Jaina Proudmoore: Tides of War (10 page)

“No offense was taken, and a good diplomat can often see clearly what is troubling another,” Kalec said. “It has indeed been difficult.
For so many ages, dragons were among the most powerful beings in Azeroth. We alone had the Aspects to guard our flights and the world. Even the least of us had a life that must seem impossibly long to you and abilities that made many of my race feel superior. Deathwing—what is the phrase you humans use?—gave us a good helping of humble cake.”

Jaina fought to keep from laughing. “I think the phrase is usually ‘humble pie.’”

He chuckled. “It would seem that even though I like the younger races more than most of my kin do, I still have a lot to learn.”

Jaina waved her hand. “Human slang should not be high on your list of things to master,” she said.

“I wish I could say that I had nothing more pressing to do,” Kalec replied, sobering again.

“Halt!” a voice cried sharply. Kalecgos stopped, looking at Jaina with curiosity as several guards approached with drawn swords and axes. Jaina waved at them and they immediately put away their weapons and bowed as they recognized her. One of them, a fair-haired, bearded man, saluted.

“Lady Jaina,” he said. “I wasn’t informed that you and your guest would be passing through. Do you wish an escort?”

The two magi exchanged slightly amused glances. “Thank you, Captain Wymor. I appreciate the offer, but I think this gentleman will be able to protect me,” Jaina said, keeping a straight face.

“As you will, my lady.”

Kalec waited until they had passed out of earshot before saying in a completely serious tone of voice, “I don’t know, Jaina; I might be the one who needs rescuing.”

“Why then, I shall come to your rescue,” Jaina said, keeping her face as serious as his.

Kalec sighed. “You are already doing so,” he said quietly.

She glanced up at him, her brow furrowing. “I’m helping,” she said. “I’m not rescuing.”

“In a way, you are. You all are. We’re… not what we were. I want so much to protect my flight, to take care of them.”

Something clicked in Jaina’s mind. “As you wanted to protect Anveena.”

A muscle twitched in his cheek, but his steps didn’t falter. “Yes.”

“You didn’t fail her.”

“Yes, I did. She was captured and used,” Kalec said, his voice harsh with self-loathing. “Used to try to bring Kil’jaeden into Azeroth. And I couldn’t save her.”

“You had no control over that, if what I understand is true,” Jaina said softly, feeling her way. She wasn’t sure how much Kalecgos was ready to share with her. “You were possessed yourself by a dreadlord. And once you were freed from that horrible existence, you went to her.”

“But I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t stop them from hurting her.”

“Yes, you did,” Jaina said, pressing him. “You let Anveena become what she really was—the Sunwell. And because of your love and her courage, Kil’jaeden was defeated. You were selfless enough not to deny her her destiny.”

“And the Aspects were destined to lose our powers in order for us to succeed against Deathwing, I know,” Kalec said. “It’s not wrong, what is going on. But… it is hard. It is hard to watch their hope failing, and—”

“To know yours is failing as well?”

He turned sharply to look at her, and for a moment she thought she had gone too far. But it was not anger in his eyes; it was anguish. “You,” he said, “are not nearly as old as I. How is it you are so insightful?”

She hooked her arm through his as they walked. “Because I’m wrestling with the same thing.”

“Why are you here, Jaina?” he asked. She raised a golden eyebrow at his bluntness. “I’ve heard that you were considered one of the finest magi of the order. Why are you not in Dalaran? Why are you here, standing between swamp and ocean, between Horde and Alliance?”

“Because someone has to.”

“Truly?” His brow was furrowed. He came to a stop and turned her to face him.

“Of course!” she retorted. Anger rose in her. “Do you
want
war between the Alliance and Horde, Kalec? Is that what the dragons have decided to do with their time these days? Go around stirring up trouble?”

His blue eyes showed hurt from the blow her words had landed.

She winced. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that.”

Kalec nodded. “What
did
you mean, then?” he asked, but there was no rancor in his voice.

