Christie Golden - War Crimes

Draenor.

It was the birthplace of the orcs, and for so long, the only home Garrosh Hellscream had known. He had been born there, in Nagrand, the most beautiful, most verdant part of that world. There, he had suffered through the red pox, and bowed his head in shame at the deeds of his father, the legendary Grommash Hellscream. When Draenor had become tainted with demonic magic, Garrosh had blamed that legend. He had been ashamed to carry Hellscream blood until Thrall, warchief of the Horde, had come to show Garrosh that although the elder Hellscream might have been the first to accept the curse, Grom had given his life to end it.

Draenor. Garrosh had not returned since he left, full of the heated fire of pride and a fierce love for the Azeroth Horde, to defend his new home against the horrors of the Lich King.

And now, it would seem, he was back.

But this world was not as he remembered it last, pulsing with fel energies, the wild creatures fewer and sickly. No, this was the world of his childhood, and it was beautiful.

For a moment Garrosh stood, his powerful body, adorned with the same tattoos that had decorated his father’s skin, stretching as he turned his face to the sun, his lungs inhaling the clean, sweet air. It was impossible—but it was so.

And in this place that was impossible, another unthinkable thing happened. Before his very eyes, his father’s image shimmered into shape out of nothingness. Grom Hellscream was smiling—and his skin was brown.

Garrosh gasped—for a moment no warchief, no hero of the Horde, no valiant warrior, but a youth beholding a long-dead parent he had never thought to see again.

“Father!” he cried, and fell to his knees, overwhelmed at this vision. “I have come home. To this, our birthplace. Forgive me for ever doubting your true nature!”

A hand dropped onto his shoulder. Garrosh looked up into Grom’s face, the words still tumbling from him. “I have done so much, in your name, and my own name has become beloved of the Horde and feared by the Alliance. Do . . . do you know, somehow? Can you tell me, Father—are you proud of me?”

Grom Hellscream opened his mouth to speak. A metallic, clanging noise came from somewhere, and Grom vanished.

Garrosh Hellscream awoke alert, as he always did.

“Good morning, Garrosh,” came the pleasant voice. “Your breakfast is prepared for you. Please—step back.”

If his jailers had waited but a moment longer, Garrosh would have known the answer to the question that had haunted and driven him all his life. If only he could throttle the infuriatingly composed pandaren for such an intrusion.

Garrosh, clad in a robe and hood, contented himself with presenting an imperturbable expression as he rose from the sleeping furs, stepped back as far as possible from the metal frame and glowing violet octagonal windows of the cell, and waited. The mage, wearing a long robe decorated with floral designs, stepped forward and began an incantation. The glow faded from the windows. She moved back and the other two pandaren—identical twins—approached. One brother watched Garrosh closely while the second slid a meal of tea and assorted buns through an opening level with the floor. As the guard rose, he motioned that Garrosh was free to take the tray.

The orc did not do so. “When will my execution be?” Garrosh asked flatly.

“Your fate is still being decided,” one of the twins said.

Garrosh wanted to hurl the food at the bars, or preferably, lunge faster and farther than anticipated and crush his smirking tormentor’s windpipe with a single massive hand before the little female could intervene. He did neither, moving with calmness and control to the furs and sitting down.

The mage reactivated the imprisoning violet field, and the three pandaren then left, ascending the ramp. The door clanged shut behind them.

Your fate is still being decided .

What in the name of the ancestors did that mean?

“It looks too peaceful and beautiful to be the prison of someone so horrible,” Lady Jaina Proudmoore mused as she approached the Temple of the White Tiger. She, the blue dragon Kalecgos, Ranger-General Vereesa Windrunner, and King Varian Wrynn rode in a cart drawn by a steady-footed yak, whose fluffy fur indicated the beast had been freshly bathed. In acknowledgment of the honored status of the passengers, the cart had been upholstered with silk cushions in vibrant shades, though the travelers did bounce a bit when a wheel hit a rut.

“Better than he deserves,” said Vereesa. She fixed her gaze on Varian. “You should not have stopped Go’el from killing him, Your Majesty. There is no other justice for that monster than death, and even that is more merciful than what he has done.”

The ranger-general’s voice was sharp, and Jaina couldn’t blame her. Especially as she completely shared Vereesa’s sentiments. Garrosh Hellscream had been responsible for the destruction—no, that was too kind, too clinical a word for what he’d done—the obliteration of the city-state of Theramore. The deaths of hundreds, all occurring in the space of a heartbeat, could be laid at his feet. The then-warchief of the Horde had contrived to trick several of the Alliance’s finest generals and admirals into assembling at Theramore, where they planned for the sort of warfare that involved an honest fight. Instead, Garrosh had dropped a mana bomb, its power magnified by an artifact stolen from the blue dragonflight, into the heart of the city. Everyone, every thing in the bomb’s blast radius had died. Jaina shook her head to clear the awful memory of precisely how some of them, people she loved, had been killed. Jaina Proudmoore would never again be the lady of Theramore.

A gentle touch on her arm brought her back to the present. Jaina looked up at the blue dragon Kalecgos, who had been the one good thing to come out of the disaster. He and Jaina might never have found one another if he had not come to Theramore asking for her aid in recovering the Focusing Iris. If the tides of war had brought Jaina a loving companion, they had borne away that of Vereesa Windrunner. Rhonin, the archmage who had held Jaina’s present title of leader of the Kirin Tor, had stood at the heart of the city, pulling the mana bomb to himself in order to magically contain the blast as best he could. In the process, he had forcibly pushed Jaina through a portal to safety. Jaina, Vereesa, the night elf Shandris Feathermoon, and a few of her Sentinels had been the only survivors.

The leader of the Silver Covenant had never—likely would never—truly recovered from the loss. Vereesa had always been strong and outspoken, but now her words were barbed, and a hatred cold and bitter as the ice of Northrend dwelt in her heart. Thank the Light, the ice thawed when she spoke to her twin sons, Giramar and Galadin.

Not so long ago, Varian might have risen to the bait and grown angry with Vereesa for her open condemnation of his choice. Now he merely said, “You may yet get your wish, Vereesa. Remember what Taran Zhu promised.”

After Varian had prevented Go’el—formerly hailed as Thrall, once warchief of the Horde and now leader of the shamanic order known as Earthen Ring—from dealing Garrosh the death blow with the mighty Doomhammer, Garrosh had been delivered into the paws of the pandaren, a people whom both Horde and Alliance trusted, and who had endured their share of harm at Garrosh’s hands. Taran Zhu, lord of the Shado-pan, had assured them that Garrosh would be tried, and justice would be meted out to all. The orc was presently imprisoned in the cellars beneath the Temple of the White Tiger, under heavy guard, and two days ago word had come from the celestial Xuen’s own emissary: We request your presence at my temple. Garrosh Hellscream’s fate shall be decided.