A/N: for those unfamiliar with the Warcraft timeline, the year 25 is the *official* beginning of the online game World of Warcraft; although Blizzard hates numbers and consistency, all canon lore counts Warcraft III as taking place in the years 20 to 21 and World of Warcraft vanilla as starting in the year 25. Since the story up until now took place entirely in the interim, this would be the first chapter where we're actually in the period of time covered by the online game, just for clarification.

This is also one of the few chapters in the story that could almost be described as light hearted, so savor it.

March 14, year 25

If there was one thing that still bothered Tirith even after half a year of mellowing out, it was people deliberately ignoring her. There was a lot she'd learned to tolerate in terms of rudeness and lack of manners common among some of the outlanders - though not among all of them to be fair - and she'd like to believe that her patience for the stupidities of the modern world had grown.

Her court ordered therapy sessions, however, tried that patience more than any other annoyance in her life. If she had to sit in that chair much longer at Finklesnap jotted down his sloppy notes onto the thin, fragrant paper patterned in white, yellow and pink sheets.

"So Miss Nightshade, that job you got when you first got released," Doctor Finklesnap mumbled disinterestedly. "How's that working out for you?"

Resting her chin on her hands, Tirith made no secret of the fact that she was even less interested in their weekly sessions than he was. "Fine," she replied tersely, and so engrossed was he in his own notes that he didn't even notice her discourteous tone of voice.

"Uh huh, very good...it's a full time job, right? At the delicatessen down on seventeenth street?"

His answer was so obviously confused with another unwilling patient he'd no doubt had legally mandated to attend his sessions that she honestly wondered if he even remembered by Marge had tried to hard to screw her over like this. In fact, he didn't even stop writing his notes despite the fact that Tirith didn't answer at first, totally unconcerned whether or not she was actually telling him anything of use.

"I work part time at the Kaldorei consulate stamping papers I never actually read and giving directions to offices that have no relation to the papers I stamp."

"Mm hmm...mm hmm...that's good news," Finklesnap mumbled, as if she hadn't already been working there for half a year. "And how do you like your coworkers there?"

"They don't piss me off, at least," she mumbled right back, sending a passive aggressive jab that he didn't even notice.

Filling every uncovered square inch of the sheet of paper, the gnome even began to collect undried ink on the bottom of his writing hand. The tiny man had some strange obsession with conserving paper despite the fact that he had also let slip the fact that he was part owner of a lumber mill that had just begun operation in Darkshore - all under the auspices of the Kaldorei leadership's 'concessions' toward their allies for the sake of unity. Finklesnap obviously didn't care about preserving the environment and was most likely just a cheap skate who tried to make every piece of stationary last as long as possible.

Complete from just his first sheet, he tore off the white and yellow pieces of paper and folded the pink one back. Instead of actually facing her, however, he just continued scribbling even more on the pink sheet of paper. "And what sort of things piss you off?" he asked in a flat, monotone voice that insinuated that he wasn't even listening to his own question.

"People who write things down when talking to me instead of just looking at me like a living being."

Her narrowed eyes were a gamble; Finklesnap was someone of importance within the community, and his ties to business, government and medicinal research meant that a large number of people viewed him as a brilliant, benevolent figure. In the waiting room of his office, other patients occasionally spread rumors of people being signed away to a special hospital for the criminally insane, sentencing them to a prison of sorts that wasn't restricted by the standardized sentences and judicial oversight of the penal system. All of the talk consisted of rumors, however, since nobody in the waiting room had ever crossed the gnomish psychiatrist enough to end up in such a place.

Her risk proved imaginary, however, when Finklesnap seemed to grow even more engrossed in his work. "Interesting," he mumbled as if it were the least interesting thing he'd ever heard. The fact that his scribbling neither increased nor decreased in speed insinuated that he wasn't trying to antagonize her and truly wasn't paying attention. "And have you experienced any sort of nightmares or hallucinations?" he asked in passing, thumbing his way toward the end of a laundry list of questions he was required to ask.

