When I regained consciousness, I found myself among fallen trees and blasted rubble far too close to the colosseum for me to have lost it right there. It took my only a few seconds to regain my faculties of reason, and I surmised that, in addition to having been hit by the blast from Mioda's runes but then conveniently knocked through the portal, we must have been teleported to a rather safe distance. And then, upon finding my unconscious, my comrades pulled me closer to the colosseum for some reason. I awoke to the sound of familiar voices behind me and figured out that they needed to return to the wreckage from the blast but didn't feel safe enough to leave me on my own.
As an undead person I feel no physical pain, but I do retain a measurement of sensation and I could immediately sense that something was wrong. The blows I'd suffered during the fight against the blood golems beneath the colosseum had been worsened by the blast; I'd later undergo two separate surgical procedures by a talented surgeon at a charity hospital at Exarch's Refuge since my body can't heal naturally on its own, to repair a torn rotator cuff and a dislocated finger. None of that seemed very important at the time, though.
I sat up, finding myself among a dozen or so other survivors of the blast in need of medical attention. We'd been lined up in clear view of the colosseum, and a few healers either tended to or simply guarded us as dozens and dozens more of Draenor and Azeroth's heroes sifted among the rubble left after the blast. The colosseum and all associated structures were destroyed, and the sky was filled only by Reshad's people and more of said heroes scouting for any remnants of Nerapa's forces. Dead cultists lied all around us, as did the bodies of the fallen as people worked to pull the remains of their comrades out of the wreckage and dig makeshift graves. For as far as the eye could see, people of all races and factions were setting up gravestones carved from broken tree bark and smashed bricks, or whatever other suitable objects they could find. It was a scene few people there found unfamiliar considering the line of work most adventurers found themselves in, but being the first time I'd lost somebody since my creation a few years prior - my six sets of memories from past lives felt distant at that moment - it stung quite a bit.
In a rare sign of what counted as compassion from her, Zhenya actually clopped up behind me, knelt down and placed an armored hand on my shoulder. Knowing her, it was probably the closest non sexual contact she had with somebody in a very long time.
"They were at the epicenter," she began softly, correctly guessing that I'd know exactly what she was talking about. "There were no remains, but Oronil has picked out a plot." She extended a hand to help me up, somehow sensing that one of my arms was injured despite the Light yielding poor results when trying to diagnose or heal the undead. Once again seeming to read my thoughts, and once again breaking her normal stoic demeanor, Zhenya actually appeared to make a joke as she helped me to walk to the plot. "I didn't know that the undead can be knocked out cold like that."
It was a sort of dark humor that might not have quite worked well in any other situation and between any other pair of people. As we walked slowly toward the group of congregated elves and bird people, I surveyed the quiet scene all around us. For the first time, the place actually looked peaceful. "Well, we posses consciousness. I suppose that possession of a thing is the first prerequisite to losing it," I surmised, though my mind was elsewhere at the time.
Once we reached the plot, I realized that I must have been out cold for a good deal of time. Mioda's four classmates looked like they'd been weeping as young people of all races would, but the past tense is the important factor there; a few of them still choked on their own exhalation but other than that, they appeared to have already finished mourning. Reshad and his two counterparts chatted lightly with the four other students, and while everyone appeared to have calmed down, there were no jokes shared. Ahead of them, Kurekk stood like a sort of block between them and Oronil, who knelt before two carved pieces of wood. I could already read the Thalassian runes, and knew that what I had witnessed hadn't been some sort of a bad dream.
Zhenya stopped when she felt me hesitate, and the two of us watched the bereaved brother for a moment. Acceptance didn't prove easy so much as simply unavoidable; there was no possible way for the stages of denial and bargaining when the gravestones were clearly right there. The fact that a vicious, murderous cult had been destroyed after a long blood feud with the good people of Veil Zekk meant that the ordeal didn't feel like a loss or a waste of time, but I was struck by the pain of the deaths of Mioda and Aneril all the same. Selfish or immature? Perhaps. We were surrounded by at least two dozen other such scenes of other people burying comrades, some of them possibly in more pain and having suffered through longer struggles than we had. But their stories are not Mioda's story; and I could only account for the loss of the person I'd failed to save.
Upon seeing that my legs were unhurt and that I could walk just fine, Zhenya let go of me and stood next to Kurekk, the two of them bearing surprisingly similar personalities and mannerisms despite the difference in their physiology. I approached Oronil, noticing only then how much his stone cold stare resembled that of his brother's. Though his expression was unreadable, I could imagine that a number of thoughts and feelings were flowing through his mind like the waves at the end of a storm.
