World of Warcraft®

Threads of displaced energy crackled and slithered like serpents as the carriage wallowed through a time-slick rip in reality, snapping suddenly into the golden Court of the Sun. The carriage settled for a moment, as Buck took the time to adjust his beret and pocket the purse from which he had paid the travel tithe. Headquarters brushed small tendrils of temporal static from his surcoat, the pause granting the passengers a windowpane glimpse into the City proper.

The luscious, golden avenues snaked around the balconied spires lining the Court, rich billowing scarlet curtains catching the cool morning breeze as it funneled through the impeccable streets. Floating flowerpots lined shimmering avenues, the overhead sun nestling upon every corner and boulevard like a radiant blanket. There was no escaping it, no screens or overhangs beneath which to lurk. At every turn was a reminder of the Sun, its luminescence casting a beautiful facade over Silvermoon, City of the Sin'dorei.

Liore Bloodwing quieted almost instantly, recrossing his long legs with clear discomfort. Choir, who had been ear-to-ear'ing the whole ride, turned her smile out the window, somewhat less daunted than her lord.

“Right then. Lets -head- on in,” Buck grumbled overhead, earning an overzealous snap of the reins for his cleverness.

The carriage lurched onward, the forsaken steeds trotting them down an eastern split, to the Farstrider's Square.

Neither of culture, or of the case did Liore say another word. He just sat still, peering unhappily out his window. Something familiar would catch his eye, and he would restrain himself from tracing its passing with a longing stare.

--

The morgue was not a far drive, the trip made quicker still by the roar of skeletal warhorses and the snap of the Inquisitor's flag. As the vehicle sped along the sun-kissed streets, merchants howled a little softer and noblemen adverted their eyes. Guardsmen gripped their shields tighter, and wanderers found somewhere else to posture and pose. Word of the murders had gotten people jumpy. The arrival of an Inquisitor made them downright paranoid.

A robed gent smoked a pipe outside an enchantment shop, chewing thoughtfully on the old, worn wood. He scrutinized the flag as it whipped by, and shook his head.

“Bloodwing. That was Bloodwing,” came from his right. A duelist, rummaging Smoker's wares for something that would compliment his new falchion, stepped out from the doorway, to hiss the name and spit in the street. A broom floating along of its own accord paused its dutiful milling to sweep at the spittle, leaving behind a moist smear.

“Hindeed. Must be the Nightguard murder what's awakened him from his lair.” Smoker snorted a ribbon of grey smoke.

“Bloodwing,” the duelist repeated, his noble upbringing stretching sharpening his vowels. “Well. What of it. That... stray will not be hurting you or I any.”

“No? What makes you so certain?”

“Mm,” the swordsman continued, turning back into the shop. “We aren't -related- to him.”

They shared a laugh.

--

The black carriage came to a grinding, sparking halt, rocking stiffly as Big Bucket leveraged his mass down from his seat and tugged open the fine door. Before them rose the golden arches and twisting steeple of the Blood Hall. The exterior of the garrison had been decorated with the vast, hanging tabards embedded with the deep red and black of the Blood Knight's order, as befitted their quarters. This was their nerve center, armored figures strutting here and there with imperial swagger, a pair of scantily clad gold statues overseeing the single promenade stretching back to the Square. Rows of knights trained their craft down the street. Those without post, or possessing an unhealthy amount of curiosity, loitered within and without the vast Hall, to gawk, glare, or sneer at the uncouth steeds and their gothic luggage.

Choir hovered out first, contemptuous of gravity, and studied the dozen knights arranged nearby while Benoite and the inquisitor emerged. Buck offered the Archivist his arm, and she accepted with graceful gratitude and alighted with an appropriately concise curtsey. The big forsaken then turned to offer Liore his arm as well, putting on a mocking smirk. The Sin'dorei hopped out unassisted, planting the heel of his boot on Buck's foot. They eyed one another with mock wariness, the big man chuckling and turning to shut the carriage door. Headquarters folded one leg over the other augustly, snapping open the day's newspaper and making a big deal about inspecting it with erudite care. It was upside down.

