The Power of Corruption.

They found the three Windrunners sitting together at the edge of a large theatre, quietly taking in their cobwebbed and crumbling surroundings.

"The Karazhan Opera House, I'd heard stories about this place," Uther breathed. "Medivh sponsored players from the local towns to come and perform here for the nobility."

"What kind of plays?" Jaina asked, stepping down into the stalls.

There was a thunderous boom, before the organ began to play a sombre tune. Dust and smoke billowed out of the pipes, quickly enveloping each of the heroes. When it cleared, Yrel found herself standing alone in one of the balcony boxes, looking down at the stage where a ghostly human was bowing to an audience of ghosts.

"Uther!" she cried, only to be shushed by a ghost in the next box.

"Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. We proudly welcome you to this evening's feature presentation!" The man bellowed, his voice carrying over the general murmuring of the audience.

Yrel was deathly afraid of her predicament, she already was a stranger to this world, but now she found herself alone in a strange tower surrounded by ghosts of the dead, with no idea how to locate the rest of her party.

"Tonight… a tale of romance and rage, one which will prove once and for all if beauty is more than skin deep. Can the fair Bella learn to love the surly Brute? Or will a ghastly curse claim the lives of the prince and his servants? See for yourself whether the rose of passion blooms beneath a beastly veneer! And now… on with the show!"

The faded red curtain lifted up to reveal several painted bits of scenery on the stage, three animated objects, a creature Yrel had never seen before, and near the back of the stage was a beastly figure standing on its hind legs, and a gorgeous woman in a yellow and white dress.

"Who… who are you?" the woman asked in a timid voice.

"The master of this castle! You will be my guest for dinner!" the beastly man roared.

"Never! I only dine with gentlemen, not a Brute like you!" the woman yelled back.

"Fine!" the beast roared in her face. "Starve to death for all I care!"

The woman ran off the stage in one direction, while the brute stalked off in the other, whilst the animated objects and the strange creature danced around and spoke of a 'curse' affecting their 'master'. When the two came back on stage, the other pieces took assigned places on the stage.

"If you didn't yell all the time, I wouldn't run away." The woman said, cautiously approaching the Brute.

"I don't yell ALL the time! WHY DO YOU ALWAYS SAY THAT?!" he roared.

"There you go again!" she yelled back.

"Fine." Brute breathed, clearly trying to calm his rage. "Hey, do you like books?"

"Ooh, I love books!" the woman said with giddy excitement.

"It's working! It's working!" one of the animated objects said with glee, before the scene suddenly changed.

Now the objects and the strange creature were scattered around lying on the stage, while Bella was cradling Brute in her arms at the centre of the stage.

"The curse… it's… killing me…" he wheezed.

"No! Our dinners together… those hours in the library… Oh Brute, I love you!" she wept.

"It's… too… late…" Brute gasped.

Suddenly an arrow blossomed from Brute's chest, and the scenery and performers began to disappear like smoke. Bella was the last to disappear, looking up to where Yrel was standing and gasping, before she too faded away.

"Uther!" Sylvanas called, and Yrel looked away from the stage to see that she and the others were alone again in the empty opera house, each standing somewhere different around the room, with Jaina, Vereesa, and Sylvanas standing on the ground floor.

"What the hell just happened?" Arthas demanded.

"I think we all just enjoyed a performance from Karazhan's past," Vereesa laughed. "Did we all see something different?"

"Probably." Arthas smirked. "A tale of forbidden love?"

"We had a girl trying to find her way home," Jaina shook her head.

"I saw a tale of a woman falling for a man in beastly form." Yrel called, looking back at the stage to see the arrow was still embedded in the stage. "Who fired that arrow?"

All eyes turned to Alleria, who was on the top floor at the very back of the hall.

"An old lady turned into a monster and attacked a little girl," she said defensively. "I fired without thinking!"

"Well it's over now, if everyone could make their way up to me," Uther assured her from the royal box. "I think I see a way forward behind me."

Jaina and Vereesa teleported to his side in a flash, before assisting the others to be at Uther's side in an instant.

"What did you see Uther?" Jaina asked as they climbed another flight of stairs.

"A vision from Medivh's past," he sighed.

"Our friend lies just in here," the ghost of Anduin Lothar said slowly, walking on to the stage with another ghost at his side, approaching the image of a comatose Medivh lying in a bed.

"It breaks my heart to see him like this," Prince Llane Wrynn sighed.

"Another year of slumber," Anduin said as he knelt beside the bed. "I wonder if Medivh will ever awaken."

"Does our old friend dream? Is he trapped in nightmares?" Prince Llane wondered aloud.

Uther fought back a wave of nostalgia at seeing Anduin and Llane again, relatively alive and well.

They left the opera house and were immediately teleported to a different corridor, one lined with statues depicting the kings of Stormwind.

"Did we just ascend or descend?" Alleria asked, noticing the nearest statue depicted Varian Wrynn. "I doubt that was there when Medivh opened the portal."

