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Through her machinations, Onyxia has made me twice the warrior, twice the statesman, twice the king I was before!
Varian's own words echoed over and over in his mind as he strode up the winding pathway that led to the entrance of Onyxia's lair. Open magma flows yawned on either side of him, hot and mephitic, while the ceiling above groaned and shifted ominously. Behind him, a chorus of shouts and laboured grunts echoed off the basalt walls as his men slowly but surely dragged the former broodmother's severed head forwards.
My open hand will reward my friends, as befits a great king. But let my enemies beware!
Varian could feel the stares of his men prickling the back of his neck as he passed. Some were awestruck, some were sceptical, and not a few were distinctly afraid. He did not begrudge them their concern – after all, he'd been two different men less than an hour ago – but that did not make their scrutiny any less uncomfortable. Still, he squared his shoulders and stood to his full height, trying his best not to let his disquiet show. His men were looking to him for reassurance, to know that their king had truly been returned to them, and he was determined to meet their expectations as best he could.
For on this night and in this hour, Stormwind has been reborn!
… or had it?
Despite the rousing speech Varian had delivered over Onyxia's fresh corpse, he wasn't entirely sure whether what he had said was true. He had spoken boldly, as a king ought, but now that the fire and fury of combat had faded from his blood, the weight of all that happened since his abduction settled over his shoulders. It had been easier whilst he was still moving, fighting to get back to his kingdom and his people, but in the unnatural quiet of the battle's aftermath, everything he had been trying so very hard not to think about came rushing to the fore.
Varian stepped off to one side as he finally emerged from the confines of the tunnel, so that his men might have space to drag their hard-won prize out into the open. Night had already fallen when Stormwind’s forces had first breached the broodmother’s lair, and after several hours of fighting, the moons had reached their zenith. They now hung high in the sky overhead, their pale light bathing the marsh in an otherworldly glow and sending strange shadows dancing up the broken trees and shimmering across the water.
Varian closed his eyes and took a deep, steadying breath as a gentle breeze rolled across his skin. The air down in the depths of Onyxia’s lair had barely been breathable; stale and thick with the scent of sulphur and rotting flesh. Not that one would ever describe Dustwallow Marsh as fresh, either, though it was certainly an improvement.
A mournful wail trembled in the cool night air as some unseen denizen of the swamp cried out, and Varian’s eyes flew open. His head snapped towards the sound, though he immediately cursed his own twitchiness a half-second later. It was probably just a bird, and certainly not something to make a king jump.
With an irritated growl, Varian brushed his unruly hair back from his face, and his hand came away grimy with sweat and blood. He had too many cuts, burns, and bruises to count, and a lingering twinge in the centre of his chest where he and his double had been struck by Onyxia's magic. He was fairly sure that two fingers on his left hand were broken, and the less he thought about his right knee, the better. He could also feel a large graze across his stomach pulling whenever his abdominal muscles tensed or stretched, though he couldn't expressly remember being hit.
Still. He was alive, which was more than many others could say.
In a somewhat futile attempt to distract himself from the pain, Varian tugged the straps of his gauntlets tighter, when a flash of silvery gold in the corner of his eye caught his attention; a single point of light against the desolate browns and greys of the Wrymbog.
Anduin.
Varian had sent the boy on ahead to safety while he and Stormwind’s soldiers had set about the grizzly task of properly severing the broodmother's head and securing it for transport. Anduin had protested, but his stubbornness was simply no match for that of his father, and after a brief but intense discussion, he had relented. He was now seated high on a fallen log fifty odd yards to the left of the tunnel entrance, with his feet dangling about a foot off the ground. Four guardsmen flanked him at a respectful distance, wary and watchful, as he was tended to by a stout dwarven priestess with flaming red hair.
Something tight and uncomfortable in Varian’s chest eased at the sight of his son, and he hastened forward. Anduin sat up taller as his father approached, and made a cursory attempt to straighten his rumpled tunic and smooth down his hair.
“Father!”
Varian acknowledged Anduin's greeting with a short nod, but his focus was firmly fixed on the priestess.
