Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Dindrane Holloway

Human, Arcane Mage

1. Vanilla
1. Born somewhere in the middle of this time period, she was way too young to have much to do with any of the wars with the orcs or any of the original raids.
1. Her mother worked for the mages in Stormwind; a very small Dindrane was left with the neighbors to play in the Mage District.
2. As soon as she was old enough to follow orders and mostly keep out of the way, her mother brought her to the mage tower to “help” with her work, mostly light chores--she learned how to read, etc.
3. At 6, her mother left--a handful of her mother’s colleagues took her in. She ran messages for them and did light housework. Once she had grasped legible writing, they set her to copying scrolls and such, though they forbade her to think too hard about what she was copying.
4. She began to think they were deliberately holding her back, and took to practicing magic in out of the way corners--magic they had certainly told her she was too young to learn.
2. Somewhere late in Vanilla she turned 16.
1. One of the mages who had been raising her caught her practicing more powerful magic than they had taught her. They finally told her that her mother didn’t leave--Terysa wanted more power and turned to a warlock to get it, becoming a warlock herself. She lost her job and her home for choosing to do so.
2. To teach Dindrane some discipline, or perhaps simply because they feared she would take her mother’s route in the end, they sent her out into the world.
3. She found herself in Northshire, and with no better options and a vague, well-buried inclination to help, she signed up with the recruiters in order to prove that she could take care of herself.
4. Once she was sent to Goldshire, she used the recruitment letter as an introduction--and then made sure said record disappeared from the Marshalls’ files--she’s not a soldier and had no desire to take orders.
5. She took baby’s-first-hero-steps work in Elwynn, eventually getting sent up the chain to places far from the forest. She used helping people as an excuse to travel and see more of the world and learn from any wandering mages she came across, growing stronger and more self-possessed.
2. Burning Crusade
1. Hellfire Offensive
1. She had somehow made enough of an impact on those she helped/had grown enough in her own security in her power to be accepted as a volunteer to head through the Dark Portal to Outland with three main motives for doing so.
1. She wanted to test herself against a prohibitively difficult challenge.
2. She was curious what another planet would be like, and what it could teach her.
3. She had a lingering, mild hatred of demons: her mother’s association with them got her evicted from what she considered a comfortable life, and she wanted to prove that she was better than her mother by destroying the creatures that had indirectly led her mother astray.
2. Though still stupidly young to be fighting, she rapidly matured in regards to her attitudes towards war--it’s hard, people get hurt--and made enough friends that she began to think there might be something worth fighting for. The more atrocities she saw committed by the demons, the more her hatred of them grew.
3. During this time, she also turned more seriously to the idea of the Light as a comfort and a guide, but was still very reliant on the more obvious, physical manifestations of the Light’s power--e.g. A’dal, O’ros, and a paladin who became a close friend.
2. The Black Temple
1. She ought to have just been fodder at the gates, but chance had her notice one of the heroes meant for the elite task force get overwhelmed. Knowing his importance to the battle, she tried to help him. He succumbed to his wounds despite her aid, and one of the other heroes, witnessing this, asked her to take his place. Woefully unprepared, she did her best, and they succeeded in defeating Illidan.
2. Though she had certainly proven herself enough to have been offered a place in the fight at the Sunwell, she suffered serious damage to her lungs at the Black Temple and gained a vulnerability to fel magic that she would have to fight for some time.
3. Wrath of the Lich King
1. Early--The threat of the Scourge awakened a deep fear of undeath in Dindrane, and she would have rather been anywhere than on the front.
1. Her heroics in Outland caused her name to be considered for recruitment to Northrend when the crisis broke out. She had recovered enough that she could not use lingering malaise as an excuse, though she tried. Ultimately, most of her friends felt strongly enough to ship up North, so she joined them.
2. Upon reaching Valiant’s Rest, she froze. Demons were one thing, but fighting people who were allies days, months, a lifetime ago? Her fear of joining them became overwhelming and she sought refuge in Dalaran, hiding in the libraries of the great city and pretending that learning from them would help her fight.
2. Middle--The Kirin Tor took an interest in her aptitude for magic.
1. They actively recruited her to join the Nexus war, and she gratefully leapt at the chance to do something worthwhile that wouldn’t paralyze her. She helped rescue the city from the assault through the Hold, and then headed out to the Nexus itself, ultimately aiding in the defeat of Malygos.
3. Icecrown Citadel--With Malygos defeated, her friends who had been fighting against the Scourge won her a slot at the Argent Tournament.
1. She was unremarkable as a valiant, disliking the tournament’s emphasis on physical combat. She distinguished herself out in the field of the greater Icecrown area, however, working with other valiants to take the fight to the foot of the citadel. She deeply hated every moment. This competence elevated her to champion where her lackluster performance at the actual tournament might have held her back.
2. She threw her bout in the Trials and never made it to the Grand Tournament, because the thought of actually stepping foot in the citadel petrified her. Many of her friends called her a coward--especially those she had made cross-faction during her time in Dalaran. She cut her losses and ran to Sholazar, then to Ulduar, fascinated by the information about the old power of the titans, though she was not part of the team that took down Yogg-Saron.
3. She did offer what aid she could in the aftermath, safely back on the continents.
4. Cataclysm
1. While Dindrane herself did not regret her actions in Northrend, she had lost several friends, and of those she kept, many thought she had quite a ways to go to prove herself reliable in a fight.
1. Uldum--She was eager to escape to the desert, hunting down ancient magic. She redeemed herself admirably, not only by finding the powerful artifact, but by genuinely putting time and effort into helping Ramkahen.