Her guard down, Tirith forgot who she was dealing with and offered an honest answer. "I've never had hallucinations, doctor; I told you that before. Sometimes when I dream, I just...see them. And see what happened back there-"

Her voice was cut off by the quick upward snap of the doctor's head. Without any escalation at all, his visage contorted into one of arrogant, recalcitrant outrage whereas it had been one of calm indifference just half a second before. Setting his pad of fragrant papers and his pen down on his desk in a way that a gnome might have found to be forceful, the psychiatrist folded his hands and pursed his lips to an almost comical degree, leaving forward in an attempt to intimidate his legally bound patient.

"Miss Nightshade...we've talked about this before," he scolded her, pronouncing every single word carefully not out of a condescending idea that she couldn't speak Common, but rather out of a legitimate threat he was making. "You've been told, and you've even signed your name. You're well beyond this...this...nonsense," he sneered at her almost hatefully. "Nothing happened. You experienced a psychotic break and invented a fantasy in your head in order to block out the memory of assaulting your comrades, men gracious enough not to have pressed any charges after Marge interceded on your behalf. You need to stop indulging in these immature stories you're making up immediately." He continued to glare at her for effect until she thought twice rather than defend herself any more, and once she repressed her anger, the urge to crack his head open and the irregular rhythm she felt beating inside her chest due to said repression, Tirith just stared into her lap. Satisfied that his point had been made, Doctor Finklesnap relaxed his posture and fished a transparent, neon orange vial and slammed it on the desk as hard as his little hands would allow before sliding it across toward her.

At first she hesitated, but when tried to give her his almost comical death stare again, she just grit her teeth and picked up the vial. "What are these?" she asked plainly, refusing to display any hint of emotion in front of him lest she allow him to think that he'd actually gotten inside of her head.

"You aren't in any place to ask questions," he scolded her while scribbling at lightning speed on another sheet of paper. Tearing it off of his pad, he passed it along toward her. "This is your prescription for when the first vial runs out. Two pills, twice a day before food. Start now."

A minor staredown ensued as the two of them glared at each other across the desk, unbeknownst to the two armed guards waiting in the hall. Logic dictated that Tirith shouldn't play with fire, but she was almost at the end of her limited patience for the awful little man.

"I'm not hungry. I don't feel like eating-"

"Tirith calm down!" the little liar yelled, not even bothering to mimic the expression of somebody who was afraid. He looked like the psychotic one as she yelled in fright when clearly on the verge of boredom by the looks of his facial expression. "We're trying to help you, don't you understand that?"

One of the two guards peeked inside and rolled his eyes. If it came down to a conflict, the armored human would most assuredly support the doctor just to resolve any problems, but it was obvious that even he was tired of the stern medical practitioner song and dance. Knowing that even one more word could cause her to incriminate herself, Tirith sufficed herself by snatching the vial away quickly enough to make the psychiatrist jump.

"Fine," she huffed while popping the white top off of the vial and sticking two pills in her mouth.

Unsatisfied that his point had been made in this specific instance, Doctor Finklesnap began to puff up his chest as if he were preparing some sort of devastating blow in battle. "Guards, I need you to inspect the patient's mouth to ensure that she's actually swallowed her medication," the gnome announced while staring directly at the night elf across the table.

Like a deer in the headlights of a gnomish mechanostrider, the first guard just stared into the room through his saucer eyes. The second conveniently made himself scarce, abandoning the first to one of the doctor's awkward tasks. After living in Stormwind for six months, Tirith had learned enough about the ways of the humans to know that they were extremely patriarchal - far, far more than orcs and probably on the same level as trolls and centaur - and had a soft spot for damsels. Despite her stature, Tirith gave the guard the best sabre kitten eyes she could, earning an outraged gasp from Finklesnap as she proved that he wasn't the only one who could manipulate others when pressed.

