February 3, year 24
One of the many birds of paradise found in Stranglethorn Vale announced the rising of the moon with its call. The sound found its way through the open window of the women's barracks, the most melodious sound to be heard at the small Alliance outpost in the far south of northern Stranglethorn 'province.' Or at least, the faction claimed it as a province. As Tirith came to find during the past half a year there, that claim was not only contested but largely a fantasy.
The last few buckles of her bracers didn't cooperate as she tried to fasten them. For millennia she'd donned her armor without assistance, ritualizing the behavior until it had become second nature. She and her shield sisters used to hold competitions to see who could suit up the fastest, passing by the countless years and preparing to spring into action on a minute's notice for the inevitable return of the Burning Legion. Their grove's commander narrowed the amount of time to don her armor to forty three seconds; they all threw a moderate celebration over that. Those days had long since passed, and after the loss of her people's immortality, they began to age. Those of them who were a mere thousand years old or less fared the best; little changed aside from an increased fertility rate, and the younger ranks of the Kaldorei - very well likely the majority - were the most accepting of the brave new world they found thrust upon them. Those who were older than the War of the Shifting Sands but still born after immortality had begun displayed some signs of ageing in terms of their appearance and, by night elven standards, their maturity; they probably wouldn't live as long now that they were mortals again, but their mentality was still similar to that of the younglings.
Those from Tirith's generation weren't faring quite as well. Born three millennia before immortality had even begun, she had already outlived the life expectancy of an elf by then due to the longevity provided by the Well of Eternity; so much time had already passed before the War of the Ancients that Tirith could already have filled volumes with all that she witnessed. The Long Vigil, their ten thousand year watch, was longer but much less eventful, filled mostly with monotonous duty night in and night out. And after seeing and living through so much, those who were born in her eon knew they would be the first to go.
It was felt immediately. At the Battle of Mount Hyjal, she stood next to her shield sisters as the horn was blown, and Nordrassil was sacrificed to destroy Archimonde; the shockwave from the wisps caused a quick pain in her spine, a dizziness in her head and the temporary loss of the glow of her eyes for a few minutes. The younger night elves didn't feel it, having largely been unaffected by the loss; for Tirith and many of the others, it was the start of nagging annoyances that upset the night elves much more than the younger races. Illness had been unknown to her people, and she suddenly found herself blowing her nose more when exposed to cold weather. Bumps and scrapes had been temporary, and she suddenly found that a scar from a skirmish against a mob of murlocs just wouldn't go away. Clumsiness had been incomprehensible to them, and suddenly she found herself less nimble that her youngers and stubbing her toes, dropping her chopsticks and overestimating her own jump distance on occasion.
On that particular night as she sat on the edge of her bunk, her problem was that buckling her bracers unassisted required twenty three seconds. At least she had been stationed in a jungle; she'd heard stories from the few other night elves she'd met in that part of the world about pre-immortality individuals suffering from joint problems when assigned to huntress lodges and Druid dens in Winterspring.
Maybe things weren't so bad at her newest assignment after all-
"Hurry up!"
The loud banging on the door and the bellowing from outside snapped Tirith out of her thoughts. Her shift hadn't even started yet and Marge was already causing a ruckus outside.
In only five seconds, Tirith ran one last check on her armor to ensure it was all fastened properly. That wasn't fast enough for the outpost's commander, and by the time Tirith had hitched her shield to the carrier on her backplate and attached her moon glaive to her right bracer, Marge had already waddled off, leaving the doorway empty when the sentinel walked outside.
"You! Don't out those steel cables there!" the dwarf yelled at someone who Tirith couldn't see around the corner of the men's barracks. "And you, get to your post! You're going to be late!"
"A sentinel can be at her post in under ten..." Tirith's Darnassian retort trailed off as Marge had already disappeared, likely off to her usual frantic scurrying around the camp in order to ensure that all daily chores had been finished so she could sleep in her private quarters.
