~ Author's Notes ~

The hardest part of shortening the Orgrimar Arc is handling the revelations, admissions, plaintive whining, angsty naughtiness, and blatant disregard of racial boundaries. Cutting down entire scenes into just having the characters tell each other these things is the quickest way to get though this section (that I can think of) and still maintain a semblance of character and plot development. Experimentally cutting out the Plaguelands Arc let me get to the Undercity Arc faster, but the obvious drawback is that if I want to refer to things that happened I have to stop the story to flashback to old conversations.

Reviews are important. I love hearing from people and usually respond to reviews with private PMs. I'm unable to do this with Anonymous or PM-disabled accounts. Please keep this in mind in the future.

~*~ Chapter 80 ~*~

Jetadiah unmounted, standing beside his horse. Corrosa joined him, making a face at him for pretending he didn't feel relief. Her usual position was slightly to the front, but this time opted to stand directly beside. She captured the attention of the larger orcs. It might be a wedding day but warlocks did not keep company with the social graces.

Corrosa spoke: "The answers to your question of 'what is she?' is 'all of the above'. Forsaken, non-undead, druid, night elf, and Alliance. His." She shot a filed thumb bone to the priest. "The Dark Lady tried to keep her and Brill caught fire. The Scarlets tried keep her and their compound caught fire. The goblins tried to keep her and their ship caught fire. Noticing a pattern?"

One of the line cooks swallowed. Corrosa gave him an appreciative look.

The orc under Kayas lowered his brow and locked eyes with the undead warlock. His mind turned over her not-so-subtle threat while his mouth made nice.

"Mistress Fellwitch? If you're here at the wedding feasts at least have some steak and tell me how one can be Forsaken and Alliance simultaneously." Reaching behind he pulled a steak from the grill – without gloves – and held it out to her.

The druid understood now the offer of food was orc propriety, and not anything as intimate as an attempt at friendliness.

Corrosa smiled and ignored his not-so-subtle aggression. "Why, thank you; I thought you'd never ask." She took the sizzling steak, skewering it with sharpened bone fingers and took a healthy bite. It sizzled and smoked in her mouth, but she chewed regardless. "Delicious. No one told me dead wolves taste so good." She returned the orcs narrowed gaze and added, "I've only ever eaten their souls, you see."

The shaman ignored her opinion on how good wolf ghosts taste and looked back at the priest. His question became addressed to the both of them. The priest looked puzzled, and glanced at his companion. She refused to answer, enjoying the meat. It wasn't often she let the priest get blindsided by responsibility, but right now she wasn't going to answer the question for him. The druid always annoyed her and regardless the warlock was not accountable for the answer.

Jetadiah cleared his throat. "I... um. You see. She. Isn't... dead. So. She can't really be Forsaken. That is. They don't accept living members. Well. Not fully accept. There are allegiances. With others. Like her. For the greater good."

Annoyance settled on the priest's face. Up the wall someone pretended to die from lack of air they were laughing so hard. A little crease formed between the elf's black eyebrows. The druid wondered if that was embarrassment as well. Maybe the priest slept through his articulation lessons as a child?

When the orcs wouldn't stop laughing he shot a look up the wall – an attempt to glare maybe? - and got an eyeful of seven orc women flashing him in unison (1). "Lovely," he remarked, unphased, turning his attention back to the shirtless orc in front of him . Before he could speak catcalls poured down, the least of which were suggestions of what they'd do with his hair. The priest glanced away for a moment, refusing to blush with embarrassed.

The warlock took a full four seconds of the attention in strides before turning to look up the wall which made all parties vanish.

The priest relaxed a little.

Chief stared at the pair in annoyance for a good ten seconds. An educated brain worked at deciding how to fix the problem. He would not let the priest put the collar on the druid, nor could he just let her loose in the city: she was not exactly their ally. Finally he sparked upon a solution.

Grinning slowly Chief received a look of dismay from the priest, who knew well what that look meant. The orc smiled at the cat balanced on his shoulder and said with great ceremony, "Welcome to Orgrimar, Druid of the Wild. Please enjoy your stay as my personal guest. For your troubles and tribulations dealing with my less scrupulous allies I'm decreeing that you're off limits to orcs, trolls, and blood elves for the duration of your stay. Not much I can do about the Forsaken though; you did swear an oath."

