Captain Yimit completed the inspection of the ship, finished stowing away supplies, and observed the change of the watch. The amount of food in storage was within acceptable limits thanks to the two sharks that her crew had caught on the voyage. Vizier Krivax had promised to secure some more supplies from the night elves. The sentries and the enchanted wards built into the ship’s hull would make sure that no one would make their way onto the ship without alerting her. If there was a hostile boarding party, she could cut the anchor lines, unfurl the sails, and set out with the tide within minutes.

Satisfied with the state of the ship, she made her way to her cabin and started to sort through the notes that she had made on the voyage. High King Anub’arak and his council had wanted a full report on improvements for the next class of nerubian warships. Azjol-Nerub was planning to make three more ships in the Waterstrider class with minor improvements before building a bigger flagship class. She had heard rumors that the next class of ships would be nearly two hundred and fifty feet in length.

After looking through her notes, Captain Yimit decided to send a skitterer to call First Lieutenant Hak’ris to her cabin. The voyage, especially the final approach into Auberdine, had revealed that future nerubian ships needed not just design improvements but also adjustments to the crew composition. Instead of waiting around for Vizier Krivax to complete his diplomatic mission, she wanted to run some tests to try out some of her suggestions before finishing her final report.

At the knock on her door, Captain Yimit called out, “Come in Lieutenant Hak’ris. I wish to discuss the ship's handling and crew with you.”

The title still felt strange in her mouth, but the Circle of Viziers insisted on appropriating everything it could from the surface races when constructing Azjol-Nerub’s navy, including its command structure.

Lieutenant Hak’ris saluted and replied, “Yes Captain.”

“I noticed that there were some difficulties with the steering, when the ship was listing to one side,” Captain Yimit commented. “I believe that this problem can be solved by adding two coupled rudders to the outrigger hulls.”

“The rudders on the outriggers have to be smaller in size as the turning moment on the ship will be larger due to the distance from the center of the ship,” Lieutenant Hak’ris mused. “We can run extra tiller ropes from the ship’s wheel to control the coupled rudders on the outriggers in sync with the main rudder.”

“Please make some sketches for a suitable pulley rig for me,” Captain Yimit said, nodding in agreement. “Now moving onto the crew, I think that we will need more nerubian fliers for scouting. The nerubian fliers were invaluable on the journey to Kalimdor in scouting out hazards along the route like icebergs, reefs, and sharp points.”

“We will need more deck space for extra nerubian fliers,” Lieutenant Hak’ris pointed out. “We could extend a small light deck over the struts for the extra nerubian fliers. That would also help increase the storage space.”

“I will include the suggestion for a light deck supported by the struts in my report to the council,” Captain Yimit agreed. “Unfortunately, Azjol-Nerub does not have skitterers capable of diving in the water. Having scouts underwater would be useful…”

Both Captain Yimit and Lieutenant Hak’ris stared at the skitterer nibbling on a candied ant in the corner with a thoughtful expression.

—

The next morning found the Waterstridder in a frenzy of activity. The crew were scrambling all over the deck preparing for Captain Yimit’s dive experiments.

“Weaver Gruvat has completed the silk airtight sack,” Lieutenant Hak’ris reported. “I have inflated it with air for our dive test.”

Captain Yimit was attaching a small set of lead ingots to the nerubian skitterer Sijem. She took the silk air bag and tied it down on the skitterer’s belt.

“Try breathing through the air bag,” Captain Yimit instructed skitterer Sijen. “The lead ingots are only attached by a single silk thread. If you need to surface quickly, cut the silk thread and you will rise to the surface.”

“I will do so Captain Yimit,” skitterer Sijen stated and took a few practice breaths using the silk air bag.

Captain Yimit and the crew all watched with interest as skitterer Sijen clambered carefully down the struts onto the outrigger. Skitterer Sijen tied the safety line to his waist and slipped into the water.

Captain Yimit took out a stopwatch and commanded, “At my signal, I want everyone to pull on the safety line. Skitterer Sijen should have enough air in the bag for two minutes.”

