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// Suramar: Telemancer Oculeth 
// Story: World of Warcraft: The Ties that Bind 
// by Blackdrag-rose 
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The moment Lyra and Trixie had the coin that Thalyssra wanted them to show Oculeth, when they discovered where he was hiding and convinced him that they weren't enemies, the duo walked out of Shal'Aran and bid farewell to the rest of the heroes that Trixie had called to their side. Lyra raised an eyebrow when she noticed that one of the druids that had come along was missing, though the other druid simply said that their companion was investigating something they had seen when they were coming to see Shal'Aran. The druid then promised that their friend would be back in the near future with news about what they were doing, though Lyra said that it was fine and followed Trixie out of the ruined area, as they needed to start their next mission and see what happened when they found Oculeth's hiding place.

Instead of heading down the path they took to reach the area outside Shal'Aran, and treading upon familiar territory, the two of them turned to the right of the cave entrance and followed the path back towards Ambervale, though when they reached a certain distance they turned right once more and climbed the hill that was in front of them. From there they walked over to the road that the Nightborne had put into the ground so many years ago and crossed over the bridge that was in front on them. After a few minutes of walking they passed up another ruined part of the area that was around Shal'Aran's cave, though this one was directly above the cave, but neither of them paid to it as they followed the path that was directly in front of them.

From there they continued to approach what was once the main gate of Suramar City, and likely still was to this day, but as they drew closer to the stone gate Trixie stopped them before they got too close and beckoned for Lyra to follow her as they started walking to the left of the gateway. Normally Lyra would have questioned why they weren't sneaking through the barrier and taking a quicker route to Oculeth's workshop, but since the Nightborne seemed to specialize in magic, along with time magic based on what they had seen Thalyssra do to one of the elves that had been following her, heading inside the city sounded like a terrible idea. Besides, she was sure that their enemies night be able to sense anything that passed through the barrier, even if it had weakened since the Legion invaded Azeroth... and she didn't want the leader of the Nightborne to know what they were doing just yet.

Instead of walking on a stone walkway, no doubt carved from the earth itself, Trixie and Lyra made their way up some hills and across a small river before they spotted the building that Thalyssra had told them about, though at the same time Trixie insisted on being the first one to approach the structure while Lyra kept an eye out for any additional enemies. Lyra agreed, because with how close they were to the city she didn't want a patrol to see them and raise the alarm or investigate what they were doing, though she drew her warglaives and readied herself. Trixie let out a sigh as she walked up towards the entrance of the building and stepped into the opening, to which she found herself frozen in a spherical barrier that slowly pulled her into the air.

"That is far enough." a voice said, to which Trixie moved her eyes and watched as a male elf, Nightborne like Thalyssra and the others they had encountered, stepped out of a room to the left of where she was standing and stopped when he was in front of her, "Well, you are not from the palace... and you are clearly not a demon, as I have no idea what you actually are. Identify yourself, before I teleport you to the depths of the Great Sea!"

"I'll tell you what she is," Lyra said, to which she stepped forward and stared at the elf, who was no doubt Oculeth, though at the same time she decided to sheath her weapons as she glanced over at Trixie and remembered what she had told her earlier, "She is Trixie Lulamoon, Archmage of the Tirisgarde, apprentice to Archmage Khadgar, slayer of three Old Gods, at least three Dragon Aspects, the Lich King, and Archimonde, one of Sargeras' greatest warriors. There is something else that you might not have noticed..."

"And what is that?" Oculeth asked, though at the same time he raised an eyebrow, because while he was sure that Trixie's achievements were grand he didn't understand why he needed to be told about them.

That was when he noticed that there were cracks forming on the barrier that he had placed as a trap, something that normally wouldn't be possible, which meant that this Trixie was far more powerful than he was giving her credit for, as he had assumed that the dragon look was a fake to make people more afraid of her. A few seconds later the barrier shattered as Trixie broke out of the trap, though to make it even more dramatic Trixie's dragon wings, sized to the same size that Lyra's were when she glided from one place to another, flared for a moment before she touched the floor and huffed. A moment passed before she stood back up and stared at Oculeth, while at the same time pulling her wings close to her back, like she had seen Lyra do from time to time when she was in her Havoc form... while being annoyed that she had likely ripped two holes into the back of her robe.

"I'm a blue dragon," Trixie replied, though at the same time she smiled for a moment, because Oculeth seemed shocked that she had shattered his prison trap with such ease, before she reached into her pouch and withdrew the coin she had been given, "Here, we were told to give this to you whenever we found you."

