Night of the Dragon

EIGHTTEEN

Vereesa wound her way from one passage to the next, aware that she descended deeper and deeper into the mount without yet any sign to show that her quarry was near. She had thought that she would find some trace leading to Zendarin, but instead the passages through which she journeyed seemed more and more unused, and when the ranger attempted to navigate back from one, she only ended up in yet another unfamiliar tunnel.

Sometimes it is as if Grim Batol itself is alive and toying with all of us, good and evil, Vereesa thought. She knew of legends of such places, areas said to have intelligences of their own, often because they had been repositories for great magic. Certainly, that qualified Grim Batol. There were few places in Azeroth so drenched in such energies for so long.

Determined to find her way, the high elf began using the tiny blade to leave small marks in the walls that she would recognize. Each time she turned a corner, Vereesa also made certain to mark which side was on her right. In this way, the ranger was certain that she would not remain lost.

But when one passage abruptly ended—forcing her to turn back —Vereesa was unable to locate her marks. She stepped back, reaffirmed what direction she should head, and stubbornly pushed on.

However, Vereesa soon saw nothing she recognized and, worse, an attempt to return proved just as vexing as before.

Then, somewhere in the distance, the ranger heard what sounded like skardyn. While at one point she would have kept from their presence, now the high elf saw them as her best hope of not only locating her cousin, but finding out just where she was in general.

The hissing, growling voices seemed to move away from her. Even when she picked up her pace, Vereesa could not get any closer.

More worrisome, her path continued to descend far more than she had originally desired. She had no notion as to what lurked in the lowest depths of Grim Batol and, at the moment, had no interest in finding out unless Zendarin proved to be there, also... which she doubted.

For the most part, Vereesa had been relying on both her eyesight and the small gems that lined the walls every now and then to guide her way. That they had been set by some hand was obvious and that had kept her concern from growing too great, for clearly she was still in passages used by the current or former inhabitants.

Indeed, in one small chamber, she had even found the remains of a troll, likely one who had served here at the time of the orcs' occupation. The cool underground had kept the body fairly intact, so much so that she could still see some of the tattoos on his long, lanky body. The pointed face was stretched into a death's-head grin. There were even a small ax and a dagger, both of which were in a usable state and thus claimed quickly by the high elf.

Yet, as she abandoned the corpse to its endless sleep, it bothered Vereesa that she had found no mark that explained why the troll had perished. Other than being amazingly thin, he had looked almost alive.

Had the troll lost his way here and starved to death so near and yet so far from his comrades? That hardly boded well for the ranger.

Still, with the hand ax and the dagger, Vereesa at least felt better prepared for any foe that she did come up against. She also continued trying to mark her way.

Then, the path she was on grew less and less illuminated until she finally turned into a passage utterly devoid of any of the glowing crystals. Frustration growing, Vereesa retreated to the previous tunnel and went on until she found another.

That, too, was unlit.

Twice more, she paced down some length of the lit passage, only to find side tunnels filled with darkness. Now she was certain thateither some entity—Zendarin, perhaps—or even the mount itself was toying with her.

She paused before another black tunnel, debating her choices. Seemingly trapped into entering one or another, the ranger simply stepped into the one she faced—

From within its depths, the ranger heard a faint voice.

What it had said, Vereesa could not tell. It had sounded pained and weary.

Despite the likelihood that it was a trap, the high elf picked up her pace. She listened carefully as she moved, but did not hear the voice repeat. That it might have been a figment of her own tired mind, Vereesa could not deny. However, now that she was committed, she had no intention of turning back. Wielding the ax in one hand and the dagger in the other, the ranger pushed through the darkness.

With each step, she felt herself descend deeper and deeper. Her grip on the weapons tightened. Ahead, she thought she detected a slight illumination....

Sure enough, what started as just a faint haze began to fill the passage the more she headed toward it. Vereesa was finally able to make out details in the walls, details that indicated that this passage had been far more crudely carved out than those above. That in itself bespoke of its ancient construction and the likelihood that most of those above did not know of its existence.

But then... to whom did the voice she believed that she had heard belong?

The high elf slowed. Ahead radiated a low, red glow... as if a chamber lay just a bit further beyond. Her jaw tightening, the ranger very cautiously approached.