Everyone waited with bated breath watching the surface of the water and watched the line move about for a minute. At Captain Yimit’s shout, the crew started to pull Sijen to safety.

“Captain, the line is unusually heavy,” Lieutenant Hak’ris reported. “It may have caught onto something on the seafloor.”

“Keep hauling on the rope,” Captain Yimit shouted and joined in to help.

After some tense moments, Skitterer Sijen finally broke through on the surface. Captain Yimit noted with concern that the silk air bag had been punctured and was full of something. She began to fidget anxiously at the thought of reporting the experiment to the council. The high king would not be pleased to know that she had put her crew in danger.

When Sijen was finally hauled onto the deck, she rushed over to examine the silk bag.

Captain Yimit sputtered angrily, “Skitterer Sijen, why is your air bag filled with clams?...”

============

Auberdine was a nice and well-made settlement, if not the largest he had ever seen.

Still, Malzie could have done without the wary glances of the natives as they were led towards the local inn. Of course, the glances were nothing when compared to the disapproving glares of the elders back at Ironforge whenever he did something wrong. As the representative of Ironforge Malzie would weather the suspicion, and let Krivax handle the brunt of the talking as usual.

“Man, this place is super weird,” Trixie said as she examined the inn and the room she had been assigned.

Malzie hummed as he looked inside his room. After checking that his luggage had been deposited in his room, he looked into Trixie’s room across the hall. She was rummaging through her trunk that was full of various tools and inventions rather than actual clothes and belongings for a long trip

“Oh? Why’s that, lass?” Malzie couldn’t help but tease a little. “I’m sure you’ve seen human buildings before, and most of them tend to be made out of wood too.”

“It's not the material that bugs me, though that is part of it,” Trixie said with a huff. “I swear, how can anyone sleep without tons of metal over your head and the constant rumblings of machinery to lull you to sleep?”

“Can’t say, though I am more partial to the rhythmic booms of hammers on anvils,” Malzie admitted. “I do admit that this place is a bit quiet given its size. Even a human settlement back home would have more activity. I suppose we can chalk that up to us being here and the locals being a bit on edge because of it.”

“Maybe… but as I was saying this place is weird. Like, weirdly constructed weird,” Trixie said as she went over to the doorway to her room and started pointing at various locations. “See this?”

Malzie was no carpenter, but being from a large family, which included more than a few crafters of various kinds, even he could notice it once it was pointed out. “There are no seams… no nails… the whole thing looks like it's made from a single piece of wood.”

“Yeah, the whole inn is like this too from what I saw as we were walking in. Heck, I think all the buildings in the settlement are just trees in the shape of buildings! Saw leaves, flowers, and all kinds of green stuff growing out of all of them. Pretty sure this place wasn’t built, but grown and is still alive.”

“That is rather strange and unexpected,” Malzie said with a curious hum as he started examining the various wooden furniture within his room. “The bed frame and chairs also do not have any seams or joints, but I doubt they are alive too. More like carved from a single large single cast off branch or some such.”

“Krivax did mention that these elves were really into druidism, nature magic, and stuff. He also said that they take their forests very seriously and warned us not to do anything to damage them or risk pissing off their whole military,” Trixie recalled as she kept examining the structure. “I mean, as far as I know druidism is kind of out there and unpopular in most of the Eastern Kingdoms, with only outcasts and such making use of it way outside of regular civilization. The idea of a society built on it sounds pretty weird, but the night elves somehow make it all work.”

“Ingenious in a way too. Why build a house when you can just tell a tree to grow in a certain way after all?” Malzie pointed out. “Ever since Uldaman, lots of dwarfs back home have been talking about reconnecting with our Earthen roots. We know now that the Titans made the Earthen to shape the stone and subterranean regions of the world long ago, which we figured is why we dwarfs are naturals when it comes to digging and mining. Some believe we might be able to go further than that with practice. Maybe our Wildhammer cousins can help us learn how to shape the earth given their access to Shamanism and its connection to the elements. Could you imagine what we could do if we could freely move and shape stone with our bare hands like it were clay?”