“Is he well?”
To Varian's inexpert eye, it seemed that Anduin had not sustained any permanent damage from his recent adventures, but he wanted to be absolutely sure.
“Aye, Yer Majesty. He’s got a few scrapes and bruises, but there’s nothin’ so wrong with him that he won’t be right as rain after a good night’s rest,” she answered brightly, flashing Anduin a warm and indulgent smile.
Quite unlike his father, Anduin tended to inspire affection and attract new friends wherever he went, and it seemed that the dwarf priestess was no exception.
“Thank you,” Varian said, hoping that the priestess could hear the genuine gratitude in his voice. “I'll see to him from here.”
She nodded. “As ye wish, Yer Majesty. And ye stay out of trouble now, Yer Highness.”
Anduin rolled his eyes, as young boys were wont to do when they thought adults were making an unnecessary fuss, though he nonetheless blushed and ducked his head to hide a smile as the priestess ruffled his hair.
Varian waited politely for the dwarven woman to depart, before he took a seat next to his son and carefully rested his new sword against the log on his other side. It was as fine a blade as he'd ever seen, perfectly balanced and fairly thrumming with eagerness beneath his touch.
“It's done, then?” Anduin wondered, his gaze straying briefly to the sword's razor-sharp edge. “She's really dead?”
“She is,” Varian said firmly, with no small amount of pleasure.
“And do you think there are more dragonspawn hidden within the Stormwind Court?”
“No. But if there are, they'll share their mistress's fate soon enough.”
Anduin nodded, though he still looked somewhat doubtful, and Varian sighed. He hated how stiff and distant he sounded. He would have torn Azeroth apart in order to protect his son, but talking to him was another matter entirely. He felt like he owed Anduin an apology, but what was he supposed to say? ‘I'm sorry I was kidnapped and split in half by a deranged dragon hell-bent on trying to destroy our kingdom‘? Even inside Varian’s own head, it sounded ridiculous.
“You… ah… you did well back there,” he said instead, nodding towards the yawning mouth of Onyxia’s lair. “You showed great courage.”
Anduin flushed. “Do you really think so?”
“I do,” Varian confirmed. “I know men four times your age who would have lost their nerve when faced with Onyxia's infernal brood.”
“It all happened so fast,” Anduin mused, kicking his heels back against the log with a dull thump. “Is it still bravery if I didn't even have time to be afraid?”
“I think so. Or at least, I hope so. Otherwise, I don't think any of us could ever call ourselves brave.”
Anduin smiled at that, his nose crinkling, though he soon fell back into a thoughtful silence. It was strange, Varian thought, how his son could look so different and yet so familiar, all at the same time. He'd grown taller in Varian's absence, but with early adolescence still a few years off, he'd not yet begun to fill out. His features had matured, too, though Varian still held out hope that he might be spared his father's chin…
Lost in his reflections, Varian entirely missed Anduin's next question.
“Hm?”
“Did it hurt?” Anduin repeated. “Being… uh…”
Evidently unsure as to how to describe his father’s magical reintegration, Anduin pressed his palms together with a slight clap.
“Oh.” Varian scratched at the stubble on his jaw. “Not really. It certainly wasn’t a pleasant sensation, but not especially painful, either.”
“What about when you were… er… split?”
“I… don’t remember,” Varian lied.
In truth, it had been agony – bone cracking, sinew searing agony – but that was not something that Anduin needed to know. Varian’s memories of his life before the Crimson Ring were somewhat jumbled, coming back to him in fits and starts, but that particular pain he could now remember very clearly.
“What happened to your face? Did that happen when… when you were split?”
Varian angled the blade of his new sword so that he could see himself reflected in the shining metal. A stranger stared back at him. It seemed that his reintegrated self had retained the scars he had obtained as Lo'Gosh, most notably the violent, bloody cross that split his cheeks and bisected his left eye. With all the chaos of the last few weeks, he hadn't really had a chance to take stock of his new appearance. He'd never considered himself a vain man, but it was nonetheless jarring to realise that the damage to his face was most certainly permanent. He grunted, and turned the blade away.
