Chapter 2

"What happened here?"

Necri and Ropart had begun walking along a dirt path away from the mausoleum. Her whispered question was driven by the corruption laced darkly through the once-beautiful Tirisfal Glades. The trees, she had discovered on closer inspection, had taken on darker tints, their trunks oozing black sap and their leaves dripping off the branches like oil. A low, creeping mist clung to every surface. She couldn't see or hear any birds or other natural forest animals, but on one side of the path, a giant, glistening spider methodically spun a great web between two trees. On the other side, a pair of red-winged bats almost as tall as herself hung from tree branches.

Ropart walked beside Necri, making good time with his two canes, despite missing both of his legs at the knee. He was silent for a long moment, but then managed, "It is a long story."

"Stories usually are," Necri nodded. "When last I saw this place, the trees were clear and the forest had a great life to it." She eyed the spider, which fortunately was ignoring them.

"Then you are from before our time," Ropart sounded surprised. "Our Queen was the first of us; she freed us from the..." he paused in his speech. "No. Let me start at the beginning, as much as I know it. Do you know of the kingdom of Lordaeron?"

Necri shook her head. "I remember only the Empire of Arathor, and the founding of the City of Dalaran."

"Arathor!" Ropart stopped walking to stare up at her. "But Dalaran was founded over two thousand years ago!"

It was Necri's turn to be surprised, though she did her best to not let it show. Two thousand years! What could possibly have kept her dead for so long? Usually it would have been a matter of days, or weeks at the most, before her spirit returned to whatever was left of her body and the resurrection process began. She thought again of the cloth wrappings and the stake and garlic, which she had initially dismissed as harmless trappings of a superstitious undead-hunter who had mistaken her for a vampire. Without -some- sort of magic, there would have been no way that those objects would have survived that long without decaying into dust. Even the coffin itself should have long since decomposed. Someone had wanted to keep her down for a -long- time.

Ropart was still talking. "After Arathor and the Elves defeated the Trolls, some of the humans moved north and founded Lordaeron, which lasted as one of the Seven Kingdoms for two thousand years. It was a shining beacon of nobility... an empire of great honour and valour."

At this point, his voice seemed to gather bitterness from the surrounding mists, "And then, only a few years ago, a young prince of Lordaeron named Arthas was corrupted by a great evil. He brought a massive army of undead back here, and utterly destroyed the kingdom in a matter of days. He raised many of the dead into servants of his Scourge, all of them enslaved to his undying will."

He paused, then continued more proudly, "But one of the Elves he had taken, Lady Sylvanas Windrunner, managed to break his control over her mind, and set to freeing others. This is why she is now our Queen! She named us 'the Forsaken' and founded Undercity, beneath the ruins of what was once our home. Eventually, Arthas was defeated, and the remains of the Scourge quieted down. Though, there are still some places that are infested and dangerous."

Necri listened silently, taking this in. The name of Windrunner was vaguely familiar, but she needed more information to place it. She spoke in her whispering voice. "And this is where you are taking me - to Undercity?"

Ropart nodded enthusiastically, and pointed ahead of them. "You can see the Zeppelin towers over the next hill. Beyond them are the city ruins."

"Zeppelin?" Necri was confused by the unfamiliar word.

"Airships! They keep us connected to the rest of the Horde... oh, wait." Ropart looked distinctly uncomfortable and his words stumbled to a halt. Necri patiently waited for him to explain, allowing the awkwardness to grow until he finally began to speak again.

"The survivors of Lordaeron, and the rest of the human nations, did not take well to our ... resurrection. We were rejected, exiled, and hunted by the living humans and their allies. So we joined forces with the only other military force in the world who would take us in as equals - the Horde. It's led by the Orcs, which of course you don't know about either. I'm sorry, there's just so much, it's hard to summarize."

"That is fine," Necri replied, though it was anything but. Even back in her time, her people had certainly been wary - even fearful - of her undead nature, but there had never been anything like a formal declaration of exile against her. To be rejected so thoroughly by one's people was deeply troubling.

And the way he had said 'the only -other- military force' implied much about the humans' capabilities. "You are doing your best, and I am thankful for your introduction. I would truly have been lost without it. Let us continue our journey."

As the pair crested the final hill, Necri got a look at the ruins of what had once obviously been a great city. Enough of its crumbling walls and white stone towers remained that she could easily envision its former majesty. It clearly would have commanded an imposing presence throughout the area.

Two spindly, rickety towers of black wood stood before the walls. Roped to one of them was an elongated balloon, with a wooden boat-shaped structure suspended below it. Assuming that this was one of the 'zeppelins' that Ropart had spoken of, she watched as its lines were cast off, and it gracefully sailed off through the skies. Elegant transportation indeed.

"The humans oppose the Horde, then?" Necri asked, as they passed through the shadow of the towers and approached the city's shattered gates.

"Yes. The humans are part of the Alliance of Lordaeron, together with the Dwarves and Night Elves. The Orcs are allied with the Tauren, Trolls, Blood Elves, and now the Goblins." Ropart jabbed a cane toward the retreating zeppelin. "The Goblins brought us technological marvels like that."

While the airships were certainly interesting, something different caught Necri's attention. "Blood Elves? I thought the Elves sided with the humans."

"There are different kinds of Elves," Ropart shrugged. "I'm not sure of the differences, really, except that some of them hate us, and the rest ... tolerate us. In fact, you could say that about most races. I don't know a lot about -our- Elves, except they come from a ruined island north of here, their leader went insane, and they're all hopelessly addicted to magic."

Necri stopped and leaned against the cold stone wall, stunned by this news. She remembered very little of her living life; the transition to undeath had purged great swathes of her memories. But she could clearly envision the island that he had spoken of: Quel'Danas, home of the High Elves and their mystic font of power called the Sunwell. She had visited it even before her first death, awed by the beauty and power of the Elven architecture and people. So great had the Sunwell's energies been, that she believed beyond doubt that no harm could come to the Elves while it protected them.

But now - the Isle... ruined? The Elves calling themselves Blood instead of High, and allied against their age-old human friends? Was -everything- she knew gone from the world?

"And what of Strom?" She asked weakly. "What happened to my home?"

"Stromgarde?" Ropart knitted what little remained of his brows. "Ruined only a few years ago by Ogres. There were survivors, but... they are resolutely allied with the other human nations, and they have no love at all for us."

Her old world -was- dead.