Brambles formed an impenetrable barrier blocking the path into the Park. Their intimidating thorns rose up over eight feet into the air and seemed to dare anyone to pass. Asterius knew better than most that these plants were like a natural razorwire, only worse. Razorwire never wrapped itself around those who tried to climb it, shredding would-be trespassers in a green embrace.
Someone wanted to keep people out. The druid General turned to ask a question of his forsaken guide, but Frenze had disappeared as was his habit. It seems that the only way to find out what was so important was to go forward.
The brambles would have made a most effective defense... had the intruder not been a druid. Asterius waved his hand in a dismissive gesture and the thorny wall shirked away from his touch, creating a vaguely tauren-sized hole for him to pass through. Asterius continued on, walking along a pleasant path made of cobbled stones surrounded by lush grasses. It was a place of serenity, but the druid's every instinct shouted at him that something was wrong. Despite the essence of life permeating this place, something within was dying. Nearing the center of the Park, his heart seemed to break in two as he caught sight of who it was.
"Oh, gods, no..." His voice was a faint whisper as he beheld the massive bear form, so silent and still. By her side as ever was her brother Iyo, whose sorrowful attention was locked onto his sister so tightly that he hadn't even noticed Asterius arrive. Iyo was kneeling by his sister's side, haggard and worn, as if he hadn't slept for weeks. His entire body sagged as if he carried some tremendous weight on his bulky tauren shoulders. His eyes held the haunted look of one who had been trapped in a bad dream. Asterius' clinical eye caught note of a dozen different minor injuries covering his intellectual friend, as if Iyo had been on the losing side of a bar brawl, or perhaps been bodily thrown down a flight of stairs.
If Iyo had lost a bar brawl, Leda in comparison had lost a war. She could quite literally have passed through a meat grinder in better shape than she was. Large swathes of fur were missing from her hide where only bloody gashes remained. Asterius could faintly hear the labored breaths she took, each one shorter than the last and each possessing the liquid gurgle of a punctured lung. Her body had odd lumps in the skin at places where broken bones jutted up in positions that no doubt would cause unbearable pain. She was either blissfully unconscious or in a semi-permanent coma.
A group of night elves surrounded the two. A horrible darkness spread slowly through Asterius. Rage bubbled over and his vision turned blurry. The animal within him screamed for vengeance at those who had done this to his closest friends. He locked eyes with a night elf female, emerald green meeting a light gold. He was half a breath away from releasing an attacking spell, from charging forward with weapons raised. Only his inner strategist held him back; that quiet, logical portion of his mind that favored thinking over action. It whispered for patience. Gather the facts, and then move. Asterius closed his eyes and took a deep, shuddering breath, exhaling as if he could breathe out his anger.
His inner strategist had been right, he could see with the clarity of a level head. These night elves were no vicious tormentors; they were healers. They carried bandages and odd concoctions of herbal remedies. Asterius could smell the strong salves that had been slathered on Leda from here. They even appeared to be comforting their tauren rival, whose shocked mind probably wasn't even aware of their reassurances. He was focused entirely on his dying sibling.
Without a doubt, she was dying. Healers or not, the night elves had made little difference and they knew it. Asterius could plainly see they had given up on keeping Leda alive and had taken the next step. They surrounded her in a loose circle, chanting in their lilting, musical voices, though their words were somber. It was a ritual designed to give peace to the body while guiding the spirit's journey to the afterlife. It was a great honor to be bestowed upon a non-elf... and entirely unnecessary now that Asterius was here.
"You? Who you?" The night elf female who had first noticed the new tauren's arrival and whose eyes had locked briefly with his own had left Iyotanka's side and had greeted Asterius in a respectable attempt at Taur-ahe. Asterius answered back in her own language. He was rusty after having gone so many years without speaking it, he had been a long time removed from the Moonglade, but his backwoods accent was a definite improvement on her mangling of the tauren language.
"I am their friend... as I assume you to be. What happened to them?"
"You can speak!" She appeared delighted at that, but her expression quickly turned sorrowful. "We believe they may have been tortured. This... this war has done terrible things, even in the city I call my home."
The night elf druid looked mournfully to Iyo. "Can you tell him... that I'm sorry for his loss?"
"Why bother? He's not losing anything today." Asterius pushed past the slender elf and strode quickly to his friends.
