Before the Storm

by Christie Golden

  He embraced her tightly. “I am one happy goblin,” he said, kissing the top of her head. “Come on, Punkin. Let’s head out on our next adventure.”

  They descended into the tunnel. “I hope it hasn’t caved in,” Grizzek said. “Haven’t checked in a couple of years.”

  “I guess we’ll find out,” Sapphronetta said grimly.

  It was a long underground trek from Grizzek’s lab to the hills that separated Tanaris from Thousand Needles, where Grizzek promised Saffy they would emerge. Along the way, they talked openly for the first time. About how much they cared about each other and always had. About what they’d done wrong and how they felt they’d been wronged. Over meals, they analyzed what had worked this time that hadn’t worked the last time. And when they slept, they did so snuggled close together.

  There were no cave-ins, fortunately. And finally, the pair reached the end of this phase of their journey. “According to my calculations, it’s about midnight,” Saffy said. Grizzek believed her.

  “Perfect,” Grizzek said. “It’s a pretty remote location, but even so, I’d like to not pop out of this hole in broad daylight. How did you gnomes ever stand living underground, Saffy? I’m going bonkers without sunshine.”

  “There’s sunshine out there,” Saffy assured him.

  “But we’ll be living with night elves.”

  “They get sunshine in Teldrassil, too; they just prefer to sleep through it.”

  “You Alliance people are very strange.” He kissed her. “But cute. Definitely cute.”

  Grizzek had left a ladder at the end, and he climbed up first and undid the latch. “Look out below,” he called down.

  “Huh?” Then: “Hey!”

  “I covered it with sand,” he explained as the yellow grains poured down over them. He didn’t mind. Freedom and a life with the gnome he’d given his heart to years ago awaited him above. He wiped off his face and clambered up the rest of the way, sticking his head up and blinking even in the faint light of the moons and the stars.

  Nothing looked out of the ordinary. Grizzek cocked his head, listening. He heard nothing. “Okay, I think we’re good,” he said, and hoisted himself up onto the ground. He extended a hand to help Saffy out. They stood, stretched, and grinned at each other.

  “Phase one complete,” he said. “I’ll go back down and bring up the rest of our stuff.”

  “Actually,” came a voice, “that won’t be necessary.”

  They whirled. A large goblin was silhouetted against the star-studded sky. Grizzek knew that voice. He reached out for Saffy’s hand and clutched it tightly.

  “Druz, you and I always got along okay. Tell you what. I’ll come back and work for Gallywix. No more tricks. I’ll do whatever he wants. You can take everything we got. Just let Saffy have some food and water and let her go.”

  “Grizzy—”

  “I ain’t letting you die, Saffy,” Grizzek said. “We got a deal, Druz?”

  Druz climbed down, followed by no fewer than three other large, irritated-looking goblins. “Sorry, pal. We’ve been on to you this whole time. Within five minutes of you hopping down into your hole, we’d deactivated the bomb you set to go off in your lab. And as for your parrot, we shot it out of the sky. We just need what you took, and then…” He shrugged.

  “You’re not just going to kill us? In cold blood?” Saffy stammered.

  Druz looked at her and sighed. “Little lady, your sweetheart here knew what he was getting you into. This comes directly from the boss. It’s outta my hands.”

  The other goblins leaped forward, grabbing both Grizzek and Saffy roughly. Grizzek made a fist and slammed it into the belly of the nearest one. He heard a yelp and a growl from Saffy and figured she’d gotten in a good blow of some sort, too. But any resistance on their part was but a gesture. Within a handful of minutes, the goblin and the gnome had been searched, slapped around a bit, and then tied up back to back. Even their feet were bound.

  “Hey, Druz! I got some notes off the gnome,” one said.

  “Good job, Kezzig,” Druz said.

  “This is dumb, Druz,” Grizzek muttered through a mouthful of blood and broken teeth. “And you ain’t dumb. I’m worth a lot more to you alive than dead.”

  “Not really,” Druz said. “We got all the things you made back in the lab. We got all the things you tried to steal. And now we got the gnome’s notes. We can take it from here. You’re too great a risk.”