It was for the best, anyway; Marge had officially banned the speaking of any language other than Common by the Alliance soldiers stationed at the camp, and the woman had the authority to assign anyone to overtime, manual labor or even an appearance at the office of the regional command. That would require a trip even further from the main highway running between Booty Bay and Duskwood, which to date nobody had been unfortunate enough to be tasked with.
Swift and silent, Tirith exited the women's barracks and slipped in between that and the camp wall. Like Nesingwary's camp, the Alliance camp in that part of northern Stranglethorn had no real center; there were high walls made from murdered trees forming a circle, a ring of government and military buildings inside forming another circle, and then civilian vendors and settlers in the middle. One dirt intersection between some buildings on the other end was wide enough for chairs, and the civilians and off duty soldiers would often spend part of the evening playing what humans seemed to think was music and drinking far more than was healthy. Wanting to avoid all that, she slipped unseen out the main gate, surprising William and the two silent but polite dwarven warriors who shared his shift.
"Greetings," Tirith droned a little more pleasantly as she found the three men relatively at ease as they chatted just outside the camp walls. The darkness of the jungle lied beyond save for a narrow dirt road leading through and the opening in the canopy above, though Tirith's eyes saw perfectly under such conditions.
Feigning surprise, William blinked his eyes in an exaggerated manner. "Glad it's you and not a certain someone else!" he laughed deeply despite his tired eyes. The two dwarves with him smiled as well, much more low key than the humans when they were sober. They never stared or pried, and coupled with William's relatively reserved nature, the trio were of the few people at the camp whose company Tirith actually enjoyed.
"I feel the same," she replied, finding it much easier to speak their language when she felt at ease.
For a second he seemed to expect her to say more, and when she didn't, he continued talking comfortably. "I take it we're finally to be relieved of our posts for the night?"
"Yes, and I think Marge will want you to tell her to her face." William found Tirith's comment funny and she assumed she'd used words in a way he wasn't used to as a native speaker. Seeing an opportunity to practice her skills without fear of being mocked, she tried to make a joke. "So I will wait here all by myself?" she asked, knowing that she'd been handling the night shift at the settlement gate by herself on most nights anyway.
To her relief, the human knew her well enough to know it was a joke and laughed. "Unfortunately, we don't have the budget for heavier security at night. Luckily, we have you here and a few of the night owls prowling inside - we never lose sleep knowing you're here."
It took her a second to realize she'd been complimented, and her pride swelled. "I am...glad. And ever vigilant. This is what my people do best."
"Of that, we have no doubt."
"By the way, lady Nightshade, a number of us're going te be around the circle tenight," interrupted the wearier looking dwarf. "Ol' Marge'll be sleeping soon enough, ye could probably risk just locking the gate and joining us inside."
Appreciative but wary of growing close to people so foreign and so distant from nature, Tirith tried to refuse without losing their goodwill. "I am honored, but I cannot leave my post. I wish for another time," she replied, trying her best to smile but not knowing how to do so naturally after having remained stoic for most of her life.
"Oh, ye be right there, lass. None of us want te earn the wrath of the fearless leader," the tired dwarf laughed as he walked inside. The human and the other dwarf followed soon thereafter, leaving her to herself.
"You can lower the gate if you so choose, Tirith," William said just before he disappeared among the cramped, closely placed buildings of the camp. "I don't think we're expecting any nighttime arrivals this week."
She paused, but this time to consider the idea rather than any need to formulate the words in her mind. "This is maybe...it can be raised again," she called out just as she found herself alone.
Once by herself, of course, Tirith had a few rounds to do. The perimeter of the camp would need to be inspected, even though they hadn't yet faced any hostile targets during the night. If there's one thing she knew she excelled at beyond all others at the camp, it was diligence in following orders to the letter; one didn't spend ten millennia performing the same patrols nightly for enemies that never appeared without developing such dutiful habits as hers.
