Warcraft Fan Fiction ❯ Bloodstained Shadows - Chronicles of a Lost Soul ❯ Memories of the Twilight - Chapter 2 ( Chapter 18 )

Chapter 2:

 

 

The minutes pass and my anger diminishes. But still I am sure that once I am out of here that giant insect is going to get what it deserves.

I walk from corner to corner inside the cage not knowing what to do or how I could keep my mind off the situation.

"You look like a wild animal thrown into a cage, you are quite the nervous type, aren't you?" the Forsaken asks with a cold voice.

"So what?", is my only response. Most things he says sound like he is making fun of me. After I'll have dealt with the giant beetle, he will surely be the next on the list.

“You made yourself a name quite fast in the recent year with the way you ... `act' and the things you do.”, he talks to himself, I guess he notices that I don't pay much attention to him.

"Hrm..., come to think of it, you haven't told me why you are here, actually.", he turns his head to me.

“Why is that of any interest to you?” I ask him, the tone of my voice is provoking.

“I want to know if the rumours are true.”, his response is short.

“Rumours? What rumours? `They' are supposed to speak of me in fear and say my name with respect, not spread any rumours!?”, I am shocked.

“'They'? Who are `they'?”, Chillsbane asks.

“Well..., the Forsaken, the Cult of the Forgotten Shadow, everybody actually.”, I'm a bit surprised because of his question.

“So you already look at them as your property... alright. But now, back to topic. The rumour states that you would want to turn yourself in to the Scourge willingly. And now sitting here next to you, I wondered whether this might be true.”

“Where did this rumour come from?”, I hesitate to answer his question.

“It is basically all over the Forgotten Shadow. But please, answer my question. Do a dying man this single favour.”, he smiles at me.

“Well, okay... If that is what the rumour says, they are right.”, I shrug.

“But why are you doing this? You are just taking a few more steps on a road leading to damnation!”

“I long for freedom. That is all I want to achieve. But to reach this goal I have to become strong and powerful. That is the way our world goes round...”

“You call this freedom? You are selling your soul to someone who is willing to erase every living creature in Azeroth!”, the light in his eyes flickers.

“I am a Forsaken, just like you are. I was able to get out of his grasp once, so I will be able to a second time!”

“That was Sylvanas who freed you from his icy grasp, not you!”, his voice grows louder again. He stands up and approaches me.

“Curse you and your banshee queen, how do you know that she is able to conduct things like this at all? I never swore an oath to anybody and I surely will not do so in the future. I won't show any gratitude towards her, nor respect. Her reign is just another form of slavery!”

The undead seems angry. “Silence yourself! Do you think the Scourge would grant you freedom? If they find out what you want to do you will be killed on the spot and revived as a ghoul for his hordes. The Lich King is merciless! You should know that!”

“I will take my chance of achieving freedom, not matter what or who will oppose me or what I have to do for it!”, I take a step towards him. “I am strong, stronger than you could ever imagine to be. I will be able to do this! I had to sacrifice so much to get to this point and I won't retreat after coming this far!”

“So what? If you join the Scourge the greatest sacrifice still lies before you, the moment when you give in to them!”

I calm down, turning my head away from him. “Believe me..., the greatest sacrifice was already made.” My voice is shaking, the tone of it testifying my sadness.

He seems surprised because of my reaction to his words. He returns to his corner and sits down quietly. A few minutes pass.

“Tell me, who were you in your former life?”, Chillsbane breaks the silence again.

I try to ignore his question.

“Go ahead, tell me.”, I can imagine how he is smiling behind me.

“I won't tell you anything about that time...”, the tone of my voice states that this answer is absolute.

“So, I see... you don't want to remember.”

I say nothing to his conclusion.

“If you don't want to talk about that part of your life, then tell me something about your life as an undead.”, his voice is clear and he even sounds happy, what a weird guy. “Oh sorry, I don't mean the time as a ghoul or so, I couldn't remember that part either, but as a Forsaken.”

I don't know whether I should answer or not.

“Oh come on, this surely should kill some waiting time. And start right at the beginning!”

I hesitate, yet I guess it shouldn't matter if I told him things about myself, after all... he is second in priority on my list of people to kill at the moment.

 

 

`Where am I?'

This was the first thought that came up in my head. Everything was dark and cold. The last thing I could remember clearly was a scenery in the eastern plaguelands. I still knew who I am, or who I was. Everything in between those last memories and now seemed like a dream, like a nightmare.

I fully opened my eyes and tried to figure out where I was. I stood up from the cold floor. It was completely made of stone. Very slowly my eyes adjusted to the darkness that filled the room. It seemed I had been lying almost directly in the centre of it. I took a step forward and bumped into something that was lying on the floor. I crunched down to try and have a look at it, but my eyes were still not used to the not existing lighting of the room. I stretched my hand out to reach for whatever was lying in the way. I touched bone, I went on wanting to know if the rest of the skeleton was still lying there. The next thing I felt was flesh. I jumped up to my feet almost screaming and took a few steps backwards where I instantly bumped into the next body. I was afraid. The only thing I could think of was how to get out of there and the question: 'Where am I?'

I stood there for a few minutes breathing heavily.

In the meantime my eyes adjusted to the darkness more and more. What I saw in that moments was shocking. I was surrounded by literally piles of dead bodies. Behind one of the piles I noticed a staircase leading up. I passed the dead bodies, carefully trying not to step onto any of them.

After about twenty steps the staircase took a turn to the left. The same thing occurred two more times before I entered a greater hall. It looked similar to the one I ascended from with the only difference that it was a lot brighter and you could already seen where the light was coming from. On the other side of the room there was another staircase, but this time it was clearly leading outside. All around the room where alcoves in the walls, some of them filled with a coffin, some not.

