The Twins’ Coronation (sort of)
Laz and Vex have decided that freedom from Hell deserves ceremony. Somewhere they’ve found cloaks of scarlet velvet and mismatched crowns made of tankard lids and cutlery.
Laz (raising a mug): “Presenting his eminence, Lord Lazandros Vahl’Quin of the—what was it, Vex?”
Vex: “Thirteenth Vein of Crimson Dominion, you uneducated peasants.”
Garruk: “Thirteenth Vein o’ Goats and Cheese!”
The room howls. Even Kaer smirks.
Before long everyone is butchering the names in chorus. “Lady Vexiara De’Malphyr of the Shadowy Lace of Pancakes!” someone shouts, and Vex collapses laughing until her crown falls off.
The Drinking Trials
At the back table Kaer has been drafted as judge while Borin and Garruk go tankard for tankard.
Borin: “One more an’ ye’ve tae dance, big lad.”
Garruk: “Fine, but you have tae sing!”
Kaer, deadpan, raises a hand like an officiator at court.
“Contestants: begin ruining their livers.”
Two rounds later Garruk’s song has devolved into rhythmic grunting, Borin’s dance is mostly falling sideways, and Kaer is clapping in perfect time without a flicker of expression. The crowd cheers anyway.
The Quiet Outside
Arden slips out through the kitchen door. The noise dulls behind her; the night air smells of rain.
She cups her hands around the small silver symbol of her faith and whispers.
“If necromancy is sin, what is mercy when it keeps someone whole? He saved them all… does that make it right? Or just useful?”
The wind gives no answer, only a faint warmth against her palm—as if even the gods aren’t sure.
The Corner Table
Inside, Elaris and Sereth sit close enough that the noise of the tavern fades to a hum.
Their joined hands glow faintly gold where the marks meet; the pulse of one mirrors the other.
Sereth: “So that’s it, then. Dead once, damned twice, kissed by a ghost. Romantic week.”
Elaris: “Strictly speaking, valuable data for future research.”
Sereth: “Research. You’re impossible.”
Elaris: “Only when provoked.”
She bumps his shoulder, laughing softly, the first unguarded laugh she’s had since Timberfall.
For a moment she grows quieter.
Sereth: “Your daughter… I heard what you told Valthrix.”
Elaris: “Enough stories for one night,” he answers gently. “Let’s not give the dead another reason to talk about me.”
She lets it go. Tonight is for living.
The Collapse of the Court
Hours later:
Vex is a heap of curls and silk on the floor, murmuring fragments of card games in her sleep.
Laz sits beside her, self-satisfied and attempting to convince Borin that Arden secretly adores him.
The dwarf’s beard is red from blushing, and when Arden returns, tea in hand, she smiles politely through his stammered compliments.
Her eyes flick to Laz, a brief golden shimmer of divine reprimand.
He whistles, hands behind his back, and retreats toward the bar with exaggerated innocence.
Garruk snores at the table, drooling; Kaer has vanished somewhere after being forced to clap through an entire dwarven jig. The tavern smells of spilled ale and victory.
The Last Light
Elaris and Sereth are the last ones still awake by the fire.
The candles burn down to stubs, and the runes on their hands fade to a steady, quiet glow.
Elaris: “For once, I don’t mind the noise.”
Sereth: “For once, I don’t mind the quiet.”
They share a look that says everything neither of them needs to speak.
Outside, the wind shifts, carrying the faintest echo of thunder far away—the world moving again after a long breath of peace.
The Ember Tankard — Night of Embers
The tavern is still half-alive with the echo of last night’s celebration.
Banners hang crooked, someone’s left dice on the bar, and a lute lies abandoned by the fire.
The Pale Company sit scattered around their favourite table — the one Borin swears is “officially ours now by right of spilled ale.”
The door slams open.
A gust of cold air stirs the embers in the hearth.
A man steps in — thin, travel-worn, wrapped in a patched red cloak.
He drags a wagon trunk behind him that clinks softly, like bottles or blades.
The barkeep sighs. “Not another collector.”
“Name’s Fenric Vale, relic broker. I’ve come from Embercross with a fine haul — rare salvage from the Glass Plains.
Melted steel, crystal armour, even dwarven forge-marks intact!”
He cracks the lid of the trunk.
Inside, light gleams off a dozen weapons — all glass-smooth, glowing faintly from within.
Some seem to whisper.
Borin freezes, ale halfway to his lips.
Borin:
(low, almost reverent) “That… that’s my clan’s mark. Dawnhammer Forge.”
(His voice hardens.) “Where did you get those?”
Fenric shrugs, unbothered.
“Excavation crew down in the southern fields. Legal charter from the Crown, signed and sealed. You can check it yourself if you’ve got the coin.”
Garruk’s tusks grind together.
“You dig in the Glass Plains? You mad bastard — the ground still burns.”