The circular camp was surrounded by trees on all sides, though the back walls of the camp were only a mere few yards from the edge of the rainforest. A small but powerful river flowed back there, providing the important water access necessary for any thriving settlement, and at one point there was even a small pool that formed in one broken portion of the banks that held water still enough for her to see her reflection. The clearing in front of the camp was wide, providing empty space for the extremely rare landing from a flying mount at the unmanned flight point, right next to the dirt road that led westward toward the main highway of the province. The gaudy sign out front read 'Camp Freedom' - the rather jingoistic name Marge had chosen for their settlement a few weeks ago. Everything was in order, as it should be.
These nights were Tirith's time. Six nights a week, she marched around her post out there, holding watch during a ten hour shift while all but a handful of the other forty someodd residents remained awake. All of them were pioneers for the Alliance, either troops like her or basic civilian workers - laborers and craftspeople. There were no farmers and since the younger lived races weren't in touch with the balance enough to grow food naturally without labor, their provisions had to be shipped in at great expense. For whatever reason, the faction was absolutely set on having a presence in the region, and Marge's obsessive micromanagement was just what they'd wanted. Everybody was there for a purpose, all were in tight schedules, overtime could be assigned in almost any given day and no children or youths were allowed to stay. The militaristic lifestyle was all too familiar to Tirith, and the population wasn't much more than that of the village she'd spent the entirety of the Long Vigil living in.
Well...to an extent, she thought. For ten thousand years, she'd lived in a grove physically sealed off from intruders by the ancients and treants, emerging only for their nightly rounds of patrolling their region of the Ashenvale forest. Twenty five women, all led by their own local priestess of the moon assigned by the High Priestess herself, all waking up to the same faces as they performed the same actions for what they'd expected to be forever. A few faces changed as some were transferred out by order of the Sentinel regional command, and others were born over the millennia, but most of the originals remained the same; all of them were shield sisters.
Until the Third War, that is. After having fought both the Alliance and the Horde, the High Priestess had decided to pick a side rather than remain as a third faction on their own. Larger cities such as Astranaar and the brand new Darnassus thrived from the new trade and technology; small villages like Tirith's chafed under the influx of alcohol, wheat flour, refined sugar and the new foods, germs and ways brought by all the Alliance immigrants. Because they were all one faction now, troop rotations were undertaken to increase goodwill, and she had been one of the first; mere months after they'd joined the faction, she'd been shipped here, though she had remained at their village long enough to see her shield sisters become a minority among all the humans, dwarves, gnomes and even night elves from other provinces.
Freezing next to the gate and letting her shoulders sag, Tirith tried frantically to push the thoughts away before any tears came. Immortality had hardened night elf women as their eternal wait while the men slept left them to toughen up against a harsh, unforgiving world of endless night; the return of mortality had brought a rush of new sensations, experiences, physical changes and also realizations as their impending deaths taught them to value life again. Like most, Tirith had become emotional again, and after having felt little to nothing for so long, she'd long since forgotten how to cope with emotions. Whenever she felt sad, she found herself crying more easily than many of the orcs and humans; whenever she felt mad, she had to restrain herself from harming people who didn't deserve it. Breathing in the humid jungle air, she did her best to tame what had become one of her great challenges since her emotional awakening.
Wait...people.
Her ears picked up the sound. For weeks they hadn't received any visitors after dark, and on those occasions when they did, they were usually visitors they'd been informed of in advance who had simply taken too long to arrive. On that particular night, there had been no news passed on to her of any approaching guests; this was unexpected, and Tirith instinctively shadowmelded, becoming transparent and unseen per the blessing of nature that her people retained.
Very slowly, she tugged on the rope that lowered the tall but narrow wooden gate, making sure to keep the outpost secure should those approaching be hostile. Should that be the case, she'd need to make the warning call to wake the rest of the barracks. She'd be at personal risk by remaining outside and revealing her position; that was her duty, though for the sake of a faction she somewhat resented, it didn't seem like an entirely easy decision.
