Serenity Grove was abuzz with renewed energy behind its construction push that day. A brand new stable had been raised along with the appointment of a quartermaster from Ironforge, and the addition of all the laborers had led to demand for a second new inn to be built. Eventually, they would finish the most recent work and give way to a new wave of residents: gnomish scientists apparently believed the local water table contained some sort of naturally cleansing enzymes that could be replicated elsewhere.
Velonia surveyed the open side of Serenity, the once nameless grove that was now enclosed on only three sides instead of all around; a dreadful sense of exposure washed over the warrior of the night, mixed in with her alarm at the tendency of these outlanders to always insist on so called 'defensive' layouts that left the village open to attack. The entire north end was open to the forest and ringed by a combination of wooden fencing, waystation services and a checkpoint. On one side was the banner of the Sentinel Army; on the other was the blue and gold flag of the Alliance. It was a major sticking point for the once small community that the wider faction had dubbed Serenity for administrative purposes, and that flag was viewed by some of the older individuals among the two dozen original inhabitants as a sign of colonial domination. The day that a rather pompous human diplomat from Stormwind alongside an overseer, ten laborers and a contingent of unfamiliar Kaldorei soldiers from the fabled new capitol of Darnassus all arrived, waving a signed missive from the forum of High Priestess Tyrande herself, all members of the community knew it was the end of an era. All twenty four of them.
The new flight point was established before the quartermaster - there was no point in maintaining a stable until after the humans had completed their crudely hand-built paved road insultingly dubbed as 'authentic dark elf style.' For ten millennia the hippogriff roost had stood, naturally grown like the rest of the structures, but apparently it did not conform to the safety standards set by the transnational government that Darnassus was now a part of; the same was true of the cozy dugout cottages of the two dozen original inhabitants, which were apparently considered a fire hazard. Gone were the hovels formed by short, squat hollowed out trees with half the height of the naturally grown structure tucked into the earth, all dozen or so of them returned to the soil by a reversing process undertaken by a team of Azsharan druids who themselves appeared guilt stricken throughout the whole process. They were then replaced by more of the offensive handbuilt structures of the humans that sacrificed comfort and homliness for the sake of compactness and efficient usage of space. Plots of land that had once been inhabited by three or four elves were now occupied by three or four elves, five gnomes and eight humans crammed into three story apartment buildings with ground floors made of stone carved by hand rather than raised from the soil by the grove priestess.
Before leaving, the druids had naturally grown one structure - a huntress lodge for hosting outside night elf patrols who now had a tighter rotation schedule and had less time to get to know anyone in the community. In the past, the huntresses were often shared between groves for decades or even centuries at a time before returning to their ancestral villages; it both helped all night elves in one province memorize the common patrol routes as well as increased the sense of sisterhood between villages. If anything, though, the new addition of more anonymous night elves who remained for only weeks at a time just added to the cultural dilution felt by the originals, and when the provincial capitol of Raynewood began requesting up to five of the remaining twenty four originals for rotation three times a year, the hopelessness of an occupied, colonized native people set in. After naturally clearing out the entire north wall and sending the two ancients elsewhere only for them to be replaced by a mixed contingent of night elf and human guards, the regretful Azsharan druids left forever and there was no going back.
The community's original leader, Priestess Lamynia, did not take it well. Her tree tower was the only original structure to remain aside from the moonwell - allowed to stand by the Alliance for respect of the almost mocking concept of 'cultural sensitivity,' though even that came from another Darnassian missive with fine print (written in Common, of course). The ground floor was a fifty-fifty split between Kaldorei and Alliance officials, while the second floor that was once the village council shared by the same twenty five individuals for ten thousand years was commandeered by the humans - again, with a missive bearing the seal and blessing of Tyrande Whisperwind. Whereas questioning her command would have been considered heresy a year before, many of the originals openly doubted the veracity of the claim to her being Elune's chosen. When the rotating night elves from outside reacted as negatively as any would to heresy - which was not taken lightly in such an undiverse society - the few remaining original inhabitants of the grove known as Serenity realized that they, like many of the smaller communities they had heard of in the province, were truly alone. Large night elf settlements such as Astranaar and Auberdine had actually benefitted from membership in the Alliance, hence the support of the visiting huntresses for the blue and gold flag; the originals of the grove now known as Serenity found no support from anyone save themselves.
