Tale of Crusader Atherton
Alansen Atherton sat in a dimly lit house in the city of Hearthglen. He looked at his uncle from across the table, not looking at the man with a happy view.
"It pains me to do it, but I have no other choice, Uncle"
The older man sighed. His hair is gray and he sports a small beard. He was by now, in his early sixties, way past his fighting prime. He has just now been asked to look after his niece, as his father intend, to leave them behind.
"You know. She has just lost her mother to the Plague! And now she is loosing her father aswell!"
The old man yelled coldly at Alansen. The farmer was to quick to respond to his uncle's words.
"For Light's sake, Uncle! Do you think I want to do it? You've seen what the undead can do. Not even the Knights of the Silver Hand could defeat them! These people, this Scarlet Crusade claims that they can defeat the undead, but they need men. I have no other choice, I have to join them, for her sake"
The old man sighed as he looked as his nephew, listening to the conviction and hint of zeal in his voice. He knew he could not convince him not to go, as, to be frank, he would have done the same in his stead. Join in on the fight to ensure the future of your only child.
"Fine. I will look after her. She will live her until the day you return. Whenever that might be"
Alansen smiled at his uncle.
"Thank you, uncle. I will keep in touch by letter, and I will return in person, when the greenweald is free of undead once more!"
Alansen spoke with devotion and enthusiasm, but the old man just waved him off. He had heard such talks before.
"Yeah, yeah now be off with you. Atleast make it abit easier for her"
Alansen sighed and stood up. He grabbed a piece of bread off the table and walked into the night, towards Mardenholde Keep, the seat of power in Hearthglen and former home of Tirion Fordring.
This was the night Alansen abandoned his old life. The night he abandoned his daughter and joined ranks with the forces of the Scarlet Crusade. He hasn't been back since then, and no letters ever reached the house of Estee Atherton.
Crusader Atherton sighed. He had returned to the Crusade's camp after another long day of hunting undead within the Western Plaguelands. The battle had been long and fierce, but ultimately, the men of the crimson banner were victorious in the end.
"For the Light", "For Lordaeron", war cries like these ran rampant across the Crusader camp. He sighed under his helmet as he rested by a fire. Was this really the Lights will? All this destruction? All this death? Everyone, he noted, who were yelling were young men, none who had lost anything to the Scourge he thought. Men without families. He shook his head.
Alansen took out his compass and opened it. Broken it was, and instead used as a pocket picture of the last shred of sanity he had left here in the broken land of Lordaeron. A picture of his daughter, Estee.
"Ohh Elizabeth, Our Girl has grown big"
He smiled and wept quietly as he looked at the picture.
But he didn't cry because of the picture, or because he missed his daughter. No, he cried for a whole other reason.
He knew his wife, if she lived to this very day, would never accept the man he had become, and to be honest, he could not blame her.
The man his wife had known was a loving and caring farmer and husband. Now, he was a cold brutal Crusader who cut down undead and heretic alike. A reality he was fine with, by now, but what made the gap between him and his family, what truly ensured that he could never become what he used to be, was but a simple fact.
He loved fighting. He loved battling the undead, swinging his blade against their rotten flesh and bashing in skulls with his shield.
Now the man broke down in tears for the first time since the outbreak of the Plague.
That was the day he realized that the knew his life as he knew it before was over. He could never again love, as he used to. From that day on, Elizabeth Atherton, the love of his life, an inspiring and bright force to be reckoned with was reduced to a mere memory.
Worst of all, he feared Estee would become but a memory too.
Crusader-Sergeant Alansen's legs and arms were shaking as he walked into the City of Hearthglen. For the first time since the outbreak five years ago, he had returned. In this time, everything had changed since then.
The place used to be a happy and sprawling city. Merchants on the streets, children running after one another playing and people in general about doing their business.
Now, it was a fort. A fort under siege.
Armed soldiers patrol the streets. The citizens hide within their homes and those who are capable are send to work in the mines of the city to bring out Iron for the smiths to work and turn into weapons for the Crusade.
The Crimson clad crusader sighed; he did not care about the development of the city. He was there for one reason, a very personal reason.
He walked up to the house he had left five years ago. He walked up to the door and paused by it, looking at the name of the house. Jonathan and Estee Atherton. He clenched his fist and with a heavy hand, knocked on the door.
He looked through his helmet as the door was opened. He stood there shocked, as before stood someone he had not seen for half a decade and could be a whole new person to him.
Before him stood Estee, his daughter. She looked him over, clearly some fear in her eyes. Shakingly, she stares at the man before finally breaking the silence between the them.
"Uncle Jonathan is not here. Shall I leave a message?"
The Crimson clad crusader simply stared back at her through his helmet. He opens his mouth, unknowingly and completely hidden by his helmet. He looks down and shakes his head, turning on the spot, speaking in a hoarse voice.
"I am at the wrong place"
Before she can question him he leaves. She feared him. His own daughter feared him. He had sought out to protect her so she might live in peace, so she could be safe, but no. She lived in a state of fear, within a fortress of fear.
Alansen clenched his fist and slammed it against a wall in anger. An anger against the undead, an anger against all who had kept him away from his duty in Lordaeron. But first and foremost, an anger against himself.
Five years had passed since he left her and she can't even leave her home. What could he show her which was worth those years? Nothing, he is a failure.
He walks onto the sparring ground, sword in hand. Hopefully, beating up an initiate, would help cool down his temper.
Alansen Atherton returned to the place he left his daughter. In full armor, hiding all of the man's body. He walks up to the door and with a heavy hand, he knocks on the door, putting some force behind each knock.
After a while the door is answered. Answered by none other than his uncle, Jonathan. He looks at the heavy armed crusader from top to toe, not at all able to look past the metal, completely unable to recognize his nephew in the armor.
He doesn't know its me. The work of the light, or the shadow? Atherton thought to himself. He shook his head and spoke in a hoarse voice.
"Jonathan Atherton"
He continues as he receives a reluctant nod from his uncle. He hands him a letter, a letter with his own name on it.
"Crusader-Sergeant Alansen Atherton has been declared lost in action. He is believed fallen leading an expedition against ghouls and undead in the southern Kingdom of Stormwind. You've my condolences. This, is a last letter, he wished delivered to Estee Atherton"
Shocked, in disbelief, Jonathan stumbles back into the room he came from. He looked up at the armed man, then down to the ground. He sits there, in complete silence, his trance, unbroken. That is until it is broken, by his own daughter, no less.
"Uncle? Uncle, what is going on?"
Jonathan turned to look at Estee with a sad and broken face. He shook his head as he looked at he girl he had been the guardian off for the last five years.
"Your father is not coming home Estee"
Estee begins to cry and joins her uncle, both daughter and uncle of the hidden Alansen wailing, mourning the perceived death of the man, who stands before them.
The sight almost broke Alansen. He could feel the desire to tell them it was a lie, to go and console them both, prove to them that he was alive, but he knew, he couldn't do it. After staring for a while at the two, he turns and walk away.
It is better for them this way, he thinks to himself. It is better for them to think I am dead, and not have a false hope. A false hope, that one day a failure will bring them glory and a new future.
He clenched his fist and drew his sword, going for the gate of the city, back into the Plaguelands, his new home. He didn't intend to return to Hearthglen. He didn't intend to return to anyone again. He was a dead man after all.