"No. I shall make the choice. I believe I know better than anyone what is involved in being a Guardian—certainly more than you who stand around this glade and make pronouncements while the rest of us do the actual work."
"Magna—" the human started, but Aegwynn wished to hear no more.
"I have heard your advice, and for once it is worth heeding." She smiled. "I suppose it was bound to happen eventually. Even a village idiot may stumble upon a valuable philosophy once in a while. When my successor is chosen, you will be informed. That is all."
Without waiting to be dismissed, she teleported back to the parapet. While the council's words were in fact true, she was in the midst of doing her duty. She once again cast the seeker spell to determine if the demon was loose in Lordaeron, as rumored.
Once that was taken care of—there was no demon, only some teenagers indulging in magicks they didn't understand; had they continued, that demon would have been summoned, but Aegwynn was able to forestall their adolescent efforts—she traveled to Stormwind, specifically to the home of Nielas Aran.
Aran had been an admirer of hers for many years. Aegwynn barely paid any attention to him, except insofar as he was more talented than most of the mages who were part of the Tirisfalen. He was blissfully free of the prejudices of the council, and had done well by his craft, serving also as the court magician for King Landan Wrynn. Were she several centuries younger, she might have admired his steel blue eyes and his broad shoulders and his easy laugh.
However, she wasn't several centuries younger, and so had neither interest in him nor desire to even acknowledge his interest in her. She'd had plenty of dalliances in her younger days, starting with Jonas, but she'd long since lost patience with them. Eight hundred years of life had exposed romance to be a mass of fallacy and artifice, and she had neither the time nor the inclination for it.
Still and all, she managed to dredge up the flirtatiousness that she had first used on Jonas as a teenager, and started speaking to Aran. She suddenly became fascinated in his hobbies and his interest in dwarven music.
All of it served one purpose, which was for him to share his bed with her.
The next morning, she knew that she had been impregnated by his seed. She had been mildly disheartened to realize that the embryo within her would grow to be a male child. She had been hoping for a daughter, as yet another poke in the eye to the Guardians of Tirisfal. But even so, this boy would serve the purpose for which he had been conceived.
Taking her leave of a rather disappointed Aran—who truly had expected little else, but had been hoping that Aegwynn could at least have been polite about it—she departed Stormwind. For nine months, she performed her tasks as Guardian as much as she could, and eventually bore Medivh. Only then did she return, handing the infant to Aran and declaring him to be her heir.
"I can see by the look on your face that you're horrified." Aegwynn said the words to Jaina with a vicious smile.
"I am." Jaina spoke true. She had fought alongside Medivh—it was he who had encouraged Jaina to ally herself with Thrall and the orcs against the Burning Legion—but she'd had no idea that the prophet's origins were so tawdry. Indeed, she knew very little about him, save that he had returned from the dead and was trying to atone for his sins by doing everything he could to stop the Burning Legion.
"That is why I told you the story," Aegwynn said. "I'm no hero, I'm no role model, I'm no shining beacon to inspire wizards of any sex. What I am is an arrogant ass who let her power and the wiles of a clever demon destroy her—and the rest of the world."
Jaina shook her head. She remembered many conversations with Kristoff about how the lessons of history are rarely in the written word, for such accounts were invariably biased in favor of what the writer wished the reader to know about. She realized that the histories she'd read about the Guardians of Tirisfal in Antonidas's library were as vulnerable to such biases as the historical texts that Kristoff had spoken of.
Then, suddenly, a feeling pricked at the back of Jaina's neck. She stood up.
So did Aegwynn—no doubt the old woman felt the same thing. She confirmed it by saying, "The wards are back up."
Jaina found it interesting that Aegwynn felt that—especially given Jaina's own ability to break down the wards without her knowledge. It confirmed a growing suspicion of hers.
Of greater concern, however, was that these wards felt far more powerful. And had entirely the wrong feel. "Something is wrong."
"Yes—I know this magic. Never thought I'd encounter it again, to be honest." Aegwynn made a tch noise. "In fact, I'm not really sure how it's possible."
Before asking Aegwynn to explain herself, Jaina had to make sure she could penetrate the wards. She attempted a teleport spell, this time adding a ward—penetration incantation to the mix, bracing herself for the ensuing pain should it not succeed.
Sure enough, it didn't. It would have worked previously—she hadn't used the penetration spell to teleport the thunder lizards only because she needed to investigate the highlands before bringing hundreds of agitated animals there. Closing her eyes briefly to block out the pain, she turned to Aegwynn. "I can't get through them."
"I was afraid of that." Aegwynn sighed, apparently not relishing being stuck with the "little girl."
Jaina wasn't entirely thrilled with the prospect, either, but more because she couldn't fulfill her promise to Thrall while trapped in these highlands.
"You said you knew this magic?"
Aegwynn nodded. "Yes. Remember Zmodlor, the first demon I encountered—the one who imprisoned those schoolchildren?"
Jaina nodded.
"These wards are his."
Fifteen
Kristoff hated sitting on the throne.
Intellectually, he understood the need for it. Leaders needed to convey that they were in a position of authority, and the intimidating physicality of a giant chair that was raised above everyone else in the room conveyed that authority beautifully.
But he hated sitting in it. He was convinced that he would damage the authority of the position by making some kind of mistake. Because Kristoff knew his limitations—he was no leader. He'd spent years observing leaders firsthand and studying leaders he didn't have access to, and knew as much as anyone living about what good leaders had to do right and what bad leaders often did wrong. One thing he had learned early on was that the arrogant rarely lasted long. Leaders made mistakes, and the arrogant never admitted to such a thing, a conflict that often resulted in self—destruction—or destruction from outside forces. Certainly, that was true of Kristoff's previous employer, Garithos; if the Highlord had simply listened to Kristoff—or any of the other six people giving him the same advice—he wouldn't have sided with the Forsaken. As Kristoff had predicted, the undead creatures betrayed Garithos and his warriors and led to his downfall. By that time, Kristoff had left for greener pastures.
This tendency was rather unfortunate, because the arrogant were usually the only ones who pursued leadership positions in the first place. The conundrum had fascinated Kristoff as a young student, and also explained why there were so few truly great leaders.
Kristoff was also self—aware enough to know that he was incredibly arrogant. That supreme confidence in his own abilities was why he made such a good advisor to Lady Proudmoore, but it was also why he was so terribly unfit to take her place.
Nevertheless, he did as he was told, and served in the lady's stead until she returned from her ridiculous errand.