Auriana

Auriana awoke sometime in the late afternoon. She swore silently. She hadn't meant to sleep so long. Every second they spent here meant another chance that they would be discovered. She might not like Varian Wrynn, but she would damn well do her duty and keep him safe, no matter the cost.

Although... if she were being honest with herself, she had to admit he had surprised her. He was cooler and cleverer than she had expected. Only a fool would be unable to see the wolf that lurked just behind his eyes, but evidently he had it well under control. She had also seen that he had understood her anger, had felt it himself, but had grown to understand that fear and fury were not the hallmarks of a great king. Far from being a pigheaded, arrogant warmonger, he had seemed more a confident and considered man with great emotional depth, even if he did have a temper and a stubborn streak a mile wide.

You were unfair on him, she admitted to herself.

In all her blind grief, she had latched on to Wrynn as a target for her rage, had hated him for his refusal to slake her lust for vengeance. She had felt betrayed by his refusal to pay for one crime with another. Her cooler mind realised this, just as her turbulent heart still seethed.

How did he do it? she wondered.

He had lost as much as she had, more even, and yet he was the one counselling intelligence and restraint. She suddenly felt embarrassed. Last night he had acted like wise ruler, and she a petulant child.

So lost was she in her waking thoughts, Auriana forgot that she was lying on the king until she felt his weight move beneath her. Furious with herself, she scrambled away from him and carefully arranged her features into a mask of control. Control had been her shield from the world for a long time now, and she absolutely hated to lose it. She had trained it into herself so carefully, and she would be damned if Varian Wrynn would be the one to break down her barriers.

"Apologies, my Lord," she mumbled hurriedly.

"For kicking me as you woke up, or the snoring?"

"I... both, I suppose," she stammered, flustered. "Your Majesty."

Wynn's face was carefully neutral, but she could tell he was enjoying her consternation. She glowered.

"Did anything happen while I was asleep?" she asked.

"No. I didn't hear anything out there. I think we're safe for now."

"You let me sleep too long," she said sternly, clambering to her feet.

Her muscles ached, and her wounded arm throbbed dully. The bruises at her throat made it feel like she was still being strangled by the thick grasp of an orc. She shivered.

"You look liked you needed the rest, and we were in no immediate danger," Varian said defensively.

She frowned at him. "We need to get out of here as soon as possible."

"Can't wait to get away from me, then," he said, and she was surprised to hear a note of genuine hurt in his voice.

Auriana turned away, rubbing a weary hand across her eyes.

"I should scout the area again, Your Majesty," she said, abruptly changing the topic. She wasn't quite ready to apologise to him, though she knew she probably should.

"Good idea," he agreed. "Before you leave, however... help me stand. I'm starting to stiffen up."

She walked over to him and allowed him to sling his good arm over her shoulders, so that he could gather his legs beneath him. Varian Wrynn was an absolutely enormous man, especially up this close. Auriana suspected that his arms were as big around as one of her thighs. She thanked the Light that years of fighting had made her small body much stronger than it looked, otherwise she might never have been able to lift him.

Wrynn now stood, half leaning against the cave wall.

"How is your leg?" she asked.

He tested in gingerly, placing as much of his weight on it as he could.

"It isn't pretty, but I could move if I needed to," he said. "I…"

"Shut up," she snapped suddenly.

She had felt the familiar tingle in the back of her mind as something out in the jungle moved through one of her wards. She had placed them last night, and had carefully spelled them to ignore the movements of various jungle birds and beasts. The fact that they had been tripped meant only one thing - the Iron Horde was coming.

Wrynn was staring at her, thoroughly confused.

"You asked…" he started angrily.

She clamped a hand over his mouth.

"There's Horde out there," she hissed.

To her relief, his eyes widened and he stopped trying to speak. She stepped away from him and pointed to the back of the cave.

"Hide," she whispered.

He complied without hesitation, limping quickly into the darkness. Auriana dashed for their supplies and the ruins of Wrynn's plate, and gathered as much in her arms as she could. Everything was placed too close to the cave entrance. If one of the patrols came too close, they might spot the gleam of metal and come to investigate.

It took her several trips, but she managed to shuttle all of Wrynn's discarded plate to the back of the cave. Last of all she bought Shalamayne, which he accepted gratefully in his good hand. His eyes were focused, serious, and he remained standing despite his obvious discomfort.

