Bronze Dragonflight.
Part III: This Will Be The Day.
Uther took in what he had been told, old memories resurfacing in his mind at the mention of the moment. Before he could gather himself for what lay ahead, he felt the pendant burn against his collarbone.
"One moment, Alexstrasza is trying to contact me; this may take a moment," he said, pressing the pendant against his skin.
"Would you like us to go without you?" Sylvanas quickly suggested.
"Am I required for this moment?" He asked Chromie, the pendant continuing to burn.
"Not entirely, I can always summon another to take your place," Chromie said brightly.
"I will rejoin you for the next moment," he said quickly, the burn was beginning to irritate him.
Before anyone could argue, he turned and walked toward a building embedded in the cave wall, which he recognised as an inn.
"I understand that a greater crisis is coming, and that Uther is a crucial part of them, but this is a matter of great importance to the stability of the time lines, more so than the previous one," Chromie said quickly. "And it is situated in the time following the Battle at the Dark Portal."
"What must we do?" Sylvanas asked, after watching Uther enter the inn.
"I will explain inside," Chromie said brightly. "But to make up for numbers, may I summon someone to help in your endeavour?"
"Of course," Sylvanas smiled. "Who did you have in mind?"
A portal opened beside Chromie, and a tall, silver haired Sin'dorei stepped out. Sylvanas froze, not believing her eyes.
"Sister?" she breathed, and the woman took a moment before recognising her own flesh and blood.
"Sylvanas!" she nearly yelled, before embracing her sister tightly. "It's been far too long!"
"Indeed it has Vereesa" Sylvanas said softly. "You've barely aged since last we spoke little sister."
"And you haven't aged at all, though your eyes tell a different tale," Vereesa smiled. "A tale of conflict, sorrow, and pain. You must catch me up on what has happened to you, as I have only heard rumours."
"The same can be said of you," Sylvanas laughed. "So… You don't believe the Prince's lies about me?"
"That you destroyed the Sunwell, of course not!" Vereesa laughed. "You're my sister, you're not like that!"
"Oh where are my manners," Sylvanas laughed, remembering that they were not alone. "May I introduce my lord's travelling companions, Ysondre of the Emerald Dragonflight, and Onyxia, former daughter of Deathwing."
"A pleasure," Onyxia and Ysondre said in turn, shaking Vereesa's hand.
"It's a pleasure to meet you too, but where is your lord? I have heard much about him, but never had the pleasure of meeting him." Vereesa asked, looking around expectantly. "I feel he should meet all three Windrunners, complete the set."
"He had to speak with Alexstrasza; he will join us after this we have saved this moment in history." Sylvanas said slowly.
"May I enquire what moment in history this is?" Vereesa asked the small gnome beside her.
"The second opening of the Dark Portal," Chromie said brightly, and Sylvanas saw a familiar look of horror on her sister's face.
"You mean... the opening before it..." Vereesa said slowly, clutching at something around her neck. "Before..."
"Before our sister was trapped on the other side when it closed again? Yes." Sylvanas finished.
"What threatens this… important moment?" Vereesa asked quickly.
"Time is slipping by, please enter the anomaly quickly," Chromie said, looking at an elaborate timepiece. "I will explain more inside."
The dragons and the two Windrunners entered the portal, and were immediately greeted by the third Windrunner.
"There you are, where have you been hiding?" Alleria said coldly. "Khadgar needs our help!"
"Alleria?" the two sisters said dumbfounded. "Is that you?"
"Yes it's me! Who are you?" Alleria asked. "Where the hell have you been for the past few weeks?"
"We're..." they said, before looking at each other and realising their appearances were of two human females, almost identical in appearance. "Never mind, but your fame precedes you."
"Don't kiss my ass! Now hurry up and follow me, these infernal orcs are relentless!" Alleria growled, before leading them away from the keep. "We've beaten their best, but now they've done something cataclysmic!"
"What?" Sylvanas and Vereesa asked.
"I do not know, but the whole planet is dying or something, our job is to guard the Dark Portal whilst Khadgar closes it forever." Alleria said, leading them toward the stables. "So you're one human markswoman and three human mages, judging by your dress. Excellent, we need all the ranged troops we can get, these blasted orcs are trying to escape this dying hellhole and enter our world, and we cannot let that happen!"
They mounted up and rode east, seeing fireballs raining from the skies overhead as they moved further and further from the Alliance's Hold.
"But how will we get home?" Sylvanas asked, the one question she knew she had to ask eventually.
Alleria just stared at them coldly, and they understood, their plan meant no going home, and this burned deep inside Sylvanas and Vereesa. They reached the area around the Dark Portal, Sylvanas noted that it was a lot larger than the one she had seen in the Black Morass. The rag-tag Alliance army had an established defensive line around the portal, with humans, dwarves and a few Sin'dorei rangers all fighting against Orcs and demons.
