Ammi could have sworn, as she stared out over the bleak, barren landscape of the central Dragonblight, that the wind itself was a force set against the success of humanity.
She glanced over at Kol, her traveling companion and best friend, as he set to work trying to unroll their camp packs against the force of the freezing galewinds. Kol was tall and strong, even for a Worgen, but the icy blasts continued to pull the blankets and utensils right out of his hands, forcing him to hang on with all his strength.
"This is unlike anything I've ever seen before," he growled as he hauled a cooking pot back to its original place beside their hastily-scratched fire pit, which was already beginning to fill back in with dirt and ice shards.
"Northrend is unforgiving," Ammi sighed. "Clearly, the Lich King doesn't appreciate the living coming in to encroach on his creepy frozen territory."
Kol finally got one of the bedrolls out and spread open on the ground, quickly sitting on it before it had a chance to be blown away. "Remind me to thank him with a sound whack on that metal head of his," he said, smacking the cooking pot against his palm menacingly. It looked a little ridiculous, and Ammi giggled quietly, though she made an effort to mask the amusement for the sake of Kol's dignity.
"Can I help in any way?" she asked, surveying the little campsite with no small degree of disappointment. When they had received their commission from the Seventh Legion, the prestigious military unit in charge of Dragonblight, they had anticipated life-or-death conflicts in an epic pursuit of glory and righteousness. Reconnaissance in the bitter cold was rather more lackluster in comparison with their lost pipe dreams.
"Unless you have some way of keeping the wind out, not really," Kol replied heavily. "I have no idea how we're supposed to get anything done."
Ammi tapped her knuckles against her knee in vexation. "I wish I was a better study at arcanism…I'd be able to make a barrier then."
Kol shrugged. "Does no good to wish, Ammi. Besides, you're a better pyromancer than any I've seen—don't take it too hard about the other disciplines. This is only for one night, and we'll make do." He smiled, and the sight of his wolf teeth baring in a grin made Ammi smile too, just a little.
"Okay. But, Kol?"
"Yes?" Kol tilted his head inquisitively.
"I'm going to need the other bedroll."
Luckily, the wind died with the sun, leaving them cold but undisturbed as night fell over the wasteland, the silver moonlight touching the bleached dragon bones with a glimmer like precious gems. Finally wrapped in her bedroll and blankets, seated beside the campfire that she had proudly lit, Ammi gazed out over the field of bones once again, finding both a strange solace and an unspeakable loneliness in the desolate sight.
Kol, now in human form and with a steaming mug of coffee held between both hands, slid over to sit beside her, his eyes following hers out across the expanse with an expression of curiosity and trepidation. His gingery hair and beard glittered with frost, and Ammi reached up and brushed some of it out of his curls with a small smile.
"You've got ice in your hair, Kol. Might want to see to that."
Kol gave her a sideways smirk. "I think you've just done it for me, haven't you?" He didn't push her hand away, though, and she just laughed and ruffled his hair until all the ice crystals had vanished. After that, they sat in contemplative silence for another very long moment, the moon casting streaming shadows before them so that they appeared as giants towering over the plateau.
"Ammi?"
"Hm?" Ammi turned her head to meet his eyes, raising a brow curiously.
"What do you see when you look out there?" Kol's voice was quiet and almost tentative, as if he suspected that the answer might not be something he would like or understand. But that was just Kol's way, Ammi knew; he was a warrior and had no trappings of magic save for his Curse, which neither of them really understood all that well.
Ammi exhaled a slow breath, watching it form a mist in the freezing air as she considered her reply; finally, she turned back to watch the sky again, her words meandering forth like they weren't quite sure of their direction.
"Do you see the little glittering pieces far away over there?" she asked, pointing her finger at the distant shimmer of the dragon bones.
Kol nodded. "Yes."
"They're the bones of dragons, come here when they knew their lives were about to end," Ammi said with a soft sigh. "Dragons of every flight come here to lie at rest when they die, surrounded by the bones of their kin, a more indestructible memorial than anything humans could carve out of stone. They've been doing it for centuries, nigh on millennia, and still, the bones of every single dragon ever to come to rest lie there in the Dragon Wastes, preserved by the strength of their magic."
Kol said nothing, but Ammi could tell that even with his limited knowledge of sorcery, the thought entranced his sense of imagination just as it did hers.
"I can feel that magic, Kol," Ammi whispered, leaning forward to rest her head on her knees. "I can feel it rising from the land and from their bones, pressing against me with all the centuries of their power. I can feel it, and I want so badly to be a part of it all."
"A part of what all?" Kol sounded a little wary, as if she'd just expressed the desire to join up with a cult or something.
"All the world's magic," Ammi said, turning back to him with a glimmer in her eyes; a wild, foreign hope and desperation which Kol found both beautiful and worrisome. He had never seen his friend look as she did now, filled with so much longing that it seemed it might explode out of her. The firelight sent golden flickers off of her blonde waves of hair, and although he didn't say it out loud, she already seemed to be as one with that strange magical presence which he could not sense or feel. It made him feel keenly distant from her, and the feeling was not a good one.
"Ammi, you're already a powerful sorceress," he said quietly. "I don't know what it is that you feel out there, but…in my estimation, you don't need it to become stronger."
Ammi laughed quietly, and a little of the anxiety ebbed out of Kol's heart at the sound. That was the Ammi that he knew, the girl who could laugh at anything.
"You probably think I'm crazy, don't you?" she said, giving him a gentle knock on the shoulder.
He returned the gesture with a half-smile. "Only a little. But I doubt we would be friends if you weren't. You're more interesting than sane people."
She gave a genuine laugh at that, and he let his own smile widen.
"You're a good friend, Kol." Ammi leaned her head on his shoulder and stared back out over the landscape, but her eyes were not as distant as before, and he was glad.
"Ammi, what would you do with all that magic?" he asked after a slight pause.
"I'd march right into Dalaran and prove myself to the Kirin Tor," Ammi replied without hesitation. "I've wanted to be one of them since I learned that I had magic."
Kol smiled a little; that notion was at least more down to earth than her previous statement. "Ammi, you could join the Kirin Tor right now if you wanted to. You're just as good as their magi. Better than some."
Ammi snorted. "Forgive me for my derision, Kolbyon, but you are a warrior. You have no idea what the Kirin Tor's standards are, but I do, and I know I have a ways to go still."
Kol grinned. "Then how about this, Miss Amily D'Aure: until you are initiated as a mage of the Order of the Kirin Tor or the Violet Eye or whatever it is that they call themselves, I promise to stand by your side as friend and supporter in all things. Do we have an agreement?"
Ammi looked up at him with a smile of true delight. "Do you mean it, Kol?"
Kol nodded sagely. "As much as I've ever meant anything."
There was only a slight hesitation before she hugged him warmly around the middle.
"Deal," Ammi said joyfully. "We have a deal."
Kol just hugged her in return and sipped his coffee with the trace of a smile lingering on his face.