Three figures marched from the Hall to greet them. They wore the heavy black plate of their caste, traced and chased with an awful scarlet. Shields on their backs rattled against blunted pauldrons, the insignia of the Blood Knights stamped on every conceivable surface. Thick, master-craft swords hung in loose scabbards at their hips. Liore had seen those weapons at work minutes before, cutting swift arcs through the air and severing young blocks of wood.

The leader of the trio, a seal of scrollwork hanging from his pauldrons, bore the ribbons and presence of a Knight-Lord. The Blood Knights were not to be outdone, or out-ranked, on their own turf. This might lead to a problem. An Inquisitor could make anyone's life difficult, but a Knight-Lord could slow his investigation, if he wished to dispute jurisdiction and regulations.

Liore's hand drifted into the fold of his peacoat, and he retrieved a small black wallet, flipping it open to reveal his badge; the dreadful Horde emblem, a silver I slashing beneath its curve.

“Liore Bloodwing, Horde Inquisition. Lordaeron Order,” he said. “And my agents.”

“Knight-Lord Reynve Riverflare,” boomed the decorated Blood Knight, his brilliant red hair tied back into a low tail, his green eyes bright and hard with distrust. He nodded over his armored shoulder.

“Knights Emberbane and Firehand. We have awaited you, Inquisitor. The Magistrate sends his regards. Now please. The morgue is this way.”

Knight-Lord Riverflare stormed off towards an alcove littered with long, startlingly blue silk sheets. Liore shared a final glance with Benoite, his thoughts uncharacteristically discernible. I hope you are ready for this.

He followed the Knight-Lord. Choir floated along behind them, still eyeballing the tall arches. Buck placed himself behind Benoite Dawnsong, gripping his lapels and encouraging her with a covert wink. His well-dressed figure provided a stable barricade between her and the two accompanying Knights, one of whom appeared to be having a stroke.

.

.

.

(Yet another eloquent and amazing chapter! I hope Mr. Stupid knight gets a good spanking!)

[ You'd like that, wouldn't you. ]

(Maybe, YES! Stupid, stinky, mean, yet probably handsome knight!)

It took this, standing in Riverflare's spartan office in the rotting belly of the Blood Hall, bereft his weapon and his gun, without the powerful shoulders and soothing psyche of his agents to ease his burden, without the caustic and demure wit of his aide to deliver him from the adder-tongue of Sin'dorei society; it took this to make Liore feel truly and deeply dejected. Alone with his demons.

I like the way you struggle, one, cast in gold, whispered. But you know I'm here to win.

He did not part with his armaments by necessity. Morgue regulations or no, he was a damned Inquisitor. He could roll up in a goblin war machine and nuke the walls down, just because he couldn't think of any good reason not to, were he so inclined. As surely as he unbuckled and extended his rapier and revolver to the mousey clerk, he had offered an olive branch. I will play by your rules, if you make this quick for me.

Reynve Riverflare did not get the memo.

“Trade seems well. In the Undercity,” the militant elf droned, perched behind his spare desk with steeped fingers. The posture suited him, Liore decided, leaning his own slender frame against the opposite wall. Predatorily. Out for blood. The precision in his low thrum betraying the effort he mustered to seem insouciant.

The office was a small room with little ornamentation that did not serve an immediate purpose. Shelves stylized with the upward curves of Silvermoon's feathered emblem, plump gold columns supporting scarlet-trimmed walls. A wooden cabinet, with little golden pad-locks, the bent edge of a neglected page pinched in one of the doors. Unlit anti-magic torches hung from golden chain plaques. The entire building was lousy with them, little void zones that would flare up to siphon and consume magical energy of any design. To discourage unwholesome experimentation within, Liore figured, as much as to defend the garrison from without.

Of the two flat-backed chairs sitting opposite Riverflare's desk, Liore had chosen neither. He loitered near the closed door, simmering with impatience. How much longer he could stand to humor this needless protocol was a universal mystery. Buck and Choir waited out in the hall, just far enough to lend the officers their privacy. As the blood rushed behind his ears, he had to legitimately restrain himself calling them in to rearrange the Knight-Lord's furniture with as much prejudice as physically possible.

