Slithering down one of the many tunnels of the cavern, Lady Vesh'ari traveled with a hint of displeasure in her stride. Se'jash still refused to kill that elf, and this entire situation she allowed had gone from a minor nuisance she had to tolerate, to a full-blown embarrassment she knew she had to quell before her stubborn sibling made a damn pet of the hated creature. Already she could hear the objections of dissent voicing themselves among her people, pointing out their urge to watch the night elf die, only to watch her executioner refuse to perform the deed over trivial matters naga did not typically associate themselves with as strongly as he did. And that was why she was headed for the Great Sanctum in search of an answer.

Most naga within the tribe would visit the many shrines and statues built around the surface of the island to pay tribute or pray to Azshara or the Old Gods, but within the caverns they lived in there was an old sanctum that held great importance. Only those with severe problems or immense offerings would come to this place to seek divine guidance.

Naga who passed by the sanctum would sometimes hear mad laughter from within. Or occasionally a shriek that would curdle one's blood. Or just ramblings that droned on for hours. Though it seemed devoid of any worthy and intelligent creatures, there was one who haunted it, and she was as revered among the tribe as she was questioned.

Tidepriestess Zajra.

Zajra was an ancient creature, even amongst her fellow naga. She was from a time where the highborne were still elves, and was the only one in the entire Depthweaver tribe to have walked beside Azshara before she made the pact with the Old Gods for their current forms. Long ago she had gone blind, and her mind was as broken as the first Well of Eternity. She would often spout crazed gibberish, mad prophecies that typically failed to pass, or speak to voices that no one else heard but herself. Normally one would pass these off as the senile rantings of one who had simply gone insane, but the times her prophecies did come to fruition with unnerving accuracy astounded many, though the chance of them being faulty made it hard to trust such predictions.

Also, unbeknownst to many, she occasionally had her moments of clarity. And as Lady Vesh'ari found out in her youth, back when she spent an abnormally long amount of time with the old tidepriestess whom she held in higher regard than most, it came from patience. Being the only one willing to care for the 'Mad Prophet', Zajra cared for Vesh'ari as well. Making sense of some of her otherwise nutty side-rants revealed minor details about her rivals, and putting her clever and cunning mind, as well as her brother at times to good use, she plotted against them accordingly until she surgically moved through the ranks of their old clan's hierarchy. And now that she was the one in power after breaking off from the old, decaying tribe, she made sure that Zajra didn't have to worry about anything anymore. It was the least she could repay her for, after all.

Finally reaching the cavern where the sanctum was kept, Vesh'ari peered in. In the far back, carved directly out of the cave's wall, was a tall, magnificent statue of Queen Azshara herself. Her features looked impossibly well-etched, from her ethereally beautiful and watchful face, to her stone 'skin', to the snakes that were her hair. Surrounding the statue, and the room for that matter, were carvings and glyphs depicting the Old Gods and their race's history, dating from the Great Sundering to the present.

The room would seem empty to the untrained eye, but that was not the case. Lurking in the deep pool that surrounded the two halves of the otherwise circular room like a moat were three naga brutes of a blue coloration. The beasts were an even more monstrous subspecies of their race, and instead of possessing a serpentine hind section as all normal naga did, they had stubby back legs for their enormous, apish front sections to balance out on. As they saw Vesh'ari enter the holy area they guarded, they all lifted their reptilian heads from the water where they floated in and looked to her with the six beady eyes that rested on each's face, sensing an intruder.

"Be still, pets," she quietly said to them. As Vesh'ari uttered her words, the creatures all recognized her voice as they had been trained to, and sunk uncaringly back into the water. Vesh'ari went further into the holy place until she had reached its center and there she sat.

"Tidepriestess, I wish to speak with you," Vesh'ari said aloud, causing the area to fill with a small echo. As soon as she had spoken, a flash of movement caught her eye, and she turned to it.

From just behind the statue of Azshara, a shape began to emerge. It was an old and haggard shape, pale as a ghost from centuries without experiencing sunlight. She was thinner than a starved murloc, and scars, most of which were self-inflicted, lied scattered across her body in an almost rhythmic pattern. Also hooked into her scaly hide at seemingly random were piercings of bone, rock and metal. The webbed fins over her head and back looked tattered but still bore a faint orange complexion. Perhaps the most striking feature of this naga were her two gray and clouded eyes, telling any who looked her way that she was as blind as a cave-dwelling fish.

"Sing your praises, say your prayers. One wanders in where the faithful shalt dare..." the old creature murmured in a decrepit voice, seemingly to herself, slipping her aged form to the ground with a jagged smile about her face. Without warning, she suddenly rushed at Vesh'ari at a speed many would flinch away at. Instead of performing such an action, Vesh'ari held firm and stayed where she stood without even a snivel of surprise. When Zajra was but a foot away she halted her advances to a dead stop and stood as high as she could.

Her blind eyes looked everywhere except at Vesh'ari, but her four hands, bony and frail, stretched out and grabbed ahold of Vesh'ari's face, feeling the comparably younger naga over. Vesh'ari simply ignored the act and let the tidepriestess finish her examination, waiting uncomplainingly for her to recognize her.

"It is our lady. You have come here to me. Seeking... something. Not prayer, not teachings... My sweet child, you have... questions... what is your question, daughter of the sea?" Zajra asked in a venerable, maternal voice, as if sensing the problem that was afoot.

