittering amulet from the pool of water on the floor. “It concerns whoever you stole this from,” she answered with a shrug.

With a wail, Demia slammed her fist on the ground with dejection. The undead woman started, reaching for her knives, but calmed after a moment.

“I have no quarrel with you, Acolyte,” she said, rising to her feet and depositing the amulet into a pouch on her belt.

“Well I have quarrel with you, undead!” Demia fumed, her face red and streaked with tears.

The assassin walked out of the hut. “I’d advise you not to pursue it.”

It wasn’t until the following evening that Layla Du Lac rode Brokenstride back into the Rogues’ Quarter of the sprawling, undead Undercity. The gold and purple lights of dusk shone through the grates in the city’s high ceiling, but no sign of their light existed on the streets and walkways below, overpowered by the glowing green run off from the Apothecarium’s various processes that had flooded the underground canals and sewers.

Layla dismounted, lashed Brokenstride to a signpost, and walked into the great, cavernous district known as the Rogues’ Quarter. There were many wandering about, some dealing with the traders and the small conclave of engineers who also made their home there, but even they, with so noisy a profession, spoke in murmurs and whispers.

Layla made straight for the Deathstalker Headquarters, a shadowy pavilion at the very back of the city. Outside, she saw Mennet Carkad speaking to a young trainee she didn’t recognize, and beyond him, Miles Dexter was teaching a student where to strike someone from behind for a killing blow. Two masked rogues were reading over the notices posted on the board. Layla walked walked past them all into the pavilion.

The lanterns were dim, here, and few faces were not covered by masks or shrouds. It made it easy to find her.

Carolyn Ward sat in the corner, her legs crossed primly, her daggers daringly visible. She looked up at a new recruit to the Deathstalkers, who was haphazardly explaining himself to her, trying, Layla guessed, to justify some failure. Carolyn listened with little interest and less patience. Upon seeing Layla, however, she held up her hand to him. “Later,” she commanded, and waved him away.

The novice rogue glanced at Layla, then left.

Carolyn’s visage brightened, insofar as it could. “Bring me some good news, Layla, it’s been a long, long day.”

Layla reached into her pouch and withdrew the amulet, dangling it from her bony fingers before Carolyn’s face. She grinned, exposing her missing teeth, and untangled it from Layla’s hands. “The Razzashi Talisman... Kaal Soulreaper assures me that returning this to the Weird Sisters will put them forever in the debt of the Forsaken.” She turned away, opened a drawer in a desk whose paint was chipping, and removed a small, jingling bundle and a small envelope. She handed both to Layla. “Your payment.”

Layla took the bundle but stopped to examine the envelope. It had been sealed, at one point, with wax, but no sigil had been stamped into it. The wax, however, was broken, and the flap of the envelope hung open. “What’s this?”

“It came for you two days ago,” Carolyn replied. “And not from any of our usual couriers. It did not travel through the mail routes.”

“You read it?” Layla flipped it around with her fingers, showing the broken seal.

Carolyn shrugged. “Do I get no credit for not attempting to reseal it?”

Layla made no reply. She desposited the sack of coins her pouch, and pulled the letter from the envelope. On it was written, in a neat, minimalist script she immediately recognized, and in Common:

I will be at the Giant’s Table at high noon on Sergeant’s birthday.

Layla Du Lac knew immediately who it was from and what it all meant.

Carolyn cocked her head. “You should tell your contact not to speak in such obvious code.”

Layla sighed emptily, folding the letter. “It’s not a contact.”

“We’re living in dangerous times, Layla,” said Carolyn warily, with only the hint of a grin on her dark lips. “The Scourge, the Syndicate, and the Alliance all want us out of the picture, and all, we are certain, have active agents in place in the Undercity this very moment. I’m realistic enough to know they could be much closer to me than you are and they would escape my notice.”

“I don’t spy anymore, Carolyn,” said Layla impatiently. “I have no patience for lies and deceit. Death’s too short.”

Carolyn seemed unimpressed. She crossed her arms. “Layla, what would you say if I offered you another assignment?”

Layla paused, thoughtfully pressed her tongue to her teeth. “I would politely decline. I would go on to inform you that I’ll be out of the area for the next two weeks.”

