2: By Any Other Name

She had been climbing for what felt like hours, rocks giving way to pebbles and dirt the higher that she clambered up, flitting between toeholds in cracks and stretching to pull herself, heaving with air that burned her chest, over the hanging ledges of flattened rock. Every time she dragged herself over these lips of rock she would lie, basking in the sunshine and gasping for air, waiting for the hammering of her anxious heart to calm, staring with wide eyes into the sky.

The pathway up to the higher reaches of the bluffs was one not often used or cared for it appeared, with the village shamans preferring to communicate with the spirits in a newer fashion. But Rianno liked the old way, she liked the challenge of going into the world and seeing for herself all the forces at work.

Eventually she came to a plateau that creased into the mountainside far back, with pillars purposefully put along the way to the Oracle, which appeared to simply be a fire, set to burn the middle of a small ring of stones.

Placing her pack down, she cast a look around warily, "Hello?"

Maybe this was also some kind of strange test, as no one saw fit to answer her call. Frowning, Rianno sat down and tucked her legs underneath her, resting her elbows on her knees and glaring over the flames and around the cleared plateau that was painfully quiet but for herself.

Hours passed and there was nothing but the quiet to greet her, echoing back from the calls of eagles high overhead as the day wore into the afternoon. She alternated between sitting and standing, pacing around the fire and chewing on one of her nails in distress. Perhaps the Oracle wasn't ready to give her the chance to spread her wings. Perhaps it had already known she would come and the silence was her answer. The hours continued to roll along, the sun slowly sinking across the sky and to the horizon, painting everything russet and orange.

Rianno stood with her back to the small fire, hands on her hips and for a moment she put aside her frustration with the testing. Sunset had always held a special kind of magic for her, as much as a dawn did. There was a moment when the whole of Azeroth seemed to stand still, stopping to admire the sky and in turn, the stars and sun gazing down back at the land with mutual love. There was peace, warm and deep as an ocean, rolling over the world for that one moment she could only seem to find at those times of the day and as it spread its net over her that evening, her eyes drifted closed and she felt the smile welling up deep inside her, not just sitting on her lips.

Peace.

Squatting down, she settled onto her haunches and began poking at the fire, the spell cast flames flickering at the air on which is appeared to sustain itself. This was nothing. She would wait, she could stay for days and see that peace again from high up and wonder. It would be almost a distinct pleasure, to be so far removed from hustle and bustle that she could centre herself and languish in deep enjoyment of that solitude.

As the hours slid along and she sipped only water, keeping her fast, her eyes began to grow heavy with sleep and soon she was resting her head on drawn up knees, staring into the fire with a drowsy kind of contentment.

"Ah, I see you're still here."

Rianno started awake, surprised to see an elderly tauren sitting across from her at the fire, his fur white and wrinkles visible where the fur was patchy with age. He was adorned in many beautiful trinkets and cloth woven with care, draped to protect from the night chill of the Mulgore Bluffs. A staff, also carved with symbols and sigils and topped with a spray of crystals in varying colours, was laid next to him, the chunks of rough gemstone glittering in the firelight.

She composed herself as quickly as she could, "Uh, oh I mean. Ahem. Where did you come from, Sage One?"

"I am as the wind, I came to listen to the world and saw you. I suppose you're waiting to speak with the Oracle, little one?"

She didn't bristle at being called little, after all in comparison to what was probably a great and heavy age, he was her superior in height and bulk, hinting at an impressive stature in youth. No doubt he had been a great hero of the Horde. She shuffled her feet and swallowed nerves, hero as he might be, he was still the stealthiest person she'd met for all that ageing muscle gone to fat.

"Yes," Rianno said, "It's my time for the testing. If I pass, I'm going to go out into the world."

"The world eh, I wonder how it has changed, it seems like so long ago I started up to this spot too."

She smiled, "It's noisy, unruly and filled with danger and death. But there's moment where you can look past it all, you get to see real beauty. There's compassion and love, bravery and all kinds of wonder in the world. I don't think it's changed much in that regard, just harder to see."

"Hmm, and they say the Lich King has returned."

"They do."

"You know, you missed you chance at glory in the Outland, the ancestral home of our allies, the orcs. The Lich King lives in a distant land, not so distant as the Outland, but still treacherous. It is filled with despair, such terrible despair and unforgivable crimes." The elder shook his head, mane clinking as ornaments bounced back and forth.

"I'm not afraid," she asserted.

