Of Claws and Totems

Chapter 18

Vortex

For a while Blackheart's mouth lay agape as he stared at the huge funnel of wind in front of him. The roar from the wind was almost deafening now and he could feel it physically pulling at him while his tabard and hair whipped about. Leaves where sucked towards the vortex while small sticks bounced along the ground. Above the wind he could see larger objects being slung about; large branches and even some small trees where violently spun around the vortex, slamming into each other and splintering. And they needed to be on the other side of it.

He turned to Kalara and had to shout to be heard above the noise. "Any ideas on what to do about this thing?"

She continued to stare at it for a time before answering. "I'm not sure. The amount of energy in the wind funnel should be ripping the land apart." She furrowed her brow for a few moments before continuing. "I don't know what it is, but something is… containing it. I think… I think we need to go and see what it is."

Whatever Blackheart was about to say was drowned out by Miakoda's bellow. "Are you both absolutely insane? Do you see the size of that bloody tornado? There's no way we could even get close! We'll be picked up and thrown around like that. It's madness!"

Rather than answer, Kalara closed her eyes and concentrated, floating slightly off the ground and putting her hands out to either side. "I hate it when she does the floaty thing. Last time she floated she got struck by lightning. It's not natural!" In answer to Miakoda's protest, Kalara touched back down to the ground and the wind, at least the wind close to them, stopped to pull at their clothes and became quieter. Blackheart looked around and noticed a slight shimmer around them. Outside of their 'bubble' the air was being sucked towards the vortex like normal, but everything inside was unaffected.

Miakoda snorted and shook her head. "Oh sure, you made a fancy little bubble that stopped the wind whistling here, but what about up there at the heart of the storm, what if your shield doesn't hold?"

"Then I guess we'll be flying over Darkshore once again. I thought your problem was with boats and water, not with being in the air Miakoda."

The tauren covered her face with her large hand for a moment before looking at Blackheart. "And I suppose you're not gonna stop her, are you?"

Blackheart smiled as he shook his head. "Stop her? Have you seen anything, including me, stop Kalara when she has her mind set to it?" Kalara winced slightly at the reminder of throwing him through the inn. "Besides, she's kept me safe and brought me back from the dead. What is walking into a little storm compared to that?" That brought a smile to the shaman's face.

After a pause involving a lengthy you're-both-crazy stare at each of them, Miakoda threw her hands up in defeat. "Fine! But if I leave the ground at any time, I'm making sure to land on you." She pointed at Kalara. "And trust me, I'm heavy."

The group turned and slowly approached the vortex. The closer they got, the worse the outside airspace became. Soon, the trees that were still standing were leaning towards the tornado and much larger debris was flying towards it. Blackheart watched as some kind of shrubbery was ripped out of the ground, flying towards the tornado to be thrashed around and then thrown clear. He deeply hoped that they wouldn't share that same fate.

The ground was also in worse condition the closer they came. The earth was broken into a small island network, surrounded by swiftly flowing waters that were raging towards the sea. On the largest and most central island was the eye of the storm. The center island was a higher elevation than all of the other islands. It was impossible to see the top from where they were.

Kalara grimaced as a particularly strong burst of the vacuum buffeted her shields, shrinking the shimmering air bubble towards the group and crowding them together. They were standing within arm's reach of each other and only had a foot to spare on either side. When they were within a few paces of the edge of the water, Blackheart turned to Kalara to see if she had any ideas about crossing it. The river was flowing too swiftly by them to think about trying to ford it, and it also seemed to deep for that as well. He opened his mouth but failed to speak when the hairs on the back of his neck stood up. The sixth sense of danger he had developed was flaring up, and something bad was about to happen soon. Without thinking about it, he was instantly a worgen and was trying to sense what was happening. Kalara, startled by his change, was stopped from asking about it by another strong gust that pushed her bubble back again, forcing them to stand nearly shoulder to shoulder. Following the gust was a tremendous crashing sound from behind the group. As one they turned to see part of a tree trunk, roughly the size of their group, barreling along the ground towards them.

Blackheart's mind raced through the possibilities for escape routes. Kalara's magic was tied up trying to keep them rooted to the earth as it was, so she was out. Miakoda's bow wouldn't be able to stop the thing, in fact any arrow she fired wasn't likely to make it but a few paces out of the bubble before turning back towards the vortex. That left Blackheart with his sword… and his shield. He saw their only way out of this, if it worked. The chances seemed slim. Then again, chances of surviving a boat being thrown onto the shore by a tidal waved caused by Deathwing also seemed slim. He was used to beating the odds by now.

"Down!" Blackheart yelled at his group, and both of them knowing the worgen well enough to listen, hit the dirt. Kalara looked up to see Blackheart yank the shield off of his back, slam it into the ground at a 45 degree angle, and hunker down behind it. The whole event took place as if it were slow motion for her: The tree slowly bounding along the ground towards them, Blackheart hunkering down behind the shield to brace it and trying to judge when the trunk would make its next bounce, making an impromptu ramp for the trunk, him looking back at her and holding her eyes for a second before squeezing them shut and grimacing a moment before the trunk hit him. A scream tore loose from her as the massive tree slammed high into Blackheart's shield, knocking the shield into Blackheart's head before it tore free. The tree was sent bouncing up and over them as it sent the worgen flying backwards out of the air bubble that kept them safe.

