It had been some time since Aneyah had seen either Theras or Telivathus. In fact, it had been some time since the two men had seen one another either, both having been directed by Magister Dawnwing to aim their talents towards the threat of the Twilight’s Blade. Back at the estate though, for the moment, the pair were more focused on the chess pieces on the table between them.
Although both were former Farstriders—one the youthful idealist who had left the formal structure of the military to pursue his own horizons, the other forced into retirement for his disregard of command—their respective approaches to their task differed greatly. Their game reflected this as well: Theras played black, and always seemed a few steps ahead of Telivathus’ white, although only defensively; he did not readily strike back, while Telivathus displayed an almost reckless aggression, as the graveyard of lost pieces attested. Still, Aneyah observed over her book, he was likely to win.
Theras carefully charted suspected cult movement in the wilds of southern Quel’Thalas and proposed routes of escape for Thalassian populations nearby, or choke points where the porous mountains and forest could be better defended. Telivathus, on the other hand, was the blade; his information was gained through targeted violence. Aneyah shivered, despite her proximity to the fireplace. The harm the older man had done in his life weighed on his shoulders like a heavy black cloak, a darkness shrouding his otherwise vibrant spirit. And yet, he seemed at peace with it all.
“What do you make of Father’s situation, Tel?” Theras asked, breaking the silence of concentration that had settled over the three.
Telivathus shook his head, sweeping a bishop across the board to take one of Theras’ rooks, “Hardly out of the ordinary for Magistry business. It’s all posturing.” He looked up from the board and snorted a laugh, “You know how dragonhawks will display for territorial rights? Wings flapping, beaks clacking, tails thrashing? It’s like that, but with more paperwork.”
Aneyah peered at the pair, and felt the tension in each. Theras was worried for his father, and Telivathus’ flippancy was a ruse, she knew; she could feel the swirl of his anxiety in her own stomach. Indeed, she did not even need to reach out to his mind to feel it; his speaking too much was enough of a tell—not to mention an attempt to distract from the state of the board. It was not for Magister Dawnwing specifically, though. Did he fear the coming dark as much as she? Had he heard the Song, too?
Theras quietly tapped Telivathus’ bishop out of the way with a pawn, looking coolly at the elder ranger, “I’d like to believe that, Tel, I really would.”
Telivathus leaned forward, arms resting on the table’s edge as he scanned the board, moving a knight with what appeared to be little thought, “You should. It won’t do any good not to, will it?” Surface aggression, to keep his opponent on his back foot, but clever, Aneyah noted. “Check,” the ranger added.
Theras furrowed his brows, looking much like his father in that moment, and took the knight with his second rook, exposing his castled king, “Do you think his research is actually dangerous? I know he claims it will be useful, will be revolutionary, but what of the harm it could do?”
“Anything worth doing has an element of danger, doesn’t it?”
The younger Dawnwing looked utterly unamused at Telivathus’ carefully hedged answer, his lips drawn into a thin, flat line.
“What is an acceptable cost to fight against Renilash?” Aneyah ventured, her voice quiet and distant, as if her mind were somewhere far away, even as she spoke to the men at the table. Perhaps it was, as it drifted back to the Sunwell, and to the fear she had felt there, “Priests of the Sacred Flame say that when the end comes, if we give all of ourselves, the darkness cannot triumph. He risks everything in search of understanding.”
“But,” Theras replied, shifting his attention to Aneyah, “Is what Father doing personal sacrifice, or is he trying to make himself a martyr? What good comes of prolonging his dispute? Surely he can still make progress in his work if he just…” He paused, searching for the right words, and spitting them out in frustration when he came upon them, “Turns over his Void artifacts? Toys with other forces?”
Telivathus chuckled as he moved his queen—the only piece still in his arsenal other than king and pawns—across the board, “Check, again.”
Theras snapped back to the game, glaring daggers at Telivathus, who only gave him a broad grin in return.
“He would be right to do so,” Aneyah responded, “But you and I saw K’aresh, Ther. Can you deny that there was life even there, awash in darkness? I am not sure the Void is the threat, but the Harbinger. Or other predators. So he may yet be right not to do so, as well.”
