Kamalia et alia

An RP Story with dialog mostly (though not entirely) directly quoted from the Heritage of the Sin’dorei questline. By the dates on my screenshots, I played through this questline in late June 2020. I have been writing the story about it in bursts, separated by long intervals of dormancy, ever since. The upcoming renewal and expansion of Eversong Woods and Silvermoon City in Midnight spurred me to complete it at last.

~*~*~

The door ward I’d put on my rented rooms in Dazar’alor chimed.
“Hold that thought,” I said to the scrying bowl, where Ianestin and I had been discussing the potential ramificaitions of the rather shocking recent events at the gates of Orgrimmar.
Before opening the door, I tucked back up into my bun the stray lock of hair that I’d been twirling around my finger as Ianestin and I talked and brushed the ever-present dust off of my sleeves. I was glad that I’d taken the care, as it was not one of the Zandalari child messengers who stood there.
“Ambassador Dawnsworn,” I said, concealing my surprise; I knew her by sight and by her formidable reputation, but had never interacted with her in person, “to what do I owe the pleasure?”
“The pleasure is mine, Magistrix Dawnstrider,” the Ambassador replied, handing me an elegant scroll sealed with the governmental seal of Silvermoon. “I am here on behalf of Lor’themar Theron and the city of Silvermoon. The Regent Lord asks for your assistance with a ceremony of great importance to our people. He requests your presence at your earliest convenience.”
“Please, come in,” I gestured through the door.
She shook her head slightly. “I will await your response here.”
I cracked open the seal, and as I read the contents of the scroll, I could not completely hide my astonishment. “I would be honored to accept the Regent Lord’s invitation,” I said, my voice quavering just a bit.
Ambassador Dawnsworn smiled. “I will let the Regent Lord know to expect you,” she said, then turned and walked away down the corridor.
“Kaelinda?” came Ianestin’s voice from the scrying bowl as I closed the door.
“You will not believe what just happened,” I told him. I read the scroll to him:
Every year, we ask a champion of our people to perform an act of remembrance in honor of those who fell to the Scourge. Lady Liadrin has performed this ritual, as have I, among others. This year, in recognition of your service as First Conjurer of the Tirisgarde, your valiant action in protecting the Sunwell once again, and your outstanding contributions to the Nazjatar campaign, I am honored to give this task to you.
“Kae!” he exclaimed, “That’s magnificent! You absolutely deserve this!”

Ianestin met me at the Silvermoon portal chamber and accompanied me back to my apartment in the city. He watched, bemused, as I sorted through my wardrobes trying to find just the right combination of things to wear before I went to meet with the Regent Lord. I needed to be elegant, yet modest, displaying both pride in Silvermoon City and Quel’thalas and solemn reverence for the tragic events that I would be memorializing. I finally settled on a set of simple Magister’s robes, with their matching belt, some sleek filigreed shoulders, a floating crown of semiprecious stones to show my status as a Mage, and a flame-shaped red and gold staff.

~*~*~

“Ah, Magistrix Dawnstrider, you are just in time,” the Regent Lord graciously greeted me when I arrived at the main audience chamber in Sunfury Spire. He handed me an ornate lantern. “This lantern carries a flame born of the Sunwell. I would ask that you bring it to the locations that were significant to the fall of the Sunwell and of Quel’thalas, and to light the memories that we cannot forget. I will accompany you on your journey through the Ghostlands. Meet me in Tranquillien.”

The Walk of Remembrance had been instituted the year after the reclamation of the Sunwell. Regent Lord Theron himself had been the first to perform it, and Lady Liadrin the second in the following year. When I had been able to be in Eversong Woods for the occasion, I had joined the throngs lining the pathways. Sometimes, I just watched the procession pass at one place; at other times, I walked along with it for one segment of the memorial journey. That I might one day carry the lantern myself had never occurred to me.

Silvermoon citizens lined the streets from Sunfury Spire out to the dragonhawk eyrie. They silently raised lights — spells or lanterns or candles — as the Regent Lord and I passed by. A few eager Nightborne tourists among the crowd let out brief cheers, but quickly quieted as they observed the solemn behavior of the Sin’dorei around them.