"What?!" The amber-eyed elf seemed horrified. "We have already tried the healing arts and all have failed. It is the will of Elune that the feral one pass now. It's her time!"
She placed a hand on the tauren's shoulder. "What gives you the right to go against nature? Who are you to defy the will of the goddess?!"
"Who are you to try and stop me?" Asterius replied, his tone menacingly low. Recalling what she had seen in his eyes just moments ago, the elf withdrew her hand as if it had been burned. Asterius continued forward and crouched next to Leda's body. Iyo looked at him with a dead stare for a long moment. Then, as if finally realizing who it was, his eyes widened and he let out a snarl.
"No!" He shouted, swinging a fist at Asterius. Within his cupped palm was an instinctive amount of druidic magic. The punch slammed into the druid General with the unstoppable force of a landslide. Asterius, caught off guard, took the full brunt of the hit and was knocked back over two dozen feet by the time he had rolled to a stop.
"Iyo, what are you doing? It's me!" Asterius coughed, holding one arm to his side. Iyo had placed his body defensively between Asterius and Leda.
"You can't have her! She's not dead!" Iyo shouted back. Realization hit Asterius almost as quickly as the punch had. It was quite possibly the oldest of tauren legends. The spirits of one's dead ancestors would come to guide the dying to their new home. So that was it, then. Iyo thought he was a ghost. The last thing he needed to do was to get into a fight with her brother while Leda's every heartbeat drew closer to her last.
"Iyo, just listen to me," Asterius said as he limped cautiously toward the sibling pair. Iyo raised his fists again, but the only defensive move Asterius made was to reach into his pack and pull out a flower; it was the peacebloom that had been placed in his Ironforge grave. As Iyo caught sight of it, he fell shaking to the floor, his body wracked by sobbing spasms. In a quiet voice, Asterius whispered to him, "I have a few tricks up my sleeve. I can still save her."
A muted nod was his only answer, but it was more than enough acknowledgement for him. Asterius dropped to Leda's side and focused using his second sight. He almost wished he hadn't. The internal damage was horrifying. He couldn't believe the bear had survived five minutes of this torment. The first order of business was her lungs; one deflated and the other punctured and filling with blood. She was not getting nearly enough oxygen, slowly smothering to death while the untouchable sky remained just a breath away. Thin, hollow roots erupted from the ground at Asterius' command, wrapping tightly around the limbs of healer and patient. He felt himself grow dizzy as he siphoned his own oxygen-rich blood to support Leda's massive frame while his magical influence sped the recovery of her lungs. He had to turn her on her side as she unconsciously coughed up blood.
Many of her bones had been broken; even shattered. Some were so fragmented that they might as well have been made from glass and dropped from a three-story building. Hard of breath and straining, his wandering mind focused on the pieces, sticking them back together like a giant three-dimensional puzzle. A flash of warning within his mind pulled him away, though. Her bruised, battered, and often bleeding organs were beginning to fail. Like a circus performer, he was trying to juggle her bodily functions, using his own earth magic to force them all to work at once. It wasn't enough. His power wasn't enough. He could feel them slipping, one by one, like grains of sand in a tightly grasped fist. He had nowhere near the power to heal them all while simultaneously keeping her alive. He was losing her.
Like hell.
"You!" He shouted to the night elf female who had talked to him before. Oddly enough, she had stayed when her companions had left; they must have thought Iyo's greeting to be rather violent. She approached and kneeled beside him, her voice hesitant.
"How can I help?"
"The moonwell. Did your healers try using the moonwell?" Asterius pointed to the shallow pool nearby. He noted with distress that his hand was shaking. He had to hurry.
"It wouldn't help." The elf shook her head sadly. "This moonwell is a failure... the power it possesses pales in comparison to the originals'. We are not sure why this is, and our priestesses have never managed to restore it to proper form."
It was low on magic? No problem, he could work around that. Asterius climbed into the moonwell and sank into its waters. He turned to Iyotanka this time.
"Iyo," he said in a soothing voice. "I need you to do something for me."
"Anything."
"I need you to shoot me."
"What?!"
"Listen, moonwells act as magic containers. They store the power of the moon. I don't know anyone more gifted with Elune's magic than you are, and I need this moonwell to be more charged than it ever has been. Gather as much magic as you can, and call down a strike right on top of my head. I can act as a medium between the magic contained within the blast and the well itself."
