return

An honored Ranger, coming with many an accolade, attached to a noble family.  Retainer of the House with plenty of freedom.  Captain of the Guard, directly of service to his Lordship.  A calm force, the temperance to his fits of rage. 

Most importantly, covertly protecting him against his willful and dangerous son.

Despite my best efforts, my Lord made some big mistakes.  There were whisperings of a bastard child.  Then, the sad and lovely Lady of the House disappeared under...questionable circumstances.  To add insult to injury, my Lord embroiled himself in things above his head, and his House was ultimately betrayed and destroyed during the Scourge invasion of Quel’thalas. 

My Lord fell to the very hand of his own dark son, I might point out.  ...What?  The bastard had it coming.

He watched as the dwarven woman walked away. A soft smile came to his weary face. "Thank you, Lorith Stonegarten..." He turned and paced over to the small slope, at the edge of the lake. He slipped a plated gauntlet off and touched his finger to the water, watching it rippled for a moment, before it froze solid, into a glass like mirror. He stared long and hard at himself for the moment. "...Daroth Malichai...Do you even remember who YOU were?" He closed his eyes, and went back in time...

Hot tea…While the cups she had while staying with the Argent Vanguard had been bland in comparison to previous ones she had savored, they still had the euphoric effect of refreshing old memories that came with the warmth and taste.  Cups shared with friends and colleagues at a table in one of the inns or in the comfort of a charming cake shop.  Cups shared at the estate, smiling across the table at her friend, love, and husband as they took sanctuary in themselves from the turmoil of Silvermoon’s politics.

She frowned at her reflection in the tea, the bitter reminder settling in like the leaves at the bottom of the cup: her more recent cups had been savored alone.

The nobles danced and talked beneath their masks, he noted as he made his way through the crowd talking to the occasional guest and making himself quite the host, especially with the fine and “noble” ladies of the night. He sent them off with a laugh, their presence greatly appreciated from the male patrons of his party. He nodded with a sense of satisfaction as he approached the stairs going to the rooftop, exiting himself away from the party. As he emerged from the door to the roof, there stood three of his greatest friends, entrepreneurs all. He raises his glass with infinite glee, filled with wine and ill-gained success.

I returned home this weekend, for the first time in months.

Though my fire burned in anger against the scourge all this time, it could not warm me as her smile.

Our son is nearly a year old.

This is cause to celebrate.

To tell the world his name.

Joyously, I await my love's choice.

Leaning back in the worn, dingy hammock, she stared at the rotting wooden planks that consisted of the ceiling, trying to summon some kind of entertainment from them; it was a terrible failure.  She had understood the risks and sacrifices that would need to be taken, what she'd be giving up once the paralytic toxins took hold and the dagger sliced through his arteries.  It was all too hasty, too hasty.  Of course she wouldn't be so forward.  No matter.  That want for revenge...it seemed to slip away, one more emotion consumed by the overwhelming apathy that comes with a job finished with no satisfaction.  And now where was she?  Taking sanctuary in the Underbelly of Dalaran.  She let out a quiet, bitter chuckle at the term: sanctuary.  No different from prison, really, except you pick the accomodations.  She rolled over, facing the entrance of the room, watching as a sewer rat scurried across the floor, sniffing for any scrap of food.  It bolted in squeaking terror as a throwing knife struck the wood a few centimeters away from its twitching whiskery nose.  No, this wasn't the way to be...She scratched her head  through the material of her cowl, her eyes catching sight of a group of chattering sin'dorei.  An idea started taking root in her brain; shallow roots, but quickly digging in.  She sat up and ushered the barmaid close as she wandered by, "Oy, 'ere's some coin.  Buy th' girl there a drink."

The Legion probably wanted a body before they'd be satisfied.  She could manage that.