She suddenly noticed that the closer she got, the cooler it became. Much cooler than it should have warranted. In fact, in Grim Batol, she would have expected such a chamber to emanate heat, not cold.

Despite how far she had come, Vereesa debated turning around. Yet, something would not let her.

Crouching, the high elf peered inside. Her eyes widened.

She stared into a huge chamber that was both fire and ice. The former was from where the crimson glow originated, vast pools of molten lava constantly bubbling. The smell of sulfur suddenly filled her nostrils. There were more than a dozen such pools that the ranger could see, from those as tiny as her hand to others wide enough to have engulfed her and the dwarves without the surface hardly shifting.

The chamber should have been so boiling hot that sweat should have already covered Vereesa. Yet, it was actually so cool that she could just see her breath.

The explanation for that came from above. There, massive daggers of ice thrust down from the celling. Yet, they were not by any stretch of the imagination of natural origin. As Vereesa moved farther into the chamber, she saw how absolutely white they were inside and even felt the coolness pulsating against her skin.

And then the "why" for this magical arrangement became obvious. The high elf spotted one, then another, then another...and realized that every rounded mound she saw was the exact same thing.

There were eggs everywhere. Eggs so large that they had to come from only one creature. A dragon.

Vereesa approached the nearest. At first she thought that the egg was cracked, for what she could see of it was covered in some sticky coating that reminded her of part of a yolk. However, as she studied it closer, she saw that the egg was not broken. The odd resin simply covered it completely.

Probing the substance with the dagger, the high elf had her answer. Myatis. Her people had used the magical coating to preserve sacred relics and rare living things like seeds. Someone had decided to use it for a more ingenious purpose; keeping these eggs from rotting.

But while the myatis coating was excellent for preservation, Vereesa understood now the constant battle between heat and cold in the chamber. It was not enough to preserve the eggs; sticking her finger into the coating, she determined that they were just the perfect temperature to guarantee the life within stayed absolutely viable.

And then Vereesa noticed just how many eggs had been arranged in such a perfect balance. Not a handful. Not dozens.

Hundreds. So many hundreds that she could only imagine that they had been gathered over centuries...

The high elf spun around. It had gone unnoticed by her at first because the myatis coating tended to make everything look gray, but not all the eggs were of the same type. It was not simply a matter of some difference in shape or even size, but also color and patterning.

By the Sunwell! These are notjust the eggs of a black dragon.... They are surely those of reds and others, too....

Vereesa could not believe what she beheld. When she and Rhonin had helped aid the queen of the red flight to escape from the Horde, there had been ample opportunity to see pieces of that flight's broken egg shells. Afterward, her husband, constantly seeking to keep himself educated in all magical matters, had shown her egg fragments from other flights, including those of the black. Certainly, eggs of Deathwing's kind dominated the chamber, but there were many akin to the red and those that looked like neither had to have been stolen from the blue flight and others.

"Centuries..." she whispered to herself. "Yes, it must have taken centuries..."

Then, something odd about the eggs made the ranger peer closer at a couple. They looked strangely swollen and there were tiny pustules all over the shells.

Whatever these eggs had once held, they no longer held the innocent young of dragons.

A shiver suddenly overtook her, a shiver that had nothing to do with the fierce, magical stalactites. She knew well Deathwing's desire for a new, more terrible dragonflight and how his children had carried that foul legacy on. But all the while Nefarian and Onyxia had been delving into their own plots concerning that flight's creation, someone else had been patiently and methodically collecting all these different eggs—no doubt often by deceit—for the time when it would be absolutely certain that the chances of successfully creating the monstrous dragons desired were almost perfect.

And with so many eggs, there would be more than enough of the abominations to sweep over every last bit of defiance Azeroth's natural creatures might muster.

The horrific images filling her head were suddenly swept away by the sound of movement from farther in the great chamber. Ax held ready, the ranger moved toward the direction from which she thought the brief sound originated.

But as she neared, ail Vereesa saw was yet another of the bubbling pools. This one was so vast that a sailing ship could have been set down in the middle of it, although from there it could not have gone very far. The high elf studied the edges of the pools, searching for anyone who might be near. Despite the constant bubbling, she was certain that it had not been that noise that she had mistaken for much more.

From the center of the pool burst forth a huge, monstrous head. The heat of the molten lava colored it a bright, burning orange. It opened its reptilian maw—

"Ve-Vereesa?" it rasped.

