If I die, I'll kill you.

[Maulbane]

Lorailis had never been punctured this many times in his life. He felt as if he were going to fall apart. He wasn't, though – there were Humans stabbing him that needed to be disposed of. Were his arms not removed by a halberd, he'd not be lying around on the ground, watching others fight in his stead.

The impotence would enrage him far more than his normal despising of Humans, and he'd focus the hate within him productively – bouncing thoughts off the inside of his head with extreme prejudice.

"Now look. They're walking over you. They think you're dead. If you could just call someone over it'd be fine. You useless vessel."

His thoughts would be intruded by a Human's jackboot crunching down on his skull – part of an entire platoon.

"How do they think they'll keep Hillsbrad?"

Another boot. He could feel a clavicle snap in two – or it may have been a twig. He felt a bit dissonant with his own body.

"They're all alone. They know it. They'll die. They're wasting troops. Good."

He'd look much like a broken artisan's marionette. Both arms severed – the blows from the Human's implement had disconnected them – one at the elbow, one at the shoulder. It would take a lot of doing to fix this, but it would be fixed. Forsaken are more durable than any Human, both in mind and spirit. Another boot steps on him. The pressure withdraws again, and mercifully nothing more is broken. He would turn his head – his fifth and sixth vertebrae giving worryingly sharp cracks as he does so.

"No medics. Where are they."

The sound of battle would reach behind him, now – he had fallen backwards, so that meant only one thing, and he wouldn't abide by that. They wouldn't retreat, they had the advantage on this ground. No losses today. He needed a medic, then he could help. Why weren't there any medics?

"If Rosie were here."

Rosie was dead.

He tilted his head backwards, feeling a tendon resist. They were winning, it seems – the Humans were being cut down by the dozen, and the Forsaken could be repaired. He could be repaired. But they weren't winning fast enough. Maybe if he could just get up.

So, he tried to get up. His legs were intact, so they curled up against him. He forced his torso to work in tandem, but it was no use. Were he anything but dead, he'd be dead – his abdomen functioned more as a window now. He just needed someone to pull him up. He could form a plan, rout them. Nobody was around, nobody he could depend on to see or aid him.

"They think you're insane."

Why did he say that? He meant it. The Deathguards snickered at him when he reported for duty at the Forsaken's borders. How dare they laugh at him? He'd seen more combat than they, he'd led real troops into battle, not ghouls.

And every single one of them's dead.

Maybe it was his armor. His uniform was old, it had lost its sheen. It was a sight to behold when he first designed it, when nobody had yet died. The dye was powerful, but not powerful enough to last a year of self-endangerment. Now it was grey, and red, and, should you look close enough, the smallest shade of thistle. He still wore the tabard, but it had long shredded. Hardly anyone, let alone the Deathguards, cared enough, but a curious specimen could see just the littlest remains of the original stitching. Lorailis craned his neck just a little to the left, trying to see how the fight is going.

"I think I see a scarecrow."

When Forsaken can't feel emotion, they tend to resort to irony – whether out of sheer malice or some kind of search for meaningfulness is hard to tell. Why had he picked a scarecrow, of all things?

Then, a figure loomed over him. He didn't see it coming, despite it being clad in all that the taxes of Stormwind have to offer – golden plate armor. He knew what paladins did, they consecrated the dead, and he was about as good as any vile, bloated Human body that could be found. It took some doing to tilt his head far enough, but there would be no doubt what body the paladin was regarding. He had maybe half a minute before he was cast out of this plane by the magnanimity of the holy Light.

"Prove your worth, body. Get up. I won't tolerate death."

[Brutalskars]

"Dark Lady, watch over me."

Dalamar prayed quietly, sifting through the bodies. His armor was pristine, minus the ichor dripping from his fingertips as he rolled broken bodies about.

His scythe was lodged in a still dying human, the field was quiet for the most part though.

"No harvest is complete without a sickle."

Eventually he tugged his scythe out of the man, placing a boot against the crying human's face. He sputtered something about the Light as Dalamar loomed over him.

