by William King
With casual strength, Illidan backhanded Vandel away. “The end of all things approaches, and I have no time to waste on fools. If you would have your vengeance, seek me out.”
Darkness flickered across Vandel’s field of vision. The updrafts of the burning village drove smoke and sparks into his face. When his sight cleared, Illidan was gone, leaving Vandel alone amid the ruins of his suddenly shattered life.
Mockery dripped from the demonic voice in his head. He spoke the truth. You know that now. You knew it as soon as you had time to absorb your grief. You spent all the long years of your wandering trying to find him. Now you have. Too late for it to do you any good. You are mine, and I will have you.
The scene shimmered. The village vanished. Vandel stood naked and alone in a tortured landscape. He had no weapons. In front of him stood the felhound he thought he had killed, alive and well. Only one thing was different. It possessed the eyes of a night elf. It took him only a moment to realize that they were identical to his own.
The creature stalked forward. Its movements were confident, those of a hunter that knew its prey couldn’t escape, that was going to take its time toying with it. Vandel flexed his hands. They were empty. He glanced around, seeking an edged rock, a boulder, anything he might use as a weapon. There was nothing. Claws scratched the stone in front of him. The felhound had taken the opportunity to close the distance between them. It reared up, huge mouth open wide.
Vandel caught the jaws just before they could close on his throat. Their points slashed the flesh of his fingers. He scrambled for a purchase that was not razor-edged, inserted his fingers into the flap of flesh between gum and lip. His right hand was not so fortunate. It snagged on sharp teeth. The pain was agonizing. The tingling of the flesh where demon saliva touched did nothing to ease the torment. It seemed to amplify it.
This is not real, he told himself.
It is very real, and if you die here in this spell-born dream, you die forever, and I will have your soul and your body. Already I have infected you. Already I can use your skills, your thoughts. Already I am so much more than I once was.
He tried to pull the jaws apart, but it took all his strength to keep them from closing. The teeth sawed into his fingers. He knew it was only a matter of time before he lost this struggle.
He lowered his head, trying to get it out of reach of the snapping jaws by resting it against the demon hound’s short neck. The creature’s claws bit into his unprotected chest, ripping strands of flesh free, tearing ribbons from muscle and rib. He knew he had only one chance. He let go of the beast’s jaws, got his body underneath it, and raised it on high. It struggled frantically, trying to overbalance him. He held it above his head then brought it down, snapping its spine across his knee.
The felhound thrashed, all control of its limbs lost. Vandel brought his foot down on its throat and crushed its windpipe until it stopped moving.
Then driven by an instinct he could not understand, he kicked open its squelching stomach, reached into its chest cavity, and pulled out its heart. He held it up, squeezed green blood from the ventricles into his mouth, and then devoured the meat.
It tingled as it went down, but this time he felt he was gaining strength from it. The world shimmered and went dark. Nausea filled him. He fell forward over the body of his enemy. A wrenching, tearing sensation tugged at his bowels.
He stood above his own corpse where it sprawled atop the dead felhound. Slowly, impelled by some external force, his spirit rose and drifted out into the blackness. He saw that Outland was but a tiny speck in the infinity of the Great Dark Beyond. A tiny worldlet that floated in a void too vast for any mind to encompass. He became aware that all around him in that void were millions upon millions of worlds, teeming with life and glittering with promise.
He focused on one and saw a golden land, bright with sunshine, where a carefree people harvested. Then he saw a portal tear open in the fabric of reality. Through that rent poured the unstoppable forces of the Burning Legion, invincible armies of demons, bent only on destruction and slaughter.
All of this had happened many years ago. Long before the Legion had ever reached Azeroth, it had smashed its way across countless worlds, destroying everything that got in its path. Its sole relentless purpose was to kill.
There were times and places where the Legion was halted, but it always came back, stronger than before. Sometimes worlds were not destroyed; they were conquered and incorporated into the Legion’s structure, producing more soldiers to feed its unceasing war engine.