She felt a second tingle as another of her wards was breached, closer in this time.

"Damnit," she swore quietly.

"Close?" Wrynn whispered back, not wasting words.

"Yes."

"How?"

"Wards," she replied, catching his meaning. "Set last night."

"Do you know where they are? How many?"

"Yes, and no," she said

She knew the approximate position of any Iron Horde out there based on which wards they'd hit, but had no idea of how many enemies might be bearing down on them even now.

"I'll have to scout," she decided.

Even in the near darkness, she could see Wrynn's disapproval. He shook his head.

"Too dangerous," he protested.

"No choice," she retorted. "We need to know."

He radiated disapproval, but gave her no reply. She went move away, but stopped as he clamped an iron grip on her arm.

"Careful," he said finally, and she was surprised at the concern in his eyes.

She nodded tightly as he released her arm.

"Always," she replied.

Heart pounding, she turned and made her way towards the bright afternoon light, and the Iron Horde that awaited her.

Auriana made her way quickly into the jungle, racing from the relatively exposed cave mouth into the thick foliage, where she would be much better camouflaged. She thought about summoning her water elemental, but decided it would be too easy to spot. Instead, she gathered almost all of her magical power to her, and held a powerful frost spell on the tips of her fingers. If the Iron Horde wanted a fight, she was more than prepared to oblige them.

The last ward tripped had been about half a mile to the south, so she headed in that direction. Moving silently through the jungle was hard work, but she was well accustomed to operating in rough terrain. She'd made it about a quarter mile when she heard the unmistakable sound of something large heading in her direction, and she dived into the undergrowth beneath a large tree.

A small patrol of four orcs walked into view. They were conversing loudly in their own guttural language, clearly unafraid of anything they might encounter in the jungle. Given their vicious looking axes, Auriana couldn't say she blamed them. Fortunately, none of them appeared to be magic users, which meant that her wards had likely remained undiscovered even as the patrol marched through them. From what she could see, they also seemed to be nothing more than an average patrol, rather than a hunting party specifically tasked with finding Wrynn.

The orcs continued on into the jungle, oblivious to her presence, and were quickly swallowed up by the endless green. Unfortunately, they were heading north, towards the cave where Wrynn was concealed, but they were moving fairly slowly. Auriana was small and fast, and she guessed she'd have the advantage moving through the jungle.

As the sound of orc conversation faded away, Auriana decided it was finally safe to move. She rose cautiously from her position, and breathed a sigh of relief as no orc axe swing came to greet her. She took off like a shot into the jungle, determined to beat the orcs back to the cave. Auriana could hear them moving in the distance just ahead of her, and carefully flanked to their right. Once she was ahead of them, she would take off and make her way to the cave ahead of them. With any luck, the orcs would walk right past their hiding place, and she and Wrynn would be temporarily safe.

Sweat poured down Auriana's face as she exerted herself, the wounds at her throat making it hard to breathe. It was difficult moving at speed through the dense jungle while listening out for any sounds of the orc patrol, but she moved as quickly as she dared. From what she could tell, the orcs were somewhere behind her now, so she prepared to change directions and cut back across their path towards the cave. She put on a last burst of speed to put the orcs as far behind her as possible, and readied herself for the final charge up the hill. If she had calculated correctly, and she was confident she had, she was far enough ahead of the patrol to slip past them unnoticed.

So intent was she on her final goal that she didn't notice the group of three axebeaks until she'd ploughed straight into them. Two of them took off with a cacophony of angry squawks. The third bird she hit straight on, sending them both tumbling across the jungle floor in a ball of limbs and feathers. Behind her, she heard the orcs start shouting and moving towards her position, alerted by the ceaseless cawing of the flustered axebeaks.

"Stupid birds!" she hissed, scrambling to get back on her feet.

She looked back through the jungle, and her eyes locked with those of a dark-skinned orc.

Just my luck, she thought, as he snarled a war cry to his companions and charged towards her.

Not wanting to lead the orcs to Wrynn, she threw herself to the left as a storm of icicles flew from her fingertips. The orc who had first sighted her was thrown back against a nearby tree, impaled by the sharp ice. The other three orcs still charged towards her, unphased by the death of the orc who had sounded the alarm.