Carolyn nodded. “And I would naturally ask why.”

Layla sighed again. “I wouldn’t tell you.”

Carolyn made no move, merely blinked. “You see the position this puts me in.”

“Am I under suspicion? Have I not completed every task the Deathstalkers have put to me? And if I was in collusion with a hostile force and had managed to be so subtle until now, why would they give me away with such an obviously coded letter?”

“So who, then?” asked Carolyn. “Who are you in collusion with?”

“Contact is not collusion,” said Layla.

“Contact, then,” Carolyn rolled her glowing eyes.

“I can’t tell you.”

“Why?”

Layla stuffed the envelope into her pocket. “Because you wouldn’t understand.” She sighed. “I’m leaving, now, and I will not return for two weeks. Stop me if you feel you must but I am leaving.”

She couldn’t say what she expected to happen as she turned. Like most discussions in the Rogues’ Quarter, theirs had not raised in volume as it had in intensity. But if Carolyn had raised the alarm, the entire pavilion would turn on Layla without question. Not that she needed to; Carolyn could have easily dispatched her former pupil on her own.

But she found no knives flung at her back, no blockades formed as she tried to leave. Layla walked from the Rogues’ Quarter without looking back.

Layla did not forget things anymore.

She wasn’t from Lordaeron. Though perhaps that was an oversimplification. Her parents, warriors of Stormwind both, survived the First War of Man and Orc and traveled with Anduin Lothar and his fleet of refugees, and after surviving the Second War of Man and Orc, the Du Lacs had two daughters in Southshore before returning home. Layla, the younger of the two, grew up in Stormwind, but it was a faded painting in her mind, now. Hers was a family of fighters, with a long history within the military. Du Lacs had died in the Troll Wars, as her father so proudly boasted during various lectures, when he would claim that sneaking out at night, neglecting her chores and training, or excessive drinking was dishonouring the memory of the venerated dead. She received these lectures rarely, as she was not frequently caught for her indiscretions. Layla favoured deception at a very young age.

This was not the case with Lyria.

Though older than Layla, it was only by a year, and the two were the closest friends each other had growing up. But where Layla resented their father, Lyria adored him, and embraced his tutelage and strict regime. Lyria found solace in structure, while Layla simply grew restless. Layla often tempted Lyria with talk of late night rendezvous, promiscuous stable boys, and the punch packed by dwarven ale, but Lyria adamantly refused. The only times Layla ever managed to convince her sister to indulge herself was during their summers spent up north with their relatives, the Callows. Even then, Layla knew to keep herself on a tight leash, as anything too deviate would send Lyria back home.

Lyria only ever told on Layla once, the night she snuck out of their home in Goldshire to lose her virginity to the young apprenticing lumberjack Terry Palin. She couldn’t remember his face. She could only remember the softness of his fledgling beard.

Lyria believed that Layla didn’t know about it, as their father had been too flustered to reprimand her for it, but she had heard them discussing it afterward. Layla favoured subterfuge at a very young age. Her father seemed to know this. They never called him “Father,” though, they referred to him by the military rank he had achieved before retiring. They called him “Sergeant.”

The friendship between the sisters nonetheless endured, until they reached the Age of Ascension and were given a choice: get married, or join the Stormwind Academy. Layla gave very real consideration to the prospect of running away for good, but decided she lacked the initiative and resources to do so, and went with Lyria to join the Academy. There, their relationship became strained, as Lyria immediately excelled while Layla fell behind. She quickly became “Lyria’s sister.” Their instructor went so far as to occasionally use Lyria to demonstrate how a certain martial art was executed properly during combat training, and immediately after using Layla to demonstrate common mistakes and missteps. Their instructor was a balding man with a sad-looking face. Layla did not remember his name.

Layla did win bouts. Especially after the first few months, when she began to disregard the codes of conduct and rules of engagement. This behaviour, though effective, held her back and made her the subject of many a reprimand.

After only a few months of this, she was approached by a retainer of one Lord Tony Romano, who, he revealed to her, was in fact a high-ranking member of the secretive Stormwind agency of spies known as SI:7.

