Leesah reached into the bottom of the backpack. Her nose wrinkled as she pulled out what had once been a wrapped package of Very Burnt Worg but was now looking slightly green and furry around the edges. It made a kind of wet splat as she dropped it onto the pile of rubbish she had just pulled out of her bags. Other items lay scattered around her where she sat on the floor of her room in the Valley of Wisdom.
"No wonder Max has been sniffing around the Kodo a bit more," she thought as she looked fondly at the little windrider cub, curled up asleep with the moonkin hatchling on a cushion nearby.
A loud screeching cry from outside in the valley made her look up in alarm. "What in the world..." She quickly packed about her potions and other useful items back into one backpack and plonked the pile of rubbish into another. It was amazing what vendors would buy these days.
Leesah headed outside and looked up in wonder at the sky, her jaw dropping. There were dragons, drakes, sparkly flying horses, windriders, gyrocopters, rockets and all sorts of other flying creatures and apparatus flying around the air above Orgrimmar, swooping and diving. She turned to a Tauren standing just outside the door and said, "What's going on?"
The Tauren shrugged and said, "I heard the Warchief had started allowing people to fly in Kalimdor airspace now, but you have to have a licence. I'm not sure where to get them."
Leesah thought she could probably guess. A good number of flying creatures were hovering above the new flight master and Zeppelin towers on the top tier of the city. She headed up the ramp to the lift.
As the lift reached the top of the shaft she was almost unable to get off it. An enormous crowd was gathered around the general location of the Flight Master, shoving, pushing, shouting, mounts crying out in panic and flying creatures squawking and screaming above. Someone riding a War Mammoth was trying to push through the crowd, and a large number of swearing people were busy ducking out of the way of the large tusks as the huge creature swayed back and forth.
Leesah joined the back of the crowd, peering over the heads of those in front of her to see what was happening in the centre. Gradually, she was pushed from behind towards the centre of the crowd, where she could see the Flight Master, Maztha, frantically scribbling on bits of paper and shoving them at members of the jostling crowd. A goblin standing just behind her was collecting gold from those lucky enough to be handed a licence.
"Do you mind, you're standing on my foot!" shouted an unfortunate Blood Elf who Leesah had been shoved into from the side.
"Sorry!" she said helplessly as another shove pushed her forward suddenly and she found herself with a piece of paper in her hand.
"Well? Hand over the gold! 212 please!" The goblin was looking at her expectantly and holding out a hand. Leesah blinked and quickly counted out the coin, then realised she was free to go. With a grin she muttered a few words and transformed into her Stormcrow form, shooting straight up above the crowd with a strong flap of her wings.
"Orgrimmar looks so different when you're not coming in on a zeppelin!" she thought as she circled higher above the city, then suddenly had to dive out of the way as some idiot on a Green Drake almost rammed into her from one side.
"Watch where you're going!" the orc on the back shouted, shaking one fist at her. She glared after him, then hurried back down to the Valley of Wisdom to finish her preparations.
~o~
Incidentally if you're having trouble clicking on an NPC for a quest or training because of people standing on them, try keybinding the "interact with target" command. Type "/tar " then the NPC's name to target them, use your keybind, then step back and leave the suckers to it.
Thanks for the top tip, Sunfyre!
