“That was all on one gnoll?” Kyle asked with understandable skepticism, staring at the small pile of shiny gold coins being displayed by a servant.

“It is,” Lora confirmed with a sour nod. “An’ I know what ye’re thinking, and if we hadn’t found it on the thing I’d be thinking the same as well.”

“And I’ve checked,” Pelton preemptively joined in, “there’s no signs of the coins being charmed.” Beyond the fact that the not insignificant amount of gold coins were a mix of currencies from throughout the Alliance, there was nothing truly out of the ordinary about them.

Commander Parston gave a grim nod of his own. “The rangers were thorough in searching the area to make sure, the gold is only found on the gnoll leader. How a beast would know to hold onto that and why though, I cannot say your highness. Admittedly, if not for them and La- Lora’s suspicions, I would have taken such a finding at face value, and think little beyond that the gnolls were paid to come here.”

Kyle leaned back in his throne wearing a perplexed expression. “Do gnolls appreciate the value of gold?”

Pelton shook his head. “When they’re not hungry or bored enough, perhaps. Even then, the alleged cases of trading are at most done with a few silvers. There was a case of a Dalaran scholar trying to determine how civilized the gnolls can be. She found that if they’re not too hungry, the smarter ones are aware enough to know that the coins they scrounge up are worth something to us. The problem is that most of them don’t make the connection between using the coppers and silvers to buy food from villagers; all cases of commerce are done on the initiative of humans and gnomes.”

Because neither elves or dwarves were curious, patient or desperate enough to try.

“So someone got the gnolls to accept a whole sack of shiny coins, perhaps as payment to come here?”

There were shrugs from various members of the court. “It’d make more sense if they were paid with food,” Kharak Stoutanvil, unofficial representative of Khaz Modan, opined as he tugged at his braided beard. “Then again, the food’s probably been all gobbled up far before they came over.”

“But if they’ve already been paid in food, why the gold?” Marshal Colin asked on behalf of just about everyone present.

A silence descended upon the royal court of Alterac as everyone tried to puzzle it out.

“Unless…it’s not payment?” Kyle slowly proposed, clearly mulling over something. Pelton gave his king a confused look, who himself seemed trying hard to put the pieces together.

“What if the gnolls were already paid with food or something else, and not only to trespass here, but to carry the gold as well?”

“That…that doesn’t make any sense?” Parston voiced. “Why’d they want to do that?”

Pelton though saw the concerning conclusions his liege was drawing, and answered with a heavy frown. “Because…they wanted us to think someone else paid the gnolls to come here. But that then raises more questions.”

“Unfortunately so.” Kyle gave a slow nod, irritation clear on his face. “Right now, just from where they originated, our initial suspicion would be on Stromgarde, wouldn’t it?”

“As debatable as that suspicion is,” Tobias Farham said with thick skepticism. Stromgarde might have mended the worst scars of war, but there were regions that had been abandoned or razed that hadn’t been repopulated yet. The only reasons bandits weren’t so rampant in that kingdom was the fact that King Thoras kept his soldiers employed and his people well cared for. There was none of the abandonment or neglect that the Alteraci faced before Kyle took over.

But that still left significant portions of the realm uncontrolled, allowing for infestations like gnolls to grow unchecked.

And besides, Thoras Trollbane was not one for such subtle tactics, in Pelton’s mind. He was a warrior king, leading from the front and was more likely to call out his opponents to their faces rather than orchestrate anything more complex than a cycling charge.

But… But if it was someone from his court acting on their own, then the payment of gold would also make no sense, as anyone with enough of a brain to think up such a brazen plan would also take care to remove any trace of evidence, however meat-headed they might be.

“Greymane then?” Pelton ventured aloud.

Kyle shrugged. “It might make sense, but as much as I don’t like him, I don’t think Genn would go that far just yet?”

“Aye,” Erica, the Overseer of Trade, agreed. “King Genn is taking slow steps towards isolating Gilneas from the rest of the Alliance. Everyone knows he’s looking for a reason to break away without losing out on all the benefits. All his actions are currently aimed towards distancing himself and his kingdom from the Alliance. Going out of his way to do something like this is beyond his character.”

“So who else would have reason and the funds to pull something like this off?” The young king almost finished his question when a sudden realization dawned on his face. “What about my half-brother?”

“Aliden?”

Well… Could he?

Would he?

“That…is possible…” Pelton ventured as unhappy mutters rose among the courtiers. “But that’s a lot of gold to simply throw away. And he was recently noted to be a guest in Stromgarde; he should know that it’d be too easy to pin all of this on him…now that I think of it. Hm.”

Kyle let out a groan as he slowly slid down his throne. “So…someone’s got the gnolls to march over from Stromgarde, ideally wanting us to blame Stromgarde for it. And if not, then maybe direct our suspicions onto Aliden or Gilneas as the next best targets.”

