Notes1: I think Varok Saurfang is overrated. Like, extremely overrated. He was an interesting enough character for me to tackle, a character outside of my usual comfort zone of brooding badasses, fallen heroes, complex villains that may or may not turn on their heel, and lawful good heroes hit my with patented wrench of moral conflict (with which the harder I hit them with, the more they slide into that familiar grey zone that is the moral spectrum). However, I think if I had to choose between him and Sylvanas (as an example), bias and interest are going to make me want to write about Sylvanas more than someone who shot to fame due to a bug back in vanilla!WoW.

So imagine my surprise when, in the BfA alpha, he refuses to go back to the Horde to stay behind at the Stormwind Stockades to speak with Anduin - although, as the recent patch shows, not about the Mag'har Orcs that Eitrigg suggests recruiting from AU!Draenor. I'll be honest, but I was one of those people that did want the Mag'har to join the Alliance, if only out of a desire to see the constant whiners on the forums rage at salt levels that would probably be unprecedented. Of course, thinking back on it now, at this point in the game's timeline there is possibly no way - or very little chance of - the Alliance taking in a group of orcs. Void Elves get a pass because they're former blood elves who were saved by Alleria and, having already been banished by Lor'themar/from Quel'Thalas and seen as traitors for exploring Void magic (when there are shadow priests, warlocks, and death knights around? Although that could be because shadow priests aren't going all the way with their art?), swore off their allegiance and went with her to join the Alliance. Orcs, on the other hand, would have a much more difficult time getting in, most likely due to the history of bad blood toward the treatment they received from humanity throughout the years, especially after the Second War when they were thrown into the internment camps. On the other hand, and I'm aware the canon in the books can be...dubious depending on what gets transferred over, there was a human spy (or more than one spy) Thrall had working under for the Horde, and the Kingdom of Alterac collaborated with the Orcish Horde in the First War to ensure their survival given that the favor was falling to the latter's favor. If the idea of orcs working with the Alliance is ever possible, slim though the chances might be, then I believe it can only happen if they are neutrals/outliers; not substantial enough for a group to follow in the vein of the Ren'dorei, but enough to make it feasible (albeit very uncommon).

Notes2: Still, Varok proved an interesting challenge. He's big on honor and doing what's right for the Horde so as to protect them...but nowhere near as ruthlessly pragmatic as Sylvanas is. I'm uncertain as to how faithfully I got that down, but I wanted to draw parallels (and a contrast, regarding Thrall and Vol'jin) between what he experienced when Garrosh was in charge in the past and Sylvanas in the present. Somehow over the course of writing this it did become about Vol'jin, for a little bit. Did it suck that he died? Well, yeah. Did it suck he didn't do much of anything? Well, yeah, but life's a bitch sometimes, it doesn't care what happens to you. And lastly, should every death have to be glorious and romantic? No, and I will always maintain that opinion about Vol'jin's death, no matter how much people may say otherwise. I don't really give a shit about the faction bias accusations; it makes me laugh when I remember, from Cataclysm to Warlords of Draenor, people would scream "HORDE BIAS!", but come Legion the tables were turned and it became "ALLIANCE BIAS!" Please, give me a break.

Notes3: Normally I have OCs filling in specific roles for, say, the Alliance and Horde champions that strictly faction-reliant. Armi, however, is in my headcanon a neutral mercenary like Mishka (in contrast to the actual game, where both are Alliance and Horde, respectively, because apparently neutrality doesn't exist in-game), and probably as close to a very vague mouth-piece/SI-OC as you can get; but even then, Armi ended up as a more Knight in Sour Armor kind of person - again, in contrast to the more humorous appearance she displayed in No More Retries. The Horde PC at the end is left purposely ambiguous for the reader to self-insert, although in the initial writing I did consider making one of my other OCs, a blood elf warrior, to be my go-to representative for the Horde. But only because I love high/blood/void elves above all other races, with draenei and night elves a close second (sorry Lightforged, you and the Highmountain tauren are too similar to regular space goats and bulls for my liking :P).