"Ascend now brother..."

One quickly motion, the rotation of the pole-arm. And the head rolled down the hill away from its cumbersome body. Dalamar began walking again, then found a still moving body, but it had a scarecrow printed on its chest. He sank the scythe into the ground then proceeded kneel down, inspecting the body carefully.

"There is my sickle... But, can it be salvaged?"

The body twitched, face hardly recognizable, Dalamar put his hands over the body, pulses of shadow and necrotic energies poured into the forsaken below him. Bones creaked, ash broke off of bone and the body seized a few times.

"All in good time... All in good time my old friend."

[Maulbane]

Oh, great. Something had gone awry.

Being a Forsaken gave him absolutely no concept of what being dead felt like. That wasn't how it works. Because of this he had no actual experience, but he assumed this wasn't what being dead felt like. He felt like he would feel vigorous, were his movement not restricted.

"Where am I."

His faculties were all in place, good. It'd be a shame for him to lose his mind after everything that had happened. He pulled his arm up, but it seemed to be stuck. Wait.

His arm?

He looked down – his vision was weak and his fortitude was physically not there, but he had the determination. He yanked his arm again, seeing the outline of the thing holding it there. The manacle refused to give from the force, but his 'arm' did, ripping in two at the elbow. One end hung off the edge of the table, still inside the cuff, while the half he kept dominion over would slide across the table as he tried to force himself out of this.

"I know you're there, Human filth. You think steel will stop me?!"

His voice was weak, it sounded as if he were gargling nails as he talked. It didn't help that he hadn't had a lower jaw for almost a decade. The fury was there, at least. Something to keep him fighting. As he craned his head, he could see his tabard hung on a table, in all its vile, matted honor. They'd pay for that.

He yanked his legs, but they were appropriately stuck, and he apparently didn't have another arm to resist with – simply nothing there. Now armless, he realised how dangerous his situation was, and started looking out to find his captor, or captors. It was that paladin, he'd been caught and now they'd try to torture him. An amusing idea.

He waited for something, anything, to call back.

[Brutalskars]

"I know you're there, Human filth. You think steel will stop me?!"

The forsaken struggled to look about, but the table was tilted in such a way he could not see the room behind him. Dalamar slowly was pulling strands of muscle across bone, hands sparking with unholy energy.

He took a moment to test the appendage, taking hold of the bone that would socket into a shoulder, a rush of magic entered it causing the muscles to pull and twist. The arm moved as it should, better than it did before. Dalamar then began folding skin over the arm as spoke.

"It was quite surprising... But I guess I should of expected that at least a part of your survived."

Lorailis' flailing tensed to a slow halt, obviously the echo of Dalamar's voice caught his ear.

"Show yourself deathknight."

Dalamar fused the skin onto the arm and stepped slowly to Lorailis' side. He held the appendage near Lorailis' shoulder, measuring.

"I brought you back from the brink, have spent countless hours rebuilding the body you abused in your fervor."

The deathknight pushed the arm into the shoulder, putting his left hand on the connection, energy pulsing into the area until the tendons weaved back into place. Lorailis' coughed through a new jaw, throat and un-adjusted vocal cords.

"I was dead?"

"Nearly so, but a broken weapon is no use to the Queen... You do remember don't you? You swore an oath, just as I. We are her property, all the Crows are."

Lorailis groaned for a moment, but then he could feel it again. It felt whole again, unlike those weeks before his mutilation. He simply watched Dalamar's masked face.

"We have much work to do. In order for the harvest to continue we require Crows... In order to gather Crows. You must be operational again."

Dalamar's hands took up a long needle, and they sparked with unholy magics.

"Now. If you do not mind... Please refrain from moving."

[Maulbane]

"You're interesting"

He'd relax. Maybe the man's words had struck him, or maybe he was just relieved to not have met his demise yet. Relieved possibly was not the most appropriate word.