Clearly flustered to have his attention drawn two ways, Theras held his head in one hand as he both observed the state of the board and formulated a reply to Aneyah. When he spoke, it was slow, deliberate, “It doesn’t make sense to fear the lynx, but it does to guard the flock from them.”
The Arathi beamed, “You understand. I knew you would.”
Theras’ cheeks colored at even this slightest bit of praise, and he turned his head away before hastily taking Telivathus’ queen with his own king.
“What a principled stand Dawnwing is taking, hm?” Telivathus mused, a smirk playing on his lips, “He could lose much, but anything worth doing is dangerous, right?” He gently slid a pawn forward, one that had slipped past Theras’ defenses, reaching the opposite end of the board, “The queen is dead; long live the queen, as they say.”
Theras turned his attention back to the game, and his shoulders slumped in dismay. With the new queen in play, he had run out of options.
“Sometimes a little bit of calculated sacrifice can do more good than harm,” Telivathus said, adding in a whisper with a wide, cheeky grin, “Checkmate, kid.”
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"How can any of our people have given themselves over to such cruelty?" Aneyah asked. She spoke in hushed tones as she sifted through the recovered belongings of a Nightfall cultist.
Theras shook his head, the rasp of whetstone on the edge of his glaive offered in reply before the younger man spoke, "Father would say they are fools who have looked too deeply into the Void. That they believe its lies, and have become something else."
The Arathi's lips turned down at their corners, fingers tracing the delicate ornamentation of the cultist's befouled tinderbox, "But he is not here, is he? Tell me what you think, Ther."
The whetstone stopped for a moment. In the weeks they had spent rooting out Order of Night activity among the Sureki remnants, the cleric had gained his trust. Only in recent days had she started calling him something so familiar, and it still caught him off guard.
"You know how a lynx gets when it gets backed into a corner? I think they're scared." The ranger added quietly, "I don't think they're doing what they're doing out of malice. I think they're just...so, so frightened."
The tinderbox flipped open, revealing a darkened shard of crystal embedded within. Aneyah shuddered, clapping it shut once more, "What fear could do this? Could..." She choked. Months had passed since Wenren's murder, but the wound was still fresh, the embers the cleric once held within her breast yet warm.
"People will do a lot to avoid facing the unknown alone. If Renilash really is approaching, like you think, Aneyah, they...probably don't have the heart to face it alone." He eyed the edge of his weapon with satisfaction and stood, placing it with great care of its rack.
"Ther? If something should happen? If I ever lack the heart to..." She rasped a sigh, her shoulders trembling with it, "Please do not let me face it alone?"
The young Dawnwing nodded solemnly, though he found himself, as often, at a loss for words.
Theras kicked his feet, tapping his heels against the stone wall upon which he perched. The hour had grown late, and shadows crept long across the open space of the Exchange. Enchanted lanterns began to emit their evening glow, and shopkeepers and their patrons began to filter out and head towards home, or their other evening plans.
Charcoal swept across the page held across Theras’ lap, sweeping shadows on the page, for all the accuracy for which he strove, a pale comparison to the reality before him. No image could fully portray the movement, the moment the sun dipped beneath the buildings and shone upon white-paved streets no more, plunging all into twilight.
Though, he reflected, the city was often as static as its likeness on the page; the routine of sunrise, sunset, and the rhythms of its people, all remained. They flowed through the streets like lifeblood–reliably, dependably present. If he were not here, perched upon the wall surrounding some business or another’s courtyard, committing it all to page, he could easily have created it from memory.
Having returned from the Dragon Isles, from Khaz Algar, from K’aresh, he understood at last why his father had left, why he felt so stifled by the walls. Perhaps it is why grandfather Selius, too, had preferred his home on Dalaran’s outskirts and why the Dawnwing estate lay so far from Silvermoon proper. Theras had been cursed with wanderlust from the beginning.
The young man squinted down at his page in the dimming light, the breadth of the Exchange gazing back up at him, stark in black and smudged gray on white, a moment of twilight frozen forever. He snapped back to the moment at the sound of footsteps approaching, a light step on the cobblestones.
