By Way of Ending Introduction

Funny how with traveling companions, the longest journey seems to pass so easily.  Brother Earth spoke to me at length about things, and as he spoke and I listened, I began to appreciate life again.  With his guidance, I was able to start the process of, not so much healing, as coming to terms with the thing I had become.  I resolved that the only way to make up to my family, and my people, the things that I had done was to do my best to help out everyone that I could.  This would be hard, having seen my reflection in the river.  I was hideous.

It was a long journey to Tranquillien.  The town had changed so much I hardly recognized it, but at least it was there.  I befriended a whore there, after she got over her terror and disgust at the sight of me.  Trellindra was her name, and she was a beauty.  She also knew a priest who would do her favors in the ways of healing in return for favors of the kind she could provide.  The priest told her that what was wrong with me was beyond his ability to repair, and told her that she should not associate with me…that I was a danger to her.  Of course he could not fix me, for his Eternals are a sham.  True healing comes from other means.  She, thankfully, did not listen to him and she let me stay with her in return for protection.  She did buy me a gorgeous red and gold mask to wear, so that I might go about town without frightening people.  It was the mask of an ancient brotherhood of ascetic elven monks that died off in the Second War during the first days of invasion.  Now they are worn by those who have some sort of vow they had taken and would prefer not to be spoken to.  It was ingenious, that idea.  One that I thank Trillindra for to this day, when I think about her.

Just when I thought that I might be enjoying life in the company of my people again, healing the sick here and there, helping the needy with whatever things I could do…sort of a holy handyman, you might say, it was then that Arthas and his Scourge boiled out of the Greenwood Pass, determined to reach the Sunwell.  The call went up throughout the kingdom for every available warrior to answer the call.

Of course I went.  By now brother Fire had made himself known to me, and he assured me that this was the reason I was back in the Woods…to purge myself of old regrets in the flame of new conflict.

And so I fought.  I fought the Scourge at every opportunity.  I fell back with the rest of our forces as they drove their way inexorably toward Silvermoon.  We locked the gates and got ready to withstand a siege.

And then the Traitor sold out his entire race and one night the Scourge attacked us in our sleep.  Brother Earth woke me in the very early morning, screaming in my mind that something was wrong and that I needed to go now.  I woke everyone in the barracks, and we poured out into the square as the first monsters rounded the corner.  Leading this group was Arthas himself.  He gestured…some great, black monster raced toward me…and I remember nothing after that until the following day.

I awoke on a beach, across the strait from the Sunwell Isle.  I was not wounded.  I had fled again.  I dropped to my knees and despaired.

It was not your fault, brother, Earth told me, Arthas is a Death Knight, he ensorcelled you and your fellows with a mighty fear spell, driving you all off the cliff to your west.  I was able to save you with my brother Water’s help but only just.  You did all that you could.  Shield yourself, something awful is about to happen.

I dropped into the fetal position...and the Sunwell exploded.  The blast of energy buffeted past me and I stood and looked at Sunwell plateau.  I could see a line of Scourge snaking its way up the side.  Then the golden light that came from the Sunwell turned suddenly into a loathsome sickly purple.  Banshee wails cried out from near the perverted well, and I knew I had to flee quickly or be consumed by the vile energies emanating from it.

I found a group of survivors, and we fled into the mountains.  I watched as my brethren became listless and hopeless.  I was not affected by the loss of the Sunwell as they were since I now had the elements to guide me and infuse me with their magic, so I did what I could to help them.  It would not be enough to bring them back to full health but did give them enough of a spark to continue living.  Years passed, and we huddled in our mountain glade, fearing that the Scourge would find us any day.  We barely survived, scratching out a meager crop and supplemented by hunting.

I never saw Trellindra again.

Then, two years ago, rangers finally found us.  They told us that Silvermoon was to be retaken, and we would rebuild our Kingdom under the Regent Lor'themar Theron, and that our Prince was alive and that he was working to restore us to our former glory!  Of course we all came, and began rebuilding the deserted, but relatively undamaged eastern half of Silvermoon.

Of course, after that was done, we had to purge the Blackened Woods of the evils that had taken up residence, and the putrid undead pouring from the Dead Scar.  We had finally, finally finished that task, and it was this event…the final cleansing, that had brought me to Thrall, chief chest-thumper of the green monkeys.

Who was still waiting for my answer, you will recall.

