The Adventures of a Rebellious Huntress
The cool, salty air gently embraced Ardrella's face as she straddled the bowsprit. She looked off into the distance where the sun was setting in a brilliant display of orange and red while letting the rocking of the boat and the bracing wind fill her up. Behind her, the looming silhouette of Teldrassil shrank into the distance. Within a couple days or so, the Moonspray would dock in Stormwind Harbor, and Ardrella would finally prove her mettle to the Alliance and, more importantly, her sister Tyrande.
A year earlier
The day had finally come. An excited Night Elf scurried through her house trying to find her quiver and thigh sheath.
"Agnes….Agnes! Time to go!" Shouted the Night Elf as she haphazardly strapped her thigh sheath on. A couple seconds later, a large grey owl fluttered down from her perch in the rafters. Agnes preened herself, trying to copy her master's morning rituals as she always did. The Night Elf was currently in front of her mirror fixing her long, black hair into one thick braid that reached down to her waist. After making sure her blue skin was free of any blemishes or the like, she grabbed her bow and motioned for Agnes the owl to follow her.
"Oh my goodness we are so late! My sister is going to kill me when she finds out that I missed my first mission briefing!" said the Night Elf through heavy breaths. She ran along the wooded path while her owl flew from tree to tree, keeping an eye on her master's progress. Not long afterwards, the image of Aldrassil came upon them, and so did the angry visage of Melithar Staghelm.
"Ardrella Whisperwind," said Melithar in a scolding tone that pricked at her mind like an owls claws on bare skin. "This is not the best way for Tyrande's sister to begin her service in arms." Melithar's voice had a tone that hinted at the other standard that she had failed to meet, and she rolled her eyes in exasperation.
Since Ardrella's older sister Tyrande Whisperwind was the high priestess of Elune, leader of the Sisterhood and the leader of the Night Elf race in place of Malfurion Stormrage, she had assumed her baby sister would assume the title of sister as well and become Tyrande's protégée and eventually successor. However, the thought of sitting around in a temple all day and only venturing to the battlefield to heal the wounded didn't appeal to Ardrella at all. Ardrella's main interest was archery and taking care of her pet owl Agnes.
This had led Ardrella into becoming a huntress. The public, shocked at her disregard of her sister's wishes, treated her like a rebellious child that needed to be watched closely. Ironically, Ardrella had never learned her sister's thoughts on her career choice but she was sure she disapproved of them. She therefore decided that it would be best to ignore those troublesome thoughts and focus on doing well during her training, but a longing to gain favor with her sister always stuck in the back of her mind.
In every kingdom belonging to the Alliance, a year of training was allotted to the novices to prepare them for open warfare. In Teldrassil, young rookies were assigned to kill off pesky Nightsabers and boars while keeping the Furbolgs and Bloodfeather Harpies in check. These fiends were easy fodder for Ardrella. She delivered fatal arrow shots from the shadows while Agnes fought in close quarters, keeping the target busy. In only a month's time, Ardella and Agnes had come to their final mission on Teldrassil, the annihilation of Lady Sathrah.
Lady Sathrah was something of a hometown legend for the Night Elves. She was a giant spider who pleased the goddess Elune with the beauty of her silvery webs. The dew that collected on these webs was collected by the Sisters and used as healing reagents. Ardrella had been told stories about her, but she never thought she would actually see her, much less kill her. Much like everything else in this day and age, it was the fault of the growing corruption brought on by Malfurion's fallen brother Illidan an his demon filth.
This "corruption" was already present in Teldrassil. Corrupted furbolgs completely took over Starbreeze village to the west, and the path to the Oracle Glade to the east was frequently patrolled by the Bloodfeather Harpies, lead by Fury Shelda. However, Lady Sathrah was always thought of as untouchable, a glimmer of hope that the old life the Night Elves knew would survive through the war. Obviously it was a foolish thing to believe. Discarding her romantic musings of hope, Ardrella took up her bow and dagger and sped off into the dense forest.
The plan was simple. Ardrella would first hit the spider with an arrow coated with an herbal poison that would slow the creature. Agnes would then swoop in and begin to distract it with rakes of her claws and sharp pecks of her beak. Meanwhile, Ardrella would take shot after deadly shot into the creature's vital organs, thereby taking it down without drawing the spider within melee distance of herself. "It's just a big spider," she said, "How hard could it be?
"Spider in sight" said Ardrella, copying the way the gnomes were said to ramble into their portable communication devices during battle. She laughed briefly at her own silliness and once again became serious. Drawing her first arrow, she applied the gelatinous, clear substance from the emerald vile she kept in her pack and coated the arrow with it. Placing it on the bow, she recalled the basics of archery she was taught by her trainer back in Shadowglen, Ayanna Everstride.
Ayanna was the closest thing she had to a friend in her entire life. Although she was her tutor and therefore superior, Ayanna was extremely agreeable and she sympathized with Ardrella's situation with her sister. "I understand that you think you're disappointing your sister by choosing to be a huntress," she would say, "But in the end I think you did the right thing by following what you desire." Ayanna taught Ardrella how to plant her feet firmly when she shot a bow, how to set traps so enemies couldn't spot them and which venoms would be most effective when taking down undead targets like the vile Forsaken that inhabited the fallen kingdom of Lordaeron like parasites feeding off a rotten corpse. Ayanna had taught Ardrella more about how the world works than even her own sister Tyrande, but even Ayanna couldn't go with Ardrella once she had taken the great spider down. The kaldorei and their lands held no interest for Ardrella and she intended to remedy that situation as soon as possible.
"Once I kill you," she seemed to whisper to the spider, "I'm leaving Tyrande, Teldrassil, and Kalimdor for good." And with that she released the arrow, letting her pale blue fingers slide off the bowstring as effortlessly as a weary traveler finally setting his burden down.