"A coin? Why would you need to show me..." Oculeth started to say, though that was before he noticed something interesting about the coin, to which his eyes widened as he understood what was going on now, "The sign of the dusk lily... this is the First Arcanist's seal! Is she alive?!"

"Yes, she gave us that coin and told us to find you." Lyra explained, to which she smiled as she realized that they were finally getting somewhere, though at the same time she was sure that they would need to do something before Oculeth would head to Shal'Aran.

"Then there is still a chance..." Oculeth commented, though that was when he raised a hand and beckoned for the two of them to follow him into the area of the building he had been hiding in all this time, "Come quickly, I need your help with something before we head to Thalyssra's location."

Lyra nodded and stepped forward to follow Oculeth, though before she got too far she pulled back and helped Trixie as she sealed her wings away once more, as she hadn't intended to bring them out when she broke the prison trap, though they had come out on their own. Once the wings were sealed away, back with the rest of her dragon form, the two of them entered the room that the elf had been hiding in, though as they followed him it looked like he was salvaging items and taking them away from the Nightborne that controlled the city.

"I didn't have the time to gather any of my instruments before fleeing the palace, so I came here to salvage some old equipment." Oculeth explained, knowing that they were curious as to what they were seeing, though at the same time he stored some of the pieces in his own pack, "This old workshop is actually several rooms connected by teleporter pads, though all the rooms are scattered along the mountainside. Elisande's goons are already scouring the place looking for me, but from here I can alter the teleporter network and keep them moving in circles. I need the two of you to use the teleporter pads and find two special components that I need for whatever Thalyssra has planned, though at the same time I will monitor your positions and ensure the teleporters work normally for you."

"Sounds easy enough," Lyra replied, as it sounded like what she had done several times after she first formally joined the Illidari, gather specific items and kill whatever enemies were in front of her, though there was something that she needed to ask before they got started, "Where's the teleport pad that we need to use to get this started?"

Instead of answering her question Oculeth beckoned for them to follow once more and led them outside the building they were standing in, to which they headed to the right of the entrance and approached the pad that Trixie and Lyra hadn't seen from the direction they had approached the workshop from. There happened to be a small pedestal near the pad, one that apparently activated the pad itself, to which Trixie reactivated the teleport pad and stepped into the center of the one in front of them, where she disappeared a few seconds later. Lyra immediately followed her companion, to which she appeared on a decent sized cliff, with a small single story building nearly, before noticing that they were higher up than the main body of Oculeth's workshop.

Near them rested three more pedestals, which had to be switches for the various locations that this pad connected to, though Trixie told Lyra that one went to a fountain, the second went to a library, and the third went to a lab, which had to be the one they had just been at, though this was something that she was able to tell by just staring at the pedestals for a few seconds. Trixie decided to try something and activated the pedestal that connected to a lab, though a few seconds later the duo appeared near a small tower which clearly wasn't the building they had encountered Oculeth in, but before they did anything else they noticed some Nightborne already starting to gather the telemancy items that had been stored in this location... to which Lyra pulled her warglaives out and charged at their opponents.

Trixie smiled as she watched Lyra fight, because when she went into battle all of the Nightborne decided to charge her at once and allowed her a chance to investigate the tower for whatever items they had been tasked with finding, while claiming everything that the Nightborne had been attempting to take away from this area. She ended up finding an interesting piece of equipment that was cracked in some manner, though whether it was because of the elves that Lyra was dominating or because of age she had no idea, but she had the feeling that this was one of the pieces that Oculeth wanted them to recover for him. Once she had everything in the area, and she was sure that she wasn't leaving anything that Oculeth could use behind, she walked outside and found Lyra looting the bodies of the dead elves, claiming their gold and anything that might be of use to them in the future.

The moment they were both done they returned to the pad that they had appeared on a few minutes ago and Trixie went to work determining where they needed to go next, as they still needed to find one more item that Oculeth asked them to recover. Since there was only one pedestal they had no choice but to teleport back to the workshop for a few seconds before they teleported back to the cliff area that they had first encountered, where they picked the library and accessed the pad once more. Instead of appearing near their intended destination, however, the two of them appeared in what seemed to be some sort of cave area, where Oculeth spoke to them, through some magical means, and informed them that he had lost them for a few seconds... before pulling them back to the workshop.

