Thrall Twilight of the Aspects (20 page)

She sprang from a sitting position straight up into the air with a speed that was almost faster than his eye could follow. A heartbeat later, a giant red dragon hovered over him. The fine gray dust of the dead land was stirred up and covered Thrall’s skin and robe, causing his eyes to water. He leaped to his feet and stepped back quickly, wondering what would happen next.

“Yes, I was made,” Alexstrasza said, her voice deeper, harsher, and full of anger and a blistering bitterness. “Made into the Life-Binder without truly understanding what was being asked of me. And what is being asked of me is no longer bearable. I have sacrificed, and given, and aided, and fought, and my reward is more
pain, more demands, and the death of all I hold dear. I do not wish to kill, but I will, orc, if you trouble me further. Nothing matters!
Nothing! GO!
”

He tried one more time. “Please,” he said, “please consider the innocents who—”

“GO!”

Alexstrasza reared back, beating her wings to keep herself aloft and opening her enormous, sharp-toothed maw, and Thrall fled. A sheet of billowing orange-red flame charred the stone where he had been sitting. He heard her drawing breath again and half ran, half fell down the side of the jutting peak.

A roar filled the heavy air. It was a mixture of anger and anguish, and Thrall’s heart ached for the grieving Aspect. He wished he had been able to find some way to reach her. The thought of her dying here, alone, from lack of food and water and most of all from a broken heart, pained him. He regretfully imagined travelers one day coming across her bones, bleached and old like the other skeletons that dotted this landscape.

He slipped and slid the rest of the way and, bruised and with a heavy spirit, trudged to where Tick had said to meet her. The dragon wheeled above him for a moment, then landed and regarded him sadly.

“Where shall I bear you, Thrall?” she asked quietly.

“We go to the Nexus, just as we planned,” Thrall said, his voice ragged. “We go to convince the blues to unite with the other flights, as Nozdormu asked.”

“And … we go alone.”

Thrall nodded. “Alone.” He glanced back at the shape of a great red dragon, her wings beating erratically, her body contorted as she threw back her horned head. Perhaps, if she saw what the others were doing, her heart might yet be moved. “For now.”

Yet even as they flew northward, over the sound of Tick’s beating wings, Thrall could hear the bitter, roaring grief of a broken Life-Binder.

Like a shadow stretching out across the land at twilight, something dark lifted up from the hollow in which he had concealed himself. Far enough away so that he would likely not be seen, but close enough to keep the quarry within range, King Aedelas Blackmoore, perched atop a twilight dragon, followed.

The wind blew back his long, black hair. His face was, if cruel, not unhandsome. A neatly trimmed black goatee framed thin lips, and his blue eyes snapped beneath elegant black brows.

After the first effort, Blackmoore had decided not to follow Thrall through the timeways. It was too tricky; the odds of his prey eluding him and leading him on a futile chase were too high.

Better to wait, and bide his time, and be where he knew Thrall would eventually have to appear.

Thrall. He had heard enough about Thrall to want to dismember the orc with a paring knife. Thrall, who had slain him, whose mere existence had caused Blackmoore to continue down the path of a pathetic, drunken coward. Thrall, who had led an army of orcs against Durnholde. No, it was quite the joy that lay before him. The victory would be even sweeter, given what a challenge the greenskin actually was.

Fly away, orc,
he mused, his thin lips curling in a smile.
Fly, but you cannot flee.

I will find you, and I will slay you. And then I will help destroy your world.

T
hrall had to admit to himself that he was uneasy about approaching the blue dragonflight in its own lair. Exposure to the great leviathans had in no way lessened their majesty in his eyes. Indeed, the more he learned of dragons, the more impressed he became. Green, bronze, the mighty yet heartbroken Life-Binder, who was arguably the most powerful dragon in all of Azeroth—even the least of them could destroy him with a single tail swipe or crush him beneath a clawed foot.

They had impressed him more than physically as well. Their minds were not those of the “shorter-lived” races, as they termed them. They thought on a larger scale, and no matter how long he lived, Thrall knew he could only grasp the merest fraction of their complexity: Ysera’s dreaminess even as the Awakened, seeing things no other being had or ever could; the weaving of a life in Nozdormu’s scales; the aching pain of one who held the world’s compassion in her heart. …

Now Thrall and Tick were heading directly for the dragonflight that had recently caused so much harm—whose Aspect had been chosen to be the guardian of arcane magic in the world. Malygos
had gone mad, and then, fearfully sane, had done worse things than he had ever done in the grasp of his insanity. Thrall had not walked in the Emerald Dream, but he had exchanged jokes with Desharin. He had done his best to help Alexstrasza, huddled and broken. He had been able to enlighten the Timeless One.

But the blues …

No love of the “lesser races” had they, this flight—masters of arcane magic, living in climates as blue and white and cold as they themselves were said to be.

He chuckled ruefully as he anticipated the meeting. “Perhaps I should have just stayed home,” he said to Tick.

“Had you done so,” Tick mused, “then this timeway would have been altered even more, and you would have created yet more work for my brethren.”

It took Thrall a moment to realize that while in a way the bronze was serious, she was also attempting humor. Thrall laughed.

The blue-gray of the frigid ocean beneath them, which was all Thrall had been able to see for much of the journey, gave way to white and gray cliffs. Thrall had seen many impressive sights in his day, but the Nexus came close to topping them all.

Blue, it was all blue, with shades of silver and white here and there. Several flat disks hovered in the air, spaced around the Nexus itself. As Tick flew closer, Thrall could see that these disks were platforms. Their flooring was ornamented with glowing, inlaid sigils, and on a few of them were beautiful crystalline trees, their branches seemingly made of ice and leafed with frost.