~*~*~

Regent Lord Theron stood in pensive silence before the still fountain in Tranquillien for a few long minutes. At last, he turned toward me. “This land will never recover from the damage that was done here. But we lost so much more than land that day.” He sighed. Turning further to face the gathered crowd, he raised his voice to address them. “Long has the southern wall separated Quel’thalas from the once great kingdom of Lordaeron. We did not believe that anyone could breach it. That overconfidence was our undoing. When the Scourge arrived, the the gate was not conquered by force.” His voice hardened. “It was willingly opened by a traitor.” There was a brief, quiet chorus of boos. Regent Lord Theron continued, “Though caught unaware, every Farstrider, soldier, and magister in the area rushed to the defense of our homeland. Very few of them returned home. The gates now stand as a memorial in their name.”

Arriving at the gate, I lit the memorial lantern there with the flame from the lantern I carried. Then I read aloud the plaque above the lantern:

“In honor of those whose blood was shed to secure the survival of our people.
Though the Eternal Sun may set on our darkest day,
It rises again with the coming of dawn!”

The Regent Lord addressed the watching people. “This is where the end began. My company was patrolling the forests near Zul’Aman when we received word of the Scourge invasion. We were wholly unprepared for what we encountered. Quel’thalas had enjoyed years of idyllic peace. And suddenly, we were facing death itself. I lost my eye in that battle… and would have lost my life, were it not for Halduron.” That was a story I hadn’t heard before, though I knew that the Regent Lord and the current leader of the Farstriders were as close as brothers. “Words cannot describe the devastation our people suffered that day.” His voice swelled, encouraging, challenging his people: “That any of us survived to tell the tale is a miracle. One that we cannot afford to waste.”

As they had done in the city, the watchers raised small lights of their own to acknowledge the sacrifice, and the challenge.

He turned back to me, speaking more quietly. “And now to walk their path.”

Regent Lord Theron continued his narration to the crowd. “Arthas cut through the land itself to get to the Sunwell. The Dead Scar is a constant reminder of that desecration. Where it starts is where our first line of defense attempted to hold the Scourge at bay. It is where the first blood was spilled. It was a slaughter. We will now take the lantern to the base of the Dead Scar and use its light to reveal the memories of of what happened there.”

Outside the gates of Deathholme, there was no lantern to light, only a glowing rune on the ground indicating where I should stand. As I raised the lantern, my clothes temporarily appeared as those of a Battle Magister of those bygone days, and illusions of ballistas, Farstriders and other defenders, and the attacking Scourge appeared. A battle scene played out. Voices still familiar, though changed, called out orders — Velonara, now one of the few Dark Rangers who had cast in their loyalty with the Horde itself, rather than with Sylvanas Windrunner; Thalodien, now captain of the aerial guard of Acherus, the citadel of the Knights of the Ebon Blade.
A specter of Arthas, astride Invincible, appeared. In a single blast, he froze and killed almost all of the defenders.
As the illusion ended, Regent Lord Theron stood quietly for a long moment.
“Elor bindel felallan morin’aminor,” he intoned solemnly, quietly. The magical amplification he’d used previously carried those quiet words clearly to the ears of all who stood listening, and they reverently bowed their heads.

His next words were only for me, instructions for the next stage of the Walk.

“The next memory…” Regent Lord Theron sighed heavily, and his eyes became distant. “Forgive me. For many of our people, it was when we realized death was coming for us.” He paused, collected himself. “A memorial to a particular defender lies to the west, in the place of her home. The light there has no doubt attracted some of the area’s lingering souls. Clear them out, and then relight the flame.”

We mounted our hawkstriders, and I followed Regent Lord Theron west, to Windrunner Spire. Laying to rest the tormented souls of several Rangers as I climbed the spire, I came to the statue of the former Ranger-General… now betrayer of the Horde, fled by strange and terrible magics to places unknown. Despite what she had now become, here we remembered what she had once been.

The words on this plaque had been set to music, so I sang them:

“Anar’alah belore (By the light of the sun)
Shindu sin’dorei (Failing children of the blood)
Shindu fallah na (They are breaking through)
Sin’dorei (O children of the blood)
Anar’alah belore (By the light of the sun)”

I am not much of a singer, but at least I managed to carry the melody reasonably accurately.
Then I knelt and lit the lantern.

An illusion of Ranger-General Sylvanas Windrunner, directing her Rangers to fly to the defense of Quel’thalas, appeared. “Sylvanas Windrunner was our kingdom’s protector,” Regent Lord Theron told the small group of citizens who had braved the lingering souls to assemble at this lantern. “Had she and her rangers not met Arthas with such fierce resistance, our people might no longer exist. She paid the ultimate price so that enough of us might escape to rebuild our fallen kingdom. When Arthas raised her as a banshee and turned her against Quel’thalas, it broke all our hearts. I’ve had my share of disagreements with Sylvanas… But I will never forget her sacrifice. She was the Ranger-General of Silvermoon. Nothing will ever change that.”