The entire second floor had been taken over by officials from Stormwind and Ironforge, with a rare non druid male night elf sharing the planning and command deck as they monitored movements of Horde soldiers. Although Priestess Lamynia had been a beloved leader there for so long, the humans appeared to have a subconscious bias for males, causing many awkward misunderstandings with their tendency to address the local druid Uryndil as though he were somehow a representative for what had been a matriarchal society for so long. Like a declawed nightsabre, Lamynia spend most of her days locked away in the third floor of her tower receiving guests from among the originals as decisions were made a floor below her about the fate of the grove, with her only input being various edicts decided elsewhere by officials who had never even visited the place expecting her rubber stamp on everything for appearance's sake.
Velonia sighed sadly, ignoring the gawks and overt, rudely nosy questions from her two concerned human partners at the checkpoint. They never seemed to stop talking and asking questions and would stare, point and comment at every last single Goddess forsaken thing happening or merely existing around them. Even when she held still at her post and stared into the woods without responding, nearly a minute would pass before they would take the hint and retreat to their own posts, audaciously grumbling about how elves supposedly had no manners.
All the originals felt the loss. As she scanned the paved cobblestone road lined with a wooden fence - fashioned from the corpses of murdered trees, no less - the fakeness that the whole scene reeked of was overwhelming. Every quarter mile, there were lampposts bearing wisp-powered light stones to illuminate the forest floor, insultingly designed with the authentic Kaldorei aesthetic of Lunar Festival lanterns despite night elves not needing any light for their paths other than that of the stars. If anything, their night vision resulted in the lanterns making their patrol duties on the numerous new roads throughout Ashenvale even more difficult due to the relative brightness in their vision.
"Her will be done," Velonia repeated to herself in a voice so low that even she almost couldn't hear it.
This was fate, she thought to herself. The night elves had been members of the Alliance for four months. In that time, all the administrative and architectural changes had wiped away ten thousand years of history. Her mother Celonia had been transferred all the way to Winterspring, a distance that would require at least a month off duty for a decent visit. Month long vacations were only earned after a decade of duty during the Long Vigil; without their immortality, the older generation born before immortality had even started - such as Celonia - were already ageing. She may not have another decade left considering that she was already more than six millennia old when the Vigil began...for the first time in many centuries, Velonia felt herself fighting off tears at the thought.
Though, who was she kidding...the decision was no longer theirs anyway, so there was no point in fighting it. Darnassus acknowledged Stormwind as the interfactional capitol. High Priestess Tyrande Whisperwind, who had led their people from the Kaldorei bronze age up through the iron and then dark ages and into the present, was lower in the hierarchy than some short lived human monarch across the ocean. The humans now led the night elves. A group of boorish men now led Priestess Lamynia. And with the transfer of Silviel and four others all the way to Feralas and Tirith to some Alliance expedition to Stranglethorne where she was literally the only elf, the original inhabitants who had ruled the once nameless grove for ten millennia were now outnumbered by people who had only arrived in the past few months by a ratio of four to one. The melancholy slowly transformed into depression as Velonia, ever true to the night elven ideals of restraint and self-control, silently mourned for what they all believed was a perfect way of life erased so quickly and carelessly.
She did not even pay attention to the visitors slowly ambling up the road. The two human guardsmen were already standing at attention, wondering why there were two people on only one nightsabre when there were no more additions from the Sentinel Army scheduled to arrive that week. That week...the Alliance appeared to change schedules almost daily, placing no value on consistency.
"Halt! There are no visits registered for today, are you travelers?" one of the two indistinguishable human guards stated with a voice he was obviously making too loud on purpose as though to show off.
Velonia tried to ignore the whole exchange. The humans were not only as obnoxious as orcs, but also seemed to cut down trees at a faster rate. A part of her almost wondered if her people would have been more at home among the Horde...the humans already seemed to regard her people's traditions as savage anyway.
The travelers continued approaching. Riding sidesaddle atop was a Kaldorei woman wearing the distinctive cloak and cowl donned by their people during stealthier, smaller patrols. The earholes were weathered as though she had been wearing and washing the same clothes for a long time. She held herself carefully on the sabre's back as though she were experiencing difficulty balancing.