In the months that followed, Layla trained under him, posing as one of his servants. There was only one rule to Romano’s training, and that was this: never tell anyone. Aside from that, there were no limits save what she was capable of, and after her time with Romano, what she was capable of dramatically changed.

Layla’s youth, her family history, and her skills made her a primary candidate for a show of camaraderie between Stormwind and Lordaeron. She was one of three SI:7 agents sent to Lordaeron to report to King Terenas Menethil, the sovereign king of Lordaeron. On the night she left, Layla travelled home to tell her father she was leaving for the north. She told only Lyria the true nature of her mission.

Layla would spend the rest of her life in the northlands. Lyria, however, took every opportunity to travel there to see her. She would volunteer for any envoys, would spend any shore leave, or freelance for any caravan that would take her north of Khaz Modan. She would send missives to Layla to inform her of her arrival, and they would meet in secret at a large tree stump in the Arathi Highlands; a landmark they had discovered during their summers with the Callows. Layla knew where it was, but she coudln’t recall the finer details. Which side the knobby stump of a branch was on; whether the stump had been cut or had fallen naturally; the colour of the wood.

They came to know this landmark by a name only the two of them used. They called it the “Giant’s Table.”

Things were different now. Layla remembered everything since her death with remarkable clarity. The first scent she had ever smelled through her dead nostrils was a mixture of mildew, burning oil, and Undertaker Mordo’s embalming fluids, which she likened to recently cured leather. She remembered the feeling of Apothecary Quinard digging maggots from her thigh as she was being embalmed. She remembered her first time in the Undercity, how she accidentally stepped on a cockroach, severing all its left legs from its body. She had watched it, as she walked by, skitter around in circles. She remembered that Fenwick Thatros’ lifeblood, as it splattered on the docks when she killed him, smelled like a birch forest in the fall, and its pattern on the dock looked vaguely like a leaping hedgehog for a fleeting moment before it streaked towards the spaces between planks and dripped into the waters of the Lordamere Lake below. She remembered the undead body she killed better than the living one she had made love to.

It had taken her three months after awakening before she even thought about her family. She had killed a member of the Scarlet Crusade, throttled him from behind with a barbed wire, and on turning him over, had noticed a mole on his neck, in almost the exact same place her father had one. It had reminded her of him, and she had been surprised that she hadn’t thought of him or Lyria at all. She had wondered flippantly what they were up to, or if they were still alive, but put it from her mind with ease. They weren’t a part of her new life. She couldn’t be with them, so there was no point to dwelling on them.

It amazed Layla that Lyria had managed to contact her. It meant that Lyria knew she was a member of the Forsaken, which in turn meant that she knew she was undead. It occurred to her that Lyria wished to destroy her. This wasn’t uncommon enough to discount. There were stories circulating amongst the Forsaken of ones who had been lured into remote areas with promises of reunion with living loved ones only to be ambushed by those former loved ones and their new friends within the Scarlet Crusade, who saw no distinction between Forsaken and Scourge; between free will and bondage. The chances of Lyria having joined the Crusade, Layla reasoned, were less than some, since she lived in Stormwind and the Crusade had largely built its ranks in the northlands, however the Deathstalkers had circulated intelligence that indicated missionaries had been sent abroad.

She couldn’t say why she was going at all. She had never been gripped by any sense of loss or desire to see Lyria again, and the risks were very real. Not only the chances of a trap, but now she had come under suspicion from Carolyn. The trust of the Forsaken was not easily earned, and not to be idly thrown away. Layla had nothing to gain from seeing Lyria. Obviously Lyria would have no place for Layla in her life, unless she too had become one of the undead. And if she was Forsaken she could have simply sought her out conventionally, which meant that if she was undead, she was Scourge, and this was almost certainly a trap. Also obviously, Layla couldn’t bring Lyria back to the Undercity. Killing Lyria would afford her no advantage either. So unless Lyria had decided to meet to simply give her some money, Layla only stood to lose. Unless she hoped to gain something deeper than that.

Layla had loved Fenwick Thatros. If love was a real thing, if anything could love anything, she had loved him. Even now, she could remember what that felt like. She had felt many things during their battle, but none of them had been love. The woman she used to be loved the man he used to be. Neither of them were those people anymore. Still, she felt that killing him would have stirred something in her when she was alive. It didn’t worry her so much as prodded her curiosity. Could she love anymore? Could she feel anymore?