Notes4: Although in-game the warrior PC flies out to the Broken Shore to find Saurfang, this is mostly done to unlock the Arcanite Bladebreaker skin for Strom'kar, the Arms Warrior artifact. Here I have decided to switch things around a bit and make it so Armi is being sent out to bring him back to Skyhold (that, and in-story and in-game I have her currently specialized in Fury). As such, with the scenes set on the Broken Shore, Borean Tundra, the Battle for Lordaeron, and the Stormwind Stockades scenario, the lines are paraphrased from past expansions and current datamining so as not to be completely copy-pasted over.

He's lost track of the days he's been in here.

They put him in a cell that's big enough to get up and move not to and fro (as most prisoners are wont to do) but forward—straight out the gates, where the only thing that awaits them is freedom. Of course, Varok thinks, in this day and age 'freedom' can only mean one of two things: there's freedom in absolution, wherewith the King has the pleasure to undo the leash from the dog's collar and let bygones be bygones, the world is your oyster…but that's a bunch of Alliance tripe, and not every criminal who is proven innocent or guilty in the court of law feels remorse over their action. Recidivism has a way of whispering secrets, temptations, in the minds of those who are twitchy with paranoia, simmering with an anger that is only half-baked.

A person may be free in the sense they're not clapped in irons anymore. They may be free to do what they please, but not even Elune or the Titans (No, not even them, Saurfang amends, remembering those accounts he heard from warriors in the days after Argus, titan and planet, had fallen, those days were over before they even began) can protect them from the eyes of the worgen lurking among the trees, stalking among the battlements, hiding in the shadows, and the hand of their Lord who doesn't need to hold a leash in his hand to let them loose.

All it takes is a single command and the hounds will be upon them, teeth slavering and claws on display.

What a pity it must be for the Kal'dorei, to have fallen so far from the top of the food chain. To have their empire shattered in a rain of brimstone and hellfire in the War of the Ancients thousands of years ago was a contrivance simply beyond their control. How could they, with a mad queen who dove headlong into the abyss, hungering for more of the arcane that drew the Dark Titan to their world? Theirs was a fate they could not avoid—not with the Prince Farondis's ill-thwarted attempt at stopping her, and not even when the Betrayer provided his kin with the gift of a second Well of Eternity to take advantage of for the Legion's inevitable return. Never again would the night elves reclaim what they once had lost; most had scattered to the winds, but those that remained sought shelter, comfort, in the trees and the brush of the land of Kalimdor that is broken, and thousands years more would they settle across the seas within the walls of Stormwind and beneath the shade of the great tree Teldrassil—declawed, defanged, but not defeated.

Now even that is gone, a blackened stump Varok is more than sure is still burning to this day. A hand he's played a part in…but, at least, it was not his hand that held the match. A match to set the world on fire, where the blood never stops flowing and the yellow gold that drives the red and blue men crazy.

He clenches his fists, uncaring of the manacles clanking with the motion. If it's not one queen, then it has to be another. A pretender in undeath as she was in life, hanging onto the last few threads of a lifeline that through dint and a silver tongue secured her people a place in the Horde.

For being so steeped in damnation, it is truly a miracle no one has had the balls to step forward and challenge Sylvanas. To call her out and try to force some ray of light (Varok harrumphs at the pun) into her eyes so that she may no longer be blinded and see beyond her blinding selfishness. It would more than likely end in death, a most inglorious and undignified one, but it would give him hope. Hope for the Horde, that there was still honor and common sense among them.

What loyalty is there to be had in a Warchief who sees fit to further kick the wounded prey when it is down? What is there to secure for the futures of everyone who has pledged the Blood Oath when nearly all but the most unreachable, unobtainable resources have been spent in seeking justice upon the Broken Shore and among the stars?

It was only a matter of time before someone made the first move, a voice that sounds uncomfortably like Dranosh whispers in his ear. Did you honestly believe we were just going to let all that azerite sit, untouched and unattended?

Varok rumbles, chewing the inside of his cheek. No, he disagrees. Who in their right mind would? Something had to be done with it, and fates be damned it fell upon Gallywix to get that twinkle in his eye and open his box of rats to fly all the way to Silithus to excavate it from the cracks and crevices spiderwebbing all throughout the Wound (and the Cenarion Hold, he adds, frown dipping severely; dear ancestors, if the reports were any indication not even kindling from the outpost remained). Even without Sylvanas's input, he would have still rolled up his sleeves and plant that ridiculous walking stick into the ground to remind everyone this was not just the Horde's azerite, it was his as well. There were possibilities to be realized in producing it as they saw fit, weapons and vehicles and technology that would make Garrosh's iron star machinery look like a prototype assembly line, but the most important thing of all—the most important thing for a goblin—was profit. To hell with anyone who dared to interfere with the operations or make even a fraction more money in the purchase of azerite.