“No. We were fighting naga. One of their sirens called lightning to her blade, and…”
Varian mimed a violent slashing gesture, and Anduin winced in sympathy.
“I overhead one of the men saying you fought as a gladiator, too, is that true?”
“It is.”
“Well, I imagine you would have been rather good at it,” Anduin said, nodding sagely.
“I was. Or should I say, we were.”
Varian glanced towards the dragon’s lair again, where Broll had now begun to summon dozens of enormous roots in order to seal off the tunnel. Valeera stood a few paces behind, her hands on her hips and her head cocked to one side as she sought to direct his efforts. Varian couldn't see Broll's face, but he could perfectly picture the tilt of the druid's frown and the exasperated quirk of his brows as he stubbornly ignored Valeera's ‘advice’. They had both shown him enormous loyalty over the past few weeks, and their friendship was perhaps the only truly good thing to come out of the whole damnable mess.
“And… um…” Anduin's voice grew hesitant. “Was that really you? The ‘Varian’ who returned to Stormwind. Or not?”
“I’m not sure. I don’t really know how this all works,” Varian muttered. “Believe it or not, this is my first time having my soul split in two…”
He was well aware that he had all the magical instincts of a rock, and if a mage of Jaina's calibre had struggled to comprehend the complexities of Onyxia's spellwork, then he didn't stand a chance.
“I see.”
Anduin looked away, his shoulders slumped, and Varian winced. He hadn't meant for his words to come across so harshly. Anduin's curiosity was only natural, given the circumstances, but it was difficult to explain something that Varian was only just beginning to wrap his head around himself.
“I…” he started, but Anduin cut him off.
“I’ve missed you,” he blurted. “You were gone for so long. I-I thought I'd never see you again, I thought I'd never know what happened to you. And then you were back, sort of, but most of the time you weren’t really… you…”
Varian flinched, and rubbed a weary hand across his eyes as he struggled to organise his thoughts. I’m not sure I'm ‘me’ right now.
Even thinking of himself as ‘Varian’ was strange, when Lo'Gosh still felt so close at hand. Was he only one of them now? Both? Neither? He had claimed to be twice a man in front of his troops, but in his heart his words had been little more than empty bravado. Varian certainly didn't feel like two men. Hell, he barely felt like one. More like a horrid chimera of disjointed memory, pain, and guilt shoved into a suit of armor. A dull headache began to pound behind his left eye.
“I've missed you, too,” he mumbled.
It felt like another lie. After all, for most of the time Varian had been in Kalimdor, he’d had no idea that Anduin even existed, and he hated himself for it. What kind of father forgot he had a son, even for a second? What kind of husband forgot he had a wife?
Something inside Varian cracked, and a sick, slithering blackness uncurled deep in his gut. He immediately tried to force it back down, but he was far too slow. Shadowy tendrils snapped at his guilty heart, and a sharp pain lanced through his chest. Sweat pooled in his palms, and his vision warped and narrowed. Every nerve screamed at him to run, to take off into the night and never look back, but he was frozen in place as surely as if he'd been bound. An invisible hand closed his throat in its vicelike grip, and for a brief, terrifying moment, he entirely forgot how to breathe…
“Father…?”
Anduin’s quiet, wavering voice cut through the night like a clarion bell, yanking Varian out of his grim spiral and banishing his darkness back to its lair. He could feel something solid in his left hand, and he looked down to see his fist wrapped around the grip of his new sword. Evidently, he had reached for it without even realising. Varian flexed his fingers, the familiar weight of a blade helping to keep him grounded in the present, and exerted his considerable will. With great effort, he brought his erratic breathing back under control, and slowly but surely the dull haze over his eyes began to clear.
His darkness was not gone – it would never be gone – but for the moment, at least, it had been held at bay.
“I-I'm sorry,” he said gruffly. “Lost in thought. It’s… well, it’s been a long day.”
Anduin clearly did not believe a word of Varian’s explanation, but before he could say anything further, they were interrupted by the arrival of a soldier in Theramore livery. The four guardsmen Varian had assigned to Anduin’s protection turned as one to face him, hands reaching for their swords, only to relax as they recognised the newcomer as one of their allies.
