Chapter Text
Far above the capital city of Lordaeron circled a bird. That in itself was no strange occurrence, perhaps. Stranger though, was that this particular bird was an albatross and in no way at home above an inland city. Stranger still was that the eyes of this particular albatross gleamed yellow. And strangest of all things was that it showed no inclination of veering away from the murderous carnage below, which should arguably be in the interest of any sane creature.
The army that approached the walls of Lordaeron was formidable, as was it’s siege equipment. A dozen massive siege towers were visible in the gaps in the smoke and dust beneath, carrying not only armoured soldiers but counterweight trebuchets mounted on their rear side and in some places cannons. From the walls a rain of projectiles rained over them, some conventional and many magical. Of special note were arrows that left inky trails and seeming to cause damage far beyond what a mere arrow should be capable of. Here and there black-cloaked archers could be seen nocking and loosing more of those, and in particular one archer in a heavier dark red armour, although evidently not heavy enough to impede it’s wearer ina nay noticeable way. The archers leapt across the battlements and onto a tower, firing black arrows as she made her way to it’s top to loose one last black arrow that collapsed one entire side of the wood-and-steel structure and left it toppling. The archer disappeared in a dark cloud only to reappear again on the ground with her bow in hand and shouting a battlecry that could be heard well beyond these heights.
”For the Horde!”
***
It was later during the day and the lowering afternoon sun should have warmed up the sky.
Instead, the sky was a sickly black and green.
Coughing and stumbling, the Alliance army was retreating west, towards their forward encampments by the small town of Brill. Behind them loomed a vast and ominous cloud of blight.
Anduin Wrynn panted in his too heavy armour, feeling more trapped than usual inside the expensive plate. He turned around to view the devastation beneath the walls of Lordaeron’s capital.
”The blight has broken our ranks!” Fury and frustration turned the outcry of Genn Greymane, the worgen king of Gilneas, into more of a snarl than anything else.
”Our assault...has been for nothing.” Anduin concluded with a defeated voice.
The pinnacle of Alliance siege engineering lay in shambles before the torn battlements of the city wall and far too much of it’s finest heavy infantry would never rise again, unless it would be as new Forsaken under the reign of their enemy.
Anduin felt the wind increase. The cold wind…that had started blowing from the other side? He turned around slowly and saw Genn do the same. The sky was darkening already from the smoke from the battle but at a distance they could see a distinct storm cloud set apart from the rest of the turmoil in the sky. A storm cloud that was fast approaching.
”What now?” Genn growled.
Anduin strained his eyes to discern anything inside the whipping smoke-like cloud that seemed to form and be held around something. He could make out a dark outline of something truly massive inside it, he thought, but could not guess what it might be.
The next moment, the cloud parted and shrivelled like paper consumed by flame. From inside it emerged a monumental…ship. A Kul Tiran ship of the line, but larger than any other that Anduin knew of, suspended in the air upon a bed of water flowing under and around like it’s own miniature sea, practically shining with arcane magic. The massive oak timbers were dark and somehow murky, and it seemed eerily deserted instead of crawling with the vast crew normally needed to operate such a vessel.
Except for one.
The wind was tugging at the dark blue cloak and white hair of Jaina Proudmoore standing at the bow with her mage staff in hand, majestic as a queen and infinitely more dangerous.
”Jaina!”
She raised her hands and waves of frost appeared upon the ground, coalescing around the traces of arcane runes and exploding outward. Where it struck, the blight broke down and receded, as if every drop had been frozen and shattered into useless refuse. The air cleared when chlling gales swept the green-black clouds away to form a clear path to the city walls.
Around Anduin, routing troops had stopped to watch the sky in wonder, and battered units were hesitantly forming up again.
”Alliance! Forward!” Anduin shouted.
He had time to curse his clanky and too heavy armour many times on the way back, rallying what companies were in sight by actions more than words. It was dangerous to advance without coordination but could be just as perilous to wait too long. Genn was with him, Anduin knew, easily keeping pace with the stamina of a wolf, or perhaps two.
But unfortunately the Lordaeron battlements had in no place been broken enough for mere infantry to scale or breach the city, not without the siege equipment of which none remained in one piece. They would maybe be able to bolt together a makeshift ladder or ramp from some ruined tower. If they had time which they currently did not.
Or…
Anduin turned around and looked to the sky.
”Jaina! The wall!” he shouted as loud as he could.