With a groan, the giant rolled toward her end of the pool. The ranger stumbled back as several tons of steaming dragon fell free of the lava and onto the ground before her. She continued to retreat, stunned by the massive girth of the beast. Rarely had she seen a dragon so huge save the queen of the red flight or Krasus in his true form of Korialstrasz—

Korialstrasz?

The steaming leviathan continued to collapse in her direction. The ranger turned and ran, realizing that the dragon was even larger than she had first calculated.

His shadow loomed over her. Vereesa knew that she was not running fast enough. She braced herself for the inevitable—

But Korialstrasz did not fall upon her. Indeed, the massive crash she expected did not happen, instead only a slight thud behind hermarking the end to the dragon's fall.

The high elf dared look back.

Steam still rising, Krasus the mage lay sprawled at the edge of the pool. His generally-pale complexion was, for a moment, bright red and his body was clearly burning an imprint into the stone floor. Curiously, his cowled robes were untouched... but then, they were a false image, the results of the dragon's conjurations and thus far more durable than any true garment.

Getting over her shock, she ran to his side. Fortunately, despite his still appearance, Krasus breathed.

However, she could not wake him. Not certain what else to do, Vereesa tested to see how warm his body was. While still far more than was normal, she could at least touch him without fear of burning.

Lifting the slumped figure as carefully as she could, the ranger pulled him over to one side, where the floor of the cavern rose up. There she set him in a sitting position and pondered what to do next.

Krasus saved her that trouble by at last opening his eyes.

"V-Vereesa of the high elves," he managed. "You were not one of those I expected—" The dragon mage went into a coughing fit. He looked older, more emaciated."—but it is good to see you, albeit not so good to see you here."

"I should have expected to find you, though," the ranger returned. "With so much evil at hand, who would come to see to its end but you?"

"You—you and Rhonin—have done more than your sh-share, young one." He waved off her protest. "Be-besides, that is neither here... neither here nor there." His eyes narrowed. "Do you know what is going on In Grim Batol?"

"Just enough to be confused, great one." As he winced from pain again, she eyed him in renewed concern. "Krasus...what ails you?"

"I have been to a place of a hellish kind I hope never to suffer again. I barely managed to escape, but in doing so nearly tore myself apart. I was cast back from limbo into the very mountain itself...the very rock of the mountain..."

He quickly described for her as best he could the awful moment when, escaping a magical trap, he was randomly thrust by its unleashed forces into a part of Grim Batol. His body and the foundation of the mount became part of the same. Only the dragon's incredible magic and powerful will kept him from becoming forever entombed.

"It was all that I could do to thrust myself into the nearest chamber. I burst through, still in my true form, and crawled without care from one cavern to the next. I needed heat to revive my body. Incredible heat. Yet, the only source that I could sense close enough to reach felt like so little. However, I had no choice. I went there, forcing the change to this body when the tunnels proved too narrow...."

He had not even paid any attention to what lay all around him, his suffering mind only knowing that, despite the heat seeming so little, there were pools of molten lava within sight. Dragons were not, by nature, generally found diving into lava and, had he stayed in much longer, he would have eventually burned to death. However, it said something for the critical state of his life that this was the only way that he could quickly recuperate. Aided by what magic he could muster, the incredible heat revived him far swifter than normal means could have.

"But the trick is to know when to escape the pool. I was originally so undone that I nearly overstayed. I had thrust up twice to call as secretly as I could to any who knew me as friend, for I knew that I would unfortunately need help yet. I expected another, either one of the dwarves or a draenei—"

"Iridi?"

His brow arched. "Ah? You have met. Yes. She seeks not one impossible quest, but two. She hopes to either free or destroy a nether dragon—"

"Yes... and also take from a blood elf a staff that he stole from a friend's murdered corpse." Vereesa's expression turned cold despite the nearby pool. "But Zendarin Is mine and no one else's...."

He studied her face in concern. "A personal quest, a personal feud. I will not ask you why, but remind you of the folly of such."

"You are hardly one to judge that," the ranger curtly replied, standing. She glanced around at the monstrous display. "And what do you make of this? Is this left over from Deathwing or his children?"

