Looking back, the long journey through the lands of what he now knew as Lordaeron had been a lonely and arduous one. WIth only his wits and minimal guidance, Thrall managed to sneak through the human kingdom undetected. Beyond the occasional beast that sometimes made for a decent dinner, the fugitive orc had encountered nobody in his travels.

If not for the food that appeared whenever he woke up, he’d have given into the belief that the invisible voice that echoed in his head guiding him had been a figment of his own imagination. Yet, it was the owner of that voice that had urged him to freedom after the walls of his Durnholde cell had been blasted open. It was that voice that provided what little company Thrall had, mostly with curt instructions and the occasional information about the greater world.

“Do not follow the river. Durnholde outriders are following it, and will run into you.”

“Put out your fire, hunters are drawing near.”

“Do not bury the cat if you’re not going to eat it.”

“Wake up. A whole pack of gnolls were nearby. Right, yes, that way. You’ll probably find some food on their corpses. No I didn’t kill them, a patrol ran into them. No, you shouldn’t feel bad about their fates.”

“Those are murlocs up ahead. You can’t outrun them. Do you still have the cat?”

With little choice, Thrall learned to trust in the curt, guiding voice. However unamused it sounded, its instruction kept him safe, especially during the few close calls in the middle of the night. If not for the rattling voice in his head waking him up, Thrall would’ve likely been captured or killed at least two times already. Yet for all its helpfulness, the unseen benefactor was far from sociable.

“Aedelas is dead. Taretha is safe.”

Thrall had been shocked by that declaration when he had begun fleeing, but he wasn’t given much chance to doubt it as he was warned into hiding from a patrol.

“Why are you helping me?” he tried asking during one of the quieter treks when he was sure he was being heard.

“You serve a purpose.”

“Could I know what it is?”

“No.”

“Could you at least tell me where I am going then?”

“West.”

“West? That’s all?”

“Go west. Life is peaceful there.”

Other queries came to similar unsatisfying ends, but Thrall tolerated it. After all, compared to the insults and humiliation back in Durnholde, it was almost refreshing. The orc did try staying awake one night for a chance to glimpse at his benefactor when they presumably dropped his food allowance, but it somehow knew he wasn’t asleep.

“If you’re going to be awake, keep moving.”

Because of that curiosity, Thrall was forced to march through the night, and only found a sack containing his rations when he finally woke up in the later afternoon. Though it mattered little to the undemanding orc, the stale and cold pies and bread sent a clear message that kept him on behaving for the rest of the journey.

Eventually, forests and plains gave way to hills and mountains, and Thrall’s reliance on his guide increased as he navigated jagged outcrops and treacherous cliffs.

“It’s snow, frozen water. You’ll be fine, that’s what the shoes and blanket are for.”

“Not that cave. Bears inside.”

“Stay very still and very quiet until I tell you to move.”

“What did I tell you about being quiet? There’s a river to your left, head for it to clear your scent.”

“That big cat’s a mountain lynx. Leave it, it’s mine.”

Eventually, after weeks beyond counting, Thrall was led towards one final mountain before the sole companion of his travels went permanently silent.

“Remember what I told you, and don’t die,” were its last words.

After enduring a palm-shredding climb and plenty of near falls, Thrall made it past the mountaintop, and immediately ran into a trio of large, snarling wolves, each bearing a rider on them.

Riders that looked very much like Thrall.

Remembering his guide’s words, Thrall carefully introduced himself. And as the now silent voice had predicted, it became very apparent that he couldn’t understand the orcs’ pointed demand, while they took offense to his use of human Common. Still, through patient hand gestures the former slave gladiator was escorted into a hidden orc village, where he was slowly and tentatively welcomed into the clan that he’d come to know as the Frostwolf Clan.

Thrall took his time learning the orcish tongue under the wary but patient tutelage of Drek’Thar, the clan’s blind leader. He ignored his hosts’ initial distrust and the guards that watched over him as he took to their chores and life, resolving to prove himself worthy of their trust. For their part, the wolf-taming orcs were patient with him, and grew to trust their new guest enough that Thrall eventually had a tent within the village itself.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

More weeks passed, and eventually Thrall’s mastery of his race’s language was decent enough, and his presence trusted enough, that he made friends and was treated as one of the Frostwolves. It was then that he acted on the words of the invisible guide that he owed his life to.

