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1.
Illidan wasn’t all that needed at the Seat of the Pantheon, but he had not discovered that until after his route home was gone. It was the kindness of Eonar that had him beamed back down to Argus, to rout out the remaining demons and help the Arguri rebuild their homes. It was something like peace, this existence, not knowing.
He worried, of course. He worried so much for his home and his Illidari and his people.
But, he could do nothing. He could not go home.
So, he did what he could on Argus, and tried to make a life there.
It was difficult, it was heart-wrenching, but… it was peaceful. Hunting demons, cleansing corruption, helping to scout and fight back against nature and void alike.
He even helped in the cleansing of the farms so they could grow a wider variety of vegetables. Fel made it almost impossible for plants to grow, and those that did were usually highly intoxicating, but the Krokul had methods of preparing them that brewed the toxicity away with fire and arcane magic. It was interesting.
He’d even made a few friends, learning and teaching fel and arcane magic in turn, forming bonds with these people that he’d never expected to, but when you have nobody else-... well, they weren’t so different from him anyway. Fel-corrupted, scarred and abandoned, picking up the pieces, but determined to survive.
Illidan held a lot of respect for the Krokul, and was grateful that they had accepted him readily into their society.
2.
Malfurion’s heart was breaking. He wasn’t sure if this was the right thing to do. Nobody could answer this question for him.
Nobody really liked Malfurion, though, did they? They just wanted his power.
Tyrande’s face as he backed away, though.
The tears streaking her cheeks.
The way her shoulders set.
Each little thing crashed against his resolve, like tidal waves against a crumbling cliff, but he had to, he had to . They needed Ysera, and Malfurion was the closest thing they had to someone who could replace her.
And yet, and yet, his heart bled as he watched his beloved weep for him.
He could not apologise.
He could not even breathe as he stepped back, through the portal into the brilliant blue twilight of Ardenweald, and silence fell.
Ysera had already left, and he felt the tendrils of power, torn asunder, reaching for him and his stabilising influence. Blue anima flowed from the ground, and he let it wrap around his wrists, pulling him to kneel and then land on all-fours. Tears dripped from his nose, and his breathing caught in his throat as he felt the anima bite into him, claim his soul and his body and his future and was this what Illidan had felt like when he lost his eyes?
Was this what it felt like to lose all of your autonomy? Was this what it felt like to die?
3.
A spark bloomed in the dark. An unused connection flickering to life. Despair echoing from one end, and calm from the other.
And unlike usual, it was the fel-corrupted end of the bond at peace. Illidan’s mind, calm and sleepy after a long night, surprised to feel the faintest touch of grief, pain, fear from someone he had never thought he would speak to again.
His hand lifted to press against his heart as he listened some more, straining his ears as though he could somehow hear what Malfurion was unconsciously projecting through a veil of power that Illidan did not recognise.
Did he even realise he was reaching out to the brother he had disowned? Did he realise what he was doing?
Illidan… didn’t know what to do.
Did he respond? Ignore it? Lock up their bond tighter so Malfurion could not reach out at all?
But-... that sort of grief…
Despite what Malfurion had said, how he had disowned Illidan, disavowed him as his brother- Illidan still loved his twin. Through thick and thin, through war and strife, he’d never stopped loving his brother.
No, he couldn’t let him suffer alone like this.
Where was Tyrande? Why was she not caring for his brother?
…had something happened to her?
There wasn’t a lot that could reduce Malfurion to this sort of pain. Yes, his brother was emotional and deeply traumatised, there wasn’t a night elf who wasn’t traumatised, but. Malfurion had always been the balanced one. The peaceful one.
And Illidan had been the one with emotional outbursts, with pain to spread and rage to share.
Now, it seemed, it was the opposite.
“Illidan, is all well?”
Noraa, one of the krokul he shared a home with, had approached him. Maybe there was something to his expression - these people had learned how to read him faster than most. He hummed softly.
“My brother is in pain, and I can feel it,” He responded, pressing his hand into his heart, feeling his pulse and pretending that it was Malfurion’s, soft and steady and not wailing in grief . “And I can do nothing.”
She offered him a cup of tea, which he gratefully took her up on. The tea on Argus was bitter and harsh and slightly alcoholic, but it would steady him to hold something warm. He thanked whatever gods that had not let him down for the presence of the Broken and their easy acceptance. They knew what it was to be fel-tainted and torn apart, and they did not judge him for his demonic appearance, nor the fel that ran through his body.
Malfurion’s wailing seemed to increase, grief soaking into the bond and Illidan instinctively stretched back as he watched Noraa set the kettle over the crystal campfire. Warmth, comfort and peace were the feelings he allowed to spread down the bond. A reminder that Malfurion was not quite as alone as he seemed to be feeling.
And yes, the distance between them was insurmountable, but they had a bond that could cross that distance.
Was that enough? Perhaps.
Perhaps not.
4.
Illidan’s touch is foreign and shocking and scares Malfurion right out of his hysteria. He’s kneeling, alone, gasping in a grove surrounded by wildseeds. The portal behind him is gone. He is alone.
Was the Winter Queen meant to meet him here? He can’t remember.
All he knows is that he is desperately lonely, cut off from his world and his life and the Dream in a way he’s never been before, and Illidan is reaching down their bond for the first time in ten thousand years.
The dirt, full of life but the wrong kind of life, feels like ash. The warmth in his mind, in his heart, is the only thing keeping him from collapsing.
He trembles. Shivers. Wonders why Illidan would ever choose to comfort him, after so long, so much rage and violence and hatred and cruelty between them.
Malfurion does not deserve this kindness from his twin.
And yet, there it is. Gentle. Kind. Soft. Loving.
Somehow, Illidan still loves him.
After everything. After the Sundering, the imprisonment, after everything Malfurion had done to him and allowed to be done to him.
Malfurion remembers his little brother, arrogant but so, so eager to learn, struggling under the tutelage of Cenarius, crying in his bed because the demigod had rejected him.
Malfurion remembers his little brother coming home with a blindfold and new scars.
Malfurion reaches back, curling his fingers into the grass and the dirt beneath, wondering if perhaps he can still have this.
If, perhaps, he has not broken the one he thought he had lost ten thousand years ago, with the grinding of a cell door.
If, perhaps, things will be okay.
Someday.
Their warmth crashes together, blazing their connection back to life, and Malfurion bows his head as his mind is flooded with Illidan’s.
Sorry, sorry, sorry, they both cry, echoing and laughing and sobbing as they reach for each other. Forgiveness and grief and yearning pour between them, and Malfurion…
Malfurion thinks maybe, maybe he’ll be okay.