He was not the only parent who had ever lost a child to the Legion. Every moment, somewhere, ten thousand children were killed by its unrelenting savagery.
Images of innumerable dead worlds flickered through his mind. He saw gigantic ruins, toppled buildings that had once reached the sky, lakes of glass where proud cities had once stood, endless plains of rubble. He saw the lights of life in the universe winking slowly out until only a few remained.
He never doubted the truth of what he was seeing. The Burning Legion left behind a trail of smoldering worlds in its wake.
There was madness here on an incomprehensible scale. The Legion existed only to destroy. It would not stop until everything everywhere was dead, and then it would turn on itself with all its savagery until nothing remained. It was a vision of unspeakable horror. The worst of it was that he knew now how strong the Legion was. Nowhere in all the worlds in all existence was any force capable of defeating it.
Now you know the truth. Join us. The voice was back. This time there was a wheedling, pleading note, but he sensed the same hunger lay behind it.
Never.
Reality shifted. He stood amid the shattered heart of a tower. A carpet of blackened bones crunched beneath his feet. A felhound lurched forward, determined to kill him. He stooped, picked up a broken rib, and stabbed the demon through the heart. It was easier this time and he felt stronger, as if each time he slew the beast, he gained part of its strength. Once again, he opened its chest cavity, drank its blood, and devoured its heart.
A titanic vision smashed into his brain. This time he saw not just one universe but a near infinity of them, a complex fractal structure, where new worlds were born each minute from the decisions made a heartbeat before.
Everywhere the Burning Legion marched, destroying world after world. Every death narrowed the range of possible worlds, till eventually all the multitude of possibilities narrowed to but a few. In every one of them, the Legion marched triumphant, leaving futures stillborn and presents empty of all life. He saw countless Azeroths, countless Vandels, and countless Khariels, and to every one of them came death. He saw his child die in an infinity of different ways, and in every one of those possible worlds, he was powerless to prevent it.
In every world, in every future, the Burning Legion strode, invincible, unstoppable, dooming the universe to eternal darkness in its wake. Behind it all, he saw the looming demonic figures of its leaders: Archimonde—who was believed dead by so many—Kil’jaeden, and above all others, Sargeras the fallen titan, once sworn to guard the universe, now bent on destroying it.
On and on the visions roared, tearing through his brain, goading him to the edge of madness and beyond. And every time he saw one, part of him died, and the demon within him fed on his agony and gloated. He covered his eyes with his hands, but it did not stop the horrors from flowing in. He squeezed his eyes tight shut, but still he saw and saw and saw, until he could bear no more.
Drowning in horror, he inserted his fingers into his eye sockets, feeling the blood flow and the jelly puncture beneath his nails. He pulled and pulled and pulled, straining against muscle and optic nerve until his eyeballs came free with a hideous sucking sound.
At the last moment, before horror overwhelmed him, he realized this was what Illidan once saw. This was what had turned him into what he was. The Betrayer had walked this path before him. This whole ritual was intended to re-create his experience.
Pain seared through Van
del’s skull.
Darkness.
Silence.
—
VANDEL WOKE IN AGONY. He had no idea where he was. He could see nothing around him, only flickers of shimmering light. He reached up and touched his ruined face with fumbling fingers and found, as he had feared he would, that his eye sockets were empty. He had indeed torn out his eyes.
Fear flashed through him. Was he alive? He could see nothing. Perhaps he had died in the aftermath of the ritual. Perhaps his soul wandered in that cold wasteland where it had drifted during its voyage. Fragments of memory returned to haunt him, shards of the terrible vision eating the demon’s heart had given him. He could recall only a tiny portion of what he had seen. He was grateful he could not remember more. The mind was not meant to hold such a tidal wave of horror.
He tried to stand upright but felt himself totter and fall. His head banged into the cold stone and sent tiny flickers through the darkness around him. He allowed himself to hope that perhaps it was his sight returning, but he knew it was not. He was blind and he was useless.