“It sure would be nice if I could just build some fancy tool just by touching it rather than actually sciencing it out… though that would take half the fun out of it, now that I think about it. I imagine you dwarfs would start remodeling all the mountains in Khaz Modan to your liking,” Trixie said with a smirk.

“It could do with a bit of remodeling, I say!” Malzie said only half-jokingly. “Been hearing a lot of things on the Senate floor before we left. The Second War has really opened the longbeards’ eyes about how close we came to being wiped out, and they want to take steps to truly secure our homeland against future attacks. Also mentioned that we should strengthen our ties with our allies so that we can come to each other’s aid more easily.”

“Makes sense to me,” Trixie nodded. “Fights are always easier when you get together with friends after all. The Horde was tough, but we won in the end because we had more friends than they did.”

“Indeed,” Malzie nodded along. “I hear that the first step towards that might be connecting ourselves much more physically with the other kingdoms of the Alliance. King Magni, last I heard at least, was getting frustrated about how long it takes to send aid and supplies from Ironforge to Stormwind. He might propose something quite grand while we are away.”

“How so? By building a dwarf made super highway or something?” Trixie asked curiously. “Maybe building up Wetlands into a huge port area to send ships around there more regularly, since transporting cargo in ships is usually faster than using the land routes? Has Ironforge come up with their own flying machines yet?

“Well, from what I heard it sounds more like something a bit more like mine carts…”

---

“Not the worst elf food I’ve ever eaten, but still too light to my liking,” Falstad grumbled as he ate alongside his companions in the inn’s common room.

“It's heartier than quel'dorei cuisine, but not as much as dwarf food I will agree,” Vereesa said as she dug into the ‘kimchi’.

“I’d almost say you were describing human food, though the night elf cuisine has a great deal more variety of relatively simply cooked food," Rhonin put in his own thoughts as he poured himself some wine. “Everything here seems like something you’d gather from the wild rather than from a farm or ranch.”

“Considering what I know of my distant cousins, that is most likely the case,” Vereesa agreed.

“Think they will be interested in actually talking with us during this trip? Or do they just plan to stable us until we eventually leave?” Falstad asked curiously. “Seems like they are more interested in that Krivax fellow over us, after all.”

“It's what Quel’Thalas would do,” Vereesa explained. “We elves are patient and can afford to wait people out.”

“We did basically buy our way onto the nerubians’ ship,” Rhonin admitted. “But it's not as if the leaders back home would have accepted not taking part in a historic visit to Kalimdor of all places and meeting with its people, even if our participation is mostly just symbolic.”

“So we are just here to wave the flag basically. Hmph. Hopefully, I can get permission to go flying around with Swiftwing while we are here at least,” Falstad grumbled. “It’d be nice to explore some new sky after all.”

“Best ask for a guide then so you don’t unknowingly insult the kaldorei by flying over the wrong tree or something and get shot out of the sky for your trouble,” Vereesa said.

“This place really does feel like home to you, doesn’t it?” Rhonin couldn’t help teasing his wife.

“In a very uncanny kind of way, yes,” she admitted as she looked out a nearby window and into the village beyond. “It feels similar, but also nearly completely different. The cultural attitudes are similar, but everything else is way off the mark. If nothing else I can still see signs of the shared history between my people and theirs, despite the distance and time spent apart.”

“Weren’t your folk still in contact with them and they just choose not to tell anybody about it?” Falstad reminded her.

“Yes, but while we were aware of each other, we literally went thousands of years between contact. Also, only the highest levels of our society even knew about it. Yet another thing kept from most high elves,” Vereesa growled. “I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if both sides would prefer to return to that status quo. Just to go back to living on other sides of the world and mostly ignore each other.”

“Sounds like family alright,” Rhonin chuckled at the bad joke, before turning serious. “Forgive me if I’m wrong, but did it seem like they were giving the both of us especially directed looks as we came into town?”