"I had hoped that you and I would meet again one day, but...I never imagined it would be like this." Frivolous words in retrospect, but I didn't know how else to speak to him. Despite the strong attachment I'd developed to Mioda, the truth was that Aneril had been Oronil's brother; they'd spent centuries together no doubt.
Those old scars on his face barely moved, and I could tell that he was extending a tolerance for me that he wouldn't have granted to others. "Me neither," he whispered, though I don't think he'd intended or even noticed how quiet his normally strong, charismatic voice sounded. "I wish circumstances had been different," he added, an ambiguous hint to his voice.
I knelt next to him as well, ensuring to lower myself carefully for the sake of balance. "We tried," I sighed.
Fel green eyes flickered, and a sort of coldness borne in someone who'd witnessed the loss of most of his country's population during the Third War formed a protective barrier around him. "So many have died...very few truly live. I saw them when they were together, for however brief a time between when I was released from prison and today. They were happy...they made each other happy. I'd rather remember them in life than dwell on this." He swept has hands across the air in front of us, though in a very subtle, understated motion. There were no bodies in those graves, but it felt like hallowed ground all the same.
After a few moments, I found I had nothing more to say. There really wasn't at the time; we tried, and we failed, but in their final moments I witnessed what Oronil was talking about. The fear of death was entirely absent in them both - even Aneril, who unlike Mioda, could have chosen to live on. There was a sense of peace radiating from them both even more brightly than the magic from the runes, and I knew that the two of them had found a joy far beyond what the rest of us knew. Yet there we were, the survivors who would live on. How spoiled we were...how foolish I was.
"Where will you go?" I asked him, trying in vain to change the topic when I realized that there was no way to simply rationalize my way out of what had happened.
That old stone face of his didn't change, and he didn't even seem to feel any need to shift his weight after holding in the same position for such a long time. "For now, I am charged with escorting these students back to the Refuge. They practiced their skills in the field, and their instructor died in a way they all probably consider enviable; they will finish mourning in a week or so and move on. The academy will give a token speech and then soon forget."
"It's not fair," I muttered almost involuntarily. My gloved hand brushed away a bit of dirt that the arid wind had already blown into the grooves forming Mioda's carved name.
Oronil may have spent a good deal of time with his brother and past future sister in law upon his release, as he almost seemed to channel her. "Life isn't fair, my friend; neither is death. But if it was their time to go, this was the most optimal way it could have been," he muttered himself, his voice laced with a forced distance that at least signaled that his heart wasn't as cold as his visage. After a few moments, he seemed ready to change the subject as well, also pained by the utter helplessness we both felt. "Once I have escorted the students back, I likely won't be bound to them by the terms of my parole anymore. I know them very well."
Both of us were uncomfortable. We were both mourning, him probably more than me but internally, and we had only known each other in a very different setting from this. Unsure of how to open up to him when we were both devastated by the loss but unwilling to let go of what little connection I had to anyone else in my short undead life, I tried to cling. "Khujand is at Frostfire," I told him. "He says he can probably help find work."
He raised one of his long eyebrows. "You weren't kidding when you mentioned what a strange evening it had been yesterday." Pausing for a moment, he seemed to understand the implication. "If you and your friend are willing to wait in Talador...I might go along. Without Aneril, I have very little holding me to anything."
"Well, Zhenya won't be able to follow, but I'm sure she'll go with us halfway. The bird people will not; they're the real victors here." Despite my respect for Reshad and my sincere admiration of how his people had rid themselves of an old threat, I couldn't prevent the bitterness in my voice.
Fortunately, my old friend was in better control, and didn't lower himself to the level of jealousy for the good fortune of others. "If that's the case, then feel free to fly to the Refuge whenever you're ready. I...need to spend some extra time here."
"I understand, but will the students in your charge be patient enough to wait?"
It was a silly question, as I came to realize. "They're third year academy students. It doesn't matter whether they want to wait or not," Oronil replied while staring at his brother's headstone, the faintest hint of a dark humored smile creaking onto the corner of his mouth.
Leaving him to a vigil I wished I could have shared in but did not feel I had the right to, I turned back toward Reshad and his people. Kurekk and Zhenya had joined the rest of them, and the group was even more subdued than when I'd woken stepped forward, and the look in his ancient eyes told me that he knew this was his last goodbye to a dear friend.
"I'll forego gushing about how my people couldn't have done this without the help you brought, and suffice by delivering our heartfelt thanks," the old scroll collector told me in his unnaturally echoing voice. "My only regret is that this will likely be the last time I see you...this dimension is not yours."
