Post by Larae on Dec 25, 2005 22:37:57 GMT -5
Larae looked through the pages, written in the steady, educated hand of her human friend. She folded them, and put them in an envelope, then pulled out a fresh piece of paper, and wrote a letter in her own bold scrawl. She sealed the envelope and gave it to Johnson (surely he could be trusted with a sealed message, even though she knew her sister didn’t think much of him) for delivery to Lady Merlinne. Here are the contents of the envelope:
Dear Lady Merlinne,
I am very glad to hear that you have spoken with my young friend Thelanya, and that she has been accepted as an initiate in the Defenders.
With some difficulty, I have persuaded her to write out her life story, and to permit me to send it to you. As you read it, I think you will understand why she is reluctant to reveal the details of her experiences. I have persuaded her to trust that you will not share all this information more widely than necessary, and that she will be judged by her actions as a part of the guild, and not on what happened in the past.
Thelanya is still slow to trust others, and at times I think she is still very sad and very angry. These feelings, along with the power of a warlock, may be rather dangerous. Every sort of power is dangerous, I suppose, and can be abused. I think that is one of the main reasons we need each other -- we have to help each other stay on the right path. Thelanya may need that help even more than most of us.
Larae
I grew up, like many humans, on a farm in Westfall. My parents worked hard and they were very religious. It was always their goal that one day I would go to the great cathedral in Stormwind and serve the light as a priestess. And for most of my life that was my goal too.
Becoming a priestess would mean getting a good education, and I loved school. I loved reading books. I loved thinking about the noble ideas that the priests taught about virtue and light. I learned about many other things, too. One year a neighbor’s barn burned down. Of course, all the grownups worked frantically trying to contain the fire. I was too little understand or help, so I just watched the fire, and it seemed to be the most wonderful thing I had ever seen. I became fascinated by the subject of fire and as I got older I read everything I could about it. I would sit by the hearth in our house and watch the fire for hours. Once my mother caught me putting my hand in close to the flame, and of course she scolded me. What she didn’t know was that many times I had put my hands much closer to the flame, for much longer, and it didn’t really bother me. There was a limit, naturally, to how long I could tolerate the heat without being hurt, but it seemed I could tolerate much more of it than most people.
One day, browsing around the library for something new to read, I found a book about magic. The book described powers wielded by mages and warlocks. I read the book over and over, every chance I got, especially the parts about fire spells. But when my parents found the book, and they were very angry. They told me that this type of magic was dangerous and evil, and not something for a future priestess to be learning about. When I was older, they said, I would learn to use the power of the light instead. I thought, fire gives off light, so why is it wrong? But that wasn’t the sort of thing my parents liked to talk about, so I said nothing more about it.
When I reached the age of fifteen, just beginning to turn from a child into a young woman, I was old enough to begin studying at a seminary. It was so exciting, living away from home, talking with the other students and the teachers, having so many new books to read. In one of my discussions with my fellow students, I mentioned the subject of magic. How was the power of light different from the power of shadow, or fire, or anything else? This was not a principle that a seminary student was supposed to question, I guess. (I know now that some priests also draw upon shadow powers, but at this school we were taught that was wrong.)
For bringing up this question, for being interested in learning more about these different sources of power, I soon found myself in the Headmaster’s office. He spoke to me very sternly about the danger and evil of magic. Did I want to fall under demonic powers and become evil? Of course, I did not. Had I studied very much on these matters? I admitted that I had read about them before. “Well, then,” he said, “much of the damage is already done. But I think you have promise. We will meet together privately each day after your other classes, and I will help you to rid yourself of this evil.”
Our private sessions began the very next day. The Headmaster often began by lecturing me about the dangers of magic, and told me that I had already been contaminated by these evil ideas. Then he set simple tasks for me to do for him, as penance. At first, the tasks he gave me were cleaning up his rooms, straightening his books, things like that. While I did these things, he always watched me in a way that made me feel very strange. After a week or two, he started to ask me to do more personal things for him, and soon he was ordering me to do things for him that he never should have asked.
I struggled for months to understand what was happening to me, whether what was going on was right or wrong. It seemed that the Headmaster would never tell me to do things that were wrong, and yet, it never felt right. You will probably think me very foolish and ignorant, but I was barely past childhood, and had grown up in a simple, devout home, where such things were never discussed – and this was the Headmaster of one of the most conservative seminaries. Would he lie to me? Did I want to question or resist him and be at the mercy of evil forces that I had already practically welcomed into my life?
After several months, however, two things finally became very clear to me. One was that what we were doing must, indeed, be wrong. The other was that I was going to have a baby.
