The True Deception

                The wind whipped across the frozen vale, the weather of Winterspring as unforgiving as always. Leaning against a snowy bank, Braeth’el gave little acknowledgment to the biting cold, his leather armor and fur lined cloak keeping him warm enough and his thoughts distracting him from the discomfort.

                Things had been bothering him for a very long time now. Pieces of a puzzle he couldn’t see felt just beyond his grasp. He’d spent the last few months hiding in Silvermoon, slowly gathering a following of mercenaries and House Sunfire troops that had managed to avoid being incarcerated by the orcs that held the estate. Once they had left, as Braeth’el had known they would have to eventually, he had finally reunited with Kyliska and presented her with a renewed military force that gave her options. Options that the split with House Spellblaze had temporarily taken from her.

                Although their reunion had been a happy one, Kyliska’s continued brooding and underlying rage had worried Braeth’el. Between it and the nagging feeling that he was missing something important, the urge to act was almost overwhelming, and so he had ended up here in Winterspring on a little mission that he’d kept from Kyli; better not to get her hopes up… or her rage.

                The valley below contained a solitary, abandoned Highborne ruin; a tower sticking slanted from the snow as if a giant had kicked it when it had grown tired of playing with it. The snow-covered fields before it were seemingly abandoned, with random ice elementals wandering here and there with no purpose. Or at least, that is how it seemed. Braeth’el had not survived as long as he had by taking things at first sight. If one watched closely, the ice elementals were not wandering randomly but were actually patrolling in set patterns that were widely dispersed in time to make it appear that their actions were random.

                The patrolling creatures only deepened his suspicions and confirmed his objective. He’d brought his team here using all the cunning House Sunfire had left to it. Tracking the Highborne that had been Biara was easy enough; she’d left all sorts of magical traces in Sunfire Estate, from jewelry to the remnants of the spells she’d cast. Tracking such signs lead one in a million different directions all over Azeroth. The Highborne was busy, and her sanctuary in Feralas was not the only place she’d prepared as a precaution. Braeth’el had come up with a different plan though, one that hinged on his inner suspicions and that was now bearing fruit.

                He’d gone through Biara’s things. Things that she wouldn’t have thought were important. Her clothes, her undergarments, her make-up; anything that had been hers that she’d left behind. Within these objects he found a very old jewel that Biara had enchanted long ago when she was an adolescent. It was one of her first spells, and she’d affixed the jewel to a ring at her naval that made her mother furious. He smiled as he remembered it. Selun’athiel had called it a ‘pompous display of very poor spellcraft’ and had forbidden the young Biara from wearing it. But she’d kept it all these years, lost in one of her jewelry boxes along with all her other old effects.

                Scrying spells cast on that jewel in conjunction with the Highborne’s leftover magic had lead not to a million locations, but to one singular location here in Winterspring. Braeth’el had found the cunning creature… or he had confirmed his suspicions.

                He rose from his place on the ice-covered ground, gesturing to the two Sin’dorei with him. Both of them stood and began to walk beside him as he descended into the valley towards the tower. They were the last of House Sunfire’s apprentices, and the most skilled at magic given that they had survived the Highborne’s wrath. It was they who had helped him with the scrying spells, and he’d taken them with him so that Kyliska couldn’t ask questions until he returned. As they strolled casually towards the tower, several of the ice elementals turned and began approaching them rapidly.

Braeth’el grinned, making a curt hand gesture when the creatures were about twenty yards away. Instantly the snow around the elementals erupted and Sin’dorei assassins appeared seemingly from nowhere to strike the creatures down with enchanted weapons. As they fell lifeless, Braeth’el continued to move towards the tower, the two apprentices in tow.

The structure was even more dilapidated up close than it had appeared from a distance. Even so, the doors were sealed with magical wards that were obvious even to a non-magic user like the Spymaster. He gestured at them, and the two apprentices began to work, weaving magic to unravel the door’s wards. Other Sin’dorei approached and attached grappling hooks to the tops of the stone portals, prepared to pull them down once the spells were removed.

The tower was one Braeth’el had heard of in passing. A place where Malandrae Moonwhisper was supposed to have survived the Sundering thanks to her magic. It was tales of Malandrae that had first sparked Braeth’el’s suspicions. There were so many unanswered questions about Biara’s highborne identity that made little sense.

How on Azeroth could Malandrae Moonwhisper have kept such a thing a secret? The thought of the air-headed elf not blurting such important news out at some point was almost impossible to imagine. After giving it a lot of thought, Braeth’el still could not reconcile the fact with what he knew of Biara’s deceptions.  It was this thought that made him begin to ask questions, to carefully review events with the apprentices and other servants of House Sunfire.

Had there been any changes in Biara’s behavior? Had she done or gone anywhere unusual? None of the servants had remembered anything critical, except for one fact. Some time ago, around the time that the Legion first attacked, Biara had stopped consuming Fel magic. It was such an innocuous thing; a little nothing that he almost overlooked it except that he’d watched Biara Dayfire grow up. He knew her appetites, her desires. Casually giving up a source of power just because it was no longer the main, accepted practice in Silvermoon? It was so out of character that it stuck in his mind.

There was a rumble of grinding stone and the two doors fell open before him, exposing the dark interior of the tower. One of the apprentices closed his eyes and then opened them, nodding inside. Braeth’el returned the nod, pulling a dagger out and walking in; Biara’s magical traces, including ones that matched her person as an adolescent, were within the tower. So were traces of Highborne magic. He would learn the truth here.

