After.

[Srelok]

As I sat by the calming waters of the pool, I let my mind wander back to the visions I'd seen earlier in the day.  I was still trying to make sense of it. I was put to sleep by a herbal nix and placed inside a disturbing echo of Frostfire...

Dark and desolate, with no sign of life whatsoever, its inhospitable wastes seemed to go on forever, instilling me with a distressing feeling of insignificance and loneliness.
"Hello..?"
words echoed around me, repeating back and forth: "Hello..? Hello..? Hello..? Hello..?
Letting out a low snort that reverberated around the wastes, causing the edges of reality to ripple, an ethereal frostboar trotted towards me â€" its ancient wrinkled face weathered but proud, its skin scarred and flayed in places. It had clearly seen better days.. Its weary, beady eyes regarded me curiously for a moment, then it motioned its head sidewise, as if to indicate I should follow. It trotted along at a slow but steady pace, looking from side to side almost cautiously.
The boar let out a low but loud squeal â€" the guttural outcry echoed throughout the desolate plains, causing them to seemingly rise and fall like an earthquake was happening. This was basically normal, considering I was locked in a dream-vision..
The boar stopped by a rocky-outcropping in the middle of nowhere. Suddenly, a female came into view... One I knew very well, though she seemed different then last I laid eyes on her. Different armour, for one.
"Srelok... Mok'ra."
"Mok'ra, wildeye.."
her smile widened at my words, as if my voice alone was making her happy already. She leaned in, taking my hands. The wastes around us seemed to close in, until my sense of insignificance was finally replaced by a warm intimacy, as if we were the only two around.
"I've..been thinking."
"Oh? " Dumbest comeback ever, but it was well known by now my eloquence with females was about equal to a half-rotten turnip...
"I don't want Trakmar. It's clear he doesn't like me. I want ye. And ye alone." My heart fluttered at this. But I couldn't help myself but make a stab at her over a conversation I'd had earlier with Throatrender.
"Not Sharptongue, then?" If she understood, she gave no sign.
"He's far too weak for me. What I told him was a test, to see if he was truly wishing to stick with his mate. I want ye." And then, she was kissing me. I reacted in the only way I know. Freezing. Hoping the emotions assailing me go away. Bring down the walls protecting me. She pulled back slightly, and she still held my hands. I was trapped...
"Ye don't want me?"
"I... I'm not comfortable having people touch me, I told you. This might take some getting used to."
She smirked at that, starting to undress while speaking in a low, seductive tone.
"I can help ye get used to it fast enough..." I had to remind myself this was just a vision. Not true. None of it. I told her I wouldn't, angering her. She was like nothingI'd ever seen of the real Wildeye. trying to manipulate me, trying to tear off my clothes.
"Everyone is a toy! Ye just don't know it yet. Hearts are sooo easily corrupted. So easily -used-. Ye will see... Oh, ye will see, my love!" After those words, she disappeared, leaving me alone with the boar. It stalked off through the disturbing emotional mindscape I was apperently stuck in..
Eventually my silent guide and I came to a campfire. A puddle of water trickled around it. Sat beside it, an enormous, crumbling limestone statue of Sharptongue. It was wailing and crying about Throatrender's death. I tried consoling it, but nothing worked.The wailing and crying increased in loudness until it was almost deafening. The statue was crying endlessly, its head in its hands. The saline tears that flowed from its eyes continually eroded it away â€" its lap half-dissolved, its legs eaten through as the tears started to pool on the ground. Eventually the statue just broke up, leaving behind it only misery and despair. Even that faded though.
The boar eyed me carefully, then moved on, breaking into a run. The world around me was silent, but unseen winds started to nip and pull on me. Distant yelling was heard about the wastes, anguished and disturbed, countless voices talking over one another in a great jumble of meaninglessness. I was nearly overwhelmed by the emotionscape I was trapped in. The wind continued to pick up in severity, until the boar came to rest by some lava-fissures… and a solitary she-orc appeared.
Throatrender's form was bruised, battered...And her neck was actually ripped open, blood streaming from the severed skin, her head nearly wobbling on her neck. She was carrying two wrapped up bundles in her arms, as I recalled.

I blinked angrily as the memories came. I never wanted any of this branded into my soul..
I forced myself to remember. Make sense of it.