Fenric: “Aye. But the pay’s good, and the stones… sing.”
The word sing seems to ripple across the table.
Even Elaris’s mark flares faintly.
The glass isn’t dead; it’s alive.
- Kaer folds his arms.
“The Glass Plains? That’s a graveyard, not a market stall.” - Vex smirks, “You’d be surprised what people buy, darling. Corpses make fine currency these days.”
- Laz, leaning over the trunk: “How much for the shiny axe?”
Borin: (growling) “Not for sale.” - Arden: quietly, “If those blades still hum, something binds them. Souls, maybe.”
The hum grows louder the closer Borin and Garruk get to the trunk.
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A faint chant rises in the tavern’s rafters — one only they can hear.
It’s the death-chant of Garruk’s tribe, looped endlessly in the glass.
Fenric:
(unaware, cheerfully oblivious)
“They say the flames of the Plains never went out. Guess that makes these relics self-polishing!”
Borin slams his mug down so hard the table cracks.
“You took these from the Dawnhammer forge.”
“That wasn’t a ruin — that was a tomb!”
The tavern goes dead quiet.
The broker truly doesn’t understand the relics’ nature.
The glass carries necrotic resonance identical to Silvenna Flamehand’s work.
Garruk recalls tales of dwarven glasswork twisted into living weapons.
Elaris leans forward, tone calm but weighted.
“Who sent you, Fenric Vale? No one digs there without protection.”
Fenric:
“A collector, works out of Embercross.
Name’s Lira Ves. Said she represents an order — something about flame and reflection. Paid double the Crown’s rate.”
The twins exchange a sharp look; even they’ve heard that name whispered among infernal circles.
Vex: “Silvenna’s acolytes.”
Laz: “So the witch still breathes…”
The broker packs his trunk nervously and leaves coins for his tab, unaware he’s just dropped a war into their laps.
The company sits in uneasy silence until Garruk finally growls:
“We ride at dawn.”
Borin lifts his mug, solemn.
“Aye. To the forge.”
Sereth sighs softly.
“You do realise dawn is in four hours?”
Garruk grins for the first time in days.
“Then you’d better not sleep.”
Quiet Corners of the Ember Tankard
The tavern has thinned to a low hum.
Most patrons have gone home or fallen asleep where they sat.
The smell of spilt ale and burnt wood lingers in the rafters.
Outside, dawn gnaws at the horizon, but the embers inside still glow red.
Two conversations unfold in different corners of the same silence.
?? Elaris and Garruk
They stand near the hearth, the fire painting both their faces in copper light.
Garruk’s tusks glint, his expression caught somewhere between rage and guilt.
Elaris watches the flames, hands folded behind his back — a calm opposite to Garruk’s storm.
Garruk: “You ever feel it, Bones?
The kind o’ anger that sits in the gut like iron?
Feels like if I don’t swing at something soon, I’ll split in half.”
Elaris doesn’t immediately answer. He studies the coals instead.
Elaris: “Anger keeps the heart beating when grief would stop it.
But it’s a poor companion for the road ahead.”
Garruk: “Then what? I’m supposed to just forgive the witch who burned my tribe?
Watch her rot others while I sit on my hands?”
Elaris’s gaze lifts — sharp, but not unkind.
Elaris: “No. But you could do something rarer.”
Garruk: “What’s rarer than vengeance?”
Elaris: “Justice that doesn’t become vengeance’s twin.”
Garruk snorts, a half-laugh, half-growl.
Garruk: “You sound like Arden.”
Elaris: “She sounds like someone who hasn’t lost what you have.”
(He pauses.) “But she’ll understand when you show her the weight of it.”
Garruk turns the thought over, jaw tightening.
For once, he doesn’t argue. He just nods.
Garruk: “If this trip turns ugly, you keep the others back.
This fight’s mine.”
Elaris: “You forget, big brother,” he says with the faintest smirk,
“we don’t let family fight alone anymore.”
The orc chuckles softly, shaking his head.
Garruk: “You talk like I ever had a choice in joining this mad family.”
They share a quiet laugh — a heavy one, but true.
Across the room, near the window’s weak starlight, Arden sits with her teacup and a patient smile.
Borin ambles over, cheeks already warm from ale and maybe something else.
Borin: “Couldn’t sleep either?”
Arden: “Not with half the Tankard trying to drown itself in drink.”
(She gestures to the others, a hint of humour.)
“Though I suspect you had a hand in that.”
He chuckles, scratching his beard.
Borin: “Aye, well. The lads needed a reason to laugh after all we’ve seen.”
(He hesitates.) “Didn’t mean to make a fool of meself last night, mind.”
Arden tilts her head, eyes softening.
Arden: “You didn’t make a fool of yourself, Borin.”
Borin: “No? Because I recall tellin’ a cleric she’s got eyes brighter than forge-fire.”
Her smile twitches, betraying amusement.
