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The various guards and drudges of the Sons of Lothar went about their multitudinous chores, in much the same way as they always did and had for the past decade and a half. The fortification had long since adjusted to its manpower being constantly at a premium, and those living in it were not going to grow lax due to the recent influx of material and military support from their only just re-established superiors in faraway Azeroth. Hence, personnel rotations ground in years ago remained firmly in place, every single man and woman knowing exactly what was expected of them in every waking moment. These were people that had weathered the charge into an entirely unfamiliar world, withstood the full fury of the Legion’s machinations and endured through and beyond the climactic destruction of Draenor and the momentous resealing of the Dark Portal that was even now ferrying fresh supplies and soldiers to bolster the battlefront raging beneath the Stair of Destiny. In a way, they had become the epitome of the tenacity inherent in the Alliance’s finest, and it would take quite a display of power to jostle them from their stoically carried-out duties.
Such as the dark and brooding Hellfire Citadel, far away along the gruesome Path of Glory, suddenly becoming enveloped in a blazing spike of surging felflame that could be seen across the entire region.
Trained warsteeds nickered and stamped their feet nervously as a faint tremor ran through the very bedrock itself (what remained of it, at any rate), and those versed in the mythical arts could swear on their ancestral graves that they heard a demonically charged roar of vindictive rage roll through their minds like the buffet of air that follows a distant explosion.
Trollbane was already on the topmost rampart of the main keep, gripping the worn stone tightly with gauntleted hands as he stared, eyes cold and hard, at the flaring beacon that even now had begun to fade away. His lieutenants were behind him, talking agitatedly among themselves, but he paid them no heed.
“Light help me, if I have sent you three to your doom …” he whispered hoarsely, bowing his head and shutting his eyes tightly to hold back the tears of regret that kept burning just behind his eyelids.
“Commander Trollbane! Through the northwest gate! They are back!”
Danath snapped his eyes open at the watchpost’s ringing cry and stared with renewed intensity over the parapet. Indeed, three mounts – a fully-armoured Paladin charger, a tall, agitated palomino and a lean, darkly coloured Sabercat had just come galloping at full tilt through the hastily opened gate, the riders now calming their heaving mounts in the courtyard as stable hands and medics rushed up to them.
The Commander let his head drop once more, this time with a deep sigh of profound relief as the chatter of his fellow officers shifted to the miraculous but nevertheless triumphant return of the intrepid ‘scouts’. As the highest ranking officer of the fortification, it was his duty and eternal burden to be ultimately responsible for sending his troops into the field, and it was always with a heavy heart that he would receive and archive the inevitable reports of those fallen in battle. To him, as any military superior, it was a genuine reprieve when soldiers returned alive – it meant that many less costly sacrifices made in the protection of the tenuous foothold that the Honor Hold represented in this twisted, broken land.
He wasted no time requesting the heroes’ immediate presence within his situation room.
~||~
“… a Pit Lord?!”
The other lieutenants present flinched noticeably at the Commander’s outburst. He quickly cleared his throat and recomposed himself.
“Name’s Magtheridon, near as we could tell,” Tuan continued her monotone account of the group’s rather eventful three-main raid into the forbidding stronghold. She had already discarded the bloodied sack in which the warlock Keli’dan’s head had been brought back to the Hold as a grisly trophy.
Danath stared at her with widening eyes, the colour draining ever so slightly from his face. “Are you suggesting that—”
“That Illidan the Betrayer did not kill the Pit Lord upon his assault and subsequent takeover of the Black Temple,” Theluin finished with his melodious baritone. “Indeed so.” Danath silently put a palm over his face.
“It gets ev’n more interestin’ than that, sir,” Eleazar chimed in. The Paladin, still wearing his battle-scarred golden armour, nodded to the she-rogue to continue.
Tuan duly recounted the ghastly experiments, the blood-curdling manufacturing facilities and the blasphemous purpose for which the gargantuan demon lord had, obviously, been kept alive. Her voice remained level throughout, but both of her companions noticed how her eyes would flash every so often with a dark fury, and none of them blamed her. Neither of the three had yet fully digested the horrific sights they had been witness to over the past couple of hours.
Danath began pacing in a small circle, his hand to his chin in intense deliberation.
“I have to admit,” Tuan chirped with only slightly unnecessary merriment, “it sure took that big lug some sweet time before he started tearing stuff up.”
Eleazar glanced wearily at the incorrigible woman. “We did make sure ta leave in quite a hurry, Miss Tuan.”
She put up a hand, letting the banter drop. “Just saying.”
Danath suddenly stopped. “… it would make sense, wouldn’t it?”
The three heroes looked up at him quizzically.
The Commander turned to them. “You said that these Orc Warlocks were harvesting Magtheridon’s blood to create more Fel Orcs under Illidan’s command?”
All three nodded in concert.