His voice, which had crescendoed as he spoke to the people, quieted as he again turned to speak just to me. “Sylvanas and the Farstriders sacrificed more than most of us. Sometimes I must remind myself of that fact, given the current state of affairs.” His tone turned brisk. “The Ranger-General fell just east of Fairbreeze Village, where she was holding the line to protect the civilians as they retreated to Silvermoon. If it wasn’t for her, our people would number far less than they do now. Shine the lantern upon the battlefield, and witness how her forces ultimately broke under Arthas’s personal assault.”

We came now to the segment of the Walk that I had attended the most frequently, for this was the place where I had been on that terrible day. Ianestin, Kaelyla and Ishaleron, a few other friends, and I had been studying for an exam on intermediate portal theory at the nearby Academy when the news of the attack came.

The Magisters gathered up all the apprentices and rushed us to Fairbreeze Village. Although we were not novices at casting portals, we didn’t have much experience with sustaining them. We held as many portals open for as long as we could, straining all of our strength, to help the people of the village and its surrounding farms and orchards escape. I heard the clash between the invaders and the defenders, the shouting… and the screaming… coming slowly closer and closer. Finally the Magisters called to the apprentices to drop our portals and go through theirs, to save ourselves if we could. It broke our hearts to leave our beloved Magisters behind, but we did as they commanded and collapsed, exhausted, with the other refugees in the plazas of Silvermoon City.

As I had seen others do in years past, I stood on the rune glowing on the ground in front of the East Sanctum and raised the lantern I carried. Again, my clothes temporarily transformed into those of a bygone Battle Magister as the illusions appeared.

Though I hadn’t known it on the day of the attack, here, at the East Sanctum, one of those Battle Magisters who had fought and fallen had been my Mother.

The illusion of Ranger-General Sylvanas Windrunner called upon me as if I were one of her Farstrider troops: “You, there! Man a ballista. Provide cover for the retreating civilians!” With tears slowly beginning to trickle down my cheeks, I especially targeted the Scourge who were breaking toward the road leading to the village, as if I could somehow change the course of what I had experienced that day. But the Scourge were too many; the defenders were overrun; Arthas drove Frostmourne through the Ranger-General’s heart. As the illusions faded, I already knew what Regent Lord Theron would say to the crowd gathered here: “In the words of one of the more poetic retellings: As her defenders fell, with anguish she cried, ‘Shindu fallah na, Sin’dorei’. She was a true Ranger-General until her last breath. May Silvermoon never forget her bravery in life.” He paused here, as he always did, before continuing the narration. “With our best defenders defeated and the line broken, Arthas made quick work of Silvermoon’s remaining forces and tore through the city.”

Ianestin and our other friends and I had been portaled by our Magisters into one of the plazas in the eastern part of the city. We had heard the Scourge rampaging through the western part of the city and had stood, trembling, mustering what little strength we had left after the effort of holding the portals in Fairbreeze Village, to do what we could to defend ourselves and the civilians around us if the Scourge should come our way. To our great relief, they did not.

Over the next hours and days, we had waited anxiously for every scrap of news about what had happened, what was happening elsewhere in the City and in Quel’thalas, wondering desperately if our families and other friends were still alive. We heard rumors that nine out of ten Quel’dorei had been slain in the undead onslaught. Ianestin’s older sister, Kaelydia, and Ishaleron’s younger sister, Khrysanthemina, each eventually found us in the ruined part of the City as we were scavenging for supplies for ourselves and the other refugees from the Fairbreeze Village area. All of my immediate family — my parents, my siblings — were gone. Later, I learned that a few more distant relatives had survived.

The Regent Lord’s voice broke me out of my memories. “The dragonhawk master in Fairbreeze Village has orders to fly you to Quel’danas. Someone much more familiar with the events on the island will meet you there.”