“Another piece for the collection, Ther?” Aneyah asked, peering up towards Theras. The golden glow of her eyes seemed to light the shaded corner of the city more than if the sun had glimpsed over the horizon again.
He only nodded in response, offering her the page from his perch. She had taken to keeping such landscapes, pinning them to the wall of her little apartment in lieu of any true art. She’d not taken anything, truly, from Mereldar when she left, after all, and insisted on working in the city for her keep rather than relying on the generosity of the Dawnwings.
“Can you see it?” She beamed as she traced a fingertip over the long shadow of a tree on the page, “Night comes, and the light fades, the shadows creep along the ground until it is all dark. And the twinkling of the streetlights!”
Theras slid down from the wall with a fluid, feline grace, and when next he laid eyes upon the page, it was in new light: it was not one moment in time, but a series. The shadows crept, indeed, and the lamps emitted their warm glow even while the sun yet hung in the sky; he could almost see the fabric of a group of magisters’ robes swish as they strode self-importantly through the square.
Perhaps it was not so static at all, neither the page nor the city itself. Perhaps it was only perspective.
Theras wrinkled his nose as he took a sip of the drink Telivathus had offered him. Tears sprang to his eyes and he let out a sharp cough as he set the glass down with a clink, the amber liquid sloshing about in the glass.
“Potent, Tel,” the young man coughed while the elder, legs tossed over the arm of his chair, savored a sip from his own glass.
“Not to your taste? Fair enough, then,” Telivathus replied with a laugh, “No rush, my friend.”
It had been since before Theras joined his father on the Dragon Isles that he had seen Telivathus. Retirement from active duty with the Farstriders seemed to be treating the man well: the crow’s feet and deeply etched laugh lines, along with his silver hair, bestowed upon him the air of a good-natured uncle, his easy humor and quick laugh a welcome refreshment among the heaviness of his home. The room itself was dim, lit only by lantern, the rich hues of wood and the sheer weight of the furniture–handmade, knowing Tel–suggested a somewhat more rugged tenant than sat before him.
“I’ve heard good things about your new friend, by the way,” Telivathus ventured, raised brow and lopsided smile betraying a hint of his rakish younger years, “The Arathi girl?”
Were Theras to have had any of that acrid spirit in his mouth, he would have sputtered, so surprised by the turn of conversation; it had been mere pleasantries before, catching up with his mentor, comparing their works of art–Theras his sketchbook, Tel his carved figurines–and, unfortunately for the young man’s palate, tasting a few of Tel’s favorite beverages.
“Aneyah, yes,” Theras replied, a hint of color touching his cheeks. His friend.
“Your father has said little else, other than that she is insightful and studious. The sort of things he might notice in someone,” Telivathus continued, tossing his legs off the chair’s arm and leaning forward attentively, “I ask not as a father, but an interested friend. Tell me about her!”
Theras sighed. He should have known that he would not be able to avoid such conversations with his elders forever.
“She is…” He trailed off, lost in thought, sifting through words for the closest approximation to Aneyah’s complexity, “Peculiar? Uncanny at times? When Father introduced us, it was for work, for hunting cultists, and she seemed so sad, or perhaps fearful. I think she is, but she isn’t at the same time, if that makes sense?”
Telivathus only nodded and leaned back in his seat.
“I’ve never met someone happier to look into the dark. The Arathi have a prophecy, the final battle of Light and darkness, Renilash, and it is always a lingering presence in their lives–in her life.”
“I unfortunately know all too well what doom and gloom does to a person. Is there anything–”
“No, Tel, not Aneyah. She’s…happy, despite it all. She wears the fear like a comfortable cloak. Have you met anyone who simply sits and watches the shadows shift across the ground? Or stands with her feet in the sand, eyes closed, and just…is?”
Telivathus offered a slight chuckle and a shrug of his shoulders, “You’re making her sound like poetry, kid. Should’ve known from that shocked look in your eyes when I brought her up.” There was the rakish half-grin again.
