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--two months earlier--
She kept pacing restlessly around the topmost lookout of the keep’s central tower, one hand perpetually at the side of her head as she would alternatingly pinch the bridge of her nose or press her wrist against her temple in vain, repeated attempts to ease the pounding inside her skull. As much as she detested having only this tiny area to move about with any degree of freedom, she had long given up trying to coax the local commanders into giving her looser reins. She couldn’t blame them, really – the Keep of Nethergarde had been constructed for one very simple reason, and the jagged, tortured landscape surrounding it was a constant reminder why.
That being said, she still hated it.
“Why can’t they just let me leave whenever I’m done here?” she muttered to herself for the umpteenth time. “I swear, every time …”
Around and around, one circle after another, in never-ending loops of nothing but empty time ticking past. Light, she hated it. Especially when she would forget where she was for a split second and turn her head in any direction not resembling north.
Like now. She bit back an oath and quickly lowered her head another inch, careful not to look up as she once more crossed along the southern rim of the rampart. For a lopsided stack of crudely hewn monoliths tossed into a deformed crater the size of the Stormwind Park, that Portal certainly was a noisy piece of work. She mouthed a few choice invectives and continued her self-imposed circuit.
She glanced up and nodded curtly to the guardsman that had just ascended the flight of stairs below to replace the current tower watch ensconced in the small, fortified alcove above the rampart. He took little notice of her, as was the wont of most of the troops stationed in the Keep – only those few warriors that were directly attached to the Argent Dawn paid her much respect these days. She allowed herself a cold smirk while the two men’s backs were turned towards her as they took the opportunity to exchange small soldier’s talk. It wasn’t like there was anyone there that would bother reprimanding such insignificant breaks in discipline.
Her attention was suddenly seized by an odd movement in the corner of her eye. She looked up and squinted, trying her level best not to cringe as the churning headache intensified briefly. “What’s that?”
The two men cut off their hushed chat and glared at her. “What’s what?” one of them snapped edgily.
She pointed matter-of-factly to the south. “Near the Scar. I saw something moving.”
The newly-arrived guardsman sighed resentfully and brought his looking-glass to his face. There was a moment of tense silence. “Fel if I know,” he finally said dismissively. “Must be another adventurer looking to play demon hunter.” He hooked the looking-glass back onto his belt. “Let them be suicidal idiots, I’m tired of shouting wolf whenever a cricket chirps.”
She squinted harder. “I don’t think that’s …” She pulled her own – decidedly customized and distinctly more ornate – spyglass from her backpack, extended it with a series of clicks and whirrs and lifted the finely crafted double ocular to her eyes. The guards shot her a joint look of incredulity at the outlandish equipment, but she paid no heed, deftly focusing the intricate lens array on the speck moving steadily away from the twisted, craggy area only known as the Tainted Scar.
Her features hardened. “It’s a Doomguard. A big one.” She folded the spyglass with far greater speed than the construct’s apparent complexity would have implied. “He’s headed for the Portal.”
The guardsmen stared at her, and then picked up their own looking-glasses almost in unison. It took them decidedly longer to speak.
“She’s right,” the residential watchman mumbled. “And I don’t think that Doomguard is out for a picnic stroll …”
“So what,” the other snapped tersely. “Probably just a wannabe lieutenant trying to rouse a little raid of his own. We’ve weathered worse than this.”
“No, he’s not …” The first guard paused for a moment. “They’re avoiding him. Like they’re afraid, or …” Another pregnant beat of silence. “He’s—he’s going straight for—what’s that he’s holding up?”
The pounding, so long reduced to a dull, throbbing ache, suddenly rose to a titanic roar like crashing tidal waves. Her eyes widened. “He’s—” That was as far as she got before she doubled over with an explosive groan, the parapet’s stony edge cutting into her hands as she clutched it desperately to keep herself from falling over.
And then the Portal opened.
The shockwave running through the bedrock reached the Keep first, like a twisted, fractured heartbeat of a new dark god being born. She crumpled to her knees, hands clamped over her ears as pain unlike anything she had ever imagined possible lanced through every inch of her brain like incandescent crossbow shafts, her scream drowned out by the roaring gust of wind that followed in the eldritch detonation’s wake and nearly bowled her already unbalanced comrades over.
“Fel!!” the first guardsman shouted, heaving himself to his feet after being thrown against the side of the lookout alcove. “What in Light’s blazes just happened?!”
She gasped painfully for a breath that wouldn’t come. “Th-the Portal … it’s …” The rest was lost in a throat-rending cry of excruciating agony. “Fel, it hurts!!”
“Hey! Hey!” He kneeled quickly in front of her, shaking her shoulders. “For Light’s sake, pull yerself together! What’s going on?”
“Don’t touch me!!” She shoved him aside hard enough to send him careening into the parapet wall, then pressed her wrists against her eyes. “Get out of here. Go!” she hissed between her teeth. “Warn the captain, you morons, warn the captain!”
