Chapter IV: Thieves in the Night

Torgall had, for many long years, given up hope of returning to the old ways - to the old life. But since his happenstance meeting with Greshka and enlistment into the New Horde, it was as though someone had lit a fire inside his soul - he now had a passion, a will to live life to its fullest. Where once he was despondent and lived out a solitary hermit existence, he now embraced life and all it had to offer. It was Greshka who helped him adapt - after so much time out of his people's culture, it seemed very alien for him to suddenly be thrust back into orcish society.

The New Horde was quite large - Greshka had explained that under Doomhammer's, and later Thrall's, leadership, the Warsong and Frostwolf clans had broken free orcs from several internment camps before assaulting Durnholde itself. With the destructinon of Durnholde and the death of Aedelas Blackmoore, leader of the internment camps, it was ease itself for the New Horde to travel from camp to camp, shattering the walls and freeing their people.

Torgall was glad and impressed to know that Thrall held much disdain for the thought of what Gul'dan and his warlocks had done to his people. Torgall was even more impressed when Greshka told him that Thrall sought not war with the humans, but peace. The tone in Greshka's voice suggested she did not think highly of that plan, but Torgall knew that she, like many of the orcs in the New Horde, did not hold much in their opinion of the humans. However, Torgall also knew that Greshka and the other orcs were far too grateful for Thrall's wise leadership of the New Horde to disobey or disrespect him.

Given the New Horde's large size, and the fact that they needed to continue moving to avoid confrontation with the humans, there was little in the way of shelter when it had to stop, whether it be for an evening or, as was the case for the moment, a week or more. It was fortunate that the winter had already passed for that year, as Torgall did wonder how the New Horde would cope without adequete shelter in harsher weather - while this nomadic lifestyle was not new to Torgall (granted, never in such large numbers), he usually had his own shelter to speak of - nights were now spent under the stars in the hopes that rain would not approach. Food and water were, fortunately, not a problem - the New Horde seemed very efficient at rationing both, and there was plenty to be gained from the surrounding forests.

On this particular evening, it was crisp and warm. The New Horde had settled days earlier in a large clearing with several creeks nearby - Torgall, having decided not to join in the Horde's energetic festivities for the evening, was resting along the edge of the large glade. The hubbub of the orcs was not quite as loud here, and contrasted nicely with the trickling of the water and the crickets that were coming out for the evening. Torgall had spent much of his day sparring and collecting firewood for the evening bonfires, and was rather spent - as such, he was settled on a rock, humming tunelessly to himself as he sharpened his new axe. After joining the New Horde, Greshka had commissioned an axe for him to be made - other than his hunting knife, Torgall had left all his other "possessions" at his cave, and had not returned to retrieve them.

The axe was finely crafted - Torgall had forgotten how sturdy orc craftsmanship was, yet balanced. Most of the Alliance races dismissed orc weaponry and equipment as crude, primitive or shoddy. In actuality, orc weapons were solid and unlikely to break or shatter, and were sharper than at first appearance. Similarly, orc armour, while simple, provided adequete protection while not hindering the wearer. Torgall frowned at that - humans seemed to overdo their equipment, seemingly caring for appearance as well as protection. Human armour was impressive to look at, but Torgall imagined it must have been very cumbersome.

The axe he was sharpening was no exception to orc craft. The smith had Torgall test several handles to see which would fit his hand most effectively. Next he had to test Torgall's arm muscle strength to know how heavy and solid the axehead would need to be so as to maximise how fast and hard Torgall could swing the axe without losing power to the weight of the weapon, or having to worry about damaging it. While orc craftmanship was secure, it wasn't indestructable.

His ears perked - there were footsteps on the stone. He turned his head to see Greshka approaching, wearing a simpler set of clothes. She did not have her swords with her, though her bow and arrows were still slung over her back - Torgall had yet to see her without them.

"I've noticed that you've been thoroughly integrating yourself with the rest of the Horde," she said, seating herself next to him while he resumed sharpening the axe. "You've been enjoying yourself," she added, smirking.

"After many years spent lonesome, I've forgotten what it feels like to be a true orc," Torgall replied, cleaning the end of the axehead.

"How come you didn't join with the other orcs who were free before Thrall?" she enquired, gesturing towards orcs who bore the mark of the Warsong clan. Torgall paused, his lips pursed. He decided that she deserved to know, being a fellow orc. He told her of his clan, of how he and his kin felt about the changes Ner'zhul imposed upon their people, and how they were punished for their disobedience. He told her of how he wandered Draenor while the Old Horde went about making war upon the humans whom did not deserve it, while Ner'zhul plotted to conquer more worlds. She listened intently, occasionally making noise of praise or agreement, at other times vehemently exclaiming or disagreeing.