"But I don't think-"
"If you love your sister, then SHOOT ME!"
That had an immediate effect. Iyo's body grew heavier and an impenetrable coat of feathers covered over his fur. His bovine hooves became three-toed claws, and a beak replaced his snout. Strange glowing orbs winked into existence, pure magical essence that orbited around his body. He made an odd half-avian, half-beast call, much like a horn, and raised his hands into the air. In the sky, a thousand pinpricks of light appeared as the stars flared brighter than the sun. A cloud overhead began to whirl like a ship caught in a maelstrom. A black hole appeared in the otherwise unbroken blue sky; a single spot of night in the light of day. From this darkness, the White Lady moon floated serenely in its full beauty.
It was an incredible display of skill, far greater than anything he had ever witnessed. Far greater than he anticipated Iyotanka of even being capable of. Asterius sighed and clenched his teeth.
A wave of fire burst forth from the heavens, arching toward the ground like lightning, though many times larger. The released fury of the moon struck the druid, bathing the Park in a blinding white light. Asterius howled as arcane energy seared fur and flesh, filling the air with the acrid smell of burning hair and cooked meat. Every bone in his body was illuminated, making his skeleton as visible as if his skin had been transparent. The arcane magic, converted from damaging attack to pure energy, forced its way through the path of least resistance and into the welcoming waters of the moonwell, which had begun to glow a milky white.
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The hurricane force of magic and the druid's shout of pain faded. Nara Meideros winced as she opened her eyes once again, blinking to clear away spots in her vision. The sight that greeted her was a beautiful one. The moonwell shone with such power that it reminded her of long gone days in the elven lands of her birth. Those 'pure' moonwells were just as exquisite as this one. The only difference was that they usually didn't contain the body of a tauren, floating facedown in the pool.
Nara frowned at that. The other tauren druid who had fired the blast seemed drained and unable to move. Deciding to act, the night elf jumped into the moonwell herself, struggling to turn the healer druid over onto his back. With his weight, it was not easy. She put a sensitive ear to his chest, but could not discern a heartbeat. Understandable. That much power flowing through any body would be enough to fry it from top to bottom. She placed her hands above his heart and pushed with all of her might. The rhythmic movement combined with the trace of magic she imbued into every thrust jumpstarted the still heart, which began to thud loudly again within his chest.
Asterius opened his emerald green eyes. Emerald green eye, technically. His right eye was stained crimson from where a blood vessel had burst. He focused on the night elf standing above him and coughed.
"Good morning," she said. Asterius sat up with no small amount of difficulty, thumped his chest and spat out a mouthful of blood.
"A bit more than I expected..." He got to his feet unsteadily and nodded to the night elf. "Not many elves would revive an enemy. I'll have to thank you for that."
"Who said we were enemies? Besides, not many people would go so far to save a friend. That was very foolish... and very brave."
Asterius snorted as he made his way, carefully so as not to fall again, over to Leda's body. "You're confusing bravery with desperation."
Roots burst from the ground, cradling the unmoving bear as gently as a baby, lifting her up and depositing her within the water of the moonwell. Asterius opened himself up, embracing the energy of the engorged magical fount. With limitless energy, he delved back into Leda's body with his second sight, convincing bones to mend themselves whole and knitting deadly punctures within the life-sustaining organs. The look on his face was sheer exulted triumph as he undid every bit of damage to the battered bear's frame. Leda was suffused with an ethereal light, the undeniable aura of healing energy.
With an exhausted sigh, Asterius released the spell and examined his patient. The healing glow faded, followed swiftly by the druid's joyful expression. Something was wrong.
"No..." Horrified, Asterius again drew in the power of the moonwell and channeled it into his friend's body. The glow rose and faded with no change. "No... no, no, no, no!"
He shouted helplessly, again and again forcing magical waves of energy through the motionless bear to no avail. This shouldn't be happening, he thought to himself. Her flesh is unmarked, her bones are whole, her organs are perfectly healthy. There was physically nothing wrong with the body. However...
"It's her time," the night elf called softly from behind him, putting his own thoughts into words. Whether or not the damage had been mended, it was already done. Leda's body had taken a fatal blow, several of them in fact, and he was powerless to undo that. The shock had taken its toll on her. The body was convinced it was dying and was shutting itself down.
