Ars Moriendi
On any other day, in any other time, Ohtion Hruodland would have found this day beautiful. Lordaeron had never been home, not truly. That had always been Stormwind, the land of his childhood. The land of sweet innocent memories. Lordaeron stood a darker spectre in his life. Lordaeron had been Ohtion’s home after the fall of Stormwind in the First War until the Third War, when Lordaeron had fallen itself to the undead plague. In the Second War, Ohtion wore Lordaeron’s colours as a 15 year old boy in his first battles. His mother had died to a death knight’s blade here during the Second War. The soil of Lordaeron had drank deeply of his sorrow. It was a place of loss, of darkness, of war. Yet today was indeed beautiful. The sun reigned triumphantly in the sky, beaming down on all gathered.
Or, it would have been beautiful if not for the fact that the Horde and Alliance were currently waging an open war right here outside the Undercity. “For the Horde!” Sylvanas Windrunner, the dark Warchief of the Horde, had shrieked in her banshee wail. And the Horde had surged forth.
Ohtion matched blades with a large blood elf, clad in heavy armor. As he slipped his dagger behind the elf’s breastplate, Ohtion sighed in fear. He hated fighting sin’dorei. Half-elven, Ohtion’s father was a blood elf. Loyal to the Horde. Ohtion ripped off the elf’s helmet. Quick, like a bandage. The elf was red-haired and scarred. Faerthurindir had dark, raven-feather hair like his half-human son.
Ohtion breathed a sigh of relief, and surged to his feet just in time to deflect an orcish axe. Another swing knocked the orc’s weapon away, opening the orc up to a bash in the head from Ohtion’s pommel. The green being’s head made a sickening crunch, and Ohtion opened his throat as a mercy.
It seemed as though the Alliance might actually win this war. The Horde had burned Teldrassil, the ancient tree-home of the night elves. Ohtion had never seen it, but he had heard it was beautiful. And the Horde had incinerated it, killing thousands, including civilians and children. The night elf capital and dozens if not hundreds of villages turned to ash. It was unthinkable.
Your hands aren’t free from blood either, his conscience chided him. It was true. Ohtion had been on the earth for just over five decades, and had been killing for the better part of that.
As a soldier. As a mercenary. As a paladin. he told himself.
Sometimes, his inner voice agreed. But sometimes as a butcher… And you are no paladin. Do you think one such as Anduin Wrynn would want you wearing that shiny lion on your breast if he knew what you’d done? Who are you to mete out justice?
Ohtion shook himself from the reverie. He was likely to get himself killed if he didn’t focus. He was a decent swordsman, he wasn’t too humble to admit. But nor was he too proud to also admit that luck had as much to do with his continued existance on Azeroth as his own skill, if not moreso.
A Forsaken - a reanimated human corpse, endowed with free will and malice - leapt into the air at him, twin shortblades whirling and singing. The blades were jagged and bent, but nevertheless glinted in the morning sun. Ohtion hated undead more than anything. Had dedicated his life to eradicating them, first as a Scarlet Crusader and then as a freelancer. He roared in anger at the undead, spitting an epithet at the undead as he kicked the ghoul backwards.
The corpse smiled at him with malevolence, letting out a wheezing cackle like dead wood cracking in the chill of winter. The undead surged forward again, its gait unholy and fast, jerking and unnatural. Ohtion roared and reached out to the Light. A faint yellow glow illuminated his left hand. He blocked the two blades and then reached out with his holy hand, laying it on the face of the undead. The flesh seared and the ghoul shrieked. Ohtion squeezed and squeezed, his hand sinking in like he was squeezing a loaf of bread fresh from the oven. Then the undead’s skull cracked, and the Forsaken went limp, crumpling to the dirt.
See? I’m a paladin, he chided his conscience. He could swear he heard his conscience scoff.
“Such a crude and vulgar utilization of Light,” came a baritone,rich voice. A familiar voice. A voice as deep as the earth, like the heartbeat of the very land.
Ohtion looked up from the smouldering, headless corpse at his feet. And then he looked up some more, for standing before him was a 10-foot-tall Tauren.