  “Hold me hostage,” Saffy piped up. “You’ll guarantee he won’t escape.”

  “Saffy, shut up!” Grizzek hissed angrily. “Tryin’ to save you here!”

  “I got my orders,” Druz said, sounding almost apologetic. “You ticked off the boss, and this is what we’ve been told to do with you.” He nodded to Kezzig. “Set the bomb.”

  “Wh-what?” Back to back with Saffy as he was, Grizzek couldn’t see her. But she sounded pale.

  “You try to blow up our stuff, we blow you up. Smaller bomb, though.” Kezzig approached and shoved something cold and hard between the bound pair. “Sorry it didn’t work out, Grizz. Look at it this way: it’ll be fast. It didn’t have to be.”

  And they walked away, laughing and talking.

  Grizzek analyzed the situation. It was not good. He and Saffy were sitting back to back, tied together tightly with what felt like sturdy rope. Their hands were bound, presumably so that they would not be able to work them free and thus untie themselves.

  “Think maybe if we wriggle, we can scoot away from it?”

  Saffy. Always thinking. Despite the awfulness of the situation, Grizzek felt himself smiling.

  “Worth a shot,” he said, though he didn’t add that it might cause the bomb to go off immediately. She probably knew that anyway. “Count of three, scoot to the left. Ready?”

  “Yeah.”

  “One…two…three…scoot!” They moved about six inches to the left along the uneven surface of the narrow trail. The bomb was still wedged solidly between them. “That’s not going to work. Punkin, can you get to your feet?”

  “I—I think so,” she said.

  On the count of three, they tried that. They toppled over to the right the first time. They attempted it a second time once they’d straightened up. Grizzek’s foot turned on a loose stone, and they went down again.

  “One, two, three!” Grizzek said again, and then, with a grunt, they were standing.

  The bomb was still wedged tightly between them. “Okay, Pookie, it’s not gonna drop out on its own. We gotta shake it loose.”

  “You’re the explosives expert, but I cannot imagine that would be productive to keeping a bomb unexploded.”

  “I think it’s the only chance we got.”

  “Me, too.”

  Again, on the count of three, they began jumping up and down. Disbelieving, Grizzek felt the bomb shift. It had been pressing, silently threatening, against his lower back. Now it was at his tailbone.

  “It’s working!” Saffy squeaked.

  “I think it is,” Grizzek replied, trying not to be too hopeful. They kept jumping. The bomb slipped lower, lower…

  And then Grizzek no longer felt the pressure. He braced himself for what he secretly thought was inevitable: detonation on contact with the ground.

  But their luck seemed to be holding. He heard it plop on the sand but nothing else. “We did it!” Saffy cried happily. “Grizzy, we—”

  “Quiet for a sec,” Grizzek said. Saffy obeyed. Grizzek closed his eyes sickly.

  In the silence of the desert night, he could hear the tick-tick. The bomb was on a timer.

  “We ain’t out of this yet,” he said. “Hop to the right and keep hopping.”

  “For how long?”

  “Till we reach Gadgetzan.”

  They hopped. Even as he believed the bomb was ticking awa
y their lives second by second, Grizzek marveled at what they had done together. Even now, they were working together in perfect coordination. The clichéd well-oiled machine.

  “Grizzy?”

  “Yeah?” Hop. Hop. Hop.

  “I have a confession.”

  “What’s that, Pookie?”

  “I didn’t tell you something I did because I thought you’d be angry with me.” Hop. Hop. They were three yards away from it now. If only they both had longer legs—

  “Can’t be angry with you for anything now, Punkin.”

  “I burned the notes.”

  Grizzek was so shocked that he almost stumbled, but he managed to keep their rhythm.

  “You…what?”

  “I tore out all our notes and burned them.” Hop. Hop. “There’s no way Gallywix can re-create our experiments. He has a few prototypes and a couple of already-mixed potions, but that’s it. Whatever awful thing he intends to do with Azerite, it won’t be on us.”

  Hop. Hop.

  “Saffy…aw, you’re a genius!”