"What's wrong? What's she saying?!" Iyo asked in a desperate voice. He had recovered enough from his excessive use of magic and had crawled over to the moonwell's edge. Asterius looked to his friend with tears in his eyes.
"I can't- ...I can't save her. I was too late. I can't do it, Iyo."
"No!" Iyo shouted, clutching painfully onto Asterius' shoulders. "You have to, Tree! Save her!"
"I said I can't do it!" He answered back in a pained roar of his own.
From behind him, Leda made one last, wheezing gasp and breathed no more. Iyotanka began to violently shudder. He seemed near the point of breaking. His voice was curiously calm now.
"You're supposed to be dead, but you came back." He bodily pushed Asterius over to Leda's corpse. "Now it's her turn. Do what you do, Tree. Make her come back. Make my sister come back... please."
How could he explain? He hadn't fixed himself, he'd only made a new vessel for his spirit to inhabit. His own soul had been trapped in the Emerald Dream. Leda's had no such luck. He couldn't make her a new body before her spirit disappeared beyond the veil of realms forever. He would need a container for her spirit to rest, something that was so tightly attuned to her that her spirit could call it home. Perhaps a particularly powerful seed might work, but he had no such options available and no way of getting one within the seconds they had remaining. How could he look into those sad, blue eyes that held such agony and tell him it couldn't be done? Those sapphire eyes that held back tears even now, that...
"The eyes..."
"What?" Asterius had spoken in a mere whisper, but the look of shock on his face was remarkable.
"Your eyes... they're the same. They're her eyes." Asterius stared at Iyotanka, a smile breaking on his face. "You're twins."
They were the same. Together from even before birth. It might work. No... it would work!
"You're twins!" He shouted with jubilant glee.
"What are you talking about, Tree?" Iyo asked worriedly. Asterius shoved him aside and shouted at the night elf maiden, who had continued to watch the interlopers with expressions ranging from sorrow to confusion.
"Elf! I need sticks! Wood! Clubs! Shields! Anything you can find that is even remotely similar to a totem!" She was smart enough to know not to ask questions and hurried away. Asterius turned back to Iyotanka, grimly serious for a moment.
"I have a plan. If I can trap Leda's spirit within an earthly container long enough, I can rebuild her body."
"She'll live?!" Asterius nodded in response. Noting the druid healer's concern, Iyo asked, "What container are you talking about?"
"...You. Your body will be the container." Asterius looked troubled for a moment. "This has never been done before. The risks are unimaginable. All I know is that you are the only option. I must warn you that, even should this succeed, you will never be the same again."
"What are you waiting for? Do it!" Iyo answered back, but Asterius snarled.
"Fool! I'm saying that Leda will be inhabiting your body, your mind! Her every memory will be seared into your own. She will be unaffected, but you will suffer twice the strain! Even after her spirit is gone from your body, its effects will remain, and I don't have any idea what it could do to you."
Iyo said three words. It was enough of an answer. It was all that was important. "She will live."
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Nara had returned, a bundle of objects in her arms. At the tauren healer's request, she dumped them next to the moonwell as he drew a small knife from his packs. The night elf priestess looked on worriedly as the first of the tauren lay down beside the corpse of the feral one. He seemed to be casting a spell on himself; a hibernation one, she realized. The healer, the one who spoke her language, examined the objects she had brought, selecting a few from the pile.
"What are you going to do?" She asked. Never before in all her years had she seen something like this. In an almost frantic pace, the healer druid made a small slice in his skin and using the bloody knife began to carve strange runes into a wooden chair she had brought.
"Druids are masters of the wild, of living things," he answered. "We aren't dealing with a living thing anymore. The shaman, however, are masters of the elements, and more importantly are masters of matters of the spirit."
He placed the chair on the northern end of the moonwell. The sigil inscribed on its wooden back began to blaze with an inner fire. Another rune went into a wooden buckler, the round edge of which was jammed tightly into the ground at the southern end of the water, and an eerie breeze seemed to be coming from the shield. A third rune was scratched into a wooden club for the eastern edge, stones rising from the ground to orbit around the weapon as it touched the earth, and the fourth carving went into a bucket that had magically filled itself with water after it was placed on the western side of the well. The tauren pointed to each, adding an explanation for the elf's benefit.