Arden: “And I recall you meant it.”
He blinks, thrown off.
Borin: “You— uh. You don’t mind?”
Arden: “I didn’t say that.”
(She sets her teacup down, tone lighter.)
“But… it was kind. And rare. Not many see me beyond the robes.”
The dwarf grins, trying not to look too pleased.
Borin: “Aye, well. You’re easy to see, lass.”
Arden laughs — a soft, unexpected sound that makes him beam.
Then her gaze drifts toward the window, thoughtful.
Arden: “Your forge — the one you lost. What did it stand for?”
His grin fades a little.
Borin: “Family. Pride. The sound of a hammer tellin’ you you’re worth somethin’.
And when it burned, that sound went quiet.”
Arden: “Maybe it’s waiting for someone to strike it again.”
The words settle like an ember.
For the first time in years, Borin doesn’t deflect.
He just murmurs,
Borin: “Maybe it is.”
A long pause, warm and awkward and alive.
Arden: “Get some rest, Borin.”
Borin: “Aye. And you, Bright Eyes.”
She rolls her eyes, hiding a smile behind her cup.
He catches it anyway.
Morning creeps in — pink and gold through the shutters.
Two conversations end differently but with the same quiet resolution:
old wounds not healed, but heard.
Across the room, Sereth stirs under a blanket, the faint glow of her mark pulsing in rhythm with Elaris’s as he returns to his seat.
For once, there’s no danger. Just the soft hum of belonging.
The Morning After – Departing Thornmere
The Ember Tankard’s yard smells of horses, wet hay, and regret.
Sunlight slants off empty bottles and the faint steam of spilled ale.
Half the Company are still squinting like vampires.
Sereth is quietly strapping her pack to her mare, Ashwing, hair a beautiful disaster — the kind only achieved by equal parts sleep deprivation and bad decisions.
She’s halfway through tying the saddle cords when a certain tiefling voice cuts through the morning fog.
Vex: “Going for the hangover-huntress aesthetic, are we? Very rugged. Very tragic beauty.”
Sereth doesn’t even lift her head.
Sereth: “Going for the Princess of Pancakes and Lace look again, Vex?”
Vex: “What—?”
Kaer, still polishing his sword with the world’s most visible smirk, gestures casually at her.
Kaer: “Might want to check the crown jewels, Your Majesty.”
Vex blinks, looks down—
and freezes.
A half-eaten pancake clings stubbornly to one of her horns, syrup glistening in the dawn light.
And around her waist, very clearly not her own, hangs a delicate pair of lace undergarments.
Vex: “Oh for— LAZ!”
From the other side of the wagon, her twin’s muffled laughter explodes into the open air.
Laz: “It was performance art! You were royalty!”
Kaer: “Princess Vexi, Wearer of Pancakes and Other People’s Britches.”
He gives a solemn bow, entirely deadpan.
Vex’s tail lashes behind her. The pancake slides off, landing squarely in the dirt—
right as Garruk strolls by, grinning like a wolf.
Garruk: “Love me some morning pancakes. Thanks, Princess.”
He peels it off her horn and takes a huge bite before walking on.
Vex: (murder in her eyes) “I’m going to—”
Kaer: “Save your vengeance for the Glass Plains. We’re late.”
Borin strides out of the stables, helm under one arm, already mounted and looking far too awake for a man who downed half a keg last night.
Borin: “Right, you lot! We ridin’ or arguin’? Sun’s not waitin’ on hangovers or royalty!”
Vex mutters something infernal that sounds suspiciously like “royalty this, beard-gnome that.”
Laz vaults into his saddle with a flourish.
Kaer rolls his eyes and follows.
Arden finishes her tea, mounts with practiced grace, and sighs softly at the chaos.
Elaris, of course, looks infuriatingly composed, cloak pristine, eyes still half-amused from the performance.
Sereth adjusts her bow, now gleaming faintly in the morning light.
Elaris rides up beside her, leaning slightly in the saddle.
Elaris: “You look radiant, considering the company.”
Sereth: “Radiant’s one word for it. Tired’s another.”
He smiles faintly, the corner of his mouth twitching.
Elaris: “Then let’s hope whatever waits in Embercross is less exhausting than last night.”
Sereth: “We both know it won’t be.”
Their marks pulse in quiet harmony before the moment’s broken by Garruk’s booming voice:
Garruk: “All right, Pale Company! Time to make the road regret our boots!”
Borin: “Aye! Mount up, and try not to lose any royalty on the way!”
Vex groans, pulling her hood up.
Vex: “I hate all of you.”
Kaer: “Good. Means we’re back to normal.”
The gates of Thornmere creak open as the Company rides out—
laughter still echoing off the stone, hangovers forgotten for the moment.
Beyond the road, the horizon glows faintly with red light.
Somewhere far ahead, the Glass Plains wait, whispering through the smoke.