She stared at him mutely. She didn’t know. Then words came tumbling out from somewhere. “I didn’t want to be part of the order after Dalaran fell. After… Antonidas died. Arthas killed him, Kalec. Killed so many of them. The man I had once thought I would marry. Had loved. I didn’t… I couldn’t be around that. I had changed, and the Kirin Tor had changed too. They’re more than simply neutral… I think, perhaps without realizing it, they may look down on anyone who’s not one of them. I had learned that to really foster peace, you have to embrace the people—all of them. And although I was the last one to suspect it, I do have diplomatic gifts,” she said earnestly.

The hurt was gone from his kind face, and he lifted one hand to stroke her golden hair, almost as if he were comforting a child. “Jaina?” he asked. “If you believe that—and I am not saying you are wrong—why are you trying so very hard to convince yourself?”

And there it was. He had plunged a dagger in her heart, keen and sharp and so painful that she gasped as if it were a physical blow. She stared up at him, unable to drag her gaze away, feeling tears sting her eyes.

“They don’t
listen,
” she said, barely audible. “No one listens. Not Varian, not Thrall, certainly not Garrosh. I feel that I am standing alone on a cliff, and the wind snatches the words from my lips even as I speak them. No matter what I do, no matter what I say, it is all… pointless. It has no meaning.
I
… have no meaning.”

As she spoke, she saw a sad smile of recognition touch Kalec’s lips.

“And so, this we share, Lady Jaina Proudmoore,” Kalec said. “We fear being of no use. Of no help. All that we have known to do is useless.”

The tears spilled down her cheeks. Gently, he wiped them away. “But I do know this much. There is a rhythm, a cycle to such things. Nothing stays the same, Jaina. Not even dragons, so long-lived and supposedly so wise. How much, then, must humans change? Once, you were an eager young apprentice, curious and studious, content to stay in Dalaran and master your spells. Then the world came and ripped you away from your safe place. You changed. You survived, even thrived, in the new role of a diplomat. You had puzzles and challenges, but of a different variety. And that is how you served. This world—” He shook his head sadly, looking up into the sky. “This world is not as it was.
No thing, no one,
is as it was. Here—let me show you something.”

He lifted his hands, his long, clever fingers moving. Arcane energy sparked from his fingertips. It formed a whirling ball, hovering in front of them.

“Look at this,” he said.

Jaina did, forcing her foolish tears—where had they come from?—down and focusing on the little orb of arcane magic. Deftly Kalec touched it. It seemed to shatter and then reform, with a difference.

“There—it’s a pattern!” Jaina said, marveling.

“Watch again,” Kalec said. A second time he touched it. A third. Each time, the patterns became clearer. There was a moment when, baffled and enraptured both, Jaina wondered if she was looking at a gnomish schematic rather than a ball of arcane energy. Signs and symbols and numbers whirled, then jumbled together, then arranged themselves in a certain formation.

“It’s… so beautiful,” she whispered.

Kalec splayed his fingers and drew his hand through the orb. As if it were mist he disturbed, it fragmented, then reformed in still another way. It was a ceaselessly shifting kaleidoscope of magic, of precise patterns and order.

“Do you understand, Jaina?” he asked. She continued to stare, almost hypnotized by the exquisite patterns of formation, shattering, and reconfiguration.

“It’s… more than spells,” she said.

He nodded. “It’s what spells are made of.”

For a moment, she didn’t follow him. Spells had incantations, gesticulation, sometimes reagents—and then understanding smote her so powerfully she almost stumbled with the revelation.

“It’s…
math
!”

“Equations. Theorems. Order,” Kalec said, pleased. “Combined in one way, they are one thing—in another, something altogether different. It is fixed and mutable, as is a life. All things change, Jaina, whether from the inside out or the outside in. Sometimes with only a single shift in a variable.”

“And… we are magic, too,” Jaina whispered. She tore her gaze from the ineffably beautiful swirl of lyrical, poetical math and began to form a question.

“Lady Jaina!”

