Illidan (5 page)

Some of them produced their bows and glaives. Responding to the mood of their riders, the nightsabers roared defiance. The druid Sarius dismounted and transformed into a monstrous bear, his fur branded with mystical markings. Maiev considered her options.

To stand and fight was to be overwhelmed by the sheer number of the ravagers. Something had clearly stirred up the creatures.

She glanced behind her, at the way she had come. The long, dusty road lay empty. They could retreat with little resistance, but that would set them back to where they had started. She needed to thrust ahead, down into the land the natives called Zangarmarsh, if she was to make contact with Akama.

She had to admit she was curious. The Broken's message hinted that he knew something of Illidan's plans, and all she had managed to find out about Akama from the draenei at the Temple of Telhamat was that he was a leader in a faction known as the Ashtongue tribe. He had access to troops, and he knew this land. He was the only one who had seen fit to contact her. How had his agents known where to find her? Why did he choose to reach out to her? Was it a trap?

Ahead of her the sky darkened, as if low hills or perhaps huge trees glowered on the horizon. The air carried a strange tang. The wind bore hints of rot and putrefaction and something else she could not quite place. There was just the faintest trace of moisture on the breeze blowing toward them.

Zangarmarsh was a monstrous place, a boggy fenland filled with alien horrors. Maiev took a deep breath and stared down at her foes. There were many of the beasts, but they lacked discipline. There were weak points in their massed ranks. If she concentrated all her forces, they could puncture the enemy line and ride like the wind down the road. She doubted the scuttling monsters would follow into the swamplands. These dry hills appeared to be their home.

“Form up in a flying wedge behind me. We will cut down these animals and smash our way clear.”

The Watchers nodded their understanding. Anyndra raised her horn and sounded one long, silvery note. The night elves charged downslope.

A smile twisted Maiev's lips as she drew her umbra crescent. Just for a moment, she could lose herself in the fury of combat and let her mind rest. Her nightsaber roared. The elves crashed into the ravagers in an avalanche of fur, claw, muscle, and blade.

She slashed the nearest scuttler with her weapon, wishing it were Illidan.
What is the Betrayer up to now?
she wondered.

M
aiev rode toward the Broken village of Orebor Harborage. She licked her lips. Her tongue tingled where it had touched the spores. They were everywhere. In her hair, in her clothes. They settled behind the ears and in the sweat-soaked sleeves of shirts. A phosphorescent fungus grew on the skin of her followers, and only careful cleaning and the use of healing magic could take it off.

She had thought Hellfire Peninsula was a terrible place, but this was worse. The entranceway to Outland was a desert hell filled with fel orcs and hideous creatures, but Zangarmarsh was something darker and stranger. It was hot and humid and dank. Huge mushroom trees, larger than the towering oaks of Ashenvale, blocked out the sun. Manta-like flyers flitted through their shadows, and things part jellyfish, part alien monster floated through the air.

True, there were fewer orcs, but there were other menaces. After smashing through the host of ravagers, the Watchers had been attacked by a giant ambulatory fungus. They had been ambushed by ogres and swarmed by huge stinging insects. She had lost Kolea to tiny grubs that had emerged from her flesh after she had been stung, the vermin eating her eyes and her brain. Another death that ultimately could be laid at the feet of Illidan.

Maiev longed to look upon the beauty of Darnassus once more. She would have given ten centuries of her life just to breathe its clean air and walk through its airy plazas, to listen to its bards and singers. She suppressed the feeling, despising her own weakness. There was no sense in longing for what she could not have.

Orebor Harborage looked like the ruins of what once might have passed for civilization in these parts. Now there were only tumbledown huts built on what had been the marble base of some formerly great plaza. Stagnant, stinking water surrounded the huge plinth. Jagged ridges of towering mountains loomed over it.

All around, Broken hobbled. They stared at the night elves as if they had never seen their like before. One or two of them reached out with empty palms, begging for alms, but most averted their eyes with tired, defeated gazes. Maiev felt that they would not raise their hands even to protect themselves. They were not the stuff of which suitable allies were made.

Not all of them were like that. Some carried weapons and watched her warily. She rode up to one now, looked at him, and said, “Akama! Where is he?”

