## A Whisper of Warning by Delilah S. Dawson The afternoon sun filtered through the crimson leaves overhead as Alleria Windrunner walked the path toward Silvermoon City. In times past, happier times, she might have flown or used a portal to appear inside the city walls, but as it was, she approached warily, as if nearing a sleeping beast that did not wake gently. Once, she had defended these walls, these people. But now? Now, to many, she was the source of danger. Funny how she had faced the most terrifying monsters, demons, the very worst of the Horde, and yet here the thought of passing through a simple gate filled her with trepidation. *Turn around and leave. This place is full of enemies. Everybody hates you.* Alleria ignored the whispers. When they were this foolish, it was easy. Her boots carried her forward. Her mission could not be stopped by her own fears, much less by those that came from her connection to the Void. Recently, Khadgar had summoned her to Dalaran, where he’d asked her to investigate something called the **Dark Heart**: an object that **Iridikron** had found within **Aberrus** and given to a being known as **the Harbinger**. For all his wisdom, Khadgar knew nothing more; regardless, Alleria was accustomed to acting on vague reports and would soon uncover the meaning of this new threat—and end it. But first, she had to do something that worried her far more. She had to speak with her son, **Arator**. Whatever was coming, whatever the Dark Heart portended, she had to warn him to stay away from it. Despite their estranged relationship of late, despite her spending time in the Rift to be away from Stormwind City and constantly on back-to-back missions, she could only hope her son would listen. And so she stood at the gates to the city her son called home and watched a familiar figure stalk her way. > “Alleria Windrunner. Have you forgotten that you were banished from > Silvermoon?” “**Lor’themar**,” she responded with less respect than he surely preferred. Her sights landed on his gleaming armor. “Have you been demoted to guard duty? Such a petty task seems below the station of Regent Lord of Quel’Thalas.” He raised a long white eyebrow. “When there is a significant threat that requires my attention, I attend.” “I am no threat, old friend. At least, I would assume that if you found me threatening, you would not have invited me to your wedding. Not that your wedding was uneventful— or without its threats. I never did get to taste that exquisite lavender cake.” “I can direct you to the baker, if you’d like to commission one similar.” Lor’themar opened a gate and stood there looking somber. “Why are you here, Alleria?” The city shone behind him, glimmering white walls with red tiled roofs and gilded frames, the sun glinting off windows. A place so familiar, even if subtle differences showed in the process of reconstruction after the ravages of the Scourge. A place she had known all her life. A place she was no longer welcome. “I came to see my son. I am leaving shortly on a mission, and I wish to say goodbye.” “An admirable reason to cross our threshold. But remember this, Alleria. Your welcome, if one can call it that, extends only so long as the sun touches Silvermoon. Once night falls, you must leave.” These were the same conditions upon which she had agreed to attend his wedding in Suramar—one day, and no later. Even as a former ranger-captain of Silvermoon and a hero, she knew the city would treat her as they treated all enemies if she were to overstay her welcome. Alleria’s chest tightened. “I am no enemy. You must understand, what happened at the Sunwell was an accident—” Lor’themar waved a hand, cutting her off; few others in Azeroth would dare to do so. “Accident or not, the damage was done. The people do not trust you . . . I am still not sure I can trust you. But . . . go and visit your son while you can. The light is already fading.” *Now return to the Sunwell and finish our communion.* *You owe Lor’themar nothing.* *Claim what is yours. Destroy him and take this place!