Mad laughter bubbled from his lips. He had wanted the power to kill demons. Now he could not even see. He had been filled with the desire to oppose the Burning Legion, and now he knew it was invincible.
Hopelessness flooded through his mind. Somewhere deep inside him, a demon was feeding. It took nourishment from his bleak mood and gloated over every crumb of wretchedness.
He would have wept if he still could. He covered his empty eye sockets in despair.
Guards in glittering chest plates, mounted on armored elekk, watched Maiev approach impassively. Their tabards bore the sign of the naaru. She guessed they had looked upon far more imposing armies than her own. Shattrath was far and away the largest city she had seen in Outland, a rival in size for any of the great metropolises of Azeroth. The walls were so huge and thick, a procession of clefthoof-drawn wagons could have marched along behind the battlements and Maiev would not have known. A huge tower jutted skyward, visible even over the monumental ramparts. Above the city a range of mountains shielded the northern approaches.
A massive flying beast passed overhead and descended beyond the fortifications. She needed some of those huge sky-dwelling rays. Mounted on those, her troops could strike swiftly and be gone before their enemies responded.
She dismissed the thought. If she could get such mounts, so could her foes. The battle would just move to a new arena. At least on the ground, her troops could hide beneath the eaves of the forest. It was something the night elves were suited to and the draenei and the Broken were learning.
Not that these woods were much like home. Like so much else in Outland, they were alien. Huge moths fluttered loathsomely through the trees. Many of them were tainted by fel magic. The more she saw of this world, the more she realized it was saturated with evil mystical energies. Perhaps it had something to do with the presence of the Burning Legion. She was certain of one thing: Outland was the perfect place for Illidan. It had everything he craved. He was at home here in a way a natural elf would never be.
She stopped her teeth from grinding when she saw Anyndra looking at her. She smoothed the frown from her brow and gave the signal to advance upon the gate. If the draenei sentries were daunted by their approach, they gave no sign. They waited until the last moment to drop their lances across the entrance. It was a flimsy barrier. Her nightsaber could have jumped it, but that was not the point.
“State your business in the city of Shattrath,” said the sentry on the right. He was the senior of the two.
“I have come seeking an audience with A’dal.”
The draenei’s face remained impassive. “And your retinue also?”
“Yes.”
She guessed that the fact that so many of her troops were draenei worked in her favor. Or perhaps the guards were really just used to the sight of refugees. Her fighters were ragged from hard riding and hard fighting. Perhaps the sentries were just glad to see more troops enter the city.
The guards raised their lances. Pennons fluttered once more in the wind. Maiev rode through the huge stone arch. As soon as she crossed the threshold of the city, she gasped. There was power here, ancient and benevolent. It was woven into the stones, transforming them into more than just a physical barrier against the minions of the Burning Legion. She sensed the pulse of vast energies from within the huge central tower that loomed over the city.
“We are in the presence of the Light,” Anyndra said. Whatever it was, she sensed it, too.
“Let us hope so,” Maiev said. “Let us pray it is not some great deceit.”
Too often evil wore the mask of benevolence. Wickedness cloaked itself in sanctity. It was easy to manipulate the gullible by such means. She considered that possibility long and hard. There had been times recently when she had thought that she would accept aid from Kil’jaeden himself if it meant the end of Illidan.
She decided that even if these naaru were less benevolent than they seemed, it did not matter. If they would help her against the Betrayer, she was prepared to make a pact with them.
—
THEY RODE THROUGH THE wide streets of Shattrath. Her draenei recruits pointed out the sights to one another and their night elf leaders. All of them had heard a great deal about the city even if they had never been here before. Maiev supposed that it was to the draenei of Outland what Darnassus was to her own people.
