[Story] Shattered

“What are you doing?”

Vajarra thought this was a foolish question. Hastily folding her traveling clothes and putting them in the already-overflowing crate, it was fairly obvious what she was doing. Her sister Vassanta had gone to Ironforge to help the gnomes in Gnomeregan. Vajarra, as she often did, had come to find her sister.

“I’m going back to the temple,” Vajarra replied, balancing the lid atop the crate. With luck it would stay on during travel. “It’s not safe here! The–” Another earthquake shuddered through the surrounding stone, sending rubble clattering down around them. Odd as it sounded, the broken remnants of Draenor seemed a much safer place to be. No earthquakes, no cultists, and most of all — no enormous angry dragon.

But Vassanta wasn’t moving. She was in what Vajarra recognized as her stubborn stance, arms crossed and her head back. She was wearing armor that Vajarra hadn’t seen on her before; finely wrought with intricate naaru symbols tracing its contours. Maybe she’d had it made while she was in Shadowmoon. Either way, it made her look intimidating and — Vajarra realized with some awe — respectable. After all her years of striving, surely their father would have been proud of Vassanta today. But would he be proud of Vajarra? She frowned faintly, looking into her box of belongings.

“You can’t just leave,” Vassanta said quietly, incredulous. “They need us. They need you. Any fool can pick up a sword, who is going to help all the injured people?” Vajarra knew she was right. How strange that Vassanta would be the voice of reason! “Didn’t they help us when we needed it?”

Yes, they had. The Alliance had responded in full force to the Legion’s threat. Vajarra sighed. “Yes. All right. But this time, we stay together. No matter what.”

———————–

“Father, what are we going to do?”

Since the skies had turned red, and the ground split apart, Tathariel had finally started to call him ‘father’. Possibly it had to do with the fact that she felt more afraid than she wanted to admit. The restless elementals had been right, a harbinger of disaster they couldn’t have imagined. To make matters worse, their forest was over-run with orcs. They had not yet reached their corner of the woods, but Ornasse was not going to wait for them to arrive. It hurt to leave the shadowed boughs of Ashenvale behind, even more to leave Naeva and the other Sentinels to fend them off, but he could not allow his daughter to remain in harm’s way.

Malfurion had sent the call for druids to aid him at Hyjal, where Ornasse had fought not so long ago. Perhaps it was folly to bring her along, she was young, after all — but undoubtedly talented. There was no teacher so efficient as experience.

“We pray,” he said quietly, lifting his gaze to the full moon. “For all of us.”