Hey, hope you're enjoying this story, just wanted to let you know that this chapter does not contain an erotic scene so if you're not into that you can skip it.(it does have some context that will be important in the following chapters)
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Anduin travelled to Boralus through a secret portal in the depths of the palace. Officially, he was now out to inspect the situation in Redridge, there was a whole procession of elite guards that were under the impression they were guarding him on it way there. In reality, that was Matthias Shaw using one of his rogue tricks to disguise himself as the High King.
This gave Anduin a flexible amount of time, there was always a lot to inspect in Redridge, being a border region, to take care of the Jaina business.
With strident steps he made his way towards the inner court of the palace. Dressed as a traveller, his face hidden under a heavy leather hood he had some trouble negotiating his way in there. Shalamayne, the legendary sword carried by his father before him, sheathed in a large hunk of metal to cover the glowing swirl of golden and purple energy at the base of it, was how he managed to persuade most guards. An ancient elven blade such as this was one in the world.
Of course, such a reveal of his identity came along with a strict warning that they couldn't tell anyone. Thankfully, the Kul Tirans seemed to have discipline and just stoically nodded at the request. Anduin put his faith in them keeping their vows to do what was best for the nation.
When the wielder of Light and Shadow finally made his way into the inner court, he found Katherine lost in thought, gazing down a balcony and over the vast sound that cut Kul Tiras into three large island formations. She seemed eager, waiting for something.
Katherine Proudmoore had clearly been attractive once, the beauty of her daughter still laying within her face, but it was clear that loss, stress and age had taken more from her than from women like Mia Greymane. Her skin began to slope, dark bags sat under her restless eyes and while her posture was as doing her last name honour, it also betrayed a readiness to take the burden of regency of her shoulder.
Anduin did not desire her, she was clearly out of her prime and ready to retire to a nice garden somewhere just outside the city.
The Lord Admiral of Kul Tiras turned to Anduin as the sound of his heavy boots announced him. "And who would you be?" she asked in a negatively intrigued fashion. "I made it clear to my guards that I wish to be disturbed only by the adventurer."
"Then it is lucky I arrive before him," Anduin said, slipping back his hood.
"Her," Katherine corrected, looking at the young man. She had never met Anduin before, but the rumours about his good looks and the way he stood before her as if her equal must have told her all she needed to know. "Anduin Wrynn, I assume."
"Indeed, Lord Admiral," he answered in a dignified tone, slowing his step until he came to a halt with a pace between them. "I am here to help free your daughter."
"You would be a fool to do so," Katherine pointed out.
"Not more than you, my nation is stable and I have people that will follow me should I perish," Anduin retorted. "You, on the other hand, have a nation in turmoil and no one who could hope to take your place." She had no retort to that. "I am not here to judge you, Lord Admiral, Jaina is dear to me as well. Let us be fools together."
A moment of pondering, then she nodded. "Together then, High King."
An imminent sense of danger filled Anduin's senses and he reached for Shalamayne. The unstable crackling of fel energy filled the air around him. A particular branch of magic that seldomly came without anything foul.
A shield of light encapsulated him and Katherine, a quick spell that would protect and heal them. It came in the shape of a golden curtain, laying spherical around them, through which he peeked outwards and at the demon that landed in the courtyard. It came from the sky, hidden behind its giant wings, and a wave of green fire was unleashed upon its impact. Stone splintered with glowing cracks marking the area like a network of emerald veins. The fire cascaded against the shield, but was so weak it wouldn't have done any damage whether or not it would have been there.
Anduin dismissed the protective spell one he saw the two signs that this particular demon was not going to be an enemy. One was the particular aura around it, pieces of darkness peeling off the skin and losing themselves in the air like smoke as the extended metamorphosis lost cohesion. The other were the tattoos pulsating with fel magic. The marks of a demon hunter.
The demonic transformation unravelled with the opening of the large wings and out stepped a blood elf. She had pale skin, a little bit of red tinge to it, and was built more muscular than others of her race. Her ears had been cut, shortened either by means of torture or she had done it to herself during the temporary madness that was known to grip demon hunters during their transformation from normal elves to half-demonic entities.