"I know...just another point on a list of regrets today. My desire is to stay for a bit longer, but I can't logically justify doing so. My heartfelt thanks for all your efforts...we tried."
Although Reshad had never actually met Mioda and most assuredly wouldn't weep for her, I know that my respect for him was mutual, and he seemed a bit downcast at seeing my own demeanor. "We did the best we could. If the young lady was as you described, I don't imagine she'd wish for you to allow the pain of her loss to linger inside."
"No...no, she wouldn't."
When the conversation skipped a beat, Zhenya poked in without a segue, so typical of her behavior. "Oronil and I discussed returning to the Refuge while you were under. I wouldn't mind going along myself, just to rest before I have to head out again. I hope that you do not mind my presence."
"Stop," I scolded her, only half seriously though at the time I don't think the humor would have made its way through in my voice. "I'm parting ways with too many people today; I'm not ready to let you go, too."
The four students never told me their names from what I remember, and typical of elves, they didn't seem keen on discussing their feelings with a stranger, much less an undead one. Beyond that, there is nothing more for me to say; we remained at the site only a little longer before Reshad lent us one of his ravens to Talador, allowing it to fly back on its own. On the way there, I found myself fixated on the plot until we flew so high and far that it became indistinguishable from all the others. It seemed unfair, but objectively speaking, wars were always unfair. Mioda left no remains and her grave was on an alternate timeline of Draenor which, through means likely well known to you by now, is permanently closed; return to that site or any part of the universe in that dimension will never be possible again after what happened a decade or so later.
Oronil's prediction about the academy had been almost prophetic. A speech was given in honor of Mioda and Aneril, and they were both posthumously granted awards commensurate for a student and a teacher at a ceremony in which a few Sindorei digniraties even temporarily ported in from our timeline on Azeroth. Thereafter he was discharged from his duties and followed myself alongside Khujand to a small settlement in Thunder Pass, where we spent much of our remaining time on parole commiserating like only three prison buddies could do. Zhenya, due to her factional affiliation, only followed us as far as Talador, though I did bump into her on a few interfactional raids until the eventual liberation of that world from the Iron Horde.
Time passed. People move on. I know that all of us did.
I never saw Reshad or Kurekk again, as I had predicted. I won't delve into the details of how that alternate timeline was eventually sealed off from us - and if you know your history well, then you know that it's been at least twenty years since it was determined that to ever open the dimensional rift again is scientifically and magically impossible. For many long months, I searched the Outland of our own timeline, asking among the bird people of that planet if they knew of stories before their planet's despoilment of one of their own named Reshad. I found that he was unheard of, as was Nerapa, and for another few months after that I wallowed in the realization that Veil Zekk, the cult and indeed all the people I met during the liberation of Draenor were specific to that alternate timeline, and had never existed in our own universe. That meant that to visit the grave of the two lovers was impossible; never again would I even be able to go through the motions of at least giving a few kind words to them or to any of those who were lost during the campaign against the Iron Horde.
In the immediate aftermath of what had transpired, I spent months doing my part in the campaign, meeting a rather colorful group of people introduced to me by Khujand. Eventually most of us moved to Ratchet alongside the friends of the she-elf he married. She's the wife of my dear friend, the mother of the apprentice who is editing this very volume and even worked as Ratchet's other warrior trainer for a time, but I don't think Cecilia minds that I can't see her as anything but a she-elf; her people as as feral as his and I suppose they like it that way. In a way, the ordeal we went though began a longer lasting friendship with an entire community that I hadn't expected; a chance meeting while my mind was occupied with the salvation of a young mage has essentially led to the entire life I've built now.
Oronil, as you know if you follow current events, is still alive and kicking. After a story of his own between him and a certain young orc woman who eventually captured his heart - that's the part you may not know - Oronil ended up causing more political uprisings across a few worlds. It's said that he was behind the people's revolution in Silvermoon a few years back; whether he did or not, I know he would not be interested in seizing the reins of power himself, and I'd like to imagine that he'll spend his last few decades of his long, nearly finished life trying to awaken the masses of the world elsewhere. Though hopefully not here in Ratchet.
Zhenya and I didn't quite keep in touch. She promised to, but Zhenya promises a lot of things and I reckon that she only means half of those promises. Though she was the best person to have watching your back - it obviously takes a true test of loyalty for a paladin and a Forsaken to become so close - she simply isn't much into writing letters. The last time I heard from her was maybe four years ago, during which she mentioned something in her brief letter about traveling eastward to work as a mercenary for some group of pirates used as a proxy force by the Alliance. Seeing as how factional conflict has died down, I've considered going to finally visit her a few times, but as has been the case in my distant friendship with her for the past two and a half decades, such plans always seem to fall through.