It was impressive enough in its own way, although it was a place of stone rather than living wood. Like so many of the draenei refugees it held, the city had a smashed look to it. She felt as if she was looking upon the patched ruins of a once mighty metropolis. The people around her fit their location. Many were ragged and hungry looking. Several approached her with hands outstretched. A few were children. She had nothing to give such beggars even if she wanted to. It was hard enough to keep her own troops fed and clothed, and every coin was needed to fund their war.
There were people from all over Outland. Broken huddled in lean-tos by the side of the road. There were orcs here, which surprised her. She was not sure why. She was so used to fighting them, her hand itched to draw her blade. That urge was as nothing to the anger she felt when she saw a blood elf staring at her. She was not the only one who noticed.
“Blood elves,” Anyndra said with a scowl. She felt the same loathing of these twisted elves as Maiev did. They had lost their fount of arcane magic when Arthas defiled the Sunwell and used its energies to reanimate the lich Kel’Thuzad. Now they craved arcane power with an unappeasable lust.
The blood elf’s lips bent into an arrogant sneer, but he could not meet their gazes just the same.
“We should pity them,” Sarius said. He walked along beside them in his night elf form. “Their lives are twisted by their unnatural craving for magical power.”
“I do not think I could live if I became what they are,” Anyndra said.
Sarius’s smile was complex. “They were our kin once. Perhaps they could be again. They might be redeemed.”
Maiev stared at him. She should have expected as much. Sarius was a druid. They had strange ideas.
“I do not think they want to be redeemed,” Anyndra said. “I think they enjoy being what they are.”
“How would you know?” Sarius asked. “Have you talked to any of them?”
“No. I was too busy trying to stop them from killing me,” said Anyndra. Her tone was soft, and she smiled at the druid. “As you should remember.”
“I certainly healed the wounds.” Sarius was smiling as well. There was a definite fondness between the pair. As long as it did not interfere with the performance of their duties, Maiev did not mind.
As she rode she noticed that more than one set of sin’dorei eyes tracked them. There was no love in those gazes. She wondered if the blood elves were spies for Kael’thas and, through him, for Illidan.
—
THE SIGN OF THE Crystal Goblet hung over the street. The sound of music and revelry came from within
. Maiev led her troops to the courtyard, and Broken stable hands rushed out to greet them. They seemed confident enough with the elekk, but none of them wanted anything to do with the nightsabers.
A massive Broken emerged from the building. His eyes went wide when he saw the number of riders. She could almost see him counting the profits.
“Blessings of the Light be upon you,” he said. His horned head bowed. The long tendrils around his mouth drooped. He placed his hands together, fingers interlocked. “Welcome to the Crystal Goblet. You will find all to your satisfaction here.”
“I hope so,” Maiev said. “Arechron spoke very highly of Alexius and his hospitality.”
The Broken’s smile widened. “You have spoken to my cousin. You are thrice welcome. You will be wanting accommodations for your retinue?”
“Only for myself, my officers, and a dozen or so bodyguards. The rest of my force will be encamped beyond the city walls.”
Alexius gave a small grimace of disappointment, then turned and bellowed instructions in Draenei. A small army of servants scurried off to prepare the best rooms in the house. “I would be honored if you would join me in my private rooms,” he said. “I am sure there is much we must speak of.”
Maiev thought she detected a note of urgency in his voice. Perhaps Arechron had already made contact. Messengers flew between Telaar and Shattrath on a regular basis.
“Indeed, I am grateful for your hospitality.”
—
ALEXIUS’S CHAMBERS WERE LUXURIOUS, furnished with rugs and mirrors and racks and racks of wine bottles. He carefully selected one, blew dust off it, and showed it to Maiev, as if it meant something. She had no idea about the differences between draenei vintages, and she cared even less.
“This was a very fine year,” Alexius said. “A century before our world was broken, this bottle was laid down. When you taste this, you will be getting a taste of the old Draenor.”
She forced herself to smile as if she was interested and waited for him to uncork the bottle and pour. He sat there for long moments with the full glass under his lips, sniffing it with his eyes shut and a look of profound satisfaction on his face. “The scent always makes me think of my childhood.”