"Someone's been doing some housekeeping here," Arthas noted, looking at the other statues. "There aren't as many cobwebs here as there were in the ballroom and opera house."

There was a flash from the other end of the corridor and a large mechanical construct began to march slowly towards them.

"The Menagerie is for guests only. Please vacate immediately." It demanded in an emotionless voice.

"I'll handle this," Yrel smiled, unsheathing her mace from her back.

The custodian took a swing at Yrel as she approached, but the armoured Vindicaar was ready and skilfully dodged it, before smashing her mace into its hand.

"Do we help her?" Arthas muttered, noticing a statue of his father standing opposite the one of King Llane Wrynn.

"She's handling it just fine without us," Uther smiled, watching as another swing took off the custodian's right arm.

"Failure to comply will result in offensive action." It said in a demanding tone, attempting to stamp on the Draenei. "You are not a guest."

"Your Guardian sent us here," Yrel rolled out the way and spat, before leaping up and swinging at one of its knee joints.

The blow severed the magically held together leg, causing the custodian to wobble on its remaining leg before falling backwards. Yrel raised her mace above her head and leapt, bringing her full strength down on the custodian's head.

"Curator is no longer operation… al." it said in a warble before another blow to its torso silenced it.

"Impressive." Sylvanas complimented her.

Yrel gave her a confident smirk, before shouldering her mace again and rejoining the others. The remains of the Curator did not lie still for long, as they made to move past it, the mechanical construct shattered into a thousand pieces and floated into the empty alcove opposite Varian's statue. The shards and fragments formed into another statue, one of an awfully familiar Queen.

"Not sure how I feel about there being a statue of my sister here," Arthas noted, looking up into the statue's fair features.

"Would you rather have a statue here?" Jaina probed.

"Let's just keep moving, time is ticking by while we stand around talking," Alleria cut in, her tone far less aggressive than it had been downstairs.

When they left the hallway lined with statues, they were again teleported to another part of the tower, this time they emerged in a large circular chamber with bookshelves covering every wall.

"Enough of this weakness, boy!" a gruff voice bellowed, and they beheld an elderly man in faded Kirin Tor robes berating a young boy in dirty brown robes. "Contain your magic!"

"Too… Much… Power…" the young boy groaned, his hands clutching the sides of his head.

There was an explosion of energy that erupted from within the young boy, a mixture of purple and sickly green colours, that sent the older man slamming into the wall before he collapsed to the floor.

"Father! No!" the young Medivh cried, staggering towards the body of his father, before collapsing.

"This must have been the moment Medivh's powers emerged," Uther explained for the others. "He ended up in a coma for years, and when he awoke, people noticed a change in his behaviour."

"And his father?" Arthas gestured to the older man's ghost.

"Nielas Aran was buried in Stormwind with honours befitting his former station as the court conjurer." Uther sighed.

Instead of disappearing as the other ghosts had, the spectres of Nielas Aran and his young son rose to their feet again and turned to face them.

"This is who I am. I was tainted from birth, polluted from before my conception, a bad seed grown to bear bitter fruit." The young Medivh said calmly, but his father was more panicked at seeing them.

"Who are you? What do you want?" he yelled. "Did HE send you?"

"Who's 'he'? The Herald? Turalyon? Khadgar?" Jaina asked, stepping forward in anticipation of the two magi's ghosts attacking them.

"You're just like the others, aren't you?" young Medivh asked, remaining unerringly calm.

Vereesa moved to stand beside Jaina, glancing back to instruct the others.

"Go now, we'll catch up with you."

"But…" Sylvanas tried to protest, but her sister cut her off with a gesture.

"This'll be a contest of spells, not might, wit, or brains, so we're the best candidates to face it."

"I will not be tortured again!" Aran bellowed.

Vereesa sent an arcane shockwave backwards to force the others from the room, while Jaina threw up a wall of ice to protect her from the elder mage's attack. They stepped out of the chamber and the door slammed shut behind them, trapping the two mages battling the ghosts inside.

"We have to help them!" Arthas exclaimed, slamming his fist against the sealed door.

"We would only get in the way," Uther put a hand on his shoulder. "I can't speak to Aran's capabilities, but Medivh is and was the most powerful mage on the planet as the Guardian, I pray that spectre is a shadow of him for the sake of our friends, but we have other things to concern ourselves with."

"The Herald is somewhere in this tower," Alleria reminded him. "The sooner we find him, the sooner we can save the whole of Azeroth."

"Agreed." Arthas sighed after a long pause. "Let's go."

They continued upward, before reaching a room where the path ahead split in three directions.

"Which way now?" Yrel asked, looking from one pathway to the next. "Do we split up?"

"No, to split up now is to divide our strength," Sylvanas said stoically.

Their question of where to go next was answered by the sound of a door opening down the middle option.