Since it appeared that the library wasn't an option, as the pedestal seemed to be broken, Trixie had them teleport to the cliff area before heading to the fountain, where she immediately discovered another pedestal that was labeled as some sort of lab. When the two of them appeared in their new destination they discovered that it was also being sacked by the Nightborne, to which they repeated what they had done when they reached the other lab, Lyra charged forward and Trixie used the distraction to gather everything that had been in the process of being stolen. It didn't take them long to recover everything that the Nightborne had stolen, and find what Oculeth wanted them to recover, to which they accessed the pad and returned to the workshop.

When they returned to the workshop they found Oculeth fixing the other pedestal that had been connected to this teleport pad, which meant that he had a way to get them away from this area without the elves in the city discovering what was going on. He stopped working when the duo approached him, to which he looked at the various items that they had acquired for him, both what he requested and items they had taken from the Nightborne they had encountered.

"These are in rough shape, but they will suffice." Oculeth said, to which he put all of the parts into his pouch, though that was before he tapped the pedestal he had been working on for the last couple of minutes while they had been busy gathering the items, "We must lock down the facility, otherwise my esteemed colleagues from the palace could uncover my secrets, which puts any teleporters I build for you and Thalyssra at risk. This will take us to my secret test chamber beneath the mountain, where we can begin the lockdown sequence and make our escape!"

Lyra and Trixie nodded their heads and Oculeth activated the second pedestal, to which the two of them stepped onto the pad and teleported into an underground workshop of some kind, though it contained the same style that all of the Nightborne buildings possessed. A couple of minutes passed before Oculeth, his task at the workshop complete, joined the duo in what he claimed to be his old sanctuary, to which the three of them continued down the path that was in front of them. As they walked Oculeth noted that his defenses were offline and that intruders had invaded his old sanctuary, though when they reached the device in front of them, an Arcane Coil as Oculeth called it, Trixie overloaded it with arcane energy before the three of them headed down the path on the left... where they found a large group of enemies using four more coils and their leader was floating in the air.

Oculeth noted that the elf in the area was Thwen, an apprentice who had no doubt be raised in the ranks after he fled from the palace, though before he could do anything else Lyra pulled her warglaives out and charged at the Nightborne that were gathered in the area around them. Trixie always found herself amazed when she watched Lyra fight, as her movements reminded her of how Illidan fought when her guild confronted the Betrayer all those years ago, because sometimes it seemed like they were one in the same person, as if Illidan had moved his soul into Lyra's body and was simply lending her his experience. She had to wonder if Lyra even noticed how she fought, as she was vastly different than the other members of the Illidari, but she paid that no mind as she accessed the coils and overloaded them... while weakening whatever Thwen was up to.

When the fourth coil was overcharged, however, Thwen growled and blasted Oculeth in the chest, causing him to stagger backwards for a moment as the arcane blast left a smoldering wound on his chest, causing Lyra and Trixie to turn on her in an instant.

"Face it ,old man," Thwen shouted, though at the same time Lyra and Trixie would tell that she was focused on Oculeth and was completely ignoring their presence, which was a mistake on her part, "with the ability to create a warp field, which warps the space surrounding me to act as a shield, I have surpassed you in every way possible!"

"I will admit, that is an interesting trick," Oculeth commented, to which he coughed up some blood, indicating that the wound was much deeper than they originally thought it was, before he stared up at his former pupil, "but let me ask you something; what if the space around you is already unstable?"

Before anyone had a chance to say anything, however, Oculeth wove his magic into the area and teleported all four of them into the strange area that Trixie and Lyra had accidentally discovered earlier, though that was followed by Oculeth falling to one knee as he coughed up some more of his blood.

"My warp field is not working!" Thwen shouted, to which she turned on the group, where Lyra and Trixie noticed that the field she had been using earlier had ceased to exist, "No matter, I shall simply bend this place to my will and prove that I am stronger than you could every be. An'ratha... an'tal-thandos!"

The trio watched as Thwen started to channel the energy of the unstable area into her body, though after a few seconds her body actually started to shake as the unstable energy coursed through her body, indicating that the power of the area wasn't something that anyone could control. A few moments passed before the energy detonated, tearing Thwen apart from the inside out while vaporizing her entire being, to which Trixie and Lyra focused their attention on Oculeth and his wound. The elf told them to stop worrying about him and gathered his energy once more, where he asked them where Thalyssra was hiding, to which Lyra told him that it was a cave near Ambervale... to which he warped them out of the unstable area and actually reappeared outside the cave in question, where he collapsed in pain.

Trixie and Lyra picked Oculeth up and carried him inside the cave, where they would be able to find a healer and make sure that he didn't die from his wounds... and then, once he had recovered to some degree, they would see what Thalyssra needed them to do next.