“She’s–I’m not…” Theras choked out, cheeks darkening further. Despite the burn, he reached for his drink and tossed back a larger gulp than he’d expected himself to take.
“Nothing wrong with a crush, Theras!”
“Tel!” Theras exclaimed over his glass, gaze cast down in sheer embarrassment, “It’s not a crush, it’s just–it’s admiration!”
Telivathus smirked over the lip of his glass, “What is it you’re admiring, then?”
“I’m admiring her…complexity! Appreciation of the world around her, maybe, or… It’s just admiration!”
“Take all the time you need to figure it out, Theras.” Telivathus slid from his chair and strode to his bar cart, lifting and examining a bottle, “Another drink?”
Theras downed the rest of his glass and nodded mutely.
The grounds of the ruined Dawnwing estate were growing vibrant. Though the stone remained pockmarked by the decay that once gripped the lands, blooms had returned at last to the sickly trees, and the sun illuminated the ruins through new leaves, their shadows dancing over the skeleton of the manor house and its grounds.
Luminash strode around the perimeter of the courtyard, gloved hands clasped behind his back. While the structure of the home remained, it had been gutted by the twin depredations of the Scourge attack and time itself. Scarce evidence remained of his mother’s garden on the south side of the grounds, and only a husk of his father’s tower remained. It had survived even the Scourge’s ravages only to be destroyed by the surge of power that had come through its portal on Dalaran’s fall.
Theras and Aneyah stood, the Arathi resting her shoulder against the ranger’s, before the memorial Luminash had placed many years ago, its eternal flame glowing yet, even if the sun seemed to dim its light.
“What is he looking for, Ther?” Aneyah asked, peering up at him. The pair had arrived after the magister, and their brief time at the memorial had seen Luminash circle the courtyard thrice.
Theras shook his head, “I can’t say I know for certain. Jaskian might be able to say, but Father hasn’t said a thing. I thought we were only here to pay our respects as always.”
The younger pair watched as Luminash knelt before the ragged field of grass that had once been the estate’s garden, and pressed his hands onto the soil. Theras moved to speak, lips already parted, but stopped as Aneyah shook her head. She sensed something, it seemed, the younger Dawnwing did not.
There came a flash, like a spark, from Luminash’s hands, the brilliance of the Arcane tinged with something else. Then, a warm golden glow from the grass as flame began to spread; it was not the red-orange of a natural fire, but the same comforting yellow as Theras had seen in Hallowfall.
He looked to Aneyah, his surprise evident on his face, “Is that…?”
She nodded in reply as the Sacred Flame began to swallow the grass and creep across the field.
The magister stood, raising his hands to his side, looking for all the world like the conductor of an orchestra as he guided the dancing flames to an unheard tune. The growing light of the fire illuminated his silhouette, golden hair shining like the flames themselves, even as the shadow of the leaves above danced about him.
They stood in silence as they watched the fire encircle the magister, though it never so much as singed his robes, only for that silence to be broken by Luminash’s own voice.
“Theras, Aneyah. This is but the start. Will you join your efforts to mine to restore this place? The time has long since come to let the pain this ruin holds end.”
He turned towards them, then, eyes shining with radiant purpose, the Sacred Flame around him searing away the dry grass and leaving behind only a clean slate, a hopeful smile spreading across his face, “Today, Dawnwing is born anew.”
@daily-writing-challenge
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The landscape of Eversong was hazy, shifting and wavering, its details never the same; at times, a tree would be young, others ancient, its branches hanging over its own deep shape. The light always remained the same, a calm golden glow from above, cast not by the sun; rather, it was the omnipresent light of dream.
The runestones rose and fell, flames flickered in and out of shaded thickets, burning them to ashes and disappearing as quickly as they appeared. The Amani surged from the gates of Zul’Aman, a sight unfamiliar to the dreamer’s mind; just as quickly, they faded away, replaced by shambling hordes of the undead, their eyes as cold and dead as those dredged from the Undersea by the kobyss.
Then, it calmed, the bleak scars carving through the forest giving way to new, green growth; broken spires in the north rose towards the sky once more, a people renewed, bathed in Light from the Sunwell.