"...Camp Freedom, right? I can see the lights of the torches up ahead..."
The nervous voice of a gnome echoed in the trees, and she could tell that a mixed group was close. Crouching after having closed the gate, she readied her glaive lest those approaching carried unsheathed weapons. Just because they were members of races considered part of the Alliance didn't mean that they were friendly. She'd encountered plenty of bandits and highway robbers in the past half year, and in fact most of them were humans.
When the party of six came into view, however, her heart fluttered and her arms turned to jelly.
There, among the two humans and two gnomes, were also not one but two other night elves. Excitement welled up inside as Tirith counted the weeks since she'd last bumped into one of her own kind; there were perhaps only a hundred thousand of her kind left alive compared to millions of the other races. While Kalimdor was full of their new allies, this continent had very few Kaldorei. Every time she encountered more of her people out there, she felt like it was a miniature holiday.
Immediately, she broke her shadowmeld, pulled the rope suspending the gate and secured it to an anchor that had been hammered down into the soil. The two gnomes, both of them technical workers without weapons, jumped behind their comrades in fright, though the humans both wore the robes of mages and appeared unafraid.
Her attention was focused on her two fellow children of the stars, however. One of them was a man about her height - as a sort of dragoon, Tirith had been chosen due to her large stature - bearing the antlers of a Druid from the older generations. The other was a woman who was about a head shorter than them both, but bearing a glaive rather than a bow - obviously a flanker and quick strike fighter. Like their companions, they looked tired, hungry and greatly relieved to see the camp.
"Ishnu alah!" Tirith chanted happily to the entire group as they stopped before her and the gate, all of them on foot. "What brings you here?"
Jumping in before anyone else could speak, the male human began rattling off a list of demands. "Hail, sentry. We've been traveling all day since we underestimated the distance here. We're in serious need of quarter and provisions, and we have the gold to spend."
"I'm tired!" complained one of the gnomes.
"Is there a public bath, here?" asked the female human.
Amused as she often was at the very forward and open behavior of the younger races, Tirith wondered how exhausting the two night elves must find their traveling companions. A swift sense of solidarity set in as she glanced at the glowing eyes of similarly ancient beings who found themselves surrounded by talkitive, unwise people who had seen so little. Perhaps these would be people she could finally speak to freely, if just to feel as though she weren't lost and alone in unfamiliar territory.
Her fantasy about having a connection to them was quickly wiped away by reality when her fellow sentinel spoke.
"I second that one," the female night elf chuckled while politely holding her hand over her mouth. She and the human practitioner of arcane magic actually shared a friendly look as if there was some sort of...inside joke, or something, between them.
A bit of jealousy stung Tirith's heart despite not knowing any of these people. That other night elf was a member of her people, from her homeland, and should be making inside jokes with her. A desire she readily admitted to herself was immature struck her and she wished the other sentinel wouldn't behave in such a familiar manner with outlanders.
Realizing that she had a job to do, Tirith stiffened up and tried to suppress her wants. "Our camp is modest; inside, there is a traveler's hostel that contains outhouse and bathing rooms, but they are only for two people at a time; we will not have the capacity for multiple facilities until after our coming expansion," she explained to the entire group in Common, at least feeling rather proud of herself for using such vocabulary without needing to practice first.
Much to her further chagrin, the male night elf disappointed her as well.
"We'll need to accept whatever you have; our party took some time getting here and we might need to remain for a day or so." His tone was just like that of the male human, and he spoke to her as if she were a stranger and the outlanders around him were not.
Her hopes of people to open up to dashed, Tirith withdrew into her shell as she'd done so many times around the outlanders, only this time two of her own kind were present. Let down and disinterested once more, she reverted to her monotone sentinel voice in order to fulfill her job description and get the whole interaction over with. "You may find a number of our residents still awake inside; just follow the sound of their music, and they will likely be overjoyed to see visitors. They can direct you to all of our facilities."