I sat in my chair and shivered, eyes never leaving the bed adjacent to me. The being who occupied it was one I have known for quite some time, he lay sleeping what I hoped was comfortably now, his wounds seen to by my Gelis. Blood still seeped from my own wounds, the prefect set of teeth mark in my neck and the ragged lines where his nails had torn open my tattooed chest. I wondered who would wake up with the shock of red hair and face that told me it was Iloam. It wasn’t his sunken features or his extent of injuries acquired not only in the demon realm but for his violent return to this world that I was worried about and it wasn’t Iloam that worried me, it had been the eyes set in the face that I knew was his.

The crackle of arcane energies disturbed the layer of dust that had accumulated on the apartment’s floor. The energies coalesced and focused as the portal opened and the mage stepped through.

Sinobel sighed, and snuggled deeper into the furs which covered her chair in her private Venomspite apartment.  The soft warmth did little to assuage the constant cold she felt deep inside her, body and soul, since her and Alainthal's return to the land of the living. 

She chuckled despite herself - funny she should call it that, when here she was, the only flesh-and-blood inhabitant of a Forsaken town in the middle of the Dragonblight. 

But the chill of Northrend was not the cold which haunted her, and the Forsaken in their current state were more alive than she had felt until very recently.

Her eyes lidded and her thoughts wandered as she stared out the window, through the blue-white gnarled Dragonblight trees she favored, and into the bleak scenery of a darkening Dragonblight sunset...

The months had been slow, peaceful, fullfilling.

Ythika, my love, my wife. She spends her days training, fighting, somtimes simply sitting in the garden of our Sanctum, surrounded by my creations. She is so regal, hands resting upon her stomach, listening to the child within, watching Ashe as she wanders about the twisted yet beautiful creations I have made.

She is distant at times, but she has always been as such. Her past haunts her, her mind still conflicted.

Unlike mine, no, mine is once again complete. A single entity.

Death, Hatred, they are no longer. There is only Corruption. I am corruption. My Sanctum is full of my beautiful creations, twisted and perverted creatures of nature. I love them with a artists passion, for they were born of my hands, my creativity.

It's time to venture out again, to give my Creations new lands to explore. Azshara has become dull and uninteresting them.

Perhaps Tesstirina will have use of them...

"While I find this entire matter utterly preposterous, I suppose I can understand why some have become so focused on this case. Just the other day, Billy, he said to me 'Ollivar' he says, 'This thing talked to me, it did. Like a person, but weren't really. Like a ghost, but it weren't either. Said we got more to worry about. What d'you figure that means?' Poor Billy, it's work stress." --Officer Glanville, Stormwind Guard

Their tabard is of a tree with all its leaves shorn off, yet still it stands. I should have known those roots go deep.

The cloth hangs now between my fingers, and in the deep light of evening those bare branches are hardly seen on their inky ground. Now and again I feel a tear, a frayed edge of the garment, a hardened place where blood has dried. I have not washed and mended it yet, Lord Elrin Kast's tabard. But I will.

Eleventh month, sixteenth day, on the year of the return of the King.

((The future))

Doric Steelhands' expedition to Tanaris was a resounding success.  The written materials found, as well as the other artifacts at the site, secured his place in academia.  Of course, the inevitable book and book tour came in due time.  Doric Steelhands became a much sought-after lecturer, as the insights he gained into the Scourge War by the journal proved to be priceless.

However, as the years went on, he never stopped wondering.  What exactly happened to Raealle de Bouillon when she left the desert?  Did she even make it out alive?  Did she ever find the peace she was looking for?

He would spend the rest of his days searching every known database for the answers to these questions.  He never did.

((Two years ago))

My return was eminent; it only took the right motivation to return to a place that no longer held what it used to. Master Blackmarrow was gone, and no matter how far I stretched my watchers, I can’t seem to find him, I imagine my fate will be the same someday. Evil people are never met with happy endings, we fade from existence or go out in something messy and devastating, perhaps he is still out there, and if he is I will find him, but for now I have other problems to deal with.

It hadn't worked...

It was still there...

And there was nothing I could do about it. 

It was easier than I expected. I didn't have to go into the Undercity or see any of the horrors that guard the corridors and entrances to that place. The Orb was placed outside, in the Courtyard. I simply walked up to it and triggered it.