Chapter Fifteen

Gillaen

I'm afraid I got Arrentai rather worried after our visit to the cathedral. I didn't mean to, I just wanted some company. But then he asked if I wanted to talk. Sometimes it's hard to find someone to talk to when you need to get things off your chest. I know there are the priests who are supposed to hear anyone who needs a confidential listener, and they have their place. All our units have priests attached, sometimes they double as healers, but mostly they're there as spiritual advisors.

When I was a paladin I found it easy to talk to a priest if something was troubling me, but it's different now. I don't see them any differently, but you can sense how uneasy they are with death knights. They see us as irredeemably lost, an affront to the purity of the Light, especially those of us who were paladins. And that attitude, however we try to ignore it, is not exactly conducive to baring our innermost feelings and doubts.

I remember a gnome among the death knights back in the early days of our freedom, tiny, pink haired, as small as Taliesa. She should never have been there, she wasn't a fighter. A healer, she'd been helping wounded soldiers on the battlefield and it was her courage in trying to defend me from the scourge warrior that took my soul that led to her joining our ranks. She was a priest, devoted to the light; everything that she'd been made to do, every terrible deed went against that creed. I often wonder how she reconciled what she had been with what she became, how she was treated by people who'd once counted her among their number. I hope she fared better than some of us did. Maybe someday I'll meet her again and find out. From what I recall of her I think she'll manage well enough. She had such strength of character for one so small.

Arrentai is different. My brother was always my closest confidant as a child and young man. We shared all our doubts and secrets, our joys and sorrows, knowing that it would never go any further. I only ever kept one secret from him, my love for Nerissina. To tell him that his happiness had come at the expense of mine would have been too cruel and even at my most despairing I couldn't do that to him.

I never intended to burden him with all my doubts and fears and guilt that day. But once I'd started I couldn't halt the flow of words. And Arrentai, my dear reliable little brother, as always knew just the right answers, the words that would lift me out of my despair.

When I suggested going for a drink, it wasn't that I felt the need to get drunk, not this time anyway. I just wanted more time to talk, about his plans for the future, about what I'd be doing next. He'd mentioned his planned trip to Pandaria the night before over dinner at his friend's house. I hadn't said anything then because it had just been rumours, but this morning before I'd left the barracks we'd been told that we too were going to Pandaria. The king was determined that the horde be prevented from doing to Pandaria what they'd done to Theramore. We were the weapon, the shield that would curb the Horde's endeavours.

We headed for our favoured drinking place, the Pig and Whistle, and ordered ourselves drinks. As Arrentai and Lizabetha were staying with his friends until their departure we were undisturbed and stayed there drinking and talking until well into the afternoon. I couldn't tell you now all that we discussed; all I recall is that we reminisced over the past, told tales of our adventures and considered our future plans. It all seemed so normal, how we had been before everything went so wrong. It was what I needed more than anything; to feel normal.

I couldn't see that we'd be spending much time together when we got to Pandaria but it would be a change to be on the same continent for longer than a few days. We didn't get to spend nearly enough time together. As it turned out we had a fair bit of time to spare before we'd be leaving Stormwind. With the sheer number of troops heading to Pandaria, there weren't enough ships to take us all at once. Eventually we hoped to be using mage portals, but they have one insurmountable disadvantage. A mage can only open a portal between places he has been to in person. For the permanent portals the king wanted we needed a secure base with mages there to set them up.

Josstellan and Maelinastra, together with the other mages necessary for such an undertaking would be on the first ships and airships to depart. We had to wait until there was room for us. I knew the voyage would be a long one, and I remembered all too clearly the last long voyage that Nerissina and I had taken, that from Northrend. I wanted to avoid a repeat of those events if I could. So I decided to plan a short excursion for us and a few friends. A few days demon hunting would sate our hunger nicely and there were always plenty of demons to be found in Outland. So I invited Arrentai, Hestia's husband Jothan and his friend Lissan, a warrior from Goldshire, along for the adventure. Nothing could go wrong I thought. I really should know better by now.

Arrentai

I thought after the events in Darkshore I had seen Nerissina at her worst. I was wrong; by the Light I was terribly wrong.

We were in the Blasted Lands, on our way to the Dark Portal; Gillaen, Nerissina, Lissan, Jothan and I. We were riding out from Nethergarde Keep, relaxed, cheerfully anticipating the adventure we were bound on. Because there was no danger I was in human form; Nerissina was worgen as she usually chose to be now.