“The price of ghost iron has risen,” Riverflare continued, his pupil-less eyes locked in what Liore imagined must have been an intimidating glower.

“Has it.”

“Surely the discerning investor will adjust his stock to compensate.”

“Surely.”

“Textiles, however, will remain Sylvannas' prime export. Particularly in wartime.”

“Naturally.”

“Though Undercity would do well to expand into mass smeltery, don't you think?”

“Nnh.”

“Perhaps import richer, rarer metals from less populated lands. Uldum, Nagrand...-”

“You are wasting my time,” Liore growled.

“-Northrend,” the Knight-Lord finished, resting his chin atop his steeped fingers. A cat with feathers in his grin.

The Inquisitor froze and hardened into a statue, his eyes falling to the floor.

But you know I'm here to win.

Reynve Riverflare pushed through the silence, rising to his feet as the Inquisitor sank deeper and deeper into some fathomless, personal hell.

“I know who you are, Bloodwing. I know what you've done. The Council knows. Your days of playing guard dog have ended. Your order may be corrupt enough to turn aside from justice, but you cannot outrun your reckoning!”

The Knight-Lord rested a hand on the pommel of his short, masterful sword, stepping around the edge of his flat desk like a duelist circling his foe. He grit his perfect teeth and glared his revulsion at this short-haired husk of an elf. With his sharp coat and his badge.

Liore said nothing, the name of that frigid hellscape occupying solely his partition-less mind. Everything returned to him in a strangling rush. He could just as well have been standing there again, on the precipice of oblivion. The harsh northern winds ripping the life from his limbs and her name from his lungs.

“Confess, butcher,” Riverflare hissed, slinking closer. “Confess your sins and cast yourself upon the sainted benevolence of our Light. The Council may then deign to look upon you with merc-”

Knight-Lord Reynve Riverflare, brandishing his blade over two-thousand slain in the name of Quel'thalas, at his prime and with a hand on his weapon, did not see it coming.

It snapped to him in a bone-jarring blur, forcing him back against his desk. A booted foot crushed his hand down against his sword's pommel. A gloved hand flew into his mouth and pinched his tongue. Liore Bloodwing loomed over him, traces of black electricity slithering violently along his shadow. The A-M torches flared a baleful black, their flames writhing like serpents bolted to the walls.

When the Inquisitor spoke, it was with a cold, professional calm, weighted with menace.

“Listen here, you insignificant little insect. I have played your game of papers and I have dawdled with your procedures, and I have allowed myself to be brought into your pitiful little den with the hopes of closing this irritating case and quitting this loathsome pit of a city before I inhale any of its myriad diseases, and how do you respond, but with your sword and with your threats.

“Lets us speak of secrets. I have plenty. I have secrets that would hollow you out and cast you aside as though you've never been. That is the nature of my profession. You have secrets of your own. That is fine. Until you plant yourself against me. You are impeding my work, Knight-Lord, and that is beginning to erode my patience.”

Reynve became very, very still. It was to his credit that he did not simply soil himself, the weight of the Inquisitor's hatred bearing down upon him so. The torches crackled and sputtered in their valiant efforts to contain it.

“Where my patience has diminished, my authority will rise in its stead. And then, Reynve Riverflare, you will pray to your 'Light' that I do not take an interest in -your- secrets.”

Liore detached himself and stepped back, gripping the paladin's armor and setting him up on his feet. The A-M torches died out one by one, the rage leaking from the old warrior's posture. The Blood Knight held his gaze bravely, as he chewed the sensation back into his mouth, nursing his crushed hand. Shock and dismay warred with his handsome, flushed features as he struggled to process the sudden shift in control. He would not be cowed into submission, as a lesser being may have been.

But he was also smart enough to know when he was eclipsed, in rank and ability.

Reynve eyed the dark Inquisitor, who had reverted almost instantly to his former, indifferent self, pout and all.