"Citizens, you must state your business! It's official procedure in these newly acquired Alliance territories," ordered one of the two armor-clad guards. Velonia had to restrain herself from going rogue and making him regret the statement right there.
From the corner of her eye, she saw that the person leading the sabre on foot was a human. A very tall human wearing the furs, kilt, and cowl typical of a night elf man, but a human person nonetheless.
But...something wasn't normal.
Unlike all the Alliance inhabitants, he wore no insignia and didn't respond dutifully to the interrogation of an armored foot soldier. His eyes weren't darting around to look at every single object and direction around him, and his head movement was as slow and methodical as his gait. As they approached, Velonia noticed that even his breathing was slower than that of the other humans. Were she to close her eyes and feel his presence rather than see it, there was absolutely no way she would have thought him to be anything other than a very short male night elf. And she could have sworn the glint in his eyes was just a little too bright to merely be the reflection of light.
"Is this the sacred grove of Priestess Lamynia?" the elf like human asked in a low, purposeful tone.
Velonia's eyes nearly popped out of her head. Spinning around so fast that one of the human guardsmen jumped, she dashed forward and shoved the other guard aside like he weighed nothing. Eschewing the usual rules of propriety in her shattered society, she reached forward and tugged on the man's cowl, unable to speak as she saw familiar pale colored eyes bearing an unfamiliar shine to them. The beard and hair had grown a bit longer and wilder, if anything causing him to look even more like a Kaldorei aside from his coloration. Velonia's jaw dropped open as she looked from the man to the woman and back again, ignoring the irate human guardsman as he tried to pull his comrade out of the drinking trough in front of the horse stables.
A group Serenity originals chatted amongst themselves in a small circle of benches next to the tree tower, whittling their time away. With the influx of Alliance guards posted both to help protect the water table analysis and to ensure the locals adhered to missives from Darnassus that were likely dictated by Stormwind originally, their guard duties were significantly reduced. The leisure time was welcome at first, but without the duty of protecting their sacred grove and surrounding area twentyfour - seven as well as the higher calling of the World Tree, aimlessness set in and they all found themselves bored out of their minds. Sitting in a circle for hours on end as they mostly talked about the past over and over while consuming way, way too much refined sugar and fatty foods took their minds off of their new, shared experiences with illness, pains of ageing and a sense of monotony.
Vadia was the first to stand, cupping a hand over one of the annoying lanterns the Alliance representatives had planted everywhere as part of 'standards and practices.' The gaudy, imitation contraptions already interfered with their vision due to the combination of light and dark, and the fast approach of Velonia with visitors depite her being on duty was unusual. The whole situation seemed amiss
"Who is that?" Vadia asked to the entire group as she spied a cloaked night elf riding a sabre in an odd fashion.
Elindir, one of the two local druids, emerged from the ground floor of the tree tower, smiling as he went about his daily rounds, ever cheery in the face of such monumental changes. At the sight of Velonia and the two visitors, he dropped the mail from the Cenarion Circle he had been carrying, garnering confused looks from Niorith and Delebria as they stood to join Vadia halfway between the benches and the approaching sabre. The big cat stopped, and the human not acting like a human took the rider into his arms and helped her down. Her movements were plodding, and she took steps as though she were carrying a great burden by merely walking. Velonia took the woman by the hand and guided her the rest of the way, and the three originals stood in shock as Elindir, the jolly yet still collected mountain of a man, rushed forward to give the two travelers big hugs before sharing a few hushed but urgent words. Leaving the two men to converse, Velonia nearly carried the woman the rest of the distance.
Niorith raised a trembling hand to her face. "Unelia?"
The three originals froze in place, unable to lift a finger as the visitor pulled the cowl back over her ears to reveal a haggard yet kind face, weathered by what seemed like much time spent living on the move and sleeping on the ground. Though she had not reduced herself to begging, her eyes were downcast.