The shout startled them both, and they turned to see Captain Wymor galloping toward them on a bay horse. He pulled the beast up so sharply it reared and mouthed the bit.

“Captain Wymor, what—” Jaina began, but the guard cut her off.

“Pained has returned with news,” he said, panting from the short but intense ride. “The Horde—they are gathering. Coming from Orgrimmar and Ratchet as well as from Mulgore. It looks like they’re set to converge on Northwatch Hold!”

“No,” Jaina breathed, her heart, an instant ago so buoyed by the beauty and insight Kalecgos had shared with her, now heavy in her chest. “Please, no… not this… not now…”

I
t was Ol’ Durty Pete’s turn to keep watch in Corporal Teegan’s Expedition encampment, located on the edge of the mysterious jungle Overgrowth, which had seemingly sprung up overnight. Despite his fondness for a “mug o’ th’ brew” on, well, nearly an hourly basis, the white-bearded dwarf knew enough to take his assignments seriously. He hadn’t had anything to drink since nightfall, and it was nearly dawn.

He patted his blunderbuss—which he loved, even if it was becoming a bit erratic these days (unkind folks said it was Ol’ Durty Pete who was erratic, not his gun)—and sighed. Soon his watch would be over, and he could open up that cherry grog he’d been saving for—

There was a rustle in the undergrowth. The old dwarf got to his feet with more speed than most would have given him credit for. All kinds of strange critters could be attacking. Raptors, plainstriders, those big nasty flower- or moss-things—

A woman, wearing a tabard that sported a golden anchor, stumbled forward, stared at him a moment, and then collapsed. Pete barely caught her as she fell.

“Teegan!” roared Pete. “We got oursels a problem!”

A few seconds later, one of the guards was attempting to bandage the young scout’s injuries, but Pete thought sadly that it was pretty clear the little missy wasn’t going to pull through. She reached out
frantically, grabbing on to Hannah Bridgewater’s arm as Hannah bent over her.

“H-Horde,” the scout rasped. “T-tauren. Opened the gate. Heading east. Think… Northwatch…”

Her eyes closed, and her black hair, matted with blood, fell back limply against Pete’s broad chest. He patted her shoulder awkwardly.

“Ye got yer message through, lass,” he said. “Ye done good. Take yer rest, noo.”

Teegan hurrying up in response to Pete’s call, shot the dwarf an angry look. “She’s dead, you idiot.”

Gently, Pete replied, “I know, laddie. I know.”

Two minutes later, the fastest one among them, Hannah, was running as quickly as her long, strong legs would carry her, east to Northwatch, praying to the Light that she wouldn’t be too late.

•   •   •

Admiral Tarlen Aubrey was, as usual, awake before dawn. He rose swiftly, splashed water on his face, dressed, and shaved. As he met his own eyes in the mirror, he saw that they had circles underneath them and frowned as he carefully shaped the beard and mustache that were his only concessions to physical vanity. Over the last few days, the Rageroar clan of orcs had appeared to be regrouping—what was left of them. Skirmishes had broken out, during which it had been reported that a few of the orcs had shouted insults along the lines that the Alliance would get what was coming to it, or had grunted defiant comments as they died, such as, “My death will be avenged.”

Nothing out of the ordinary, not really. Confidence and arrogance marked almost every orc, in Aubrey’s experience, and the Rageroar in particular. And yet, he had not gotten to his position without being alert to all possible dangers. It was odd that the Rageroar had come back after being defeated, and he needed to know why. He had sent out spies to confirm if the Horde was beginning to move toward war, and especially if its sights were on Northwatch Hold. None had reported in yet; it was too early.

Aubrey broke his fast with a banana and some strong tea and
headed to his usual patrol route. He nodded a greeting to Signal Officer Nathan Blaine, who saluted smartly despite the early hour, and together the two men looked out over the sea. Dawn was full-on, and the ocean and dock were painted in shades of rose, scarlet, and crimson, the clouds hovering above limned faintly with gold here and there.

“‘Red sky in the morning, sailors take warning,’” Aubrey mused as he sipped his tea.