The line cooks burst out laughing the same time the gathering on top of the wall took up a their merriment once more. The priest's eyes grew large as silver pieces, the intensity of the green glow shooting up to match that of felfire and then back to their normal dimness.

The warlock peeled out one of her characteristic cackles around a mouth of meat. She alone was immune to the decree and elbowed the priest's for sport.

The druid was stunned: What did that mean? Did the Dark Lady tell you about oath? Guest of whom? Who said I'm staying? How come everyone gets steak but me?

The priest hissed, brows pinched, jaw soft, eyes pinpointed at her.

Kayas cowered. Seeing the Dark Lady do it more than once she should have known the High Elves kept that particular trait from their kaldorei ancestors. It meant one thing for both elves and the jungle cats they adopted it from: Now you've pissed me off. The priest was looking at her and making that noise. A fresh spike of fear rip through her nervous system.

Without breaking eye stares with the trembling cat he warned Chief, "You don't want her loose in your city."

The orc kept eyes on the priest. His own brow furrowed in annoyance, as if that hiss were not just directed at the druid. Maybe it was actually meant for the shaman, but the priest knew better than to actually level it at this particular orc.

Chirf didn't say anything. He handed the boney druid her introductory steak and eased her off his shoulder. Once on the ground she almost darted for cover, but a hand appeared in front of her face. She stopped, tucked her tale, and ate like a tamed house cat. Hunger and fear warred, sending shivers down her spine and spiking her hearing up to an almost unbearable level. Meanwhile, the orc, elf, and undead warred over her future. In this moment she hoped the orc one, not just because she hadn't killed her on site and fed her food, but to teach his arrogant opposition a lesson.

The shaman stood and spoke, "What harm can one sick and starved druid do? How much good might come from a show of good will?" His voice bespoke intimate knowledge of both hunger and faith in good will.

The warlock hawked a laugh at that. "You remember that pyrotechnic display with the zeppelin?" Something she'd only done to annoy the goblins for annoying her he-elf. The Dark Lady found similar annoyance when that one was annoyed and parts of her territory burst into flames.

Chief looked bored for a second, "You mean where you set a zeppelin on fire in order to destroy the only neutral ground available to the Alliance inside this city?"

The priest snorted, "You mean that pre-planned display of a controlled crash-and-burn scenario which was done with permission of the ships owners, and cooperation of the Dark Lady, who graciously agreed to pay for the damages to both ship and owners."

Kayas paused in her eating. How come he never articulated this well when answering the question of whether she was alive or undead? Engineers...

Kayas noted the Dark Lady did not offer to pay for the damaged city. Probably by way of passing some annoyance down the line. In lieu of civilized discussions the Horde seemed to prefer passive-aggressive-aggressive displays. The bigger the better.

"Oh, I though you were billing that display as a gift to the bridegroom?" Prep cook two scratched his balding head.

"Did he enjoy the show?" The Forsaken warlock was curious to know.

"Indeed!" Came a call from on top of the wall.

The priest looked up, rolled his eyes, looked back down and rolled them again, He sighed. Not a noise he made often. "Then it was a gift to the bridegroom. From the Banshee Queen and the Bilgewater Cartel. Can we agree it was not an act of war and should not be reported to either Alliance or neutral governments?"

Chief knelt beside the small, trembling druid, responding instinctively to her obvious nervous tension. Her ears swiveled to take in every bump and grind, tail tucked around her paws. His fingers worked their way down her back, massaging the tension. Up her neck they went to the split in the fur where the collar had been. Every loud noise made her jump. She was very exposed and very small next to these huge orcs.

"Agreed," Chief said, "You were going to make a point, Misstress Felwitch." Besides threatening my city if your priest doesn't get his way?

"She's night elf: how long do you think she'll put up with being your guest before she's done shacking up with orcs? That hasn't worked for anyone who's tried it so far."

The little druid yowled at her, choked, colored even in her feline form. The wide-eyed look she gave the pair, meat still hanging from her maw, would have put softer hearts a twitter. She had never heard the warlock talk so much. The priest usually did the talking, though normally they were not in the heart of Horde territory passing thinly veiled threats with battle-slaving orcs.

