This story is entirely fictional. All NPCs, and even the name Tyrael, are property of Blizzard. I do not own any of the intellectual properties.
That being said, this story is entirely possible, even with Blizzard's Warcraft lore. The story is set in the time of World of Warcraft, except for this initial prologue. This is my first REAL attempt at writing in story format, so any honest and helpful comments will be greatly appreciated.
The smell of death was in the air—it permeated around him, sinking into his robes, nearly singing his nostrils.
As Xanos walked amongst the burning huts and corpses of the fallen, he looked upon the destruction he had wrought with little more than apathy. There was no true meaning in this widespread slaughter, he knew. No purpose besides the unquenchable thirst for mass murder that drove his master. Xanos was but a pawn in his schemes—a valuable pawn, but a pawn nonetheless.
Archimonde would come on the morrow. He would bring his demons down to kill the remaining stragglers on this planet, and claim Xanos' work as his own. The master knew, though. He was well aware of Archimonde's scheming, but Sargeras allowed him to continue with it.
He had never liked Xanos. The Dark Titan saw something within this Eredar that was different than his other minions. Where the others reveled in the destruction, Xanos cared little for it all. Where his brethren used the fel arts, he did not. Even his appearance was different from the majority of his race. His scalp was round and smooth, lacking the raised and ridged brow inherent in his kind. His smooth, chiseled jaw lacked tendrils of any kind, and he had not a hair on his body. He was also relatively lanky, his muscles sculpted and toned, but lacking the bulk that was so common amongst his peers. In all, he looked much more like a strange variation of elf than an Eredar…but an Eredar he was.
He was powerful, as well...A creature of nearly pure shadow, closer to a priest, and far stronger than the majority of his people. This power caused the others to fear him, and because of this he was given the supposed "honor" of being the first to set foot on any new planet. This was little more than a poorly masked attempt from Archimonde to have the Eredar killed, as Xanos would have been the first choice to lead the armies of the Legion. It was nearly laughable to the Man'ari –or it would have been, if he cared enough to find the humor.
As he walked, he saw a small figure, curled into the fetal position in the corner of a destroyed hut. With an inward sigh, he walked towards the being, ready to deliver it into the arms of oblivion. Drawing nearer, a small realization came to him in the back part of his mind—this was a child. Sobbing and covered in soot, this child had seen the murders of countless people. Her people.
Training and 22,000 years of corruption told Xanos to kill the child outright. The darkness within him screamed at him to destroy this life form quickly, and be done with it. However, something else, something slightly stronger, made him hesitate. Dropping from his shadowform, he approached the child slowly, the smallest inkling of emotion apparent in his eyes.
As he neared, the child flinched, its sobbing breaking with absolute terror. Pursing his lips, Xanos spoke, almost comfortingly.
"Come here, child. You will not be killed, yet. There is little you could do to escape me, at any rate."
The child whimpered and rose slowly, trembling in fear. Xanos noted the long hair and the hints of feminine growth, deciding that this was a girl nearing the start of her adolescence. Small horns rose from the peak of her scalp, and from the bottom of her gown, he saw hooves. This girl was a Draenei…one of his people that escaped the corruption.
She stumbled to him slowly, her legs shaking in utter terror. She whimpered softly, sensing that her end was near, but facing it as bravely as she could.
Something awakened in Xanos that moment—something he believed long dead. For the first time in eons, compassion pushed its way to the surface, breaking his apathetic barrier, cracking the facade. Immediately the corruption within him began to battle this emotion, fighting to quell it, screaming at him to end this girl's life. He forced these feelings down, and offered her a small smile, his eyes changing from apathy to sincerity in a mere moment.
"I'm not going to kill you, child," he forced himself to say, the corruption seeking to force his hand, to prove him wrong. He was expecting any sort of response from her, from disbelief to hatred, perhaps an attempt to kill him, or herself. What he did not expect was her reaction, however.
The girl ran to him, wrapping her arms around his waist, crying into his chest.
Frozen with surprise at first, the corruption within Xanos reared its head again, attempting to control him, to strike her down. Fighting it down one final time, he stroked her hair softly, soothingly.
With this act, the unthinkable happened. The corruption, the ever-present force inside of him, the source of his power, and the power of all the Man'ari, died within him, and he was a mortal once again. Standing there with the young girl in his arms, the last remnants of the darkness cleared from his thoughts. Suddenly, in a flash of blinding light, he was gone, leaving the poor girl in the center of her destroyed home, and at the mercy of Archimonde the Defiler.
Heat. That was the first thing that registered in his mind—an unnatural sort of heat that felt as if it blistered him to his core. His eyes opened groggily, and he peered at his surroundings.
He was atop a mountain of sorts, on a cliff of nearly one thousand feet of sheer rock face. All below him was molten lava and granite, the occasional piece of architecture littering the land. The smell of sulfur weighed heavily in the air, and he could see elementals and a short, dark-skinned people patrolling the area.
How had he come to be here?
His eyes suddenly opened with shock as he realized he could remember nothing. Looking down at himself for what seemed the first time, he took note of the hooves, the tail, and the smooth, naked skin. He wondered what sort of being he was, and the word "Draenei" came to his mind. He spoke it aloud, pleased that he could speak at all. He felt a small comfort in the fact that he could speak, but it was far from enough to quell his rising panic. Who was he? Why couldn't he remember anything? And why was he here, of all places?
A small whisper in his mind came to the forefront of his thoughts. It offered wordless comfort, a soothing presence from another source. He could not understand the intentions of it, but one word came to him. "Tyrael."
He rose, shrugging off the fatigue and ache in his muscles and joints. After a short time, he mustered the strength to walk, but stumbled and fell—directly off the cliff before him.