Stage Fright

Whispered by GM Yurifury...

Your meeting with Lady Bloodcraft has ended, just in time for Laceus to appear beside you with one arm courteously extended toward the exit. He waves, almost impatiently, for you to follow. You aren’t sure if it's fate or will that compels you forward, yet you follow all the same. The walk is an uncomfortably silent one, and more than once you have to hold back an urge to hum one of your favorite tunes. You get the sense that a little bardic beatboxing could be good for the uptight steward, but before you can test out the (surely well-motivated) theory, you arrive before a curtained doorway.

“The exit is through these curtains,” says Laceus. He pulls out a small round stone from his pocket and hands it to you. A blue rune is etched on either side, and glows softly. “This hearthstone will be your method of communication with the lady. I assume you know how to use it.” Then the steward turns to face the doorway. “Your party will be waiting to meet you on the other side.” You notice he maintains a peculiarly safe distance from the shrouded exit, and you can't help but to suspect more trickery lies beyond.

You look over your shoulder, suddenly anxious, to discover you're standing in a room entirely different than the chamber you had just occupied with the lady and her steward. The only exit appears to be through the curtained doorway. Guided by uncertainty, and the absurd notion that the way in is the way out, you gently clutch the translucent skin and peel it back. As you step through the marble threshold, something strange takes a hold of you…

…And suddenly you’re standing backstage of the Tranquillien Opera House, and a stagehand is dragging you to a stool beside a makeup station where a grumpy elf is standing with a fluffy brush in her hand. Actors and singers pass you left and right, rehearsing lines and practicing scales. “Just a quick powder, a costume change and you’re on in five. Got that?” You don’t have time to respond to the voice you think is talking to you; the grumpy elf sits you down and presses a fresh layer of rouge to your cheeks before, suddenly, an unknown number of hands are dressing you out of your dark leathers and into bright silks.

Then, just as you think it couldn't get any weirder, Sabastion Wulfe walks into the room. Your mouth gapes. Only the most renowned composer in all of the Eastern Kingdoms, and he's heading straight for you. Your heart flutters in your chest. You hardly have time to compose yourself before Wulfe grabs you by a sleeve of periwinkle and guides you to the edge of the thick curtain. He digs a hand into his black suit frocket and retrieves a small round stone very similar to the one given to you by the steward.

“Take this,” the composer tells you, an urgency in his Gilnean accent. He places the stone in the palm of your hand and squeezes. A tune you don’t recall learning enters your head:

The way is wroth and full of fright,
But even lost in the darkest night,
A melody of the soul can find the light.

Wulfe grabs you by the shoulders before you can react. “Now get out there and sing!” he says with a violent shove, hurling you onstage of the Tranquillien Opera House.

You shield your eyes as a white light blinds you and the sound of a roaring crowd fills your ears. Panic seizes you involuntarily. “SING! SING! SING!” You can hear the audience screaming at you. Something as bright as the sun prevents you from looking up and you’re forced to stare down at the wooden floor, so you search frantically for your voice, but it never comes. The screams of the audience begin to drown out your thoughts.

“SING! SING! SING!” They roar louder. You clasp your hands over your ears and squeeze, but the screaming won't stop. Darkness sets in around you. The light that blinded you fades, but it’s fading too fast. “BLEED! BLEED! BLEED!” They’re saying now, but everything fails to make sense. You search frantically in the dark for a body, a soul, someone. That’s when you see them, those red eyes, hungry and alive, staring back at you from the black…

And a brute force slams into you, knocking the wind from your lungs. You're lay sprawled out on the floor when a pair of claws sink into your thigh; with a strength you didn't know you possessed, you throw the weight off you and roll to your feet, but the red eyes fail to relent, and in a split second you're back on the ground again. You begin rolling, clawing desperately at the dark figure for reprieve, for an end to the torment…

Until you hit a small bump and topple off the side of the stage.

And then you fall.

You watch the red eyes become smaller and smaller as you descend, until they're little red dots against a black sky. You keep falling. It almost feels peaceful, until you hear those words again, whispering to you in the dark. “Bleed. Bleed. Bleed.”

A hundred more red eyes break around you. As you fall, you see the vrykul's eyes, you know they’re his, even though you've never seen them before. You try to lash out, to fight back, but you're still falling. The red eyes follow, watching in quiet mockery. You scream out.

And suddenly land facedown on a pleasantly comfortable flower bed. A few startled birds perched on an Eversong tree beside you take flight, scattering into the evening air. You look over your shoulder in bewildered realization that you are back at Bloodcraft manor, sitting outside the main entrance.

What's more are the three souls standing beside you with equal expressions of confusion on their faces. A troll woman, an angry tauren, and the strangest looking elf you've ever seen. You fail to make any sense of the situation and must now decide what to do: confront these strangers or flee from the mysterious manor.