"Please excuse our intrusion," Unelia apologized in a tired voice. "But in the past year, some...hard times have befallen the two of us in the wilds. I know that the...circumstances under which I left were not the most ideal. Thus, I will understand if our request for shelter isn't accept-"
Delebria and Vadia were the first to break out of the paralysis, both sisters reaching forward to take Unelia's hand in theirs. "How can you call this an intrusion! This is your home!" Vadia exclaimed. Though more subdued, Delebria did send Unelia a subtle wink that didn't escape Johan's attention.
A chorus of relief, sobs and denials of any wrongdoing erupted as the three were joined by two more of the originals. Unelia appeared overwhelmed after having lived in exile for a year due to her choice. Niorith, still shocked beyond speech, even moved forward to break every rule in the book and kiss Unelia on the cheek, eliciting a round of coy laughter from the others that lightened the mood.
"I did not expect such a reaction. You know - I'm sure you must know - that if I can't return with Johan, I will not return at all," Unelia confessed demurely but not weakly.
"Our people are members of the Alliance now; our laws are not the same as before," Vadia sighed as she ran a hand through Unelia's hair, the crowd gathering around her seeming to break out of their shells at the sight of their truant sister. "But we would still fight for the right of the two of you to come home, even if it weren't the case."
Unelia scanned the area, noticing how much more crowded the grove felt with all the changes. Her eyes fixated on something, and when Velonia walked up beside her defensively the others turned to see two tall off duty originals staring at the group with wide eyes. Down the new road from the benches, two prickly huntresses who had been instrumental in Johan's departure had wandered within view by chance. The two groups exchanged uncomfortable stares for just a moment longer.
Gwynneth was scowling in Johan's direction as if to blame all the changes in their village on him, but Isurith saw only her sister from down the street that had been so shoddily built around the tree tower. The entire group stood still again, unsure of what Isurith would do upon seeing the blood sister she had helped drive away with her cruel xenophobia a year before - only to see their community torn open by the outside world in a way none of them could have imagined.
Isurith took a step forward from down the street, and Niorith stiffened. Even some of the immigrants took notice as the younger but larger sister took long strides forward, radiating a palbable tension as everyone around was silenced in anticipation of what she would do. Isurith had been furious. She not only blamed Johan for the accident that put her sister into retirement from combat, but was also the intigator of the final argument months after he had fled that led to Unelia's humiliation in front of the others, and Isurith's own demotion and flogging for slander due to said argument. Unable to cope with being kept away from the young man who had become much more than a friend to her, Unelia had made a choice and chose the outlander. The night she made that choice was the last time the two sisters had seen each other before being separated for the first time in twelve thousand years.
And there Isurith was, quickening her pace and rate of breathing despite Niorith nudging the others out of the way in case she had to prevent the situation from escalating (and put her own self in harm's way) by tackling the very angry Isurith;
Ferocious, vicious Isurith who was feared by all the Horde (and formerly, even Alliance) agents in the area;
Strong, indomitable Isurith who had forced a corrupt furbolg warband to retreat solely from intimidation;
Stoic, emotionless Isurith who once broke a satyr's horn off and stabbed him to death with it while laughing even more maniacally than the demon had;
Big, bad Isurith who held a stiff upper lip even when receiving news about their mother's matyrdom in the War of the Shifting Sands, and had berated her sister, her uncle and his wife for having dared to weep.
And all her power and prowess drained out as the tormenter collapsed in a weeping mess before she even made it as far as Unelia's feet.
Nobody dared to interfere in the reunion, though Velonia and Niorith helped Unelia to limp over to her fallen sister, pulling back once she bent down to take Isurith's hands in her own and pull her sister up into a kneeling position. Isurith clutched tightly onto the folds of Unelia's weathered cloak and burst into loud, shrill sobs as though she'd just watched a loved one die. How ironic, then, that she had refused to shed a tear when faced with actual death of a loved one, and a millennia later cried from guilt.
"I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" was all she could choke out in between fits of convulsing, quaking cries.
More humans and gnomes stopped to gawk, though a death stare from Velonia sent them on their way, and Niorith led Vadia and Delebria to form an elven wall to shield the reunited sisters from bystanders. Isurith seemed inconsolable at first, and was completely oblivious to the fact that Gwynneth turned her scowl on her former partner in crime. All the resentment that had been focused on Johan and even Unelia tangibly pulled back and burned a hole into the back of Isurith's head as Gwynneth sent a death gaze ten times more awful than Velonia's, but to no avail; the two sisters were in their own world. Hissing once more at the futility of her own glare, Gwynneth stormed away for the last time, disappearing from view and eventually from the village itself before the night was even through.