He would allow the Death Knight to perform his craft on him. He had no reason not to – he had to be in fighting condition, and this specimen before him had all the ability... And, it seemed, a more than agreeable motive. He wouldn't let himself be swept away by flights of fancy, though. Metaphor was not his strong point. Irony, however...

"I have not abused this form."

He genuinely believed it. He worked tirelessly to kill the enemies of the Queen. He may have neglected to repair himself for a long time, but that was only because he felt his duty was more pressing. He'd grow irritable, ordering the man's statements chronologically in his mind.

Stay still? Very well. He'll see what it would perform unto him.

"You had best hope you don't try to warp my mind, Death Knight."

[Brutalskars]

Three days later, Dalamar watched as Lorailis stepped off the table. The rebuilt forsaken took these moments to feel out the repairs, tensing his muscles and rotating about. A sort of hellish smile formed across Lorailis' face.

Dalamar silently moved forward motioning over Lorailis' body, nodding slowly.

"It took time. But you are whole again, where you needed connective tissue, I have replaced it. The destroyed bones have been repaired or swapped with the healthiest I could find... Through surgery and magic. I present to you Crow Father, your body."

Lorailis did no speak, merely testing the weight of his steps, left arm falling behind his back, right hand coming to his chin. Thoughts boiling in his brain, while Dalamar spoke.

"Now we must focus on the will of the Queen. We must make haste to continue the work she set you to do."

Lorailis slowly worked his way across the room to a table which had a whole suit of armor, swords, other provisions laid out. Gleaming in the low-light a deep purple, he then noticed the tabard folded neatly in the center; scarecrow hanging upon the backdrop. Peeking back he noticed Dalamar's full body, purple and silver armor - wearing the very tabard that was laid out on the table.

"Shall we begin?"

Lorailis let out out a quiet chuckle. His vocals finally roughing out to something less like gravel.

[Maulbane]

Lorailis had come to terms with the facts brought... Perhaps more appropriately, wrought, upon him recently. His thoughts would have been kept safely in his head so far. There was so much to consider. For all he knew, this figure could have been some kind of mindless sycophant, following him for... Months? How did he have this equipment? Was he mad, or was he simply prepared? Prepared for... What?

Reaping, he supposed. He didn't quite understand. They'd all died so long ago. It was so unlikely anybody knew who he was, but now he was standing in a burnished suit of mail and leather. It's as if nobody ever died, and he was in some kind of time dilation. Stupid thoughts for a sluggish mind, and ones he quickly pushed away as he kicked a man off the end of his sword.

He'd been quite adamant about returning to Hillsbrad – he had to finish what had begun. Dalamar, as the figure had introduced himself as, was seemingly worried that he'd end up in need of fixing again. No matter, as this was far more important, at least in his head. He wasn't mad – he knew the battle ended weeks ago, but there were always stragglers. Lost soldiers, ones who didn't acquiesce to evacuation, they were easy pickings as the two prowled the forests.

Dalamar had his fun – he'd particularly enjoyed the processing of the remains. Even Lorailis got wound up in the fervor of it all, for better or for worse. But this was both not worth his skill and not productive in the slightest.

He barked out into the forest air – his voice had regained its normal tone over the days. To a Human its incredibly deep tone – and the way certain consonants were mercilessly grated - might be intimidating, but Forsaken were used to far more unique things than just voices.

"This is enough. We will begin now."

He felt... He wouldn't say he felt particularly different, but there was something about not working alone. He wasn't a dead-head – he knew the feeling of companionship, but he was reticent to say that this was it. After all, for all he knew, Dalamar wanted to steal his identity. He'd keep the man under close watch – Death Knights were odd folk to begin with, let alone the kind that nursed you back to health and gave you a new set of clothes.

At any rate, Dalamar raised his head. He seemed pleased.

"Now we can spread news of the harvest."

Lorailis pinned it almost as amicable.

The travel to the Undercity would take a long time. Long enough to think. Lots and lots of thinking. He kept his hand close to his scabbard - not just for any lost Humans.