If killing Fenwick had provided no answers, perhaps her meeting with Lyria would. But Layla didn’t feel passionately compelled to know either way. She didn’t feel passionately about anything.

Brokenstride did not tire, nor did most skeletal horses. They retained what intellect they had as horses, and thus drank when water was placed before them, knew which chasms they could jump and stopped before those they could not, flicked flies from their flanks with their tales, and so on. However without the capacity to tire, it never occurred to them that they should tire. Brokenstride was no different. He galloped without complaint, heedless of the stone hoof that gave him his name, used to replace one warped by an embalming anomaly. Most horses ran with a clip clip clop. Brokenstride’s stone hoof struck the cobbled stone with a loud snap, it jilted the rhythm. Clip clop snap, clip clop snap.

It made no difference to Layla. It became the background noise of birds chirping and the wind blowing. Though Brokenstride didn’t think he needed to, Layla had enough sense to rest. They may both have been dead, but their muscles could still overexert and potentially seize up. She made camp every morning and rested for four hours for each of the six days it took her to reach Arathi, but they made excellent time nonetheless.

Layla did not squint as she gazed up at the sun. She had no eyes do be overwhelmed by the blazing light. It hung directly overhead in the sky, at its absolute zenith. If that wasn’t high noon, she didn’t know what was.

The Giant’s Table was not quite so impressive or romantic as it had seemed in her youth. The stump wasn’t even that large; the dinner table in their family home growing up was actually larger, and had any giant actually attempted to sup on it, it likely would be straining to reach past his knee.

It was hewn by mortal hands, Layla saw now, and her memories refreshed themselves. It was neatly sawn off, revealing its many faded rings. Most of the bark had been stripped by the wind or the deer, and patches of moss grew on its roots and its surface. A cluster of wild ivylark grew out of a crack in the side.

Brokenstride grumbled a whinney, and Layla absently reached forward, stroking his spine.

The Giant’s Table sat on a small plateau in the foothills leading into the Hinterlands. From there, they could look out on the major holdings of the Callow estate. Though the farmstead had changed hands since the Scourge invaded, it appeared much the same. So did the rest of the Highlands. Even Stromgarde, from this distance, appeared untouched by the last ten years.

Layla’s gaze caught a chestnut stallion lashed to a tree branch at the base of the hill, digging at the ground with his hoof. Someone was there, that much was certain. Whether or not it was Lyria...

With a rustle from some fifty yards away, Lyria emerged from behind a silverleaf bush.

She had a sword sheathed, and a shield slung across her back. But as she strode towards her, her hands were at her side.

“Layla,” she said. “By the Light, Layla...”

Layla swung her leg over Brokenstride and hopped to the ground. She nodded. “Lyria.”

Lyria appeared much the same as she had before. She had the same face; kind and happy but businesslike, the same short, no-nonsense haircut, and the same lean, sturdy frame. But she was different, in places, as well. Something about her eyes had changed. Her gait seemed more intentional, and her stature more guarded, even relaxed as her arms were. On the whole, Layla thought she looked tired and worn. Though perhaps it was merely days of hard riding.

Lyria was sizing her up too, she could tell, and as she did, Lyria’s face progressively more concerned and agitated. Finally, she murmured: “Light, what have they done to you?”

“They haven’t done anything to me,” Layla replied quietly.

Lyria shook her head, struggling to hold back tears. She suddenly rushed forward, holding out her arms. “I thought I’d never see you again.”

Layla started, took a step back, and held up one hand defensively while the other hovered over her dagger. Lyria halted. “Layla...”

Layla relaxed. “Lyria, I don’t know why you’ve come, and I don’t know what you want...”

“What I want?” Lyria was exasperated. “What I want is to hold my sister in my arms. Layla you can’t possibly think I’d want to harm you, can you?”

“It’s been five years, Lyria,” Layla explained flatly. “Five rather dramatic years. I don’t know who you are anymore and I have no idea what you think of me.”

“I’m your sister,” said Lyria, almost pleading with her. “And you’re mine. Nothing will ever change that.”