Viewing the ancient warrior with chivalrous, sympathetic eyes that had no idea how many demons, monsters and even humans those two purple hands had killed, the guard involuntarily shook his head and stepped back. "Nope. Er, I mean...she's clear," the man mumbled before making himself as equally scarce as her parter.

Finklesnap's jaw dropped open so wide that his pointy goatee almost poked the surface of the table. "What! Guards, you...hey! Tirith! Tirith, come back here right now!" the gnomish psychiatrist fumed from atop his chair that was too high for him to easily descend and chase her.

"Thanks for the medication doc, see you next week," Tirith said with an immature finger wave that she knew was unbecoming of someone of her prestige, but which was also oh so very satisfying when it had the desired effect of garnering a string of curses in gnomish as Finklesnap found himself too angry to properly work the lever and descend from his high chair. If he could get away with taunts and subtle insults since they were impossible to substantiate, then so could she.

Jumping over the balcony like the first time she'd left the building, she quickly took the back alleys to make her way home, giving the doctor no opportunity to grab a few guards and accuse her of something she hadn't done. By that time, she'd at least learned how to find her way to a few familiar places based on habit, though that was the upper limit; human buildings and streets tended to all look the same, and there were certain parts of Stormwind that Tirith simply hadn't visited before.

It only took her a few minutes to reach the apartment just one side street over from the grassy area where Kaldorei tended to congregate. Passing by numerous people of different races and only a minority of night elves, she promptly found her way to the five story apartment building in question, leapt up the stairwell to the fourth story just to ensure that her skills stayed sharp even after unofficial retirement from combat and passed two more of her kind in the hallway whom she greeted only by bowing. For someone as nationalistic and perhaps slightly prejudiced as Tirith, living in a neighborhood full of her own kind should have been a boon to help her psychologically make it through the two year sentence of therapy.

What it had turned out to be, however, was one of many false promises. Gossiping with her fellow Kaldorei about what other Kaldorei were doing or wearing, or whom they were dating, wore out relatively fast. There was talk of news and current events, none of which interested Tirith considering the fact that she was, whether legally or not, forever removed from the battlefield. Listening to younger warriors describe their exploits was entertaining but painful in a way as well, and after the first month she had found herself becoming more withdrawn. When she started hearing all the comments about how beneficial most of the night elves found their people's membership in the Alliance to be, she simply had to excuse herself from most social circles. True, most of the population did benefit; after the loss of Nordrassil and Mount Hyjal - where more than half the world population of their people lived - the assistance from the Alliance allowed the survivors to resettle in big cities. But for those from the marginalized villages such as the women of Serenity, a deep sense of betrayal settled in, alongside a healthy dose of jaded skepticism about their own race.

All of that stopped the moment Tirith walked through the door of the tiny but very cozy apartment she shared with Soraya - a woman who was brilliant at military logistics but was by no means a deep thinker or given to conversations on serious topics.

"Tirith?" the younger night elf asked from the bathroom, where she appeared to be brushing her hair. "You're home a little early, aren't you?"

Kicking her shoes off and sprawling on the only couch they owned together (Tirith paid for as much as she could afford inside the apartment to save face after having been taken in as a charity case), the older night elf closed her eyes and rested for a moment. "I was given the day off because Fickelsnot insisted on this week's session being during working hours. You were the one that signed off on that, remember?"

Partially occupied by all her hair, Soraya didn't seem to think about the matter too hard. "Oh...I guess I did," she replied noncommittally, and then returned to spending an inordinate amount of time on her hair for someone from a militaristic, matriarchal society.

Barely even looking up, Tirith watched her move from the bathroom toward the front door, barely spending more than a few minutes in the apartment after the older elf had just shown up. "Lunch meeting?" Tirith asked nonchalantly.

