I do not own Azeroth or Duswood or blah, blah, blah...
I do own Anyanda and Sean.
"What's that?" I sat up in the harness, squinting over Sean's head. Near Brightwood grove, there was a small clearing in the middle of a hill range. The foliage looked….different to that of the rest of Duskwood. I was certain I'd never been there or heard of such a place before.
"What's what?" Sean asked, halting in mid-air for a moment.
"That." I pointed to it. "Could you take us down."
With powerful wings, Sean swooped down to land in the clearing. I dismounted, and he changed back, scales and claws shrinking into the scrawny teenager I knew so well. He peered around curiously.
The trees had a strange purplish hue, much unlike the gray, corrupted greenery of the rest of Duskwood. A path winded through them, and disappeared into a small pass between the hills. Kal'dorei lamps dotted the path, the unearthly blue fire glowing ever gently on. But perhaps most prominent was the portal standing at the nearer end of the path. It wasn't nearly as grandiose or foreboding as the dark portal. It was made of unfamiliar rich wood, a branch winding around the frame. The centre of it was a deep, intoxicating green.
Sean looked around, curiously.
"This place seems familiar." He mused.
"I don't see why it would be." I answered absent-mindedly, walking up to investigate the portal. "The last time you were in Duskwood, you were but a hatchling." He shook his head.
"Not like that. I don't remember-the blood does." I turned around, fingers outstretched mere centimeters from the portal.
"This place has something to do with dragons?" I guessed. "It's that what you're saying?" Sean thought on this for a moment.
"Not exactly." He said. "But it had something to do with something to do with dragons. A great being that was no longer great died here." He noted, sadly.
"I'm going to go through the portal Sean." I warned him, before stepping through.
Surprisingly-or unsurprisingly, in some respects-I ended up on the other side. Still in Azeroth, still in the clearing-just round the back of the portal.
"Mum?" Sean called out. "Can you hear me? Where does it lead?"
"It doesn't work." I replied, poking my head around the frame to wave at him. I walked over to my son.
"Maybe we should ask Dad, or someone in town. They'll know."
"You know your Dad's a worgen, Sean?" I asked him, abruptly.
"Yes?"
"And that he's a good worgen, and there are other good worgen, but also lots of bad worgen?"
"Yes. Dad explained it to me, after someone tried to have him lynched."
"And-wait, someone tried to lynch Tobias? When?"
"Two years ago. You were in Stanglethorn."
"Damn it! Why didn't he tell me?"
"He said that he didn't want you to get angry."
"If someone tries to murder my husband, I think I'm perfectly within my rights to be angry!" I palmed my face, trying to collect myself. Sean stared at me for a minute or two.
"What were you saying about good and bad worgen, Mum?"
"There's a story that the first worgen-bad ones, who later gave the good worgen their curse-came from Duskwood. That the night elves accidentally caused it, right here." We stood in silence for a while, contemplating the night elf ruins and lamps, and old legends."
"They found a something powerful in Roland's Doom a few decades ago." Sean stated. I nodded.
"It was a scythe. When they removed it, the Worgen started showing up."
"A few years ago, Dad saved a scythe from the forsaken. They wanted everyone to be a worgen. To share their agony." He stated. I nodded again.
"The worgen came from the scythe. The scythe was in Roland's Doom. Where do you think it came from before then, Sean?" Sean contemplated.
"Not from there." He decided, pointing at the portal.
Sean is a red dragon that Anyanda adopted. The portal they are talking about is in the middle of a mountain range in Duskwood-I recommend checking it out.