Hey look a wild story appeared!

I swear I have no self control. Oh well.

I had this moment pop into my head today, and it wouldn't let me not write it. So yeah. But that's ok, this isn't as random of a little story idea as it seems because this is my main character here. And I've spent over eight years developing a story for him. His past and all the details of his life and his personality and basically everything about him are so extensive that it's as if he's a person who is very close to me.

I don't know whether or not if I should continue this, though. I guess it depends on what kind of feedback I get. For some reason I'm almost nervous to tell his stories, yet I also feel as if... I have to. Like I need to. Does this make any sense to you? It doesn't to me :P

Well. Here you go. Oh btw, if I do continue this, the title is most likely going to change a few times, but for now...

Howling

Also, the picture for this story is the character. And I don't own WoW or anything, etc.

The commander stood in silence and stared out into the snow from the entrance to the great hall, eyes not really focused on anything in particular. He felt as far away as he looked, his mind lost, drifting somewhere with the howling of the wind and the Frostwolves. One sound was a comfort, the other brought about nightmares, yet both sounds were so similar. The calling of the wolves stole his heart, keeping him locked in place as he strained elongated ears to grasp at the sound, to pick it out from the maddening wailing of the wind. The wailing... Horrible, unending, invading... Ripping the night air apart with shrieks and screams, the memories they invoked sickening his heart.

Faces rushed at him from the frantic wall of white snow just beyond the shelter of the hall, mouths agape as they wailed with the wind. Their clawed hands ripped at his clothes and skin, at his soul and his sanity. He clamped hands over his ears and shut his eyes tight, but he couldn't shake the visions this time. Every day the memories and nightmares got a little bit closer to winning, to taking him over just as the Scourge had taken over his life all those years ago. For him...

The Invasion had never ended.

It was a siege, an assault he couldn't keep up with, a million tentacles and threads of his broken, ripped up life tangled around his wrists and ankles, forever dragging him under. Into The deep, dark, black below. The underbelly of his insanity. He knew he was losing his mind, he was losing this battle. He was losing himself. And often he was tempted to give up, again, as he had done before when the pain had been far too great, far too real, far too present and recent to handle. He would wash everything down with arcane magics and alcohol, draining bottles and magical essences all the same.

He was young, startlingly young for an elf to hold such position as one of the garrison commanders for the Azerothian Horde, a key figure in the fight against Draenor's Iron Horde. But he felt old, ancient even. Perhaps it was the blood in his veins, with only three ancestors in his lineage on his father's side between himself and the Highborne his people once were, thousands of years ago. The Highborne blood in him was much higher than in others of his people, but being a Noble's son it should be that way. Or so he supposed...

But whatever the reason, he felt old. His armor felt too heavy when he wore it, his heart even heavier, he found himself sleeping less and less but tired at the same time. He would lay in bed and stare at the knots in the wood planks of the walls. There would be times where he felt halfway dead, as if his soul was separate from his body. He supposed this was what Hyasist often felt like as one of the Forsaken, she had explained it once before as some sort of detachment, a feeling but also an... Un-feeling? The opposite of a feeling... It seemed to match this. But who could truly know?

All the same... He knew he was losing. He could destroy all the Humans on Azeroth for what they'd done to his people and his father, he could kill every demon for what had been done to his wife and children, every undead for what that bastard Arthas had done to his people and his mother, win again and again on the battlefield against the Alliance. But this was one battle he would lose, and the worst part was knowing it. Being aware was a horrible thing at times. Being aware of your failure when it came to being a person was even worse. He often hated his own existence, self hatred coiled and hot, ready to strike like an iron snake bathed in fire. The ways he would inadvertently punish himself for existing hurt just about the same as a bite from something like that.

He opened his eyes to face the snow, hoping maybe it could cool the seething rage and freeze the roiling fear that had poisoned him so. He shed his furs, leaving them on the steps beside his bow. He felt empty when it left his hand, but he forced himself to shake away the off feeling it gave him not to feel its weight in his fingers or against his back. In cloth pants with a thin shirt and simple boots he stepped out into the raging storm of a wild Frostfire night.

He began to walk, willing the cold to claim him, fighting the howling of the wind. He wandered aimlessly through his garrison, hardly able to see more than two feet in front of him, and found himself at the gates to the stables. The stablehands had put up a barrier of skins and hides to shelter the animals within. Before he realized it, his numb fingers closed around the rough, ice-caked fabric flap that served as a door and entered.

Inside all the hunters' pets and everyone's mounts were huddled together asleep around a firepit in the center of the stable. The stablehands were asleep, too, in their cots. All rested on a night like this. All but himself.

Frostbite lifted his head, the great white Frostwolf looking at him with that very same looked he'd donned the moment hunter and beast laid eyes on each other back in Alterac Valley all those years ago. He lowered himself to sit beside his oldest companion and closest friend. Both elf and wolf heaved a great sigh together, both feeling the strain of a night like this. He ran fingers through Frostbite's fur, warming his hands and calming himself. He closed his eyes again, relishing in the memory his mind had latched onto now. It was one of the few good ones he had, and he did not want to let it go... But before he could even fight it, Jaerim had fallen asleep.