“Drek’Thar. I have to ask, now that there is no chance of…wrong meaning between us. Do you know of Durotan and Draka?”

The chief’s surprise, and that of the orcs around Thrall, was total. They had never brought up the names in his presence, not even a whisper. Of course, that got Drek’Thar wary, but also curious. Contrary to what his guide had expected though, no blades or axes were leveled at Thrall.

“Where did you learn of them?”

“I was…guided here, by someone. Or something. It told me to bring this up to you when I could speak our language. So no insult could be wrongly meant.”

“I see…” The old orc slumped into his furs and the sightless milky eyes bore into Thrall’s for a moment, before Drek’Thar finally heaved out a sigh. “Theirs is a terrible tragedy…” And Thrall learned of the clan’s former chieftain, of how he and his mate were betrayed. Of how…their child was…

Missing?

Drek’Thar too came to the same impossible conclusion as the tale ended, and pressed Thrall for his past. So Thrall told him of his life as a gladiator and a slave, and took in their disgusted and pitying looks. He did not dare try linking his own lack of parents to the Frostwolves’ betrayed leader, but everyone became aware of the possible connection.

“Come here,” Drek’Thar ordered after Thrall gave his tale, and the latter did so with apprehension of what might follow.

The blind orc reached out with a hand and began muttering, and the chill winds from beyond the feasting tent swirled in and around Thrall. As the winds spun into a whistling, and then howling, gale, he felt the ground tremble beneath him. The nearby cooking fires flared brightly, swallowing and incinerating the meats hanging over them. Drek’Thar’s murmuring became strained, and for a moment, Thrall feared that he’d be torn into shreds from the growing storm, or swallowed by the rocky ground beneath him.

His fears went unrealized, as both wind and earth stilled suddenly, and the blind chieftain slumped over into a waiting attendant with a heavy exhale.

“Thrall…son of Durotan, son of Draka…” Ignoring the gasps and muttering that arose, Thrall found himself blinking dumbly. What had been an impossibility was now…

“I…my parents were…”

“The wind, the earth, even the flames, have answered, and all have given their answer.” The old chieftain’s voice was trembling a little. “You are Durotan and Draka’s son, come back to us at last. Praise the elements for guiding you back.”

Thrall couldn’t help frowning. “I was not led by the elements, a voice guided me, as I’ve told you…”

Far from being dissuaded, Drek’Thar nodded instead with approval. “You have a bond with a guiding spirit. It is a rare gift indeed. Your guide brought you here, and made your ties to us known…”

Doubtful of the claim, but unsure of what else his guide might be, Thrall shrugged off his skepticism for now.

“It also gave me more tasks for when I joined your clan, as well as more questions to ask of you.”

There were noises of admiration at that from the orcs around him. The spirits they believed in must be highly respected indeed.

“Ask your questions then, Thrall,” Drek’Thar said with a smile. “Let us see what else your guide wishes you to learn from us.”

Nodding, Thrall took a moment to find the right translation to the voice’s words. “What is the Path of Glory?”

The smiles of the adults all fell instantly, and Thrall felt a spike of panic.

“I might have mistranslated…”

He did not.

Thrall learned about his clan’s darker, shameful past. The other questions he had gave similar bleak answers.

Thrall learned that the orcs were not native to this world. He learned of dark magics that fueled their arrival here, and the orcs’ genocide of the draenei in original homeworld. He learned of a great war between the Horde and the human-led Alliance.

More importantly, Thrall learned that the so-called spirit guide had parted ways with him not with a benevolent promise, but a dark threat.

“When you truly become an orc, figure out what you’ll do from there. When I return, I will see if you deserve a Path of Glory or a Shattrath of your own.”