“Or they simply want us confused as to the true identity,” the gnome steward suggested bitterly. “Leave something so obviously unrealistic as this with so many implausible suspects just to keep us guessing…”

“Or someone’s really that stupid,” Erica added.

“Should’ve tried to keep some gnolls alive,” Lora grumbled.

“It couldn’t be helped,” Kyle mollified, “you were sent in the expectation of dealing with marauders, not mercenaries. My fault for not considering that.”

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“Ours too,” Colin chipped in, and then stood stiffly straight as he fully faced his king. “Mine, in particular. As your marshal, I should have considered such a possibility. You have my apologies, your highness-”

Kyle waved it off. “It’s our collective mistake. We’ll know better next time.” He slowly got back to sitting straight in his throne before letting out a heavy sigh. “Need a fucking Poirot or Holmes for this,” he muttered unhappily, and everyone pointedly ignored the nonsensical babbling from their king with the ease of experience. “Even Father fucking Brown for fuck’s…”

The young mage-king then shook his head and slammed a palm down on the throne’s armrest to focus himself. “For now, keep the gold as evidence. Every single coin should be accounted for. Captain Ariande, now that we know that there is more to this than initially expected, can I trouble your rangers to go over the gnolls’ tracks to see if they might have left some sort of clue?”

Ariande sketched a bow, her green cloak fluttering softly. “It will be done, your highness.”

“Thanks. Galvan, Kharak, do you know anything about minting? Or anyone who does? See if the coins themselves have any clues on them?”

Pelton's cousin rubbed at his chin as he hummed in thought, while the dwarf simply shrugged his shoulders.

“I’ll ask around…but don’t expect much, your highness.”

“Unfortunately, it’s the same here, your highness. I’m not sure if there is much nuance to the minting process…none that would be useful here, especially. Nonetheless, I will ask my peers.”

“My thanks. Better to fully exhaust what avenues we can.” That got most of the heads in the throne room nodding in agreement at their king’s sentiment.

Then, perhaps not so surprisingly, Kyle’s attention shifted on Pelton. “Pelton, have a message sent to Stromgarde about our gnoll encounter, but make it clear we’re not accusing them of anything.”

He nodded, as much in agreement as in compliance. “Any allusions to Aliden Perenolde?”

The mage-king paused for a moment before shaking his head. “We’ll play dumb on that front for now, see if that changes anything.”

Another pause came, and then Kyle tossed over a querying look. “Also, any chance that we might find some assistance through arcane means?”

It should be Valoghan’s job, but seeing that the recluse was still unavailable, the gnome sighed. “I’m not sure, but I suppose I can try asking a few acquaintances back in Dalaran about it.”

“Dalaran, hm?”

It looked like that was the wrong thing to say, as Kyle took on the expression he normally took when he came up with…eccentric ideas. Pelton braced himself for the proposal that his liege was about to spill, though admittedly, it wasn’t as bad as dealing with murlocs or giving the palace guards floating eyeballs as mounts.

“It’s been a while since we’ve had contact with the Kirin Tor…”

Pelton shrugged his shoulders. “There isn’t much to discuss. Unlike Stromgarde, Gilneas and Kul Tiras, we’ve established all the relevant agreements with the Kirin Tor, and there’s little reason to make further contact.”

Plus, the magocracy really liked playing up their aloofness a bit too much, Pelton personally thought. Though perhaps it is justifiable considering how easy it was for superstitious humans to be riled up against ‘damning’ magic.

“Well… Would they be open to discussing new trade agreements? I’m thinking of marketing the toilet systems.”

The gnome steward hummed at the idea, and then glanced to Erica, who seemed to be just as lost in thought as he was.

“It would be a boon to the whole product if even the magi, who have magic at their disposal for their everyday lives, find the sewer and toilets to be worth investing in,” the overseer finally remarked.

“That it is,” Pelton agreed, though with a touch of concern. “Though it’d be more likely that they’d reject the offer and instead figure out a conjuration to emulate the system.”

He gave a nod as the memories of being a budding mage came back to him. “It might make for good practice for the apprentices, and if it ends up being uncharted territory in terms of spellwork, trust that there’d be more than a few magi who would be fully invested to get their name commemorated for being a pioneer in that field.”

Nielas Aran, one of the most renowned spellcasters and father of the great Medivh, was famed not only for being able to maintain several summoned elementals at once, but also for perfecting the conjuration of sparkling cider.

It took long decades of research before Rafel Chantwick became lauded both in Dalaran and Quel’Thalas for refining the frost nova spell so that the ice was a ‘cleaner’, cold-blue color instead of taking on the muddier tones of its environment.

So creating an arcane analog to the Alteraci toilet system? Pelton would bet a year being polymorphed into a goblin if no fewer than a dozen magi took up the challenge for some fame.

Kyle still wore a doubting look. “But for every single household like we’re offering?”

Pelton shrugged. “Maybe. I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to ask.”