He stared at her for a moment, then sprung to his feet and jolted the other guardsman from his dumbfounded stupor with a punch to the arm. “You heard her! Get moving!!”
The other man snapped out of his momentary paralysis and, with a wide-eyed glance at the she-rogue, fairly threw himself down the stairs.
The resident watchman grabbed her by her shoulders again, pulling her to her feet as tall as she was. “You too. Get … get yourself to the infirmary or something. Whatever the hell just went down out there, you’re bloody well not staying up here, you hear me?”
She merely dragged an agonized inhale between her teeth and nodded, her eyes screwed shut with pain, and stumbled over to the stairwell.
Not even several years later would she remember how exactly she made her way down, but she somehow did – landing in a heap of misery at the bottom, surrounded by the din of shouted orders and panicked exclamations.
“What in Light’s grace is happening??” “Did the Portal just open?” “That’s impossible!” “It’s been dead for years!” “Who could’ve done this?” “All troops, mobilize! Mobilize!”
A golden-armoured paladin, wearing the silver sun emblem of the Argent Dawn, skidded past her and stopped dead, kneeling beside her and gingerly trying to steady her ragged sobs. “Light’s mercy, are you alright? What happened?”
“It hurts,” she whispered hoarsely, her hands still clamped over her eyes. “Fel, it hurts so much!”
He stared at her indecisively for a moment, then swiftly summoned a small heal and applied it to her head. She shied away with a sharp inhale.
One of the Keep’s priestesses stopped by as well. “Is she injured?”
The paladin shook his head in uncertainty. “She does not seem to be … not physically at least.”
“What’s going on here?”
The two practitioners of the Light turned and saw a High Elven Magistrix, also wearing the Argent Dawn signature on her battlerobes. The paladin addressed her immediately. “We do not know, sister. She is in great pain, but I cannot determine the source of it.”
The Magistrix focused past him and onto the she-rogue, huddled awkwardly against the wall. The High Elf’s glowing blue eyes narrowed almost imperceptibly. “Step aside.”
The two humans complied without a word, watching intently as the Magistrix kneeled where they had a moment earlier. The trained arcanist brushed a light hand across the other woman’s face – who flinched in turn, but not nearly as violently as she had reacted to the healing attempt – and then put her fingertips to the quivering she-rogue’s temples. Almost immediately, the human’s features relaxed, though her eyes were still screwed shut with pain and her tall frame continued to tremble intermittently.
“You should go, brother,” the Magistrix intoned without turning her head. “They need you outside.” The paladin nodded curtly and turned on his heel, vanishing into the milling hubbub of troops moving out and medical supplies being distributed. The priestess lingered a heartbeat longer, regarding the High Elf and the peculiar patient with a measure of bemusement, before she too returned to her imminent duties.
A human Mage stopped by a moment later. “There you are!” he exclaimed with a huff. “I’ve been looking all over for you! They need you outside to stabilize—” He cut himself off. “What in Light’s blazes are you doing? Who is this? Why are you …” He trailed off as he looked more closely at the situation at hand.
The High Elf exhaled exasperatedly, withdrawing her hands and quickly shaking them out before reapplying her gentle but firm grip. “She’s overloading for some reason. I don’t know how or why. I’m draining her as fast as I can.”
He frowned deeply. “How is that even possible? She isn’t …”
Before the Magistrix could reply, the she-rogue stirred suddenly. One hand shot out, seizing the High Elf by her wrist, who duly let out a loud gasp, eyes widening. A split second later, the arcanist tore herself free with a jerk, nearly tumbling backwards onto her rear. The mage jumped back as well, more out of instinct than any conscious reaction.
Ignoring them, the tall, athletic woman pushed herself upright, face still hard with pain but distinctly less so than previously. She continued to press a wrist against her eyes, however. “Get out of here, both of you,” she mumbled tonelessly. “They need you outside.”
The Magistrix stared up at her with a mixture of utter disbelief and abject horror. “… what are you?” she finally managed to breathe.
The mage looked down at the High Elf, concern clearly etched in his weathered face. “What-what did she do?” He hurriedly helped his colleague to her feet, and snapped his attention to the perpetrator in front of him. “What did you do??”
They both froze in their tracks as the other woman shot them a resigned glare – not so much the piercing silver-teal boring into them, but the strange, dark gleam deep within her irises that even now seemed to swirl and writhe with a life of its own. “What part of get out of here did you not understand?” the towering she-rogue growled.
They stared mutely at her for a few tense heartbeats, and then they too vanished into the clamour of the keep’s mobilization.
She panted hard as she pulled herself up to her full height. Her head was still pounding mercilessly, but at least the worst had subsided – for the moment. She knew she only had so long to act; she could already feel the ungodly strain building up again behind her forehead.
Pushing through the stream of troops filing out, she made her way to the captain’s office, slamming the door open with little ceremony. He looked up sharply, his eyes settling in a by now all-too-familiar expression of resentment as he recognized her.
“This had better be good,” he snapped tersely.
She decided not to waste any words. “I need to get out of here.”
His eyes narrowed. “For what purpose?”