“Well they don’t like high elves and also apparently they don’t like arcane magic, so I guess the two of you together really push their buttons,” Falstad deduced. “Maybe they're thinking you're doing unspeakable things in the bedroom too.”

“Only on Thursdays,” Rhonin joked, earning a punch in the arm from his lovely wife in the process, which he rubbed off good-naturedly.

“Hehe, I bet,” Falstad laughed before turning serious again. “Any idea what we or the other kingdoms want out of this then? My clan mainly just wants to stay in the know and maybe interact with any shamanistic cultures over here. They are thinking of doing something similar with the tuskarr in Northrend. I have been asked to explore the wild places here and connect with Elements more.”

“As said, Quel’Thalas will be happy to return to happily ignoring the kaldorei,” Vereesa said. “They only sent me as a token part of this diplomatic expedition to exchange some polite greetings.”

“Specifically, Dalaran would like to further study and understand druidic magic, especially from a civilization of users. In general, we would also like to explore this brand new continent for all kinds of things. We are scholars, first and foremost after all,” Rhonin chipped in eagerly. “I hear that Ironfroge and Gnomeregan would love to send Explorers’ League expeditions as well. Expeditions to Kalimdor probably will likely not take place often however if the kaldorei plan to remain mostly isolationist and not partake in much trade of any kind.”

“I imagine the other human kingdoms would be in the same boat,” Vereesa predicted.

“You’d be mostly right,” Rhonin confirmed. “Most of the representatives here are relatively minor, all things considered. They are just here to wave the flag and shake hands if able. Gilneas naturally doesn’t want much to do with a continent a huge ocean away. Alterac are more concerned with trade within the Eastern Kingdoms as they do not have access to the sea. Stromgarde and Lordaeron are primarily focused on repairing the damage caused during the war and strengthening their military. Unfortunately, Stormwind has to rebuild all their cities and infrastructure brick by brick.”

“Rebuildin’ a whole country from scratch does require a heap focus and effort,” said Falstad, his voice sympathetic.

“The Church of the Holy Light might attempt to send missionaries in the future, but they are a bit busy with the sudden influx of void cults,” Rhonin continued, his expression thoughtful. “Honestly, I think only the Kul Tiras representative cares about this trip even a little bit, and that is just to see if the night elves have anything like a navy. They are concerned about other navies, since they are still rebuilding theirs.”

“I doubt the kaldorei will be inclined to share anything about their capabilities either way,” Vereesa guessed.

“You elves do love playing things close to your chest, even if you got shit cards,” Falstad laughed. “But aye, it seems like only the nerubians are properly invested in this. I am pretty sure that is mainly because of the one leading this diplomatic mission. I wonder why that is?”

“I have no idea. I only know that he is favored by the Dragon Queen, and apparently this expedition only happened due to their good word,” Rhonin explained. “Ever since the start of the Second War, Dalaran and Azjol-Nerub have had very cordial relations and various nerubian divisions have been working closely with the Kirin Tor. Beyond hunting down possible Void sources and searching for Titan facilities, I could not tell you much more due to all the secrecy. Makes me think that I should be asking the Council of Six some pointed questions once we return. Being in the dark on things has never suited me.”

“So long as you don’t get yourself put on probation again,” Vereesa warned.

“But it was only by being put on probation that led me to you, my love,” Rhonin said as he took her hand in his and kissed it. “I wouldn’t trade that away for anything.”

“Sh-shut up!” Vereesa stammered and turned her head away to hide her blush.

“Pffft, newlyweds,” Falstad could only shake his head in mirth as he got up with a large plate of food. “Gonna go out to the stable and share this with Swiftwing. You two go get whatever you need out of your system,” he said with a laugh as he walked off.

“Oh my love?” Rhonin leaned in close to whisper into his wife’s ear. “It’s Thursday.”

Vereesa’s face seemed to turn entirely crimson at that statement. She quickly stood up and pulled her husband along with her back to their bedroom, which was quickly magically locked and warded against sound.