Misunderstanding her intentions, Soraya froze for a moment and looked by apologetic and uneasy. "Hmm? Oh...well, yes, there's a new seafood restaurant by the port, and...um...Pontus says it's really great." Wringing her hands for a moment, Soraya fidgeted as if afraid that Tirith would insist on coming, making her elder feel not left out so much as like a burden on her friend. "Do you want me to bring anything back for you?" Soraya asked while looking at her shoes, almost embarrassed to ask the question.

Had Soraya simply been honest about wanting to meet Pontus without her, Tirith wouldn't have cared at all. The more indirect nature of the younger elf's speaking, however, just made Tirith feel like the ultimate third wheel and borderline unwanted. "No, no, you two go have fun. I'll make do here," the older elf replied for what felt like the hundredth time.

Easily reassured as always, Soraya bowed politely before hurrying out the door, locking it behind her even with Tirith inside due to their shared paranoia about burglary in the somewhat dangerous human capitol. The younger's soft footsteps padded down the hallway and over to the stairwell, where they were soon engulfed by the sounds of the light foot traffic on the streets outside. For a few moments, Tirith just stared at the wall next to the door, trying to think of something to do. Even on normal days, the part time nature of her job left her with ample free time, and boredom was her constant enemy as she waited out her two year sentence in Stormwind.

If there was one thing she was never short on while there, it was sleep. Even after the disruption to her circadian rhythm and Soraya's penchant for going out for a stroll at odd hours, Tirith had so much free time on her hands that she always felt well rested. That was at least one consolation of her current life of ignominy.

So when the unexpected knock came to the door after what couldn't have been more than an hour and a half, she found herself nearly falling off the couch in surprise. "The key isn't in the door this time!" Tirith shouted in Darnassian reflexively, remembering a running debate she and Soraya had been engaging in for at least three weeks.

What she heard next shocked her beyond all belief.

"Tirith? Is that you?"

Her long ears twitched, and she rubbed her salty eyes as she tried to ignore the person speaking in Common on the other side of the door. In an instant, her stinging eyes shot open and she froze in place, staring at the door as if it would suddenly become transparent for her.

"Khadijah?"

It took another second to register, but when the diminutive priestess spoke again, Tirith found herself literally falling off the couch this time as she rushed to clean up the mess of unwashed saucers and teacups Soraya had a tendency to leave everywhere.

"I was worried I had the wrong address!" the human joked from the other side of the door. "Is this a bad time?"

Banging her knee against a stack of smutty sentinel femslash novellas that Silviel had insisted had merit and then gifted to Soraya, Tirith shoved away enough of her messy roomate's belongings to clear a path toward the couch and the opposing loveseat, panicking in a good way as she realized that she'd received a guest other than Silviel for the first time. "Yes! No, it's a perfect time - I'm off work today!" Tirith replied just before she stubbed her toe on the leg of an end table and bit her tongue to avoid cussing. Finally stumbling toward the door, she tucked her bangs behind her ears and opened the door to find her long lost friend standing before her.

Usually, humans aged poorly - even as Tirith felt death approaching and the twilight years of her life ticking away, she still looked in the mirror every morning and saw no change from how she'd looked the day before. Humans, on the other hand, had a tendency to look old only a few decades into their lives, and the changes were as dramatic as they were rapid. Eight months was certainly long enough for such an unchanging being to notice the changes in a human.

Yet there Khadijah stood, her coffee colored skin just as beautiful as the last time Tirith had seen her. It was no wonder that the human had chosen to become a member of her people's clergy; there was a sort of light upon her face even when Khadijah wasn't smiling, and when she showed her teeth it seemed to calm everybody around her. She wasn't wearing the robes of her order, and instead wore a vibrantly multicolored set of robes along with a shawl that wrapped only partially around her head and ran almost past her knees. She always provided a rather interesting ensemble to look at, and Tirith didn't realize she'd been staring.

"Custom made," Khadijah said uncomfortably but cheerily, a combination she always managed to pull off. "Ta da!"

"What? Of course, I'm sorry," Tirith chuckled while moving aside from the door. "I apologize for the mess, neither me nor my roommate...um...we had a party last night," she lied through her teeth, not knowing what else to say.