The soft light from above faded abruptly. The sky grew black, and even the brilliance of the Sunwell from Quel’Danas faltered. The spires began to crack and topple into a swirling darkness erupting from the south, carving a new scar through marbled streets.
A moment of dread, and a scream from the depths of the world. The Radiant Song, shrieking in terror, and so the dreamer awoke.
Theras awoke with a start to a knock on his door. He stumbled from his bed, throwing a blanket around his shoulders to cover himself at least somewhat, and made his way to the door. Still bleary-eyed as he opened into the hallway of the inn where he holed up during his stays in Silvermoon, he was greeted with the sight of Aneyah.
Her golden eyes were wide, their luster seemingly dimmed by the ashen pallor seeking to overcome her face. Her breathing was uneven as she threw herself onto Theras, wracked with stifled sobs. There they remained for several minutes–what seemed an eternity–the ranger’s arms wrapped around the priestess as she returned to herself.
“Ther. All the way down to my core, I feel something terrible is coming,” she whispered at last.
Pulling away, Theras ushered her to the room’s divan and offered her the blanket he wore, “I’m going to get you some water, alright? What is happening, though, what do you mean?”
While her host provided a much-needed moment of nourishment for her body, frail as it was after waking from her terror, Aneyah recounted her dream, the shattering of Silvermoon, the darkening of the Sunwell, and the dread, the absolute certainty beyond simply a feeling of fear. The world itself had called out, and warned of the doom of all things.
“Renilash comes, Ther, and I don’t think we can stop it."
*****
Luminash looked across his desk at his assembled companions, Jaskian standing by his side. Though his own gnawing worry could surely be felt through their bond, her presence brought him the calm he knew he needed to project in this moment, not as a husband, father, or friend, but as lord of House Dawnwing.
“I am glad–in truth, we are all fortunate–that you’ve come on such short notice,” he began, the sun newly-risen to stream in through the study window. Theras and Aneyah had come, of course, and Telivathus had even arrived early, though he looked as if he’d only been in bed for a few hours before dawn.
“As you may be aware, before the destruction of Dalaran and the descent into Khaz Algar, I received the visions that we’ve taken to calling the Radiant Song. Though they have faded in recent months, they have never left,” he continued, looking pointedly at Aneyah, the slight Arathi staring into the distance and pressed against Theras’ arm. Luminash’s heart welled with pity; the cleric had most certainly not slept after what she had seen.
“You are not alone in this, Aneyah,” he added hesitantly, gaze flickering to Jaskian.
“Luminash has seen it too,” Jaskian added, offering a reassuring smile to the younger woman. Her husband nodded, jaw clenched, before he recomposed himself.
“Not in such depth as your account, however, only a renewed call to act,” Luminash resumed, clasping his hands together as he spoke, “And so we shall. No threat to Quel’Thalas will surface without House Dawnwing rising to meet it.”
He had been in Dalaran when the Scourge had come, and in the ruins of Quel’Thalas when Dalaran fell. He had failed twice to defend his homes then, and with Dalaran itself now a smoldering ruin, he would not fail yet again.
“I will be searching for any leyline anomalies,” Jaskian said, “With their nexus at the Sunwell, any disturbance that could alter its state must be felt elsewhere. Should anything change, I will be sure the Magistry moves to act quickly.”
Luminash nodded, then turned his attention to his son and his longtime confidant.
“Theras, Tel. I know neither of you are Farstriders any longer, but the wilds are hardly closed off to you. Aneyah’s vision showed darkness from the south. See to it that nothing untowards lurks in our forests, and return.”
Telivathus snorted, though he spoke with a smile, “Calling me out of retirement to play in the woods, are you? Fair enough then, Dawnwing. If there is anything to these visions of yours, I’ll do my part.”
“As I knew you would,” Luminash replied; his own smile betrayed warmth for his friend though his words remained formal and professional, “And with such duty comes privilege as well. You are hereby reinstated as a retainer for the House, with all the accompanying benefits. You are to safeguard these lands through whatever means necessary.”