"To be young again. Tell me though, what do you truly know of fear? What can one as young as you know of the harsh realities of this world? I see in your eyes you have known loss, but it was softened by love, gentled by those who cared deeply for you and those you in turn care for. What can you comprehend of the ways of this world, cruel as they are? Do not be so hasty to lose yourself to it, it will swallow you up in a snap!" The fingers of the old tauren made such a whip crack as they clicked that she jumped, hand snatching up to her chest to try and calm her suddenly racing heart. "Youth, so quick to run before you walk. So eager to die for a cause, that you never question the roots of the tree you shade under."

"My mother and father were both raiders," Rianno clenched her hand in the clothes of her loose fitting tunic-shirt, her necklace with the carved beads that Cialis had made for her clattering together quietly. "Despite the dangers, they believed there was something to put their lives on the line for. I believe that too, I believe in protecting those who cannot protect themselves, by being there on the front lines, by being that line of defence in the way of danger. It's not great or noble, it's a horrible and bloody affair but..."

As she paused, eyes filling with a suspicious moisture, the idea of her younger sister and Nazaden floated around in her head. Of the war that the Scourge of the Lich King threatened to bring down across the lands, the first hints of a horrible winter already bleaching the land. They would die, her foster parents, her friends who sought a peaceful life... all of that life would vanish in a moment. She was talented, she knew that much and she also knew she was strong.

Arus had told her that strength without a true cause, was a strength abused. Strength that punished, that created misery. But a strength to protect those she loved, that was a strength that Rianno knew she held.

"It's a really awful thing, when you think about what you're saying," Rianno lowered her eyes from the tauren, looking into the flames, "I'm talking about being willing to die in the place of another person. I'm talking about war and death and all the horrible after effects that war brings. But I think I would be more of a coward if I didn't stand up and say that I will fight, so those I love don't have to. I will fight so my sister may grow up in peace."

"And when you die, will she not grieve you, seeking to blame those who killed you?"

"No, I taught her better, our parents did. Revenge is a sword with two edges. One edge cuts those you have a grievance with, but the other blade of vengeance cuts you deep, wounding you, leaving scars."

"Then what?"

"Forgiveness."

"You are very kind hearted, especially for one of the Darkspear. I sense much of your father in you." The tauren smiled.

Rianno laughed, she couldn't help herself, "Ah but people tell me that I have my mother's temper!"

"Tell me their names."

"Lakuta and Sasoria, both shaman."

"Shaman is what you want to become too, am I right? After all, you are up by the Oracle, waiting in this chill wind for a sign." He tilted his head, old eyes briefly catching the firelight, looking careworn. "Lakuta, I remember him. I remember his childhood, he and his father passed through our village a few times before they chose to settle here, his father a local herbalist minister. After his father became too old to travel, Lakuta decided to leave the village and go looking for new herbs and medicines. I know it was during these travels that he joined a Guild."

"I am probably going to do the same thing," Rianno smiled fondly at the fire, eyes shimmering with tears, "I also took up herbalism like my father, grinding the little plants up and concocting potions and elixirs, maybe discovering new and impressive combinations. Who knows. It's more than that, potions help people, help the sick and the needy. And I'd even do it for free, because why not. Herbs are given freely and it's not too much hassle to go pick a couple."

"Altruistic, aren't you?"

"Another strange thing for a Darkspear troll like me to be?" She sighed, "I guess."

"Just be careful that you don't mistake your kindness and compassion, take care that you do not diminish yourself in giving to others. It is possible, entirely too possible, to take away everything that you are and then be left with absolutely nothing at the end of it."

"If that is what it takes," Rianno glared up briefly from the fire, huddling closer to the heat instinctively as the cold drew in closer.

"Sasoria I know a little of, but less than you perhaps. I know she settled in the village between Guild jobs and when you were born, they had you blessed by the spirits. Your sister, she hadn't reached her first year so she wasn't blessed by the … Loa you call them I believe?"

"Loa, spirits, light, ghosts, gods... they're all the same. By any other name you might call them, they all do pretty much the same thing. They listen, they watch and they judge us. But you're right about Cialis, because our parents died in Silithus they never took her to the main encampment to be blessed by the shamans. Cialis instead, her eyes see stars and moons. She is up there," Rianno pointed a finger up the sky, smiling a little lazily, "She wants to be the first troll druid. She's a stubborn girl. She gets that from our mother."

"But not you, you do not have that streak of stubbornness."

