This fic is set before/partially during Pandaria, and it may last nearly to the end of that arc.
Most of that won't even matter much, since the main characters won't be following the MoP storyline as closely as my characters from Breaking Faith. However, for those of you who do read Breaking Faith, occasional events may line up...and you may see some familiar characters show up from that story. :)
This isn't a sequel to anything either, so you don't have to read my other stories for this one to make sense. It is a new storyline in its own right.
Disclaimer: I own nothing other than my OCs. Blizz is providing my sandbox.
Beads of sweat dripped generously down the disoriented elf's forehead and into her scrunched eyelids.
Her hearing was foggy, slowly returning, and behind her eyes throbbed an intense, debilitating pain that gave her the urge to lie down, to rest her head—or if that didn't work, to end her suffering with the cold steel of a blade. Heat flooded her senses as they returned as well, its intensity robbing her of moisture and burning her throat to the point of where her thirst overwhelmed her. Above her head, her hands had apparently been bound and shackled, draining her arms of proper circulation and making her fingers tingle uncomfortably. To top everything off, muffled, loud voices surrounded her, none of them friendly nor familiar.
What a way to wake up.
Aria let out a croaking breath, coaxing her dry, swollen eyelids to reopen, but the beating sun was so bright that it was physically too painful to attempt, so she let her head slump toward the ground and kept her eyes closed. Her dirty, thick, navy hair, half unbraided now that she'd gone so long without tending to it, was drooping lifelessly around her face, where it stuck to the sweat and tickled her neck and chin. All her armor was missing. She could tell her clothes were not her own; far too baggy, scratchy, and musty. Her shoulders and back were sore beyond measure, and any subtle movement sent shooting pain down her spine. She wondered if she'd bruised it.
Aria, she coaxed herself helplessly, relieved she could at least remember her name. There were so many missing hours she couldn't account for, missing days even, in which she had no idea what'd happened. The last thing she recalled, the last vivid memory of her own, was falling on that rainy battlefield possibly days earlier.
It'd been storming actually, not just raining, back on that field in the Arathi highlands. In her mind, she could still visualize the look on her human comrade Tommy's rain-streaked face when he died: haunting, yet accepting; a final goodbye. It refused to leave her, that look. The way his cold, dead eyes stared into nothing by the time his body had hit the muddy ground. And then, the way his killer's eyes had turned upon her, those vivid red pools of death, how they swirled with the adrenaline of battle as well as a streak of hysteria. Those blood red troll eyes. They belonged to just one in a multitude of many, her sworn enemies, for as long as she could remember: The Horde.
Once Tommy had fallen, Aria had known it was only a matter of time before she too was swept away with the beating rain, just another name on the list of one battle's casualties. No one would care. Anyone who possibly could care was now dead, there, in front of her. Including Tommy.
Right there on that battlefield, amidst the thunderous roars of her enemies while she fought back pointlessly against their attacks, Aria had begun to feel the full weight of her loss. Tommy was dead. Her comrade—no, her friend—had been slaughtered right in front of her eyes in that battle, and she hadn't even had the decency to react to it like a normal person; she'd merely stared, accepted, and returned to the battle without hesitation.
Had it been shock? she wondered, trying hard to recall that battle while she knelt there in disorienting, dry heat of midday sun. Whatever it'd been, she regretted it now. Better to lose one's life in battle than to be captured and… What was it she was doing here?
She peeked open one squinting lid, flinching at the pain that followed the action and willing her glowing silver eyes to accustom themselves with the sun. A few agonizing seconds passed before finally a picture came into view.
Boots.
What?
She blinked a few more times, trying her best to lean back despite her odd kneeling/tied position, and looked again.
Yep, boots.
Multiple people were all standing there in front of her, wearing tall boots, most of them a darkish leather. She wondered if she'd gone insane. That'd explain a lot.
A loud voice shouted out over what she realized was a crowd, which she'd been blocking out until now. It was a crowd of various types, all of them appearing to be of the criminal sort. There was no specific race of which they all belonged; they ranged from human to troll, no exceptions. Some of them looked like they could possibly be pirates, though she had no idea from which strain of pirates they hailed. Clearly not the friendly types.
She could tell she was on a tiny, tropical island; the sea could be heard in every direction, and the telltale smell of salt was heavy in the muggy air. Sand blew about by her knees on the platform, as well as down below it, and seagulls could be heard crying in the skies. She was in some sort of open square with warehouse-like buildings all around, and tall palms speckled the area, though they offered scarce relief from the beating sun.