The orc rubbed the soft spots between ear and eye and sudden pleasure blossomed from scalp to the base of her tale. Who taught an orc to pet cats? That she knew of none were native to this region.

The blue eyes looked on the druid kindly for a moment, an expression she'd never seen before, and he said to the pair, "What harm can an ounce of freedom cause? It did me a world of good."

The priest's expression was flat as he took on his Patience voice. "An ounce of freedom is what I tried when I took the range off the collar. She wound up in the hands of the Scarlet and burned their fortress to the ground. With, might I add, the children still inside."

Kayas yowled again, finished her steak, glared at the priest.

"Children? Burned alive?" Chief sounded concerned she might actually do such a thing. Then he added, "Like how you had the airship set aflame? So tell me how you sanction one and not the other?"

Maybe you should keep a tighter leash on your warlock and none of this would have happened. Kayas wasn't upset at all to hear Brill's razing was to punish the Dark Lady. If the priest though she were capable of harming children he didn't know her at all. The Scourge arrival and the Archbishop's plot had ended most of the mages who would have been able to subdue the fire quickly. It was all just bad timing.

Suddenly she put it together that the baker had been baking moonberry pies 'special ordered' from stolen alliance shipments and that Caspin had given her moonberry pies. Oh, wow... And all those mean things I said about him.

Corrosa finished her steak as well, licked her fingers with an off white tongue and managed to issue a burp. Chief snorted approval. More orc etiquette? Now done eating she opted to defend her client whole-heatedly once more.

"I heard," the warlock said as if she were the foremost authority on the subject, "that a Scarlet warrior named Salira Porter set the fire. Then promptly took off with the children after the fighting was done. They are currently in Theramore enjoying sunshine and Scourge-free beaches for the first time in their lives." Corrosa wrinkled her face at the vile idea of mixing children and sunshine.

The priest seemed to read the druid's thoughts about Caspin. He smiled in a way that touched his eyes with genuine delight. Maybe he wasn't the political mastermine some wished he were but he at least knew who was a pawn and how to use them.

He spoke politely, as if to a friend, "Dearest Caspin sends his regards. Now that he's had a sniff of woman Serz thinks I need to take him to a cathouse."

From the way he said it Kayas could get the gist of what that meant even if half the words didn't make sense.

She growled at him, hackles raising in a rage so sudden Chief pulled his hand back and stood up quickly. The orc stared at her for a moment while the priest's friendly smiled turned into a grin. Then it vanished.

"Oh," he said, remembering. Something sparked in his eyes and they widened a little. His face went blank for a second, she knew he was sorry for saying it. It had only been a bit of a joke, but it hit tender nerves. The implied apology was enough for Kayas to force the rage back, using will to lower her hackles.

How quickly he forgot. It wasn't even that long ago.

It was a week into their trip through the Plaguelands before Kayas' druidic nightmares got so bad the priest tried to find a solution. The first thing he gave her was alcohol. That backfired horribly. Kayas, now drunk and extremely talkative, confessed to not looking forward to the druidic traditions surrounding finding mates. She became uncharacteristically aggressive and threatened to rend the backside of any man who even suggested it and not stop till she hit organs. The following details of said rites had the priest wide-eyed with disbelief until the warlock intervened and sent the seething druid to bed. Since then the priest avoided the subject entirely. At least, till he forgot he was avoiding it and brought it up in broad daylight in front of Elune and the Horde.

In the present a chorus of cat-calls began raining down on them once more. The women on the wall were neither aware of the cat's reaction or the priest eating his words. The stillness of the man suggested it was the first time he'd ever considered his prisoner had gender, let along one that might compliment someone else'. A slight purple hue rose in his cheeks as he looked up the wall wide-eyed at their oblivious comments.

Suddenly evil intent bloomed on the elf's youthful face. "Maybe I'll just drop him off with you ladies instead, aye? Can you give a stripling Night Elf a good time?" He kissed a hand up to the one in the lace bra before returning his attention to the group. The women vanished over the wall in serious discussion. The priest let out a breath of relief; a diversion deployed and bait taken.

Corrosa stood passive, not minding their harassment if her companion was playing along. The blank look she gave the druid meant she was filing away a bit of new information for latter use. Warlocks were well known for their information gathering; a lucrative source of income for thieves and spies. The better to blackmail you with, my dear.

