“Yes, Fa’shua, I do,” said Tyrande, rising and walking to Jaina’s chair. “Lady Jaina . . . you also later discovered that, had you released the tidal wave, you would have destroyed the Alliance fleet. Would you say that is the reason you are glad you refrained?”
Baine held his breath. It would be easy for Jaina to simply say yes. That was the answer Tyrande wanted, and Jaina would be free to leave, and to try to do what she could to salve wounds that had been so brutally reopened. He knew that the betrayal of the Sunreavers in Dalaran—her new city, her new Theramore—had cut deeply. Many said it had catapulted her right back to where she was emotionally after Theramore fell, and there had been rumors that she had pushed Varian to actually dismantle the Horde.
Jaina did not answer immediately. She gave the question the consideration it was due. “Of course, I was relieved to hear that I hadn’t inadvertently wiped out the fleet. But no—that wasn’t why I was glad.” She looked at Garrosh, and there her gaze remained. “I am glad I refrained, because I would never, ever want to be like him.”
Later, Baine would think that Tyrande should have accepted that. But the night elf could not leave well enough alone. Jaina was Tyrande’s final, best witness. The Accuser would henceforth be confined to follow-up questioning, and it was clear she wanted to end on a strong note. And so, she asked one question too many. “Or like the Horde?”
Jaina went very still. Tyrande waited. After a moment, she prompted, “Lady Jaina? My question was, do you wish to never, ever be like the Horde?”
And Jaina—battered, angry, wounded, devastated, honest Jaina—replied simply, “The Horde isn’t Garrosh.”
Tyrande’s eyes grew wide as now, too late, she realized her error. “No further questions, Fa’shua,” Tyrande said quietly, gave Jaina a long look, and returned to her seat.
When Sylvanas arrived at Brightwater Lake in Tirisfal Glades, near the Undercity, she found her sister waiting.
“I got your note,” Sylvanas said, “and I brought horses for us.” Sylvanas had not expected Vereesa to return to the courtroom after the respite. She had just watched her husband die—or, more correctly, watched her husband be turned into a pure arcane manifestation, then die. But Sylvanas had been surprised at the note, which said only, Brightwater Lake. I want to ride. Sylvanas took it as a good sign that Vereesa had suggested meeting at a place so deep in the Forsaken lands. She was proud of her sister for even knowing about the site, and for getting to it unspotted and unscathed. The Windrunner “Moons” were both superior rangers. Vereesa’s requested activity, though, was not a surprise. They had loved riding together as children; Vereesa especially had taken to it.
Vereesa sat with her back against the trunk of a dead tree. She turned her head slowly. She looked haggard, fragile, and Sylvanas was glad she could, she hoped, offer something pleasurable to her sister. Vereesa’s eyes widened at the mounts. The dead things regarded her steadily. One of them bent its long neck, devoid of flesh, and bit at a patch of grass. The grass fell back to the earth as its teeth ground it, but the being did not appear to notice, and bent its vertebrae for another mouthful.
“They are . . . skeletons,” Vereesa murmured. “Horse skeletons.”
“Few living things will bear me willingly, Sister, or even bear being near me. You will need to learn to ride these, if you are to come live in the Undercity. I promise you, they will obey.”
“Yes, I imagine they will,” Vereesa said.
She made no move to get up. Sylvanas dropped the reins of the two horses, knowing they would go nowhere, and sat beside her sister. Awkwardly, she asked, “How are you?” It had been so long since another’s welfare mattered.
Vereesa closed her eyes, but tears slipped from beneath her lashes. “I miss him so much, Sylvanas. So very much.”
Sylvanas had no comfort to give. She couldn’t even reanimate Rhonin’s corpse for her sister. So she sat quietly.
“I am so, so happy we are killing Garrosh,” Vereesa said. “I hope whatever poison you have is slow and painful. I want him to suffer—suffer as he has made me suffer. I am glad I saw what I did today. It is fuel for my fire. I never want to have to see that again—even think about his death again. I want nothing to do with that world anymore.”
“Well,” said Sylvanas, withdrawing a small vial from her pouch, “I think I can make all your dreams come true. This tiny vial contains enough poison to kill twenty orcs. And yes . . . it is everything we both want—slow, agonizing, and utterly without a cure.”
Vereesa reacted as if Sylvanas had just given her a birthday present. Her face lit up, the sorrow retreated, and she accepted the vial almost reverently. “So small, to be so lethal,” she murmured.
“One drop on each segment of the sunfruit, and Garrosh Hellscream will be no more.”
Vereesa clutched the vial tightly, her other hand closing around the locket that draped her slim throat. Sylvanas had returned Vereesa’s necklace to her, and both sisters now routinely wore the jewelry during their time together. “Thank you, Sister. I knew I could turn to you.”
Sylvanas smiled. “You have no idea how much it pleases me that you did. And as for leaving that world—I open mine to you. Is that why you wished to meet here?”
Vereesa nodded. “It was . . . becoming too sad to keep meeting at the spire,” she said. “I wanted to start investigating where I will soon be living.”
Sylvanas hid a smile at the choice of words, but said nothing. The strange phantom pains were increasing, but Sylvanas ignored them with the same steely will that had won her freedom from Arthas. For the first time since he had marched on her people, leaving behind the Dead Scar like the trail from a slug, Sylvanas was . . . happy. She had lost so very much, and it seemed to her that fate had delivered this unexpected gift—both for her personally and for any attempt to obtain more power within the Horde. She and her sister would indeed be unstoppable. Violence and horror had brought Sylvanas to the place she was today, and the same had driven Vereesa to seek her out.
How good it would be, she mused, to have someone she trusted. Truly trusted, who did not merely obey her orders out of fear or personal gain. Someone who thought, felt, as she did. And it seemed as though Vereesa longed for this as well.
Sylvanas had not told Vereesa everything, of course. One could not be equal to the Banshee Queen unless one was oneself a banshee. Her people would resent having to obey a living thing. But she would make her sister’s death so much gentler, easier, than her own had been. Kind. Vereesa would merely go to sleep, and awaken beautifully transformed, reborn with insight and ambition that one who breathed could never fathom.
“It may amuse you to learn that I now know how to make green curry fish,” Vereesa said, carefully tucking the precious poison into a bag.
“You are more than trusted in the kitchens, it would seem.”
“Yes. Another day or two, and then . . .” She frowned. “Sylvanas—can it truly be this easy? I keep feeling that something will go wrong somehow.”
“Nothing will go wrong, Little Moon,” Sylvanas reassured her. “We have not been given this moment—we have bought it with sweat and tears and torment. We have earned the right to this victory.”
“We have. My only regret is we cannot watch Garrosh Hellscream breathe his last.”
“Ah,” Sylvanas said, “but we can certainly imagine it, and that will have to do. What we will see is his corpse, and the chaos that his death will cause. And when one day we are able to claim credit for our kill, those who were too slow or too timid will envy us.”
Vereesa gazed out over the lake, arms wrapped around her knees. “I had always thought these lands dark and . . . sad,” Vereesa said. “But there is a strange kind of beauty in the darkness, is there not?”