As Auriana ran, she heard a strange whistling noise behind her. She threw herself to the ground just in time to see an axe go flying over her head and imbed itself six inches deep in the tree behind her. Had her reflexes been a second slower, it would have cleaved her head clean off. She swallowed nervously.

Auriana scrambled to her feet and kept running, shooting wild ice lances behind her as she did. There was no time to aim, she simply hoped that the barrage of ice would be enough to slow them down. The dense jungle bit and tore at her exposed skin, and soon she was covered in vicious scratches.

She saw a pile of mossy boulders perched on an outcrop ahead of her, and a plan began to form in her mind. She slowed her pace ever so slightly, allowing the three orcs to close on her. As she sprinted past the boulders, she spun and threw a perfectly placed frostbolt. It slammed into the precariously balanced boulders and sent them tumbling towards the orcs.

The first orc had no time to react, his head splitting open as a boulder ploughed through him. The second and third orcs tried to backpedal, but vanished behind a wall of rock.

Auriana waited to see whether any of them emerged. She was breathing heavily, but was ready to blast any orc that showed his face from under the rockslide. She gave it a few minutes, but no-one emerged from beneath the rocks to challenge her. Satisfied that all the orcs were dead, she gingerly made her way back to Wrynn's hiding place.

She crept stealthily up into the cave entrance, keeping a watchful eye out for any more orcs.

"Auriana?" she heard Wrynn's voice call out from the darkness.

She heard the soft scrape of metal against rock, and realised that he had prepared his sword.

"It's me," she identified herself quickly, not wanting to find herself on the business end of Shalamayne.

Wrynn sighed with relief, and limped forward out of the darkness.

"Well?" he asked.

"We have a problem. I encountered a patrol of four orcs. I was nearly able to sneak past them, but I ran into a nest of bloody axebeaks. The orcs made my position," she admitted.

"Where are they now?"

Surprisingly, he made no comment on her error, for which she was very grateful.

"Dead," she told him, a hint of satisfaction in her voice. "I had no choice. They didn't seem to be hunting for us specifically…"

"... but they will be now," Wrynn finished grimly.

"Precisely," she agreed. "Which means we don't have much time."

She looked out of the cave. The soft blue glow of twilight was rapidly descending on the jungle.

"It will be nightfall soon. Whoever's out there will take some time to realise the patrol is missing. I doubt that they will send a party out into the jungle at night, against a force of unknown strength."

"We are only two people," Wrynn pointed out.

"Well, they don't know that… at least, I'm fairly sure. I don't believe the orcs I killed had time to sound an alert."

Wrynn nodded. "In that case, I think we can safely assume we have until dawn before we might encounter more enemies. Are you able to create a portal?"

"I can try."

Auriana closed her eyes and reached out for Stormshield. It was within her grasp, but every time she tried to solidify the connection it slipped away. The magic blocking her felt curious, unfamiliar. It almost seemed as if Stormshield were in the wrong place, which was of course utterly ridiculous. Gritting her teeth, she poured more energy into the spell, drawing on more magic than she'd ever used in her life. Her head pounded, and the cave walls actually began to shake under the sheer power of the spell, but it was all to no avail. The spell slipped, and crumbled into nothing.

She cried out in frustration and pain as her power left her, and narrowly resisted the urge to throw a punch into the cave wall.

"I take it Stormshield is still…" Wrynn started, but cut off abruptly and pointed at her face. "Are you alright?"

She cocked her head to the side, confused. He mimed touching his nose. Mimicking his action, she raised a hand to her own nose, and was surprised when it came away covered in blood. Sighing, she wiped it clean with the back of her hand.

"I'm fine," she told him. "I just overdid it somewhat. Magic is not without its costs."

"As long as you're sure," Wrynn said skeptically. "Bleeding like that isn't generally a good sign."

"I promise," she said firmly. She didn't want his pity.

Wrynn nodded, somewhat mollified, though he was still studying her intently for any further sign of weakness.

"If we're unable to get to Stormshield, we will need to prepare a defense," she continued. "We can't stop them coming for us, but I'll be damned if I'll give them an easy time of it."

"Well now, that's an idea I can get behind," Wrynn said wolfishly. "What did you have in mind?"

Author's Note: Just got my Nemesis: Orcslayer achievement. That's a reasonable excuse to post a new chapter, right? Hope you enjoy!