"Fire, Earth, Air, Water. The four elements. So long as the medium is wood, I hope that the Spirits forgive the crudeness of the totems. All I know of shamanism is what is taught in books, but I need their wisdom for what I am about to attempt." As he spoke, he shifted into the wooden form of a treant and carved a final rune onto his own body. "The last element, and the most difficult; the Spirit of the Wilds"
"You're turning yourself into a totem?" The idea was ridiculous. Never before had anyone been insane enough to even imagine such a thing.
The tauren-turned-treant only nodded, adding "And using myself as the conduit to pass my friend's spirit into her brother's body for safekeeping. Well, that's the plan anyway." He said it as if it was the most sensible thing in the world. Nara was speechless.
"You... y-you can't-!" She started, but was interrupted as he spoke up again.
"Step back, please. This is a rather new experience for me and I'd hope to not put anyone else in jeopardy." With that, he closed his eyes and called to the totems. A torrent of writhing elemental energy shot out from the separate totems and converged on the treant druid. The unleashed magic combined into a radiant rainbow light, engulfing the druid with a thunderclap of primal fury.
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When Asterius next opened his eyes, he was somewhere entirely different. Or nowhere entirely different, depending on one's point of view. He floated, still in treant form, in an endless sea of nothingness. Even with his second sight, the only view that greeted him was utter blackness, as if he had been permanently blinded. However, even without the use of his eyes, the druid could still feel the presence of something in the dark... watching him. He was not alone.
"WWHHOOOO... AARREEEE... YYOOUUUU?" A deep, drawn-out voice called to him, harsh and grating like stones being scraped together. It was unimaginably loud, rumbling deep into the furthest reaches of his skull even though Asterius clasped his bough-like limbs tightly to the side of his head. He answered back in a shout, though his own call seemed pitifully weak to his ears.
"I am Asterius, a druid!"
"Notourkind. Notafollower. Notabeliever," a low, hissing whisper replied. The sound of its voice moved oddly about in the darkness, even while in mid sentence; first in front of the druid, then behind. It talked endlessly, never seeming to draw breath. "Adruidhesaysbuthefitswrong. Oddsmellhecarries. Notmaderight. Notnatural."
"Burn him!" Shrieked a third voice; a high pitched, insane cackle following its words. This voice's presence was like hot cinders, its words like dragon's breath. "He shows no respect, appears unannounced, uninvited!" Another fit of mad giggling. "My totem was a CHAIR! Burn him! Scatter the ashes! Grind his bones into dust!"
"Or we could try asking him what he's here for, and then burn him," A sarcastic tone replied, chuckling. Its laughter sounded oddly bubbly and reminded the druid of a murloc he had known once. "Corpses are rarely talkative, and this creature has roused my curiosity. Rarely do we see such interesting entries."
"Please, listen to me! I apologize for my crudeness, for my ignorance, but I have no time to spare!" Asterius got the feeling that the voices were conversing to one another, though he could not distinguish any sound. After a long moment, the first voice called out once again in its thundering roar.
"SSPPEEEEEAAAAAKK."
"Wewillhearyourwordsdruidbutdonottestourpatience."
"I am no shaman... but my friend lies dead in my world." He blinked back tears and fought to keep his voice steady. "But I will not accept this! I can still save her, but I need your powers!"
"Hehehe... hehehahaHAHAHA! You dare to command us?!" Intense heat blazed at the accusation. Asterius could feel the elemental's fury.
"No! I seek a bargain! Nothing more!"
"Oh, my... I'm quite speechless with delight. I've not seen something so amusing in ages. Tell me something; what do you offer to trade, hmm?" Foreign laughter again filled his thoughts, though this voice's laughing came from actual mirth rather than anything deranged. "Is it gold? Shiny gems? Or maybe the finest silks? Honestly, what could you possibly have that would interest us?"
"...Myself!" Asterius ignored the laughter that followed and continued. "A life for a life! You help me save my friend and I pledge myself into your service! So the Spirits command, so shall I obey, as long as I live and beyond if necessary!"
"UUUUSSEEEELLLEEEESSSSSSS."
"Suchahighopinionyouholdofyourselflittledruid."
"What could possibly make you think we want YOU?!"
"Hahaha, this is too rich!"
"It is all that I have to give!" Asterius fought to make himself heard. "It is all that I possess!"
Quite suddenly, the overlapping voices of the others were cut off. Silence remained unbroken and Asterius hesitated to speak. He could feel a change, though he couldn't see it. A new voice had arrived.
