** Hope you have a strong stomach for this one!**

*Scroll 11*

Cold drops dripped onto her nose and cheek, sliding down her neck in a shivering line. Shining eyes snapped open as Luna choked up sea water and gasped for air. Rolling to her side she vomited water and bile into the sand of the beach she lay on. Coughing, she looked around in a panic. Everything looked wrong. Trees were uprooted and thrown, cracks and fissures in the surface didnt look like any place she remembered. The sky was pregnant with fat, rainy clouds that spit drops of water at her.

Pushing against the sand she fought to sit upright, growling to herself as her arms refused to lift her. She had no strength. Breathing heavily, she shouted at the clouds in a wordless bellow before collapsing completely to her back. Tears burned her eyes but she refused to let them fall.

'What happened?' she wondered. ' I dont even know where I am. Much less how I got here...' She glared at the clouds, remembering them black and angry and lashing out at her. She remember being struck by lightning that was red and fueled by hate, but how did she land here, and why wasn't she-

Her thoughts halted as she looked down at her torso and her eyes couldnt make sense of what she saw. Red. Scraps of leather. Raw meat. Her brain was trying to protect her from seeing it, but she wanted to, had to, and when she did she knew that she'd dream of it. Her stomach was flayed open, her intenstines poking out of little holes in her lower stomach, pink tongues. Her right leg had a bone protruding from right abover her knee, white and stark against all the blood. A twig had peirced it's way into her calf muscle. Her arms were layered with cuts and gashes of all sizes and shapes, who knew what made them. Wind. Leaves. Her own hands. She had no memory. Light-headedness started to overwhelm her but she shook her head and began thinking.

" I have to move." She mummbled to herself. "I have to move, or I'll die. Now. MOVE!" With a tremendous effort she rolled onto her stomach again and began to claw her way off of the beach and onto the grassy knoll above her. Her cries echoed down the beach and through the trees ahead of her.

'Go...' she told herself. 'Go!' Hopefully she could find a stick large and thick enough to splint her leg with. Reaching the edge of the grass she screamed again as her leg was pulled over the edge and she felt the protruding bone scrape against the hard dirt. Pain exploded up her spine and into her head and her vision went black for a moment, before she dug her fingers into the dirt and hauled herself back from oblivion. Gasping for breath again, she began dragging herself to a nearby tree. Clawing at the rough bark she sighed as she felt the life coursing through the tree, but somthing was wrong, she couldn't touch it. She couldn't caress the swirling life and wrap it around her like a lover. She couldn't do anything!

She felt like she'd taken a blow through her heart. Tears came unbidden to her eyes, burning a path of their own to her cheeks. She felt like her power had been caged, the key thrown into the sea. Stareing at her hand on the tree, she felt her heart break, as she tried again and again to tap into nature. Into life.

Hours passed before she removed her hand from the tree side. Night had fallen though she didn't know when. She glanced around nervously at the clouds, though no black storm came to devour her. The wind blew in a gentle caress as though telling her it would be alright. A sweet lie. She'd seen enough battle wounds to know she'd never walk properly again, if at all. She felt numb. She had no more tears to give, only a subdued anger, a quiet hatred. Sitting with her back against the tree, she glared at her legs, at her ruined stomach, and wondered how she would die. Would her wounds get infected? Would she starve or dehydrate? Or would she go mad and end her own life long before then. Night elves were, regretably, incredibly resiliant creatures, and would take a good long time before they starved.

Resolved to sit and wait for whatever end met her, she laid her head back against the tree and tried to find a star between the clouds. She'd rather her last sight wasn't the dull-ness of the storms aftermath.

A screaming roar echoed through the trees around her, making her jump. She'd forgotten the possibilty of the animals killing her. She'd long ago made friends with most of them, but a massive storm tearing apart their home might've pushed them into a rage. She only hoped they wouldn't prolong it.

She gasped suddenly as yellow eyes glowed at her from between two overgrown mageroyal bushes. She watched them as they blinked at her, and she fought not to be afraid. She'd lived countless years. Maybe not as an immortal, she'd been born shortly after they'd lost it, but elves still lived the longest lives out of all the races. A twig snapped on the other side of her and she snapped her head over to look, finding herself eye to eye with a huge moonsaber. The blood drained out of her face as she beheld his size, his shoulder easily as tall as hers standing. She watched with fascination as he walked to the front of her and sat next to her crippled legs.

The moonsaber lowered its nose to her and sniffed gently before looking her in the eyes again, and she almost fainted when she felt a mind touch hers.

"I share these forests willingly, accepting night elf kind into my home, and on occasion calling them friend"

"You're a spirit!" Luna gasped aloud. The feeling of the titanic mind touching hers made her feel as though a great weight had settled on her chest. The moonsaber spirit bowed it's head at her before continuing.

"Though they have been tainted greatly in recent memory, I can see in you the same strength, honor, and spirit that first endeared them to me." His gaze bored into hers, "Do you place value in the ferocity to overcome all odds?" She gasped as she recalled her willingness to die. It was still there, masked and tucked away in his presence, and she knew he felt it non-the-less. A feirce feeling swarmed inside her, a flame that filled her limbs and made it easier to breath. She felt like she'd been cleansed of somthing, of a curse, and looking to the Moonsaber Spirit she knew that was it exactly. The storm was a curse.

A renewed vigor swelled inside her and she knew that she would not die here alone. Closing her eyes she searched for a feeling from the earth, for anything. Sorting through the anger and scorn she found a smell. Moss. Thick and clinging, and the more delicate smell of magic. She knew where she was. She was home. Opening her eyes she wanted to thank the Moonsaber Spirit but he was gone, replaced by an actual Moonsaber of a much more normal size. He sat there watching her with yellow eyes next to two overgrown Mageroyal bushes. Reaching a hand out, she somhow knew that he would come to her, and she knew that he would help her stand, her leg still injured but significantly less painful. Limping, she kept one hand on the sabers soft fur, the other snatching tree limb to tree limb to stay upright. She would live.

As she made her way north, hoping to find somwhere still in tact, she heard a voice whisper through the trees,

"I name you my champion..." She heard it and felt its power, and knew what she had to do.

** I followed a quick quest line in the aftermath of the Cataclysm on Darkshore. Soon I'll add another with more tie in's and hopefully it'll be longer!**