"Now, I wanna get outta this heat as bad as all of you," the rough, loud voice cut out over the raucous shouts in the crowd, "so let's get a move on with this sale." It came from one of those to her right, one of the people in boots. Given the nature of the voice, it sounded like an orc.
She glanced around her and realized she wasn't alone. To her left was a human woman who looked in just about the same shape as she as far as dehydration went, and to her right was a human man who appeared even worse. Beyond them appeared to be countless more people, all tied up and malnourished. Aria tried swallowing, even though she had nothing to swallow. What was going on? How did she get here?
She tried to speak to the woman, but her throat was so dry her words came out in a cracked whisper.
"Hey," she croaked.
The woman didn't respond.
"Hey. Girl." Her voice won out for a half second.
The woman looked over at her, but then lowered her head immediately as a shadow fell over Aria. She glanced up at the source of the shadow to see a stocky female orc glaring down at her with a painful-looking thrash in one hand.
"Shut your mouth," the orc said brashly, her Common just barely understandable.
Aria gritted her teeth and glared up at the orc, the two of them stuck in a stalemate. She refused to look away, her hatred boiling up at the sight of this creature. For all she knew, that orc could have been one who helped kill Tommy or her other allies.
"Eyes at the ground, scum," she growled at Aria.
The elf refused to turn her head. What did she have to lose? Her life? She'd lost everything already.
"I said eyes down," she warned.
Arria's eyes remained fixed upon the orc's.
That did it. Out came the thrash, the end of it connecting with the side of Aria's face in a resounding, stinging 'snap!', the same way a whip would injure its target. She let out a sharp cry, slumping downward, her entire face exploding with pain.
She heard another voice, just as rough as the orc's but masculine, sound scolding.
"Don't ruin that one, she's pretty. More coin for the pretty ones."
Aria's heart sped up as she stared at the ground at her knees. Coin? She was being sold? That's what this was, a slave trade? Heavens know she'd be a terrible slave.
The side of her face began to burn from the lash, and she felt a strange hot trickle down her cheek. After a moment, a splash of dark crimson blood hit the wooden plank at her knees, and she blinked away the pain. That lash had been sharper than she'd thought.
The woman who'd hit her replied to the man. "I don't care what they look like, as long as they know their place."
A pair of dark boots stepped into her vision just as a rough hand grabbed the uninjured side of her face and wrenched her chin upward. She squinted out the sun again, unable to see the face that peered down at her.
"If you aim to hit her again, avoid the face." The male orc was the speaker.
Aria silently agreed with this, though if it were her choice, no hitting would be involved at all. Then again, she'd sort of brought it upon herself.
One of the orcs standing up there on that scaffolding shuffled over to the man beside her and yanked him to his feet, forcing the guy to stumble out to the center of the odd scaffolding she and the other prisoners were on.
The orc began calling out numbers, and people in the crowds began shouting back in response. It was hectic, confusing, and made Aria's head pound even worse, so she slouched her head and scrunched her eyes shut. No use paying attention; her time would come soon.
Two more prisoners went up to the front, received a price, and were sold. Aria felt her stomach churn and twist in its emptiness. Perhaps whoever ended up buying her would give her something to eat? Would she be that lucky? She knew for a fact that no matter what happened though, she would find a way to escape her 'owner'. She was not someone's property; she'd never be anyone's property, and anyone deluded enough to believe they could contain a night elf warrior would soon enough learn their mistake.
A parrot's telltale squawk sounded out from near the front, and Aria peered out over the edge of the stage. The sight that met her at first was so ridiculous she thought all this was a joke. She'd seen pirates before, and she had heard of their tendencies. But this new group that'd taken place in front of the other buyers was so incredibly, stereotypically pirate that she couldn't help but let a parched smirk cover her dry, chapped lips before wincing as the skin cracked. She tried running her tongue over her lips, but this only worsened their condition; her tongue was so dry that even the inside of her mouth tasted like dust.
The people standing closeby were all dressed in ridiculous, over-exaggerated jewelry and hats, and one even had a parrot. To top it off, to her absolute amusement, one guy had two eye-patches on. Over both eyes. What the hell?