The Broken studied her and then her followers. At first, she thought he was not going to answer, but then he jerked a thumb in the direction of the town center.

From some of the huts came the sound of weeping. Her nostrils dilated as she caught the scent of rotting flesh. Wounds turned bad very easily here. Sometimes the spores got into the cuts and clung to ruined flesh like mold to old bread. An ancient Broken crone hobbled past, her hooves splashing through deep puddles in the shattered stonework. She kept her eyes down and paid no attention to the strangers or her surroundings. She seemed too wrapped in her own misery to look beyond it.

“What do these people live on?” Anyndra sounded upset. The sight of the Broken had clearly triggered some instinct for compassion within her.

“Mold and whatever insects they can catch, I have no doubt,” Maiev said. It was what her people had been living on for days. The flora and fauna might be alien, but they were edible. At least they had not been poisoned so far. It was always possible that their foodstuffs contained slow toxins whose effects they had not felt yet, but Maiev's spells had found no taint in them. “There are fish in those lakes we saw on the way here, and other things.”

“Yes,” said Anyndra, no doubt remembering the massive reptilian hydras that had attacked them. “I suppose so. You really think this Akama will be able to help us?” She gestured at their surroundings. “It does not look as if he can even help his own people.”

Maiev agreed, but she did not want to say so aloud. Her people did not need another blow to their morale. Ahead, another Broken sentry loomed.

“Akama,” she said. The soldier gestured toward a small hut on the edge of the plaza. A group of guards robed in ash gray stood there, gazing in her direction. They did not look hostile, but they did not look friendly, either.

Maiev rode closer and said, “I seek Akama.” For a moment, the Broken gave no sign of having heard her; then, as if at a silent signal, they stood aside and left the way into the hut's interior clear.

The warden dismounted, and Anyndra and the others stalked behind her. As they approached, the guards lowered their pikes, blocking the way.

“Just you,” said the one who had the insignia of some sort of officer. “If you are the one called Maiev Shadowsong.”

Tension crackled in the air. Her Watchers did not want to leave her. She might be stepping into a trap. On the other hand, if these were potential allies, she did not want to make trouble. She was capable of looking after herself, as anyone who tried to take her would find out.

“Wait here,” she told the Watchers. Sarius looked directly at her, and she nodded. The druid detached himself from the group and moved into the shadow of a rubble pile. He did not reemerge in his own form, but a large bird hopped on top and looked around with bright beady eyes.

The guards stood impassive. Maiev stepped into the hut and was immediately aware of the whimpering of a small Broken child.

In the center of the chamber, beside a fire, a gnarled, oddly altered Broken leaned forward and touched the child's brow. He muttered something, and Maiev sensed the flow of energy—not the corrupt taint of fel magic, not the twisted flows of the arcane, but something else. She did not relax her guard. There were many ways of hiding the evil in magic.

The child quieted and the Broken whispered something in her ear. More power flowed. The whimpering ceased, replaced by the sound of regular breathing and tiny, inelegant snores.

The Broken rose and turned toward Maier. His voice wheezed with more than age. He seemed to have to force his words out, as if the very act of speaking was painful to him. “I thought I might be able to do some small good while I waited for you.” He paused as if he needed a rest. His breathing was labored. “Rosaria had lung rot fever, but I think I have burned it from her. If she is kept warm and dry, she should make a full recovery.”

“You are Akama,” Maiev said.

“I am Akama, leader of the Ashtongue.”

“Your message said you wanted to talk with me,” she said.

“You are Maiev Shadowsong?”

“I am curious as to how you came to know my name.”

“He has mentioned it.”

“He?”

“The one you call the Betrayer.”

Maiev reached for her crescent blade. Akama made no response. He held his hands wide, showing he had no weapon. Not that it made much difference. He had already shown he knew how to wield magic.

“What do you know of the Betrayer?” Maiev asked.

“Alas, far too much, to my cost. Walk with me. We have much to talk about, you and I.” He gestured toward the rear entrance of the hut. Perhaps this was just a ruse to separate her from her troops. If so, Sarius would be watching in his shapeshifted form. And she was not without the means to defend herself.