Whether she had heard him or not, the archmage gestured with her arms as if physically pulling her flagship into place, upon which her vessel and it’s levitating sea turned to present it’s darkening broadside towards the city. On another command form it’s archmage captain, shimmering forms of glowing pink and purple formed among the gunports. Anduin almost thought they looked like…
And of course they were. Leave it to a Kul Tiran archmage to invent or discover the spell to conjure arcane cannons. Hauled forward by themselves, loaded because Jaina Proudmoore willed them to be, only the deafening sound resembled proper cannons. The projectiles they fired were not round iron shot but gleaming bolts of arcane energy that exploded on impact with enough force to shake the ground.
And, apparently, enough force and accuracy to blast a very traversable hole in the city wall before them.
Approaching the breach, Anduin raised his sword and lowered it to point forward.
”We end this... now.”
***
Arcane cannons.
Yesterday she would have dubbed the idea ridiculous, just as ridiculous as a magically flying Kul Tiran man-of-war for that matter.
In the card games her dark rangers had started to favour such a thing would have been ruled as overpowered at it’s first appearance. In the cheap adventure and romance novels they consumed like…fire did trees, it would have been a laughably unreasonable and unexpected form of deliverance.
Unfortunately neither set of rules applied to Alliance and Horde battles these days.
Not when one of the sides had Jaina Proudmoore in their ranks.
Sylvanas’ mind lingered on the archmage as she ran to take up a new position near the courtyard. For all the long history of service to the Alliance, she had never considered Proudmoore to be the greater danger to the Forsaken, and lately to the Horde. While her powers were widely known so was, or had been, her diplomatic demeanour. At least until she had lost her beloved city to the Horde and a good portion of her soul, or sanity perhaps, with it. In a way it mirrored Sylvanas’ past in no small way and it was almost curious how little they had run into one another over the years. But here she was, and making up for lost time to thwart the Horde with a vengeance.
”Everyone, move! Cut them off with the reserves! Do not let them pass!” Sylvanas yelled. ”Saurfang! Where did you go?”
Where was that blasted orc overlord?
”Leave it to me, Dark Lady. I will lead the reserves in the assault. The Alliance will go no further, I swear it.” Nathanos Blightcaller assured her, eager as always.
”Meet with Lor'themar. Quickly! Do not fail me, Nathanos!”
”I obey, My Queen. Heroes, follow me!”
Horde champions, the tauren chieftain Baine Bloodhoof and several guards joined Nathanos at the run.
”Baine, gather the catapults and every apothecary you can find. Send them to the keep at once!” Nathanos yelled.
”Yes, Blightcaller. But... where is Saurfang?”
”There is no time! We have but precious moments before we lose our terrain advantage! The chokepoint we create will funnel them through the side of the keep and thin their ranks. With us out in the open, we will outnumber them ten to one!”
” Understood. I will meet you as soon as I can.”
”No. Lor'themar and I will handle the interlopers. I can't risk leaving the Warchief unguarded. You are not to leave her side.”
”How long are you expecting to hold them off? What is the Warchief's strategy?”
Sylvanas had to smirk a little at that. A last ditch defence of the fortified keep? How much strategic variation did that allow oneself?
”It is better if she tells you herself. Now go! Champions, with me! We rally in the keep! Your Warchief commands it! Lor'themar, command our rangers from the flank! Position them on the rooftops!”
”With pleasure, Blightcaller.” Lor'themar Theron answered evenly, unfazed as usual by almost any situation.
”Blight throwers, you're our front line! You will create a swath of blight between us and the enemy! Soldiers, fall into position! The Alliance approaches!”
***
The plan had been good. For a minute it had even appeared to be working.
”It is you who are outnumbered now!” Nathanos noted smugly.
”That army is enormous... Give the word, and I will teleport us to safety.” Sylvanas could hear Proudmoore tell Anduin Wrynn.
”If we turn tail now, we just become prey. No. We'll fight - and die, if we must - for what we believe in!”
”Your time is up, King Anduin!” Nathanos yelled. Victory for the Forsaken!”
Then, of all other improbable things, had appeared a portal that was not a common portal but a Void tear, bringing Alliance mages, the gnome king Gelbin Mekkatorque and a squadron of their latest mechanical abominations – Flametron 5000 or some other ridiculous classification according to the latest intelligence reports – and lastly of course void elf rangers under none other than Sylvanas’ own sister Alleria Windrunner.
”Hahaha!” Nathanos laughed. ”Look who joins the fray. Good, I was hoping you'd keep this interesting!”