His horns were impressive, at least four feet long, though curled. Runes had been carved down the length of them. Brilliant vermillion warpaint adorned his face, armor, and body in bold, swirling designs. His mane was rich and mahogany, cascading down in two thick braids on either side of his bovine head. The feathers of eagles and falcons had been woven into them. In his hand he held a mighty hammer. The head was the form of a roaring lion, and brilliant golden stone was in the beast’s jaws.
“Pravan Lionsong,” muttered Ohtion.
Pravan dipped his head, “Ohtion Hruodland.”
The two stared at each other momentarily as the battle roared around them. It would have been inaccurate to call them friends. But they had shared drink and stories during the Legion campaign, as members of the Silver Hand.
It was Ohtion who broke the silence, “What are you doing here, Lionsong? Do you think what Sylvanas and your Horde did at Teldrassil was right?” He spat the words with venom. He instantly regretted it, as Pravan’s eyes seemed to smoulder with fire.
“No,” said Lionsong, with the closest thing to hatred in his voice that Ohtion had ever heard come from the mighty tauren. “The Warchief will face justice. Sooner rather than later, An’she willing.” An’she. The Tauren believed that the Light came from the sun, who they taught was a god called An’she. Those who wielded the Sun’s powers were therefore called Sunwalkers. And Pravan was the most zealous Sunwalker that Ohtion had ever met. The bull-man seemed to believe that his “god” spoke to him, in signs and visions, dreams and portents.
“And what of you, Hruodland? I did not take you for a patriot, yet here you are, wearing that gaudy lion.” He snorted derisively, gesturing at Ohtion’s tabard which was emblazoned with the golden lion of Stormwind. “Did I not tell you how foolish a symbol it was? There are no lions in Stormwind. Yet my tribe lived with lions. Loved them and feared them. They are as brothers to us.” Ohtion had heard the story before, even had chuckled once upon a time when he had conceded that, no, the human kingdom of Stormwind didn’t have much reason to have a lion as their symbol. But that was in the past.
Ohtion shrugged, “You’re right. I’ve never been much of a patriot. But I had to fight today, here. After what she did. After what your people did. And enlisting was the best way to do it.”
Pravan nodded. Then he smiled sadly. “Go home, Ohtion,” he muttered in that low, sonorous tone. His huge, shaggy head shook slowly as his rich amber eyes gazed with pity at Ohtion. “You’re not ready to die.”
Ohtion hated pity. He felt anger and bile rise up in him, and he spit an epithet back at the bull. “You always were a patronizing idiot, Lionsong. You know that right?”
The Sunwalker shrugged. “I only speak the truth as my god commands. How you receive it is out of my control. But it is true. Meanwhile, I am ready to die today, if it be An’she’s will. Indeed I feel my death coming soon. I have no reason to be afraid as long as I walk in his holy light. Every action I take, every breath of air that fills my lungs, is divinely ordered to his will.”
The tauren sighed mournfully. “But you… I sense your faithlessness. I can smell the hatred and anger and fear coming off of you. I always could. That is why I sought you out at Light’s Hope. I thought that I could save you. I still want to believe I can. You remind me of myself, when my tribe was destroyed, when I languished in chains, a slave. Before my old self was scourged away and my true self was illuminated by An’she. I was blinded by hatred and fear too. I know what it is like. I know the weight of it. Live another day. Mayhaps, when this war is over, An’she willing I will seek you out and help you, if you wish it.”
The tauren gazed up at the sun. Ohtion felt his anger rising, and clenched the grip of his sword tightly.
“Go, Ohtion. Find your true self. Do not die here today. You are unready. Woefully unready.”
That was enough. Ohtion was almost two decades his senior, he had been fighting since before this upstart beast was even born. Ohtion would listen to it no more. The pity, the derision, the patronizing. The truth. Ohtion snarled and rolled forward, grabbing a fistful of dust and dirt as he tumbled. He flung the dirt upward into Pravan’s eyes, then swung his sword into the tauren’s arm. Pravan was able to raise his fist in time, and caught the blade on his vambrace. Yet Ohtion’s blade still did damage, biting through the armor and into fur and muscle.
Pravan pivoted and bashed Ohtion languidly with the haft of his great warhammer, as though Ohtion was not even worth the effort. And yet, Ohtion was flung backwards considerable. Light, he’s strong! “That was… underhanded. Unbecoming of one who would purport to walk in the Light. Would Uther the Lightbringer have done such a thing? Would have Aslaug Hruodland?”