Ahead, a group of about a dozen or so men appeared round a bend in the road riding towards us. They seemed harmless enough, hunters, warriors, rogues maybe, going about their lawful business. I saw nothing to cause concern as they approached. The leader nodded cordially as he passed Gillaen who was at the front of our group. Lissan and Jothan, behind him also rode past them.

Not Nerissina; she reined in her horse and turned in the saddle to watch them, scenting the air suspiciously.

"What's wrong?" I asked, stopping behind her.

"I know them, their scent. They were in Silverpine..."

I had no idea what she was talking about. She had told me very little about her time in Silverpine and Shadowfang.

Without warning she wheeled her horse round and rode after them.

"Gillaen!"

I called my brother, and he turned at once, reacting to my alarm. We rode after Nerissina, but she had a head start and her horse, more lightly burdened than ours, was swifter. We could only watch in horror as she flung herself from her saddle to pull the first man she reached to the ground. Within seconds he was dead; his throat ripped to shreds by her fangs.

The other strangers turned to avenge their friend. They would have been better to have continued riding. A second, then a third died at Nerissina's hand before we could reach her. The leader, a warrior, had dismounted and drawn his sword; and was circling Nerissina trying to find an opening, but obviously reluctant to risk being bitten. She turned, always facing him, snarling bestially. Horribly, she reminded me of the feral worgen that had over-run Gilneas.

I tried to approach her, but she snarled at me.

"Don't try to stop me, Arrentai. I will have my revenge for what they did."

"She's insane," one of the other men, still mounted, said.

"She should be destroyed."

I ignored him.

"Tell me, Nerissina, what did they do? I don't understand."

"They stole my baby. She was newborn, hungry. They snatched her from my breast and left me for dead. Now they'll pay."

I turned my gaze on the man. He would not meet my eye.

"Is it true? Were you in Silverpine after Shadowfang was raided and its captives freed?"

"What concern is it of yours?" he demanded, rather arrogantly. "We were charged with ridding the area of the worgen; ending the problems they were causing. We found a feral worgen with a human child. Of course we rescued it."

He showed no remorse; to him, like so many others back then, a worgen was less than human, merely an animal to be destroyed.

I was aware of my brother and our friends moving to prevent the others from escaping.

"That child," I said quietly, menacingly, "was hers. And mine. Thanks to you we lost years of our daughter's life. I might never have known she even existed."

I'd held my emotions in check and was still human. Now, I shape-shifted. As worgen I towered over the man and he visibly cowered.

"What am I?" I demanded. "Man or worgen? Can you tell?"

He shook his head.

"No. You can't. And you could not tell what she was. She didn't threaten you; she just tried to protect her child. And you treated her like an animal. You deserve your fate."

I turned away; saw the look of shock on Gillaen's face. I don't think my brother had realised how I truly felt about Taliesa's loss even though he had witnessed my reaction upon learning of her existence. Nerissina glanced briefly at me, expecting me to try to stop her; she now took my words as approval. She moved towards the man baring her teeth, extending her claws, and grabbed him by the shoulder.

"Arrentai? This is wrong," Gillaen protested.

"Stay out of it, Gillaen. This is Nerissina's choice, her decision. Don't interfere."

I knew Gillaen was right; I shouldn't let Nerissina continue. But this man and his friends had almost destroyed our family by their callous disregard for her rights as a mother. And maybe, just maybe, if she had not lost Taliesa then, she would not have later been in the battle where she fell to the Scourge. She could have been a real mother to our daughter, instead of being afraid to be close to her. Right or wrong, I held them responsible for that too. At that moment my hatred for them outweighed any compassion I might have for what I knew was coming. I simply didn't care what happened to them.

The man howled in pain as she sank her fangs into his throat, but she didn't kill him.

"Shall I let you suffer as I suffered?" she snarled. "Shall I make you into a creature that your family will run from in fear? Show you what my life has been?"

She threw him to one side and turned her attention to the others. Paralysed by fear they were an easy target and she finished them quickly, mercifully.

For a moment she stood there, surrounded by the bodies of her victims. Then she turned to look at the one she'd left alive. Already the blood from his wound was congealing; he wouldn't die, I knew; he would share our fate and undergo the change to worgen.

"Remember this," Nerissina said, her voice low, menacing.

"This is your punishment for the way you treated me. When your loved ones run screaming from you remember the mother whose child you stole just because she was different."

Her rage spent, she turned away and walked towards Gillaen. My brother reached out to place his hand on her shoulder, murmuring words of comfort. Then surprisingly she shifted to human and let him hold her close as she wept. I felt a moment of jealousy that she had chosen my brother; but it was an emotion I had no right to feel. Nerissina was no longer my lover; I had a new life with Lizabetha; and she was free to make her own choices.