Throatrender snarled angrily, narrowing her eyes. Her eyes looked dead, white and milky, but she was staring straight at me. Straight through me even...
"Ya were too late...! YA WERE TOO LATE!" Guilt ripped through me, even though I knew this was only in my mind. We -had- saved her after all.
"We weren't.. We saved you!"
"Too late... Dem killed me... Dem raped me, dem tortured me, dem killed me, made inta dis... Dem took EVERYTHING!"

She threw the two bundles she was carrying on the ground, right in front of my feet. Rolling from the cloth were the two babies....cold, blue and dead, their eyes opened and staring into nothing. I collapsed then and there, truly overwhelmed, most of the rest of this vision turning blurry as my mind reeled.
Even now, in this calm and serene place, I couldn't for the life of me recall what else happened. Then, the Boar moved off again, into a thick fog. When it finaly stopped, I looked around. This was a horror story... the ground smote with fel-energies, a village struck down in ruins… daemon and cultists wandering around, performing dark rituals. I walked to a large ruined hut, topsy-turvy as it stuck out of the ground. It bore the symbol of the Red Blade tribe on a banner. As I approached, the symbol before his eyes changes to that of… the Blightskull Clan. And a dark but familiar voice filled my mind, telling me to come in.
The Spirit Boar looked up at me thoughtfully... then disappeared slowly. I knew then I was in trouble. Both Sharptongue and Steelheart had warned me not to lose my  guide! I squared my shoulders, resigned I was lost in the vision now anyway, and stepped in to hear the voice that had haunted my dreams so often in the last twenty years...
"...Mok'ra... Son." There was only one response I could give the orc that stepped out of the shadows.
"I'm not your son."
Skar'lok Bloodaxe grinned malevolently, His face familiar even though he looked different. Gone where the armour and the axe that even now was spitting vile emotions into my brain. He wore robes and a staff that stank of shadow magic.
"Deny it all you wish... just as you deny the -true power- of the Legion. Yet you have come to me, at the end of the world... what do you want?"
That stare pierced my head, straight through the soul as it had when I was but a child hiding from him.
"What power? All there is, all there will -ever- be, is slavery."
"Slavery? You would be no slave, just as she is no slave."
He grinned evilly, and before I looked behind me I knew what I'd find.
"No... no! You will not have her!
Steelheart slowly entered the hut. Fel energies swirled around her, and she was covered in green runes and tattoos, glowing ominously. Horns protruded from her skull and there was a wicked grin on her face, bright red eyes looking at Skar'lok.
"Will I not? She was always mine. -Always-, from the moment I began to raise her. You were too late."
I remebered balling my fists, calling the sirits to aid me in wiping this stain from exiistence. nothing answered. The spirits had forsaken me.. He seemed to feel it, grinning wider.
"Come here, child."
"Yes...master?"
I could only look on in horror as Skar'lok smiled warmly at Rhonya, then reached out a hand to stroke her cheek, like a pet.
"Tell him you are not a slave."
"This isn't true..." I remembered muttering.
Steelheart leaned into the stroke willingly, shuddering a little in delight at the touch, before she turned her head slowly at Srelok, a near innocent look on her face as her eyes widened a little.
"A slave...? Ofcourse not..."
Skar'lok took that opportunity to gloat, as he would in real life, though I'd by now forgotten this was only a vision. I felt the rage in the back of my head awaken.
"She came willingly. And she learnt willingly. And now look at her... all grown up... I am so, so proud."
He patted her head like some perverted vision of a house pet.
"Good girl." Something in my mind clicked back in place. Hearing a tale of a dreadlord..
"Didn't anyone tell you? You're a dead orc." He seemed to enjoy that, grinning even wider.
"Dead? I am alive. I am -forever-, son. You will -never- be without me. In your mind and in your heart... for I am part of you." That was the straw for me, and I think I may have snapped there.
"Fine... Then I'll end you myself. Right here, right now." My axe was in my hands before I noticed what was happening. The coward stepped behind his niece, shielding himself with her..
"Surely you would not go through -her- to end me?" Knowing how Steelheart would feel if she was put back in that position, my mind was made up.
"If I have to. It would be a mercy."
She tilted her head to one side again, giving me that same, innocent look, blinking a bit. Infuriating. Trying to stop me like that...
"But I'm happy... Can't you see, cousin..?"
"I'm sorry cousin... I failed you."
"You leaving me with my uncle was the best thing you ever did..." That did it, and filled with rage and grief I struck at both. Skar'lok jumped back, pushing Steelheart at me, causing me to kill my own cousin.

