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Nathanos was training the new recruits when Sylvanas summoned him. He was told to meet her at the Orb of Translocation linking Undercity and Silvermoon. Upon arriving, Nathanos saw her standing alone, her back facing him.

"My champion," Sylvanas said. "How do you fare today?"

"Very well my queen," replied Nathanos. "For which reasons have you summoned me?"

Sylvanas turned around to face him, the sound of her footsteps echoing through the air. For a moment the two simply looked at each other. No words, no movement, just silence.

Unlike most of the time, her face was softened and her gaze had lost its sharp edge. Nathanos knew something was amiss with his queen every time she dropped her hardened façade, an action she would do in private of course. He assumed it was her failure in Stormheim which affected her this time, but he could be wrong.

"Do you regret it?"

Nathanos wasn't sure he had heard her correctly, mainly due to the suddenness of the question and how seemingly it was cut off. The ambiguity in it made him frown internally. "Pardon, Dark Lady?"

"Your cousin, do you regret doing it?"

The subject of his cousin was the last thing he had expected to hear from his queen. It struck him unexpectedly as if his heart was pierced by one of his own arrows. He had tried to push down his feelings and what was left of his humanity down countless times, yet they somehow always managed to resurface. "Yes, I do regret the choice I made."

"I apologize then for suggesting it in the first place."

Nathanos noticed Sylvanas' gaze on him. One of the emotions in it was sympathy, something he knew the Sylvanas standing in front of him wouldn't show or even acknowledge its existence—except for the old Sylvanas, the ranger-general of Quel'Thalas whose grace and prowess in archery captivated him dearly in his past life. Like the latter, the old Nathanos Marris would never sacrifice his own cousin's life for vanity. "Time changes people," he said. "Death changed us."

"But some refuse to change."

Nathanos watched as his queen approached him, her movement entrancing him with each of her steps. She stopped when they were an arm's length apart from each other.

"Even if they are to change," Sylvanas said, locking her glowing red orbs with his. "Or if they are to fake the changes."

"Why?" asked Nathanos, his eyes searching hers for answers. "Why won't they change?"

Sylvanas turned around and walked back to the center of the room. "They have someone whose existence prevents them from changing," she said. "Someone whose presence alone is enough to bring them back had they gone astray."

Nathanos stared at his queen, his mind processing her words. He sensed a connection between her and what she had said, and then paired it with how the Sylvanas in front of him had been acting. A sudden alarm shot through his body when something clicked in his mind. He felt as if the person in front of him was not his queen, not a cunning and ruthless ruler of the Horde. Rather, it was someone else—someone close that he knew and once had been familiar with.

"Who are you?"

"I believe you know the answer to that question." She let him ponder as she approached the Orb of Translocation. "Now, spare me the details and follow me," Sylvanas said to him. "And try to attract as least attention as possible." She activated the orb before being teleported away in seconds.

Her abrupt parting shook him from his thoughts. He had partly been listening when she told him to follow her. Knowing she was waiting on the other side, Nathanos walked up to the orb and activated it.

Sylvanas?