#wartide

𝐔𝐍𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐌𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐃    ↪    @wartide​  asked :    fingers trace the scars littering the orc’s back, careful, gentle in her movement. it is only when a soft rumble reverberating within thrall’s chest reaches her does it cease, as the corners of jaina’s mouth quirk upwards in a small smile. "sorry,” she murmurs, genuinely apologetic, pressing a quick, lingering kiss to his shoulder. "i didn’t mean to wake you."

                    𝐏𝐄𝐀𝐂𝐄𝐅𝐔𝐋 𝐒𝐋𝐄𝐄𝐏   is not so rare, anymore. it had once been a privilege to slumber unbothered for a full night’s rest, often after days upon days of restless nights. he NEVER woke up slowly ― always in a panic, always in a start. the remains of the last night’s horrors still lingering and festering in his skull, without fail. every single time.

          it stands in such stark juxtaposition with this morning. thrall wakes slowly, in fact. before he has even opened his eyes, his chest rumbles as if there are tectonic plates shifting beneath his earthen skin. drowsy, unaware of all but the sunlight warming his face through the window and the gentle fingers tracing the ever FAMILIAR lines in his back. the sound of her voice, something he had only ever dreamed of waking up to. their little slice of heaven.

          in a few hours, he will muse over this with his morning tea and wonder how he got so lucky. but now is not the time.

                    𝐇𝐄 𝐓𝐀𝐊𝐄𝐒   her hand in his, her delicate palms dwarfed by that of his own. together they lay in this realm of death, failing in all their attempts to rest as they should for the coming war. after torghast, oribos almost feels ... too right. too good to be true. the NIGHTMARES plague the backs of his eyes as they do hers; his wrists and ankles ache as the burns on her skin surely sting. thrall has not felt this tired in a long, long time. maybe the same can be said of jaina ― no, there is no maybe. he can see the bags under her beautiful eyes, the slightest slouch in her shoulders as she stands at the war table. he has known her for so long, and even still, he struggles to think of a time where she was ever so EXHAUSTED.

          but they are together, if nothing else. the strength that he has left lies with jaina. it sits in her ribcage, within the heart he wants so desperately to know once more, and he DARES not ponder what would become of him without it. without her.

          thrall’s thumb brushes tenderly over her knuckles, as if she is made of porcelain, and his eyes shift from the ceiling to look at her. even in the dim candlelight of the room, he notices every subtle detail. the freckles scattered across her cheeks, the gentle curve of her cupid’s bow, the slight upturn of her nose. everything that, to him, has ever been synonymous with home.

send memes ♡

— @wartide

"You misunderstand me, Lady Proudmoore," That a title is remembered at all diminishes in nothing apparent animosity in every syllable of each word; she does not feign sweetness, nor plays pretend at civility (a constant: her wildness had ever been untamed, and her claws spare neither foe nor would-be ally). When her eyes meet the mage, her gaze is challenging, further incensed by Jaina's words. Alleria would not back down from a fight.

They are on the same side solely out of necessity. She, bereft of homeland and denied the company of her people, severed even from once-beloved family, was embraced in the Alliance as a hero, regardless of the changes that befell her. When finding others like herself, her kin, Anduin extended to the ren'dorei the same hospitality extended to her. No one else would have, knowing the threat a slip in the control of their shadows may pose. But the young king did, and Alleria and her people alike had gone above and beyond to honor that trust.

The huntress held no illusion the little Wrynn's grace extended to most of her other allies, and Jaina Proudmoore did not make her distrust secret. Were she someone else, Alleria may have tried a diplomatic route, to try and get the mage to understand, to show the Void was a tool, as much as the Light, as much as the Arcane. Yet there is not a bone in her body made for diplomacy. She was born and raised for war, and when a battle presents itself, she does not have the good sense to avoid it.

—

War, violence, injury — these are all things Shaw is intimate with.

That's the fancy way of saying he's been here before.

He's lucky he's made it closer to the Alliance territories in Boralus; what was supposed to be a brief scouting missions to survey the lands ended with the Spymaster uncovering Irontide bidding, which he normally wouldn't have interfered with were it not for the choice words he overheard from the pirates.

So, a dispatch was in order. No amount of pirates can ever truly outnumber the Spymaster, but at the end of the day, he is still human after all. Nothing he can't handle.

And that's the sight Jaina stumbles upon: Shaw had briefly paused to lean on the stone wall with a hand pressed to a bleeding abdomen, the rest of him looking rather worse for wear than the normally dignified look. His face is screwed tight in an expression of pain, but upon seeing her, he attempts to twist it into a smile, lifting his fingers in a light wave.