“Could you choose to deny the Light?”
“Why would I want to do that?”
“Any number of reasons. There was another golden-haired, beloved human prince once. He was a paladin, and yet he turned his back on the Light.”
Outrage and offense chased away Anduin’s discomfort. Blood suffused his face and he snapped, “I am not Arthas!”
Garrosh smiled oddly. “No, you are not,” he agreed. “But maybe . . . I am.”
14
The Ghostlands, it was called now. Once, the Windrunner family called it home. Vereesa had been invited back a single time before by Halduron Brightwing, to fight their mutual, ancient enemy, the Amani. It had made her soul-sick then, and did so again now. As she flew her hippogryph over the Thalassian Pass, her stomach muscles contracted and her palms grew slippery on the reins.
The Dead Scar. Twining its way through a once-beautiful land, leaving a trail like a slug where hundreds of undead feet had trod. No one knew if it would ever recover. It penetrated Tranquillien, aptly named no longer, dividing the Sanctums of the Moon and of the Sun, on into Eversong Woods and through Silvermoon, cleaving that wondrous city of song and story as well. Even from this height, she could see the legacy of the Lich King, dead things still shuffling, still killing.
Dead, but not dead. Like my sister.
No. Not like Sylvanas. She and her people had their own wills, their own minds. They could choose what they would and would not do. Whom they would and would not kill. And that ability was what had brought Vereesa back to the place of her childhood, where she had never thought to return.
Her eyes were dry, her senses dull with the constant press of pain that had begun with word of Rhonin’s death and had not ever truly eased. She steered her mount to the west, and could not help but wonder if Sylvanas was enjoying the thought of Vereesa returning to Windrunner Spire.
Seeing it again brought a wave of fresh pain, new and sharp and adding fuel to her hatred. Orcs had not done this to her home, but orcs had taken enough from her—first her brother, Lirath, and then Rhonin, her great light. They desired to raze Quel’Thalas as thoroughly as Arthas later had.
As she drew closer, Vereesa’s lip curled in a snarl. The spire—her family’s spire—was crawling with walking corpses and transparent spirits.
Banshees.
The spirits drifted, seemingly as without aim in death as they had been full of purpose in life. Speckled in among them were hooded figures in red and black robes. Vereesa knew who they had to be. They were the human followers of the Deatholme cult that had sprung up after Arthas’s incursion, using Windrunner Spire for some obscene and violent purpose.
Using my home.
Vereesa let out a wordless shriek, and all the impotent anger that had raged inside her since Garrosh’s defeat surged forward at this welcome outlet. She nocked and let fly arrow after arrow. The first one caught the acolyte in the eye. The second and third pierced throats before the victims even registered what was happening. The fourth target turned a shocked face up to Vereesa, and his fingers flexed as he reached for a weapon; then he too was dead. Leaping off her hippogryph before it even had a chance to land, she attacked the fallen rangers, swinging a sword that glowed as it sliced through incorporeal flesh, sending them to oblivion and presumably peace, with more rage than pity. Vereesa winced as a banshee’s howl shuddered through her body, but it only slowed her an instant before the specter’s terrifying scream was forever silenced. The high elf added her own screams to the cacophony, jumbled phrases that said nothing but spoke bitterly of poisonous anger and pain.
Two more acolytes had the misfortune of being too slow in their spells. Vereesa charged them, slicing the head off of one and following through to bring the sword carving across the chest of another. As he fell, blood spurting, she thrust the sword down through his belly.
She caught her breath, yanking the sword free, looking about for any more enemies, living or undead, that might be converging on the spire. Vereesa was unconcerned about being recognized. Few enough living beings ventured out here anymore. A hooded cape was sufficient disguise if an intrepid blood elf dared approach the deserted place, and any acolyte that saw her would not live to report back.
The minutes crawled past. From time to time Vereesa heard again soft, mindless moans and sighs. She fought her adversaries back when their meandering brought them onto Windrunner property, ruined though it was. Mist, clammy and cold, clung to her skin. She began to pace back and forth, wondering if this was all some kind of cruel trick on Sylvanas’s part.
Her sharp ears caught the faintest of sounds behind her and she whirled, bow ready, arrow nocked. Before she could let the missile fly, there was a splintering of her arrow’s shaft, and the string twanged.
The archer, clad in black leather, had shot Vereesa’s arrow right out of the bow.
The newcomer brushed her hood back. Glowing red eyes pierced the haze, and black lips twisted in a sardonic grin.
“Have a care, Sister,” Sylvanas said, lowering her weapon. “I do not think you want to kill this banshee.”
They walked along the gray sand, the sound of the waves easier to bear than the sighs and laments of the dead, though not by much. Sylvanas thought the place full of ghosts, not only literal, but those of a family that once picnicked here.
“We are all that is left,” Vereesa said, as if reading her thoughts. Sylvanas smiled a little. As the two middle children, they had always had a bond that set them apart from Alleria, the eldest, and Lirath, their only brother.
“A diplomatic choice of words,” she said.
Vereesa had come to a halt, peering out across the North Sea. “First Lirath, murdered by the orcs. Then Alleria, vanished in Outland. Why did you pick this place, Sylvanas?”
“Why do you think, little sister?”
“To wound me. You chose a rendezvous site where the dead feel at home. Where the living are not welcome.” Then she amended, “Unless they have evil intentions.”
Sylvanas stiffened. “To wound you? Arrogant child!” She laughed without humor. “Did you not notice who clustered about you, sobbing and shrieking for their lives back? Those were my rangers! I died here!”
Vereesa winced. “I—I am sorry. I thought . . . you were used to . . . well . . .”
“Being the ‘Banshee Queen’? The ‘Dark Lady’?” Sylvanas spoke in an exaggerated tone. “It is better than rotting. At least now I have a say in what happens in the world.”
“We have less of a say than we could have hoped,” Vereesa said. She picked up a rock and threw it into the ocean, where it immediately vanished. “I do not know who you are now. You are not she who was my beloved sister.”
I am . . . and I am not, Sylvanas thought, but said nothing.
“But you and I agree on one thing.” Vereesa turned, her face flushed and her eyes blazing. “Garrosh Hellscream must die for what he has done. And it seems as though you, like me, do not trust the celestials to reach that same decision, or else you would not have come.”
“I cannot disagree with you on any of those counts. And it was brave of you to attempt to contact me—especially if, as you have said, you do not know who I am now.” Brave, and a bit reckless. Had the locket been intercepted, Vereesa would have been branded a traitor.
“I took a risk. It seemed worth it. I hope it was.”
“You did not do so simply to have me sympathize with how wretched a creature Garrosh Hellscream is,” Sylvanas said, folding her arms. “You must have a plan.”
“I—well, not yet.”