Ohtion shrieked with murderous rage, scrambling to his feet and charging at Pravan. “Never use my mother’s name!” he snarled as he ran. He called upon the Light, and a faint glow began to emit from his blade.
Glowing blade swung down in a vertical line, and clanged against the haft of Pravan’s hammer, held out horizontally in front of him. Ohtion felt his muscles bulging beneath his armor as he pressed down his blade with all his might. The tauren Sunwalker looked at the faintly glowing blade and smiled. “Oh, Ohtion… Thirty years as a paladin and this is what you have to show for it? A small crack of dawn? I told you that you were faithless. Unrighteous. Oh, there may be some faith within you, but it is not in yourself nor anything divine. It is not enough to sustain you. To make you a true warrior of the Light. It hurts me so, Ohtion. There are many faithless and unrighteous in the world, it is true. But you… You have such potential. An’she has shown me. And had he not, the fact that even one as broken as you can conjure even this bit of Light is proof as well. You could be a boon in the coming battles against the Shadow. Please, leave now and go find your potential. It is not your time to die. This is your last warning.”
Pravan Lionsong could be called many things. Brave, strong, noble. But tactful was not one of them. And in that moment, the tauren may as well have thrown oil on a flame. The two were still locked into place, the half-elf’s hand-and-a-half sword bearing down on the haft of the tauren’s warhammer. Ohtion seethed, spittle flying from his mouth as he spoke “I’m not walking away! If you want to live then you’d better! I am going to kill you, and mount your head on my wall.”
In that moment, time seemed frozen. Horde and Alliance clashed around them, but to both men the din was faint, as if it were thousands of miles away. Pravan sighed and closed his eyes, and a tear rolled down the large tauren’s face, running like a rivulet through his warpaint. “Very well…” he whispered. And then his voice began to crescendo, “then bask in the glow of the true Light!” he roared. And as if he had been tangling with a small child, Pravan thrust his haft forward, sending Ohtion flying six feet backwards. The half-elf landed on his back in the dirt, and felt the wind get knocked out of his chest. Oh Light, thought Ohtion, he’s been holding back the entire time…
Sunwalker Pravan, last of the Lionsong Tribe, raised his holy hammer to the sky. Fiery yellow light illuminated both weapon and wielder, and Ohtion could swear he saw golden, fiery eagle’s wings unfurl from the tauren’s shoulders. Indeed, the beast-man leaped into the air, covering more distance than his massive frame could have ever possibly allowed.
All things are possible to him with faith, which you’d have known had you not wasted your life…
Eff that, I’m dying on my feet. Ohtion scrambled to his feet, and held his sword in front of him as a guard. The blade still glowed with Light, but an onlooker would have been unable to see it in the shade of Pravan’s brilliance. Pravan’s hammer came crashing down, shattering the blade with ease and crashing into Ohtion’s chest.
He fell back into the dirt, gasping frantically for air. He had felt his chest cave in, and now blood sputtered from his lips.
Oh Light! Oh mother! Please! It hurts! I’m not ready to die! He tried to shriek the words but could only think them.
Aren’t you? You have had over fifty years in this life, and what have you done with most of that time? Kill. Hunt. Hate. Drink. Lie. Cheat. Steal. Fear. How many people, how many children, have died while you stumbled along aimlessly, barely more than a beast. You hate undead. Do you want to know why? Because you hate yourself. Because you ARE undead. A pitiable, shambling imitation of life. Many died in Teldrassil that did not deserve it. Many will die today that deserve to go home to their families. How cruel that your mother died in her first year as a paladin while you have staggered drunkenly around as a mockery of one for FIFTY years. This is a better death than you deserve. Wearing the tabard of a hero, dying to a true knight. Take it, you ingrate. Take it and be thankful.
Now Pravan was looming over him. The tauren knelt down beside him, cradling his head. “Go now into An’she’s warm embrace, o lost soul. Though you have eschewed the Light in your life, may it illuminate your way in death.”
Gurgling. Ohtion looked up at him. “Thank you…” The tauren nodded forlornly, wiping a tear from his eye. Then he gingerly set Ohtion’s head down into the dirt, and marched on into the battle.
Ohtion gazed up at the sun until his eyes finally closed.