She sat there, her eyes wide with horror. Even the wind seemed to have stopped, as if it too was caught by surprise. Lord Valindil looked at her with sympathy in his eyes but he said nothing towards her.
Aegwyn felt her eyes begin to cloud with tears. She felt a single drop fall down her cheek.
The elf lord suddenly whipped his head to the south. His ears twitched and he began to narrow his eyes, as if he were concentrating. He stood still for a long moment and then hurried to her and grabbed her arm. “We must flee!” he said to her.
“W-why?” she asked, still shaken up.
“There’s no time!” he growled at her.
Like a flash, she saw Galion’s face as she was reminded that he had said the same thing before the goblins attacked them at the ruins of Northshire.
Aegwyn stood up and ran behind Valindil’s long fast steps. They came across a white charger in a grove in the woods. It was covered beautifully with mithril plates and long reins of velvet crimson. The horse had its ears pointed up and was staring around warily. The whites of its eyes were showing.
“Get upon the steed, milady! We must hurry!”
Aegwyn didn’t argue and she scrambled atop the back of the white gelding. The horse looked at her with its brows down, as if it were ready to buck her off at a moment’s notice. The horse looked at her for a few seconds with its big, black eyes, and then its hard gaze softened, as if it too knew she were the Guardian of Tirisfal.
Aegwyn really didn’t feel comfortable around these people.
Lord Valindil helped her move into the saddle and then he struck the white stallion in the flanks.
“Go Nightwind! Carry her far from here!”
“Wait!”
That was all she was able to say. The horse that the Lord Valindil called Nightwind started to gallop away. The trees began to blur into long streaks of green and brown about her and the wind whipped at her hair as the horse sped into the forest. She almost fell off. Aegwyn dug her fingers into the white horse’s mane and held on tight, burying her face in its soft supple coat.
Though she had her eyes closed tightly, her mind rushed back to the dream. The death knight appeared in the center of her vision. It’s green eyes burned into her mind and the cloak swirled madly about it, covering the decaying body of a necromancer. She closed her eyes tighter but the death knight’s sickly green eyes continued to stare into her own. She looked long into those dark and twisted globes of light. It was as though she could sense something hidden behind the foulness, though she didn’t know what.
The death knight in her mind quickly raised his hand and pointed it to the left. The white stallion stopped, tearing up grass and throwing dirt into the air as it halted. The horse reared and then turned left, as if it knew the death knight’s gesture. The wind started to tear at her cloak and dress as their speed picked up again.
The sickly green eyes started to fade and the dark, decaying cloak of the soldier of evil started to fade. The blackness of closed eyes trickled into the vision and soon everything was as it should be.
Aegwyn slowly lifted her face from Nightwind’s mane. She looked about to see the trees of the forest quickly rushing by her. They seemed to be on a pathway as the trees separated a long distance in front of her. When she looked behind, she only saw a large mass of green and brown, as if the trees had given her and the horse passage, only to close up behind them.
The thump, thump, thump of Nightwind’s hooves against the ground rattled her brain and the chanting of the Orcs and the clanging of their steel was alarmingly close. Nightwind started veering to the left and the noise started getting further and further away. For a brief flash she saw a blur of molted green and dark, charcoal gray. The howl of darkwolves echoed long into her ears and the curse of the orcish riders almost made her recoil.
In the distance in front of her, she saw a figure on the forest pathway speeding towards her. His blue cloak swirled and fluttered behind him as he lay low on his horse’s back. She tried to tell Nightwind to stop but the white gelding didn’t heed her call. The white horse halted, sending up grass and dirt once more and nearly unseating her from the saddle.
The rider stopped nearby, tearing up the grass with the similar effect. Aegwyn looked about to see that the trees had heavily clustered about them, as if they appeared in a circle, surrounded by walls of wood. She tried to find the clear forest pathway that had once been in front of them but it wasn’t there.
“Milady Aegwyn!”
Aegwyn looked at the rider as he pulled back the hood of his cloak. Her heart hoped that it would be Galion, or Tarmand, or even though he was far too tall, she hoped it was King Tarin. He had long fire red hair flowing from his scalp down to his shoulders and on his head was a chain of gold connected to a leather band that held back his hair. His clothes were long stripes of blue and black and on his left hip hung a jewel-encrusted sword and a silver scabbard dotted with emeralds. It wasn’t Galion, Tarmand, or even the dwarf king Tarin.
“I am Sir Tuinur, knight of the elves of Silvermoon. Where is Lord Valindil?”
Aegwyn looked at the elven knight, trying to piece all the events together. Everything was happening so quickly she didn’t even remember what had happened a few minutes ago!
“I...he...he told me to get on his horse...I...I did and then he...he told Nightwind...to take me away.”
The elven knight looked at her long and hard and then his features softened. “When I return to the forests of Quel’thalas, I shall write a song about the fall of the High Lord Valindil,” he said softly beneath his breath.
“Wait! How do you know he’s dead?”
Sir Tuinur rode up to her and placed his hand on Nightwind’s head. “His white stallion would never leave the Lord unless the need was dire. And if the need wasn’t so dark as it is, he would have mounted with you and rode to this place.”
She had wondered about that.
“Milady, there is little time. Even though the trees are friends of the elves, they cannot keep out the Orc armies. There has been a movement from the dark hordes within the past day. Huge battalions of trolls, Orcs, and goblins have been seen moving towards the alliance strongholds of the coast. Already, the human Castle Pallis has fallen to an Orc brigade and the mountain kingdom of the dwarves has been flooded with goblins. All of our forces are heading towards the seaport Annoria. Though the fleets of Lord Admiral Daelin Proudmoore have successfully kept the Orcish armadas away from the port, we cannot hold them forever. Our grip was tenacious, even when we held the lands most strongly.”
Sir Tuinur pulled the hood over his head. He gestured for her to follow.
His horse reared and started to gallop towards the wall of the tree-trunks. Aegwyn thought he was about to crash into the wood but suddenly, as if in the blink of an eye, the trees separated and the clear forest pathway she had seen before opened again.
She could hear the faintest sound of giggles in the distance. The gentlest clanging of plate armor against iron. There was the soft sound of laughter at such a high pitch that it couldn’t be any man or child. She knew that sound. There were goblins nearby.
The white gelding Nightwind reared and then sped down the forest pathway. The trees closed up behind them as they continued to flee, following the elven knight Tuinur.
The sound of giggling and shrieking died away slowly. Aegwyn looked behind to see flashes of brilliance, like the light of the sun reflecting off metal.
She clung to the mane of Nightwind as they sped after the elf knight Tuinur. Even though they were going so quickly that the bite of the wind stung her skin, they never seemed to get any closer. Suddenly, the tall spires of human settlements appeared at the end of the forest pathway. Large brick buildings and structures of stone greeted her as Nightwind started to slow. She could see many human townsfolk hurrying about as they prepared to leave the alliance beachhead. Dwarves hauling large packs of weapons and elves carrying about several bows hurried as ships started to set sail in the distance. Humans mounted upon horse and stallion hurried about, directing the flow of the armies of the city.
It was when they drew closer to the elven knight Tuinur that she realized that the seaport Annoria was in flames.