Both Kalara and Miakoda were up and running, chasing after him in an instant. Miakoda trailed slightly behind the shaman, keeping close to stay in the bubble. They saw Blackheart ahead of them tumbling towards the shore, his claws digging trenches into the ground as he tried to slow himself. It wasn't working.

Dizzy and disoriented from the number the tree and ground had done to him, Blackheart wasn't entirely sure which way was up anymore. Down, where the ground should be, seemed to be spinning all around, or maybe he was the one spinning. His thoughts were dulled and his vision blurry; a copious amount of blood had gotten into his eyes from a large gash across his forehead where the shield had slammed into it when the tree had struck it. His instincts were the only thing making him try and grab hold of the ground when it did come back into its 'down phase'. When the ground was above him, he would curl up into a ball and make the bounces slightly less painful. On the occasion that he wasn't spinning, he could see he was approaching the edge of the water… fast.

Kalara was running flat out as fast as she could towards Blackheart's tumbling form and she could hear the pounding footfalls of Miakoda right behind her. As she ran she poured more magical energy into the bubble protecting them, trying to extend it all the way to where Blackheart was but it simply wouldn't hold that far out. Blackheart was nearing the edge of the bank and just as she and Miakoda got to him he rolled off the bank and she dove for his hand.

The instant Blackheart felt the water hit him he started to despair. The equipment he was wearing, his chainmail and his sword, were dragging him slowly to the bottom. He still had one hand along the edge of the bank, but was losing ground, the river and his equipment trying to sweep him away. He felt his claws digging a furrow in the ground as he started to be swept away by the stream and he could no longer keep his head above the surface. He could feel how far he was from the edge, but didn't have the strength to do anything about it. There was only a foot left, then six inches, then his thumb wasn't in the ground anymore and it was just his claws attached, and then he felt himself break loose from the bank and sink towards the bottom.

His journey was short lived as he felt himself jerked to a stop; something had hold of his arm above the water. He looked up, but couldn't see through the water enough to get a glimpse of what it was until a large hand shot down into the water and grabbed his collar and pulled him upward. He almost had a sense of vertigo at the speed of which he was hauled out of the water and plopped onto the shore. A shape leaned over his face soon after, but it was blurry. Thinking was… difficult. He was sure the shape was a face and that its mouth was moving but he could hear nothing. What kind of thing moves its mouth but makes no sound? Now it was shaking him. Why did it have to shake him? And why did his head feel like it was being crushed? He saw its blurry appendages point to him and then a blue light came from them. He had seen this somewhere else… and the smell, thought faint, was very familiar. The comforting feeling of drifting lazily in a stream washed over him, and took with it his pain, exhaustion, and his confusion. With that gone, reality snapped back into place in a lour roar.

"Blackheart!" Kalara was saying over and over again, quietly as if in the background before finally coming to full volume as his hearing returned. He realized she was yelling and sobbing.

He reached up and wiped a few stray tears from her face, quieting her. "I'm ok now." He said, rubbing away some of the dried blood on his face. "Thank you."

"You had a concussion," she said, her voice still hoarse, "your shield hit you in the head when the tree hit you." She then bent over and hugged his head to her chest. "Try to avoid getting your head smashed in again, ok?"

"It's right up there on my list of things to avoid, along with death and dragons." He rested a moment, enjoying the embrace, before standing up. He stood slowly, testing his legs to make sure he was stable. The healing magic that Kalara could conjure up never ceased to amaze him. He looked around and, not finding the object he was searching for, said, "On the note of things smashing my head, where is my shield?"

"I don't know," Miakoda responded, a relieved smile on her face, "whatever was left of it is either up in the air or at the bottom of that river."

Blackheart scanned the area once more before looking up at the large tornado. "Ok so… what now?"

Kalara stood and pulled out a small vial filled with amber colored liquid from her pack. "Now, it's time for a little more shamanism." She held the vial in the palm of one hand and raised her other hand, palm outwards, behind it. Blackheart smelled the familiar scent of her magic fill the air, tinged with the scent of fish. A shimmer seemed to encompass the area around Kalara's feet, then around his and Miakoda's as well. "This," she said, stepping out onto the river and standing on top as if it were solid stone, "is what we do now. Come on."

Blackheart and Miakoda looked at one another, shrugged at the same time, and strode out beside her. Blackheart had never walked on top of water before. It was a most… peculiar sensation, floating where he should have sunk. He could hear Miakoda muttering beside him. "Oh sure, first we walk towards a tornado and now we're walking on water. I'm never leaving home again." He looked around and saw that Kalara had managed to force the air bubble farther out from them to give them some extra room. They continued across the river, stopping occasionally to let floating debris wash by them.

When they finally reached the island at the middle, the one that the tornado seemed to be fixated on, they had to get down on all fours in order to climb the steep slope leading to the island's top twenty paces above them. They ended up going slowly, Blackheart in the middle with Kalara to one side and Miakoda to the other holding onto him for support. He had the best footing, his claws giving him an edge with which to scale the hill. When Blackheart crested the top of the hill, he came to a dead stop, almost causing the others to fall. Kalara was about to complain to him until she saw what he was looking at. Or who rather. Standing directly under the vortex, pouring magical energy into it to control it, was the unmistakable figure of Malfurion Stormrage.