"An oak breaks, a willow bends. Water flows, air dances and fire flees... I think there's everything in me but earth."

"I think you're wrong."

"Am I?"

"Earth sustains, it protects and grows, it shelters and is a stable surface for others to walk upon. It is patience and wisdom, it is understanding."

"Patience, right, because I have so much of that to spare."

The tauren chuckled, reaching into his pack and pulling out a blanket, a little ragged but still very much serviceable. With a groan reserved for aching muscles and joints, he hauled himself to his feet and circled the fire to stand behind the curled up troll and then settled it carefully over her shoulders, tucking it about her with all the care and tenderness she had grown to know tauren for, despite their hulking size and ham-fisted looking hands.

"Thank you," she said, looking surprised, "You didn't have to, aren't you cold?"

"No, little one, I like my brethren are better suited to the colder nights that one who cannot grow fur to keep their skin from chilling." He circled back around and then leaned down, picking up his staff with nimble fingers. "I have one question more."

"Of course, ask."

"What is love?"

"Love..." Rianno sighed, "Love is something I never want, but it's there and it's cruel. I love my sister, but I'm afraid I'm just a disappointment to her, a sister who can't connect with her emotionally. I love my family, but they're not my blood relations, so how long until they grow to despise me, what if they've never really loved me? Love of a heart that beats for your song, that love..." she closed her hands tightly on the blanket, snapping, "That kind of love is a poison. I won't drink from that cup. Not ever. Love is disappointment."

"I see. Then, good night."

"Good … good nigh...t..." she yawned, then pitched to the side. She didn't feel the crunch of the dirt, instead if felt like air cushioned her all the way down, weaving dizzy thoughts through her brain like a delicious fog, taking her far away, cutting her into pieces like a jigsaw and then putting her back together in a way she had never known to be put before. She was made of new angles and dimensions, she had new colours and a sense of deep sadness, cutting through it that chased her mind through the whirl of sensations and into darkness.

"Hey, hey wake up... HEY Rianno wake up before y-"

Her head hit the bowl of oatmeal and she came up swearing, one hand coming to the side of her face to both wipe off the gruel and to nurture the line of bruising from the lip of the bowl. "Oh good f-" her eyes quickly found Heatha staring at her alongside her younger sister Cialis and Naz, "Frrrreaking Loa..."

"Smooth," Naz grinned as he spooned more oatmeal into his mouth.

"Really, Rianno, you swear like a soldier in the Orgrimmar army." Cialis shook her head, delicate features tinged with resignation. Her little sister was pretty, for a troll. She'd often been told so by those who weren't of the Darkspear tribe, there was even a captured human they had seen once who had called her a little flower among wild thorns. They had the same bright pink hair tone, but their skin colour was a little more varied. Rianno's was blue, like their father but Cialis had the greenish tone of their mother. That was about where the comparison ended, in their hair colour. The sisters were like night and day and often argued.

Heatha stood and began collecting the food bowls. Seeing their foster mother start moving towards her, she shovelled what she could into her mouth before it was whisked away. When it came to breakfast in their household, it was a quick affair as the day waited for no tauren or troll. Gulping down her last mouthful of oatmeal that had been flavoured with mugwort, she also stood up to help (or more likely hinder) the tauren matron, also snatching a towel from the stove where it rested against the brick oven door, warming. She scrubbed at the side of her face and her hair, muttering to herself.

"Urgh today is going to be so booooring," Cialis groaned, flopping back in her chair. "Why can't I be in a more advanced class?"

"Because you still can't stop yourself from playing silly pranks."

"It wasn't a prank, it just happened to be funny. It was a coincidence, a marvellous one. The whole universe stopped and decided that it was going to be truly amazing."

Nazaden laughed good naturedly, "Then what about when you set fire for the hay bales with a mistimed Sunfire cast?"

"I sneezed, I have hay fever."

"You, hay fever, as a druid?"

"It comes and goes."

Rianno grinned, "Like her ability to listen. Selective hearing."

Cialis stuck her tongue at her elder sister, making her laugh. Most of the oatmeal was out by now, just as there was a knock at their door and she was putting the towel down. Being the closest to the door and on her feet, Heatha shuffled across the way to answer it. "Yes, yes," the matron said, her voice a comforting burr, "I'm coming."

"You ever going to get a boyfriend, sis?"

Naz glanced from Cialis to Rianno, his gaze also as expectant as the younger trolls one. "What? Boyfriend, me? No, never happen."