Regent Lord Theron mounted his hawkstrider and rode away. I did not head for the dragonhawk master immediately. As the crowd of observers began to disperse, I quickly spotted Ianestin standing at the corner of the road leading to the village, as we had arranged. Suddenly, I was exhausted, quivering all over with the overwhelming emotions of my memories brought more fully to the surface than I’d ever experienced when just watching this event. Slowly approaching Ianestin, I could see on his face the feelings that were surely showing on mine. Wordlessly, he opened his arms and embraced me, and I wrapped my arms around him in return. Tears streamed down my face, and I drew great gasping breaths of not-quite-silent sobs. We stood there, clinging to each other in our shared remembered grief and horror, for several minutes before I felt calm enough to go on.

~*~*~

As the dragonhawk flew over the northern edge of Silvermoon City, I looked down and saw a small group of people gathered around the place where the Dead Scar that cut through the city vanished into the sea. I had not known that there was a meeting place for the Walk there. They seemed to be waiting for something to happen. The presence of the ceremonial lantern must have triggered the expected event, for at the moment that the dragonhawk carrying me passed over, a new set of illusions appeared. An illusion of Arthas yelled, “Witness the end: the removal of the final barrier!” He raised Frostmourne, and a sheet of ice crackled across the sea toward Quel’danas.

The dragonhawk landed in front of Sun’s Reach Sanctum, where I was met by Lady Liadrin. “Are you ready, Kaelinda?” she greeted me. I nodded, and she swung down off of her charger to walk with me.

I had passed by the memorial in the plaza of Sun’s Reach Sanctum many times — Sin’dorei on one side, Draenei on the other, it commemorated the lives lost and the cooperation attained in the effort to reclaim the Sunwell. “While the monument here was intended to honor the fallen members of the Shattered Sun,” Lady Liadrin said as she led me toward it, “it quickly took on a second meaning for the Sin’dorei.” Although I knew that she was explaining for the benefit of the other races in the gathered group of onlookers, perhaps I had spent too much time away from Quel’thalas in recent years, for I had never thought of the memorial in the way Lady Liadrin spoke of it now. She continued, “It was not far from here that we lost one of our greatest heroes: Anasterian Sunstrider, the last king of Quel’thalas. He led our final effort against the Scourge and personally crossed blades with Arthas himself. As we remember the sacrifices it took to reclaim this land, we also remember the sacrifices made in its defense.”

I had also never really paid much attention to the decorative lantern nestled near the base of the elf side of the statue. Now I recognized it for what it was, and carefully lifted my lantern to light it. As before, as the flame took hold, illusions of the past appeared: King Anasterian, with a battalion of the last remaining defenders of his people.

“For thousands of years, the Sunwell meant everything to our people,” Lady Liadrin narrated for the crowd. “Arthas dealt us a grievous wound when he defiled it.” Her voice filled with emotion. “My faith was shattered when Silvermoon fell. I lost sight of who I was. But by the grace of the Light, I found redemption before it was too late. Let this monument serve as a reminder of what it means to be Sin’dorei. That our every deed may honor the sacrifices of those who came before us. No matter how much pain we endure, we will not lose hope. In the face of darkness, look always to the Eternal Sun.”

Lady Liadrin returned to her charger and mounted. “Never forget the lives that were lost here. Both to the Scourge, and to their own misguided kin.” She paused, and when she spoke again, she seemed to be talking to herself as much as to me. “‘Remember the Sunwell.’ We ride into battle with those words for a reason. We lost so much that day… I lost so much that day.” She stared past me into the distance, her expression mournful and weary. After a few moments, her gaze refocused and she squared her shoulders. “Shine the lantern on the southern side of the island, where the Dead Scar meets the sea. There you will see how the fall of the Sunwell began. And with it, the last act of the High Elves.”

Riding slowly down the edge of the Dead Scar, looking for the rune on the ground that would be where I would raise the lantern, knowing that I would see a spectral vision of a doomed battle by a Quel’dorei champion against the Scourge, a sudden sensation of having done this before washed over me. In the next moment, I remembered: at the end of the Pandarian campaign, shortly before that bizarre venture to the other Draenor, I had helped my Tauren friend Kamalia’s Paladin sister, Karaelia, bring the miraculously recovered and reforged Quel’delar to the Sunwell for a final purification. As part of the process, we had brought the sword here, to the southern end of the Dead Scar, to be acknowledged by the spirit of its original bearer, Thalorien Dawnseeker. What other memories could be awakened here, with the right magical prodding?