Looking at her, Layla knew that Lyria was incapable of this kind of deception. It simply wasn’t something she could do, and growing up with her had taught Layla that. But five years stood between the Lyria that Layla knew and the woman who stood before her now. She wanted, more than anything at that moment, to let her guard down, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t look at the face of a living human and trust it implicitly. Maybe not at all.

“Layla...” said Lyria, a tear streaking down her face. “Please.”

Layla gulped. “Lay down your sword.”

Lyria flushed. “Layla, that’s... can’t you just...”

“I will put my weapons aside if you lay down your sword,” said Layla calmly.

Lyria sniffed, roughly wiping her eyes on her wrist, and drew her sword from its scabbard, laying it on the grass beside her. “You don’t need to, Layla. I trust that you won’t hurt me.”

Layla unbuckled her belt, and laid it across Brokenstride’s saddle. “You shouldn’t.”

“Don’t say that.”

“It’s true, Lyria,” said Layla sharply, turning about. “I don’t know what kind of world you think this is but being what I am, being one of the Forsaken... certain things come with the territory. We don’t have numbers, we don’t have magic or technology that can rival the humans or the Scourge. We survive by striking hard and fast, and free of any delusions of honour or virtue. We are not human beings anymore. Not in the way you think of them.”

“Stop it,” said Lyria, holding up her hand. “Let me hug my sister.”

Layla paused, then stepped forward. Lyria smiled at that, and closed the gap, wrapping her arms around Layla and holding her tight. Layla draped her arm over Lyria’s shoulder. It felt much better than she had expected. But it wasn’t happiness. Not really. It was just a memory of happiness, and even then it was a vague and fractured memory, like trying to remember a pleasant dream. It only served to frustrate her. She was the first to let go.

Lyria wiped her eyes again. “You look much better than some I’ve seen, or heard of,” she said with a meager smile. “Especially the teeth, your teeth look excellent. There’s something about rotten teeth I just find... unsettling. I’m glad yours are still all there.”

Layla sighed. “Lyria...”

“No, I mean it,” she insisted. “I was afraid of what you might look like. I admit I thought I might be repulsed. I had trained myself to brace for the worst, and you’re looking all right, all things considered. And, like I said, the teeth.”

“Lyria,” Layla shook her head. “They’re not mine.”

Lyria tried to stay composed, and Layla sincerely appreciated the effort, but after failing to conceal a dry heave, Lyria doubled over and threw up. She fell to her knees and threw up again. She coughed and cried.

Layla found herself kneeling beside her, rubbing her back with her hand.

“I’m sorry,” said Lyria with another cough. “I just... I didn’t know what to expect.”

Layla sat down on the grass, and Lyria, wiping her mouth, did the same.

“Why’d you come?” asked Layla.

Lyria sat, quietly crying, for a moment, before shrugging. “What else could I do?” She cleared her throat, and untied a waterskin from her backpack, taking a gulp before she continued. “I’d thought you were dead. I didn’t even... I just assumed you were dead. I mourned you. Even after the Forsaken came to power, it... I don’t know, it never occurred to me. When I found out you were still alive, or...” she glanced at Layla’s face, “I mean... when I found out you were... active, I guess, I just...” she sighed. “I knew I had to see you.”

“How’d you find out?” asked Layla.

Lyria shifted uneasily. “That doesn’t really matter.”

Layla raised an eyebrow. “Lyria, what happened?”

Lyria threw up her hands. “I have a friend who transferred to Southshore. They got their hands on a partial list of known members of the Forsaken’s Deathstalkers. He saw your name on it and sent me word.”

“How’d they get the list?” asked Layla.

Lyria said nothing.

“Lyria, our people are at war,” said Layla, ”you don’t have to beat around the bush about it. If they interrogated someone to get the information, just tell me.”

“This is a strange time, Layla. For all of us. I just... I don’t want you to think we couldn’t... I still love you. I know that. When I thought you were dead that didn’t change, and it hasn’t changed now. But I’m a soldier.”

“A soldier in an army that calls me foe.”

Lyria shook her head. She picked a sprig of grass and began to fiddle with it. “It’s not that. But I’ve taken an oath to protect our people, and I love that, too. After Sergeant died...”

