"Tari? What's wrong?" Thrall asks worriedly as Golthak closes the door behind me.

For a moment, I can't answer. The thought of uttering the words makes my throat close up and I press my face against his chest until the comforting bulk of his arm around me gives me the strength. "Varian will be coming by. Soon."

Thrall says nothing, waiting for me to finish.

"…to ask for my hand."

"Well then," he says, thick green fingers brushing my hair lightly, "he'll be leaving disappoi-"

"No."

"…Tari?"

The concerned confusion in his voice undoes me; tears leak from my closed eyes.

"But you hate him. He knows that. Why would you…?"

I can't answer. I try, but the words turn into sobs and I find myself crying hysterically.

"Golthak," he rumbles, holding me tighter.

"Hear him out, Warchief," my trusty shadow says. "Let him explain."

My brother growls, a deep, primal sound. "This had better be good."

"This had better be good," Thrall says warningly, hands clenched on the arms of the wooden chair he sits in.

Rather than take offense, Varian swallows like a man sentenced to death and his hands clench and release. "What do you mean, Warchief?"

"You made my sister cry."

Varian pales and looks suitably horrified, but my brother isn't done yet.

"You will explain to me, right now, why I should let my sister marry a man who holds the dubious honor of being the first one to bring her to tears since I turned Blackmoore into a pile of bloody flesh for throwing the severed heads of her parents at her feet."

He pales again; I'd never told him that detail. "Please believe me, it was not my intent to upset her."

Although Thrall is one of the most cultured and compassionate people I know, he is aware of how intimidating his face and size can make him, and he uses that now to full effect. "Start talking, human," is all he says.

He listens impassively as Varian runs through the same arguments he gave me. Although my brother seems to be unmoved, I can see the muscle in his jaw relax as the king of Stormwind humbles himself.

"You realize that you are effectively announcing a surrender to the same nation you so vehemently raged against," he says when Varian has finished.

"I was wrong," he says quietly. "I didn't want to see you as people because of what the old Horde did to my kingdom when I was my son's age. I was too young to enact vengeance on anyone at the time, so I held on to that resentment and tried to hold your Horde accountable for acts perpetrated by orcs most likely long dead."

Both men are silent for a long moment.

"It takes honor and courage to admit that you were wrong," Thrall says finally. "What made you change the way you see us?"

"My son," Varian answers promptly. "I was talking to him about Taretha and how I hoped she would be the mother he'd never had, and he looked at me and said 'At least I had you. Warchief Thrall didn't have anyone'." He stops to swallow the emotion choking him. "In that moment, I imagined my son in your place. Tiffin and I both dead, and he taken in by orcs and raised as a slave. I was outraged. I wanted to slaughter every greenskin in the world, and then something Taretha said came back to me."

One thick green eyebrow quirks upwards. "Oh?"

"The day I met her, she said that you were a better man than either she or I because for all that you'd gone through, you didn't hate humanity."

"I wouldn't say she hates humanity, but she certainly dislikes some of you very strongly."

"Including me," Varian says dryly.

Thrall doesn't bother trying to deny it. "Including you."

The crooked grin comes back. "Tiffin and I hated each other at first," he says fondly. Then he sighs. "I've become someone she would be ashamed of."

"Do you love Tari?"

He jerks as if struck. "Light save me, but I do." A hand run through his hair nervously, a shaky laugh. "I love her. Even though she hates me."

My brother smiles faintly. "I wouldn't say hate…do you have a ring?"

Varian is floored. "A ri-? Yes."

It is fished out from that same inner pocket and held up for inspection, scarlet and cobalt flashing to either side of the diamond. At my brother's wordless gesture it is handed over for closer scrutiny. After a moment, he turns to the decorative screen behind which I have been standing unseen with Golthak.

"Tari, would you join us?"

I glance at him as I walk calmly to my brother's side, expression carefully neutral. He looks like a man condemned, waiting for the fall of the axe. At Thrall's gesture I hold out my left hand, and he hands the ring back to Varian.

"It is customary for the man to put the ring on the woman's finger, is it not?"

Perplexed doesn't come close to the way he's looking at me. It is the confusion of utter defeat turning into a victory so unlooked-for that it almost cannot be believed. It is validation and hope clawing their way out of a pit of despair, and it takes all my strength to meet that gaze. I don't know what he sees in my eyes, but he suddenly looks fierce and…noble. His fingers are warm and rough against my skin as he takes my hand in his. The gold of the ring as he slides it onto my finger is equally warm from having sat next to his heart. When I neither shriek insults at him nor rip it from my finger and hurl it to the floor, he straightens as though a great weight has been lifted from his shoulders.

"There are many things we need to discuss," Thrall says calmly. "Many details to be worked out. The negotiations may go on for some time. For the moment, I might suggest Theramore as a suitable location for the ceremony itself?"

"Oh. Of course," he says, tearing his gaze from my face. "I will open communications with Lady Proudmoore immediately." His eyes slide back to me, and this time there is hurt concern in them. "Taretha?"

I can feel the tears welling up in me again.

"Taretha, say something?"

I can't. Ancestors, what am I doing?

His hand tightens around mine, voice low and urgent. "Taretha. Tell me how much of a jerk I am."

That's right, he's a jerk and I hate him. But not completely. I don't want to hurt him when he's being kind like this, but at the same I do. And he…wants me to hurt him, to remind him of what he should be when he's not being like this. My thoughts chase each other around until they are a tangled knot. I'm confusing myself. So what if he loves me? He knows how I feel about him; I am not obliged to change that, and I'm not going to let this change who I am. I take a deep breath, pushing the whole tangle away from myself, and see his face light up as my eyes focus on him again.

"You had best re-write the wedding vows, my lord," I inform him coolly, "because I will not swear to obey you, nor will I swear to love and cherish you."

He flinches at the edge in my words, but looks relieved at the same time and takes a deep breath of his own. "If I wanted fawning servitude, I would have picked another woman," he says. "I, uh, don't suppose I'll get to kiss you at the altar…?"

My frosty glare cools his elation.

"…I didn't think so. I'll take my leave of you for tonight, and we can begin negotiations in the morning." He bows slightly over my hand, then releases it and bows to Thrall. "My lady. Warchief."

"Go with honor," Thrall says, returning the slight bow.

"Yes," I say archly. "Go. With honor."

That earns me another slight bow, but he goes.

"Well," Thrall says quietly once he is gone, "it looks like he changed his mind."

I level a glare at the door. "He still hasn't changed mine."