I am not prepared

[Illidan Stormrage]

Cement filled his muscles, dragging him to the ground. Scored flesh stung and bled. Beneath a pale green sky, dozens of lesser creatures glared at him, gazes pregnant with judgement and hatred, something with which he was far too familiar. Worst of all, that insufferable harlot frowned beneath her black hood, chakra clasped in two tight hands. The steel glinted, slick with his own blood. The heat seeped from him, and in moments he would be a cold corpse. 

"It is finished," Maiev says, passionless, her lips barely registering the movement required to make the sentence. "You are beaten."

Even the fury that sustained Illidan for so many years was leaving him, oozing from his wounds and pooling about him. Still, if he had to die here, he would drive into that bitch one final thorn in her side. "You have won, Maiev." His mouth moved like it was filled with cotton, and just as dry. "But the huntress ... is nothing without the hunt. You ... are nothing ... without me."

Illidan would've chuckled if his breath held in his lungs as he watched the stern, sharp expression on Maiev's face soften as the realisation hit home. "He's right. I feel nothing. I am nothing."

She spoke more, but Illidan's ears closed shut. His vision blurred, eyelids slinking downwards. His time was now. The struggle was done.

---

"No!"

Illidan's will would not be so easily quenched. A renewed vigour flared inside him, awakening his body from its death slumber. Twin blades in hand, Illidan lunged to his feet with a guttural roar, eyes afire, tattoos shimmering like rivers of green through his violet skin. 

But there was nothing, and no one. No gaggle of misfit 'adventurers,' no vindictive and irritatingly persistent Maiev Shadowsong, no Black Temple, no lime-green sky ... just an empty expanse of white, rolling forever to the horizon. 

Was this death? Much less physical agony than he expected. Weren't cursed beings supposed to be torn apart by the Light, banished to some eternal suffering forever more? Illidan spat. "Pah."

The tinkling of water caught his attention, and Illidan instantly became aware of the rawness of his throat. He dropped his weapons, the steel clanging on the ground, and rushed to the edge of a black marbled fountain. Cupping his hands, he plunged them into the water and brought them to his chapped lips, slurping. Again and again he drank, feverishly, until his lips and chin dripped freely.

Illidan took in a deep breath and fired it out. His shaking hands slowed until they stilled. Every trickle of water no longer set his teeth on edge, instead becoming the only background noise in the desolate void. In that moment, he took stock of his body. He ran fingers over his naked torso, but found no slashes or dried blood. He pressed his stomach, chest, sides, but he was completely healthy. As his questing hands massaged down his legs, he noticed something quite out of the ordinary; his original feet.

He hauled a foot onto the rim of the fountain and examined it. Each toe wriggled and curled at his command. Where was his cloven hoof? 

Illidan gazed into the shifting sheet of water and at his reflection. A hand slapped his forehead and rubbed the skin above his eyes. His horns were gone! He tried flapping his wings, but nothing happened; they were absent as well. Even the bright light that blazed from the runic tattoos inked into his torso and arms had faded. His knuckles bumped an object cinched to his belt. He plucked it free. The Skull of Gul'dan. 

Had his death reverted him to the form before he consumed the Skull of Gul'dan? Was he no longer part demon? What the hell was going on here?

Black vapour plumed from the empty eye sockets, and Illidan breathed it in. The fetid stench of fel magic sank into his lungs and perforated his soul. He stared at the skull, the powerful energies of Gul'dan still brimming within. He had consumed its power to stop Felwood from being corrupted by the Burning Legion, but it had caused so much grief for him since. The final chance he had to redeem himself to his brother and Tyrande shattered when they learned that he had absorbed its essence rather than have destroyed it.


Illidan snarled at the fleshless head in his clawed hand. What right did they have to judge him? He stopped the infestation of fel magic in the forest, thereby ending the threat! Why couldn't he strengthen himself at the same time? Blasted puritans, incapable of seeing the true strength that lied behind the foggy waters of the Twisting Nether.

He stared at that orc skull for a long time, the black smoke wafting. The power could be his again. He wanted it, craved it. And yet, a voice, so small and meek that he hardly heard it at all, suggested to leave it be. Why? He couldn't find a tangible argument. But a strong gut feeling came with it. He turned the chipped bone in his hand. The longer he bore his eyes into it, the more he wavered on the decision. Was this some sort of conscience freeing itself from Gul'dan's corruption, warning him of another bleak future?

Illidan grunted. He tied the skull to his belt once more. The decision would have to wait.

So what now? More questions than answers, as always. For all he knew, Maiev Shadowsong or that damnable Kil'jaeden could be breathing right down his neck and he wouldn't know it. Illidan was never a fan of staying in one place for too long, unless it was for the purposes of building his power. Staring wistfully at his reflection in a fountain didn't count as that. The night elf scooped up his warglaives and walked away from the fountain. There was nothing on the horizon that he could see, but if there was a fountain, maybe there was something else somewhere else.

At the least, if he wasn't dead, it would give him time to think. Maybe he'd find another Portal like the one that flung him into Outland, maybe one that takes him directly to the Warden herself ...