“That is far enough, Prince Arthas!” the specter of High King Anasterian declared. “Your march ends here! Anar’alah belore! You will burn for your actions!” Undeterred, the specter of Arthas Menethil bore down upon him. King Anasterian fought with peerless might, both physical and magical, yet little by little he was overwhelmed. King Anasterian landed a powerful blow on Arthas’s horse. “Invincible!” the death knight cried, and, leaping from his horse, struck King Anasterian to the ground. “You may have been formidable once,” Arthas taunted, “But I sense your soul fading, your life force flickering weakly — a flame I will gladly extinguish.” Defiant to the last, King Anasterian retorted, “At least I still have a soul, you despicable monster.” Arthas raised Frostmourne. “Not for long,” he said, and drove the cursed blade through King Anasterian’s heart. Leaving King Anasterian’s body lying crumpled in the ruined soil, Arthas strode toward the Sunwell.

With a newly-aching heart, I returned to Lady Liadrin. “One final task remains,” she said. “The flame of the lantern dims. Your task is to rekindle it. In order to do so, you must walk one remaining path. While we are fortunate to hold the Sunwell once again — and to still hold it, thanks to your heroism during the… unanticipated outcome of Lady Alleria’s visit — we must always remember that it was yet another part of us that Arthas took away… and that our late prince was force to find us a new way of life. Enter the Sunwell Plateau, and witness its fall.”

Walking through the gates of Sunwell Plateau, I was surprised to be met by Kaelydia and her Draenei husband, Baartimeon. “We requested this as a special privilege from Lady Liadrin,” Kaelydia explained, with a smile in her golden eyes, as they conducted me through the temple grounds, “It is an honor to have someone so close to us be the Lantern Bearer.” They brought me to the entrance chamber of the Sunwell itself. In that chamber, the darkened, drained Naaru M’uru had once been held captive by the followers of Prince Kael’thas. M’uru had turned fully to the Void and been defeated, and then, by some Naaru lifecycle principle that I did not fully understand, its core had turned back to the Light and been used by Prophet Velen to restore the Sunwell. But before all that had happened, could happen, the Sunwell fell. So here, I raised the lantern for the final time and was swept into a simulation of Arthas’s attack on our most sacred place.

Along with High Priestess Liadrin and the other priests, priestesses, and keepers of the Sunwell, I battled valiantly, but in vain, against seemingly endless waves of Scourge assailants. As the first wave approached, one of the defenders cried out, “This is a high ranking Magister… we must have been betrayed from within! Defenders, hold the line here! We must not let these monsters reach the Sunwell!” Horrifyingly, among the Nerubians were necromantically-animated corpses of those who had fallen earlier in the onslaught on Quel’thalas. My stomach turned at the sight of them. Around me, the defenders were overwhelmed and beaten down. Icy winds swirled into the room as Arthas entered, declaring, “Citizens of Quel’thalas! I have given you ample opportunities to surrender, but you have stubbornly refused! Know that today, your entire race and your ancient heritage will end! Death itself has come to claim the high home of the elves!”

The scene faded to gray as Lady Liadrin narrated, “Arthas slaughtered our remaining forces and used the Sunwell to resurrect Kel’Thuzad as a powerful lich, corrupting its waters beyond salvation. Our people would soon have suffered the same fate had we remained linked to its magic. With a heavy heart, Prince Kael’thas decided to destroy the Sunwell.”

In those first desperate days after the Scourge attack, I had attributed my slowly increasing sensation of nausea to stress and grief. Then the nausea had gone away, only to be replaced by headaches and quiverings that couldn’t be calmed by any of the usual remedies for such ailments, and a bone-deep ache of my body and mind wanting — needing — something that wasn’t there anymore. When flowers, fruits, and even creatures that contained even the slightest trace of mana suddenly began to seem overwhelmingly desirable, I finally figured out that it was the magic of the Sunwell that I was longing for. Though I tried to do it as little as possible, only as much as needed to stave off the worst of the pain, drawing mana from other living creatures turned my blue eyes green, for that was a form of fel magic. I quickly realized that this was not a habit that I really wanted to continue, and began struggling to wean myself from that hunger for mana. Perhaps because I was already a Mage and used to handling mana for casting, I was slowly able to discipline myself to use mana only for casting, and not to imbue my own body. Ianestin and I, and Kaelyla & Ishaleron, and Kaelydia and Khrysanthemina, and our other friends — we all relied upon each other for strength as we fought through that awful time together.