Layla raised her head. “He’s dead?”

“Oh...” Lyria dropped the grass. “Of course, you wouldn’t know. It seems so long ago, now. I’m sorry, I should’ve told you right away.”

“What happened?”

“He took sick about four winters ago,” said Lyria, picking another piece of grass. “He fought for months, and the healers did all they could but eventually his lungs just gave out.” She looked at Layla. “Are you all right?”

Layla looked off at the mountains for a moment. “I’m not sure. It’s...” she paused. “It’s hard for us, sometimes.”

“It’s okay,” Lyria assured her with a nod, turning back to the grass in her hand. “I can’t even begin to imagine what you must have been through. Do you... does it hurt?”

Layla shook her head. “No. I dunno, maybe. We can feel. I know when something hurts, it just... doesn’t really bother me anymore.”

“We don’t have to talk about it, if you don’t want to,” said Lyria.

“I just don’t think there’s much of it you want to hear,” Layla replied. Her hand settled on a white clover blossom, and she picked it, smelled it, and idly discarded it. She turned to her sister. She looked at her the way she looked at her sister, and when Lyria looked back, she did the same. She saw past the leather straps and the pall. For a moment, it was like nothing had happened at all. They were just skipping out on their chores while at the Callows’ farm for the summer.

But the moment passed, and much had happened.

“So what now?” asked Layla. “Now that we’ve found each other?”

Lyria looked at her judiciously, pondering, Layla could see, whether or not she should say what she was about to say. “Come with me.”

“You’re joking, obviously.”

Lyria leaned forward, inadvertently putting her fingers into her vomit. She recoiled and wiped them on the grass. “No, I’m very serious. There are people who want to help you, and all the Forsaken. There are some mages from Dalaran who are making real progress. Given time, they can fix you.”

Layla smirked, in spite of herself. “Even if they repaired my body, if they made me one of the living again... Lyria, they can’t fix what’s wrong with me, or any of us. Not with a cure, anyway.”

Lyria sighed. “I had a feeling you wouldn’t. But I had to try. It was so strange... only knowing you were out there, somewhere. Something so close to me yet so far away.”

“It was the same when I was working for Terenas,” said Layla with a shrug.

Lyria narrowed her eyes. “You know that’s not true.”

She was right.

Lyria leaned back. “Did you think of me? Or of us?”

“Yes. Not often. Things are different for us. We can’t live the lives we used to have; it would drive us crazy if we tried. Most of us have to just start over, and try to forget what we used to be and what we used to have. It’s easy. Sometimes it’s really easy. Today’s Lordaeron is nothing like the Lordaeron I lived and died in. Sometimes that world is like... like a dream, or like it’s a book I read about someone else’s life in some other realm. Even walking the roads I walked when I was alive, they don’t feel familiar. They just remind me of somewhere else. I don’t usually get face to face with something from...” She paused as her mind flickered through the image of Fenwick’s head as the glow faded from his eyes. “Something from my past.”

Lyria sighed, and laid back on her elbows. “It’s like it’s the exact opposite in Goldshire. That town’s been the same for as long as I can remember. But everywhere around us is being sucked into the chamber pot. It’s easy to think that nothing’s changed; that the world’s still the same. I’ve caught myself thinking that you and Sergeant are waiting for me at home. But the world’s gotten a lot bigger in the last five years. A lot more... complicated.” She sighed. “Did you miss me?”

Layla turned away from her. “I didn’t think I did... But yes. I missed you. I missed everything. And I’ve missed it for a long, long time.”

They stayed there for most of the afternoon. They talked for a lot of it, Layla largely telling Lyria what the Forsaken were like, touching on some of her assignments in the Deathstalkers, while Lyria mostly complained about the growing decadence of the Stormwind monarchy, and the difficulties of trying to gird the civilian population into a position where it was willing and capable to defend itself. They dropped all pretense, they didn’t guard themselves or censor their conversation to prevent giving each other potentially compromising information. They both knew that that wasn’t what the other was there for.