Grunting with the effort of shifting her weight, Unelia knelt as her sister did and pulled her into an even-level hug, waiting for the larger, near carbon copy version of herself to stop hyperventilating before pulling away to look her in the eye.
"I was wrong!" Isurith shrieked, having better control of her breathing but not her tone of voice. "Oh Uni, I was wrong! I couldn't sleep for the first week after you left!"
"Shhh, it's in the past."
"I passed out and had to be put on fluids!"
"It's all okay now-"
"Forgive me!"
"You know I will," the older yet shorter and slightly less abled sister answered without hesitation "We'll always be family, no matter what. Even in the moments where we wished to return, neither of us were angry." Elindir led Johan forward to stand among the others, and the young man who suddenly behaved as though he had aged much more than a year opened his mouth to console Isurith before she burst open again.
"I was wrong!"
Unelia smiled warmly despite Isurith's hysterics. "Everything is okay, even if you prefer that we don't stay here," she whispered. "And if you accept our presence, then I promise that I'll never leave you again."
"This grove is your home, no matter which flag is flying at the front."
The familiar noble voice had already begun to age over the past few years of mortality, but it was still recognizeable anywhere. Johan helped Unelia and Isurith both to their feet as Lamynia, in a rare foray out of her tower, stood behind the group with her two assistants. No longer wearing the ornate silver chains signifying authority she once held over the community she built, the Priestess had sufficed with the light armor an archer donned when preparing for shorter hunting trips into the surrounding area.
Isurith had only just begun to glance between her sister's face and midsection in confusion when Lamynia sheathed her bow and stood at ease. "You know the past year weighed as heavily on us as a thousand did during the Vigil," she joked in a rare sign of good humor from someone ancient even in the view of Elindir.
Unelia bowed congenially to the only leader she could bring herself to acknowledge. "It was not a decision taken lightly...but I hope you understand."
"I do. We are not the unfeeling, feral shadows in the night we once were." Lamynia laid a hand on Unelia's shoulder and began peering into her, the energy in her eyes almost swirling as she appeared to read the returning sister's thoughts. "And I sense that you bring a new addition to our grove."
Silence. Silence and stares. Silence and stares and gasps. Unelia only nodded coyly as Isurith reached forward and felt the bump in her belly with a shaking hand, punctuated by Elindir clapping a rather sheepish looking Johan on the shoulder.
"This grove was established by your mother, Celonia and I ten thousand years ago, when you were but a three thousand year old old whelp," Lamynia said warmly with a casual tone nobody had ever heard from the Priestess. "Tomorrow, we will pray under the stars and celebrate Unelia and Johan Swiftfoot continuing your mother's name with the first child born right here in our community since the war in Silithus."
Finally understanding what was going on, the others gasped and Velonia, a few millennia old herself but still young and impetuous compared to the Priestess, not only broke the rules but threw them right out the window by squealing like a human teenager.
The entire group converged on the two returning members, and Isurith even spent extra effort to apologize to Johan specifically (though without directly mentioning the whole 'wanting to kill him' thing). As they all prepared to skip the makeshift registration office imposed upon the tree tower and seek the moonwell for a traditional baby blessing instead, Lamynia took Unelia and Johan both by the wrists and pulled them close.
"Welcome home."
A/N: like many of my lighter stories that are meant to be romantic, this one might be kind of cheesy, but I'm happy. I hope that those reading were able to get a smile out of this one as well.
I say "others" because most of my stories haven't been posted yet; I have enough material for a few more years on my cloud and external hard drive. Unelia and Johan will appear in more than one of those stories, but in supporting roles as we watch other women of Serenity take the stage. They're all a part of a little continuum I have going; details about which stories occur in what years on the Warcraft timeline are on my Deviant Art account.
For now, thank you so much for reading my little study of interracial romance in a remote, backwater area. Next week, I'll start posting two more stories in the continuum: Escape From Ashran, which features Isurith (under her new alias) in the present, as well as Caledith, another woman from the village as she raises three generations across nine millennia at Serenity.