(Gallywix would never say that to his face, and he would have to have a death wish to say that to Baine. Sylvanas, on the other hand, would probably scoff and say something along the lines of him not knowing what hell is really like.)

He grits his teeth, lets his nails puncture the rough meat of his skin. Death is…not always glorious. Sometimes it has to take the right motivation under the wrong circumstances to restore it, and when that happens it is better to do what is right by himself than to do what is right for the personal wishes of those who mean well for him. He had waited to heal from the wounds, waited for the nightmares of the past and the screams of the innocent being slaughtered mingling with the screams of the infernals raining from the heavens and the swarms of felbats screeching in tandem amidst the clouds; and when they had faded into the background and he was able to move did he descend from the Skyhold and return to the Broken Shore.

Vol'jin deserved better…but life, it seems, never gives a shit about what people want.

Varok never gave a shit what life thought of what he thought. He had to go there, had to step foot on corrupted soil again and…

And….

He closes his eyes.

"You mean to tell me you came all this way out here just to die?" one warrior asked him, incredulous. She was formerly Alliance, a human who went by the peculiar name of Armi (a name which, she admitted with some disdain one night, drinking together at the hearth, was a deliberate butchering of her family surname in Stormwind). Master Smith Helgar had asked her to go find him, for the Valarjar believed him to be lost in the flight to the Shore, and when she had finally chanced upon him she could only stare at him as though seeing him for the first time. "How stupid are you?"

He had scoffed at her and showed her with a sweep of an arm the dark cliffs rife with felbats in the distance, the Sentinax churning a slow, seemingly unmoving orbit on the other side of the island. "Sometimes it helps to get a more personal view of the war and the stakes at risk."

"By yourself? You couldn't wait 'til we got everyone together and pushed the Legion back toward the Tomb?"

"I wanted to see for myself what we are up against," he said. "They are much too great a threat to take on every possible course of action. We cannot afford to make the same mistake again."

"So instead of calling for a val'kyr or a storm drake to come pick you up and drop you off at Dalaran and go back to the Skyhold to let everyone know you're not dead, you stayed behind to risk your life standing like a dope and sightseeing." Armi threw her hands up in the air. "What are you really here for?"

Then he did fully regard her, towering a good couple feet over him and bore at her a glare that would've made a grunt piss himself. She didn't submit, nor did she cower; she glared right back. "I've already told you. Go back to the Skyhold, girl."

"I'm not leaving without you."

"I am fine. I can take care of myself."

"Oh sure! Let's stand around and wait until some warlock's Eye of Kilrogg spots you and calls down the entire neighborhood on us!" She had raised her voice then, deliberately so that it carried in the air. Varok clenched his jaw. "And then what? You're gonna cleave them until you're standing over their bodies, your armor a wreck and covered in blood? Is that what you think is gonna happen? You're not immortal, Saurfang! That axe of yours isn't infallible, either! Just look at Vol'jin! All that talk of loa and voodoo didn't stop him from getting killed, did it?"

"Watch your tongue, girl," he snarled, taking a few steps forward until he was damn near on top of her. He would not remember until now, one year on, that he had his fists clenched, and that he moved with the purpose of striking her. "Vol'jin died with honor."

"Vol'jin got shanked in the back by a felguard! How is that honorable?"

"We would not be here were it not for those who sacrificed their lives for us. We must continue the mission they had left for us."

"And that's fine! But you're not gonna get anything done by waiting around to die! Do you honestly think Vol'jin would've wanted you to come back here when there's still a lot of work to do?"

"They took my Warchief," he hissed. "They took your King."

"Varian was never my King! Not after I left! And even now, Anduin will never be my King!"

"Then you are a warrior unworthy of honor! You are a disgrace, not only to your kind but to your family! You care only about yourself!"

"Yeah? So what?"

"So what?" he echoed. "So what? Those were your parents! Those were your leaders! They were the ones that gave you the means to pursue the path you are on! You should be proud of them!"

Her lips pulled down distastefully. "What's there to be proud of?"

"They gave you life!"