That leaves me with the case of Mioda. Being the storyteller that he was in his universe, Reshad pledged that he would ensure that the young woman's story wouldn't be forgotten among his people. The lack of any knowledge of it whatsoever on Outland is another testament to the fact that that alternate timeline was entirely separate from the past of our own Draenor, no matter what a handful of theorists still insist on claiming. Still, I like to think that even if it's in another universe that I will never visit again, people still talk of the stalwart young woman who refused to cower in fear even when I'd found her in that dungeon in the end. That people still talk of the fiancé who chose to die with her rather than watch her wither away on her own, proving that no matter what had transpired between them before her abduction, they still didn't plan to part even in death. That people still talk about the strange group of heroes from not only another planet but from another reality entirely who came to rid them of the fanatical cult that had plagued their land for years, and that Mioda and Aneril were two of many who'd laid down their lives so a completely unrelated time and space could live just a little bit easier. And just maybe, that their names are still spoken when the names of the fallen are remembered.
And that, my dear reader, brings me to my greatest sin. Other adventures and exploits were had over the years, both on Draenor and even here in Kalimdor. None of them remain as vivid in my memory as Mioda's tale, and yet I've already committed those stories to writing; this is the first time Mioda's has been told to anyone other than those directly involved, however. I failed to fulfill my promise to Reshad and my duty to Mioda and Aneril, and for that I have absolutely no excuse. After more than twenty years, old wounds have healed and it's much easier for me to delve into these memories; perhaps it was my fear that it would be more difficult than this that prevented me for so long.
But that time is over. The entire amount of time in which I knew Mioda wasn't more than a few days, and my interactions with her lasted only a few hours; not even much longer than the time I spent with her nameless classmates or anyone else I met there in passing. Yet despite all that, Mioda left an impression on me which still remains to this day. Even after twenty years, I can remember not only what she looked like when I first found her, but also what I imagined she would have looked like before the cult had cursed her. I've even drawn a few pictures of her, though for the time being those will remain private.
She touched me in a way I can't quite describe. Even if she's dead and gone, mourned only by family members that have most assuredly moved on after twenty years, I vow that she will never be forgotten. I owe that much to her for the sense of purpose and the renewed appreciation for life that she gave me.
If there's one message I can leave you with, dear reader, rather than turning this into some sort of selfish screed about my own personal feelings, it's this: cherish those you have.
Right now, there's a very good chance that you're not on the best of terms with a person close to you in life. It's normal, and it's the right of every being to be angry when the time is appropriate. For anyone to claim that we should never quarrel with each other is simply stupid, and it would sully the somber note upon which I am trying to end. Rather, what I say is: don't go overboard. From what Oronil once told me during a late night chat in Frostfire, the last conversation Mioda and Aneril had shared was an argument over some trivial matter. All they had to remember each other by when she was locked in a cage and he was worrying himself sick about her location were harsh words and statements neither of them meant, as is common in domestic disputes. That is inevitable and happens to all of us, so why am I giving this reminder?
I'm giving it in the hope that you remember not to go overboard. Fights aren't supposed to last indefinitely, and longer term relations between friends and family aren't supposed to be ruined by disagreements over fleeting, temporary matters. The fragility of the mortal condition is so much more valuable than that, yet so easy for us to lose sight of in the heat of the moment. Please, whoever you aren't talking to, whoever you've boycotted personally, whatever the reasons for a grudge you bear, reevaluate the bigger picture. Draw a relationship timeline, use a mental scale and balance, or if you're especially blocked from thinking anything good about that person, force yourself to imagine how you would feel if you were informed at that very moment that they were dead and you'd never see them again to make amends.
That fragility is what makes us truly alive. It is so very beautiful, yet so very tenuous; one of the great ironies of life is how easy it is to break bonds that are supposed to be long lasting and intimate. Please, wherever you are when you happen upon this short tale, however you feel, reevaluate where you stand. Don't let those bonds break for issues of lesser importance. I saw, and I know: anger among those you care is almost always trivial in the long run.
With that, I will cease my moralizing and get down from my soapbox. The story has been told. I don't know for how much longer I have in this life before turning hollow, but it is my sincere wish that even after that time comes, this story is still available for those who wish to bury themselves in books and revive the souls of the fallen by ensuring that their stories are read. Light be with you all.
Valmar of the Forsaken
Ratchet, the Barrens
June 28, year 55