Telivathus bowed his head with a knowing wink, “Whatever means necessary, old friend. You know I will.”
Although his face expressed puzzlement at the exchange, Theras, too, bowed his head, “I will see it done, father. What of you and Aneyah, though?” He glanced between the only two who had yet to receive a task.
“A good question. I believe, for us, a pilgrimage of sorts is in order.” He turned fully to the Arathi, “It is high time, Aneyah, that you saw the Sunwell for yourself.”
(( To be continued come Midnight. ))
@daily-writing-challenge
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The space between Theras’ shoulderblades graced him with a tingling as he became keenly aware of Aneyah’s gaze on him from somewhere behind. She had made it a habit, it seemed, to watch him while he worked. She watched while he pruned overgrowth in the Oasis, knees pressed into damp soil; she watched while he culled energy parasites from the dome itself, spear whirling and ichor spattering across his fair skin; she watched now while he examined a slateback for injuries sustained in a territorial display. He only wondered what she saw.
Once he had completed his careful study of the beast and sent it on its way, back into the verdant depths of the dome and away from the broker’s cold instruments, and cleaned his hands in the cool and crystalline water of a pond, only then did Aneyah approach.
“Have you finished for the day yet, Ther?” the slight Arathi asked, her golden gaze flicking towards the wider habitat, its thickets and crags, babbling streams and silent pools.
He nodded, “I believe that is all they had for me, yes.” Truthfully, he had thrown himself into as many tasks as the brokers from Cartel Om, and the growing number of strange experts the Trust’s founder had brought in. Aneyah, too, had done her share, tending to the other mortals’ injuries of body and mind as they passed through, but she always managed to find time to slip away, back to Theras.
Something within him felt as if he was prey, and she the predator, though with no sign of malice in her eyes–he caught them far too often–and only the fluttering in his stomach at her approach warned him of letting her too very near. There was a cosmos to see, a world to heal, what time did he have for any of this foolish youthful fancy?
“Then walk with me for a while, would you? I know you’ve no doubt seen the falls by now, but I was thinking a stroll would do me some good. I haven’t had much chance for movement today. Not like you have.”
Her final addition made Theras once more all too conscious of her eyes on him while he dug, stretched, ran, and fought. He looked away quickly and managed to choke out something resembling agreement alongside a nod. He nearly sputtered again when she laced her arm in his and drew him towards the sound of distant waters cascading over stone.
“Are you ever afraid, Ther? Not of dangerous things, no, but of…everything? The world, and its enormity? The weight of it?” Aneyah questioned, a meekness, a vulnerability in her voice as she looked up to the elf.
There was always something in the cleric of a deer, trapped in its drive to freeze or flee, Theras reflected, although he had never seen her do either. An innate desire to escape coupled with the fortitude not to was rare. In his Farstrider training, no small number of young aspirants were culled from the rangers’ ranks from lacking that same fortitude.
He nodded in response, “How could someone not be?” Imagined scenes danced in his mind, from the devastation of the Arathi airships, their remains entombed in the Undersea’s cold embrace, to the horror of Beledar’s Shadow, and the creatures slithering, cold and hungry, from the dark, “We all have that right, but we… If this is… You’ve handled it well.”
His tongue betrayed him as he scrambled for the right response, very aware of the warmth of her body pressed to his arm.
“Thank you,” she breathed, seemingly unbothered by the young man’s faltering attempt at reassurance, “Having gone from my life in the Empire to Hallowfall, and then K’aresh, I haven’t had much of a chance to let go of the fear. I wanted you to know, though, that I think I can, at least a little.”
She continued as the pair approached the falls, their feet sinking slightly into sand damp from the spraying mist, “The Void didn’t kill this world. It is alive out there, under all of the scars. It had its heart ripped out, over and over again, and it’s… Still here.”
Theras stopped as she did, and startled only slightly when the woman’s head rested against his shoulder.
“Aneyah? I…” Theras cleared his throat, the soft sound lost amidst the rumble of the falls, “Perhaps after K’aresh, you should see Silvermoon. I haven’t been home for real in many years. You deserve…peace.”