I looked down at me for the first time since I had died.

My robes were merely rags, the emblem that was formerly ornamenting my chest was completely torn apart.

I took a few more steps. For the first time I realized that it felt as if Walked bare footed, yet again the floor felt not cold enough.

I decided to lift my robe slightly to take a look. I was completely petrified once I saw the reason for me not feeling the cold of the floor. My left foot was almost entirely reduced to bones and the right food also only had a few places left with flesh attached to it.

“What in the name of the Holy Light?!” I cried out.

Then I noticed my arms and hands. Around my elbows there was nothing left but bones and a few muscle strands. On my left arm there even was a piece of flesh still hanging down from my forearm. I touched it but Didn't feel any pain.

`What on earth happened to me?', those were my thoughts. I pressed my eyes closed and tore the piece off my forearm. It didn't even tickle.

I touched my face with my bony fingers, or what was left of them. It was a certain relief to notice that nothing particular was missing there.

This was the first time I fully realized that I had become one of them.

At first I was reluctant to take the stairs out of this crypt, I was scared of the things that might await me up there. Yet soon I realized that I was only delaying the inevitable.

This staircase also took a turn after a few steps, just like the one before, but from the room I was standing in you could already see the sunlight shining in through gaps in the walls.

I convinced myself and made my way out.

As I reached the outside, I was blinded by the light for a moment or two. A pile of bones lay to my right.

The sky was dark. The entrance of the crypt basically lay in ruins. I was glad to be out of there. I was standing on a hill, a path winding down towards a small village. From the point where I stood I could already see the pinnacle of a church.

I looked around for a moment trying to figure out where I was. I thought for a while whether this could actually be Tirisfal or somewhere else. The sky and the forest around me reminded me of those areas.

The hill itself was currently used as a cemetery. I saw graves everywhere, some of them were open, some not, some of them had a tombstone, some not.

As I reached the third curve the path made I spotted someone slowly crossing the graveyard.

I approached the person, as he was yelling something. I couldn't understand what he was saying. He spotted me as well and also came towards me.

We stopped several feet apart from each other.

"Hector!", was the first thing he yelled directly at me. "Just follow the path and into the church, inside somebody will tell you everything." Without any further word he walked on past me. He hadn't even left me a single minute so I could have answered him.

I tried to keep him from walking away, but I guess the single, "But....?", wasn't enough. And I wondered who that Hector was supposed to be.

I was already rather near the village at that point, so I decided to just follow that man's words.

An iron fence was dividing the graveyard from the rest of the village. Two guards were standing at the gates, both of them were armed. They greeted me instantly and in a friendly fashion.

The village itself was divided by a ridge of wooden spears. The church and two more houses formed the upper part of the city, mostly inhabited by undead just like the two guards, the gravedigger or... myself. From the lower part of the city I heard a moaning.

The left guard was the one to talk, I could see no visible eyes in his skull, yet I supposed he was able to see me. He had strands of greenish-blue hair and two leather bands were tied around his head. I wondered if this was a necessity or a kind of ornament.

"Good morning, Hector. I am deathguard Oliver, welcome to Deathknell. Just go into the church and talk to shadow priest Sarvis. He'll tell you everything and answer any question you might have to your current situation.", his voice had a very deep tone. I nodded and thanked him for his advice. Although I still wondered who this Hector was that they all were talking about. As I walked on I overheard the rest of the conversation between the two guards. That guy named Oliver said something about how astonishing the gravedigger Mordo was, because he always knew the names of everybody coming out of the crypt. In that moment I realized they meant me when saying the name Hector.

But that wasn't my name... I knew who I had been before becoming this... thing I was now.

I entered the church with hesitation.

Seven people and an imp were inside it. All of them were undead, three men and four women. But the strangest thing was the fact that some of them had this glowing in their eyes, some didn't. Actually I didn't know if they had eyes at all.

Shadow priest Sarvis greeted me friendly and with open arms, the guards outside probably talked loud enough so that he had heard our conversation.

As I drew nearer I saw that his lower jaw was missing completely.

“It is good to see you awake, Hector.”, the moment he spoke the name whispers arose around me. I only heard shreds of what they said, it sounded like `Mordo must be out of his mind..' or something like that. How was he able to speak? At first I was only able to look at him in disbelief.

After I had focused again I tried to tell him that this was not my name, “But, my name isn't Hector, it's Ma...”

“Don't be silly, of course your name is Hector.”, he interrupted me, “It is normal to suffer from partial amnesia for a while after waking up.”

I came to the conclusion that it was useless to talk against his words, he wouldn't believe me.

“You surely must have some questions, Hector. Go ahead, ask what you want to hear.”, his voice was friendly, yet I didn't trust him, I trusted none of them.

I had to think for a moment, I couldn't decide what I wanted to know first.

“Where am I? How did I get here? And who are you?”, it burst out of me after I realized that it wouldn`t matter if I asked everything at once or one by one. I was still a bit confused from all the things I saw and heard since I woke up in that tomb.

“You are in Deathknell in the south-west of Tirisfal. We actually found your body in Brill, you attacked some of our guards as I was told. You were taken down by them, but you deliberately refused to die, therefore you were brought here.”, he made a short pause, “And we..., well we are your new family. We are the Forsaken of Lordaeron, led by the banshee queen Sylvanas Windrunner.”

Unwillingly I took a step backwards.

I hoped that this would turn out to be merely a nightmare, yet it was far too real for a dream.

I had become one of the creatures I despised most in my life.

“Welcome back to this world, Hector.”