  At that moment, Grizzek’s left foot turned on a slippery sand-covered stone, and he heard something snap. They toppled over, and this time, he knew with sick horror that he was not going to be able to get back up. Lying facedown in the sand, he couldn’t determine how much distance they’d put between them and the bomb, and in the darkness, he hadn’t been able to identify the kind of explosive Druz had wedged between them. Were they far enough away to survive if it went off?

  He gritted his teeth against the pain as he said, “Saffy, my ankle’s snapped. We gotta crawl, okay?”

  He heard her gulp. “Okay,” she said bravely, though her voice quavered.

  “Roll over so we’re both on our left sides; that way I can push with my good leg.”

  They did and started squirming away. “Grizzy!” Saffy gasped as she panted, “I still have the ring! My engagement ring!”

  The ring, made of commonplace ugly metal. And adorned with a small golden, glowing drop of Azerite.

  “It might be enough to protect us!” she said.

  “It might at that,” Grizzek said. Hope, dizzying and wonderful, flowed through him, and he began squirming in earnest. “I got a confession to make too, Punkin.”

  “Whatever it is, I forgive you.”

  He licked his lips. All these years, he’d never said it. Wasted, stupid years. But all that was gonna change, starting now.

  “Sapphronetta Flivvers…I lo—”

  The bomb exploded.

  Anduin stood atop the ruined ramparts of Stromgarde Keep. The wind that stirred his fair hair was damp and cool, and the overcast sky did little to dispel the sense of sorrow that permeated this place.

  The Arathi Highlands were a part of Azeroth rich in both human and Forsaken history. Here, the mighty city of Strom once had stood, and before it, the empire of Arathor, which had given birth to humanity. The ancient Arathi had been a race of conquerors, but they had recognized the wisdom in extending cooperation, peace, and equality to the vanquished tribes. Those qualities had made humanity strong. Those ancient tribes of the Eastern Kingdoms had joined together, succeeding in carving out a nation that had changed the world.

  Here, too, was the birthplace of magic for humanity, a gift from the beleaguered high elves of Quel’Thalas in exchange for the aid of Strom’s mighty army against their common foe, the trolls. All the major human nations had been settled by those who left Arathor: Dalaran, founded by the first magi instructed by the elves, as well as Lordaeron, Gilneas, and later Kul Tiras and Alterac. Those who stayed behind had built the fortress on which the king of Stormwind now stood.

  He heard the sound of boots on stone and turned to regard Genn. The older man stepped beside him, his eyes roaming thoughtfully over the landscape of pine trees and rolling green hills.

  “The last time I stood here,” Genn said, “Gilneas was a powerful nation and Stromgarde’s star was waning. Now both kingdoms lie in ruins. This one’s home only to criminals, ogres, and trolls. And mine is home to them.”

  He pointed across the rolling fields to the gray stone of what was known as Thoradin’s Wall. Anduin, Greymane, Turalyon, Velen, Faol, and Calia, along with exactly two hundred of Stormwind’s finest, had arrived a few hours earlier from Stormwind Harbor. It had been sobering to see these ruins appear out of the mists, their stone as gray as the sky itself; more so, to stand where they stood now.

  Thoradin’s Wall and the small Forsaken encampment outside it marked the farthest point of the Horde’s reach in this land that was the birthplace of humanity. Gilneas was not too far, wreathed in blight, invaded by the Forsaken who had driven Genn’s people to become refugees and had slain the king’s son.

  Genn lifted a spyglass, made a soft growling sound, and handed the instrument to Anduin. Anduin emulated him. Through the gnomish tool, he could see armed figures patrolling the ancient wall. Just as his people did the walls of Stromgarde Keep.

  They were all Forsaken.

  Tomorrow, at first light, the Desolate Council would gather at the arch of Thoradin’s Wall. They would march out to a halfway point marked by a fork in the simple dirt road. At the same time, the nineteen humans selected to meet with their friends or relatives would approach them. Calia and Faol would conduct the meetings. There would be no other Horde or Alliance interference, though each side had agreed to allow a group of priests to fly overhead just in case.