She was silent, though her head shifted against him in a small nod, a smile tugging at the side of her lips.
Before they went entirely silent and let the sound of the water, that lifeblood of nature, wash over them, Theras whispered, “For whatever it is worth, I do not think I’ve seen the falls this…lovely.”
The younger Dawnwing nodded, resting his elbows on the railing overlooking Mereldar. Behind the pair, through an open archway, was the library where the magister had spent much of the past few months in study.
"Please," Luminash nudged, "What is it? Why so formal?"
Theras raised one shoulder in response, a half shrug that reminded his father for a moment of himself, a dismissive gesture he had offered many a time before. His son would elaborate no further.
After a moment in silence, the young man picking at his sleeve, gaze focused somewhere in the misty distance of Hallowfall's cavern, he spoke, "Aneyah intends to travel to the surface. She wants to see the wider world, and I intend to go with her.”
“Hm,” Luminash replied, “You are sure of this?” There was no judgement or displeasure in his voice, for which his son let out a grateful sigh, “Though the work we do here is of the utmost importance, it will continue even with fewer hands.”
“That is another point, actually, father,” Theras said, turning from his overlook and towards the magister, “About the work, about it all really.”
Luminash canted his head, “What do you mean?”
“The Order of the Night preys on the hopeless. It creates hopelessness to expand its power,” the ranger answered, emphasizing each point with a motion of the hands, “So if our goal is eradication, pruning the branches does little good, wouldn’t you agree?”
The magister noted his son’s choice of words, his expectant question. He had been listening well to him and to Ryfus, it seemed. He had no choice but to nod in agreement.
“And the Primalists, too. Everyone like them has done the same, so why have we done nothing to save them before they are too far gone?” The young elf’s voice rose, touched by a drive Luminash recognized well, as if peering into a mirror.
“Aneyah hopes the Sacred Flame may bring that to the wider world. People left behind.”
“And she can scarcely do that alone, can she?” Luminash finished, offering his son an understanding smile, “Every great work, however peaceful, finds itself in need at times of a strong arm, does it not?”
Theras’ eyes flitted to his spear, resting against the doorway. He nodded in reply, although with some reluctance.
“Which brings me to my final point, father,” the ranger ventured.
“Ah, you have done well so far. I will hear you. What is your last concern?” Luminash approached the railing and leaned next to the younger Dawnwing.
“It is…about you. And Jaskian. Dalaran.” Theras, in that moment, found it hard to meet his father’s gaze, though it showed only curiosity, an invitation to continue, no anger.
“Do you ever feel that you have gone…still? Stagnant?” A twitch of the cheek in the magister. The word, like a spear itself, had hit its mark, “That you have found yourself reacting rather than acting?"
Luminash was silent, only the furrowing of his brow indicating any perturbation. The thought had clearly crossed his mind.
"I'd grown up hearing stories from Tel, about what my father was doing: you betrayed your own kingdom on your pilgrimage to Outland because you saw who the Sunfury had become. You agitated in Silvermoon against Kael'thas, even before his betrayal was known. You advocated for more exchange with the Horde in the early days. Your research—"
"Has raised many an eyebrow. You needn't list all of my accomplishments," Luminash cut in, a chill in his voice, "My research is precisely why I am here yet. Renilash—"
"Has become an obsession, father," Theras sighed, "All your work since the fall has been for your people. You saw a problem and you sought to solve it! But you are league beneath the earth, chasing down the Order of the Night with the only end being elimination. What about a solution? What about—"
Luminash's gloved fingers gripped the railing as his son's words washed over him. All were true, he knew, but a force he could scarcely explain held him here.
As much as it pained him, though, he had to try.
"Theras," Luminash snapped, stopping the young ranger short.
Stubborn, a trait the pair shared, Theras continued, "What about hope?"
Collecting himself, the earnestness in the boy's voice piercing his heart, Luminash spoke, the gentle, reassuring tone of a proud father, "Not a word has been said untruthfully. But there are...one might say, complications?"
When Theras only canted his head in response, the magister motioned back inside with a jerk of his own, "Come. There are some things you must see."