I tried to keep my condition a secret, but that is not a secret one can keep for long. Soon enough, I was called to the Headmaster’s office. The bishop was there too. He asked who was the father of my child, and I told him the truth. But of course, the Headmaster denied it, and which of us would anyone believe? I was expelled from school and sent home in disgrace. Even for my parents, it seemed easier to think badly of me than to think badly of their church. They barely looked at me for weeks, and I was rarely allowed to leave the house. I tried everything to win back their approval, or their affection, but nothing seemed to work.
Finally, the day came for the baby to be born. A midwife was called, and soon enough I was holding a tiny boy in my arms. He had cried very little, and looked at me with a solemn expression, as if he somehow knew that his arrival in the world was not as happy an occasion as it should have been. I must have looked at him for hours, and the strangest thing happened. I had only felt bad about being pregnant, but I could not feel bad about this little person. In fact, I had never felt such intense love, such deep joy, or such overwhelming determination to protect something as I felt at that moment. If someone had told me to jump out of bed and wrestle a coyote with my bare hands to protect my son, I would have done it. The feeling was so strong, I almost wished someone would ask such a thing of me.
Finally, I was overcome by weariness, and the midwife took the baby from me so I could sleep. I wish I had held him longer. The next morning, when I woke up, he was gone. The midwife had arranged, at my father’s request, for my baby to be taken to live with a family far away. The midwife was not from Westfall, and nobody would know who she was or how to find her or my child. My mother told me it was best, that the family was prosperous and that the child would grow up without sharing in my disgrace. Maybe that was true and maybe not. Either way, after many hours of weeping and arguing, I realized that I could no longer live there, and as soon as I was well enough I set out on my own.
Having no particular destination in mind, I headed toward Southshore, mostly because many humans lived there and it was far enough away that nobody would know me. I worked in the kitchen of the inn during the day. At night I was haunted by the thought of my tiny son, his solemn eyes looking into mine, so when my work was done I spent my time talking and drinking with the customers at the inn – anything to keep me from having to be alone. Having been treated as I was by “virtuous” people it didn’t seem to matter much any more what company I kept. Eventually, I fell in with the Syndicate.
The Syndicate was wonderful at first. They didn’t care about my past. I knew that many considered them to be evil, but I was not really sure what things were good or evil anymore. It was easy to be with people who seemed to feel free to do as they pleased. Many of them were warlocks, and they were happy to talk about magic and how they used it. One of them even offered to teach me, and I began to learn the skills of a warlock.
I was not trusted at first to be involved in any activities outside of the various Syndicate encampments. But one day I was told to go with a group to a nearby farm. The leader of our group said that we needed to use this farm, and we would be evicting the people who lived there. That didn’t sound so bad -- but when we got there, the other Syndicate members took out weapons and almost immediately killed two of the workers in the field. I was horrified, but that wasn’t the worst of it. A woman came out of the main house with her two children. One of the Syndicate men grabbed the woman and shoved her back in the house, as she screamed at the children to keep running away. As I watched the children run in terror, and heard the woman continuing to scream from inside the house, I was overcome by rage, and ran into the house, killing with a single shadowbolt the man who moments ago I would have called my friend. I had caught him off guard, but the others came in right after me. They dragged me out to the barn and beat me until I thought I would die. Finally they left.
I don’t know how long I lay there, until an elf warrior found me and saved my life. Of course, this warrior was Larae, whom you know. She bandaged and fed me, and then brought me back to Southshore where there were more skilled healers. Some in the town treated me with suspicion now, since I had been associated with the Syndicate, but Larae stayed in the town and made sure that nobody bothered me. One night, when I was nearly well again, she asked me what I would do next.
“I don’t know what to do,” I said. I felt so troubled and confused. “Both the light and the shadow have betrayed me. I don’t really belong anywhere.”
Larae thought about this a moment, and then said, “The elves think differently than humans do about the light and dark. Humans seem to think that one is good and the other is bad. But the way I understand it, they are both just there. Like the wind or the ocean – sometimes they help and sometimes they cause problems, but if we learn how to work with them, they do more good than harm.”
”I thought you weren’t a philosopher,” I said, smiling a little.
She laughed, as she often does. “That’s pretty much all the philosophy I know. The good and evil is in what people choose to do with what power they have, whether it is the power of magic or the power of a sharp blade, or just the power to be honest and helpful. At least, that’s what I think.”
The next morning, she told me she had an idea. She said there were gnomes in Ironforge who were very good at magic, and some of them were trainers for warlocks. She offered to take me there, and introduced me to the trainers. I stayed there for quite some time, learning more about magic, and about many other things. The gnomes were kind and clever and very patient teachers. It was a wonderful time, different from any other part of my life. Recently, they told me I was ready to leave them, and begin practicing my skills by assisting the dwarves in Loch Modan. I still go back to visit them often for more training, both as a warlock and in the trades of enchanting and engineering, which I also began to learn while I was in Ironforge.