"Your name, mortal..." It spoke with the combined voices of a thousand different beings. A bird call, a lion's roar, the hiss of a serpent. Taur-ahe, Darnassian, Orcish, Common, and more. This cacophony of noise somehow blended itself into an understandable, even pleasant, speaking voice. "Asterius, was it?"
Asterius nodded and the spirit seemed to contemplate.
"Ahh, yes... we see now. Such an exciting life you have lived... and you have spent it trying to defend your world... Making up for past mistakes?"
"I just want to protect that which I care about."
"No," the Spirit of the Wilds answered. "From this moment onward, you want to protect that which we care about. Your terms have been accepted. Return to your world and save your friend. Know only that we are now and forever linked... and we will be expecting your end of the bargain."
Asterius bowed as the darkness that had engulfed him began to fade away. "I will not forget. You have my word, and my thanks."
The druid disappeared and the Spirits were once again alone.
"IIISSSSS... TTTHHHIIIIIIISSSSSS..... WWWIIIIISSSEEEEE?"
"ItseemslikewehaveanewpetthoughIreallydidn'texpectthisfromyou"
"I suppose it could come in handy to have a set of hands running around that world... it always seems so busy. The amusement alone would make it worth the effort."
"Let's make him DANCE!"
"Quiet, you. I've got far larger plans in mind for our little servant than mere antics..." The Spirit cast its attention toward Azeroth for only a moment; a lonely, fragile sphere hurtling through space. The balance on that world was in such anarchy that it was hardly believable. It almost brought physical pain to the Spirit of the Wilds, and such disorder could no longer be allowed. A living presence was needed there. One who would not be allowed a moment to rest. One who would restore the balance between order and chaos, regardless of the physical cost. By the time the druid will have fulfilled his contract, there will be nothing left of him. A small sacrifice, and one that the Spirit could live with.
"This Asterius does not know what he's just accepted."
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He felt as if he was falling. The world was tiny and so very far away, though it rapidly grew larger before his eyes, from the size of a grapefruit to the size of a shield and beyond in a matter of seconds. Soon, it took up his entire range of vision with its breathtaking beauty; deep blue oceans, fluffy wisps of clouds, the golden sands of deserts and the vibrant green of forests. A cold wind was rushing by his body as he hurtled ever downward. The Eastern Kingdoms continent grew massive, and with a scholarly interest he noted how familiar the view was to a map, though many times more detailed than any map he had ever gazed upon. The Dun Morough mountains clawed at the sky with their majestic peaks, while the sprawling jungles of Stranglethorn covered the southern tip of the landmass like an unbroken carpet of trees. Even these sprawling landmarks were soon beyond his view as he drew closer to the ground, finally spying the stone walls of the human city of Stormwind. Fires raged from within the city, dark clouds gathering overtop the Cathedral as if drawn in by magnetism. Uncountable soldiers from both sides flooded the streets like ants in body armor. Asterius had only a second's glance at the battles before he came to the end of his trip; shot downward from the heavens by a celestial cannon to land with an explosive crash in the only speck of greenery within the entire city.
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The light faded, and Nara lowered her arms from in front of her face where she had instinctively raised them to protect herself. Of the makeshift totems, there was nothing left but odd craters in the ground. The moonwell seemed to be bubbling as if it had been put over a giant flame to boil, and its radiant glow made the night elf's hair stand on end. The healer druid again was floating face down in the waters, and steam curled up in various places along his wooden body. With a sigh and no small amount of hesitation, Nara made a small prayer to Elune and climbed into the moonwell, though she was surprised to find its waters to be pleasantly warm, like a hot bath. Struggling with the effort, she heaved with all of her might to flip the treant druid over. This time around, however, he needed no resuscitation. He was just staring at an empty space a few feet in front of his face in awe. His mouth hung open and his face held the slightly sleepy yet happily surprised expression of one who had just woken up to find all of his dreams had come true.
"Umm..." Her expression was twisted with worry, either for this druid or for herself. "Are you okay?"
After a long moment, the treant blinked. Asterius' only response was not in Darnassian, though no translation was really necessary. "...Whoa."
He stood, surprisingly sure on his feet, and made his way over to the pile of totem rejects that Nara had brought from earlier. He knew what he had to do now and enough time had already been wasted.