“Your Majesty!”
Anduin sat forward, his boundless curiosity immediately roused, though it took Varian a moment longer to remember that the soldier was talking to him. He doubted he looked especially majestic at present, though he nonetheless shook off the last vestiges of his melancholy and rose to his feet. A king, he told himself sternly, simply did not have time to wallow.
“Corporal,” he said, acknowledging the younger man with a short nod.
He was a tall, lanky fellow, with a crop of sandy blonde hair, a freckled face, and the coltish eagerness of a new recruit.
“Apologies for the interruption, sire,” the soldier said, “But Lady Proudmoore wishes to discuss our return to Theramore. In particular, she has some concerns over how we might transport… er… that…”
He pointed towards Onyxia's head, and his lip curled in distaste. Her fat, bloated tongue lolled grotesquely from the side of her mouth, and her teeth gleamed ominously where they caught the moonlight.
“A challenge, to be sure,” Varian agreed. “You may inform the Lady Proudmoore that I will join her momentarily.”
It had come back to him easily enough, the particular cadence and patois of a king, though he still couldn't shake the feeling that he was merely an imposter; a dumb, vicious brute trussed up in royal clothing. Still, the corporal seemed satisfied, if not even a little awed by Varian's presence.
“Yes, Your Majesty. At once, Your Majesty. Thank you, Your Majesty.”
“It's quite alright,” Varian assured him, holding up a hand to stave off a further barrage of ‘Majesties’. “You're dismissed.”
The soldier snapped off a quick salute, before turning on his heel and trotting off to deliver his message. Varian watched him go, resigned to soon follow after. He had no real desire to be drawn into a lengthy discussion of logistics, but he knew it was better that he kept himself busy, lest his darker thoughts bubble to the surface once again. He sighed.
“I suppose I'd best not keep Jaina waiting…”
Varian gestured vaguely towards the departing soldier and reached for his sword, only to stop short as he felt a sharp tug on his sleeve. Surprised, he turned to face his son – and his heart dropped. Anduin was brave and wise beyond his years, but as their eyes locked, Varian finally saw the fear and doubt that his son had been trying so desperately to hide.
“C-can you stay with me?” Anduin asked, his voice rising half an octave in pitch. “Just for a little longer...”
Far too late, Varian realised that Anduin's earlier reluctance to leave Onyxia's lair had nothing at all to do with a boyish desire to see a dead dragon, and everything to do with his need to stay close to his father. Varian’s memory stirred, and he suddenly saw himself as a child of only ten years old, trying his best to appear regal and composed before the court of Lordaeron when all he'd wanted to do was curl up and weep. He had never in his life felt more alone than he had on that awful day, and it broke his heart to know that Anduin had experienced a similar pain. He'd had Bolvar Fordragon to watch over him, much as Varian had had Anduin Lothar, but it wasn't the same thing as having a parent. A fresh wave of guilt washed over him.
“I… of course,” he murmured. “Of course I can…”
Varian swiftly resumed his seat on the broad stretch of fallen log, and reached out to give Anduin a tentative pat on the back. He felt unbelievably clumsy, not least because he was wearing gauntlets thicker around than Anduin’s legs, though it nonetheless seemed to be the right thing to do, for Anduin let out a soft gasp, and threw his arms around Varian's neck.
It could not have been especially comfortable, pressing one’s face against Varian's cold plate, but Anduin did not appear to have noticed. Indeed, there was not a hint of doubt or hesitation in the boy’s fierce clasp, nor any reflection of the turmoil that stormed in Varian’s heart. Anduin simply did not care whether he was Varian or Lo'Gosh, or whether he was a gladiator, a king, or anything else besides. He cared only that Varian was his father, and that his father had finally come home.
A lump rose in Varian's throat. He wrapped his arms around his only child and at long last embraced him fully, and for the first time since he had awoken on the shores of Durotar, he felt like he was truly where he was meant to be. He may not have known who he was, but Anduin did… and that, at least, was a start.