Practically floating inside, Khadijah shut the door herself and looked at the couch and then Tirith before sitting down. Only when invited did she do so, holding her travel pack close to her as if she was worried about the cleanliness of the place. "I'm real sorry for dropping in unannounced," she said shyly.

"No, not at all! I'm delighted, actually," Tirith replied while searching in the kitchen area for food. "We have these dwarven pastries that they bake here, and then they're good for three days. These ones are only a day old; would you like to have them?"

"I wouldn't want to be a burden. Whatever you guys are able to share, really."

"Oh stop." Tirith organized the cheap, preserved pastries the best she could on a platter and grabbed two waterskins before sitting on the loveseat opposite her friend. The place always felt cramped when another night elf was sharing the space, but next to a human, the room felt rather comfortable. "How did you find me? That one letter I wrote telling everyone what happened was sent through the court, so I'm sure it didn't have a return address on it."

"No, it didn't, but I have my ways. And six months isn't a short amount of time for searching, either." Khadijah took a long sip of water, most of her movement rather slow and relaxed. "But I eventually managed to find you, and lined up a trip here with a visit as well. They sent me to scout for another assistant at the chapel to bring back to the camp."

"I hope that Marge didn't give you too difficult of a time over taking a day off," Tirith remarked while lifting one of the pastries to take her first bite.

"Oh, guess what? I'm not at Camp Freedom anymore." Khadijah suddenly looked mildly embarrassed. "I suppose that's the more significant news item, isn't it? They transferred me out."

"To where?"

"Another remote camp that hasn't been officially named yet. This one is a bit more active because it contains some reformed members of a...well, I'm not sure if they're former Syndicate or what, but they're rebelling against something and joined the Alliance."

Tirith took the time to listen and finish a bit of the pastry, finding her mood elevated greatly by the chance visit and how easily the two of them settled in to light chatting the moment the priestess walked through the door. "Did Sir Argyle transfer to the same camp?"

At that, Khadijah pouted for the first time. "No, he was also transferred but to another camp...it doesn't matter though because we broke up."

Tirith found it a chore not to smile at how quaint humans were over relations that spanned such minuscule amounts of time. She couldn't he but be moderately amused, but she knew it was obviously of some import to the priestess and withheld that amusement. "I'm sorry to hear that," she said in reply.

"If something isn't meant to be, then it won't be. William was a bit older too, you know - maybe fourteen years older," Khadijah explained, tasking Tirith with once again containing her amusement at how the human's viewed time. "And he didn't want kids, which I do want eventually. So when news of our transfers came around, we felt it best to split up."

"These things often work out for the best," Tirith said softly, lying through her teeth again for the sake of the human. She didn't believe such fatalistic jabber for a second, but she'd been emotional herself for long enough after the loss of immortality to know that sometimes people just needed to hear empty words to make them feel better. "And I'm guessing this rebel camp is also in the early phases, since you've been sent here on a recruitment drive?"

"Yes, that's correct. I finally learned of this address a few weeks ago so I was planning to drop by for a while. It felt...weird to just write you, I don't know why." Khadijah promptly stuffed a pastry into her mouth, perhaps some coping mechanism for when she addressed topics she found uncomfortable.

Tirith, however, felt just fine. "I know, I'm sure the circumstances under which I disappeared seemed...odd. Though in retrospect, I'm thankful that my discomfort prevented me from writing to you all again; a letter might have sat at the Camp Freedom post after your departure and then be read by someone other than the intended recipients."

The two of them spent a few minutes more eating pastries and drinking water until Khadijah finally broached the topic. "What really happened?" she asked quietly as if Soraya were eavesdropping from the other room. It was, again, quaint and a bit cute, and Tirith played along in order to put the human more at ease.