“I have an investigation to see to,” Liore stated cooly. “We will not speak of this...repartee , and you and yours will assist me as I deem appropriate. When I am through, I will leave your City with all due promptness, no greater a hellhole than when I arrived. Do we have an accord?”

“What the hell are you,” Reynve spat.

“Do we have an accord.”

“Yes... Inquisitor.” The title tasted painfully on his bruised tongue. He gestured for the door, smoothing out his tabard and following the mad dog out.

A younger Riverflare would have charged Bloodwing then and there, thirsting for vengeance. But he had beheld the hellfire swarming in those terrible eyes. What he witnessed there had aged him, too. And while at the moment he did not feel very proud about being Reynve Riverflare, he privately thanked the Sun that he was not Liore Bloodwing.

-Ssssssk.-

Daisy sucked the moisture from her metal teeth, baring them as she often did as she frowned down at the cauldron before her. It was suspended on a spit in the corner of the cathedral's makeshift kitchen, simmering and steaming and putting on a bouquet that was gloriously scented. At least it she figured it was. -Felt- like it would smell good.

“Can we eat it yet? Can we CANWE?!”

Nibs flounced upon the very tips of his toes, his cherubic little nose barely breaching the elevated rim.

“Dread-Ben says its fer lunch and din, newdead. Means not to touch til then, it does.” The dead woman folded her arms, revelling in the spare authority the Dreadmissus had awarded her by asking her to keep vigil over the simmering meal. It was a dominion she occupied naturally, shooing away even the most curious of Guttersnipes who happened by. To be fair, most were lured by the singular rarity of the kitchen ACTUALLY being used, but Daisy wasn't about to take the chance that one of her brothers in arms wouldn't try to snatch a spoonful. Then we'll see who catches hell. Daisy, that's who.

“But its almost lunch!” Little Nibs squeaked, pointing at the old grandfather ticking away across the room.

Daisy, who could not tell time, simply shrugged. “Not to touch! An thass final.”

“Butbut. How are we gonna know if its good? Aintcha supposed ta taste-test somethin so you know its good enough?”

She gave the little rascal a distrustful fish-eye, before pinching the petals of the flower protruding from her useless eye socket.

“...got me there.”

With a 'woohoo!' Nibs scampered off to find a bowl. He didn't get very far though, his feet churning up a couple year's worth of grime from the cobblestone floor. Daisy had him by the collar, his little legs pumping like locomotive pistons.

“Hold yer chickens there, coop. We dead folk cant taste nothin. Wouldn't tell the difference, good or not.”

Nibs deflated, mooshing face-first into the floor. Daisy scratched her ragged hair in equal defeat. They had a real problem here.

It was then that Ser Sulliven Twinkie Blunderpuss, the General of Meow, the Philanthropist of Fur, the Cheshire Fat, waddled in from some other mischief to help oversee the meal's preparations. He stared pompously at the simmering cauldron, plunking his girth down just out of reach -as is the manner of a cat- and announced himself with a portly meow.

Daisy and Nibs looked upon the cat, then back at one another, and proceeded to grin conspiratorially.

-Sssssk.-

((I am not yet finished with my turn. Please forgive the page break; this next part requires a bit more alteration.))

Life is divided into milestones, events of such great and inescapable moment they attach themselves to you forever. It is how you recover from these trials that defines who you are, and who you will become when the dust has settled. For the rest of his short years, Liore Bloodwing would remember every thought preceding this milestone in particular: the calamity in the morgue which sparked the chain of events that would ultimately undo him.

He was rounding the corner that snaked back to the reception area, all black marble flooring and feathered scarlet drapes, with Riverflare matching his impatient gait. Bucket and Choir were in tow, with a nameless pair of Knights marching behind. They had appeared, Liore believed, to lend some weight to whatever righteous ends the Knight-Lord had prepared.

Simmering still with residual agitation, the inquisitor had his eyes fixated on the floor. The polished stone was relief from his compulsory observations; it was quite enough to have become so worked up, to have the case spiralling about the maelstrom of his head, without the temptation of passersby or cheap decoration threatening to dive in. It was beyond his control, and pitiful in its way. To be locked in a state of perpetual analysis.