"We are expected it seems," Uther said slowly, though he kept a brave face.

They moved toward the sound they had heard, until they reached a large chamber that was dominated by a checkerboard floor pattern at the centre. As had been the case with the other chambers of Karazhan their entrance prompted the appearance of others, this time a small crowd of armed and armoured figures marched into the centre of the room and took up positions facing each other.

"A giant chess board stands in our way?" Alleria said in utter confusion.

Uther, however, was scanning the pieces on the board and the implications. Facing away from them were eight soldiers in Stormwind armour, two clerics, two water elementals, two knights, a mage in Kirin Tor robes, and King Llane Wrynn; Uther recognised him immediately from the vision he had witnessed downstairs. Facing them were their Orcish equivilents, and Warchief Blackhand at the centre.

"It's the First War," Uther breathed. "Someone is treating the events of the First War like a game of chess, recreating the forces on each side and their leaders to replay the war over and over as a sick game."

"But this all is a game to him, Lightbringer." A cold voice said quietly, though it still echoed around the chamber.

Khadgar appeared in a flash on a pedestal at the far side of the room, his black robes lined with vivid green bellowing outward making him look truly demonic.

"This is all a game to my former master, even now he moves armies and kings around like they're pieces on this board." He gestured to the figures laid out between them. "Surely you've noticed it in how he speaks?"

"How did you break out of the spells Medivh placed on your mind?" Arthas asked, hearing a loud bang coming from far below them.

"The Guardian's powers are insignificant to the might of the Herald's master," the corrupted mage laughed. "Sargeras freed me from those restraints and tasked me with protecting the Herald from interlopers, namely you."

"Sargeras knew we'd come?"

"Of course," Khadgar laughed again. "The lord of the Burning Legion is several moves ahead of the Guardian's efforts to stop him; this encounter was planned for, why else are your mages distracted downstairs?"

The heroes looked at each other, while Khadgar looked at the chess board and its pieces before declaring.

"The players in this game had their novelty once, but something new is needed to reflect the changing times."

He waved his hand and the chess board erupted in fel green flames, turning all the pieces to ash in seconds. Another wave of his hand and demons appeared on his side of the board, taking the places of the first Horde; Felguards, Doomguards, Nathraziem, and Shivarra, with miniature versions of Archimonde and Kil'Jaeden at the centre.

"Do you expect us to fight them?" Alleria asked with a derisive snort.

"Oh no, the Master was quite clear you were to be unarmed when I bring you before him," Khadgar shook his head. "I know!"

The front row was suddenly filled with lifelike depictions of soldiers from each of Azeroth's factions; Stormwind, Khaz Modan, Gnomeregan, Lordaeron, Silvermoon, Orgrimmar, Zandalar, Thunderbluff, and Darnassus were each represented.

"They are the pawns, and for the players;"

Uther's eyes widened as the back row was filled by depictions of each race's leaders; Cairne Bloodhoof, Lady Liadrin, Magni Bronzebeard, Gelbin Mekkatorque, Tyrande Whisperwind, and Calia Menethil, with Varian Wrynn and Thrall as their central pieces.

"You monster!" Arthas roared at seeing his sister stepping on to the board.

"Medivh is the monster here," Khadgar said coolly. "But if you're worried about the safety of these chess pieces, then you can simply surrender young Prince."

"Never." The Prince growled. "I'll take her place!"

"Arthas, you can't!" Uther protested, but the younger Paladin was adamant.

"Would you rather sacrifice me or Calia in this twisted game? I can fight, I can defend myself…"

"Done." Khadgar grinned, waving his hand and making Calia's figure disappear in a flash.

"I'll take Liadrin's place," Sylvanas announced suddenly, "Better to have two of us on that board than one."

Uther sighed, resigned himself to the inevitable, and nodded his approval. Arthas stepped into the vacated square beside Varian, while Sylvanas moved to the corner square where Liadrin had been standing moment before.

"So Khadgar," Uther challenged the corrupted mage, "which one of us will you face in this twisted game of chess?"

"I fear I will not be much help I'm afraid, I do not understand the rules of this game," Yrel excused herself, stepping back from the pedestal. "I shall watch and observe, and offer help where I can, but…"

Uther put a hand on her shoulder to reassure her, giving her a warm smile.

"I'll take whatever advice you can give," he said gently, and she returned his smile.

"The fallen Lightbringer and the Ranger who fled from the Master, this will be easier than I thought." Khadgar chuckled again, waving his hand to summon green flames around the edge of the chess board. "I'll leave the door open so you can hear your young friends dying, and so you can try to flee as you watch your pieces fall one by one."

"Did the Legion steal your powers Khadgar, are you only left with parlour tricks?" Uther challenged. "Because I'm hearing a lot of bluster and threats, but nothing to make me fear you."

Khadgar snarled.

"Who moves first?" Alleria asked.

"After you, 'heroes'." The mage gave a malevolent grin.