* He gestured to his guards to follow her, then strode away as Alleria’s hands went to fists, creaking in their gloves. They were both right, she and Lor’themar, and she loathed that. She was culpable for damaging the heart of her people’s culture, but she truly had not known that just being near the Sunwell might allow her Void nature to corrupt its magic. Being in the presence of that ancient, magical fount had soothed her soul at first, like standing in full sun after an eternity of dark and stormy nights. She had felt the power flow into her, filling her with Light—and then it were as if she herself had become a portal, and creatures of the Void spilled out like pus from a wound. And then she had risked her life to fight the catastrophe she had unleashed. But it was not enough to end what she had inadvertently started. As much as she hated to admit it, in many ways, she was a threat to everything she loved—which explained why she had been keeping her own loved ones at a distance, as she had explained to Khadgar during her visit. Still, she had ties here, old and new, and the Regent Lord had at least honored that history. > “Accident or not, > the damage was done. > The people do not trust you . . . > I am still not sure I can trust > you. But . . . go and visit your son > while you can. The light is > already fading.” She ignored the whispers—from the Void and from her own conscience—and refocused on her goal, even as Lor’themar’s guards fanned out around her, keeping their distance. She would be unable to walk freely, but that changed nothing. They were there to stop her from harming the city, but that had never been her intention. The streets of Silvermoon were being recobbled, but they still felt the same under her silver-chased boots, were still imbued with the same beauty and magic. The trees lining the path had pale bark and branches with eternally orange leaves, and the large white columns were right where she remembered them to be, rising tall on either side of her. Alleria knew her way here, and as she walked, memories floated up, layers upon layers like watercolor paint built up in many washes. As she walked, the residents of Silvermoon came into sharper focus, and their unease was palpable. Spotting her, people retreated through open doors and disappeared down alleys. Faces with perked ears appeared in windows before drapes were quickly drawn. Indeed, Lor’themar was right. The people did not trust her. They actively seemed to fear her. Word must have spread about the Sunwell—spread, and perhaps grown in the spreading like some foul, destructive fungus. Or perhaps it was the heavy white-and- silver armor on her left arm and the enormous bow that never left her side. She was a warrior through and through, and commoners often reacted to her like rabbits stilling in the shadow of a hawk. *How easily they turn on you. Like your true love has turned on you.* *You repulse Turalyon.* *Your son fears you too.* *Unleash what repels them. Destroy them.* *Destroy all the unworthy insects here. Seize your power!* Alleria’s steps hastened. Perhaps it looked the same, but this place no longer felt like any sort of home. In truth, she was not sure what home even meant to her anymore. She strolled past scaffolding where carpenters and masons worked to rebuild various structures, and toward a row of houses, a place she had only ever heard about from **Arator**. Even though he was a man grown, she still saw in him the wailing bundle she’d handed off to her sister **Vereesa** when she’d journeyed beyond the Dark Portal, before fate had turned her life upside down. Since her return from the Twisting Nether, she had kept her distance, fearful her connection to the **Void** might harm her son. And so her relationship with him had withered. But with every heartbeat pounding in her chest, she would see their bond mended, as much as it could be, and impart her warning that he needed to stay safe, here in the broken but cherished city she had walked as a child. She would fight as she always had, for the safety of her son and for the world they shared, and he would carry forward her hope for a time when this world would know peace. Finally, she stood before the blood-red door. The golden door knocker was shaped like a **phoenix**, its worn metal suggesting that at some point visitors had been welcome here. Through the open window, she heard a voice that made her heart race and her eyes light up. What was her love doing here? She paused a moment, like a good ranger, to see what awaited her on the battlefield. > “Did I ever tell you about how your mother and I introduced the elekk to the Army of > Light?” Turalyon said. “We’d worked with them on Draenor, and we suspected their > tenacity, hardiness, and intelligence would make them boons as mounts.” > “I seem to recall that you’ve mentioned it.” Hearing that voice, and the subtle but fond annoyance in it, Alleria’s heart melted. Her son. **Arator.** Once an infant in her arms, barely visible through her tears as she said goodbye, knowing that leaving was the only way to keep him safe. Then a toddler with a sword who thought war a grand thing. Then a boy sitting upon the shoulders of a Knight of the Silver Hand, looking up at a statue of the mother he barely knew in the Valley of Heroes, feeling the warmth of her love beamed across the universe in the Light and reaching for her graven face. **Now he himself was a Knight of the Silver Hand.** > He had tasted war.