”I assure you, Blightcaller, the pleasure is all mine!” was Allerias immediate answer.
”The void elves... those traitors must be dealt with!” Lor’Themar cried out. ”Their assault will soon falter. Remain steadfast!”
Unfortunately their assault did not falter. For all their irritating traits – and Belore should knew they had many – the gnomes knew their trade as much as Sylvanas was eager to consider them glorified goblins with their ridiculous yet always infallibly devastating inventions. And the void elves were few but had powers matching her dark rangers…and they had Alleria.
How many times had Sylvanas elder sister looked upon her without the now seemingly perpetual scowl since her return to Azeroth? Any time? She did not care anymore and neither of them were the sisters that had parted ways decades ago when Alleria left to seek vengeance on the other side of the dark portal. For that Alleria would have given her a chance to explain.
That Alleria would have listened.
***
The last of the Horde’s forces were in full retreat through portals or astride airborne mounts. Lordaeron lay in ruins yet again.
Sylvanas Windrunner and Nathanos Blightcaller walked side by side along one of the deserted corridors of the Lordaeron keep leading to the vast round hall where it’s ruler’s throne still stood, cracked and withered but still imposing enough.
”Shall I bring your bow too, My Queen?”
”No, a queen should have her scepter at hand when entertaining such…distinguished guests.” Sylvanas smirked. ”You know what must be done. Go... my champion.”
Nathanos nodded and left the throne room as Sylvanas lazily climbed the steps and sank down into the old seat of the Lordaeron crown with one hand resting on top of her bow at her side. She could hear the clanking steps outside, the heavy breaths and so the sound of gloves upon the doors and the metallic groaning as they slammed open.
Anduin Wrynn was flanked by Genn Greymane and Alleria as he approached, and slightly behind him was Jaina Proudmoore. The scowl of her sister looked if possible even deeper than last time when she laid eyes on Sylvanas.
The king of Stormwind stepped up to the still largely intact seal in the middle of the room.
”Look at you. The boy's playing soldier.” Sylvanas drawled, dripping with sarcasm.
”Our king just routed your army!” Genn Greymane stared indignantly and far too expectantly at her.
Sylvanas rolled her eyes and sighed. Anduin's mongrel of an advisor was just too tiresome most days.
”Muzzle your dog, Your Majesty.” She let her irritation shine through ever so slightly.
The worgen king snarled in anger but Anduin silenced him with a gesture of his arm. So, the little lion was learning how to handle his pet, Sylvanas smirked inwardly.
”Sylvanas Windrunner, you have led the Horde to a place without honour. Lordaeron is ours. It's over.” he said, more collected than she had expected.
”How…traditional, Little Lion. Is this where you tell me how I will no longer need to bear the weight of my crown? That you have - how did he put it? - taken care of everything?” As she spoke the words her gaze shifted from Anduin to the archmage behind him, who flinched visibly. ”And speaking of late kings, your father would be so proud. Is that... his?”
Sylvanas indicated the gleaming sword in Anduins hand, Shalamayne.
”You've gotten it all bloody.” she almost admonished.
”Only one of us wanted this war.”
”You call for peace when it suits you, Little Lion, but you're quick enough to kill.” Turning towards the archmage she added with an ironic smirk ”That seems to be true for most of us these days, does it not? How the times have changed us all…”
Proudmoore did not flinch this time, but her face set in stone.
”I should have killed you when last we met!” Alleria spat out.
Sylvanas sighed.
”How rude, sister. You're a guest in my home.”
Genn took a step forward, bristling with rage.
”Your home?! You desecrate that throne with your filth!”
”Enough!” Anduin snapped and slammed the tip of his blade into the floor with a resounding clang.
”I would ask you to leave your dog by the gate in the future until he has been properly house-trained, Your Majesty.” Sylvanas replied in a bored tone and reclined slightly against the stony seat.
”You put the torch to Teldrassil. But I failed those who burned. I will not make that mistake again. Surrender... or die.” Anduin's voice was pained but Sylvanas did not doubt his resolve.
”We all carry the weight of our failures, do we not?” Sylvanas mused and rose languidly with her bow in hand, but made no move to raise it.
”After all, I failed utterly to defend Silvermoon. I could not stop the last king who sat upon this throne from murdering my people after he had…succeeded…his own father. And neither could his betrothed, or so the story goes…” she added with a meaningful glance at Proudmoore.