Chief was not impressed. "So if she didn't kill children with a fire she didn't set then why does she need to wear that collar or be denied hospitality?"

The priest's brow almost furrowed. Either claim she did set the fire and was actually dangerous without it or call Corrosa a liar and poke holes in his glass shield. Why was his warlock lying on the druid's behalf anyway? You'd think she wanted the priest to have his cat back, right? The undead woman either knew too much or not enough and either way had her own agenda.

Finally he managed a reply, voice dropping down to a quiet calm. "Because of what she is. A druid of her … kind... is rare." He leveled eyes at the shaman to make sure the other man was paying very close attention. "She causes reaction. Just her presence; just her being. Just a druid. She's unbalancing and rebalancing everything she touches, even without trying. Secrets get uncovered; old boundaries are questioned; wounds get lanced. Things you though were dead and buried crawl out of their grave to take a seat at the table."

Corrosa shifted, almost as if to put distance between the living body next to hers even though she didn't move away.

The Priest slowly dropped some of his pretense, his excuses. Now, he was beginning to show some of his honestly: he collared her to keep gifts under control. Whether Chief would understand that or not would be seen.

If not for remembering the trees Kayas would take exception to having a mana-adict fallen High Elf preaching about the natural order of the world. The trees proved that deep down under all the arrogance and pretty hair he at least understood the balance of fel and Light, of holy and blasphemy. The parody of energies both pushed and pulled each other. Maybe he and the warlock were just circling each other in a similar manor.

The shaman said, "That is what druids do. I won't sanction how you've mistreated her because you find her natural abilities inconvenient."

The priest barked a laugh and said softly, with that cultured voice of his, "Inconvenient? I find it cruel. When she gets real training she'll figure out how to sense the imbalance, undo the damage, and bring back rightness." At her seething look he added, "You're elders are slacking. You need far better training than what they have to offer. To say the least of - " Corrosa slapped his arm to shut him up and that was the end of it.

The shaman stiffened. "So when exactly do you plan to release her so that she can get this training? And from whom?"

I have teachers, thank you. Releasing me would be nice.

"Therein lies the problem."

I don't owe you for my life anymore. Release me already.

"Her own people were training her."

The druid remembered her trainers, Malawyn and Terrin. They would be missing her at night when the stars came out and they sat together around the Elune stones and discussed the purpose of life and the balance of all things.

Kayas couldn't identify the notes in the priest's voice when he said, "They were doing it wrong."

Now she bristled. Malawyn was a fine druid; she knew three forms. She was the only one in Auberdine who could invoke the bear spirit in order to teach Kayas the ways of channeling rage into healing, or thickening her hide like bark. Terrin was an herbalist and skinner who's days were spent tending to the spirits of trees, plants and fallen animals. Kayas learned from him how to sing to the trees and listen to the fay spirits around her (2).

"I refuse to believe they don't know how to rear up druids."

Considering Cenarius chose the Kaldorei to teach druidism to, we know better than anyone. Even the Tauren are not our equals in all the world.

"Not this kind of druid."

Kayas disagreed. She had a place in Darkshore, in Ashenvale. It had been two years since she'd come out of Feralas and Elune granted her the strength of the bear. Even being displaced did nothing to quell her true nature: she led the charged in defense of the enclave against the Scourge. No caster could have done that. Her gifts were the feral hearts of beasts so what else was there?

The shaman was not accepting that unconvincing answer, no matter how much conviction delivered it. "Can you be more specific?"

I'd surely like to know why you've stopping me from continuing my training.

"No."

A look akin to pain crossed the priest's face. He broke eye contact with the orc and looked down. Neither the orc nor the druid took it for contrition. Though the man struggled not to give an answer his face did not remain as silent as his lips.

Chief took a slow and deep breath. "You know the best thing the Banshee Queen ever taught me?"

"I have a feeling I'm about too."

Chief continued, "That if there is a transgression and someone is clearly in the wrong, it's not abuse of power to just pull rank and fix it. If you can't give me a clear cut reason you took this child from Darkshore than the Horde won't protect you from night elf retribution."