*****

Ranger Captain Ariande Arcrose kept her exasperation in check with now expert restraint as she guarded the mage-king through Alterac’s mountains. Why Kyle decided to personally trek through the treacherous mountains was beyond her, but knowing what she did of mages, she hoped it did not involve anything as stupid as murlocs again.

The elven advisor could barely tolerate the scent of cats now thanks to all that lunacy.

Hopefully Kyle wasn’t bringing a whole ranger detachment just to hunt for cats. It’s something Ariande could envision a haughty or delusional mage might do. And Kyle comfortably straddled the line between both in her estimation.

The trip was made all the more worse due to having to bring along the king’s royal guard. Their captain Lora, by her nature of being a dwarf, was far less of a burden traversing through treacherous terrain, but the rest of her heavily armored and very human party were troublesome. For their sake, safer but more circuitous paths had to be charted, whereas if they simply stuck with even the rawest ranger recruit, Ariande could’ve likely cut the travel time in half at least.

As it was, the palace guards’ ranger counterparts did what they could in making sure that cliff sides were wide and strong enough to support the clunky tin cans, and to mark out any crevices to avoid Kyle’s vaunted guard from getting stuck from falling in.

It was more tedium to an already tedious chore of being attached to Alterac. Ariande could be home in the more welcoming forests of Quel’Thalas, culling roving trolls and orcs that still threatened her homeland. But orders were orders, and so she and some of her peers endured a couple of years being in this backwater kingdom, straining their patience as they tried to make something out of the human recruits that wouldn’t disrespect the term ‘ranger’.

Admittedly, they did better than she had initially hoped. The human locals navigated their mountainous homeland with ease and nearly as much grace as their elven leaders did. Their accuracy and stealth were decent enough to pull off ambushes, though it took them time to learn how to appreciate the subtleties of the plantlife around them.

At the same time, their eccentric king had a thing for useful contraptions, contrary to the arcane stereotype. While the repeater bows were supremely useful - and plenty had been said about it in her letter to King Anasterian - Ariande and her fellow expatriates especially appreciated the magic-free toilet systems. It made patrolling the settlements so much more tolerable. It made the elves reluctant to range deep into the forests for too long, since they’d have to go back to digging holes and enduring the lack of hygiene and privacy again.

But orders were orders, and the rangers of Quel’Thalas would not shame their reputation and their homeland over such trivialities.

Besides, they’ve already invested half their pay into the gnomish engineers, and the promise of a portable toilet was growing ever closer to fruition.

In the meantime, Ariande kept her head down and shouldered on. Toilets or no, she was currently the head of Alterac’s rangers, so if the king needed to wander off into the hinterlands, it was her job to escort him.

The ranger captain bit back a groan as she heard the clanking of metal joints from behind her. She should’ve gotten the king to order his guards to stay back at the mountain’s base…

“How much farther are we away, captain?” Kyle asked politely, pointing first to a point in the map in his hand, and then to a mountaintop off in the distance.

Knowing the mage-king’s admirable lack of appreciation for courtly bullshit, Ariande didn’t hide her annoyance or temper her bluntness. “Three days, if we’re lucky. Five is more likely, more if things start going wrong.”

It took four in the end, with miraculously no injuries or near-losses.

The young king became both apprehensive and excited as they went around the final summit, but just as they began to descend into a rocky valley, Kyle suddenly froze into a scowl, and the greener rangers startled when his eyes flared out into a bluish glow.

“Fuck. Change of plans.”

It was his tone, not his words, that made Ariande tense up.

“Everyone, gather up around me. We’re heading back. Blades and bows out.”

Any question anyone might have was put aside by the grim look on their king’s face and his order to prepare for combat. Ariande keen ears didn’t miss his muttered complaints as he handed out small enchanted crystals to everyone.

“There must be an easier way to assign the stupid faction…”

The rambling can be figured out later. For now, as Kyle’s eyes glowed brighter, Ariande gripped her repeater bow tightly. As blue-white light bathed the whole group, she pushed aside all questions she might have and prepared for a fight.

Kyle would no doubt explain to her and the others why they’d been trekking through a mountain towards an orc settlement after whatever this fresh trouble was was settled.