She glanced toward the woman to her left, who seemed to have noticed them as well. She caught Aria's eye for a moment, and Aria's heart skipped a beat as she saw what might've just been a fluke: the woman donned a fleeting smirk, winking with one eye before the whole look vanished, returning back to the blank stare at the ground.
Perhaps Aria really was going crazy.
The orc woman who'd struck Aria strode over to the hunched human woman and grabbed her by the shoulder, untying her bindings from the poles above them and dragging her to the front. Aria watched this time as the sale went down. For some reason, though she'd never spoke to the woman in her life, Aria felt a pang of sadness seeing her go. It was like being there together on that scaffolding had given them something in common, in a way. A shared experience.
The auctioneer began shouting out starting prices. One of the pirates up front, a rugged-looking man dressed in far too many colorful silks, retorted back an outlandishly-high price.
"Thirty thousand."
The auctioneer sounded surprised for a moment before he quickly became more enthusiastic.
"Do I have any more bidders?" he called out, but his sentence wasn't finished when yet again another one of those ridiculously-garbed pirates interrupted him.
"Sixty thousand," a liquid voice barked from someone she couldn't see at this angle.
The auctioneer appeared baffled, and Aria's eyes widened as well. The highest any other slave had brought in was just under one thousand. What was it this woman had that the others didn't?
"No, cheap-ass, bump it up to ninety!" another voice shouted.
"One hundred!"
Aria could swear she saw the woman's shoulders quake with what looked like laughter. What in Elune's name was going on?
"Five hundred thousand!" A woman yelled. Thus followed a round of raucous laughter from the large crowd of flamboyant pirates.
The auctioneer suddenly looked pissed. "If you aren't buying, get the hell out," he growled over the group.
"You see, we're not buying, that's the thing!" a teasing, loud, strangely-accented masculine voice sounded suddenly from up high and to the left. Faces turned, as did Aria's, but she didn't see a thing. The voice continued, still out of sight from behind thick fronds of a palm. It appeared whoever was speaking was somehow on top of a nearby shed and was taking cover behind the tree's leaves. "In fact, no one here is buying. Now let the girl go."
The orc looked unconvinced. "Get the hell out of my auction." He gripped a complicated-looking firearm at his belt.
"Ladies and gents," the voice carried out again, and finally Aria caught sight of its owner. "If you'd all kindly take a step away from those prisoners you've got there, this will go much smoother."
Sauntering leisurely out onto the rooftop of that distant shed was a troll man of decent height, garbed in tribal-yet-modern belts and pants. He wore a leather harness over a bare, bronze chest, and attached to that harness were shoulder guards, a hood, and a long, green-tinted cape. In his gloved hands was a tightly-drawn bow, with the arrow pointed straight toward the scaffolding. The only way Aria could distinguish his racial origin was due to the tusks that jutted out from under his hood, at which, due to her time fighting against these creatures, Aria couldn't help but cringe. Even so, he was at least saving some of the prisoners; that was good, right?
His voice carried out again, this time far less genial. "Touch that gun, orc, and you'll be dead before you can draw."
"You're trying to rob me of my prizes?" the orc laughed, but his hand did remove itself from the firearm.
"Rob you?" the troll's voice was oddly-clear. He laughed darkly and shook his head. "Ah, my dear slaver, but that is the dilemma: you do not own these people. Now if you'd step back with your hands above your head..."
"You are outnumbered," the orc retorted, refusing to move. "One troll against my guards? You should have thought this through."
"I take this as a confirmation you won't do as I ask?" the hooded troll asked.
"I will not," the orc said, then spat a thick glob at his own feet. "Leave before you regret this."
"Poor choice, slaver," the troll said, and with that, he sent his arrow free.
The sharpened point sank into the exposed eye socket of the auctioneer, who stumbled a step backward, then fell. Just like that, he was dead. At the same time, the human woman who'd been kneeling up front suddenly stood, hands somehow free of their confines, and Aria watched as she twisted around, grabbed the weapons of the orc woman who had held her there, and finished her off as well, the familiar-yet-sickening sound of the knives cleaving through flesh giving Aria a strange sense of excitement and hope. The woman then jumped down off the scaffolding and joined in with the colorful pirates, clashing with the guards of the auction. Aria surged forward, fighting against her shackles, wishing desperately she could be in on what was now turning into a pretty epic fight.
