Lynesse

Amely Fiske

Lyn’s cigarette burned low in her free hand while she scrawled names in her notebook. Amely Fiske, misguided, poor, unfortunate Amely Fiske. She’d missed her children, that was all. It was a common theme among the Humans who were caught up in the chaos of the Second War. It was a common theme among anyone in Azeroth, that the path a life followed would be irrevocably changed or influenced by their family.

Roussel Fiske, Sr.
Amely Fiske
Daphne Fiske
Caspar Fiske
Aldren Fiske
Roussel Fiske, Jr.

In death, their names were all that remained among the living. Amely certainly hadn’t been remembered among the dead.

Lyn’s first trip into the Shadowlands to visit where the plane of the dead overlapped with Haven had been entirely uneventful. A few peaceful spirits drifted around, moved here from the plane of the living to keep them from harm the consecration would bring. Vern Bannister had been reunited with his wife Jasmina. Konstanze Calvert with her husband, a soldier, Severin. Raina Black, a homesteader. They mentioned friends they hadn’t yet seen — Kane Whitehall and Adriana Thatcher. It was entirely possible they’d moved south and survived. It was entirely possible they’d died somewhere else and hadn’t made it “home”.

None of them mentioned Amely Fiske.

It had been apparent when Lyn reached out and cupped the cheek of that wreck of a woman that something horrible had happened to her. That there were deep, wicked hurts in her spirit that would never be healed. They’d imbedded in. Her fear, her horror, the impossible-to-grasp understanding of her situation bit and cut sharply at the skin of the Elf’s palm before she’d fled and attempted to seek refuge in the altar that kept her soul tethered Azeroth. There was finality in the Shadowlands. There was judgement in the Shadowlands. Amely swarmed and fought, pulsing against the whole of the group casting the Light that sought to force her there. It hadn’t mattered. Lyn grabbed her, because Lyn could, and Lyn threw her through the veil.

Seeking the woman out in the Shadowlands was “safer”. Safer for Amely, safer for Haven. 

Amely Fiske, in life, had been from an impoverished family. She’d had no teaching, no great ambitions, and fair few skills but homemaking. She’d married Roussel young, and only to keep their first child together from facing the shame of having a camp follower for a mother. Daphne had greater choices and chances than both of her parents, her father’s soldering paycheck paying for lessons in the Church. Amely was reverently proud that her daughter knew her letters. Caspar and Aldren followed, educated similarly, and both of them good hearty sons who were eager to help on the farm while their father was away.

Roussel the younger had come later. He’d only been five when his father and brothers were called to arms to defend the realm in the Second War. Amely would never call him a “mistake” — her baby was a blessing. 

They weren’t from the area that was now Haven. 

When word started to make way North of the settlements that were falling to the Horde, Amely panicked. She had started to panic recounting how she packed up Daphne and little Roussel to move them closer to where her husband, a Lancer, and her grown sons who’d joined the infantry, were supposed to be camped. Her prayers for their safety, overheard by a priest in the parish she’d sought peace, had been answered. Amely’s small gifts in the Light had promise in Shadow, he’d said. 

She could protect her family from the Horde, but it would cost much.

The homestead that had become Haven had been deserted back then, and she could work the rites in safety, free from the prosecution of those who would never understand. She built the altar by hand. She wrote the runes, traced from a book she’d been given. She lit the candles and drew on the darker magic, given form from the Light.

Daphne and little Roussel withered. 

Daphne and little Roussel died. 

Their life gave her strength in the shadows, and in death, they were protected. There was never going to be any healing from the truth. In her blind faith, her unquestioning desire to keep everyone safe, she’d murdered her children.

There was no mending from the fact that she’d embraced darker magics for nothing. Her husband and her other sons had fallen in battle while she, Daphne, and the baby had been moving.

The madness that knowledge brought on was a kindness. She’d died by her own hand, on the steps of the Church where this terrible path had began. But the altar, that damned altar, bound her beneath the Barracks. Her spirit fed and grew, she languished for nearly thirty years in the dark spaces. The Consecration forced her out of the cobwebbed corners and cracks in the stone.  She struggled in terror. There was no madness in the Shadowlands. She would never be able to escape what she’d done.

Lyn was unable to reassure her that she’d been taken advantage of. That her children were here on this plane somewhere was not a comfort. Amely would never rest peacefully, but she was no longer bound. She begged, and wailed, and begged — “Do not remember me, but please remember my family.”

The colors in the small Inn in Hearthglen were too harsh and bright after her time in the monotone other. Lyn ashed her cigarette into a tray and drew a line through Amely’s name in her notes. As she promised, she would be forgotten.