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So, this is what it means to be a king.
He was to have the world on a plate, but there was still some minutiae he envied. His “aunt”, before his own age, had already held the hands of a prince, imagined their wedding, and smiled up at the rose petals fluttering from the sky. The golden-tressed pair would have their fairy tale ending, and the promised bounty of life is what graduated him from prince to king. Or so she had hoped.
It seems both these princes earned their crowns through death.
He was King Anduin Llane Wrynn now, named for the late Anduin Lothar and Llane Wrynn I, another who perished beneath his crown. But he, the new Anduin, did not seek elevation above others; he sought only to restore peace, and felt persistently indebted to the task. He thought, perhaps, he would now have the authority to realize it.
King Anduin Wrynn. The title sunk heavy in his gut. He recalled the way his feet flopped out of his father’s greaves when he mimicked him walking down the cobblestone steps of the cathedral. The way his father draped the furred stole about his shoulders when he saw his ears turning red from the cold (and Anduin always sneezed from the dander). It nearly sank to his elbows, back then. It sank further and further into his bones, deep into the marrow. King. King. King.
It was still his. It was still his father’s, this title. And like the cloak and boots, it was too lofty to reach. Too large to fill. And the enormous space his father occupied in all respects—that, too, lie vast and empty. All of the wishing in the world would not reforge him from dust.
He was gone as quickly as he had returned.
His monuments and banners and even his tomb could not hold the majesty of him. The strength in his gait, the boom of his laugh, the wrinkles on his weathered knuckles, the scars on his face, the light in his eyes. Nothing of Varian Wrynn could fail to betray the name of King. The orcs had called him Lo’gosh after the wild wolf spirit, but for humans, the King’s valor and nobility were truly emblematic of the Alliance’s lion crest. Ferocious, tenacious, brave.
Anduin placed his hand within a plate gauntlet and winced as it caught on his skin. The layers always bothered him, as he had grown accustomed to cloth. Still, even beneath the encasement of metal there was a rattling, and as he withdrew he saw himself trembling.
“Mail before plate,” Greymane reminded him. An attendant handed him a chain doublet, and Anduin heaved it on over his gambeson. Together, they finished fitting Anduin into his armor. All that remained was the helm.
Anduin picked it up. On its face, the sculpted visage of a lion stared back. Soon, it replaced his own.
I don’t feel protected. I feel like I’m wearing a costume.
“Did you say something, my King?” Greymane’s wolf-ear twitched. “It seems it was caught in the armor.”
“This… is new,” Anduin’s muffled voice barely carried beyond the dense helmet.
“From the finest cobalt atop the Storm Peaks,” Greymane lauded. “Smithed in Ironforge for you exclusively, Your Majesty. So that he who represents the heart of the Alliance may truly embody it.”
Sweat already began to percolate on the prince’s brow. The king’s brow. No scars, no wrinkles. And yet—
A paw rested on one of his pauldrons, then shrank and shed down to pale, gnarled fingers. “It is new for us all. But there is none better than you to lead. It is not only within your ability; it is your right.”
“The kingdom of Stormwind,” Anduin said.
“The Alliance,” Greymane insisted. “You are doing what you were born to do.”
I am doing what I must.
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