War Crimes

3

Baine’s chest loosened as he set hoof once again on good Mulgore soil—he had felt constricted the entire time he was in Pandaria. He took a deep breath of the clean, fragrant night air and sighed it out.

The shaman Kador Cloudsong was waiting for him. “It is good to have you home,” Cloudsong rumbled, bowing deeply.

“It is good to be home, even for so brief a time—and for so somber a task,” Baine answered.

“The dead are always with us,” Cloudsong intoned. “We may grieve that we do not have the joy of their physical presence, but their songs are in the wind, and their laughter in the water.”

“Would that they could speak to us and give us advice, as they once did.” The thought made Baine’s chest ache again, and he debated the wisdom of deliberately reopening this old wound. But he trusted that Cloudsong would have dissuaded him had the shaman believed his request unwise.

“They do speak, Baine Bloodhoof, though not in ways that we are used to hearing.”

Baine nodded. His father, Cairne, indeed, was always with him. Baine and Cloudsong were together at Red Rocks, the ancient site where fallen heroes of the tauren were sent to the Earth Mother and Sky Father via cleansing flame. Set a slight distance away from Thunder Bluff, Red Rocks was aptly named, a naturally occurring formation of red sandstone. It was a peaceful and reflective site, where one could step out of the world of Thunder Bluff into a place that served as a transition between that world and the next. Baine had not been here since he had said farewell to Cairne. Now, as then, Cloudsong was beside him, although this time it was just the two of them. Looking due west, Baine could see Thunder Bluff in the distance, silhouetted against the star-crowded sky, its bonfires and torches little stars all on their own. A small fire burned in the direction of the east here on Red Rocks as well, adding warmth and a comforting glow.

Fire. He turned back and looked at the pyre platforms, empty now of bodies awaiting ritual burning. Only ashes would remain, and even these would be taken by the singing winds and scattered to the four directions. Even though they had a lasting home now in Thunder Bluff, the tauren chose not to bury their dead. Their death ritual bespoke their origins as nomads, and if their beloved ones were freed to the wind and fire, they could wander in death as in life if they chose.

“Did you have sufficient time for preparation?” he asked Cloudsong.

“I did.” The shaman nodded. “It is not an overly complex rite.” Baine was not surprised. The tauren were a simple people, and had no need of elaborate words or strange, difficult-to-obtain items in their ceremonies. What the good earth provided was almost always sufficient. “Are you ready, my high chieftain?”

Baine gave a pained chuckle. “No. But let us begin, even so.”

Clad in leather made from the hides of beasts he himself had slain, Cloudsong began to stamp his hooves in a slow, steady rhythm as he lifted his muzzle to the eastern sky.

“Hail to the spirits of air! Breeze and wind and storm, all these you are, and more. Tonight, we ask you to join this our rite, and whisper wisdom from the great Cairne Bloodhoof into the waiting ears of his son, Baine.”

It had been a still evening, but now Baine’s fur was ruffled by a gentle zephyr. He pricked his ears, but all he heard was a soft murmur, at least for the present. Cloudsong reached into his shaman’s pouch and withdrew a handful of gray dust. This he scattered on the ground as he walked, forming a curved line to link east and south. Normally the material so utilized would be corn pollen. But that was for ceremonies that involved life. This ritual was of the dead, and therefore the gray dust was composed of the ashes of those who had been sent to the spirits on this site.

“Hail to the spirits of fire!” Cloudsong faced a little blaze, lifting his staff to honor it. “Glowing ember and flame and inferno, all these you are and more. Tonight we ask you to join this, our rite, and warm Baine Bloodhoof with the strong courage of Cairne Bloodhoof, his beloved father.”

The flame shot up high for a moment, and Baine felt fierce heat from the wall of fire. Having made its presence known, the fire subsided to its more temperate state, crackling as it burned gently.

Now Cloudsong turned to the west, invoking the spirits of “raindrop, river, and tempest” and asking them to bathe the tauren high chieftain in memories of his father’s love. Baine’s heart thumped painfully for a moment, and he thought, Tears are made of water too.

The spirits of earth were made welcome next—soil and stone and mountain, the very bones of the honored dead. Cloudsong asked that Baine be able to draw comfort from the solid land of his people, to which Cairne had brought them all. Here Cloudsong closed the sacred circle, outlined with the gray ash. Baine felt the energy shift within the space, thrumming with power. It reminded him of the sensation he experienced when a storm was coming, but this also felt unusually calm.

“Welcome, Spirit of Life,” called Cloudsong. “You are in our breath with air, our blood with fire, our bones with earth, our tears with water. We know that death is merely the shadow of life, and that the ending of things is as natural as the birth of them. We ask that you join this, our rite, and invite one who walks in your shadow to be with us this night.”

They stood in silence in the center for a moment, their breathing rhythmic and steady. After a time, Cloudsong nodded and invited Baine to sit at the core of the empty pyres, facing Thunder Bluff. Baine did so, continuing to breathe deeply and stilling his galloping thoughts. Cloudsong handed him a clay goblet, filled with a dark liquid that reflected the starlight.