2. Twilight Highlands--She made it all the way to the Bastion of Twilight, finding a point to all that ogre-killing in Outland, and proving to those who desired proof that she was, in fact, capable of taking a stand.
3. Hour of Twilight--She absolutely volunteered to time-hop. Chasing magic, with a side helping of a chance to see history in action? This was very much something she was interested in. As an afterthought, for her, it was a chance that just might save the world, too.
1. Seeing Benedictus’ fall shook her reliance on the physical manifestation of the Light--she began to think that maybe the Light was bigger than the entities and people who sing its tenets.
4. Dragon Soul--They called those who were there the Destroyer’s End, Defenders of a Shattered World, and it occurred to Dindrane that having saved the world might be more important than the power used to get there.
5. Mists of Pandaria
1. Her desire to see new places and learn everything she can from them surged back in full force at the first rumor that a previously undiscovered continent had appeared from the Mists. She was eager to chase down Anduin and return him to his father--after all, at least he had a family that was trying to be there; however, once Anduin explained that there was something--knowledge, truth--that he absolutely must find, she swapped to wholeheartedly supporting his search for the Vale and offered to help him find it.
1. As she explored, she tried to avoid the faction trouble that was brewing. She had several friends made in Shattrath and Dalaran, and kept them despite the problems of the Cataclysm (in fact, because she took a stand during the Cataclysm, in some cases). She preferred to do what she could to mitigate the damage that “Garrosh’s war” was wreaking on the land (The destruction of Theramore she placed squarely on the Warchief’s shoulders, and she did not really believe that escalating retaliation was the answer). She was not present at the breaking of the statue in the Jade Forest when the Sha escaped, but she was very present at the Temples, helping to clean up.
1. Strangely, she found herself much less affected by the Sha than many of her friends. She used this to her advantage, making an impact fighting them, though in some cases she struggled a little to be sympathetic to those who were hit by their effects more strongly than she was.
2. She put a lot of effort into helping Anduin in Krasarang and Kun Lai, and was there when the Vale was opened. She stood in sheer awe of such peace.
3. She was inclined to help the Kirin Tor against the mogu, to root out Lei Shen’s power, but she stubbornly refused to fight the Horde without evidence of wrongdoing beyond Garrosh’s orders.
4. The Heart of Fear presented little problem for her--a few bugs couldn’t shake her the way the Scourge did, though this was, perhaps, the Sha that affected her the most strongly before the Siege.
5. In the lead-up to the Siege of Orgrimmar--the theft of the bell, the shattering of peace, whispers of Vol’jin’s death--she finally turned to the fight against the Horde, because she could see that her friends on both sides of the conflict were being hurt by it.
6. The Sha of Pride very nearly destroyed all her careful development over the years. She almost failed Norushen’s test, and when they faced the Sha, she finally understood what her friends who were more affected by Anger, Doubt, Fear, etc. had been wrestling with the whole time. Ultimately, she had grown enough in her own right to be able to defeat Pride and made it to the depths of Ragefire.
6. Warlords of Draenor
1. Round Two against the Legion: Dindrane was older, wiser, and she now hated the Legion with a burning passion. She also had developed an openly acknowledged drive to save the world. She was much more invested in the fight beyond the Dark Portal this time around.
1. Though she was nominally in charge of the arcane forces at the Alliance garrison, she delegated that duty almost entirely to her friend, Hravn. She headed an away team that worked mostly for Khadgar. Personally, she spent a ridiculous amount of time running errands for the Archmage, pursued a personal vendetta against Ner’zhul in the hopes that she could prevent him from retracing his former past as Lich King, and otherwise prepared for Tanaan and the fight with Gul’dan.
2. Hellfire Citadel--defeating Archimonde was extraordinarily satisfying.
2. Lead-up to the Legion’s invasion of Azeroth
1. She readily volunteered to take the fight to the Legion on the Broken Shore. She hoped that the Horde had a good reason to pull out--she never quite managed to focus her hatred on anyone other than the Legion, and maintained her friendships despite what looked like a betrayal. This was...unpopular with some people, but her friends on both sides have long since decided to reward her loyalty with their own.
7. Legion
1. Order Hall
1. She was offered the position of Head Conjuror with the Tirisgarde. She respectfully declined, passing the title to Lirshala, one of her oldest friends among the mages, a cool head for leadership, and an orc. Some among the Kirin Tor were unhappy, but Dindrane stood by her decision and the Tirisgarde benefitted for it.
2. Dindrane was offered the first choice of weapons, and she chose Aluneth.
3. No one even thought about denying her the title of “Archmage.”
2. Broken Isles
1. She spent most of her time helping Khadgar research the Pillars of Creation, as well as helping him prepare for the second assault on the Tomb.
2. Khadgar sent her and a few others to help the paladin Ixaara retrieve Light’s Heart for the Silver Hand.
3. Khadgar also sent Dindrane to make first contact with Thalyssra and the Nightfallen. She very eagerly delved into discovering and learning everything she could about and from ancient Suramar.
3. Broken Shore/Tomb of Sargeras
1. Revenge is sweet. She was perfectly happy to add Kil’jaeden to the list of important demons she has helped slay.
4. Argus
1. Her faith had evolved by this point so much so that losing X’era didn’t really phase her. She aided the Army of the Light without hesitation, and with a certain amount of awe for the battles they have fought and the strength of their faith.
2. Since the breach in the Tomb of Sargeras had already been closed, she threw herself wholeheartedly into destroying the Legion once and for all, though a part of her wondered if, even here, the demons could truly be destroyed forever.