Taking a deep breath, Tirith sought in her mind for what details she remembered clearly, and then which details from those details she deigned it prudent to reveal to someone who wasn't there. "Derrick, the leader of that guild in the red and yellow tabards, killed two members of the Skullsplitter tribe. He was bragging about it the day that that other guild was massacred, by those...two tribespeople. It turns out that the two people Derrick killed were kids - little kids. I know for a fact that the tribe wasn't lying, because they paraded these little embalmed bodies and forced the rest of us to see. The mothers came and cried and everything, and even those humans from the observation post who were captured alongside me saw, even if they deny it. One of them even denounced Derrick publicly."

"How did the savag...the tribe understand him?" Khadijah asked curiously.

"Apparently, most of them outside of their major settlements speak Low Common. They've descended so far into darkness that they lost touch with their own language."

"That's...okay, that actually shouldn't seem so weird, then. Even the Horde trolls at Nesingwary's camp often speak Low Common very fluently."

"Right. So anyway, I know the tribe wasn't lying, because Derrick didn't even deny it once they shoved it in his face; he just tried to claim be didn't know, but they were half your height so it was clear. And that's why the tribe attacked the observation post; two of their kids were murdered. They took more lives than was their right while searching for Derrick - apparently he'd been spotted fleeing the scene of the crime all those weeks before - but they might defend their actions by saying that approaching an Alliance or Horde settlement results in them being shot at, so it was fair game."

A proud priestess of the Alliance, Khadijah had stopped eating and became a little downcast upon hearing the full story. Running a finger along her small chin, she appeared thoughtful as she considered a situation in which members of her faction had been killed. "Alright. Looking at it objectively, I understand the reason why they would say that...may the Light protect us all." She then looked up at Tirith as if expecting there to be more.

"Right...so I was knocked out cold during that raid and I woke up, where they paraded the two bodies and gave this mock trial for Derrick. Those gnomes, dwarves and the human females rescued with us were let go after just a little jeering from the locals, but one of the tribe's leaders understood that they'd been wrongly imprisoned."

Khadijah looked confused. "They claimed later on that they escaped through a tunnel in a hill," she said, looking unconvinced by the words coming out of her own mouth.

Tirith already felt the heat of displeasure flowing in her veins, but controlled and concealed it. "What? That's a bold faced lie; they know I would have disputed them had we given statements to the authorities at the same time. They were set free because the tribe knew they were looking for a human male. The other human males were set free after they all distanced themselves from Derrick, which none of them hesitated to do. Even I was..." A quick pain stung down in Tirith's very core, and she pretended to be in deep thought while she worked to repress the memory of one of her only friends' sacrifice for her. "...I was let go as well, after the mock trial."

Playing with one of her braided dreadlocks absentmindedly, Khadijah looked absolutely focused despite the mounting confusion written into her features. "The few whose statements I saw all claim they valiantly fought their way out...it sounded fishy even then, how a group of beaten and unarmed people would be able to fight their way out of a Skullsplitter town when the town was found undamaged by the first gyrocopters."

"A lot of what happened there sounds fishy if you listen to official reports," Tirith muttered regretfully as she stuffed the rest of her pastry in her mouth.

On the one hand, it felt good to finally tell somebody what happened - she hid the matter from Soraya and the others at the consulate for fear of a claim counter to the deposition she'd been forced to sign damaging her job position, however boring it was. On the other hand, digging up these old memories brought her a pain much greater than the relief of confession, and a mouthful of sugary, fatty dwarf snacks that she shouldn't have been eating in the first place was the only thing that kept her mind distracted from the memories of the screams.

An unease settled over them both, and once they finished eating and drinking, Khadijah sent the big night elf woman a stare that she knew meant the climax of the conversation hadn't yet been reached. Twirling one of her braids in her fingers, the small human cleared her throat before speaking. "And the battle occurred after you were all let go, then?" she asked.

Tirith leaned her head in one hand balanced on the arm of the loveseat. "Yes...gyrocopters shooting columns of flame from the sky, and mortar teams shooting rockets from the ground. They used cluster bombs as well, which are only manufactured by the Venture Company. They're blacklisted by both factions, but I know what I saw."