The poison of his eyes flickered up around the bend, to behold Benoite Dawnsong perched as an effigy atop a hard-backed chair. A thought emerged from the tide of his thoughts, shambling from the depths to howl for his attentions. And his painful frown deepened, and the wound beneath his eyes threatened to weep.

Liore realized with startling clarity why the girl disconcerted him so. He had seen her before.

In his youth, an epoch ago it seemed, taking his lunch in the Academy's courtyard. She stood across the grass, attended by a gaggle of peers and vassals alike. Again, he had glimpsed her, as a young man in attendance at some derisory affair in a highborn ballroom, adorned in a queen's gown and timeless jewelry. With heart-rending virginity on her pout, with the promise of sin in her eyes.

They had collided during his soldierhood, upon a blood-drenched field, the dead mounded beneath their feet. Hundreds more rushed the pair, as the duet wove a waltz of de-creation through their ranks. Her armored form drifted like a phantom, her twin weapons scything with a demi-goddess' effortless precision.

There she was again, hovering on the peripheral of his broken mind in the waking hours. To smile upon him and harvest light from the black cavity of his chest, before evaporating eternally from his memory. Each morning, less and less of him remained to face the day.

And here she was at last, as they closed the lid and lowered her coffin into the cold earth.

Benoite Dawnsong was each of these, and others that Liore couldn't remember. They had touched his life, some briefly, some forever, because he recognized in them an affinity to himself. A kindred spirit.

It was a harrowing realization, that this girl, sent to tend his papers and organize his operations, possessed a soul the same vivid, anguished colors as his own. What had befallen her, in her fewer years, that was so potently tragic as to rupture her so? What had she survived, to have become so empowered?

As they walked, Reynve Riverflare mistook the doleful leer the inquisitor had placed on his secretary, for something more tantric.

“It is gracious of you, to have employed the poor girl.” They continued down the hallway, the Knight-Lord regaining his stride. Shaken, he was, but not stirred.

“How so,” Liore asked.

Reynve looked at him. “Why, because of the- You do not know?”

Liore just coiled his blonde brow at him. A silent reminder of his failing temper.

“It... is not my place,” Reynve decided, nodding with -to his credit- a sincere meekness.

They reached the desk at last. No hint of the incident in Riverflare's office could be discerned in their manner. The matter was truly decided and done with. Only the case remained.

Bloodwing watched Benoite for a moment. Surely to allow her to finish her paperwork, nothing at all to do with how effortlessly she twisted his interior.

“The Knight-Lord has been most accommodating, but we will be con-”

He saw it, then. The glint of silver on the black floor. The tug of her sleeve, the slant of the scarlet kerchief about her soft throat. Knight Firehand nowhere to be seen.

Restraint, damn you. For a change, restraint.

“-tinuing our investigations immediately. He has agreed to see us to the morgue personally, with a compliment of his men to render assistance, should we require them.”

Old instincts, honed by centuries of violence, caused him to glimpse at the stasis lockers behind the reception desk. They composed shelves and cabinets, hard black wood, an invisible stasis field securing the contents. Overcoats and purses occupied one half of the lockers, weaponry and gadgets the other. His revolver and sword were laid upon a rack, accessible only by the clerk and his enchanted ring.

The sword was a gift from Inquisitor Bleikja Solcatcher, its thin, double bladed edge inscribed with spiralling glyphs of power, its ornate hand-cage a timeless piece smithed uniquely for the measurements of Liore's right hand. The Inquisitor Solcatcher, with her flare for the dramatic, had named the weapon Dansenzeal, an old word describing the fervor of close quarters combat.

The gun was just a gun. Its purpose was singular and loud, with a brutal kickback, as Curly's forehead could attest.

Liore would have been more comfortable, possibly, with his weapons on his person, but he had sufficiently censured the Knight-Lord enough for one day, and decided to permit the enforcement of this less significant custom. They were stepping into a morgue, after all. Its occupants wouldn't be so violently affronted by the intrusion.

Funny how things turn out.

.

.