“This will grant a vision, if the Earth Mother wills it so. Drink.” Baine raised the goblet to his mouth and tasted the not-unpleasant flavors of silverleaf, briarthorn, earthroot, and something else he could not identify. He returned the goblet to the shaman. “Do not drowse, Baine Bloodhoof, but rather look upon this land with soft eyes,” Cloudsong urged. Baine obliged, letting tension leave his body and his eyes unfocus.

He heard the soft, regular thump-thump of a hide-skin drum, emulating the sound of a tauren heart. He did not know how long he sat and listened to Cloudsong, only that he was deeply relaxed, and felt peace within his heart as it beat time to the drum.

Then, gently, he was made aware of a presence. Cairne Bloodhoof smiled down upon his son.

This was a Cairne that Baine had never known—the mighty bull in his prime, his eyes sharp and keen. He held his runespear; it was whole again, as was he. Cairne’s massive chest rippled with muscle as he lifted the spear in salute.

“Father,” breathed Baine.

“My son,” Cairne said, his eyes crinkling in affection. “To walk between your world and mine is difficult, and my time brief, but I knew I had to come when your heart is so troubled.”

All the pain that Baine had buried deep inside, that he could not express, could not even permit himself to feel lest it interfere with his duties to the tauren people he led, came pouring out like a flash flood.

“Father . . . Garrosh killed you! He denied you the right to die with honor! He stood by while the Grimtotem and I fought like—like beasts in a pit, while he awaited the victor! He violated the land, lied to his own people, and Theramore . . .”

Tears ran down Baine’s muzzle, tears of grief and anger, and for a moment he could not speak. The twin emotions choked him.

“And now, you have been asked to defend him,” replied Cairne. “When all you wish is to put your hoof on his throat.”

Baine nodded. “Yes. You spoke out against him before anyone else had the courage. Father . . . should I have done so? Could I have stopped him? Is . . . is all the blood he has spilled upon my hands too?”

He was surprised by the question, but the words came of their own volition. Cairne smiled gently.

“The past is past, my son. Borne away, like blossoms in the wind. Garrosh’s choices are his alone, as is the responsibility for his actions. Always, you follow your heart, and always, you have made me proud.”

And at that moment, Baine knew the answer Cairne was about to give him. “You . . . think I should do this thing,” he whispered. “Defend Garrosh Hellscream.”

“What I think does not matter. You must do what you feel is right. As you have ever done. What was right for me, at that time, was to challenge Garrosh. What was right for you, at other times, was to support him as leader of the Horde.”

“Varian should have let Go’el slay him,” growled Baine.

“But he did not, and so we are here,” said the young-old bull placidly. “Answer this, and you will know what to do. If it grieves you that I was slain by treachery, can you then do anything but strive for perfect truth and integrity, even—perhaps especially—when it does not come easily? Can you not do your utmost to honor this role that has been given you? Dear son of my blood and my heart, I believe you knew the answer before ever you came.”

Baine did. But the knowing pained him.

“I will take up this burden,” he murmured, “and I will defend Garrosh to the best of my ability.”

“You could do no less and still be you. You will be glad of it, when it is all over. No, no,” he said, lifting his hands in protest when Baine tried to speak. “I cannot tell you what the outcome will be. But I promise—your heart will be at peace.”

Cairne’s image began to fade. Baine realized this, stricken that he had wasted this precious opportunity complaining like a mere youngling when his father . . . his father . . . !

“No!” he cried, standing, his voice cracking with emotion. “Father—please, do not go, not yet, please not just yet—!”

There were so many things Baine wanted to say. How terribly much he missed Cairne. How hard he strove to honor his father’s memory. That these few moments meant the world to him. Too late, he reached out imploringly, but his father walked in the shadow of life, not the sun of it, and Baine’s grasping hands closed only on empty air.

Cairne’s eyes grew sad, and he too reached out, only to vanish in the next breath.

Cloudsong caught Baine as he fell.

“Did you find the answers you sought, High Chieftain?” asked Cloudsong as he handed Baine a goblet filled with cool, clear water. Baine sipped, and his head began to resolve.

“The answers I sought? No. But I did get the answers I needed,” he said, smiling sadly at his friend. Cloudsong nodded his understanding. The not-silence of the night, the song of crickets and the sigh of the breeze, was broken by a familiar hum as whirls of bright color took shape.

“Who dares interrupt a ritual?” growled Cloudsong. “The circle has not yet been released!” Baine got to his hooves while the shaman strode over to the opening portal. A slender high elf stepped through. He looked fairly typical of the race, with sharp, elegant features, long, flowing golden hair, and a decoratively trimmed tuft of beard gracing his chin. He beckoned urgently to Baine.

“High Chieftain, my name is Kairozdormu. Taran Zhu has sent me to escort you to the Temple of the White Tiger. Please, you must come with me.”