I opened my eyes again. The pain, though imagined was still fresh around that mental wound. Again, I forced my eyes closed. I must remember everything...


"Look what you did!"
Rhonya looked up at me, her lifeblood slowly flowing out. I couldn't help but notice it was green.
"W-why... cousin... I-I..loved you.."
"Poor, sweet Rhonya.But she was always expendable." He cackled at me, like the true maniac I knew him to be.
"You're next, -father-." Patricide, in the tribe, would see me exiled. But the tribe was no more. THe elements had forsaken me, and it was just me and my father now... Who turned his back to me.
"Strike me down, and I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine."
He stepped forward towards me, defenseless.
"Give in to your hate." And by the spirits, I wanted to!
"You deserve it."
"And what do -you- deserve, foul son?"
"But I won't strike you dowm. Fight me!" Would he be brave enough to, I wondered.? He snorted.
"I will not look upon a -kinslayer-, much less fight him."
"Are you that cowardly, then? You forced this upon us. Face the consequences of your actions, Warsong." He looked back at me when I said that.
"Coward? Is that what you would name me? You were always so proud, so uptight. You do not deserve the weapon you wield." I looked down at my hands, the big axe still clutched in my bloodied fists.
"Neither do you. You are no orc." He turned fully and roared. In a flash, I noticed his nails elongating to actual talons.
"I am no orc?! YOU ARE NOTHING, SRELOK! NOTHING!"
"Then end this, and be done with it. Be a kinslayer."
I dropped the axe, the blade biting into the floor. He attacked me. So fast, I never even saw him coming. Despite everything, he was till a warrior of the Warsong. His claws raked through my skin, biting deep, nearly severing muscles.
"Gladly! You were always a mistake, always a regret! I am disappointed, son!" He kept slicing into me, But at least now he was close. And I was still my father's son.
I grabbed his throat and started squeezing. To escape, he stabbed his talons into my arm and my side. But even as I felt myself bleeding out, I kept my grip.
"You may kill me, but you'll never live to celebrate this minor victory... father."
As I felt him fading under my hand, my vision blacked out. When it returned... My hand was around Steelheart's throat. Skarlok was nowhere to be seen.
Steelheart gasped and her eyes were wide in fear, she looked pleadingly, trying to make me let go by clawing at my hands, crying.
"P-please.." It was all I could do to let go, disgust welling up within me. I'd already forgotten I killed her a while ago. She backed away, crawling, rubbing her throat, looking extremely fragile and incredibly afraid. She hid her face in her hands, her whole body shaking. I was just confused..
"Where did he go..?" Suspectng a trap, I retrieved my axe. Rhonya looked up, her eyes a blazing red, tensing her claws a bit. A voice echoed out from within my ribcage.
"In your mind and in your heart... for I am part of you." I recognised the voice.
"You are no part of me..." Stelheart sat up now, looking at me pleadingly.
"Why don't you embrace it...Cousin.. I did.. It's our destiny... Our purpose... I love you.."
She held out her arms to me, her eyes big and pleading.
"I love you too, but this is wrong. Come back with me..."
"I can't turn back.. There was never any way to turn back.. This is me. This is what I am -supposed- to be... And you as well. Give in..." I shook my head sadly. That it had come to this...
"No. I will not."
Steelheart started to crawl towards me slowly, her arms still extended. I backed away, the pain in my cheast increasing, radiating out of the cuts and wounds my father had dealt me.
"I will not give up!" I hesitated, holding out a hand toward her. A final plea.
"Come with me, back to the tribe..."
"There is no tribe... There is no family... Just us.. Bloodbound. This is my place...and yours too.."
As her voice faded and the world around me blackened to the tune of my father's mad cackling, I heard her one last time.
"You can never leave it behind..."

I opened my eyes, Looking into the Pool of Visions. I still couldn't make sense of it. But I knew I'd just faced my greatest fears.

And prevailed.