The Nexus itself seemed to comprise many levels, each one connected to the one above by magical strands of arcane energy. It was, all in all, one of the most beautiful things Thrall had seen. Several dragons were lazily circling, their bodies in all shades of cerulean, aquamarine, or cobalt.

Thrall and Tick were spotted almost at once, of course, and four blue dragons broke away from their brethren and approached. Their challenge was not issued to the orc but rather to the mighty bronze dragon. Thrall was, for the moment, utterly ignored.

“We greet our bronze sister,” one of them said as they flew in an apparently casual but nonetheless intimidating loose circle around Tick. “But the Nexus is not a timeway for you to explore. Why have you come to our sanctuary? No one invited you here.”

“It is not I who come to you but this orc whom I bear,” Tick said. “Nor is it I who send him this way. He was sent first by Ysera the Awakened, and then by Nozdormu the Timeless One, to this place. His name is Thrall.”

The blues exchanged glances. “For a short-lived being, he comes heralded,” one said.

“Thrall,” another said, as if trying to recall. “The warchief of the Horde.”

“No longer,” Thrall said. “I am but a shaman working with the Earthen Ring now, in an attempt to help heal a world brutally wounded by Deathwing.”

For an instant he wondered if that was the wrong thing to say. Instantly the blues looked angry, and one of them darted off and wheeled before returning, visibly needing to calm himself.

“That traitor would have seen all of our flight destroyed,” one of them growled, his voice as cold as the blue ice he so resembled. “We will bring word of your coming to the others. Tarry here until we bid you approach closer or order you to leave.”

The blues dove off, azure shapes against a dark blue and lavender sky. To Thrall’s surprise, they did not alight on one of the floating tiers of the Nexus but instead flew downward, to the ice and snow below.

* * *

Kalecgos sighed.
Here we go again,
he thought, gazing at the icy ceiling that arched above this cavernous meeting hall.

The blue flight had done a great deal of talking, and more arrived daily at the Nexus to augment their meager number, but he did not feel that any solid conclusion had been reached.

Most agreed that the timing of the conjunction between the two moons was auspicious, if nothing else. One or two had dug up ancient spells they had wanted to try that, upon further investigation, had been proved inadequate. So far, it did seem that the blues were more than content with “anointing” one of their number during what was sure to be a visually stirring astronomical moment, but there was no real emotion behind it, no real sense that this was the single right thing to do.

Arygos was holding forth on his bloodline and how being the son of Malygos really did mean that, all things considered, he was the best choice. Kalec had heard this before, and was too disheartened to interrupt. He glanced out as two more blues approached, and frowned, his interest piqued.

These were not more newcomers to the Nexus but rather two of the Nexus’s protectors. They landed beside Arygos, interrupting that dragon in his speech, and spoke quietly to him.

Arygos looked angry. “Under no circumstances!” he said harshly.

“Narygos,” Kalec called, “what is it?”

“Stay out of this,” Arygos said quickly. To Narygos he said bluntly, “Kill him.”

“Kill whom?” demanded Kalec, ignoring the implied warning and moving quickly to Arygos and the others. “Narygos, what has happened?”

Narygos glanced from Arygos to Kalec, then said, “There is a stranger who comes to speak with us. He is one of the lesser races. An orc, once warchief of what is known as the Horde: Thrall. He
and the bronze dragon who bears him insist that both Ysera and Nozdormu have sent him to us.”

Kalec’s ears pricked up. “Nozdormu? He has returned?”

“So it would seem,” said Narygos. Kalec turned a stunned gaze to Arygos.

“
Kill
him?” Kalecgos repeated, loudly and disbelievingly. “One whom two Aspects have sent to us? Borne atop a willing dragon?”

They were attracting attention from others now, and Arygos scowled.

“Very well, then, do not harm him,” said Arygos. “But a member of the lesser races has no purpose here. I will not see him.”

Angry, Kalec turned to Narygos. “
I
will,” he said. “Bring him.”

“I would not care if the titans themselves brought him to us. I will see no short-lived being in our private refuge!”

Arygos was livid. He stalked back and forth, his huge tail twitching, his wings furling and unfurling in his agitation. Others had overheard the argument between the two and began to chime in.

“But … Ysera, and Nozdormu!” Narygos protested. “This is a far from common incident. Ysera has seen much in her dreaming, and finding Nozdormu is something the Timeless One’s own flight could not manage on its own. Surely it would do no harm to listen to him!”

“The lesser races, as some have dubbed them, have proven themselves to be surprising at times. There is more to them than we often give them credit for. The fact that two Aspects have urged him toward us tells me all I need to know,” said Kalec. “I say we bring him and find out what he has to tell us.”

“You would,” sneered Arygos. “You like to play in the mud with the lesser beings. I’ve never understood that about you, Kalecgos.”

Kalec regarded Arygos sadly. “And I never understood your refusal to take help or information when it came from any source
other than our own flight,” he replied. “Why do you scorn them so? It was the short-lived races who freed you from your thousand-year imprisonment in Ahn’Qiraj! I would think you would be grateful.”

Before Arygos could sputter out an angry and embarrassed reply, another, older dragon, Teralygos, snapped, “Surely no one knows the business of our flight better than we do!”

“Indeed! We have our own business to mind, Kalecgos, or have you forgotten?” Arygos continued. “The ceremony to choose a new Aspect is but a few days away. We should be preparing for that, not letting ourselves become distracted by the prattling of an orc!”

“Kill him and be done with it,” muttered Teralygos.

Kalec turned. “No. We are not butchers. Besides, do you want to look Ysera and Nozdormu in the face and tell them you murdered one they specifically sent to us?
I
don’t. No matter how disoriented the awakened Ysera might be.”