"I see..." she said slowly and quietly when he had finished. "I cannot say that I agree with you on all of your points, but I think I understand your reasoning... I, too, feel it was shameful, the way that we were tainted, but... did you ever drink the Blood?"

"The what?" Torgall said blankly.

"The Blood," said Greshka impatiently. "No, you wouldn't have, if you are of Whiteclaw... The Blood is what Gul'dan made us drink. I do not know what it was but since then our people have been overcome with a savage bloodlust. That is why we slaughtered the Draenei-" At that, Torgall shuddered visibly, though Greshka, who was not looking at him, but at the New Horde, did not notice. "-and then turned on ourselves. It is only because we were promised new worlds to conquer that we willingly went through the Dark Portal and made war upon the humans."

"That's your justification, is it?" Torgall snapped savagely, "You had bloodlust, so you sated it by warring on those who did not deserve it? Gul'dan should have allowed the Horde to consume itself."

Greshka did not lash out in response, but replied calmly, "But you just put your finger on the problem. Gul'dan. It was he who made us drink the Blood and shamed us; it was he who opened the Portal; it was he who sent us to war with the humans. We were overcome with a bloodrage, and had no control."

"You could have refused!" Torgall exclaimed; Greshka shook her head.

"You never tasted it, did you? The Blood, it gave us power, strength... we could do nothing but battle, kill, slaughter... We were easily overcome. And even if we could disobey, we would not - we saw what had happened to the Frostwolves; exiled. Or your own clan. And we were deceived - we had been united and felt Ner'zhul and Gul'dan were leading us to a new age. We thought the Blood would help us reach that new age. We were tricked, and paid the price."

She nodded in a different direction - Torgall looked northward and saw a ruined tower of the horizon, which belonged to an internment camp. He turned back to Greshka and opened his mouth to speak, and then stopped, listening. Greshka, too, heard it - a slight rustling from the nearby trees. Torgall silently got to his feet, hefting the huge axe, but Greshka shook her head. She rose, preparing her bow and arrow silently and squinting into the darkness. Torgall scanned the bushes intently, but could see nothing. A moment later, there was a near-silent fweeeeeee-thip followed by a loud yelp as Greshka let loose her arrow. They both rushed forward and rummaged in the bushes. Torgall felt fur and leather - together, they heaved a huge and strange creature out of the bushes.

It was shorter than a human, but taller than a dwarf. It had a disproportionately large, furry body which was caused by a large hunchback. Its legs were reverse-joined and had less fur than the body and ended in paws, and while they looked skinny compared to the rest of the body, Torgall could see they were deceptively powerful. The arms, too, seemed shorter than normal but had muscle enough to heft a large axe or mace - this strange creature merely held a handaxe. If it was scouting, as Torgall had assumed, it would not wish to carry a cumbersome weapon. A large tuft of fur grew out of the hunchback, which drew forward to a face with canine-like features that were drawn into a surprised snarl. Torgall had thought he had seen creatures like this before but had never seen one up close. He looked at Greshka enquiringly.

"A gnoll," she replied grimly. "Savage little beasts, they know some basic skills... Like killing and making fire," she snorted. "The Horde has encountered them a few times but they've generally been too afraid to attack us, not in our numbers... Search him."

Torgall obeyed. The creature had little armour on - a leather harness and some ragged cloth pants, little more. The belt had a knife on it; Torgall handed both weapons to Greshka, who accepted them silently and nodded him to continue his search. Before long he discovered a small, worn piece of parchment. A poorly drawn picture had been scribbled on it; it was so simplistic it took him a moment to realize it was a very bad map of the Horde's camp. He looked up to see Greshka was studying it as well, frowning.

"If this map is correct... I think those are our food stores," she muttered, pointing at several X's that had been marked. "Audacious, making a move against us... but they seem to have been studying us for some time now... I guess that's what happens when we settle for more than a week. Cover by night, of course... they're a bit smarter than we give them credit for."

She straightened up, beckoning Torgall to follow her. Together they left the rocky outcropping, Torgall tossing away the rock he had used to sharpen his axe. They marched through the camps where other orcs were eating, sparring or generally enjoying themselves. Torgall smiled to himself to see little trace of the savagery or bloodlust that he had seen possess the Old Horde. He realized how harsh an opinion he had formulated of his own people after Greshka's words, but he had little time to dwell on the matter - he was proud to be once more among and serving his people, and already outsiders had moved against them. Before long they had reached the first tent where food was stored. Unfortunately, the gnolls had already been and gone.