I shifted back to human and turned away to face the man who still lay where Nerissina had flung him.

"I suggest you make your way to Nethergarde and tell them what has happened to you. They will see you are kept safe until the change has happened."

He stared at me blankly.

"When it happens you will become that which you fear so much, a savage, uncontrolled beast. You will be unable to stop yourself from killing; you won't even remember that you were once human. Believe me you don't want that on your conscience; to always wonder what terrible things you might have done."

"We can't leave him," Jothan said quietly behind me.

"What if the change happens quickly? Before he gets there?"

"He's right," this was Lissan.

"We let Nerissina do this. It's our responsibility."

I nodded. They were right of course. I could have stopped her, but I'd let Nerissina exact her terrible revenge.

We took him with us, bound to his horse's saddle, and handed him to the troops at the Dark Portal.

"What happened to him?" the officer in command wanted to know.

"He got on the wrong side of a vengeful worgen," I explained, "and he needs to be kept secure until he changes."

Nerissina and I were both in human form at that point so the officer had no way of knowing that she was the worgen involved, and I certainly wasn't going to tell him.

I did however tell him where he could find the bodies.

The man said not a word, just staring at me in abject terror. I knew he would never forget the day he crossed Nerissina and learned for himself what it was to be a worgen, feared and hated by so many. I had no idea what his ultimate fate would be, how he would learn to balance the beast with his humanity now that Tal'Doren was gone; but I assumed the night elf druids must have come up with some solution as I hadn't heard of any outbreaks of feral worgen other than the ones that had plagued Duskwood for as long as anyone could remember. I had done all I could for him.

I turned away to join my companions and we rode toward the makeshift stable that had been erected to one side of the bowl that held both the portal and the joint Alliance/Horde outpost. We weren't taking our horses to Outland with us, Gillaen had told us we wouldn't have much need of them as it was safer to fly where we were going. So we made sure they were settled and paid the stable master for their care. Nerissina dismissed her deathcharger back to the Ebon Hold, but to my surprise Gillaen did not do the same with his mount. Instead he handed the required gold to the man and gave him instructions on its care. Then together we walked up the ramp and through the portal.

As we emerged the other side of the portal, on a platform much like the one in the Blasted Lands I stopped and looked around me. Jothan beside me did the same. Neither of us had been here before and to be honest it didn't look like a place I'd want to visit again. I'd thought the Blasted Lands desolate, this was worse. It had the same barren, red earth that could not support any growing thing, fading into the distance further than the eye could see. The air was dry, hot, a constantly moving wind that sucked the life from everything. And the sounds, the constant clash of battle as Alliance and Horde fought side by side against the fearful demons that endlessly attacked the portal, the cries of the demons as they constantly issued what seemed to be challenges in their demonic language, the shouts of the soldiers and their officers in every tongue known on Azeroth, the shrieks of the gryphons on the Alliance side and the bats on the Horde side. It was a deafening cacophony that tortured my sensitive ears. I'd instinctively shifted to worgen for the boost it gave me, but it had the obvious disadvantage that I heard everything so much more keenly.

I heard Gillaen call to us and we hurried down the steps to join our friends. Round the side of the platform it was marginally better; there was some sort of magic screening that filtered out the worst of the noise. My brother was talking to an officer.

"We're going to head to Honor Hold," he told us. "There's always plenty to do there, and it's a lot quieter."

I nodded, gratefully. I could scarcely think straight and my head was starting to ache. Nerissina was looking equally distressed. I couldn't imagine how these men coped with this every day. Gillaen seemed untroubled, every inch the seasoned soldier, his authority evident in the way the officer deferred to him. I'd never seen this side of him before, the career soldier, the experienced officer, someone who could make a decision, issue an order, and expect it to be carried out without question. My respect for him grew exponentially.

After a short wait enough gryphons were available to transport us to Honor Hold and we set off. I would have been willing to use flight form; but Gillaen said no. There were a lot of dangers between the Dark Portal and Honor Hold, he told me. The gryphons were used to them and trained to deal with them. I wouldn't know what to expect or how to react and he didn't want to risk me being hurt, or worse.

"Lizabetha would never forgive me," he said.

"So just humour me, little brother."

I laughed and gave in.