"Looks like the party has started. Get ready for hell, because we're not going anywhere till Khadgar's finished closing the portal!" Alleria yelled.
She leapt from her mount and fired at several orcs, landing fatal shots. Sylvanas and Vereesa followed suit, except they chose to leap into the heart of the action, fighting on the front line. Onyxia and Ysondre moved into position with several other mages, before breathing fire on the demons that circled over the soldier's heads. It was not long before Infinite dragonkin joined the fight, though no one around the heroes noticed the black and white dragons fighting against them.
"It seems there is some sort of distortion, making these people see orcs and demons, instead of the Infinite dragons." Ysondre said quietly to Onyxia. "We'd be wise to not mention their presence to anyone except Sylvanas and Vereesa."
"Indeed, plus we must ensure no changes to the time stream," Onyxia replied. "And I fear our dear Sylvanas and Vereesa may do something drastic."
"I agree, a chance to save their sister from an unknown fate weighs heavily upon them." Ysondre agreed. "Lord Uther would understand that we cannot meddle with history like that."
"Lok tar Ogar!" a large, red-skinned ogre roared, as the amassed orcs parted to let him charge their front line.
The ogre smashed past the Windrunners and quickly charged toward Ysondre, blood-lust in its eyes.
"Stand back! I will handle this beast!" Ysondre roared, but she quickly found it impossible to shift into her natural form.
The ogre grabbed her by the throat and raised her above its head.
"Calm everyone," Ysondre said loudly, as soldiers pointed swords and spears at the fearless ogre. "I can handle this!" she smiled, the ogre was finding it tough to crush her draconic throat.
"Die!" it roared, squeezing as hard as it could, but only causing a small amount of pain to the disguised wyrm.
"Sleep" she said softly, pressing her index finger to the centre of its forehead.
The ogre's eyes rolled upward, as its eyelids closed, and it toppled backwards, snoring loudly. Ysondre quickly got to her feet again and walked around to its throat, before stamping on it with her heel, breaking the ogre's neck.
"Impressive," Alleria said slowly, as everyone stared in wonder at Ysondre's human disguise. "I've never seen anyone so calm in the face of these monsters!"
"They're coming again!" a soldier yelled, as the orcs again charged forward.
"Hold the line!" Alleria yelled in response, nocking an arrow into her bow and aiming, "On my command!"
Behind her every surviving archer readied their bows, riflemen loaded their blunderbusses and mages summoned fire. Sylvanas and Vereesa felt a swell of pride in seeing their sister in her element, and only wished they could let her know that her sisters were fighting beside her.
"Now!" She yelled, and the assembled Alliance forces opened fire, cutting down the first line of orcs, but the second was quick to replace their fallen comrades.
"The demons have all been killed, it's just the orcs, and they seem more focused on getting past us," Alleria boasted as they managed to hold their ground. "Khadgar, how much longer till the portal is closed?"
"Not much longer, only a few more minutes," Khadgar replied.
"Where's Turalyon and Kurdran?" Vereesa called, remembering their names as also amongst the missing heroes.
"Right here," two soldiers said proudly, from the far left of their line, whereas Sylvanas and company were on the far right, with the centre being left to guard Khadgar.
"You will not stop us Alliance scum!" a green-skinned orc snarled, emerging from the ranks, dressed in a long black robe.
"Finally!" Alleria grinned.
"Stand aside or burn with this dead world!" the orc stated.
"Never!" Turalyon yelled. "You will not harm Azeroth again!"
The orc laughed, and summoned fire into his hands. The sky ripped open and fire rained down on the soldiers.
"Warlock bastard!" Alleria yelled.
She quickly nocked an arrow and shot at his hand, impaling it and ceasing his casting.
"Elvish whelp, you'll pay for that!" the orc snarled.
"Bring it Ner'zhul, your responsible for this cataclysm, better you stay to enjoy it!" Alleria smirked, withdrawing a dagger and leaping over the front line to duel the leader of the Horde.
"No!" Sylvanas called, but Vereesa held her back.
Sylvanas did something she had never done before, but knew would need to do eventually with the path she had now chosen for herself. She knelt down and began praying, hoping that the Light would come to her sister's aid.
"Stand back, I'll handle this weakling!" Ner'zhul cackled.
The Orc warlock and the Sin'dorei ranger then began a close-quarters duel, their weapons deflecting blows and moving far quicker than anyone had expected. Alleria's daggers slashed at the Orc, who managed to skilfully deflect her strikes with his staff. Ner'zhul managed to disarm the elven ranger and knock her down, before quickly moving to bash her skull in.