Her mood dampened, Khadijah appeared to be running through painful memories of her own. "You don't have to convince me, Tirith. I served as a medic in the Swamp of Sorrows during my training. The government also bought land mines from the Venture Company to seed around a Horde town, which counts as three violations of the law. I know the ugliness that goes on away from Stormwind," the human confessed with a twinkle of pain in her eye.

Relieved that she was at least understood, Tirith stopped censoring herself quite as much. "Then you won't be surprised at what happened, and I probably don't even need to elaborate much. I warned Marge that there were children in that town. Even if they sacked an outpost of ours, that outpost was military personnel only; there wasn't even a single civilian. Even the cook signed on as a military contractor. For us to level an entire town full of mostly non combatants was entirely uncalled for."

"So I'm guessing that I was correct to assume your confession to experiencing a psychotic break was forced." There was a hint of dark humor in Khadijah's voice that Tirith would never have expected from the shy, conservative cleric in a thousand years, and the two of them actually shared a laugh.

"One hundred percent. One hundred and ten percent. It was under duress and the threat of prosecution. I think I was shell shocked for sure, but I knew what I was doing when I attacked the mortar team. I believed...really, I believed that I could delay them enough for just one innocent person to escape," Tirith said while staring down at her bare feet. "But that belief was false. I was too late. Nobody escaped the walls of that town alive." Closing her eyes, Tirith took consolation in the fact that after eight months of coping, she had at least reached a point where she could finally recall her failure without becoming weepy or selectively mute. After a few seconds, she'd sacrificed that much more of her cardiovascular health by just repressing the negative feelings and forcing herself to move on.

Easily falling into her role as camp counselor, Khadijah shifted on the couch and Tirith felt the human's small hand on hers. "I believe you, Tirith. I know that one person believing you doesn't change what happened, but know for a fact that you're not alone."

Holding on to the smaller fingers, Tirith pinched the bridge of her nose and considered actually opening up to a being so much younger than her. It felt humbling in a way - almost too much. But for millennia, her people had been almost entirely without emotion; just as they were unaccustomed to death and illness, they were also unaccustomed to dealing with their feelings. And like the former two, the reality was that the younger lived races were also more knowledgeable of the latter. Swallowing her pride, she allowed just a sliver of her vulnerability to show.

"What now? Dreaming of them is rare, and during the day I no longer think about it much - not like in the beginning. But what am I supposed to do? I know of a great evil that occurred. So I just live my life as if it never happened?"

"What else is there to be done, Tirith?" Khadijah asked rhetorically, displaying a cold objectivity that the night elf respectfully admired. "If there are no survivors, there is way for you to try and provide help to anybody. If you were pressured it to signing a legal document denying what happened, then you can't safely try to raise awareness about the issue. And if you aren't exactly plagued by the images of what occurred, then there isn't much reason to return to the site to pray for the fallen." Sighing deeply, Khadijah almost seemed conflicted herself at what she was about to say. "Sometimes repression of difficulties we can't change, and can't draw lessons from, is the only realistic option. That isn't a popular thing to say nor inspiring, but it's probably the truth."

The conversation skipped another beat as the words sank in to Tirith's mind. They were logical, and wise beyond the years of the relatively young priestess sitting across from her. That didn't make it entirely easy to accept, but certainly easier than had she not opened up to the small human. The two of them sat there, happy to simply see each other again before Khadijah spoke again.

"Tirith...can I ask you something?"

"Yes, of course. I suppose I opened the door, so let me have it."

"Alright, thanks," the human chortled. Her pleasant smile didn't lessen her unease at the question, however. "You're retired from combat, officially or not. And you don't have any family members, according to what you once told me, way back when. What are your plans?" There was a strong sense of concern laced in Khadijah's voice that she failed to hide, causing Tirith a bit of embarrassment as the feeling of being a charity case crept up on her again.