It was not until much later that I learned that my nausea was how my mind and body experienced the taint in the Sunwell’s magic left by Arthas’ desecration of it by using it to raise Kel’thuzad as a lich — and that my later symptoms were withdrawl from a mana addiction that none of the Quel’dorei — not even those who had spent much of their time away from Quel’thalas in Dalaran or elsewhere in Human lands — even knew that we had until Prince Kael’thas destroyed the Sunwell.

Now, Lady Liadrin instructed me to shine the dimming, flickering lantern one more time. The dusk outside the room brightened into daylight, and Prince Kael’thas was approaching, calling, “The time has come! May the light of the sun guide us to the very end!” High Priestess Liadrin, Magister Rommath, Magister Astalor, Ranger Captain Halduron Brightwing, and Lor’themar Theron (wearing a newly-applied eyepatch) were with him. Liadrin said, anxiously, “The sound of cannons… The Amani have landed on the shore. We must hurry!” Kael’thas responded, “Cut down enough undead for us to pass and leave the rest for the Trolls. That will buy us the time we need.” We cleared the room, and as we looked down into the Sunwell chamber, Liadrin staggered, clutching her head with one hand and her heart with the other. “The Sunwell,” she gasped, “what has he done?”

Kael’thas looked down at the Sunwell too, his face somber. “The soul of our people, now a desecrated font of decay.” His voice was heavy with grief, “It worsens with each sunrise.” At that moment, Ranger Captain Brightwing turned his head to look toward the door. “Liadrin!” Lor’themar shouted, “guard the entrance! Let none pass!” She nodded her head, saying, “We shall hold the line until the very end. Selama ashal’anore.” As more undead began to charge into the room — from both sides, some coming in the door, while others ascended the ramp from the Sunwell chamber — the simulacrum of Lor’themar Theron turned to me as if I was one of those who had actually been there that day. “With me!” he said, “Protect the magisters at all costs! We must reach the Sunwell!” I had no time to think of anything except fighting as we pushed down the ramp through Scourge abominations and many, so, so many risen bodies of the Quel’dorei who had laid down their lives defending this place. Then we came into the Sunwell chamber itself, and its polluted emanations overpowered me more than anything else I had experienced during the Walk.

Though part of my mind remembered that this was only a simulation, I still only barely controlled my sudden urge to retch. The Magisters took places equally spaced around the Sunwell and, guided by Prince Kael’thas, began to channel a ritual. Their movements betrayed only the slightest hint of being affected by its taint, but I knew that this was only because they were exercising supreme self-mastery. “The ritual appears to be working,” Kael’thas said, his voice strained. “Magisters, maintain your focus!”

Suddenly, an enormous bone monstrosity, like the one that had guarded the entrance to the spire of Icecrown Citadel, burst out of the Sunwell! As Kael’thas and the Magisters continued to perform their ritual, Ranger Captain Brightwing, Lor’themar Theron, and I engaged the monster. We fought with the strength of ultimate desperation, and at last it clattered to the floor in a motionless heap. The next moment, Prince Kael’thas announced, “It is done! Rommath! Teleport us to safety!” In a blaze of light, the simulation ended, and I found myself standing at the edge of the Sunwell, blinking, with Lady Liadrin at my side — and the light in the ceremonial lantern was burning brightly, steadily once again. She waited, patiently, with a sympathetic expression on her face, until I had calmed my breathing and steadied my trembling. “And so ends the most tragic saga in our people’s history,” she said. “Follow me, Kaelinda. It is time to return the lantern to Silvermoon.” An open portal shimmered nearby, and we stepped through it into the Court of the Sun.

It was evening now, the sun set behind the city walls, the plaza dim, but still it was crowded with people awaiting the return of the lantern and the end of the Walk. The lantern glowed brightly in the twilight. The crowd cheered, raising their own lights. Ianestin was there, waiting for me, too, and he caught me up in a quick, warm embrace. “I’m so proud of you!”, he murmured as he released me. With renewed firmness in my step, I walked up the ramp to Sunfury Spire, holding the lantern high. As I neared the top, Regent-Lord Theron declared, “Always remember that our people are not defined by tragedy, but by our ability to overcome it. From the ashes of the past, we carry the flame of hope into the future.”


The crowd applauded, again raising their lights. At the top of the ramp, I held out the lantern to Regent-Lord Theron. He took it from me, smiling. “It is done,” he said quietly. Then he raised his voice again, announcing, “It is my honor to present you with the regalia of our greatest heroes. Belono sil’aru belore’dorei. Rise, champion of the Sin’dorei!”

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