"Thank you so much, lady!" piped up one of the two gnomes from below, though Tirith couldn't tell which one it was since they all looked the same to her anyway.
Standing at attention and saluting as the group walked through the gate, she held out just a sliver of hope that the two night elves would choose to stay behind and keep her company, proving her assumptions wrong and sating her desire for friendship. No such thing happened, and all six people entered Camp Freedom while chatting amongst themselves as if she were shadowmelded again.
Ignored and let down, Tirith sighed to herself once the party had disappeared among the camp buildings. The raucous laughter and greetings that echoed out as the party was greeted by the other residents only made her feel even more left out, and she busied herself by marching back and forth for an amount of time she couldn't measure. If one group had already arrived that night, chances that another would as well were slim to nil, but she had nothing else to do and needed to ward off the sense of loneliness.
Truthfully, she never had been a loner; she realized that now. Even if her little hamlet had been small, she had always been surrounded by people. On short patrols through their part of the forest, they would still work in units of four women; nobody was ever left alone. They were constantly around each other, all the time, and had to grow used to the closeness for there was no other choice. The intense isolation of being so far away...
For the longest time, Tirith just tried to shut that thought out and control her breathing as she froze by the gate. It wouldn't do her any good to think like that; she was on a rotational assignment and had no choice in the matter. She was a sentinel, and in her wisdom, the High Priestess had ordered these rotations and troop sharings with their new allies. The only alternative was to quit and wait to die; all of her branch of the Nightshade family died in the Sundering. Her parents...her siblings...her husband...her son from her first marriage...
Footsteps. Someone was leaving the camp. Silently thanking Elune for the distraction, she sniffled once and cleared her throat in anticipation of another pointless question that would nonetheless be welcome at that time.
"Ishnu dal dieb, sister; I hope I am not intruding."
The Darnassian sentence uplifted Tirith's spirit so quickly that she thought she might be dreaming. Turning around, she saw the sentinel from earlier out of her gear and wearing a dress and shawl that could be slept in. The woman had come back to speak to her; even if it was only for a moment, she found a bit of her faith restored.
"Oh...no, not at all!" Tirith replied a bit too eagerly. "You're all guests of the settlement while you're here."
"You're too kind, sentinel; my name is Soraya, by the way. My colleague is Pontus." The woman leaned against the side of the gate, worn out from her party's journey but apparently content to spend some time with Tirith.
"I'm Tirith Nightshade, at your service. It's so glad to see more of us out here."
"I know what you mean; the culture shock can be intense at times. It's always nice to hold on to a bit of home when venturing out in this brave new world." The woman inspected Tirith's skin and hair color and the facial tattoos that were a marker of individuality for adult women in their culture. "Nightsong Forest?" Soraya asked, obviously sizing her up as often was the case among their kind.
"Yes, from Raynewood province. A village that the Alliance refers to as Serenity Grove." Tirith almost felt guilty referring to her home by that name; her local priestess had never seen the need to name their village, but the Alliance insisted on formally recorded names for everything. Switching the subject, she opened up a little more quickly than usual. "I am originally from Suramar, however."
Soraya immediately bowed lowly toward Tirith out of respect. "You're pre-Sundering then; I am truly honored, big sister," the woman said, almost in awe due to the respect for age.
Flattered and a world apart from the disappointment she'd felt earlier, Tirith couldn't stifle her little laugh. "May you be granted long life, Soraya. I take it from your accent that you're from Azshara?"
The woman frowned. "Yes...Pontus and I are both from Nendis. We just happened to be out of town at the same time just when Illidan's forces arrived," Soraya lamented, her face contorted in pain without pretense.
"May the curse of all nature be upon the Betrayer! I was devastated when I heard about the loss of that city; it was as old as Suramar, you know. I visited it, back before your time."