The weapon he carried was special. He’d designed it himself several years ago in case Biara ever became a threat to Quel’Thalas. It was enchanted to nullify magic it touched, and could shred through a spellcaster’s defenses, rendering them helpless. He’d hoped to never have to use it, but one could never be too sure. As he stalked into the darkness within the tower, he was glad he had it available should the worst come to pass.

“Something is wrong with the magical currents in here,” Borthan said softly. “Magic is being siphoned away from the inside of the tower into a source far below. Our spells will be useless here.”

Braeth’el said nothing, walking deeper within the darkness. There were no guardians here, no traps, just endless dank corridors. It was as if the solitude of the tower were meant to be its shield and guardian. Although given the anti-magic field within, traps or arcane guardians would probably wear out relatively quickly.

The apprentice Borthan paused next to Braeth’el, pointing towards a darker opening leading deep within the tower’s foundation, “That way. The faint traces of remaining magic are below.”

Without hesitation, Braeth’el plunged into the dark, walking down endless stairs by feel alone. He didn’t want to risk a light in case there were more guardians, but his precaution was unnecessary as a dim glow slowly began to make it easier to see as he descended. At the bottom of the staircase was a long corridor with what looked like glowing windows on each side.

Cautiously he walked forward, eyes widening as he looked through the glowing panes. There were creatures within them! Various types of magical beings trapped in what looked like some kind of stasis. He nodded at one, some type of mana wyrm, and looked at Borthan, “What is going on here?”

The apprentice moved forward, eyes wide as he laid a palm against the glowing pane. “This isn’t glass, it’s magic. Temporal magic. The creatures within are held in stasis. The siphon is at the end of this corridor.”

Braeth’el nodded, striding forward, dagger in hand. He passed a number of different stasis cells, each containing a rare or unusual magical creature suspended in temporal magic to keep them in place. At the end of the dark hallway he saw a crystal set on a pedestal, its purple glow adding to the illumination. Even he could feel the magic siphon here. Although he was not a magic user, he could barely sense the distant Sunwell through the haze of disrupting magical currents. He opened his mouth to speak, but then something else caught his eye that set his heart racing.

The cell directly to the right of the crystal was not glowing the same as all of the others. It flickered dimly, the blue magic of the temporal field disrupted somehow. He approached slowly, dagger ready as he peered within the cell.

A crumpled form lay on the stone, her body so drained of magic that she looked almost like a Wretched. She was an elf like him, wearing tattered rags and seemingly unconscious. He leaned warily near the barrier, nearly leaping back in shock as one of the tattered figure’s hands pressed suddenly against the magical barrier, her withered fingers clawing at the spell before falling limply down again.

Braeth’el couldn’t see the elf’s face beneath her matted red hair, but his suspicions pounded in his skull now. He looked back at the apprentices that had followed him, his voice gruff, “Break the siphon.”

He turned back towards the cell, looking down at the dagger in his hand. It could only be used once before its magic disrupting power was expended. Grimly he weighed his options. If he was wrong… But he knew in his heart that his guesses were correct. His instinct had never failed him, had kept him alive for so long against so many enemies. With a jerk of his wrist he plunged the dagger into the barrier before him, the blade piercing the spell and shattering it. Dagger and barrier both dimmed and faded, the magic giving way to the deadly spells in the blade. Behind him, he heard the sound of crystal breaking as the apprentices overturned the magical siphon.

Gently he stepped into the cell, kneeling next to the crumpled figure and slowly lifting her upper body to support her. A hand reached out, brushing knotted red hair from a face that had suffered for a long time. Biara Dayfire’s features were almost peaceful now as her death approached, and yet he knew that he owed it to her to prevent that peace from claiming her. This was no Highborne in disguise in his arms, but a Sin’dorei. One who had been imprisoned in a temporal spell that was bound to fade as it interacted with her unique magic. An elf left here for almost a year with only the slightest trickle of magic from the Sunwell’s energies to sustain her. Deprivation had taken its toll, but Braeth’el knew the truth now.

Biara Dayfire was not a Highborne; a Highborne had taken her guise and tricked them all. Had concocted tales that had deceived even Biara’s closest friend, and had left her here in what she likely thought was a safe prison that had almost been the Sin’dorei’s death sentence.

Gingerly he reached into his pocket and withdrew a small mana crystal, breaking its structure in front of Biara’s face, letting the magic seep out even as the roar of the Sunwell’s energies pulsed back into him with the destruction of the magic siphon.

She breathed in, her back arching for a moment as a flush passed across her pale flesh. Weakly her eyes opened, shockingly golden orbs from the Sunwell’s influence blinking and trying to focus before finally seeing his face. Arcane energies began to bleed across her scarred left cheek, her personal wards beginning to flare to life as mana flowed into her deprived body.

Those golden orbs, so sweet and innocent in waking, narrowed as recognition passed through Biara’s mind. There in the darkness, as he held her in his arms, Braeth’el heard the true voice of the broken Magistrix for the first time in likely a year, and her words sent a chill down his spine.

“I’m going….to kill them all…”

As her golden eyes drooped closed and deep sleep claimed Biara, Braeth’el sighed and scooped her too-light form up in his arms. Part of him wondered if he’d made a mistake, if it would have been better to leave things as they were. They still had a rogue Highborne as an enemy after all, only now….now things would be worse.