"Never?" Naz frowned, "It'll happen."

"No, never. Love's a crutch."

"Oh no," Cialis mocked, clutching onto Naz's shoulder, "Quick, the wounded hero Rianno is a bleeding heart, she'll never love, she's made of ice!"

"Hang on a minute-" Rianno huffed.

"I'm sure you'll meet someone one day," Naz chuckled, pushing at Cialis with one massive hand, his palm pushed against her protesting face and laughter, "Someone who thinks you're exceptional."

"Exceptionally bad tempered and hair triggered, you mean!" Cialis scoffed, voice muted by the taurens palm.

"Exactly, she's right, no one's stupid enough to want to be my boyfriend. Or my friend," Rianno sighed.

A chill was spreading into the room, and she clutched at her arms, wearing the traditionally sleeveless tunic shirt that most villagers wore in the heat of the summer, surprised to find goose flesh risen there. Her eyes snapped to the door, where it was open with tendrils of fog snaking their way in. Heatha turned slowly to the room, her lips dribbling blood and a large wound in her stomach, "It's for you," she said, collapsing to her knees, then landing face down on the floorboards.

"Heatha!" She cried out, but she seemed to be the only one moving to the fallen body as a tall figure, clad in heavy dark iron armour stomped into the room, past her as she cradled the corpse in her shaking hands. She wasn't a proper healer yet, or anything, she couldn't barely mend together a stitch or heal a burn from the oven.

The blood was absolutely everywhere, sticking to her knees and legs, puddling under her and it didn't seem to stop. Behind her, she listened to them as they continued talking in the chairs, as if this total disaster wasn't happening. Were they mad?

"You're just too scared to put yourself out there, you're so scared someone might find you attractive enough to like or to hang around with. You need to start being a little more assertive, Rianno." Cialias yawned, finally pushing free of Nazaden's hand, "You're my sister, I don't get why you're not as popular as I am."

"Nazaden, help me." She begged. He was a better healer than she was, she didn't even have her herbalism bag, there would surely be something in there if nothing else. "Naz, please."

"This world will bow to me, it will know fear and pain. I will take everything that you have ever loved and destroy it, just as I will destroy you." The figure swathed in the heavy armour was still circling the room with slow and deliberate footsteps.

"My bag, fetch my bag, I can... there's bandages or something. There's something. Please, please hurry."

"Alright alright, you get so upset about the silliest things," Naz stood up and as he was making his way to the stairs, the figure in the armour intercepted him. It was as thought Nazaden couldn't see him or the sword that plunged through his chest, as easily as a hot knife into a block of butter. It made a curious little crackling sound as it was removed. "Rianno," he sighed, then just fell backwards, hitting the floor. The blood from his wound spattered along the floor, flicking droplets over the table legs.

"Death is a moment, I can bring them back to serve me, they will be my pets, my stewards of hatred. They are specks of dirt on a desert, for I am the one who rules over death. I am death. I will never stop, I know no mercy. Mercy is for the weak, the useless."

She stared at Nazaden's body in horror, her brain unable to completely process what was going on. Why was he dead? Why wasn't Cialis running and screaming? Why was this happening and what was this monster doing, talking to her like she would understand him? Pushing her hair back from her face, she felt the streak of blood run into her scalp and then dribble down her face, blood from Heatha's wound that had stopped pulsing. The heart was silent.

"You know, sometimes you have to do things you don't like," Cialis' voice was a lecturing one, as though trying to make her see a point. "Life isn't all rainbows and ponies."

"Cialis, please, come here..."

The dark intruder had come to stand by Cialis and one hand took the thin arm of her smaller and slender sibling, hauling her to her feet. If Cialis had noticed this, she didn't mention it, looking down at her well kept nails with disinterest, a habit she did whenever she was attempting to look as though something bored her when it mattered a lot to her.

Rianno swallowed and tried again, reaching out to her from where she was knelt, "Sis, come to me, right now."

"Sometimes you have to be able to let go."

"Can you do it, little girl, can you reach a level of anger where you are willing to fight me? Can you even fight me, as you are, weak and pathetic? Find me, bring all your hate and pain and I will destroy you, I will break you. I will make you one of my flock."

He was raising that strange looking sword in his other hand. She felt frozen to the spot but screamed anyway, hands out still, "Cialis no, come here! I love you!"

Cialis' eyes met hers, "Sometimes you have to be broken to start anew."

"No!"