"Now you die elfling!" Ner'zhul boasted.
Sylvanas felt something building within her, and she instinctively stood up and nocked an arrow her bow. She felt the strange power coursing with her and she channelled it into her arrow. As she saw Ner'zhul bringing his staff down toward her sister's head, she fired, the arrow glowing brightly as it was unleashed.
"Argh!" Ner'zhul roared as he staff was burned away by Sylvanas' empowered arrow. "Who dares?"
Suddenly his fury was redirected at Khadgar, as the Dark Portal closed, with a gryphon rider grabbing the skull in Khadgar's hand and then charging through the Portal. The world began to shake, and the ground split open, swallowing swathes of the remaining orcs.
"You fools, now you die!" Ner'zhul laughed, before joining his fellow orcs in fleeing from the Dark Portal.
"What do we do now?" Onyxia asked, slightly scared that they were trapped in the past, on a foreign, dying world.
"Now we find a still open portal, and take shelter on the other side until this cataclysm ends," Khadgar said boldly. "Fetch our horses!"
The surviving soldiers quickly mounted up, With Vereesa and Sylvanas, Onyxia and Ysondre shared two horses between them. Most of the army lay dead around them, the brave men and women roasted alive in their armour by the rain of Warlock fire.
"Stay close ladies! Fall behind and you're dead!" Alleria called, "Kill any orcs you see! Let's leave their corpses to burn with this wretched world!"
Sylvanas, Vereesa, Ysondre and Onyxia, riding two per horse, flanked Alleria Windrunner as they rode quickly away from the Portal. The Windrunners happily picked off any orcs that came within range.
"We have to do something!" Vereesa whispered to her younger sister. "She's riding to her death."
"We really shouldn't, we can't change the timelines in any way," Sylvanas replied. "And we do not know if she's dead in our time."
"She's alive right now, we could make sure she doesn't die. Who is to say that this isn't meant to happen." Vereesa said hopefully. "Maybe we're meant to bring her back to our time, instead of into escorting to the Nether."
"We should not act on emotional impulse, if it seems that his path is unfolding before us, then we should follow it." Sylvanas said softly, her hand on her sister's shoulder. "But if it is clear that Alleria is meant to enter the twisting Nether, we should not try to change history."
"Seems your lord's teachings have sunk in," Vereesa chuckled. "You're not as reckless and brash as I remember. Plus, you've got the Light behind you know, care to explain?"
"Uther is training me to be a paladin ranger," she said brightly. "It'll mean I'm able to..."
Her sentence was cut off by a large Infinite drakonid, it appeared from nowhere and knocked the four of them from their horses. Alleria and the other heroes of old kept going, seemingly unaware that they had been separated.
"Your dear sister is destined to be lost to the world, there is nothing you can do!" the Drakonid boasted, withdrawing a large stave shaped like an hourglass. "Now you will join the dead that cover this doomed world!"
The dragonkin charged them, swinging its stave at them, which quickly forced them to scatter.
"We can save her!" Veressa yelled, drawing her bow and shooting at its head.
"Tick tock, tick tock!" it mocked.
Sylvanas dived behind a rock and focused on that strange sensation, which had emerged when her older sister was in danger. She felt it coursing into her fingers, and quickly unsheathed her daggers, making them glow gold.
"Hey ugly!" she yelled, leaping up on to the rock. "You will not harm my sisters!"
She leapt off the rock, daggers raised above her head, as the drakonid moved to block her attack. Her glowing daggers cleaved through his stave, and became imbedded in its chest. A shockwave sent her flying back into the rock, as the Infinite drakonid collapsed, bleeding heavily from where Sylvanas' daggers were sunk into its torso. It only managed several retching noses as it died.
"Impressive work little sister," Veressa laughed, helping Sylvanas to her feet.
"Thanks, I didn't think that..." Before she could finish her sentence, Sylvanas fainted.
"Well done heroes, the timeline here is safe from the Infinite corruption," Chromie said, appearing from nowhere. "Now you may return to the present."
"But Alleria..." Veressa began, as she cradled her sister in her arms.
"The sands of time cannot be changed, she has entered the Nether, there is nothing you could have done," Chromie said grimly. "Sylvanas should be proud, she drew the hatred of the Lich King years before they met with Uther."
-AN-
In celebration of Warlords of Draenor's launch, I've published two chapters that are suitably about Azeroth and Draenor's historic connection. When I wrote these chapters, I honestly didn't think they'd be released in the same week as WoD, but I think it fitting that they did.
I also realise this isn't entirely accurate to the Lore either, but like the Battle of Blackrock Spire, it has the key moments, and plays its role for the wider WoW lore, and the story in this Fanfic.