My first attempt at erotica so it may be a bit flawed. As an avid fan of World of Warcraft, I just decided to write this based on an idea that came to me. The two main characters are of my own creation, however, the setting and much of the background is from Warcraft. Those said elements are property of Blizzard Entertainment, not me.
Critique is welcome, as long as there are no rants about how "unrealistic" certain concepts of the story are. It's Sci-fi...of course it's unrealistic. Anyways, thanks for reading.
Damien and Kallia limped their way across the shattered landscape that was the Eastern Plaguelands. As they moved, Kallia had been bracing her arm around Damien's shoulder for support. The effects of the holy fire that had afflicted her an hour prior hadn't quite worn off yet, and she still needed the aid of her husband just to trek the miles of wasteland.
"Where are we-, agh!" Kallia began to speak before clutching her abdomen momentarily. One of the more severe burns had done moderate damage to her lower stomach and any quick movements amplified the pain there. "Where are we going?" she asked again. "We can't just wander aimlessly. Not with Scourge and Scarlet zealots scrambling about."
"Westward; I can't get into specifics but I know that we must head west to the Thondroril River to be out of this place. After that we go southward; the Hillsbrad Foothills is the closest region I can think of with relative safety from the Scourge," Damien replied.
Kallia breathed an exasperated sigh in response. "That's a lengthy trip, especially without mounts. But I suppose anything is better than remaining in this hellish place any longer," she said, hefting herself over a fallen log.
Damien nodded grimly, staring down at his bloodstained hands as he continued to support his wife's labored movements along the broken westward road. In his mind he didn't relish the trip that lay ahead of them, but she had certainly been right; he had seen enough of this barren place for one lifetime.
Damien had been a holy paladin of the zealous Scarlet Crusade for the past four years. He had formerly been an initiate of the order of the Silver Hand years before that; however, after the undead Scourge outbreak and the fall of the human kingdom of Lordaeron, he was forced to turn to the Scarlets because of their numbers...and their unfaltering hatred of the undead.
Only the day before had Damien realized just how cruel and barbaric the Crusade's methods were when his former master had declared Damien a heretic and attempted to slay him and his wife Kallia. Despite his years of pious devotion to that order of paladins, he could not stand idly by while his wife suffers and dies (again) at the hands of his ruthless master; thus, he was forced to kill him and several of his former compatriots.
The story was a bit more complicated than just that brief encounter however. Kallia was not entirely human...not an entirely living human anyway. For the past four years since Lordaeron's downfall to the ravenous undead, Damien had thought Kallia dead, and in truth, she had been. She had been slain by the undead hordes during the attempted evacuation of Lordaeron refugees. However, like so many other unfortunate souls, her body was raised and her will was bound to the icy service of the Lich King, the dark master of the undead Scourge. That was until her fateful encounter with her beloved husband two days prior.
Damien's master had dispatched him from their stronghold to use an attained scourge artifact to indoctrinate one of the Lich King's own agents for the purpose of gaining access to the scourge base of operations in the Plaguelands: Naxxramas. Little did Damien know that the one undead minion that he would encounter would evidently be his long lost beloved...his dear Kallia.
Their initial reunion was not a joyous one. Kallia's mind and soul were enslaved to the Lich King and thus she had no free will. She did not hesitate to attempt to kill Damien as soon as she saw him. However, Damien had an ace up his sleeve in the form of the artifact he had been given. Using its unnatural energy, he directed the power of the artifact at the twisted figure of his wife...and with success.
The outcome of using the weapon was one that Damien would never have expected to come to fruition. Kallia's free will and memory of her life had been returned to her. At that point, a tearful reunion unfolded between the two lovers; a reunion that fate had seen fit to rekindle. Damien's entire world was completely overturned after that; for years prior, he had sought utter vengeance against the undead for what they had done to his wife. And yet, here she was, clearly no longer human and clearly possessing the menacing appearance that all death knights are infamous for, but also having the very same aura of majestic kindness that she had once had in life.
Damien had never felt so rejuvenated in his entire life.
That was, until the eventual encounter with his master, who was less than pleased with Damien's lack of results from his mission. More than that, he was furious that Damien was now harboring a friendship with a death knight, regardless of the fact that it was his wife. He and his cohorts attempted to slay the two, beginning by attempting to burn Kallia with holy fire and exorcisms. The two eventually won the battle however, Damien himself personally ending the confrontation by beheading his former mentor.
And so here they were now, treading the broken wasteland that was their former homeland; avoiding not only the mindless undead, but now Damien's former Scarlet comrades. Kallia had sustained several burns from the duel with Damien's master, thus was the reason for her delayed movement. Damien was more than happy to aid her though, so long as she was by his side again.
After several more minutes of travel, Kallia suddenly motioned for him to halt momentarily. "Wait, I think the burns are healing finally. I think I can carry my own weight from here," she said, retracting herself from his shoulder to examine her pale skin and the charred wounds that were miraculously disappearing on their own. Damien could guess that it was some form of necromantic magic that was the source of the healing.
"If you say so," he said, peering into her face, captivated by her deep blue eyes; eyes that he never thought that he would have the privilege of looking into ever again.
Kallia looked back at him, meeting his watchful gaze, who abruptly turned away quickly. "Well in that case, you can go back to carrying me. I think my feet are getting tired anyway," she chuckled, her joyful laugh colored with a resonant, supernatural undertone.
Damien crossed his arms and smiled. "Getting tired, is that so? I wasn't aware you could feel physical stress being, well, what you are now," he candidly replied. The way that they joked to each other just then was as if there had never been years of war, famine and strife that they had endured. Now that they were together again, it was as if all of that took place in a different life and they were now picking up where they left off.
Kallia smiled and brushed a lock of her silky blonde hair out of her eye. She rubbed her arm and stared at her husband, biting her lip as if she wanted to say something but was hesitant to at first. "I've been feeling a lot of physical stress since seeing you again," she said before practically biting her tongue after the words left her mouth.
Damien's eyebrow rose and his mouth parted, not believing what he had heard for a second. He cleared his throat and quickly turned away, looking off to the road ahead of them as if to break the awkwardness of the moment. "It's getting late and it would be best if we made camp somewhere before continuing," he said, gulping and feeling the redness on his cheeks subsiding.
Kallia nodded quickly and her eyes darted around, she herself pretending to scan the landscape to escape awkwardness. "Well," she began, losing herself in his hazel eyes again, "We'd better get off the main road then. Scourge use these highways to ferry their troops anywhere between Stratholme and Andorhal."
He nodded in agreement, "Yes, and no doubt Tyr's Hand will dispatch troops to go after us when they learn what we've done to Brant and his men." He replied, his former grin frowning at remembrance of him killing his long-time mentor. As much as Brant deserved what happened to him, Damien certainly didn't relish in the victory of slaying a fellow paladin.
The two moved off the broken cobblestone road and began trekking along the more rugged terrain. As they walked, Kallia grew concerned when she noted the frown on his face and the serious tone of his voice. "He deserved it didn't he? I may not have known him, but from the anger that I saw on your face when you killed him...he mustn't have been a mentor worth keeping," she said.
Damien shook his head, "His methods were far too reckless. He didn't hesitate to kill innocents if doing so would destroy undead in the process. That's not the paladin way," he explained with distaste. "Still though, part of me sympathized with him. He lost his whole family when the Scourge broke out. But, that doesn't excuse the atrocities he committed for the sake of 'victory.' The Scourge certainly don't deserve mercy, but if we start becoming what they are, then what the hell is the point?"
