War Crimes

Prologue

Draenor.

It was the birthplace of the orcs, and for so long, the only home Garrosh Hellscream had known. He had been born there, in Nagrand, the most beautiful, most verdant part of that world. There, he had suffered through the red pox, and bowed his head in shame at the deeds of his father, the legendary Grommash Hellscream. When Draenor had become tainted with demonic magic, Garrosh had blamed that legend. He had been ashamed to carry Hellscream blood until Thrall, warchief of the Horde, had come to show Garrosh that although the elder Hellscream might have been the first to accept the curse, Grom had given his life to end it.

Draenor. Garrosh had not returned since he left, full of the heated fire of pride and a fierce love for the Azeroth Horde, to defend his new home against the horrors of the Lich King.

And now, it would seem, he was back.

But this world was not as he remembered it last, pulsing with fel energies, the wild creatures fewer and sickly. No, this was the world of his childhood, and it was beautiful.

For a moment Garrosh stood, his powerful body, adorned with the same tattoos that had decorated his father’s skin, stretching as he turned his face to the sun, his lungs inhaling the clean, sweet air. It was impossible—but it was so.

And in this place that was impossible, another unthinkable thing happened. Before his very eyes, his father’s image shimmered into shape out of nothingness. Grom Hellscream was smiling—and his skin was brown.

Garrosh gasped—for a moment no warchief, no hero of the Horde, no valiant warrior, but a youth beholding a long-dead parent he had never thought to see again.

“Father!” he cried, and fell to his knees, overwhelmed at this vision. “I have come home. To this, our birthplace. Forgive me for ever doubting your true nature!”

A hand dropped onto his shoulder. Garrosh looked up into Grom’s face, the words still tumbling from him. “I have done so much, in your name, and my own name has become beloved of the Horde and feared by the Alliance. Do . . . do you know, somehow? Can you tell me, Father—are you proud of me?”

Grom Hellscream opened his mouth to speak. A metallic, clanging noise came from somewhere, and Grom vanished.

Garrosh Hellscream awoke alert, as he always did.

“Good morning, Garrosh,” came the pleasant voice. “Your breakfast is prepared for you. Please—step back.”

If his jailers had waited but a moment longer, Garrosh would have known the answer to the question that had haunted and driven him all his life. If only he could throttle the infuriatingly composed pandaren for such an intrusion.

Garrosh, clad in a robe and hood, contented himself with presenting an imperturbable expression as he rose from the sleeping furs, stepped back as far as possible from the metal frame and glowing violet octagonal windows of the cell, and waited. The mage, wearing a long robe decorated with floral designs, stepped forward and began an incantation. The glow faded from the windows. She moved back and the other two pandaren—identical twins—approached. One brother watched Garrosh closely while the second slid a meal of tea and assorted buns through an opening level with the floor. As the guard rose, he motioned that Garrosh was free to take the tray.

The orc did not do so. “When will my execution be?” Garrosh asked flatly.

“Your fate is still being decided,” one of the twins said.

Garrosh wanted to hurl the food at the bars, or preferably, lunge faster and farther than anticipated and crush his smirking tormentor’s windpipe with a single massive hand before the little female could intervene. He did neither, moving with calmness and control to the furs and sitting down.

The mage reactivated the imprisoning violet field, and the three pandaren then left, ascending the ramp. The door clanged shut behind them.

Your fate is still being decided.

What in the name of the ancestors did that mean?