“Yes, yes,” his cousin had to interrupt. Of course Galvan would be interested in the idea of furthering the Engineer’s Guild’s reputation, especially in Dalaran of all places. “The magi might come up with their workarounds, but a proper sewer infrastructure would keep things clean without interruption or worries for a long time. A toilet doesn’t require concentration to maintain, just functioning parts and reasonable maintenance.”

“And water.”

“That too, but the mechanism is still more robust than simply chucking a spell and hoping it’s still there when you need it.”

Rolling his eyes at his ambitious relative, Pelton acquiesced with a nod to an amused Kyle. “I suppose you’ll want to lead the delegation yourself?”

The king grinned. “It’d be a nice excuse,” he said half-absently.

Worry crept into Pelton, but he nonetheless tried being optimistic. “To look into tracking the coins?”

“That too.”

It’s going to be about the murlocs, isn’t it?

*****

There was no delusion that his journey would go unnoticed, but at least by taking the less-traveled routes, he had hoped to minimize unnecessary detection by any discreetly planted agents. It meant avoiding trade routes altogether and using hunting trails or simply braving the wilderness to drift from village to town to village until he cleared Lordaeron.

Even when he finally reached Gilneas, Aliden Perenolde did not take his security for granted. He changed inns every other night under different aliases and kept away from crowded spaces, mostly locking himself in his room.

It gave him just enough time to ruminate over how plans were progressing. With the aid of a generous benefactor, the seeds of Aliden’s rightful ascension were slowly growing. Galen Trollbane had proven to be far more amicable to being friends than he had expected, and they’d come to a mutually beneficial agreement just as the benefactor had suggested.

Here in Gilneas, Aliden hoped to have a repeat performance, if not with Genn Greymane, then with his son, Liam. If anything, the latter would be more fitting, as it would then mean another kingdom heralding the dawning of a new era with new rulers.

Perhaps after this, if Liam did end up being the one who could be relied upon, Aliden could try reaching out to Arthas next? The entirety of the human kingdoms would enjoy a united ascension. Wouldn’t that be a sight.

Kul Tiras would obviously be taken by subverting and perhaps even marrying Jaina Proudmoore, of course. At worst, she could be promised to Arthas. It would open up Aliden to Calia and her stake in Lordaeron.

Or perhaps it might allow him a place for an elven queen…

And Stormwind… Well, they were too far south and too dependent currently on the Alliance to rebuild. Varian was too much of a needy parasite that couldn’t be tolerated.

The magi, dwarves and gnomes? Well, he had his plans for them…

Aliden spent evenings entertaining his grand plans while waiting for the right time. It eventually came a week after his entry into Gilneas. The pendant hanging around his neck tingled warmly, signaling his benefactor’s incoming contact. The true heir of Alterac shot up from his seat and grabbed at the pendant tightly, and then closed his eyes to focus himself.

The silky smooth voice of his benefactor, confident and reassuring, slid pleasantly into his mind. “Aliden,” it cooed, “you will present yourself to Genn Greymane tomorrow evening, at the docks. He will be amenable to befriending you, and supporting your cause, I’m sure.”

Aliden grinned. Ever since the bejeweled necklace appeared on him, his benefactor had been guiding him unerringly across the continent in the pursuit of reclaiming his rightful throne and more. By now, all suspicion against the mysterious voice had melted away, as every piece of timely advice had proven reliable and true. All that was asked in return was some favors in the future. Tangible gains for simple promises in the future? It was impossible to refuse such a deal.

“Genn will be there with his guards and some advisors, but they will allow your approach.”

Aliden frowned a little as a tinge of doubt seeped in. “Shouldn’t I seek a more discreet meeting?” His last meetings with Galen and exiled Alterac nobles had all been alone and in the shadows, to minimize any unwanted attention.

He felt a sigh of mild exasperation ripple in his head. “Events have to be accelerated. Your ascension needs to be hastened, before the usurper dooms the Alliance and your chance to lead it.”

The exiled heir almost growled at the mere thought of his half-brother. That the bastard Kyle, a commoner and a mage, had been selected over himself proved just how corrupt the old leadership of the Alliance had become. At least his benefactor thinks that Genn could be redeemed from his views. He nodded at the wall as he agreed with the voice in his head.

“I understand. I will meet with Genn, as you suggest.”

“Most wise, Aliden. With Gilneas’ more overt aid, you will be able to expand your influence far more easily.”

That was true. Having surly Genn as a cover would make it easier to reach out to other disaffected nobles within the Alliance…

“Thank you.”

A small sack materialized in a puff of sweet-smelling green mist, and Aliden already knew that it would be his ‘monthly allowance’ to continue his harsh journey. It was far from enough for a prince of his rank, but Aliden was not so arrogant that he couldn’t live without some suffering.

“I will contact you after you’ve…befriended Genn, as usual.”

Again, Aliden nodded at an empty room. “I look forward to your further guidance, Mal’Ganis.”