"No... this is the obsession of the mother of Nefarian and Onyxia, an obsession whose depth I have only just begun to appreciate... and fear. How long she must have collected these eggs, collected them and then corrupted each—no doubt with the aid of the accursed, still malevolent Demon Soul—for her own foul desires! And how—and how much effort she must have gone through—to move them here to Grim Batol after my own kind had abandoned their guarding of it."

"You think she and this were not here already?"

"She—she could not have been here, done all this evil, and not be noticed by those keeping sentinel. No, Sinestra has only recently come to this forlorn place, but she has—has settled in very, very, well!"

He did his best to push himself up. Vereesa quickly aided him when it became clear that he was about to drop again. "Thank— thank you. I am growing stronger by the moment, though I hope never to go through that again. That is more the way of the Earth-Warder, Deathwing's lot. But fire in any form is a valued part of life and that enabled me to do what I did." The dragon mage scowled at the many eggs. "And, as a servant of life, this hideous mockery of it—" Krasus gestured at one of the swollen eggs."— fills me with such rage that I could destroy this chamber and all in it with little regard for my own destruction!"

Vereesa looked aghast, fearing that he would follow through on his dire notion. She saw herself perishing with him, leaving her children and Rhonin without her and Zendarin able to go hunting the twins at his leisure. Much as she, too, thought that this cavern deserved razing, she was selfish enough to want to at least protect her family first.

But Krasus shook his head. "No, that I cannot do just yet. That would leave Sinestra to still plot. She has the nether dragon at her mercy and one abomination already born. She may find another blue or red dragon—magic and life—to further her creation's horrific powers—"

"Why would she even need to do that? She has eggs from your flight and likely ones stolen over the generations from even the blues, rare as they are. She could raise her own."

"The raising would require more trouble, and she would need a mature adult, well into their power for years, to even hope to achieve what she desires. Sinestra has patience, but not in all things. Besides, there have been many generations in which she herself has had to hide as much as plot." He smiled slightly as something else became apparent. "And there are few enough eggs of the other flights. They would be more valuable to her than her own... which is surely what all these black flight eggs are."

"All from one dragon alone?"

"It looks like so many, but these have been salvaged over many centuries...." He shook his head. "The tremendous range of years Deathwing and his blood use for some of their plots ever amazes me...."

Vereesa shivered. "Do we destroy them one by one, then? The two of us together—"

"Would take far too long. I am still weak, young one, and I think I know why...." Krasus gestured further into the bizarre cavern. "And if I am correct, we need to go that way now."

Wondering what could be of such greater importance to the dragon mage, Vereesa aided him in heading in the direction indicated. As they left the vicinity of the eggs, the heat from the pools began to take over, so much so that it grew harder for the high elf to breathe.

The area also took on a more crimson cast, the pools now the only source of light. While she had usually trusted Krasus in the past, the ranger began to wonder if he actually knew where he was.

The cowled figure suddenly groaned. "Yes..." he gasped. "We are very close." "Close to what?"

But Krasus did not clarify, instead peering at something ahead. Even with the eyes of a high elf, Vereesa could not see what it was until several more unsteady steps.

The glow was barely perceptible at first, only a slight, golden glimmer. It emanated from a chamber whose entrance was a crack that, when finally reached by the pair, had to be entered one at a time and sideways.

Krasus hesitated. “I will go first...but I need you to follow quickly after. I do not know how well I will be able to withstand what is in there."

"What is it?"

He looked back at her as he began to slip through. "One of my nightmares..."

And with that, the dragon mage vanished into the chamber. Aware that Krasus was not one to overstate a situation, the ranger immediately followed after. She pressed her back against the rock and slid from the previous cavern, wondering what she would find.

"It is as I suspected and feared," Krasus whispered, staring at what lay ahead. "And it made only too much sense, especially with her."

Even as he spoke, Krasus started to lose his legs. Vereesa quickly leapt to his side and helped him right himself.

The dragon mage swore with a vehemence the ranger had never before heard from him. She could see the bitterness in his face, a bitterness focused in great part, Vereesa knew, at himself.

Her gaze turned to a small platform carved from the very stone of which the mount was composed. Set atop it was the source of the glow... a horrific artifact that she recognized despite its odd state.

"One shard I had," Krasus rasped. "Another tiny one I found. Of the rest, I saw nothing and feared nothing of... but only she could resurrect even this much of that abomination... only Deathwing's consort could even dream of trying to recreate any aspect of the Demon Soul..."