As short as they were for elf ears, they still had that knife-esque cut to them and were certainly long enough to keep her white hair in check. For a demon hunter it was remarkably well conditioned, combed backwards and flowing straight down to her hips from there. It went right along with her horns, beginning at her hairline and growing parallel to her skull until they arrived at the back of the head where they took a sudden turn to point their sharp tips outwards. She would never wear a helmet, but they provided better protection than but the heaviest of enchanted plate anyway.
Her clothes also showed her to be a remarkably ordered member of her profession. Sure, she showing as much skin as was usual for demon hunters, leaving almost all of her torso and arms bare. This was done to expose the winding tattoos as much as possible, sparing the clothes that would lay on top of them from taking damage from the constant fel exuding from them. What she did wear, however, was an elegant strip of black silk that hid her breasts and a pair of leather pants of the same colour, decorated with lines of silvery-white yarn that were designed like her tattoos.
Her green eyes that were both blind were exposed to the world where most demon hunters
chose to hide them behind a strip of cloth or another shape of veil. Occasionally, flickers green energy would pulsate out of them and into the skin around them, darkened like a shape of natural mascara.
A long elven eyebrow raised even as she bowed. "Lady Proudmoore, my apologies for the property damage. Your guards pointed your spears at my preferred landing place, so I had to make due rather hastily," she spoke in a diligent and patient voice, another sign of how unusual she was amongst her kind. "My greetings and belated birthday congratulations to you as well, son of Varian. We haven't met since the campaign on Argus." At that point, Anduin realized who he was talking to.
He had indeed met her before. Numerous times in fact. She had been the leader of demon hunters during the campaign against the Burning Legion. Last time, it had been aboard the Vindicaar, where she had diligently followed and served Illidan. They had called her the firmest second-in-command at the time, due to her goal-oriented nature but aversion to be the actual head of her organization.
"I heard the adventurer was getting a lot of work done, but I didn't imagine it to be you, Slayer Aclysia," the High King spoke, trying his hardest to not stare the blood elves immensely sexy body. Her scars and tattoos worked in an unnatural synergy to highlight her curves. The fact that her middle-of-the-road but immensely firm breasts and peach-shaped ass were hidden only under clothes that hid the skin but none of the form didn't help. "Neither did I imagine you to be fighting on our side. As a blood elf, I expected you to join the Horde."
"I am no longer the Slayer, king Anduin," Aclysia responded, her blind eyes were seering into him, digging something up. "That title is no ones to hold now that the Burning Legion lays defeated. Us demon hunters have no more need of a command structure and shall only return to the Felhammer as a unit at Lord Illidan's call, shall it ever reach us doomed souls." As always, a demon hunter's outlook on life was all sunshine. "Now I am just an adventurer looking to rid this world of as much evil as I can find before I, myself, burn out. Your sides mean nothing to me."
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Aclysia guided their trio out of Boralus at night. With her magical sight, they avoided every patrol they came across, every fisherman, even a sheep that she assured them was a poor soul that a mage had polymorphed for whatever reason. They didn't have time to find out.
Instead, they went to a place where Aclysia had already prepared three griffons for them. They took them and flew west, to the land of Drustvar. Along the way, Katherine kept slowing them down but no one complained about a mother seeking to save her daughter. She knew the risk.
There was another thing Anduin noticed. Whenever she had the chance, Aclysia would stare at him as if searching for something. He had a guess as why that was, but neither of them brought it up while the Lord Admiral was around.
Finally, after flying through the night, they arrived at a hidden mountain cave where a bear made from gnarly roots and moss greeted them. "Ah, Aclysia," the voice betrayed him to be a druid and carried long years of meditating on solitude. "You return. And you brought friends."
"Friends is a wrong description, Ulfar. They are the Lord Admiral and High King of the Alliance," Aclysia nodded at the two of them as she carefully placed a large sack, that she had been carrying from her griffon, at the bears feet.
"High society here to join you on your suicide mission into the blighted lands," Ulfar grumbled whiled undoing the band of the sack with his wooden teeth and then looking inside. "No matter how often Tul reincarnates, his remains make me shudder every time. For both of us I hope that you succeed in killing him where his cycle of life and death can be stopped."