"I am worried for my brother, Tidepriestess," Vesh'ari replied. "I fear something is wrong with Se'jash. He has been acting most peculiar as of late."

"Something is wrong with our lord?" Zajra inquired, taking her hands off of Vesh'ari. "Hmm... not many things takes up our lord's mind but war and bloodshed. When did these alien cravings start?"

"After that night elf appeared. That gods-damned night elf..." she grunted back. "Her name is one I do not remember, but I believe she has been slowly twisting Se'jash's mind around. Do you have any thoughts on her, Tidepriestess?"

To this, Zajra let out a long cackle. "In that one's heart and soul the moon will die and from her throat will come a forsaking cry. But as an olden curse claims her body like a molten sword, she will regret not a single word. Can you not see those brittle words? They flutter like little birds. Have you seen the jay turn to the tide, dearest Vesh'ari?"

Before the lady could answer to the nonsensical question, Zajra's clouded and lifeless eyes stared around the damp shrine, still seeing nothing but darkness. Raising her forearms and flailing them about for a brief instant, she suddenly placed both of them to her mouth as a shocked expression came over her face, before lowering them to her side once again. "What was that, sweetest Azshara?" she hissed to a person who was not there, wandering off a short ways. "Yes, I will tell her..."

"Tell me what?" Vesh'ari asked politely.

"About our lord and the elf..." Zajra responded as she went along the floor, approaching the edge of it where a brute was relaxing its head upon from the water that the rest of its enormous body was submerged in. "He wants her. He needs her. For more reasons than one, believe it or not!" she went on, wrapping a hand around one of the large teeth lining the brute's jaw and another over one of its thin lips, rapidly pulling and tugging on them both like a child with a toy. The creature's eyes looked back down at her dumbly. Its six eyes blinked lazily and it let out sniffle from the tip of its crocodilian snout, paying her antics barely any mind as she continued. "He longs for the taste of her blood to appease his avaricious thirst. He yearns to rake his claws over her body and sunder her flesh. He wishes to tear open her chest and devour her heart."

"If that is true, then why does he insist on putting such actions off?" Vesh'ari asked. "Not even any 'honor' that lives within him would allow him to ignore such desires." Hearing her, Zajra let go of the brute's mouth and slid over to the statue of Azshara.

"More reasons. More desires. More reasons. More desires. More reasons. More desires." Zajra entered a mad chant as she clambered to the base of the statue, and from there began to clumsily scale the stone construct until she was resting in one of its arms near its head.

"More reasons? More desires?" Vesh'ari repeated, trying to make sense of her enigmatic rantings. "Do you mean to tell me Se'jash is developing... an attraction for this creature?"

Zajra crookedly smiled again as she lovingly began stroking and caressing the face of the statue with her hands. "Sweet Vesh'ari... such a forbidden lust... why, that would be madness!" A disturbed and childish giggling fit befittingly erupted from the ancient naga, and it didn't seem as though it would cease any time soon. Seeing that there was nothing left to be gained from her, Vesh'ari sighed and turned around, slowly departing from the sanctum as the tidepriestess went on with her laughter. As she fully left, Zajra's tittering fit gradually began to lessen in volume until the Great Sanctum was silent once more.

"Yes... madness. Chaos. Incomprehensibleness. Such is the inconceivable and unforeseeable will of the heart. Such is where love, blind, true and passionate, originates and disperses from like the pollen of a flower. Fragrant and queer, but never controlled..." she quietly said to herself as she began to carefully descend from the statue, as though someone fully sentient was still there with her. Upon touching the ground, Zajra turned as best she could back to the statue's face. "That is right, sweet Azshara?"

The statue said nothing, as it always did, but the tidepriestess didn't look irked. With a thoughtful smirk on her old face, Zajra went about her typical business.


Se'jash restlessly moved around the inside of his chamber, doing nothing else except thinking deeply about everything that had occurred over the past several days. Stopping his pacing after some time went by, he looked to his bed and the figure who lied on it.

He watched Caelwen as she slept upon his own bedding, in his own chamber. She had been out for almost two days now, and he tended to her as best he could while the disease in her body ran its course. Slowly but surely though, the night elf was recovering. Her purple skin tone had become lighter as it was once before, her breathing had returned to normal, and the tense look that was curled over her face now looked calm.

He was angry that she was sick with a debilitating illness and told nobody, but at the same time there were more emotions that pulled at his mind like a reef shark's jaws on his flesh. Seeing her so injured as he carried her away from the arena made his gut twist, and seeing her so peaceful now gave him relief he had never before felt.

Such odd feelings he thought to himself as he sat on the side of the bed, watching the elf closely. Sometimes she would turn on the bed, and other times she would mumble something, but that was it. Reaching forward, Se'jash brushed back some of the long, teal hair that had fallen over Caelwen's face with a careful hand, and looked at it afterword with a strange expression. What spell do you have me under, Caelwen?

Se'jash began to think of what he should do with her next, after watching her go through so much. So he planned that, as soon as Caelwen awoke and was fit enough to move, that he would take her somewhere. A place she could fully recover from the disease and hopefully replenish herself enough to be ready for their next, and surely final duel.

The surface of the island.