She matched him in the hall. With her stride, that is.

Reynve and the Inquisitor took point for the descent, the downward slant of the marble flooring into the bowels of the massive garrison. And while their respective agents quick-stepped in line, she had worked her way from the back, to his side. Liore sensed that Benoite Dawnsong had much she suddenly wished to say, or to see. It was in the directness of her stare, the intent of her stride. The white queen was urgent, the red tapes of their social standings straining against her resolve.

When they reached the bolted double-doors at last, and the Knight-Lord waved his palm over a small scrying device set in the wall, Liore stole a glimpse of her, came away distressed.

Defiance.

She defied him to reveal his worst. To test her with his truth. There had been something in those falsely colored eyes that he had witnessed for years now, in every glance and in every glare- from everybody. But it was gone now. The fear had left her, the uncertainty of him. Benoite had come to some startling conclusion and this had freed her. And glimpsing the true span of her unfettered wings unnerved him gravely. How she could soar-

With an ethereal ping, the thick double-doors pulled apart. A fog of cold drifted immediately from the morgue. As he stepped inside, Liore pulled off his peacoat and wordlessly slid its broad shoulders over small Benoite's frame.

The morgue was a long, dismal room, two stories of shelves and steel sheeting. Anti-magic torches hung from dark chains. Stainless steel autopsy tables, half a dozen, stood bolted beneath hanging overhead inspection lamps. Locked storage units lined the walls, like some metal card catalogue for a library of the dead. Hard, bright light cast blinding cones in irregular rows, illuminating coolers, suspended tool trays, the industrial marble tile of the floor. The chill was an insiduous thing, creeping up from the floor like some bone-numbing serpent. The smell alone was terrible; alchemist's chemicals and the unnatural stench of decay.

Thick, white sheets covered figures laying still upon the tables. Toes, like rubber, stuck out from each sheet. Little tags fluttered against the strain of unseen fans humming vainly against the reak.

“You're here. About damned time.”

A shadow detached from a dim-lit wall and strode purposefully into the central autopsy bay. The overhead light revealed a tall, grim Sin'dorei woman with an open lab-coat and operating mask, her unremarkable hair tightened into a dutiful bun. Reynve gestured thinly and his men took up station by the door.

“Mortician Aloisia Whitewhisper, this is Inquisitor Bloodwing. He is here to-”

“To take up half my damn day, is what!” the Mortician growled. She directed her ire to the unhappy looking blonde with the thin tie and the sharp vest. “Have you any idea the backlog you've caused? We should have moved this product hours ago, but here we are. I have -seventeen- other customers to attend, Mr Bloodwing. Seventeen.”

Bucket nudged Ms Dawnsong with a private smirk. Like peering into the future, hey girlie?

Liore cleared his throat. “All apologies, Madame Mortician. Give me but a few more minutes of your time, and we will be out of your hair for good.”

Diplomacy wasn't so painful, was it? He even affected a properly abashed expression, his head tilted in a fractional bow.

Aloisia Whitewhisper regarded him and his cronies disdainfully for a moment. Just like the Inquisition, to come slithering in here and making days long for folk with -real- work to be done. The sooner the better, she decided, and strode to a table apart from the rest. She stretched on her tippies and tugged an overhead string, and harsh light bloomed down upon the mutilated form of Vasiliy Nightguard.

“Here's your man, Inquisitor. What's left of him, at the least.”

Choir covered her mouth, smothering a silent squeak. Even Buck, an undead soldier, frowned a little deeper. The fate that had befallen Ser Nightguard came into startling clarity, and it was not one you'd wish on even your worst of enemies.

The order to step out was nearly on the tip of his poison tongue, Liore realised. But he decided Benoite Dawnsong should stay. Let her see. What she had truly been committed to. He pinched his tiny, pince nez seeing glasses from his vest pocket, and perched them atop his nose. He snapped a pair of operating gloves from a nearby tray, drawing them over his lean fingers with calculating purpose.