"The little cretins!" Greshka snarled angrily, "The nerve, stealing from the Horde! We'll show those vermin not to cross us, and take back what's ours!"

Torgall nodded, gripping his axe. Greshka looked down at the weapons the gnoll they had found was holding, looking disappointed.

"I won't have time to retrieve my swords - by the time I have them, the gnolls could be long gone," she said regretfully. "I could track them, but tracks are easier to follow when they're fresher... These will have to do," she said, holding up the knife and axe. They were simply made, but could easily cause harm when applied correctly.

"Lead the way," Torgall said. Greshka turned on the spot and marched over to the nearby forest. Crouching, she studied the ground carefully.

"They fled this way," she said after a few moments, and together they charged into the undergrowth. None of the other orcs seemed to realize where they were going, and similarly no one else seemed to realize that the food stores had been raided. The gnolls had indeed been efficient in their thievery, Torgall thought grimly to himself; moreso than those clumsy thieves that had attacked Setremedes. He wondered, with a pang, how the human had fared - if he had even made it back to Southshore at all. But now was not the time to worry, as Greshka seemed to be hot on the trail. They might burst into a gnoll camp at any moment.

Abruptly, Greshka came to a halt. Torgall skidded in the dirt to avoid colliding into her, scuffing a huge cloud of dust into the night air. Greshka stood stock-still, eyes closed and clearly listening intently. Every few moments she would also sniff the air deeply, no doubt to try and pick up a scent. Around them the night creatures went about their business and chattered to one another, but nothing out of the ordinary seemed to be nearby. And then, just as abruptly as she had stopped, Greshka's eyes snapped open and she motioned to Torgall.

"This way," she whispered, and began to pace silently away, holding her bow in one hand. Torgall followed suit, holding his axe at the ready but attempting to maneuver silently at the same time. He wished he had smaller weapons like the gnoll that had encountered before, but he knew he was much more skilled with a large axe. After a few minutes of silent sneaking Torgall could hear barking and yelping; it took him a moment to realize it was laughter. After several more minutes of silent sneaking, Greshka carefully prised apart two small branches and peeked through. Motioning to Torgall to do the same, they both looked through the undergrowth.

Before them was a rather large camp of gnolls with several makeshift huts and campfires. They could see the sacks of food which were clearly looted from the Horde camp. The gnolls were all yelping gleefully to themselves, no doubt pleased with their success of stealing from such a large potential foe. Some were alarmingly large, almost as large as an orc, while others looked very runty; even smaller than the one Greshka slew. Some had a very odd garb; feather headresses, leather rags that made a makeshift robe and carrying rough wodden staves. Torgall concluded these must have been the elders. Greshka studied the scene for several minutes before pulling herself and Torgall away.

"I've looked carefully, and noticed several lurking away from the others, closer to the forest's edge. I can pick those off and we can remove the bodies before the others realize. I've also taken note of the positioning of their huts and fires; we can position ourselves when we confront them to minimize the numbers they can throw at us. The camp might seem large, but they are woefully unprepared for an ambush." She grinned in the moonlight. "We shall show them the folly of crossing the Horde."

Torgall nodded - it seemed like a sound plan, and not until they put it into action would they be able to confirm it. Together, they silently lurked around the edges of the camp, Greshka picking off gnolls with pinpoint accuracy, Torgall stealthily removing the bodies before any others noticed. Greshka frowned with concentration with each shot as she aimed with incredible accuracy - the gnolls barely had time to let out a little gasp of surprise before keeling over silently. Before long, they had circled the entire camp and Greshka had silently assassinated nearly an entire score of gnolls.

"And now the fun part," she whispered, grinning again. "You go in first - position yourself between that hut and fire - and I'll follow up with cover fire. Together we should be able to slay a majority of them... these are cowardly creatures, Torgall, once we have killed several they will likely attempt to flee."

Torgall nodded a second time, hefting his axe. "I'll get their attention then," he grunted, taking up position behind the hut and campfire Greshka had indicated. Holding his axe ready, he charged out of the undergrowth with a ferocious bellow.

The gnolls nearby looked around in startlement; the nearest only caught a glimpse of metal before Torgall sunk his axe into it deeply. The creature had barely just died before he wrenched it out, slamming the side of the blade against another gnoll with a sickening crunch; it collapsed, yelping in pain. Lunging forward, he grabbed one of the runtier ones and threw it bodily across the camp into another gnoll, and they tumbled away into the darkness.