The flight took around a couple of hours and was thankfully uneventful, giving me the opportunity to look around. For the most part the flight path followed an old road beaten into the earth, unpaved but obviously well-used. It headed westwards, sometimes dipping below the level of the surrounding land. As we flew higher, disconcertingly I found I could glimpse the edges of the world, raw shattered rock, pieces of which floated freely in the emptiness of space. Now I understood why Gillaen had insisted I ride a gryphon. It would be so easy to drift away from my path, caught in my fascination with this strange land and risk being lost forever in the abyss. From our altitude it was hard to see much detail, but occasionally, as we neared our destination, I saw the machinery of war ranged alongside; ballistae, catapults, glaive throwers. Then I saw the immense stone citadel built at the end of the road, its towers and battlements dominating the land. To my relief that was not our destination, instead we veered southward to a partially ruined fortress built on a hill within sight of the road. The now weary gryphons circled down to land at their roost within the walls and we alighted with relief, stretching out our stiff limbs. Curiously I looked around.

We'd arrived at Honor hold as evening drew in, although you'd be hard pressed to tell in the never-changing light of Hellfire Peninsula. Close by the flight point ranks of unenthusiastic soldiers were being drilled by an officer, to one side was a rough stable housing a varied handful of mounts. Behind the soldiers was a low two storey building that was obviously the inn, higher up the hill was the keep, the administrative hub. There were a few other buildings, among them a forge, a mage tower, and of course barracks for the troops. At the northernmost point was a building that was almost completely demolished. It was too late, Gillaen decided, to speak to the commander; we could do that in the morning. We spoke to the innkeeper, to arrange for accommodation. He had only two rooms left, he told us; other adventurers were occupying the others. They'd do for us, Gillaen decided, he and Nerissina would share one room, the rest of us the other. We paid for the rooms for a few days; the innkeeper insisted on being paid in advance, too many people died before settling their bills, he said. I wasn't entirely sure if he was joking. That done we settled in the common room for a meal.

The food was plain, but well cooked and flavoured, and there was plenty of it. No strong alcohol was on offer though, only light beers, fruit juice or water. It didn't bother me, but I overheard more than a few soldiers complaining about it. I'd chosen a seat from which I could watch over the room as I ate. The soldiers seemed a pretty standard lot, always complaining, as they obeyed their orders with little or no enthusiasm. I guess some of them had been serving here a long time and had become disillusioned with their lot.

The adventurers were rather more of a mixed bunch. As the evening passed the inn filled up and I had ample opportunity to observe them. They came in twos and threes, in larger parties, in mixed groups of all the Alliance races; noisy, enthusiastic, eager to do their bit to help. There was little to distinguish one from another; or from any of us really. We were all there for basically the same reasons; to kill demons, to protect our world, maybe to earn some glory.

It was late and the inn crowded and very noisy when the door opened and a lone draenei entered. Tall, solidly built like a warrior, yet wearing dusty, travel-stained robes such as a priest wore, he carried only a staff and a small all-purpose knife at his belt, and a single bag over his shoulder. For a moment he hesitated as though unwilling to join the crowd; then he pushed his way through the room to the bar. He seemed so out of place that I continued to watch as he spoke to the barman, took the two bottles of beer the man put on the counter, and turned to look for a seat. It so happened that the nearest empty place was at our table. He headed over and paused by us.

"Excuse me," he said quietly. "May I sit here while I eat?"

The others, engrossed in their conversation, scarcely noticed him. I nodded.

"Feel free," I answered.

"Thank you."

He pulled out the chair, sat down, and set one of his bottles on the table. He unscrewed the cap on the other and took a long swallow of beer before looking at me.

"Forgive me, I needed that. The dust here gets in your throat, and no amount of drink eases it while you are out there."

After a moment's pause he went on.

"I am Kayllen."

No last name, but then few draenei did have one.

"Arrentai Bearheart," I responded.

"You are new here?"

I nodded.

"We arrived today."

"You will not stay long. You don't seem like the usual people who come here."

"No. We're just here for a few days, before we sail to Pandaria. It's a long voyage. Gillaen, my brother, and Nerissina are death knights; they don't handle long periods of inactivity well, so they figured a few days of demon killing would help them cope better."

Just then the barman brought a plate of food and placed it in front of Kayllen. He paid the man and began to eat. I sipped my own drink in silence for a few minutes before asking,

"So what brought you out here?"

"We've heard so much about the troubles here I thought I should try to help. But I wasn't prepared for this; it's changed so much, not the world I remember any more. It's hard to be a healer and know that you can't heal what's wrong here."

"What do you mean?"

"Are you a healer, my friend? You'll soon learn. The best you can do is put an end to the suffering. And try not to lose your own humanity."

I had no answer to that. I couldn't imagine what it was like to return to your home after so many years and find it changed beyond recognition. I'd never had the courage to return to Gilneas and walk its deserted streets, since the day the night elves had evacuated us.