  Anduin returned the spyglass to Genn. “I know this must be difficult for you.”

  “You know little about this,” Genn snapped.

  “I understand more than you think,” Anduin continued. “I have Turalyon and Velen to assist me.” Kindly, he added, “You didn’t need to put yourself through this.”

  “Of course I did,” Genn said. “Your father’s ghost would haunt me if I hadn’t come.”

  As Liam’s haunts you, because you did, Anduin thought sadly. “It will all be over soon,” he said. “Thus far, Sylvanas appears to have kept her word. Scouts report that everything seems to be in order on the terms we discussed.”

  “If she did honor a promise, it would be a first,” Genn said.

  “Whatever we may think of her, we must be aware that she is a master strategist and that she therefore believes agreeing to this will somehow benefit her and the Horde.”

  “That’s what I’m afraid of,” Genn replied.

  “She’s worried about losing her grip on the Undercity because of the Desolate Council, but she’s smart enough to know that they’re no real threat. So she agrees to one day where members of the council only are permitted to meet their loved ones. The council is satisfied. Plus, it’s an honorable thing to do, and that placates any orcs, trolls, or tauren. It’s shrewd politics.”

  “She could very easily double-cross us and murder us all.”

  “She could. But that would be a terrible idea. Going to war over this right when the Horde is recovering from a brutal one? When she could be focusing on Silithus and Azerite?” He shook his head. “A terrible waste of resources. I don’t trust her to keep her word for honor’s sake. I do trust her not to be stupid. Don’t you?”

  Genn had no response to that.

  “Your Majesties,” came Turalyon’s deep voice. “I’ve put the priests into position. Per your agreement, twenty-five of them will mount their gryphons tomorrow and be our eyes on the battlefield.”

  “It’s not a battlefield, Turalyon,” Anduin reminded him. “This is a peaceful gathering site. If all goes according to plan, it never will be a battlefield.”

  “My apologies. I misspoke.”

  “Words have power, as I know you know. Make sure the soldiers under you refrain from using that term.”

  Turalyon nodded. “We’ve seen nothing to indicate deception on the Horde’s part. They appear to be keeping to the proper num
bers and holding their positions.”

  Anduin felt a flutter inside his chest that he quickly quelled with a deep breath. For all his insistence that this would not provoke a war, he shared the worries of his advisers. Sylvanas was indeed a good strategist, and she almost certainly had plans in place that even SI:7 had been unable to ferret out.

  For the moment, though, he would put aside his apprehension. Archbishop Faol and Calia would be conducting a service shortly, and after that he would move among those who had been brave enough—and who loved enough—to accept the chance to be reunited with people who would not be as they were in memory but who would be present. Would be, as much as the Forsaken could be, alive.

  There was still something left of the old sanctum of the keep. It was more than sufficient to house the nineteen civilians who had come to be part of the meeting, the priests, and any soldiers who wished to join them. There were a few missing timbers in the roof, and drops of drizzly rain fell on some of those who had assembled. No one seemed to mind. Hope shone on their faces on a gray day, and Anduin took heart in those expressions. This, he mused, is how you combat fear and long-held grudges. With hope and with open hearts.

  Calia and Faol waited until everyone was assembled, and then Faol spoke.

  “First, I want to reassure you that few people enjoy sitting through a religious service for long even at the best of times. And today,” he continued, glancing up at the gray clouds, “suffice it to say I’ll spare you a lengthy session spent standing in a drafty old building.”

  There were some chuckles and smiles. Turalyon stood next to Anduin and said quietly, “They are still getting used to the idea of a Forsaken priest.”

  Anduin nodded. “It’s to be expected. That’s why I asked Calia to participate, too. Seeing the two of them side by side, priests of the Light, so obviously comfortable with each other, is a good introduction to what they’re going to encounter shortly.”

  “Has anyone recognized her yet?”

  Calia had donned a nondescript, practical dress and a heavy cloak with a hood. Most everyone had their hoods up in the light rain, so she did not stand out. Valeera had once told him that the best disguises were simple ones; appropriate clothes, behaving as if one belonged. No one was looking for a queen long thought dead today.