Beyond the Dark Portal

She bowed, stiffly, first to Uther, then to him. "Lightbringer. General."

Ah. This was how it was to be played, then. "Ranger." He was surprised at how calm his voice sounded. He had half-expected it to crack with emotion. "What brings you here?"

"Tidings," she said, "of the worst sort." Her eyes flickered to Turalyon's, then back to Uther's. "Little else would."

Turalyon felt a muscle twitch in his cheek and gritted his teeth. "Then pray deliver them."

The elf looked around, slightly contemptuously. "I wonder if I have not come to the wrong place for aid. I did not expect to find generals, knights, and holy warriors tending to babies in a church."

Turalyon welcomed the anger; it chased away the heartsickness. "We serve where we are called, Alleria. All of us. I feel certain you didn't come all the way here just to insult us. Speak."

Alleria sighed. "A short time ago, I met with Khadgar and several of the Alliance leaders, including your own king. It seems that there is a dimensional rift where the Dark Portal once stood. Khadgar believes that very soon, orcs — perhaps an entire second Horde — could come through again. He sent me on gryphonback at once to inform you."

She had their attention now, and they listened in silence as she repeated what she had learned. Not for the first time since the Lion of Azeroth's death, Turalyon wished Anduin Lothar were here. He often found himself wishing that when faced with a difficult decision, or impending combat, or simply the need to talk to someone. Lothar would have responded instantly, calmly but decisively, and others could not have helped but follow. While the veterans of the war had begun calling themselves the Sons of Lothar, Turalyon himself — Lothar's lieutenant — was not comfortable with the term. He did not feel like a son of the great man, although he would defend Lothar's ideals to his last breath. He was still thinking when Alleria finished talking and turned her eyes expectantly upon him.

'Well?" she demanded.

"What say the Wildhammers on all this? What does Kurdran think?"

"I doubt he knows," Alleria admitted, the blond ranger having the grace to at least be embarrassed by that statement.

"What? You flew all this way to inform me — on one of their gryphons, no less!—and no one told the Wildhammers' leader what was going on?"

She shrugged again, and Turalyon bit back a curse. During the Second War the Alliance had all fought together, elves and humans and dwarves — both the Wildhammers and their Bronzebeard cousins — side by side. But in the past year it seemed the human rulers had been distancing themselves from their nonhuman allies. The elves still participated in the defense of Nethergarde, but that was as much from their fascination with all magic as from any desire to help humans. The Bronzebeard dwarves had an ambassador, Muradin Bronzebeard, at Lordaeron, and so they maintained close ties with King Terenas. And there was cheerful little Mekkatorque and his assistants here in Stormwind. Turalyon felt the heat of shame rush through him at the recollection of his amusement at the gnome's expense earlier, when Mekkatorque and his people were performing an invaluable service to strangers.

But for all the Wildhammers' loyalty and bravery and skill, many humans seemed to think the gryphon riders little more than savages.

"Will you wait for the dwarves to give you instructions? Or perhaps Lothar's ghost?"

Turalyon frowned. Color rose in Alleria's cheeks and she glanced down, realizing she had gone too far.

"The Wildhammers have been staunch allies," Turalyon said in a soft yet sure voice. "They are as much a part of the Alliance as anyone. I will see to it that they are informed as soon as possible."

"We must go immediately," Alleria said. "The gryphon will bear you to Lordaeron. I will make my own way there."

She wouldn't even deign to ride with him, then. Turalyon didn't answer at once. He glanced at Uther, who was bridling on his behalf. Their eyes met for a moment. The bigger man nodded and turned back to the young mother and her child.

"You will bring the members of your order, yes?" Alleria said, almost perfunctorily, as if she knew the answer already. When Turalyon shook his head, her jaw dropped. "What? Why not?"

"The Archbishop wishes them to stay here and in Lordaeron. To tend to the people who need them."

"You haven't even asked!"

"I know without asking. Don't worry. If the need is great enough, they will come. But need can take many forms. Come. Let us talk for a bit."

"We should—"

"Five minutes will change nothing." She frowned. He realized she was shivering. A drop of rain slid from her wet hair down her face, looking like a tear, but it was nothing nearly so soft. At that instant, he wanted to pull her into his arms so badly. This coldness, this acerbic venom that poisoned her words and turned her lovely face ugly with barred — he knew what it was. And he knew why she carried it.

And the knowing was like a knife in his heart.

"I wrote. You never answered," he said quietly.

She shrugged, pulling her cloak about her slim frame automatically, although what she needed was dry clothing. "I have been traveling. On patrol. Our most recent task was a patrol through the Alterac Mountains," Alleria said. "There were rumors of orcs hiding among the peaks there." She allowed herself a grim smile. "We found ten of them." Turalyon didn't have to ask what she and her rangers had done with the discovered orcs. He wondered if she'd started taking trophies. He'd seen her once crouching over a body, a savage grin on her face, and had been stunned by the glee she took in the killing.

"Alleria," he said quietly, "I've been writing you and you've never answered. You owe me nothing. I understand that. But if… what happened between us means you can no longer work with me, I need to know that now. I'm your commander. I — the Alliance — can't afford to find out on the battlefield that you're not listening, or not obeying." He waited until she looked at him. "Do you have a problem with that?"

"There is no problem," the blond elf answered sharply. "The Alliance wants every orc dead. So do I. We can work together on that."

"That's all we are to you now — a means to an end. A way to kill more orcs more quickly"

"What else is there?" she answered. "Khadgar only found me because my band and I were hunting orc renegades in Alterac. I agreed to meet with him at Nethergarde because his messenger said it involved orcs, and I agreed to bring his summons to you for the same reason." She frowned. 'And the sooner we reach Lordaeron, the sooner I can seek out more of those green-skinned abominations and cleanse this land of their filth!" Her voice rose with passion and her eyes flashed. Some heads turned in their direction. "I will see them dead, every last one of them. Even if it takes me a hundred years!"

Turalyon felt a shiver run down his spine. "Alleria," he began, pitching his voice low, "you're talking genocide."

The smile that curved her lips was a cruel one. "It is only genocide when those being slain are people. This is nothing more than exterminating vermin."

He realized with a shock that she honestly believed her words. She really didn't see the orcs as sentient people. She saw them as abominations, as monsters, as… rats. Turalyon knew he had slain his fair share of them — had done so at times with great anger in his heart at what they had done to his people. But this… Alleria didn't want justice. She didn't want the orcs to pay for the crimes they had committed, she wanted to hurt them. To exterminate an entire race, if she could.

He took a step toward her, reaching out a hand, hoping to connect. "You've lost so much. I know that."

Alleria knocked his hand away. "Hah! A human speaks of loss? What do you know of it? Your lives are so brief you never learn what it means to truly love someone!"