Larae has been very kind to me, and so have the Defenders of Valor. I know my story must make you wonder whether I belong in such an honorable group – I am not sure myself that I deserve it. But I do intend to work very hard so as not to disappoint you.
Thelanya Alexston
Dear Lady Merlinne,
I am very glad to hear that you have spoken with my young friend Thelanya, and that she has been accepted as an initiate in the Defenders.
With some difficulty, I have persuaded her to write out her life story, and to permit me to send it to you. As you read it, I think you will understand why she is reluctant to reveal the details of her experiences. I have persuaded her to trust that you will not share all this information more widely than necessary, and that she will be judged by her actions as a part of the guild, and not on what happened in the past.
Thelanya is still slow to trust others, and at times I think she is still very sad and very angry. These feelings, along with the power of a warlock, may be rather dangerous. Every sort of power is dangerous, I suppose, and can be abused. I think that is one of the main reasons we need each other -- we have to help each other stay on the right path. Thelanya may need that help even more than most of us.
Larae
I grew up, like many humans, on a farm in Westfall. My parents worked hard and they were very religious. It was always their goal that one day I would go to the great cathedral in Stormwind and serve the light as a priestess. And for most of my life that was my goal too.
Becoming a priestess would mean getting a good education, and I loved school. I loved reading books. I loved thinking about the noble ideas that the priests taught about virtue and light. I learned about many other things, too. One year a neighbor’s barn burned down. Of course, all the grownups worked frantically trying to contain the fire. I was too little understand or help, so I just watched the fire, and it seemed to be the most wonderful thing I had ever seen. I became fascinated by the subject of fire and as I got older I read everything I could about it. I would sit by the hearth in our house and watch the fire for hours. Once my mother caught me putting my hand in close to the flame, and of course she scolded me. What she didn’t know was that many times I had put my hands much closer to the flame, for much longer, and it didn’t really bother me. There was a limit, naturally, to how long I could tolerate the heat without being hurt, but it seemed I could tolerate much more of it than most people.
One day, browsing around the library for something new to read, I found a book about magic. The book described powers wielded by mages and warlocks. I read the book over and over, every chance I got, especially the parts about fire spells. But when my parents found the book, and they were very angry. They told me that this type of magic was dangerous and evil, and not something for a future priestess to be learning about. When I was older, they said, I would learn to use the power of the light instead. I thought, fire gives off light, so why is it wrong? But that wasn’t the sort of thing my parents liked to talk about, so I said nothing more about it.
When I reached the age of fifteen, just beginning to turn from a child into a young woman, I was old enough to begin studying at a seminary. It was so exciting, living away from home, talking with the other students and the teachers, having so many new books to read. In one of my discussions with my fellow students, I mentioned the subject of magic. How was the power of light different from the power of shadow, or fire, or anything else? This was not a principle that a seminary student was supposed to question, I guess. (I know now that some priests also draw upon shadow powers, but at this school we were taught that was wrong.)
For bringing up this question, for being interested in learning more about these different sources of power, I soon found myself in the Headmaster’s office. He spoke to me very sternly about the danger and evil of magic. Did I want to fall under demonic powers and become evil? Of course, I did not. Had I studied very much on these matters? I admitted that I had read about them before. “Well, then,” he said, “much of the damage is already done. But I think you have promise. We will meet together privately each day after your other classes, and I will help you to rid yourself of this evil.”
Our private sessions began the very next day. The Headmaster often began by lecturing me about the dangers of magic, and told me that I had already been contaminated by these evil ideas. Then he set simple tasks for me to do for him, as penance. At first, the tasks he gave me were cleaning up his rooms, straightening his books, things like that. While I did these things, he always watched me in a way that made me feel very strange. After a week or two, he started to ask me to do more personal things for him, and soon he was ordering me to do things for him that he never should have asked.
I struggled for months to understand what was happening to me, whether what was going on was right or wrong. It seemed that the Headmaster would never tell me to do things that were wrong, and yet, it never felt right. You will probably think me very foolish and ignorant, but I was barely past childhood, and had grown up in a simple, devout home, where such things were never discussed – and this was the Headmaster of one of the most conservative seminaries. Would he lie to me? Did I want to question or resist him and be at the mercy of evil forces that I had already practically welcomed into my life?
After several months, however, two things finally became very clear to me. One was that what we were doing must, indeed, be wrong. The other was that I was going to have a baby.
I tried to keep my condition a secret, but that is not a secret one can keep for long. Soon enough, I was called to the Headmaster’s office. The bishop was there too. He asked who was the father of my child, and I told him the truth. But of course, the Headmaster denied it, and which of us would anyone believe? I was expelled from school and sent home in disgrace. Even for my parents, it seemed easier to think badly of me than to think badly of their church. They barely looked at me for weeks, and I was rarely allowed to leave the house. I tried everything to win back their approval, or their affection, but nothing seemed to work.