“After you,” she said, making a gracious gesture toward the door. Akama nodded and hobbled forward, putting his back to her, as if he wanted to show that he did not fear treachery from her.

They emerged behind the building. Toppled houses surrounded them. Garbage lay strewn around the half-ruined structure. Mold clung to it, as it clung to everything here. Glittering insects buzzed around it, feasting hungrily. Maiev wrinkled her nose.

Akama said, “It was not always like this. Once, Orebor Harborage was a beautiful place.”

“I will need to take your word for that.”

“You should. The world has changed since Ner'zhul wrought his destruction. Once, this was a center of civilization, a place of learning, a hub of trade.”

“That is hard to believe.”

“You should have seen this place when tens of thousands of my people walked here, admiring the statues, looking upon the gracious homes.”

“I did not come here to purchase a dwelling. I came here seeking an ally.”

Akama looked up at her. “You are not the first of your kind to tell me that.”

“Illidan is not of my kind. He forfeited any claim to be a night elf long ago, when he first made his pact with the Burning Legion.”

“And yet once he was a great hero of your people, to hear him tell it.”

“To hear him tell it. I could tell you differently.”

They passed the boundary posts of the village and arrived at the edge of a vast, calm-looking lake. Small islands dotted the water. Massive buzzing insects flitted over the surface. Akama came to a halt beside a small, motionless pool. The water was clearer here. Still, a faint freckling of spores floated on the surface. Shadowy shapes moved in the depths.

“And I would most probably believe you,” Akama said. He gestured toward a chipped stone bench that overlooked the lake. “Please be seated.”

Maiev remained standing. Pointedly she placed her hand on the hilt of her weapon.

Akama's grimace might have been intended to be a smile, but it showed his menacing fangs. “No one intends you harm here, but as you wish. Let us talk about the Betrayer.”

Maiev had been waiting for this opening. “He is a being of great and cosmic evil. Long ago, more than ten thousand years as we measure time on Azeroth, he betrayed us to the Burning Legion. For ten thousand years, I stood watch over him to make him pay for his crimes. In the end, through the murderous treachery of one who should have known better, he escaped my vigilance and fled my wrath to this place. He is a terrible sorcerer, steeped in wickedness you cannot—”

Akama raised one hand, palm outward. “I know all this. I have talked with him, fought alongside him…”

Maiev glanced around, half expecting at any moment to see naga emerge from the water or blood elves erupt from the undergrowth. There was nothing.

Akama tilted his head to one side and watched her as if her behavior was curious. If she had not known better, she would have thought he was amused.

“Why do you serve the Betrayer?” Maiev asked. She could not keep the anger out of her voice. The sight of her wrath had made demons tremble, but Akama merely shrugged.

“Because he offered to help my people free the Temple of Karabor. He was the enemy of my enemy.”

Maiev glared into his alien eyes. Akama looked down at his interlocked fingers and let out a long sigh.

“And that is no longer the case?” Maiev said.

“He has made no move to return the temple to my people, and we took it more than a month ago. I have my doubts as to whether he ever will. I fear we have removed our former conqueror, Magtheridon, only to put something worse in the pit lord's place. Illidan has made a new pact with the demon lord Kil'jaeden. He has agreed to destroy the Frozen Throne for him. It seems the Burning Legion still holds our sacred site. It just has a new leader.”

“And you feel I may be the enemy of your enemy.”

Akama nodded. “You imprisoned him. He hates you and, unless I miss my guess, he fears you. You have great power. I can sense that myself.”

Maiev's smile flickered, thin and cold as a waning crescent moon. “He is right to fear me. I will see him bound once more, or dead.”

“I thought such might prove to be the case.” The Broken turned his head and studied the waters as if he expected them to reveal some great truth. His voice was flat and emotionless.

“And would such a turn of events be acceptable to you, too?” Maiev asked. She already knew the answer. This Broken might pose as a holy sage, but he was treacherous. The fact that he had served the Betrayer and yet was here now proved that. She could find a use for him. To use his words, he was the enemy of her enemy.

“If there is no other way of regaining the sacred ground…” Akama took a wheezing breath, unclasped his hands, and looked back at her. “I spent my youth in the temple. It was…It
is
a holy place. I would not see it desecrated again.”