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Cold stone did not talk. The stone did not weep. It did not bleed. The blood of countless champions had been spilled against it, and the stone was unmoved. It stood, resolute as it had watched the legion pour forth, watched Sargeras rise and rise again, watched as it became the final prison for those who fought the Fel. The tomb was home to hatred, to forgiveness, and to vengeance, but the stone stood apart.
Maiev stepped up the stone, towards the cathedral. Nearly a year had passed since her struggle here, and the fall of the legion. Sargeras was once more imprisoned, and her quarry with him. She glanced up briefly, as what little light from an overcast sky finally gave way to cold arches overhead. It was funny, she thought idly,that she would willingly return to the stone that had killed her loyal sisters. She moved deeper into the temple, stepping around huge blocks of stone. They were black as the night and still smooth despite the devastation they had seen, unmarred by the chaos that had caused their fall. She grazed her fingers against one, disturbing the dust that had settled there. It rose, and hung in the air. Even the dust ref used to fall, to rest again, within the heavy air.
She moved on.
The air cleared as she moved into the great chamber, where the aegis still rested, and the stone above her gave way to open air. There, at the centre of the room, she sat, with only ghosts as company.
The wind howled across her face as she removed the cold iron helm, placing it on the ground in front of her. Its empty eyes returned her stare, as unyielding as the stone surrounding it.
The clouds above opened, smothering the sky in blankets of toxic rain. it splashed against her armour, splashed against the stone. It poured, ceaseless, filling the cracks in the cobblestone. In time, the water would freeze, and the pressure would tear the stone apart. But for now, it merely washed into the cracks, and surrounded the slabs.
Illidan was gone. Her life's purpose had gone unresolved. As the conflict between the Horde and Alliance intensified, and her wardens were reassigned to different commanders, even her closest kin turned from her. She couldn't muster up the energy to hate them for it. She had led them to struggle after struggle, chasing a forever unfulfilled goal. the weight of the stone around her began to press in, closing on the open sky. The dull grey slabs around her, cracked from the fight with Mephistroth, lay still as she returned her gaze to her helm and the ground. And still the ghosts remained. She shivered, though from the cold or the gaze of her kin, she could not tell.
How long had it been since her right hand had fallen, her body lying broken under the cold stone beneath her? Maiev could barely remember the face of loyal Naisha, and all those who were crushed beneath the stone. Would they ever forgive her, all those driven to exhaustion, all those too tired to run as she led them on their unflinching march through the tomb, their legs failing them as they tried to run from the rubble and stone collapsing around them. Would she speak to them when she died, all those she had exhausted, or would they turn away from her, as all others had? Naisha, who followed her across the sea to hunt the betrayer. Naisha, who stood by her in her ten millennia of duty. Naisha, who begged her to run as the others screamed and fell.
She had nothing to give her Wardens. They died for nothing, and she failed their memories when the betrayer escaped her, escaped even death in his run to avoid his guilt, leaving her the spirits of the sisters he had killed as he fled.
But he hadn't fled. He had become her. As she was the stone which surrounded him, he had become the stone of Sargeras. He was a prisoner once again, bound by his duty as Sargeras' Jailer. Illidan was serving the sentence once delivered by his brother, had willingly returned to it. He had suffered his sentence, and was suffering it still. Her duties were over, And her sentence had ended. Her fellow prisoner had left, and her duties with him.
The ghosts, however, would not leave. They lingered, silent and apart, giving her nothing but their gaze. Even as the living left, as the night elves moved past the tragedies of the betrayer, as the old passed and the young were born, the dead remained. She looked at them. finally looked, and met their eyes. were they angry, or pitying? she couldn't tell, their faces near inscrutable. As she maintained her vigil for her fallen sisters, they stood vigil for her.
The burdens Maiev bore could not be resolved by her alone, she knew. They were burdens of guilt, and fury, and could only be laid to rest with the target of her anger. The rain continued to fall, and she stood.
Illidan would return. Sargeras would not remain contained forever. And when he did, in a year or a millennium, she would be ready. She would wait for him, wait for his return, and release the burdens of vengeance, any way she knew how. Maiev knew so little, but as she walked back though the unfeeling stone, from the ruins of her kin and out through the grand and shattered entrance, she felt a certainty in this alone.
The sky cleared, the clouds drifting away above her. And still rain fell, ever present, falling against broken stone.