A moment later there was a series of whistles, followed by several dull thwocks, which were in turn followed by pained yelps. Taking a moment to glance over his shoulder, Torgall saw Greshka loading, aiming, firing and re-loading with astounding speed and accuracy. Over and over she loosed arrows, and gnolls fell before them without even knowing whom they had hit been hit by.

Returning to the battle at hand, Torgall saw one of the larger brutes stepping up, heaving a huge mace. Twisting his face into a menacing snarl, Torgall waved his axe challengingly. In response the gnoll barked furiously, hefting its mace (which was as tall as Torgall and almost as broad) and moving forward. The other gnolls backed away to give it room, only to collapse moments later under Greshka's arrows.

The brute struck with surprising swiftness; Torgall nimbly leapt to the side to avoid the blow. Fortunately, the cumbersome weapon rendered the brute momentarily defenceless. Unfortunately, Torgall unintentionally leapt into the side of the nearby hut and cursed himself for forgetting about it in the midst of combat; it may have been a fatal mistake. While the hut and fire kept the gnolls from flanking him, he could not allow himself to be foolish and let his advantage become his own disadvantage. Had the brute not been recovering from its unwieldy swing, Torgall knew he would be in much trouble.

The brute came at him again but this time Torgall was ready. Holding the axe up, he managed to block the blow - barely. With both of them using such huge weapons, a parry would be impossible, but by holding his ground he was able to surprise the gnoll. Utilizing this he shoved the gnoll backwards, causing it to lose its balance. Starting foward, he swung the axe powerfully, but was determined not to make the same mistake as his adversary - while his blow missed, barely, he was able to regain control of his weapon immediately, without being rendered useless by its weight. He briefly commended the orc whom had crafted his axe.

Behind him, Greshka continued covering Torgall's flank to stop the gnolls from attacking from behind. Before long however, the gnolls saw her as a genuine threat and, with Torgall tied up fighting one of the brutes, decided to focus their attention on her instead. Dropping her bow, she quickly drew the hand axe and knife that Torgall had taken from the gnoll she had slain earlier. Seeing the weapons of their own design, the gnolls snarled in fury - they no doubt realized she had taken it from the body of one their own.

The first that charged her was one of the runts, wielding a small but wicked blade. Greshka swiftly parried it with the hand axe before plunging the knife into the gnoll's chest. It gave a choking cough of blood, and as Greshka wrenched the knife out she kicked it to the side where it writhed pathetically. She quickly brought the axe down where it bit deeply into the neck of another gnoll charging her - too deeply. While the gnoll was now going to inevitably die, she knew it would take far too much time and effort in the heat of battle to pull the axe from her dying opponent. Glancing down, she saw this one was wielding a longsword which, judging by the design, had been stolen at some point or another from a human. Deciding quickly, she released the axe and snatched the blade from the howling gnoll, relieved that she would not have to face the remaining gnolls armed only with a knife.

Meanwhile, Torgall was pressing his advantage against the brute. These gnolls had little strategy when fighting, particularly this one - its only tactic seemed to be to swing its weapon. This tactic was working very badly for the brute, as the huge mace it was using made heavy swings unwieldy, throwing it off balance and being an inefficient way to employ one's energy. As such, while Torgall was able to strike with consistency and precision while minimalising use of energy, the brute frequently swung widely with little chance of actually landing a blow, and was quickly becoming exhausted.

It attempted to advance, bringing the mace down in a huge overhead swing, likely with the intent of crushing Torgall's skull, but the orc merely stepped aside as he had with the previous blows. With that, Torgall stepped forward and brought his axe down. The blade cleanly bit into and through the neck, and the head rolled away. Torgall briefly caught a slimpse of its face; it seemed to be snarling in fury, no doubt from losing control of its weapon again. He shook his own head, still safely attached to his neck, in resignation. He felt no shame in striking the gnoll while it was down - it had had plenty of opportunities to learn from its mistake, but chose not to, and paid the price for it. Not learning from one's mistakes proved fatal in battle.

With the skillful execution of their brute, coupled with Greshka's hail of proverbial death, the remaining gnolls were viewing the intruders into their camp with renewed fear. After a few moments, one of them gave a yelp before fleeing into the undergrowth. The others quickly followed suit. Their terrified cries echoed into the night, while the two orcs stood victorious. Torgall turned to Greshka.

"It was an honour to fight with you, Greshka," he said, bowing. She bowed in return.

"And I, you," she replied. Together they stood by the light of the campfires, relishing their victory.