Finally, the day came for the baby to be born. A midwife was called, and soon enough I was holding a tiny boy in my arms. He had cried very little, and looked at me with a solemn expression, as if he somehow knew that his arrival in the world was not as happy an occasion as it should have been. I must have looked at him for hours, and the strangest thing happened. I had only felt bad about being pregnant, but I could not feel bad about this little person. In fact, I had never felt such intense love, such deep joy, or such overwhelming determination to protect something as I felt at that moment. If someone had told me to jump out of bed and wrestle a coyote with my bare hands to protect my son, I would have done it. The feeling was so strong, I almost wished someone would ask such a thing of me.
Finally, I was overcome by weariness, and the midwife took the baby from me so I could sleep. I wish I had held him longer. The next morning, when I woke up, he was gone. The midwife had arranged, at my father’s request, for my baby to be taken to live with a family far away. The midwife was not from Westfall, and nobody would know who she was or how to find her or my child. My mother told me it was best, that the family was prosperous and that the child would grow up without sharing in my disgrace. Maybe that was true and maybe not. Either way, after many hours of weeping and arguing, I realized that I could no longer live there, and as soon as I was well enough I set out on my own.
Having no particular destination in mind, I headed toward Southshore, mostly because many humans lived there and it was far enough away that nobody would know me. I worked in the kitchen of the inn during the day. At night I was haunted by the thought of my tiny son, his solemn eyes looking into mine, so when my work was done I spent my time talking and drinking with the customers at the inn – anything to keep me from having to be alone. Having been treated as I was by “virtuous” people it didn’t seem to matter much any more what company I kept. Eventually, I fell in with the Syndicate.
The Syndicate was wonderful at first. They didn’t care about my past. I knew that many considered them to be evil, but I was not really sure what things were good or evil anymore. It was easy to be with people who seemed to feel free to do as they pleased. Many of them were warlocks, and they were happy to talk about magic and how they used it. One of them even offered to teach me, and I began to learn the skills of a warlock.
I was not trusted at first to be involved in any activities outside of the various Syndicate encampments. But one day I was told to go with a group to a nearby farm. The leader of our group said that we needed to use this farm, and we would be evicting the people who lived there. That didn’t sound so bad -- but when we got there, the other Syndicate members took out weapons and almost immediately killed two of the workers in the field. I was horrified, but that wasn’t the worst of it. A woman came out of the main house with her two children. One of the Syndicate men grabbed the woman and shoved her back in the house, as she screamed at the children to keep running away. As I watched the children run in terror, and heard the woman continuing to scream from inside the house, I was overcome by rage, and ran into the house, killing with a single shadowbolt the man who moments ago I would have called my friend. I had caught him off guard, but the others came in right after me. They dragged me out to the barn and beat me until I thought I would die. Finally they left.
I don’t know how long I lay there, until an elf warrior found me and saved my life. Of course, this warrior was Larae, whom you know. She bandaged and fed me, and then brought me back to Southshore where there were more skilled healers. Some in the town treated me with suspicion now, since I had been associated with the Syndicate, but Larae stayed in the town and made sure that nobody bothered me. One night, when I was nearly well again, she asked me what I would do next.
“I don’t know what to do,” I said. I felt so troubled and confused. “Both the light and the shadow have betrayed me. I don’t really belong anywhere.”
Larae thought about this a moment, and then said, “The elves think differently than humans do about the light and dark. Humans seem to think that one is good and the other is bad. But the way I understand it, they are both just there. Like the wind or the ocean – sometimes they help and sometimes they cause problems, but if we learn how to work with them, they do more good than harm.”
”I thought you weren’t a philosopher,” I said, smiling a little.
She laughed, as she often does. “That’s pretty much all the philosophy I know. The good and evil is in what people choose to do with what power they have, whether it is the power of magic or the power of a sharp blade, or just the power to be honest and helpful. At least, that’s what I think.”
The next morning, she told me she had an idea. She said there were gnomes in Ironforge who were very good at magic, and some of them were trainers for warlocks. She offered to take me there, and introduced me to the trainers. I stayed there for quite some time, learning more about magic, and about many other things. The gnomes were kind and clever and very patient teachers. It was a wonderful time, different from any other part of my life. Recently, they told me I was ready to leave them, and begin practicing my skills by assisting the dwarves in Loch Modan. I still go back to visit them often for more training, both as a warlock and in the trades of enchanting and engineering, which I also began to learn while I was in Ironforge.
Larae has been very kind to me, and so have the Defenders of Valor. I know my story must make you wonder whether I belong in such an honorable group – I am not sure myself that I deserve it. But I do intend to work very hard so as not to disappoint you.
Thelanya Alexston