”But at least I was there.” Sylvanas noted venomously as she turned to Alleria, who had nocked an arrow and held her bow fully drawn and pointed at Sylvanas. ”Unlike some…”
Alleria was silent but her nostrils did flare momentarily.
”You are excused, Little Lion.” Sylvanas quickly added in Anduin’s direction. ”You were after all rather…littler…at the time. But look at you now!”
She took a step closer to the king of Stormwind, well within range of his Light-infused blade and close enough to cover almost all of his vision when she whispered, almost sadly.
”You've won... nothing.” She smiled condescendingly. ”Poor boy, where would you be without your dear aunt holding your hand, hmm? It is ’aunt’ you use to call her, isn’t it? Your Alliance’s precious little force of nature, ever ready to save the day when you’ve all managed to make such a delightful mess of it – yet here she remains in the back, ever taken for granted. Always the Alliance’s good little mage.”
The precious little force of nature in question glared at Sylvanas, and was in truth probably slightly taller than her. She found the blue eyes intriguing, so much deeper than the shining high elven blue had been for most individuals.
”You’re wasting time while both our peoples are dying. End this madness, Sylvanas. Stand down.”
”Oh, you think to appeal to my better nature? How very much alike the old Jaina Proudmoore.”
”I would appeal to your sanity, or whatever shred of it that might remain. This war gains you nothing and each side will soon be on the brink of starving if it continues, heroics and strategies be damned. If you can not bring yourself to see that you are truly gone and I will end you. I will not se another Garrosh at the head of the Horde!”
The air seemed to thicken and crackle around the woman when her voice rose, and her blue eyes were beginning to glow slightly.
”I was almost expecting you to hold up Varian as the warning example considering where we are...” Sylvanas remarked casually and indicated the surroundings. ”How I would have loved to see the look on him after you robbed him of the chance to wipe us all out for good…”
”Trust me, you wouldn’t.” Proudmoore seemed to answer reflexively without much thought about it. ”So how’s it going to be, Banshee Queen?”
”Walk quietly to my death, or stand to fight overwhelming odds…yes, that is a tough choice isn’t it? Two such immensely appealing alternatives.”
”Those are not your only options. End this senseless killing. Step down as Warchief. Do you truly claim to be so devoid of imagination that you can not even consider another course than ceaseless war? Pathetic, that is what you are, all of you!”
The archmage bristled with irritation, and Sylvanas was suddenly somehow sure that it was genuine and Proudmoore was closer to losing her composure than she was letting on.
”Perhaps you are right. Perhaps I should seek a more…imaginative…solution.”
Sylvanas’ voice had changed to smooth and whispering as she hung her bow across her back in one graceful motion with her gaze set on the archmage.
She smirked, but suddenly fixed Alleria with her stare instead while she slowly raised her hands to her neck to unfasten something, which turned out to be a golden necklace with a single smooth gem in it. Recognition flashed through Alleria’s features and her eyes narrowed suspiciously as Sylvanas stepped right in front of Proudmoore to fasten the necklace beside the exquisite thin silvery chain already hanging around her neck.
”Does this…cater to your imaginations, Proudmoore?” Sylvanas whisper turned into a sultry purr when she pronounced the mage’s last name.
She let a gauntleted thumb brush briefly against the throat when she retracted her hands, and to her surprise Proudmoore shuddered noticeably from the brief contact.
”Oh, for the love of… Keep your filthy hands off her!” Genn roared and swiped at Sylvanas’ arm.
Sylvanas hissed menacingly at him. Genn bared his fangs and Sylvanas took in the quick tensing of Allerias arm holding the bow drawn and the metallic rustle of Anduin raising his guard behind her.
Sylvanas flashed a last cold smile at the Gilnean king.
Then her shadowy banshee form enveloped her and she wailed.
The sound waves detonated the dozens of barrels of blight and explosive substances hidden amongst the balconies and alcoves around the room and atop the roof. Sylvanas swept up from the floor and caught sight of Alleria and Genn leaping away from falling pieces of masonry, Alleria as quick as always and the worgen’s bulk and blunt manners belying his substantial agility, while Anduin raised his hand calling upon the Light in some way. The next moment Sylvanas soared through a hole in the roof just before it cracked and shattered and collapsed into the explosive green clouds of blight beneath.
Her trap was sprung.
But something was not right.