Danath resumed his thoughtful wandering. “If they have been draining him since his defeat and subsequent imprisonment, then it stands to reason to assume that right now, he’s in a considerably weakened state – especially given the fact that all those portals that once fed him his reinforcements were shut down years ago.” Trollbane paused for a moment, and turned on his heel, eyes far away and unseeing. “Illidan is a slippery fellow … insane as he may be, he’s not an idiot. He would have some kind of failsafe in place just in case Magtheridon would attempt to break free.”
Theluin nodded slowly. “The Betrayer was once counted among the most prodigious of demon hunters known to the Kaldorei. As much as his demonic transformation may have altered his state of mind, it was hardly a strategic maladroit that conquered the Black Temple and had Mannoroth’s second-in-command dragged back to his own Citadel in chains.”
Danath turned to them once more. “You have primarily moved through the external fortifications of the Citadel, correct?”
Eleazar nodded.
Danath wandered back to the situation table and began shuffling the papers around. “Then that leaves the inner sanctum, along with Kargath. This might actually play to our advantage.”
Eleazar hesitated, shuffling his feet discreetly. “Um … ‘scuse me, sir, but Kargath who exactly?”
The Commander didn’t look up. “Kargath Bladefist. Yes, the Bladefist. He’s been a constant thorn in our sides since the day we first drove him and his clan from the Citadel. After Magtheridon entered the scene, the Pit Lord empowered Kargath and his remaining warriors, and together they retook the Citadel. I lost a lot of good men that day.” Danath’s shoulders tensed slightly for the briefest moment as he picked up a paper and put it away again. “Needless to say, we assumed they were all slain when Illidan showed up and claimed the title ‘Lord of Outland’ for himself.” The Commander let out a heavy sigh and leaned his hands onto the tabletop. “Instead, we found those Fel Orcs still well-ensconced within the Citadel, and we’ve been trading skirmishes with them ever since.” He shook his head despondently. “Never dared to think those two things would be connected like this …”
“So what’s the advantage?” Tuan asked matter-of-factly, blatantly ignoring the odd glances from her companions as well as the other officers in the room.
Danath straightened himself, but he kept his back to the trio, putting his clenched hands on his hips. “Since you only went into the outer part of the Citadel, that leaves Kargath and his closest followers unaccounted for. However … he just might become the roadblock in Magtheridon’s path that we need right now. With the Pit Lord struggling to break free, Kargath will have his blades caked just containing the situation.”
Tuan cracked a little smirk. “Glad to hear we didn’t completely screw up.”
The Commander finally turned around, looking directly at the she-rogue with a weary, lopsided smile. “If anything, you’ve done the absolute opposite. I sent you out to scout the Citadel proper and bring back any information you might find critical – and what do you do? You take out the entire lower echelon of their command chain and throw the hugest spanner into their works that I’ve ever seen.”
The she-rogue threw an aloof pose. “All in a day’s work.” Theluin shot Danath a mildly apologetic smile.
The latter quickly sobered up, pulling an armoured hand through his waning hair. “There’s one thing left that bothers me. Make that two, actually. These … victims that you saw … are you absolutely certain they were brown-skinned orcs?”
“Pos’tive, sir,” Eleazar quipped back with a salute.
Danath’s features hardened. “That’s what I was afraid of. If they could use these … processing methods to turn indigenous Draenic orcs into fel-blooded monstrosities, then they would most likely be able to do the same with the green-skinned ones coming through the Portal right now, alongside our reinforcements.” He sighed and rubbed his face. “Hopefully your little visit will have stymied them enough to keep that from happening.”
“Thrall has every reason to be opposed to the Legion, possibly even more so than all the peoples of the Alliance put together,” Theluin interjected quietly. “He stood alongside Grom Hellscream himself, the very Orc that once led their entire race down that first dark path, as they together tore Mannoroth’s life from his body and the bloodcurse from their veins. Thrall will not suffer his kindred consorting with the daemonic again.”
“Unless they’re a’ready covertly part o’ the Shadow Council, or harburrin’ sympathetic opinions towards ‘em.” Eleazar added.
“And that brings me to the second point,” Danath cut in, stepping up to them, Tuan in particular. “The orc warlocks that were doing the legwork on Magtheridon himself … you mentioned that they were green-skinned.”
Tuan nodded.
Danath glanced over at Theluin and Eleazar. “Shadow Council, then?”
“The tendrils of the Shadow Council run far and deep, Commander,” Theluin replied, his tranquil, glowing eyes meeting the Commander’s gaze head-on. “This world was once their primary staging point. We cannot exempt them from any matters that deal with the dominion of shattered Draenor.”
Danath nodded slowly, turning back to the situation table again without a further word.
Tuan shifted her feet and rolled her eyes. “… so?”
