And now for something completely different. Anyone that knows me knows that I love World of Warcraft, and the lead up to Battle for Azeroth started with an event known as War of the Thorns, where Teldrassil, the capital of the Night Elves, was burnt to shit by the Warchief and certified genocidal maniac, Sylvanas. Inspired by Blizzard's two short stories covering the Alliance and Horde sides of the War, I decided to do something similar, with, uh. All of my WoW OC's. So, I guess this counts as my first piece of fanfiction. But, five out of eight of those OC's are beefy, so... muscle? There's a bit of transformation and flexing, you thirstier bitches will get by.

Anyways, this was something I was sitting on for a while, and thankfully avoided the Google Docs crash I had. It covers romance, fighting, family drama, a side of flexing, and the impending doom of an entire civilization. Hooray!

This is also a long one, so I'll only be showing the preview, here. Check out the pdf for the full story, and please, give me some feedback!

Races, events © Blizzard

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Baranhir always liked the Temple Gardens. Here, amongst the calm, placid water reflecting starlight and the lush, flowering vines, he felt the peace of Elune. Here, he had finally come home. Away from the Legion, Argus, the Tirisgarde… and as he turned around with two cups of freshly brewed tea in his hands, he couldn’t help but smile. Home. Darnassus felt like home now more than ever as he handed off a cup to the blindfolded, horned night elf across from him.

“I think you’ll like this one. It’s a brew from Gilneas, I understand… I thought you might like something with a little more kick,” the mage said as he settled down, fussing slightly with his robes.

His sister Danyra offered a wry grin. “I’m just glad to drink something that hasn’t been in the vicinity of demon blood.” She tasted it, and sighed contentedly. It was good. Natural. A tang of citrus and a hearty dash of cinnamon. It had been so long…

Her smile faded as she could feel their eyes at her back. The Sentinels, the druids, common citizens. All staring at her, judging her. They dared not say a word, but she knew what they were thinking.

Baranhir watched a particularly sour-faced Sentinel stare daggers at his sister as she passed by on patrol. Frowning, he reached out, placing his hand on Danyra’s. “Hey… give them time. The last time some of these people saw you, you were days away from joining the Sentinels. They’ll see you for who you really are.”

Danyra scoffed. “No, they won’t.” The Demon Hunter felt bitter. Two sharp horns, like curved daggers, poked out of her blue hair, and two faint, hellish green pinpricks burned through her blindfold. “I did what I did… to save all of this, to save all of them, but they don’t care. They just see…”

“Don’t say it.”

“A monster.”

Baranhir sighed, leaning back in his seat. Tall, even for night elves, he had a dignified look. His eyes were like amber, his blue hair well groomed, and his robes ornate, softly glowing with arcane runes. “There was a time when they looked at me like that. Back when we were little, a mage would’ve sooner been filled with arrows than let in. I couldn’t even set foot in Darnassus until the Cataclysm. They grew to accept me; our people aren’t as unchanging as others think we are. And they’ll grow to accept you.”

Danyra took a deep breath. “I’ll take your word for it.” She waved it off. “Look, I’m sorry. This is the first time we’ve had to really… relax. We’ve earned it.” She nodded to her brother. “Conjuror of the Tirisgarde.”

Baranhir smirked, returning the nod. “Slayer of the Illidari.”

Danyra chuckled, raising her cup in a toast. “To the Starstrike siblings; we’re not the heroes the Kal’dorei wanted.”

“But they’re stuck with us anyways,” Baranhir quipped, clinking his cup against his sister’s.

“Oi!” a sharply accented voice called. “You’ve started the drinking without me? I’m insulted! I even brought some genuine Gilnean Brandy.”

The brother and sister stood, and Baranhir grinned. “Ogyges!” He looked to the side, smiling wider. “And Gavrilin!”

Sir Ogyges Carwyn was a tall, well-muscled man, with a mane of black hair and a well-trimmed beard. For once, he wasn’t dressed in ornate armor and armed to the teeth, which is what Baranhir was used to, but a genteel suit, befitting a member of human nobility. Beside him was Gavrilin, a massive draenei with enough muscle packed on his mighty frame to rival a tauren. He had a heavily chiselled face, with the curious, catfish-like whiskers that characterized the Draenei hanging off his heavy jaw. Encased in a tank-like suit of baroque armor festooned with glowing blue crystals, Danyra was surprised her brother didn’t snap in half as he was hoisted off his feet, an arm twice as big as her head hugging the mage close to the huge, blue goliath.