"And that's the only good thing they've ever given me. If I want honor, then I'm going to go find it in my ideals because I think they're right for me. You, on the other hand, think it's a good idea to find it in death where you'll be immortalized in song and tale until the end of time. Oh, and just so we're clear," she added, stopping him short, "you might think getting your head chopped out or being skewered on someone's blade is the best death one can ask for, but I think I speak for most people when I say that's a load of horse shit. Like, dude, you think it feels good having something sharp and made of steel cut across your flesh? A paper cut's one thing; bleeding buckets is a whole other story. Oh, and one more thing; you're not the badass everyone says you are. There's a difference between what they say is based on what they've heard and what they see on the battlefield. Of course, you being an orc gives you a leg up compared to other cultures because yours is practically built on honor, so chances are good you will be immortalized when the time comes.

"But for everyone else? They'd think you're suicidal going in on your own." She must have gotten bored twirling a strand of her hair around a hair, because she let it go and went about dusting her breastplate off indifferently.

Varok shook his head and turned away from her. "Big talk coming from a human," he grumbled aloud; there was no point in keeping that to himself. "Honor is taught and to be respected. It manifests in those who have known and tasted fear in its entirety. Those are the ones who are the bravest among them all. It is a damn shame King Varian could not pass down his lessons to all of his soldiers."

"Man, you make it sound like everyone has to learn from one person…and only one person. Why should I have to learn it from someone who's failed to help his kingdom on occasion when I can just learn it on my own time?"

"People make mistakes."

"And when they mistakes, they have to fix them; and newsflash, Saurfang, some mistakes don't get fixed overnight. Good people, dead or alive, are not without criticism." He heard the clank and jostle of shifting armor, and then Armi came to stand beside him to gaze upon the tops of the spires of the Tomb of Sargeras peaking over the cliffs. Just well enough in reach to snap her like a twig, he thinks now, for he had been smoldering with repulsion toward this stripling girl, like a foul aftertaste on his tongue. Her comments toward Varian, an enemy on the opposite faction who had showed him and the dwarf king kindness and strength in adversity to let him pass and take up Dranosh's body atop the Icecrown Citadel, had made that brim then as a cauldron of fire.

It would have been so simple, he goes on, staring into the torchlight on the other side of the gate. Yet he had stayed his hand, simmering and preferring (rather petulantly, childishly) to be anywhere but near his fellow warrior, but keeping his feet planted where they were. For what honor was there in a man who would flee from one he did not like?

"I didn't see what happened to him, y'know," she told him. "I only heard about it from the folks aboard the Skyfire…the ones that Greymane wasn't whipping into a frenzy, that is. Maybe you didn't see it, either, what with all the chaos, but Varian literally threw himself off the ship and brought down the fel reaver that was trying to pull us out of the sky. That right there? That takes balls, man. That's honor. So I guess, on that note, you are right; I wouldn't be here if he hadn't done that.

"But Vol'jin? Okay, he protected you and the others from getting butchered from the Legion; that's honorable. What isn't is him not paying attention to his surroundings. Maybe it was the heat of the moment, maybe it wasn't, I don't know. It'd be different if he gave his life to save someone who should've died in his place…which didn't happen. That's not an honorable death; that's life being an ungrateful bitch. What, you think just because he was Warchief means he should be lauded as a hero? What's he done in the past, what, year, year and a half? What did Garrosh do?"

"Garrosh was a failure," said Saurfang, somberly. "He could have been so much more." Too easily influenced, too entranced by those days of old when we were lost and feral with bloodlust. No amount of carefully chosen words and stern warnings could have swayed Hellscream from the path he went on; once he had heard the tales of his father's sacrifice and the feats that which his kith and kin had achieved on Draenor prior to the blood curse, there was no going back.

(There's a tiny, tiny voice in the back in his head, so quiet as to be incoherent and indistinguishable, that leans in close—closer, closer, so that it may reach his ears, and says, Bygones must be bygones. Thrall should have left well enough alone.

(Varok takes in a breath, gulp by gulp by gulp, feels it engorged in his lungs and strain in chest, and yanks at the chain connecting the wrist manacles taut, veins and bones emphasizing on the drum-stretched leather of his skin.)