Cold like she had never felt since Northrend rippled through her. The air bristled with arcane magic tinted with cold that clung to her banshee form no matter how insubstantial it was. Her manner of flight was in every way as unnatural as the rest of her but somehow even that was heavier and slower than it should be. She could not move her leg, or rather the phantom part of her banshee form that she identified as her leg. Sylvanas glanced down and snarled in fury. Ice encased her lower body and was gradually climbing upward.
No.
Ice and the gauntleted hand of Jaina Proudmoore encased her lower body. The woman was hardly of the burly variety but Sylvanas felt like she was fettered to a mountain.
The banshee queen hissed but as she opened her mouth in a twisted yawning grimace to wail her scream drowned in a chilling gale conjured from the staff in the archmage’s other hand. In a blink the gale turned to a storm of hails that grew larger and larger, and sharper as well. Her face was shredded by minute cuts, but they were many and somehow the magic was pulling her back into her physical form that was vulnerable to the ice.
She had to shake off that accursed extra weight and ice but how could she shake anything when she could hardly move? Willing herself to remain in the air was taking almost all her concentration. She had to get down on the ground somewhere, but the hailstorm that was ripping her skin apart made it damn near impossible to make out where the ground was. Sylvanas crouched, almost, and saw a trace of surface beneath her. She was disoriented now, no question about it, but any patch of ground would do.
Or any patch of a Kul Tiran capital ship’s deck, as it were.
Sylvanas slammed into the massive oak planks of the airborne vessel, hearing them crack underneath her impact and feeling herself tumbling over as the archmage impacted next to her, dragged along head over heels like a ragdoll to collide with a drift of powdery snow that Sylvanas had certainly not had the benefit of crashing into. The ice around her had cracked and shattered, but she was still frozen numb throughout. She groaned through clenched jaws as she rolled over on her belly, more rigid than she could remember ever being in life or death. Every piece of her that she could feel hurt like mad, frozen and stiff and brittle.
Proudmoore hardly looked better but her eyes were still lit up like white lanterns and her entire face was clenched in a hateful, taut grimace when she looked at Sylvanas from a kneeling position. There was blood and spit dripping from her lips and she held her right arm still before her, crouching over it as if she was in great pain. It must have been broken or seriously fractured by the fall that not even the masterfully conjured snow – how had she had the presence of mind to be able to throw that up for herself but not Sylvanas? – could fully dampen.
But the woman’s left hand still gripped her staff, whose blue crystal shone to match her eyes. With a flick of the wrist she pointed it at Sylvanas and only the banshee queens centuries, if not milennia, of reflexes saved her from the massive block of ice that embedded itself in the deck and would have crushed her head like it was made of porcelain.
Sylvanas screamed in pain and anger as she forced herself to drag her battered self up and move. Deathwhisper was in her hands, she couldn’t remember if she had reached for it or just wished it forward somehow.
A gale threatened to topple her but she dodged and rolled away, and was back on her feet with a smoking black arrow nocked. Proudmoore was nowhere to be seen but Sylvanas was a master huntress. There were always traces to follow even when the prey could turn itself invisible. Such spells mattered little in the end against dark rangers and even less against the Dark Lady.
She ran forward in great leaps and listened every time she bounced between one step and the next.
There.
Sylvanas’ arrow struck something unseen and glanced off. She had to give the archmage or her armourer some credit. Very few materials withstood the black arrows.
”Come out and play, little mage…” she hissed.
In answer, an explosion of flames erupted under her and forced her to jump back with a dismayed snarl. Everyone knew that Proudmoore was a frost mage first and foremost.
”I’m sorry, was that too rough?” The last word was punctuated by a fireball striking in front of Sylvanas and exploding in a thousand searing sparks that forced her further back. Proudmoore leaned against the main mast with a contemptuous sneer at Sylvanas, who darted to the side as she loosed two arrows in a blink at the archmage, who deflected them with a wall of ice that sprang up in front of her.
More winds hindered Sylvanas, winds that grew in force in moments to a hurricane centred around the archmage. She struggled against the wind, then turned on the spot and leapt with it, narrowly avoiding a lance of ice that flew behind her.
The winds abated.
”Look at you!” Proudmoore’s voice was strong despite her injuries and the vast amount of mana and physical effort the day’s efforts must have demanded from her. ”Look at you! What have you become, Sylvanas Windrunner!?”
”What your pathetic Alliance made me into!”
Sylvanas loosed arrow after arrow after arrow that the archmage battered aside with gusts of chill wind. But she was wearying, slowing. And…so was Sylvanas. Her undead body did not tire in the normal way but she did not have infinite reserves of energy.