The Commander shot a glance over his shoulder. “… ah. Yes. I suppose you’ve done as much as could be asked of you.” He shuffled a few stray papers into their intended stacks and turned back to them one last time, straightening up in his full length. “I understand that each of you have duties that will eventually carry you all away from here, but know this: the Sons of Lothar are forever in your debt, and should you ever require our aid, it will be yours. For the Light and glory.” He saluted them solemnly.
“Lux et gloriam,” Eleazar responded on cue, saluting in return.
“Elune’adore,” Theluin replied, bowing smoothly.
Tuan smiled rakishly, but there was a genuine glint in her eyes as she threw a decidedly sloppy salute back at the Commander. “Gonna keep that in mind, sir.”
~||~
Eli allowed himself a deep heave of a sigh when the trio exited the keep. “Thank the Light that’s over with …”
“Come now, Eli,” Tuan chimed out, a couple steps ahead of the Paladin and Priest. “I seem to recall a certain someone virtually leaping at the idea of giving that gnarly old Citadel a visit earlier.”
Eli sighed again and closed his eyes for a moment. “… I wouldn’ exactly call my reply to yer … recruiting methods … leaping, Miss Tuan.” He pulled off one of his gauntlets and combed his still sweat-dampened hair vigorously. “But, well … t’was an interestin’ experience, all in all, I’ll give ya that much.”
The she-rogue spun on her heel, walking backwards and putting her hands behind her head, grinning all the while. “Glad you enjoyed it.”
The Paladin pushed the gauntlet back on, his eyes falling to the hard-packed earth in front of him as the odd conglomerate of friends continued on their slightly meandering way back to the inn for some direly needed rest and recuperation. Tuan duly caught notice of his morose expression.
“Hey. What’s with the look,” she called out again, ornery as ever.
Eli couldn’t keep himself from flinching. He couldn’t quite look her in the eye. “… yeh heard th’ Commander. We’re free to keep doing what we’re here for, and … well … I guess that means …”
“Hmm. True.” Tuan spun back around, resuming a more proper form of walking – if the word ‘proper’ could ever be applied to the she-rogue’s constant, careless style of nonchalant swagger.
Eli jumped slightly when the woman suddenly spoke up again. “You know, as amusing as this has been so far, it hasn’t really helped my actual job description much. Sure, I ran into all sortsa neat happenstances and got me a nice shiny new set of contacts to prod if I never a quick airlift or something, and that romp just now were all kinds of a hoot.”
The Paladin glared with no small resentment at her back as she went on glibly, seemingly oblivious to his own turmoil.
“Buuuuuuuut I still need to find information I can actually use.” She suddenly spun around again, walking backwards on her heels, hands tucked into her pockets as she beamed a supremely rapscallious grin back at her two companions, and Eli had to struggle to keep his face neutral.
“Now that I think about it, I got all this work done simply by hanging around you guys. So, if I keep hanging around, I just might run into the happenstance I need.”
Eli blinked back at her, momentarily caught off guard. “… meaning …?”
Her grin became, incredibly enough, even more infuriatingly cheery. “That you two just might get landed with me a while longer, Lightbulb.” With that, she spun back around, resuming her splendorous trek back to the inn, leaving the other two behind with her long-legged strides.
Eli inhaled hard, fighting furiously to keep his emotions under control. Theluin put a gentle hand on the incensed Paladin’s shoulder. “There, there,” the Priest murmured quietly.
Eli breathed out explosively. “She really likes to make it difficult,” he grumbled under his breath. Then he caught himself, and his weathered features became pensive. “She’s copin’ with this pretty easily, isn’ she?”
Theluin raised his sculpted eyebrows quizzically.
Eli gestured vaguely. “Well … r’member how she wus an absolute wreck when we got to Nethergarde Keep? An’ then the Portal after that, an’ all the fuss she’s been makin’ here at the Hold … where’d that headache go all’a’sudd’n?” He glanced uneasily at his ancient friend. “I’m just wonderin’, s’all.”
Theluin turned his gaze forward, but his forehead wrinkled ever so slightly in thought. “She has been turning to my herb supplies quite regularly for that infusion,” he eventually mused out loud.
“But that shouldn’t make such a difference, should it?”
The elderly Kaldorei didn’t reply, but an odd glint settled into his eyes.
Eli remained silent for a few more steps, and then he ventured, very quietly: “S’been about half a week since that ambush on th’ Path o’ Glory, hasn’t it?”
“Yes,” Theluin replied, just as quietly. “It has.”
Neither of them said it as they kept walking towards the inn, but they were both thinking it: the unfortunate Fel Orc Warlock that had been caught in the full discharge of the she-rogue’s sudden, inexplicable rage and practically mana-drained to death as a result – by the woman’s own hand.
Finally, as they were mere steps away from the inn entrance, Eli drew a deep breath and blurted out: “You don’t suppose—”
“All things in time,” the Night Elven Priest interrupted in the same, low voice as before. “All things in time.”
They entered the inn in silence.
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Originally written by Tuan Taureo
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