Vasiliy was laid bare upon that stainless steel table. He was a well-built Sin'dorei, top to bottom the lean physique of a man who took care of himself. But his face, his face was gone. Shredded meat replaced it, tendrils of rent flesh hanging by threads from his ruined throat. The skull was fractred with a single hole in its center. There was no lower jaw. The blood-stained white of Vasiliy's spine protruded at an unnatural angle from his neck, severed.

Gruesome.

Breakfast threatened to visit.

Liore held his breath, steadied his nerves. And began his inspection.

He reached into the lumpen mass of poor Vasiliy's head, turned it this way and then that, leaning closer to squint thoughtfully.

“Cause of death?”

Aloisia almost laughed. “You're kidding.”

“Specifically, what killed him.”

The Mortician touched a gloved fingertip to the bridge of her nose. “We are pretty sure getting his face ripped off did it. Or it might have been the bullet that blew out the back of his head. Or maybe, and I'm just throwing this out there, maybe he had a heart attack when he saw- whatever the hell coming at him.”

“Seems a bit of overkill, wouldn't you agree?”

“Well, yes. Any one of these things would have done it.”

“But which -did-,” he insisted. Aloisia shrugged. She had been holding off her own examination per order of the Inquisition.

Liore ran his fingers down the body's sides. Deep in the ribs, he slid a fingertip into a wound, finding a second one on the other side. “Stabbing. Lungs and heart, yes?”

The Mortitian nodded to this. “Preliminary examination suggested short-blade work, cutting the internal organs. We won't know until we open him up.”

The Inquisitor leaned forward again, his attention returning to the pulp of the body's head. Whatever he was seeing, he wasn't sharing. It disturbed him plenty, by the tightening of his brow. He grunted, snatched a tiny pair of tweezers from the nearby tray. Plucked something fine and thin from Vasiliy's throat, and gestured. The mortician provided a small transparent baggie, into which he dropped the stained pinchers.

“Dry scale. I'm guessing wind serpent.”

Benoite recalled Everheart, and stepped forward to accept the little evidence baggie. She followed the Inquisitor's unspoken logic; discern the species of the attacker, trace the stables. Find a name. She spotted something, the clever girl. Swimming as she was with the agonies she carried, she spotted something peculiar, and stared hard at it.

Liore's poison eyes flickered to her. Observed. And turned to follow her gaze. His blonde brows lifted, and he motioned Buck over.

“What do you make of that.”

Big Bucket adjusted his tweed cap and leaned over the corpse, giving the stab-wounds the old fish-eye.

“Huh.”

“Right?”

Aloisia stomped. “Well?!”

“The angles,” Ben Dawnsong observed in a bellish whisper.

“Quite right, Archivist. Look at how the blades would have had to enter the body, to leave wounds tilted at that angle. You can't hold a weapon like that, it would break your wrists.”

Now that they mentioned it, Aloisia saw the slit-thin wounds were tilted upward, strangely. It was as if Vasiliy had been stabbed mid-flight, parallel to the ground.

“A gunshot, straight to the head. A mauling, and stabbings on either side,” she concluded. “It was the headshot that got him first.”

Liore nodded, chewing his lip thoughtfully. “The bullet reaches him, throws him back. Spoils the sword-strokes. Critter gets him while he's on the ground. Goes for the throat, trained.”

Bucket snapped his fingers. “Three attackers. Working in concert.”

Bloodwing shook his head, straightening stiffly. “I am not convinced. As pointed out, that would be overkill. The accuracy, we're not dealing with passionate serial murderers. This is cold and calculated. But to what end-”

Hello. What is this? Liore craned down again, pushing aside uselessly folds of flesh to inspect Vasiliy's spine. Barely perceptible, but they were there. Some manner of scribbling on the vertebrae, too blurry to make out. Before his eyes, the scribbling started to take the shape of words, dozens of them. And then hundreds. Writing, golden writing was spreading through Vasiliy's bare bones, at an alarmingly quick rate. Why hadn't he seen this before?

And suddenly, Benoite Dawnsong could see everything.

(More inc.)

Incredible storytelling! You are both truly gifted.

Nothing short of downright impressive, as always.

Eagerly awaiting the continuation!