In between conversation, they sat in silence, looking out over the highlands or fidgeting with strands of grass. They paused at what was probably four o’clock in the afternoon, judging by the sun, to eat. Layla shared her peppered portabellas and Lyria her loaf of rye and Stromgarde Muenster. They also indulged in a bottle of Northshire claret Lyria claimed to have been saving for a special occasion. They toasted their father, whose birthday it was. Though the wine had an excellent bouquet, the sisters agreed it had become subject to an unfortunate bottle shock during the trip. Neither minded, though.

By that time of the evening sensation was irrelevant - it served only as a catalyst for memory. The claret reminded her of the elite wine community of Northshire. The cheese of the annual celebration of Brewfest in Stormwind. The heavy bread of the day-long breadmaking that took place whenever Sergeant came back from a supply run to Westfall with a full stock of flour. The vista was the Arathi plains of her childhood summers. The air, rich with the scent of steelbloom, wild carrot, and dirt, was the air that rustled her hair when she ran off into the mountains. She could swear she could hear the faint cry of Auntie Genavie calling her name.

And Lyria was of course a monster right out of her past, as if her memories had spilled from her mind’s eye into the real world and become a living thing. She was different, to be sure, and so was Layla. But the longer they remained in each other’s presence, the more Layla felt she knew her. Or more specifically, that she knew her enough.

It was strange, being so obviously loved again.

Lyria squinted into the flaring orange sunset descending beyond the densely forested horizon. She sighed, and turned to Layla. “I should start getting back. The Witherbarks get bold enough to stalk the roads after dark.”

Layla turned back. Brokenstride had laid down in the grass, and at her gaze, he righted himself and looked back at her. He was nearly silhouetted against the vivid orange of the sky behind him. It shone through the breaks in the skin around his ribcage.

“Me too,” she muttered absently.

Lyria stretched her arms. “What do we do?” she laid down on the grass. “I can’t just walk away from you, Layla. I don’t even know what that will mean.” She turned her head to look at her. “Will this be the last time we see each other.”

Layla shrugged. “Every time could be the last.”

Lyria rolled her eyes. “You know what I mean.”

Layla laid down as well. “Obviously meeting regularly isn’t really going to work.” Lyria nodded in agreement. “And I can’t imagine delivering mail to the Undercity comes cheap to you.”

“You’re a Deathstalker, aren’t you? Doesn’t that make you privy to some more reliable line of contact?”

“Hmm...” Layla cocked her head, thinking. “Perhaps. You can reasonably be found in Goldshire, right?”

Lyria nodded. “Usually. I go abroad a lot but I’ll always end up back there. I’m far from free-wheeling, in any case.”

“All right, I might be able to arrange something,” said Layla. “It might take a few months to set up, though.”

Lyria frowned. “Well, I’ll be waiting,” she shrugged, turning away.

Layla looked at her. “What.”

“Nothing.”

“What is it?”

Lyria sighed. “I just... how do I know you’re not just going to go back to the Undercity and forget all about me again, forget that you miss everything?”

Layla shook her head. “It’s not the kind of thing you forget.” Lyria seemed unconvinced, so Layla reached over, and gripped her arm. “I promise.”

Lyria didn’t recoil. She put her own hand over Layla’s. “All right.”

With that, Lyria stood, brushing the grass from her clothes. Layla stood, too. They hugged briefly. Layla could see that her sister was on the verge of tears again. Lyria sighed, shrugged, and turned, trundling down the hill to the stallion. She climbed onto him, and waved. Layla returned the gesture. Lyria lightly kicked her horse, flicked the reins, and galloped off into the grasslands.

That was it. She was gone.

Layla sat back down, and looked over at Brokenstride. He hadn’t moved since the last time she looked. She wasn’t worried about the Witherbark trolls. She was a Deathstalker; she knew how to avoid them.

She looked off towards the sunset, and found she had missed it. The horizon still blazed bright orange, but the sun itself had sunk below it. They were lighting fires in the farms of the former Callows. The more industrious bats were flitting about, looking for breakfast.

Layla thought of nothing at all for a long while. The horizon darkened, and in the east, stars began to appear in the sky. It wasn’t until the first chilly twilight wind wove through her bones that she thought of something.

Do you…does it hurt?

Layla laid back, and whispered so low that even Brokenstride couldn’t hear.

“Yes.”