“Little Baranhir!” the draenei chuckled deeply, his heavy chest making his breastplate creak. “Excuse my appearance. Would that I could put away the tools of war, but I only just returned from one last tour of Argus. I flew on the first hippogriff when I heard you had returned home.”

“You should’ve seen the poor creature,” Ogyges muttered, smacking Gavrilin’s wide back. “Its torso was shaped like a U.”

The draenei laughed heartily, nearly sending the Gilnean sprawling on the floor as he returned the slap on the back.

Baranhir chuckled, shaking his head. “I’m so glad to see you both.” He turned to the demon hunter. “I can finally introduce you to my family… this is my sister, Danyra.”

Danyra, however, was not smiling. The Gilnean, Ogyges- he had set something off. She sensed no demon in him, but there was something about those eyes… she knew them. From the battlefield.

“Brother,” she growled, grabbing Baranhir’s wrist as she stared daggers at the fel-touched outline she knew to be Ogyges. He was hiding a hulking beast. “Get behind me.”

“What? What’s wrong?”

“One of your friends is hiding something.”

Ogyges and Gavrilin exchanged looks, shrugging to one another. Baranhir was still looking at Danyra as if she were crazy. The Demon Hunter internally rolled her eyes. When would he learn? She took matters into her own hands. Pulling out a dagger, she lunged for Ogyges, whose false human form disappeared in a puff of smoke and a beastly howl.

Danyra’s attack was stopped by a huge, clawed hand, and she was now face to face with a massive worgen. He had burst out of his fine suit, a wall of muscle, fur, and teeth. His chest surged as he growled, arms tensing with powerful muscle as Ogyges held her in his grasp, nearly pulling her off her feet. As Danyra stared into his glowing blue eyes, her heart skipped a beat as she recognized him.

“Ah, blast! You see what you made me do?” Ogyges demanded in a deep, rumbling voice. “This was a new suit!”

“Danyra!” Baranhir pulled her back as the beast let her go. “Ogyges is a worgen- like most of the Gilneans. He wasn’t trying to hide anything.”

“No, I know…” Danyra shook her head, tucking away the dagger. “I’m so sorry. It’s… hard to remember, sometimes, that the fight with the Legion is, actually, over.” She regarded the hulking worgen. He was more than beastly; he was almost bigger than Gavrilin as he loomed over the two night elves. She had seen him in action, and she knew just what he could do against demons. “I thought I recognized you. You fought with the Valarjar, the Titan-made warriors?”

Ogyges nodded gruffly. “So I did. I know you, too. You helped us out of a nasty bit of trouble on the Broken Shore, just before we broke their ranks at the Tomb.”

Danyra grinned slightly. The battle had been bloody, but what a rush. And to see that worgen fight with ferocity and vigor to match any Illidari… “You didn’t need our help.”

Baranhir arched his brow. She never talked like that.

Ogyges waved it off. “The Legion business needed Demon Hunters. We wouldn’t have gotten as far as we did without you. Any idiot can swing a sword.” The worgen sat next to Baranhir, taking up a third of the table, and his chair creaking ominously.

“Won’t you sit too, Gavrilin?” Danyra asked, realizing her eye had been lingering. She could only make out the general size of the worgen, but he sounded handsome. Ruggedly so.

“Bah,” the draenei waved his hand. “I have broken far too many chairs woven out of twigs. I’ll just, ah… find a rock, or something....”

“Well hurry up,” Ogyges said, slamming a crystal decanter filled with honey-gold brandy on the table. “I didn’t keep this waiting in Stormwind for two years to wait for your armor-plated arse to keep me from it. We’re having a toast, to victory against the Legion. And finally, Light willing, peace, if the Horde doesn’t muck it up.”

“We’ll just end at peace, why don’t we?” Baranhir said, raising a glass as Ogyges poured them out. “Let’s hope this one gets us to the Lunar Festival, at least.”

“To peace,” Ogyges rumbled, clinking his glass.

“To peace,” Gavrilin returned, after dragging over a boulder big enough for him.

“To peace, Ande’thoras-ethil,” Danyra said. She took one last glance at Ogyges, before settling on the familiar outline of her brother. Still so tall and serene, so calm and collected. Peace. The word rang in her ears. How long had it been since she had known it? She leaned back as the three old comrades began chattering about old times, and she let her mind wander. She couldn’t discern the serene beauty of Darnassus beyond a rough sketch; she knew the water was there, that the columns were covered in vines, and the mighty boughs of Teldrassil loomed over head. But it was all tainted with green fel, from her eyes. It was slightly bitter, but there was plenty of sweet, too. A new word entered her mind, something Baranhir talked about often, but, until now, she hadn’t really felt since she left it, more than a decade ago.

Home.