The blade sliced across the neck swiftly, separating the head from shoulders. It span briefly, spraying a fan of blood across Rianno's horrified face, then bounced along the floor, coming to rest with the back of the pink haired head to her. The body in the arms of the dark intuder began to sag, blood pouring out of the horrendous wound and he let it go, allowing it to hit the wooden floor with a dreadful, empty bang.

"C...Cialis... no..." She scrabbled forward along the floor, grabbing the head and cradling it to her chest irrationally. It still felt warm. "No."

"I await you, in the North. Come and find me, shaman."

The hand that shook her awake was strong, and blinking blearily she could make out the face of a middle aged orc against the brightness of the sky, making her pained and reddened eyes stab with a thousand daggers of agony. Groaning she went to try and hug her sisters head closer to her, then paused. It was the strangest head she'd ever felt.

Sitting upright quickly, promptly banging the top of her skull against the chin of the orc to his displeasure and cursing, she pulled the small bag she'd been clutching from her middle away, staring down at it in confusion. Hands scrabbled along her skin, looking for bloody stains, then she got to wobbly feet, dizzy and feeling sick, unable to see her house or even traces of the ruin that had been visited on her family and home by the stranger in the dark armour. His voice, chilling and echoing rang in her ears still, taunting her.

"Spirits, you're trying to kill me I swear," spat the orc.

"I... I'm sorry, where... am I?"

"Huh?"

"Here, where is here," she muttered. "This place, where I am right now?"

"You're in the Barrens, this is my small farm," he gestured back at it, then at where she'd found herself, slumped by his well, "And you were unconscious on my land."

"Was I covered in blood?"

"Blood?"

"The sticky red stuff inside you."

He gave her a long suffering look, "I'm not stupid. You don't have a scratch on you. All I did was take the blanket off you so you don't bake in the heat out here." He waved the blanket at her, still in good condition if a little frayed at the edge.

"That blanket," she blinked, taking it in her hands and dropping her pack so it clinked. "I was on the Bluffs... I don't..."

"Hm, you're an odd one for a Darkspear. Where's your accent girl?"

"I was raised in Mulgore," she murmured absently, turning the blanket over and over in her hands. "I was doing my Oracle visit, and somehow... I'm here."

"The Oracle huh, I had a friend who told me about that once. Dangerous but vital stuff, gives you incentive and visions, and sometimes the spirit-walk can land you in places you don't know, places you might not realise you need to be."

"And I somehow need to be here?" Her look was frankly disbelieving. The Orc was about an inch or two shorter than she was, but still in fighting condition despite his slacks. His hair was iron grey and he had the beginnings of a very impressive beard that looked in dire need of cutting before it became straggly. His eyes were hard though, eyes that had seen too much and known too much. "On a farm."

"Maybe you did. No one comes out here these days, not since I left the Guild-"

"You were in a Guild?" She almost grabbed him by the lapels on his shirt, "A raider?"

"I was, I quit a long time ago, after a raid went bad down in Silithus."

"...what did you say?"

"Silithus," he pried her away from him, "I was in a Guild that was trying to get into Ahn Qiraj, but there was an accident-"

"-The masonry fell on part of the raid," she finished, "I know that story."

He stopped, staring at her more closely. She didn't shrink under that scrutiny, if anything, she squared her shoulders and stared right back as proudly as she could manage for someone who had been found unconscious and babbling. "Two shamans who were my friends died that day."

"Lakuta and Sasoria," she swallowed.

He passed a hand over his eyes, "Unbelievable."

"You did just say that spirit-walks put you in places you need to be. Maybe its meant to happen." She nearly laughed, "What's your name?"

"Soulcarnage was the soldier name I'd taken, but I prefer just Soul these days. I guess I'd better go get dressed and grab some things." He turned his back to her, "I'll take you back to Mulgore."

"No, I want to join a Guild. I'm going to join one."

Soul paused, then nodded, "Aye alright, but Mulgore first. You can say goodbye to... I suppose Arus and Heatha, aye – and that wee bairn Sasoria was talking about endlessly. You should say goodbye to them. If you're going to join a Guild, I'll come with you and keep an eye on you. Maybe that's why you were placed here, at this time."

"Maybe," she followed him to the door, to wait in some shade as he began to sort through his larder, picking out perishables and canteens to fill with water. "Thank you."

"Hrm," he grunted, then said, "So what do I call you?"

"How far are you willing to sink to save those you love?"

She smiled, "Depravity."