”The Alliance never made you Warchief!”
”Bold words from someone whose lover made me into a banshee!”
”Arthas is dead! Gone! Or so I thought but evidently some part of him lives on in you!”
”Don’t you dare compare me to Arthas!”
”You are right! He never set fire to Teldrassil!”
Sylvanas screamed, a wordless piercing banshees wail that should have left any being so frail as a mere human on her knees in agony, but the storm swept away her scream away and drowned out her fury in it’s own. Sylvanas still advanced, unable to shoot but struggling forward step by step while the archmage strained to keep her away.
The power of that woman. Sylvanas had to give her respect to that. She would offer her respect as she tore out Proudmoore’s throat and ripped her spine from her body!
She could count the steps left before she would be able to put her clawed gauntlets around that throat. Seven. Six.
Between the battering wind and hailstorm directed at her she could make out the one golden lock among Proudmoore’s white hair, a lonely memory of the peace-loving woman that Garrosh’s despicable mana-bomb had destroyed forever.
Five. Four.
In the immediate aftermath of Apothecary Putress’ treachery and Varimathras’ rebellion it had been Proudmoore that teleported Varian Wrynn and the Alliance forces away before their wrath at seeing Putress’ experiments could boil over into outright battle across the whole Undercity. The Forsaken had been…saved by that, most likely.
Three. Two.
How Proudmoore must regret that here and now. But it would not be for long. One more…
Between one second and the next the storm and hail stopped altogether. Sylvanas, still pushing with all her might against a force that was no longer there, catapulted herself forward.
Crunch.
Sylvanas couldn’t tell if she heard or felt the impact of...of something stopping her dead in her tracks. She looked down.
Coated in a spear tip of ice so cold that wisps of smoke trailed it, Proudmoore's staff was embedded in her chest, right through her chest armour and bone alike so that only a part of the sharp-tipped blue crystal on it’s top was visible.
Right through the light blue scar left in that spot by a weapon far fouler.
She had to applaud the effort. So few magic users would willingly forego casting their last spell in favour of close combat, and it had required just as quick acting as when she called forth the snow to cushion her fall.
But when Frostmourne had pierced her chest Sylvanas’ heart had still been beating.
And that was well over a decade ago.
She grinned a terrifying grin as she raised her head to lock her gaze on Proudmoore’s. The archmage’s eyes had widened in shock as if she hadn’t been fully aware of what she was doing. And for the fleetest of moments there was a glimpse in them of horror without end.
Sylvanas’ hand came down quick as a serpent to grab hold of the staff and wrench it out of herself as well as out of Proudmoore’s grasp. She hissed from the pain and her grin was taut and drawn when she finally closed her fingers around Proudmoore’s bare throat.
She smiled as she began to squeeze, wanting to savour the look in her enemy’s eyes as she did so, that look of…of something that was not the fear she had expected to see.
A glimmer to her right brought Sylvanas’ attention to the hovering blade of ice over Proudmoore’s hand.
Of course. A staff was not what made someone into an archmage.
Sylvanas smiled widely at the delicious irony of it all. So, they were in the end evenly matched?
She knew that her claws were digging into Proudmoore’s skin. She could kill her with a twist of her hand and the archmage needed just a thought to impale her with ice.
But the Banshee Queen was not a fair fighter. The world allowed neither the Queen of the Forsaken or the Warchief of the Horde to be.
”How long…” she whispered slowly ”…does Anduin have left?”
Proudmoore’s eyes widened and the momentary flinch was all the hesitation Sylvanas needed to clamp down on the archmage’s raised hand with her own and force it upward and away from herself. She leaned in as she tightened her grip around the soft throat.
”How long…does Alleria have?” Proudmoore whispered.
How dared she?
”Alleria means nothing to me.” Sylvanas hissed angrily.
”If that was true…would you feel the need…to tell me so before killing me?”
Sylvanas’ felt her smile become a grimace of clenched teeth.
”She was your sister…for hundreds of years…” Proudmoore continued as her strength faded and she squirmed in Sylvanas’ grip. ”Don’t tell me…that means nothing…at all… Let me go…save them…”
”Why in the world should I let you do that?” Sylvanas snarled through gritted teeth.
A glimpse of something glittering over the woman’s chest caught Sylvanas’ eyes. The silvery pendant around the archmage’s neck moved on it’s own accord, unclasping and hovering slowly to settle itself around Sylvanas’.
”Because…that is...what…wives…do…” Proudmoore whispered.