Out of Deathknell

The spider that killed him did not pause to consider the Light. Night Web’s Hollow is an old gold mine northwest of Deathknell. The Forsaken want the gold still in it; the Night Web Spiders want what walks in after it. One of them got to Ghoulsbie first.

His corpse lay on the webbing and wet stone with the same grey-green face the grave had given him, dark hair matted, yellow eyes still open. His spirit stood over the body the way a disappointed officer stands over a recruit. Ghoulsbie looked irritated to be charged twice.

He had earned the visit. Before the mine he finished Scavenging Deathknell for Deathguard Saltain, picking through boxes so the next corpses out of the ground will not walk away naked, and Rattling the Rattlecages for Shadow Priest Sarvis until the Lich King’s leftover skeletons were thin enough to satisfy him. He finished Rediscovering the Light as well — the Injured Deathguards he had left waiting last time — and the heal still burned going out of him. Aramis Hammerhand had said it would.

He had already granted Marla’s Last Wish on the way. Samuel Fipps, who murdered his own wife after the plague took his mind, is buried now beside her in the first row of the chapel graveyard. Novice Elreth hoped they would find peace together. In Tirisfal that is a great deal to hope.

Executor Arren needed the spiders cleared so someone could take gold out of that hole. Aramis needed something kinder. A Light in the Darkness: the freshly raised fools wrapped in silk along the tunnel walls were the proof that not even death can stop the Light. He cut them out of their cocoons and thinned the spiders enough for Arren to call it a start. Then one of the ones still left in the dark made a better argument than his blade did.

He rose again, because that is the joke of his kind, and went west of the chapel into the hills. Coming to Terms: not every paladin who climbs out of the dirt can bear being the thing they once hunted. The Frightened Paladin wanted no hand and no sermon. She chose a clean end over Forsaken life, and Ghoulsbie granted it. Aramis said he would say a prayer to the Light for her.

The Scarlets came next, because they always do. Arren’s scouts had found a camp southeast of Deathknell — Converts and Initiates who will not rest until every undead, Scourge or no, is ash. Ghoulsbie took their armbands up the ridgeline under those sickly shafts of light Tirisfal calls a sun.

Then he took their messenger. Meven Korgal had come down from the Scarlet Monastery with papers Arren wanted more than another corpse. The Red Messenger died in front of his tent, and among the boasts and scouting reports Arren found a map of their field commanders.

Vital Intelligence sent him north out of Deathknell, east at the fork, past Cold Hearth Manor — once known for warmth and harvest, known now for neither. Calvin Montague pressed a nondescript letter on him for Innkeeper Renee. Deathguard Simmer sent him west to Solliden Farmstead to steal ten pumpkins from the living humans who still farm there under Scarlet protection. He took the pumpkins, crossed Nightmare Vale, and accepted Gordo’s gloom-weed errand without slowing down.

Brill received him the way Brill receives everyone: with more work. Executor Zygand took the Scarlet documents and immediately handed him a war: At War With The Scarlet Crusade, a wanted notice for Maggot Eye, and two quieter tasks named Discipline and Patience. Innkeeper Renee at Gallows’ End Tavern accepted Calvin’s letter, claimed it was from her dear old mother, then told Ghoulsbie to get lost when he failed to look convinced. Apothecary Johaan took the pumpkins and sent him back toward the tavern cellar with a laced one for the Captured Scarlet Zealot. A New Plague is not a name that hides its intentions.

He learned to cook and to bind a wound in town, which is more useful than most sermons. The road paid him a little; the trainers and the town took a little more. Outside Brill, Eleanor Shackleton made him sit by her campfire until the night felt, briefly, like something a person could rest in.

He stood still in Tirisfal with Brill’s lights behind him and a list that had only changed shape. Shari Stilwell is still waiting to continue his training. Maggot Eye is still wanted. Zygand’s Scarlets are still encamped. Johaan’s pumpkin is still meant for a zealot who does not know what he is about to eat.

Deathknell is finished with him, more or less. The rest of the glades are not.