That added another layer to Kayas' suspensions this orc was not ordinary. He didn't cook steaks for a living judging by how burnt all his were. Was he gifting a mountain of blackened meat to the wedded couple? She also doubted 'chief' was a nickname here the way it was for humans, who gifted everyone from managers at retail stores to old horses with the title.

"Actually," Corrosa said using a new tone of voice Kayas could only liken to a lawyer, "the Dark Lady has invoked the Ratification clause of the Forsaken's Horde charter. Jet owes her, not you or the kaldorei."

The druid blinked, tilted her head, studied the warlock. It wasn't the vernacular which caught her attention, but the way the name of her race rolled off the woman's tongue. Natural. Smooth. The way those who spoke Common as a primary language couldn't often replicate. The warlock eyed her back. Kayas filed away a bit of information for latter use. Warlocks were not the only collectors of secrets. A druid who mastered the stealth feline form need not hire spies to do their sleuthing.

Chief responded with, "Ah."

For his part Jet looked slightly confused. "I don't owe the Dark Lady anything. She tried to kill my druid, then handed her over to the Scarlets. Amongst worse sins." A withering look brought him to a stop. The warlock pretended she hadn't heard any of that.

The Forsaken women continued, more for the priest's benefit than anyone else. "The Ratification says that any cross-racial laws which are broken which causes the undeath of a member of another race are nul and void if that person chooses to become Forsaken. Only if they choose to go to the fire may their survivors seek justice, and those actions can only be taken against the Dark Lady. Not against the Forsaken, and certainly not against any other members of the Horde." A hand held out towards the priest indicated that he was covered under 'other members of the Horde'.

Kayas noted the charter neatly allowed the Forsaken to recruit with impunity from any race not a member of the Horde. The Forsaken were probably told to avoid infecting anyone who might be missed by those who could raise the army it would take to wring justice out of the Dark Lady's hide.

You'll need all Elune's luck to get anywhere near her, let alone kill the thing.

Chief cleared his throat. "So you mean to say that when the Banshee Queen made her Forsaken and inducted her into the ranks it was an effective method of protecting your elf," he pointed to the priest "from retribution from," he pointed to the druid, "her elves?"

The priest's head snapped up at the vulgarity of such an idea. Sylvanas protecting someone?

"And that," the orc's deep voice continued, "in doing so the druid agreed to let the Banshee Queen bring the wronged parties to task for her unfortunate un-un-dead? So that now the priest owes the Dark Lady the debt instead of the kaldorei people?"

Jetadiah's face darkened without changing shades. The world should know better; not even the best diplomat could spin the Dark Lady's assault on the druid into something altruistic. A politician might be able too, though. The woman just wanted him stuck to a strand of her web closer to home, and now he owed her a debt for an assault she perpetrated?

Damned politics.

~ End Notes ~

1) Anthropology: Orcs- Teacher: Kisendra Moonblade* - Subject: Culture

Orc women are man eaters. They chase tale like human men chase females, only not half as vulgar. They're notorious for seducing any man who held still long enough and some who tried not to, adding it to the glory lists they swapped with each other. The more complex the better and bragging rights abounded. Some of them even had jewelry or tattoos made for exceptional conquests.

The druid only knew this from tales told to her by a sentinel-in-training friend who was firmly instructed to always come between female orc and kaldorie men. According to *Kissy, night elf males were the cream of the conquered, so to speak, and orc women were known to go to lengths beyond lengths to get a chance at one of them. One even got herself incarcerated and it took seven years to seduce her jailer, but when she did she broke free and had his name tattooed across her thy. That he pursued her to the ends of Tanaris and out into the sea to cut the name from her flesh was the legend in the telling.

2) According to the name of the spell Fairy Fire and the animal called a Fay Sprite, it's suggested that Blizzard intends there to be faeries in this universe. While doing research on druidism for the Undercity arc I came across real life instances of singing to plants and working with fay spirits (also called sidh and deva). Not only did one of the suggestions on the website help me finally keep a basil plant alive (after the fourth try), but fay spirits will heavily influence Kayas in latter chapters. This note is to let you know what I mean if I use the terms "sidh" or "deva" instead of "faerie". I'm not fond of "faerie", as it invokes tiny humans with sparkling wings and gives way to much human influence to a spirit that is decidedly not human in the slightest.

Draft fin: 2/18/16