“Yes, Your Excellency,” I told Thrall, “I am here at the behest of my Regent and your associate, our own fallen Sylvanas…” I gritted my teeth a moment and continued, “to give you this letter in which we prove to you that our millennia old race has the capacity…has proven our right…to join in alliance with…your various peoples of the Horde.”

I almost vomited.

“Your mill…” Thrall began, then trailed off, a quizzical look on his face, “very well, let me see what you have, Emissary.”

He broke the seal of Sylvanas to read what she had added to the letter of introduction from Regent Lor'themar Theron.  I rapidly regained composure, fighting down the bile.

“So the blood elves finally took care of their little problem,” Thrall said, nodding, “Never mind that it took your help as well as that of an entire Forsaken regiment to get the job done.”

And then he laughed.  As if my destroying the corrupted form of the traitor Dar’khan Drathir and laying low the entire stronghold of Deathholme was some minor accomplishment…as if the work of my sin’dorei brethren in rebuilding our capital and pacifying our lands was a matter of trivia.  As if that cadre of walking corpses had had a damned thing to do with the final assault on the Traitor’s fortress.  No, in the end, it had been my own squad and four other squads of hardened elves that brought low the Traitor.  I fumed, holding myself from striking him again.

“I suppose there's no stopping this,” he said with a sigh, of regret it seemed, “In the end we need them just as much as they need us.”

Thrall walked to a cabinet near his throne and pulled out a medallion and handed it to me.  “Take this to their Regent,” he said, “it is the Mark of the Horde.  Tell him it binds our alliance.”

I bowed, and then corrected the beast, “My Regent, you mean.”

He looked at me, again, strangely, and said, “Uh…hmmm.  Your…your regent?”

“Yes, dammit, I am sin’dorei!  Thanks to your butchers, it is no longer apparent, but inside this grotesquerie is an elven heart, hollowed out like a Hallow’s End gourd and then smashed upon the ground, but still the same from before the time when our world was…” I stopped, suddenly, on the verge of going too far.  Thrall stood with his mouth agape, and his guards, hands on hilts, glanced between each other with consternation.

“Your Excellency…forgive me,” I ground out, issuing the very slightest of bows, “At times I am plagued by events of the past, and it makes me…irrational.  I shall bring word to Regent Lor'themar, as you say.  My thanks.”

Thrall opened and closed his mouth a couple of times, as if he was going to speak and then thought better of it.  Finally, looking slightly to my left, his eyes lost focus.  A moment later, he nodded, took a deep breath and said, “I am sorry, good elf, I was not aware.  Firstly the mask you wear…and then especially…with you being a shaman…I just assumed that you were not sin’dorei.  I beg your pardon if I have issued insult.”

I was momentarily nonplussed.  One of the green apes, apologizing?  Maybe the Forsaken had been giving the orcs lessons in etiquette.  “Of course,” I said, bowing a little deeper than last time…he had just apologized, ape or no, so I owed him that at least, “As I said, it is the past…memories are sometimes worse for those of us that live for thousands of years.”

Thrall nodded, looking very intently at me, “I see.  Yes, I imagine it could be very bad.  Do you require anything else, Emissary?”  I believed that there was a tone of dismissal.

“No, your Excellency, thank you,” I said, taking three steps backward and turning about, as if I was at court in Silvermoon.  I am sure the nicety was lost on the savages.

You know that there was no way you could have beaten him, my brother Fire said to me as we left, he is mighty in the ways of my brothers and you are not…yet.  Your spark would have been lost in his conflagration.

“Yes,” I said out loud, spooking a passing troll, “thank you for reinforcing my inadequacy, Brother, yes I know that I could not have beaten him.  But to try would have felt very good, and if he had killed me, then it would be over, would it not?”

What good would that have done my Brother Earth asked, always taking the long view.  Of course he would not understand vengeance.  That was the purview of Fire, after all.

“It would maybe have given honor to those dead from the past.  To strike at the prancing leader of the monkeys, pretending to be equal to us in his palace of mud…yes, that might have done my fallen brethren a turn for the good.”

Patience, brother Water said to me, trying as always to soothe me, to bring me back from the edge, If you recklessly attack everything that offends you, you will not fulfill the prophecy and bring your people to victory.  And remember, you cannot redeem yourself by trying to fix the past.  It is done.

I sighed.  “You are right as always, Brothers.  My thanks for your continued guidance, you who are my only real friends.”

The elements bathed me in their love, and I left the city of orcs, happy to be gone from the place.