Tirith opened her eyes once more, letting the silver light reflect off of the teacups as she avoided the other woman's gaze. Her heart sank at the thought, a reminder of the topic she'd tried not to dwell on too much. "My people are...unaccustomed...to such matters. None of us who are still alive ever expected to die. And so, I find myself not thinking about it."

"And you view retirement in the context of dying?" Khadijah asked cautiously, and Tirith could tell that the human was trying to make a point.

"What else is there, Khadijah? You said it yourself: I have no family. I was a soldier for thousands of years, and now I'm not anymore. I work part time and don't earn enough to save, and I won't be able to collect my pension until I'm done with this anger management stuff after another year and a half." She sighed ever so slightly through her nose, thankful for the fact that Khadijah wasn't the type to assume a pause in speech was an invitation for the other person to interrupt and start talking immediately. "I've spent a quarter of my mandatory time here in Stormwind just trying to get over the circumstances of my discharge from active duty. I figure that the other three quarters will be plenty enough time to figure out where to go from here."

"Will Soraya accept you continuing as her roommate?"

"Yes, of course. I think she enjoys living with someone whom she trusts not to gossip about her or judge her for her behavior. And my part time job will be there if I wish to remain at the consulate. If I wished to cohabitate with Caledith - that's the mother of my friend Silviel - then I'd be welcome as well. Neither case is preferable; I'm not happy here and two jobless, assertive night elf women in one house and not much to do is a recipe for disaster."

Khadijah frowned. "I'm glad that your material needs will be taken care of either way; it's important to have a backup plan. But I truly hope that you can think of other alternatives and work toward them. We should never give up striving for more."

"I know. Starting to plan is the hardest part."

Having passed the reacquaintance phase of her visit, the human set down the teacup and saucer, as well as her travel bag. "I hope you don't mind if I impose, but my own work in the city is finished. And it's so rare that I'm able to travel to Stormwind..." The light hearted hint in Khadijah's voice was as heartening as it was innocent, and always quaint in a way. Tirith immediately understood and rose from her seat.

"Come on. No reason to spend much more time cooped up in here. I'm not an expert tour guide, but I've learned a few interesting things to see while here."

The two of them rose and stretched before going, though the human surprisingly made it out the door first; since Khadijah never removed her shoes before entering, she needed less time to prepare herself and was soon out in the hallway.

Bending over to put her outside slippers on, Tirith braced herself against the kitchen counter. She was tall enough that she could reach halfway across the human sized common room in the apartment, and it was a ritualized motion she hadn't given much thought since moving in. Out of the corner of her eye, she spied something dangling from the door handle of the pantry. Loose and hanging, she had hung it there ages ago alongside a few burlap potato sacks and a string with a compass on it.

Behind all of it sat a necklace containing the four tusks of two Zandalari trolls. Killed in a war between tribes that the outside world hadn't even heard about, the deceased owners of the two grisly trophies had been part of Tirith's ticket out of trouble once. That conflict in and of itself was irrelevant to her experience and all she'd seen, but since her armor had been confiscated after her admission to court ordered counseling, the grim necklace was her only connection to that brief period in her recent life. Even her easel had been given away, and she found herself wearing whatever night elf sized clothing the court had been able to gift to her in the immediate aftermath of her transfer to the capitol.

The tusk necklace didn't jingle unnaturally. It didn't somehow sway, and there as nothing that moved the burlap sacks aside to reveal more of the white ivory. By all measures, there was no reason for her to notice it this time when she'd ignored it every other time before during all those months. But there they were, grabbing her attention merely by existing. A prayer she'd never uttered conceptualized itself in her mind without words, reminding her of the fallen she still hadn't properly mourned.

"You coming?" Khadijah asked from out in the hallway.

Tirith stared into the ivory for a few more seconds, wondering what she was doing.

"Yeah, just fighting with my slippers," she replied while fumbling with her keys and locking the door behind her. "Let's go enjoy the city."