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Maiev kicked aside the empty bottle of wine, watching it roll down the steps towards the Vault’s door, sealed shut with lock and arcane. Her back, sore, was pressed against the cold wall, halfway down the steps.
She was shrouded in near black, but for the two ever burning wall torches; torches she remembered lighting; steps that she walked down, never truly expecting to walk back up.
Ninety seven steps was first; down, down, to where the young Demon Hunters had been kept, their desperation to be anything but this, etched into every line, every scar.
Eighty four. She had personally made sure these ones were caught, captured, hunted, kept. She’d been kinder to Altruis, but not enough.
One hundred and twenty. And it was -
“Everyone is looking for you,” said Illidan as he sat opposite her, his wings flaring out against the cool stone, twitching, remembering.
Maiev smirked, taking another long drink from the bottle in her hand, wincing at the bitter bite of the wine. It was beginning to turn.
“So they send the blind guy,” she said, words slow and slurred.
Illidan laughed, the low rumble echoing off the walls. “No-one knows I came to find you.”
“How did you know I was here?” she challenged, twirling the bottle in her fingers, watching him curiously beneath lazy lids with hazy eyes.
“You are nothing if not predictable, Maiev,” he said, stretching out a leg across the step, the tip of his hoof brushing against her bare foot. She breathed sharply, unabashed, staring at the echo of demon within, without.
He watched her, curiously, the darkness letting his spectral eyes see more; see the nuances of her body, moving, shifting clumsily from the wine. Her hair was down. It was a mess. Silver strands tangled to a matt at her shoulders.
Maiev rubbed her eyes with the back of her hand before she drank again. “Why are you here?” she asked, her words loud and sudden. “I thought here would be the last place you’d want to come since - since coming back.”
“Because you’re a mess,” he said, simply.
“Says the half demon, half elf, half pain in my ass,” she said, her ears drooping as she smiled despite herself. He sat, so languid, so free, despite himself. And this place.
A tremor of memories hung in the air, threatening to scream, to scratch them both, unforgiving; to never let them forget why, who, what, they had become. But they were still, quiet, and began to fade, fade, fade away.
“It...is good to see you smile again, even if it is the alcohol,” said Illidan, slowly curving his wings to his side as the memories grew quieter; as Maiev, smiled.
“It’s not the alcohol,” she drawled, stifling a hiccup as she resting her foot atop his hoof.
Illidan’s wings trembled; his tattoos glowed bright, casting their green glow over her hair, her wine stained lips, turned up into a smile.
“It’s you.”