The two of them sat silently for a beat, not needing to fill every single silent moment with the sound of talking. Over the ticking seconds, the pain drained out of Soraya's expression until she appeared to have relaxed again. The loss of such an ancient city a mere two years or so before still hurt for many of them, but a measure of pride and defiance worked its way into Soraya's features. "One day, we will rebuild. Our people are reproducing again, and we have an obligation to our youth to preserve our heritage."
The mention of youth reminded her of her son a bit too much, and Tirith found herself unsure of how to react to mentions of reproduction when it was so far removed from her life. "May all of our land be reclaimed again, some day," she replied, not knowing what else to say. Soraya only nodded, and was obviously still affected by the loss of her hometown - which Tirith understood all too well. After a few moments in which she worried her new friend would return to her quarters a bit too soon, she tried to find anything to say. "So how did you become associated with these...comrades?" she asked euphemistically. Because the outlanders were the woman's friends, Tirith didn't know how much she could open up, and tried to be as politically correct as possible.
Soraya's mood improved visibly; she looked pleasant but it caused Tirith to feel a little bit more distant from her. "They're great people, a fascinating bunch, really. By chance, Pontus and I were both assigned to Stormwind in order to open a consulate there. While I was observing him as he grew the building, our four colleagues here wandered up and began asking what we were doing. They eventually ended up inviting us to dinner and we've been traveling with them ever since." A wistful look twinkled in Soraya's eye in a way that sparked Tirith's racial jealousy again. "They convinced us to travel to this port at the Cape of Stranglethorn; it really has been quite the adventure so far!"
"I'll bet," Tirith replied while doing her best to feign interest. "And what's this about a consulate to Stormwind?"
"That's recent - you're only hearing about it from me unofficially. Darnassus doesn't like to announce projects until they're more or less complete. But basically since we're members of this faction now, the Alliance as a whole is in charge of constructing embassies to other nations like the Steamwheedle Cartel, the Argent Dawn and so forth; but within the faction, the various governors exchange consuls in order to build unity in our own nation. We should be open by next month, and you'll have an easier time handling your administrative affairs due to the proximity - you can ride for a few days down to that Bay's Boot or whatever and then catch a ship to Stormwind - that takes less than a week."
Tirith had to resist the urge to grit her teeth at the suggestion that they belonged to one 'nation' alongside the outlanders who had spoiled her ancestral grove. "I'll definitely keep that in mind; as it is, orders and directives are shipped from Darnassus first and then sorted in Stormwind," she said as congenially as possible, reminding herself that Soraya was her sister and surely meant well.
"It most certainly will be easier!" the oblivious woman chirped proudly. "We have full authority for disbursements, troop sharing and logistical affairs on this continent. Whenever you visit our capitol, you ought to drop by. I'm sure you'll find no shortage of new people to meet."
That human eyesore is not my capitol city, Tirith involuntarily grumbled in her own mind. "Rest assured that I will stop by the next time I find myself there; and I thank you for the information."
"Don't mention it," Soraya replied while fighting off a yawn. "We're going to remain here until the day after tomorrow, so I'll have time to adjust to my new sleep schedule. I'm going to return to our quarters for now, but we'll be seeing you tomorrow evening."
"We're glad to have you here," Tirith said while bowing. Soraya made sure to bow lower before leaving, reminding Tirith that the woman was kind and friendly toward her despite the differing points of view.
Alone once more and well into her shift, she finally closed the gate from the inside for the night. A rather short, ineffective watchtower had been constructed inside the camp walls, giving her a place to sit down despite being on duty. It was the first time in her entire long, long life that she'd ever shirked work responsibilities while patrolling, and the significance wasn't lost on her.
Stars and constellations passed overhead, and she spent much of the rest of her shift counting them as she actually admitted that she felt bored. At the twilight of her lifespan, she had no living family, no more community of shield sisters to return to, no place of her own to live and no real plan. But as she looked at the creases on the palms of her hands and counted the years since she'd become mortal again, a plan began to develop.
"No..." Tirith whispered to herself. "I'm not going to die in this place."