Arthas rose, his armor clattering with the movement. He lifted a hand and drew back the hood from his face, watching for his father’s reaction. Terenas’s eyes widened as he took in the change that had come over his only son.
Arthas’s hair, once golden as the wheat that had given sustenance to his people, was now bone-white. He knew his face was pale as well, as if the blood had been drained from it.
It is time, Frostmourne whispered in his mind. Arthas moved toward his father, who had halted on the dais, staring, uncertain. There were several guards positioned about the room, but they would be no match against him, Frostmourne, and the two who had accompanied him. Arthas strode boldly up the carpeted steps and seized his father by the arm.
Arthas drew back his blade. Frostmourne’s runes brightened in anticipation. And then a whisper, not from the runeblade, but a memory—
—the voice of a dark-haired prince, seemingly from another lifetime ago—
“He was assassinated. A trusted friend…she killed him. Stabbed him right in the heart…”
Arthas shook his head and the voice was silenced.
“What is this? What are you doing, my son?”
“Succeeding you…Father.”
And Frostmourne’s hunger was sated—for the moment.
Arthas turned them loose then—his new, unquestioning, obedient subjects. Dispatching the guards who charged him upon the death of his father was a simple matter, and he stormed with cold purpose back out into the courtyard.
It was madness.
What had once been revelry had now become frenzy. What had once been celebration had now become a frantic flight for life. Few escaped. Most of those who had waited for hours in line to welcome their prince back now lay dead, blood congealing from hideous wounds, limbs ripped off, bodies broken. Ambassadors now lay with commoners, men and women with children, all hideously equal in death.
Arthas did not care what their eventual fate was—carrion for the crows, or new subjects to follow his rule. He would leave that to his captains, Falric and Marwyn, as bone-white as he and twice as merciless. Arthas marched through the way he had come, focused and intent upon one single thing.
Once clear of the courtyard and the corpses, animated or still, he broke into a run. No horse would bear him now; the beasts grew frantic at the smell of him and those who followed him. But he had found that he did not tire; not when Frostmourne, or the Lich King who spoke to him through the runeblade, was whispering to him. And so he ran swiftly, his legs carrying him to a place he had not been in years.
Voices swirled in his head, memories, snippets of conversations:
“You know you were not supposed to ride him yet.”
“You missed your lessons. Again…”
Invincible’s horrible screams of agony, echoing in his mind. The Light, pausing for that awful moment, as if deciding whether or not he was worthy of its grace. Jaina’s face as he ended their relationship.
“Listen to me, boy…. The shadow has already fallen, and nothing you do will deter it…. The harder you strive to slay your enemies, the faster you’ll deliver your people into their hands….”
“…This isn’t a blighted apple crop; this is a city full of human beings!…”
“…We know so little—we can’t just slaughter them like animals out of our own fear!”
“Ye lied tae yer men and betrayed the mercenaries who fought for ye!…That’s nae King Terenas’s boy.”
But they were the ones who could not see, could not grasp. Jaina—Uther—Terenas—Muradin. All of them, at some point, by word or look, had told him he had been wrong.
He slowed his pace as he came to the farmstead. His subjects had been here before him, and now there were only corpses lying, stiffening in the earth. Arthas steeled himself against the pain that recognition brought with it even now; they had been the lucky ones, to simply die. A man, a woman, a youth his own age.
And the snapdragons…blooming like mad this year, it would seem. Arthas stepped close and extended a hand to touch one of the beautiful, tall, lavender-blue flowers, then hesitated, remembering the rose petal.
He had not come here for flowers.
He turned and strode to a grave, nearly seven years old now. Grass had overtaken it, but the marker was still readable. He did not need to read it to know what lay here.
For a moment he stood, more moved by the death of the one in this grave than by that of his own father, by his own hand.
The power is yours, came the whispers. Do as you will.
Arthas extended one hand, Frostmourne firmly gripped in the other. Dark light began to swirl around the outstretched hand, increasing in speed. It moved from his fingers like a serpent, undulating and writhing of its own accord, and then it speared down into the earth.
Arthas felt it connect with the skeleton below. Joy flooded him, and tears stung his eyes. He lifted his hand, pulling the no-longer-dead thing from its seven-year slumber in the cool dark earth.
“Arise!” he commanded, the word bursting from his throat.
The grave erupted, showering bits of earth. Bony legs pawed, hooves seeking purchase on the shifting soil, and a skull thrust upward, breaking the surface. Arthas watched breathlessly, a smile on his too-pale face.
I saw you being born, he thought, remembering a membrane enshrouding a wriggling, wet, new little life. I helped you come into this world, and I helped you leave it…and now by my hand, you are reborn.
The skeletal steed struggled through the earth and finally emerged, planting its forelegs firmly and hoisting itself up. Red fire burned in its empty eye sockets. It tossed its head, pranced and somehow whinnied, though its soft tissue had long since rotted away.
Trembling, Arthas extended a hand to the undead creature, who whickered and nuzzled his hand with its bony muzzle. Seven years ago, he had ridden this horse to its death. Seven years ago, he had wept tears that had frozen on his face as he lifted his sword and stabbed the beloved beast straight through its gallant heart.
He had carried the guilt of that act alone all this time. But now he realized—it was all part of his destiny. If he had not slain his steed, he could not now bring it back. Alive, the horse would have feared him. Undead as it was, with fire for eyes, its bones held together by the necromantic magic that Arthas now could wield thanks to the gift of the mysterious Lich King, horse and rider could at last be reunited, as they had always been meant to be. It hadn’t been a mistake, seven years ago; he hadn’t been wrong. Not then, not now.
Not ever.
And this was proof.
Throughout the land that he now ruled, his father’s blood still slick and crimson on Frostmourne, death was coming. The change.
“This kingdom shall fall,” he promised his beloved steed as he threw his cloak over its bony back and mounted. “And from the ashes shall arise a new order that will shake the very foundation of the world!”
The horse whickered.
Invincible.
PART THREE:
THE DARK LADY
Sylvanas Windrunner, former ranger-general of Quel’Thalas, banshee, and Dark Lady of the Forsaken, strode from the royal quarters with the same quick, lithe stride she had had in life. She preferred her corporeal form for ordinary, everyday activities. Her leather boots made no sound on the stone floor of the Undercity, but all heads turned to watch their lady. She was unique and unmistakable.
Once, her hair had been golden, her eyes blue, her skin the color of a fresh peach. Once, she had been alive. Now her hair, often covered by a blue-black cowl, was black as midnight with white streaks and her formerly peach-hued skin a faint, pearly blue-gray. She’d chosen to don the armor she had worn in life, well-tooled leather that revealed most of her slender but muscular torso. Her ears twitched at the murmurings; she did not often venture forth from her chambers. She was ruler of this city, and the world came to her.