“You are interrupting a sacred ceremony—” Cloudsong began.

The elf gave him an irritated glance. “I’m terribly sorry to be disrespectful, but we really must hurry!”

Baine’s eyes fell to the tabard the elf wore. Brown with gold trim, it had an insignia in the center of the chest: a golden circle inlaid with the symbol of infinity. It was the tabard worn by Timewalkers, and Baine decided to hazard a guess. “I did not know your flight continued to wear this,” he said. “I thought your power over time—”

Kairozdormu waved a long-fingered, impatient hand. “The story is long, and the time is short.”

“Amusing phrase, coming from you. Is there some dire timeways catastrophe afoot?”

“Much more prosaic a reason—this portal won’t stay open forever.” He suddenly chuckled. “Well,” he amended, flashing white teeth in a wry grin, “theoretically it can, but that’s neither here nor there in this particular moment. High Chieftain Baine, if you please?”

Baine turned to Cloudsong. “I thank you for everything, Kador. But duty calls.”

“In an elven accent, it seems,” said Cloudsong, but bowed nevertheless. “Go, High Chieftain, with, I am certain, your father’s blessing.”

The meal was light and simple: pine nut bread, Darnassian bleu cheese, and fresh lunar pears, all washed down with moonberry juice. Here in the temple of her beloved Elune, Tyrande told Archdruid Malfurion Stormrage of the events that had occurred earlier in the Temple of the White Tiger.

She had been pleased to learn that Taran Zhu had appointed a mage for the purpose of portaling those involved in the trial. Yu Fei was a sweet-faced pandaren whose silken robe was crafted with the hues of water, which matched the single unruly lock of hair that demurely hid one blue eye.

“Chu’shao Whisperwind,” Yu Fei had said, using the Pandaren term for “counselor” and bowing deeply as she introduced herself, “I am honored to send you home until your duties require you here. Do not hesitate to call upon me if you need my assistance.”

“Love, are you certain you wish to undertake this task?” asked the archdruid. Feathers that now grew from his arms, reminders of millennia spent in the Emerald Dream, brushed the tabletop as he poured her a second cup of moonberry juice. Tyrande realized she had grown used to the changes that had affected Malfurion during his long slumber: the feathers, the feet that now were more like a nightsaber’s than an elf’s, the length and thickness of his great green beard. No outward appearance could change the beauty of his inner heart to her, though. He was, and would ever be, her beloved.

Malfurion continued, “You do not know how long the trial will take, or indeed, where it will take you.”

Tyrande sipped the drink, cool and sweet as the forests at night. “The eyes of the world will be on this trial, my heart. And,” she remarked, smiling, “you are more than capable of taking care of anything that should arise in my absence. I will be able to return home every night to be with you, which is a blessing from Elune herself. As for where it will take me”—here her voice hardened slightly—“it is likely I will have to do very little, save present the evidence. Garrosh has had few who have loved him these many moons past, fewer still now that his brutal rampage has been stopped.”

His face was somber as he searched her eyes. “I did not ask how you would fare in the trial, but rather, what it would do to you.”

Tyrande was surprised and slightly perplexed. “What do you mean?”

“You are a high priestess, devoted to Elune, who champions enlightenment and healing. And when need be, you are fierce in battle. But you will be working with words, which are slippery and fickle things, not your beautiful heart. And you will be inciting hatred and a desire to condemn, not enlightenment.”

“In the end, the facts that I present will provide enlightenment and understanding, and condemning Garrosh appropriately will eventually bring healing,” she said. He still looked troubled and opened his mouth to reply, but before he could speak further, a female voice came from outside the pavilion where Tyrande and her mate were taking their meal.

“My lady?”

“You may enter, Cordressa.”

A slender hand lifted the gauzy flap, and the Sentinel poked her midnight-blue head in. “You have a visitor. She says she has come on trial business, and the matter is urgent.”

Malfurion raised an eyebrow in query, and Tyrande shook her head, as surprised as he. “Of course, Cordressa. Show her in.”

The Sentinel stepped back, holding the pavilion flap, and indicated that the mysterious visitor could enter.

The guest was a gnome with silver hair rolled up in twin buns on either side of her slightly freckled face. Wide green eyes sparkled with pleasure as she greeted Tyrande and Malfurion.

“Archdruid, High Priestess—so nice to see you both again! Terribly sorry to bother you, Chu’shao, but I fear it’s quite important.”

Chu’shao. Of course, that was another title Tyrande now bore, for at least a time. “Certainly, Chromie.” Tyrande smiled, sinking gracefully into a kneeling position before the bronze dragon Chronormu so they might look eye to eye. At the mention of the dragon’s name, the Sentinel quietly dropped the pavilion flap to give them privacy. “How may I help?”

“The celestials have something they’d like both you and Chu’shao Bloodhoof to utilize as you present your cases. It’s easier just to show you. Would you mind coming with me, please?”