Night, brittle cold and clear in Stormheim; not a wisp of cloud covered the starry sky. Away from the main continents, the hustle and bustle and light pollution, the cosmos splayed out in glorious array, diamonds and stardust on black velvet, twinkling neighbors with the full silvery moon that basted the earth below in pale, cool light.
Betcha wish you could see it, huh kiddo?
“Fuck off, imp.”
I’m just saying, there’s ways to make it happen.
“And there’s ways to cram what’s left of you into a mental box so horrible and deep and dark that you’ll wish you could die for realsies.” Her tone was conversational and almost… distracted? “So fuck off, before I make you fuck off.”
Touchy touchy. Someone’s in a mood, groused the imp. His name was Kezzik, and she killed him, many long years ago, and ate his heart.
Though it didn’t seem that long to the young elf sitting with her face turned up to the moon, unaffected by the biting north wind, as she sat in the mouth of her roost with her wings half spread behind her. Ana had, of course, forgone a tent; that was for plebs and mortals. Instead, hidden by moss growing in a fissure above, the crack-like opening of the home she’d made in the sheer face of the cliffs above Greywatch could only be reached my jumping and gliding from a very specific point above, or some really, really impressive climbing antics.
A cup of tea sat in the middle of her folded legs, lingering legacy of her mentor. She breathed the smell deep, in, out. No booze tonight. It was too pretty to drown in alcohol.
Or so she assumed.
The riot of magical color that was her world did not, sadly, include the stars. They were too far away. And the moon- well. She’d turned her face from that a long time ago, and Ana knew the feeling had to be mutual. Her sight there was sharper than most. What Ana lacked in raw power, she made up for in detail, finesse, and thoroughness.
But the coldest nights were the clearest, due to lack of cloud cover; she remembered that. And she remembered being truly blind, in darkness, forever; and she remembered how the sky looked from the top of the tallest tree she wasn’t supposed to climb by her house as a small child.
They always told her she had too much imagination. It wasn’t hard to imagine the sky, there, as it had been, bright and big and beautiful. Almost better than reality, really. Rainbows of magic seeped up, currents and eddys on a strange mystical wind from thier sources; some glowed, some flowed, some curled smokelike into the sky. Most outlined thier various vessels or origins in her keen, unnatural gaze.
Who needed silver and stars when she had rainbows and memories? Not her. Not Ana. Nope.
Something made her head snap up, a sudden movement- streaking across the heavens. What…?
“…A shooting star-?” she muttered to herself. Ana blinked behind her blindfold, bemused. “I didn’t think I could see those….”
Well, humans do have a saying about them being magic. Hey! Make a wish! I bet it’ll come true if you really, really want it. If not for tone, it could be encouraging. As it was, sly cruel mockery dripped from his words. Maybe then Daddy would give you the praise you really deserved.
“Cruisin’ for a bruisin’, Kezzik my man.” Power flared under her skin, a potent mental reminder of just who, exactly, had who by the short and danglies. She felt him pause in her mind, and snickered. “Besides, I’d never waste a wish on that.”
Oh? Nothing so… selfish?
“Tch. Selfish smelfish shellfish. I’d wish for the Legion to be dead. All of them. Forever. Every last single one. Dead, never to return; from Big Man S to all the little baby imps, suckling at thier momma’s tits.” Ana smiled into the moonlight, grinning at the thought. Her work complete, her oath fulfilled…
It would include you, too, kiddo. And that lady of yours. And your fucking teacher. Hate, there, hate Ana enjoyed with an even wider, grin, savoring it; yes, he hated Kaldanos, and as well he should. And fuck, half the people that can actually stand being around your freakish runty ass.
(The insult was rude, terribly rude. Her ass was amazing.)
Ana considered this.
Shrugged.
“Yeah. Yeah it would. We’d die too.” The grin actually widened, unnatural, showing pointed teeth as it stretched more than any normal mouth really had the right to. “Every demon hunter, probably, and Illidan Perky-Tits Himself. Dropping dead,” she said cheerfully into the cold Stormheim night. “Wonder if it’s like sleeping, or what…”
The voice turned sly again. Oh. So it’s selfish after all, then? the demon asked innocently. Don’t tell me you regr-
Pure, boiling, thunderous fury the likes of which Stormheim’s fearsome skies could never rival rose in a crashing tidal wave so sudden her tattoos blazed crimson like blood on fire. Kezzik found himself SLAMMED back into his mental box and shrieked under the onslaught of her rage.
“You. Know. NOTHING. About me. So fucking BURN, you dickless lickspittle wannabe Sargeras fanboy.” And she ramped up the pain until he screamed, and screamed, and screamed in her mind. Ana did not relent until his begging devolved into pleading and then into the kind of sound a voice made when there was nothing left but howls of pain.
And she stopped.
“A reminder. For the next time you think you can spoil my lovely night. Fucking demon.”
Silence.
“…Well. Good.”
Another shooting star blazed. Ana turned, staring, as a meteor shower began.
And she sat there, in silence, watching what she could not see, tea steaming untouched in her lap, until dawn’s light came.
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