All those ridiculously-dressed pirates, at the sight of the troll killing the auctioneer, had apparently been waiting for that as their signal. They turned on the people behind them, all those criminal-looking characters who'd attended in order to buy or sell slaves, and thus began an entertaining, terrifying battle. In her peripherals Aria noticed a flash of color, and she glanced over to see that hooded troll cutting the bindings off of the people beside her.
However, as much as she wanted to be free, Aria couldn't help but feel the bile in her stomach rise at the proximity of the troll. It had been a troll who'd killed Tommy back in Arathi. The blood red eyes of that creature had been ingrained in her mind forever, and though she was quite sure this was probably not the same troll, she couldn't help it. Her fury rose, turning into rage, and by the time he reached her, she shuffled her feet back, cringing away. She didn't want this troll to have any redeeming qualities. She wanted him to be a monster, like the ones she'd fought so often. If he saved her, if he freed her, she wasn't sure she could be responsible for her actions, nor the guilt that'd follow them.
He paused momentarily when she cringed away from him, and he stared down at her, his face hidden and unreadable under his hood. His gloved hands reached out to her bindings, and she let out a growl that even to her was unrecognizable.
His hands paused again. Around them echoed the sounds of clashing swords and shouts, but even as she glanced over at the fighting, she knew those crazy pirates had the upper hand. Most of the attendees were fleeing for their lives, and the guards and officials of the slave trade were all dead.
"Kal," a woman's voice called out, the same woman who'd been tied beside Aria. "Hurry. We don't have much time."
The troll let out a grumble under his breath and reached for Aria's bindings. Again, she tensed up. It took everything in her not to lash out. She'd been fighting Alliance battles for so long that being approached by one of these creatures like this was almost physical torture.
"Look, if I can't free you, you'll die," he said, his voice rough.
She didn't reply, just glared up at him murderously.
His shoulders slumped, and his tone had a hint of remorse. "Is that what you want? You want me to leave you here to die?"
Still, she did not answer, refusing to speak to this troll.
He let out a rumbling sigh and seemed to come to a decision on his own. He reached out and grabbed her bindings, sawing at them with his knife until they came loose. Her hands fell, and she let out a cry of pain. Her limbs had been tied up for so long that the stiffness plus the lack of circulation made it beyond painful to move them.
Still, though, there was a troll just five feet from her, and he'd willingly set her free. And when he reached up and pulled down his hood, revealing vivid crimson eyes, Aria snapped like a crazed animal at the sight.
With the pain of losing Tommy—to a troll just like this no less—still fresh in her mind, she launched herself forward, pummeling into the man and knocking him backward. She'd hoped to knock him off his feet, but his balance was off-the-charts and he somehow stayed upright as she threw her chokingly-painfully-sore arms out in punching attacks. One of her fists connected with his bare ribs, and the other swung dangerously-close to his jaw as he dodged out of the way.
"Stop," he warned her, blocking her attacks easily, which were becoming weaker as her fatigue pulled at her. Her adrenaline and fury had built up while she was tied, but now as she spent her energy, she discovered there really wasn't that much to be spent.
Aria threw another punch toward his face, and he halted it with an open palm.
"Stop," he repeated, his voice commanding.
She felt hot tears forming in her eyes and refused to quit. Tommy's memory wouldn't be disgraced. She'd rather this troll kill her right now, she'd rather her death mirror the deaths of her fallen friends, than accept this monster's help. She noticed that the sounds of battle had faded, left only with the triumphant cheers of what she could only guess were the pirate-impostors. At least she wouldn't be taken as a slave.
She'd much rather die like this.
Somehow, her energy kept up as she threw another attack at him, but he now caught her by the wrists and stared down at her in curiosity and confusion. She caught his intense, calculating gaze for a moment and averted her own, refusing to look into the eyes that so resembled the killer of her closest friend. He obviously wasn't the same man, she thought to herself as she stared at the ground, the side of her face stinging and her mouth burning with thirst. The man who'd killed her friend had looked beyond different.
But those eyes...
She looked back up at him. The eyes set her fury aflame, recounting in her mind the memories of Tommy's lifeless stare.
With a cry of grief, she made to attack again despite his hold on her wrists, letting go of any remaining restraint. Something hard and painful connected with the back of her head, and at that, she was out cold.
Ohohooo what now, what now?
Stay tuned. ;)
Thank you so much for reading, and depending on feedback, I'll try to get this one updated quickly. :)