"That's on him, man," said Armi, "and that's on Thrall, too, for thinking he was a good choice in the first place." She unfolded her arms crossed over her chest and lets them drop at her sides. "I guess we'll never find out how Vol'jin could've turned out, either. Maybe he woulda been the best Warchief you guys have ever had. Maybe he would've sucked…I'm just saying, you never know," she added, shrugging nonchalantly at the murderous glance he nailed her with. "But now you have Sylvanas, and we have Anduin Wrynn. I'm sure you can tell right off the bat how well things are gonna go from here on out."

Varok didn't comment; he had no desire to give the girl more fuel for the fire, but in this regard she spoke truly. One of Varian's closest advisers was Genn Greymane, King of Gilneas and Lord of the Worgen, and he had been present on the Broken Shore when hell itself unleashed its wrath upon their forces. He had heard of the old wolf's famous anger and how it was held in check by the High King of the Alliance…but Varian was no more, and Anduin, to his knowledge, was just now coming onto the cusp of manhood. For all his faith in the Light, not even that would be able to keep Greymane grounded. There was blood in the air, old, dried blood in cold blue skin and even colder eyes, and it rested as a thick, congealing mass of gunk in the veins of Sylvanas Windrunner, Banshee Queen.

Warchief.

He yanks the chain again, bites back the growl that wants to spill between his teeth when it doesn't give.

Honor, young heroes, said an orc once upon a time—not too long ago, with more grey than white in his hair, less scars on his body, a lump the size of Nagrand in his throat and blood roaring, drumming, in his head. He held the corpse of the man who had once been his son, bloodied and broken in wretched, filthy armor that seemed more as if it had been bolted on (forced on) rather than put on, piece by piece. The wind was cold, the wind was biting, his hands were ice and growing numb, not even the heat exuding from the engines of Orgrim's Hammer's could comfort him. His eyes were stinging, but his heart was a ball of molten iron—hot, hot, pulsing hot with each strike of the thought permeating, echoing, relentlessly in his head: justice, vengeance, closure, death. Death to the Scourge, death to the Lich King, death to every knight and lich and undead creature of ill repute that has had a hand and a say in dragging his son across the snow-capped mountains and ripped him from the untamed plains of the afterlife and the solace of the ancestors that await him.

No matter how dire the battle, never forsake it.

"Honor means nothing to a corpse, Saurfang."

He opens his eyes and he is standing amidst the ruins of the Undercity's courtyard. Soldiers are running past him en masse: orcs in large, spike-riddled Kor'kron plate armor; troll shaman in tribal skirts and pandaren in gleaming, scale-lined chainmail lugging totems, blood elves and goblins with knocked bows and loaded shotguns and nightborne with staves sparking with barely restrained magic; Mulgore and Highmountain tauren shaped as hulking bears and horned cats; Forsaken deathguards charging over the bridge and dark rangers climbing up the ladders to take their positions along the parapets. Nathanos and Lor'themar are splitting off from a small, huddled circle—the former going one way, the latter in the opposite, shouting orders at the top of their lungs as the siege towers lob ballistic bolts into the air, soaring, sailing, toward the group of human and worgen warriors, draenei vindicators, and night elf sentinels rushing up the path, screaming bloody murder, promising a pursuit of vengeance for the fallen, a one-way ticket to hell, justice not by public opinion or the court of law but the way of the sword and the Light of Shalamayne shining at their back.

"You have a habit of underestimating death for what it is. For me, it is something I am…most familiar with."

He blinks, and now he stands above the gates, sees the wolf visage of the war machine that sits behind a wall of bodies and towers pushing back the Alliance and their dwarven siege tanks, their gnomish spider tanks and steam-powered battle suits. Somewhere socketed away in its wodden, steel-lined chassis is the azerite, waiting for someone, the right person for the job, to give it its first command.

It will tear the enemy in twain like a sword through canvas. It will burn their innards from the inside out until not even the ashes of their bones remained.

Either way, they're going to die.

"Maybe you don't care if your people die so long as it is honorable, but this Horde is worth saving. In this world, that is all we have left. Us against them. I will not have them perish here—not today, not tomorrow, not in the future, and if anyone should disagree with me on this then they do not deserve to stand among us. They do not deserve to stand with me."

He blinks again, and he is in Warsong Hold, the cold slipping through the kinks in his armor even as the fire crackles low in the hearth. There is a map of Northrend drawn on leather that stretches the length of the floor, landmarks etched here and there in different colored inks that stand and pop out for the eye to be drawn to.