She grimaced, pressing her wrist against her forehead. Fel, the pressure was building fast. “With all due respect, sir, I sincerely doubt I’m going to be of much use here right now.”
He furrowed his brow slightly in minute concern. “If you’re injured, you should get to the infirmary.”
She shook her head with a weary chuckle. “They can’t help me. Not with this.”
His face hardened once more. “If you can’t give me a decent reason as to why I should let you bail—”
The door was flung open once more. “Captain, move out.”
The captain seemed ready to explode as he flew to his feet. “What in Light’s blazes do you think you’re—” Then he cut himself off as he saw the other officer, bedecked in the silver sun tabard of the Argent Dawn.
The other man merely regarded the captain coolly. “My runners have informed me that a demonic assault force is amassing in the shadow of the Portal. By my status as Argent Crusader-General and the current situation, I now have supreme command here. Any questions, captain?”
The captain shut his mouth meekly and stepped away from the office desk, standing to attention without a word.
The general turned to the she-rogue. “You said you wouldn’t be of use here?”
She stared squarely at him, one-eyed at least. Her wrist was still pressed firmly against her forehead.
“Very well. Here’s an excuse for you to leave with immediate effect: you are to report the situation here to the High Commander in Stormwind, by whatever means necessary. Do you think you can do that?”
“… whatever means necessary?”
He nodded.
She let show a lopsided smirk. “I’m in.”
“Good. You are dismissed.” And with that, he immediately turned his attention to the strategic maps and troop accounts spread across the table.
She wasted no less time leaving the office, ploughing through the hubbub in the Keep’s lower levels and exiting the building. The din was even worse outside: men shouting orders, horses whinnying, gryphons howling and beating their wings as they took off. She made her way over to the gryphon master.
“I need a flight to Stormwind, stat!” She had to shout to make herself heard.
He shook his head dejectedly, adjusting his flying goggles. “Sorry, ma’am, but the last transport just left! Ye’re fresh out!”
She facepalmed. “Oh for the love of—”
They were both interrupted as boulders suddenly began raining across the barren expanse of corrupted soil – boulders flickering with twisting, green flame.
“Infernals!” came the panicked cry. “They’re launching Infernals at us!”
“Hold the line!” the General roared as he came sprinting out of the Keep, leaping into his charger’s saddle. “Argent Dawn, launch War Gryphons! Shield wall!”
He turned his head and fixed her with a far more intense stare than his previous disposition would have inferred. “I thought I told you to report!”
“No more gryphons!” She threw up her hands in defence. “No going anywhere!”
The man’s glare shifted into frustrated resignation, but whatever retort he had in store remained unsaid as one of the flaming boulders slammed down mere yards from their position, peppering them with ash and gravel. He shot her one last glance before he stormed off into the ranks of his troops, issuing orders with booming voice.
The boulder unfolded itself in a sickening display of puppet animation, felfire dripping from the crudely hewn sockets where the Infernal’s eyes and mouth would have been. A squadron of War Gryphons swooped in from above, Argent Dawn marksmen peppering the foul construct with arcane-tipped arrows. It bellowed in rage, reaching up and swatting at them with a thick, stony arm. It then stomped forward, its jaw cracking open with a disgusting, grinding sound as it disgorged a wave of green, molten destruction before it, the twisting nether-energies enveloping the infantry. Men screamed in terror and anguish as they were either cooked alive within their own armour or had their flesh slough off their bones like mud.
Biting down on the bile rising in her throat, she darted away through the rubble upended by the maddening assault and came upon another Gryphon squad preparing for launch. A jagged boulder came tumbling across the ground – Light alone knew which Infernal must have tossed it – and scattered the formation in all directions. One of the towering War Gryphons jumped aside, coming to a sliding stop right in front of her, its rider impaled by razor-sharp rock shrapnel.
She didn’t waste the opportunity; seizing the reins, she vaulted onto the massive warsteed’s back and shoved the corpse out of the saddle, taking its place. The Gryphon reared up with a shriek, beating its wings in protest, and she was left to hang on for dear life as it bucked and leapt madly.
“Hey—oi! Calm down, you big bag of feathers—I said calm down!” It ignored her, tossing its head and howling in confusion.
Bereft of all other options, she simply grabbed one of the reins with both hands and yanked the beast’s head around as hard as she could, roaring into its ear: “Stormwind!! Back to Stormwind!!”
It let out a loud snort, planted all four feet into the ground and set off northwards with a loping gallop, its wings beating like thunder, and with one final, powerful shove it lighted into the air.
She spent a few frantic heartbeats fiddling with the rider’s harness until she gave up and buried her hands in the Gryphon’s thick, feathery mane, letting the reins whip freely. She bent down as low as she dared, bowing her head to minimize her air resistance as much as possible. “As fast as you can!” she shouted to her impromptu carrier. “Just fly!”
It snorted again and picked up the beat until the tears on her cheeks came only from the wind whipping her face and the only sound she could hear was the deafening rush of air.
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Originally written by Tuan Taureo
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