All right . . . just like we practiced. Deep breath, tap your heels for good luck.
“Why, good afternoon, my esteemed spymaster without compare!” Captain Flynn Fairwind marched up to Mathias Shaw’s desk with a flourish, followed by a bow that made his long coat flutter behind him. “Fancy finding you here.”
“I work here.” The timbre of Shaw’s voice indicated he couldn’t decide if his answer was a statement or a question.
“Right! You do an awful lot of that. Working, I mean.” Flynn set both hands on the edge of the polished but sensible wooden desk, careful not to flatten any of the parchment scrolls Shaw seemed to have created a fortress with. Each was bound with ribbon and bore the seal of the Kingdom of Stormwind: a lion’s head pressed into blue wax.
“In fact”—Flynn grinned and thrust a folded, yellowing map into the other man’s gloved hands—“I’m rescuing you from your work.”
“A map,” Shaw said, slowly, lifting his green gaze to Flynn’s.
“Brilliant deduction.”
“Of Duskwood.”
“Blimey, you’re clever.”
“Where did you get this?”
“Won it in a card game.”
“And you’re handing it to me, why?”
Flynn tapped the large X scrawled upon the map. “To find treasure, of course! You’re slow for someone so smart.”
Shaw sighed, staring at the piles of scrolls.
“Come on,” Flynn urged, laying a hand on Shaw’s arm. “I’ve scarce seen you for more than a moment since we returned from Zandalar. Just picture it, mate! Two dashing adventurers—one uncommonly handsome; the other one, you—riding together in the fresh air, treasure gleaming, ripe for the taking . . .”
“Few would describe the air in Duskwood as fresh. And the Night Watch might have something to say about treasure being taken.”
“Ah, but you know them. You can talk them into permitting a tiny little treasure hunt. And besides”—Flynn nodded to Shaw’s desk—“you can check in with them while we’re there. They might have some intel for you on . . . something or other.”
Shaw’s gaze traveled back to the desk and the scrolls. “What’s the point in running around Duskwood finding old goblets or tarnished silver?”
“Fun, mate. Which you haven’t had a lot of lately. I’ve stayed around here and learned about . . . diplomating and so on.” Flynn flicked the map. “This is my world. And . . . I want to share it with you.”
Shaw looked again at the ratty map. “You sailors have a lot of superstitions about ghosts and such. Duskwood has one of the biggest cemeteries in Azeroth, and not all those graves are peacefully occupied. It’ll likely be dangerous.”
“Erm—well, yes, we do have a lot of superstitions. And I admit, I prefer the company of living people. But I prefer your company above all. And besides, the bloke who lost the map to me swore it was genuine.”
Flynn put on his most charming smile. He’d promised Shaw he would be patient with him, and he had really tried to be. He knew that a spy’s trust was gained even more slowly than that of a seasoned captain. Still, at Shaw silence, his heart began to sink. He’d sailed into the room like a ship borne on the high tide of excitement into a peaceful harbor, its sails swelling with determination and now . . .
“I still have so much to do here,” Shaw said.
Down, down sank Flynn’s heart, down to the bottom of the sea, just like the wreckage of—
Shaw clapped Flynn on the shoulder and gave a gentle nod. “So . . . go get us some supplies and be ready by sunset,” he said. “I’ll have this wrapped up by then.”
#
“Bit chilly here, isn’t it?” Flynn wrapped his coat more tightly around himself as they followed the faded treasure map through Duskwood. The place was positively depressing. Even the inn and town square they’d passed didn’t look the least bit inviting. The odd lantern hung from a post here and there, its small orange-yellow light straining feebly to hold back the cold, dank darkness. Shaw had been right about the “fresh” air; everything smelled slightly of mildew. There was, thankfully, sufficient moonlight so that Shaw, who was presumably accustomed to doing such things as reading maps at night in a place named Dusk-bloody-Wood, had no trouble following the trail.
A faint light shone from the window of an old house very nearby. Something flickered past it. “Someone’s still up,” Flynn commented.
A ghastly groaning issued from inside.
Shaw didn’t acknowledge it; he continued on. At that moment, a shape blocked the faint light from the window. Flynn could clearly see the fletching and point of an arrow had penetrated the thing’s head. Another undead.
What would its expression look like, he wondered. Its face—
“Tides,” Flynn muttered. He quickened his pace, moving past Shaw. “We should be coming across something nice in a few minutes.”
“Nice?”
“The Tranquil Gardens, good man! A whiff of flowers would do me a world of good right about now.”
“Flynn, Tranquil Gardens is a cemetery.”
Flynn felt the blood drain from his face. “So, that’s why those rocks look like tombstones.” He plucked the map from Shaw’s hands, glaring at it. “All I saw was ‘Tranquil Gardens.’ I thought, you know. Gardens. That are tranquil.”
“This whole area was once beautiful. Brightwood, it was called. Darkshire was Grand Hamlet. Hard to imagine now.”
Flynn sneaked a swig of bracing rum and took a quick inventory of his pack to soothe his nerves: healing potions, caltrops, mild poison, rum, bandages, hardtack, rum, extra socks, rum. He listened with half an ear as Shaw, the thorough man that he was, continued telling the history of the place. Something something Medivh something something Scythe. They passed fields of rotting pumpkins, overseen by a scarecrow clearly capable of scaring more than just peckish corvids. As they followed the map, which Flynn was starting to regard with increasing resentment, he walked straight into a spiderweb.
Shaw plucked a long, gooey thread out of Flynn’s chestnut hair. “We’re close,” he said. “Assuming the map is right.”
“It is, I’m sure. You know, after all that rubbish about—”
The swashbuckler was interrupted by a long, low howl of pain. The sound cut through the muggy air like a barber’s razor in an uneasy apprentice’s grip. The mangled noise had to have come from a wolf. Hopefully came from a wolf. Shaw raised an eyebrow.
Flynn turned on his heel, searching for the red eyes, white teeth, and black fur that would surely spring upon them. He’d already used up his allotted amount of quaking-in-his-boots, and Flynn Fairwind wasn’t about to let his resolve fail so soon. Wolves were one thing; undead people were quite another. He could handle this.
He stepped ahead, wading into the brush, calling to Shaw. “I got it, don’t worry! And that treasure should be—”
Flynn stopped and cupped a hand over his mouth.
Shaw immediately bounded to Flynn’s side. “What happened?”
Flynn knelt beside a young woman, her dark uniform marred by a spreading stain. “Hold her head up,” he told Shaw, then reached into his pack. He uncorked a small vial and poured it down the woman’s throat. She swallowed reflexively, and for a moment seemed to rally, but then her head lolled against Shaw’s chest.
“Do you recognize her?” Flynn asked.
Shaw’s face was grim as he gathered her limp form in his arms. “Sarah Ladimore. Commander of the Night Watch.”