Garrosh walks around it, planting flags at Valiance Keep, Valgarde, and Westguard Keep.

"Shipping lanes, ammunition, heavy armor, supplies…you bore me to death with such talk!" he had said. "All that we need—the only thing we need—is the warrior spirit of the Horde! With this, nothing will stop us!"

"So then," Varok had asked him, after a pause, "how will you shatter the walls of Icecrown?"

How does one shatter the will of the world, and all hope that follows with it? What honor is there in dragging the Horde back into the darkness it has crawled out of: begun by Thrall, dug deep by Garrosh, and left behind by Vol'jin?

"You will not take us down that dark path again, young Hellscream," Varok told Garrosh, once he had finished protesting the children of the Alliance would one day grow and take up arms against them. Children whom, for all their dividing viewpoints their heritage, their Alliance, bestows unto them, could not possibly be born in innocence. "I will kill you myself before that day comes."

Except you didn't, says the voice in his head, mocking and cruel. That death was not yours to carry. Where is the justice in that?

What honor is there in walking knee-deep in madness?

Do you enjoy walking in circles? Or could it be you are so very, very lost? Could it be you are left with no other purpose but to die?

Well? Is that it? Is that what you want?

It is, isn't it? I should've known.

"So go ahead, die your warrior's death. It means little to me," said Sylvanas Windrunner, and she looked upon him with the quiet chill of the grave. "Perhaps I will raise your broken body to serve me once more. Or perhaps…you will have a chance to say hello to your son. Whatever serves best for the Horde, whatever serves best for me, I will make good use of it. You have my word, High Overlord."

He growls angrily, a harsh, wordless, animal sound, and yanks again on the chain.

Not again, he thinks, and pulls a fourth time. Not again, and he pulls a fifth time. Not again, not again, NOT AGAIN, NOT AGAIN, NOT AGAIN—and he pulls and pulls and pulls and pulls and pulls.

And yet, here you are.

The muscles in his wrists and the pain snaps him back to a sudden, crystal-clear wakefulness with the afterimages of torchlight that leaves him dazed and half-blind. He blinks them away. He collapses against the back of the wall.

He breathes heavily, sweat spilling over his eyes and down his neck. Yes, here I am. I am here. Imprisoned. Alone.

Dishonored?

He closes his mouth and exhales through his nostrils. Not so long ago they had come for him and the other prisoners of war taken to the Stockades: Rokhan and Nathanos and Lasan and Thalyssra with one of the Horde's most prestigious commanders…but he had refused them. "I will buy you as much time as I can so that you may complete your mission," he had told them, once they found him. "The ones you are looking for are down the hall."

"You're not coming?" the commander asked. "But why?"

"Why?" Varok said then. "I have had a great deal of time to think. There have been nights where I have stayed awake and thought it over, and always, each and every time, I have arrived at the same conclusion: I am not going back to Orgrimmar. You will not take me back to Orgrimmar. To the Warchief. After everything she has done, with my own two eyes, I will never return to her Horde. You are mistaken if you think otherwise."

"It's not just her Horde; it's yours, too!"

Varok harrumphed and turned away. "You're a smart one. Think about what the differences are between honor and loyalty. Remember them well, and pray you never have to choose between one and the other."

This is my honor, Varok tells the ghost of Armi the warrior, standing upon the brittle sands of the Broken Shore.

This is my loyalty, he tells the ghost of Garrosh Hellscream, Gorehowl in one hand and the other emptying of the flag he places on the map of Northrend.

I will reclaim what I have lost, he says to the ghost of Warchief Vol'jin, the life fading from his eyes, the breath passing between his lips as he passes the mantle onto the bewildered Banshee Queen in Grommash Hold.

Whatever happens in the end, I will find it, he says to the ghost of Sylvanas Windrunner atop the crenelated walls of Undercity as it crumbles all around them, and one way or another, I will show it to you. Dead or alive.

Varok opens his hands and turns those palms up. Nothing is in them. For now, at least.

There will be soon. Soon, and not soon enough. The rest lies on what the boy-king says, what he will do, and what will come thereafter.

"Soon, Sylvanas," he says, low beneath his breath, and rests more easily. He closes his eyes. "Soon."