"How long was I gone for?" He asked as he selected a stately portraiture of some human king from gods knew how many years ago. The artwork was fantastic. This painter truly knew how to bend reality to show his ruler in a good light. The painted face staring back at him was such an idealized view of human beauty that it almost made the druid laugh as he snapped the picture frame in two and began to shred it into kindling.
"What do you mean?" The elf asked, confusion in her voice. "Gone where? You had cast a spell or something, a bright light flared, and then you were floating in the water."
Asterius raised a leafy eyebrow, but wasn't too surprised. He had no idea of the extent of these elementals' powers, and he certainly couldn't put something like this past them. Finished with shredding the portrait, he dug a small fire pit outside of the moonwell and surrounded it with round stones. He sat with his legs crossed before the circle and gathered up the remains of the picture. Under the watchful and curious eye of the night elf priestess, he set the tinder within the pit and blew steadily onto the pile of wood and canvas. A single spark winked into existence from within the shredded portrait. The instant his breath touched it, it blazed into near bonfire status, consuming the ruined portrait with flames that stretched three feet into the air. Even after its fuel had been burnt to ash, the unnatural fire continued to burn, hungrily lapping at the sky.
"What are you doing?" Nara asked. The ways of the shaman were completely unknown to her, and she couldn't help but be amazed at the performance. If she had any sense at all, she would have followed her kind as they sensibly retreated into their homes long ago. Actually, if she had any sense at all, she wouldn't have taken such a risk as caring for these foreign intruders in the first place. For some reason that she couldn't quite place, she just was not able to leave well enough alone. The tranquil treant had locked his body into a meditative pose, and his expression of perfect serenity was unbroken as he replied.
"My friend has been dead for some time. Her spirit has left its body and is wandering, lost and confused. I need to find her before she makes her way to the next life." With his hands cupped together, he gathered water from the moonwell and splashed it onto the fire. The hissing steam rose a few feet and remained near head level as if suspended. As he was surrounded by the mist, the sigil of the Wilds carved into his chest began to glow a deep purple.
"What... what can I do to help?" The treant opened one brilliant green eye and regarded her with a mix of respect and amusement.
"You're a Priestess of Elune, aren't you?" Asterius took several deep breaths of the mist in. His own spirit began to rise from his body, freed from the bonds of flesh. Before he disappeared completely, he whispered, "Pray."
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Asterius' spirit flew through the air like an arrow. This was beyond the flight of any bird, burdened by the pull of the earth and the weight of its own flesh. In his incorporeal form, colors and shapes blurred together into an indistinctive mass of grey. It was no matter. He could feel where he needed to be. The human city may have been formless in his eyes, but the battle that raged within it could not have been clearer. The spirits of the fighters, the non-Syreen ones at least, glittered with the color of blood and fire. Red for the rage that burned in their souls. Orange for the determination and perseverance to fight for their lives and their cause. Yellow for the fear that their next step might be their last. The souls of the living were quite easy to distinguish.
The souls of the dead, of those who had fallen in battle, filtered up above the city like clouds of smoke or bubbles rising to the surface of the sea. Their colors were of confusion, sadness, acceptance, denial. They huddled together instinctively, without rational thought. They would remain here, haunted and unable to rest, until their spirits had calmed enough to attain tranquility and find their way to the next realm. Those who could not would wander endlessly as wraiths, doomed to cause misfortune and bloodshed on the living unlucky enough to cross their path.
Asterius floated into the crowd of the dead, unable to block out their emotions from his mind. He winced after every one he passed; it was another mark to add to his mental list of soldiers who had died under his command. Another entry on his running tally of lives he had personally ended. It was a very long list, and he wondered how many more entries it would be before his soul could no longer take the blame without breaking.
Such thoughts did not help the matter at hand. Rather than avoid the spirits, he focused closely on them, despite the strain on his conscience. Their souls may have only been brightly colored orbs of light, but they were surrounded by a faint shadow of their former selves. Asterius went from soul to soul, peering into their disoriented pain until he could discern who they had been in life. An orc soldier impaled on a spear. A troll archer with his head in his hands. A human mage riddled with a dozen arrows. On and on he went, scene after grisly scene, made to relive the violent deaths of a thousand beings.
Each death took a mental toll, and each death struck him even deeper within his very core. He had long since passed his limit, to the point where each soul made him cry out and beg for this carnage to stop. In his tormented state, he almost didn't notice when he finally found the soul which he sought. Amongst the swirling masses of the dead was Leda's spirit. Even in death, she took the form of the bear that suited her so. Her soul was animalistic. It held no confusion or fear, only a snarling anger. It snapped at Asterius as he neared it. He shouted wordlessly to her, begged her to remember. He reached out with an phantasmal hand. Take it, his spirit said soothingly. Take it and let's go home.
She bit down with her toothy muzzle, trying futilely to rend flesh from bone when there was no flesh or bone to tear. Asterius' spirit shrugged at her instinctive attack. It would do. With her firmly attached to his arm, he dragged her spirit downward, back toward the shining beacon of his body.
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Nara sighed. She had never felt so helpless. The treant had not moved for nearly half an hour. He had not even breathed. The only action she had seen it take was the tears that continued to make their way down his wooden cheeks. The magical fire blazed in front of him, and the bear and tauren bodies of the other druids lay beside him. All she could do was watch patiently.
A shudder ran through the treant's body; the first movement for what had seemed like ages. Instantly alert, Nara hurried over to his side. She didn't know what to expect or what she could do. All she knew was that she had to be here.
Eyes still closed, the treant extended a hand over the sleeping tauren's body on his right. His remaining hand hovered just over the head of the bear corpse. His left hand clenched tightly into a fist, shaking less than an inch above the lifeless feral body. Within his palm, a mysterious light smoldered like the ashes of a dying fire. The light seemed to travel up through his branch-like arm, cracking the bark as it passed before settling into his chest around the vicinity of the carved totem glyph. The treant's mouth was stretched wide and his eyes were clenched tightly shut. It almost seemed like he was screaming, though only the crackle of the magical fire could be heard. His entire left side looked as if something had tried to break out from within, and hairline fractures made a spiderweb-like pattern down his arm, glowing green like the druid's eyes. The light didn't seem content to rest. It continued its journey down his right arm, followed by the hiss of superheated wood. The druid's right hand convulsed uncontrollably as the light settled within it, spasms twisting the clawed fingers into unnatural shapes with a sickening crack. With a sudden jerk, the treant pushed his hand down onto the skull of the tauren. The tauren's eyes opened with a gasp, and he sat up with a sudden movement. The treant fell backwards with a movement just as sudden, as if he had been felled with an axe.
"Tree?" It was Iyo's voice, only different. An echo accompanied it; a gruffer, though still as close to feminine as Iyo's vocal cords could allow, voice that sounded nothing if not confused. Asterius answered, though he either didn't bother to get up or simply couldn't.
"Hullo, Leda. How do you feel?" He asked from his position sprawled out on the floor.
"I feel... weird." S/he said. Hir eyes widened in surprise as s/he realized who s/he was talking to. "Hey, you're dead!"
"Yeah, I get that a lot."
It might have been because she was in control of Iyotanka's quick mental processes, but Leda swiftly followed that train of thought to its conclusion. "Then that means... I'm dead!"
"Only for the moment, little sister." Asterius groaned. He tried to sit up and failed miserably. "If I have anything to say about it, you'll be alive and back in your own body in a minute."
The treant tried once again to sit up with only marginal success. "Make that two minutes."
"Back in my own...?" Ledotanka mumbled. Curiously, s/he looked around, her eyes passing over the bear corpse nearby. Hir jaw dropped and s/he screamed. S/he looked down at hir own body and screamed again. "HOLY BLEEDING FRICK ON A STICK!"
Calm down, it's not so bad!"
"Says you! I'm dead! And Iyo! And dead!"
"You're just temporarily borrowing Iyo. Your old body was too damaged and we had to put you into his body until I can make a replacement."
"Well hurry the hell up!" S/he said, panic rising in hir voice, pointing to hir body in horror. "I have nads!"
"They're Iyo's nads, and I'm sure he'd appreciate you not messing with them. Just let me get to work."
Ledotanka's head bobbed up and down so quickly that Asterius could hear cartilage cracking. "Right, right... What do you need?"
Asterius held up three fingers. "I need time, I need to be completely uninterrupted, and I need that elf over there.
He was pointing to Nara Meideros, who seemed frozen in a bug-eyed expression of shock. She had just witnessed the very strangest sights she could have ever dreamed of, and a sickening feeling was building within her that they were only just getting started. She mumbled a question to Elune under her breath.
"What did I get myself in to?"
The goddess didn't deign to answer.
