Don't Poke The Bear! (Warcraft/FurbolgSI)

The city of Dalaran, the heart of the magocracy that bore its name, had been the capital of magic and a center of arcane research and development for over two thousand seven hundred years.

A place where humans, gnomes, and elves joined the study and exploration of the mysteries of the material and magical realm.

Now, it was a pale shadow of its former grandeur. Reduced to a crater of rubble and death, like a toppled house of cards by a demon whose power and cruelty defied sanity.

A demon lord that Jaina Proudmoore saw be blinded not once but twice and then banished in a conflagration of energies so potent that nothing of him remained.

Archimonde had been a monster like no other, but he wouldn't be the last. She could feel it; he was the first of many.

But hope was burning hot and strong.

Yet the catastrophic failure that was Theramore remained a dark stain.

A chain of events that might have been avoided had she and the people she brought from across the Eastern Kingdoms not been forced to flee.

The truth was that it had been a losing battle against time.

The Horde had been a tenuous neighbor and impossible allies from the beginning; what her father did shattered any false semblance of stability that had been built with the Alliance.

Jaina blamed much of it on herself. She knew the old Grand Admiral, Daelin, to no one's surprise.

He was her father, and he loved her dearly. More than anything, the loss of Derek magnified it to an obsession.

Despite their differing opinions, he loved her dearly, and so did she for him.

He would have burned the world for her, and it was for this that he was not of the living any longer.

A reality that, despite all logic, she couldn't forgive the Horde for… Thrall and Grommash murdered him.

The Lord Admiral's actions had been extreme and wrong, but were they entirely devoid of truth? No. The Daughter of the Sea started to believe there was more than irrational hatred of a wounded old man.

Sorrow and rage came into force, but those had been motivators and not the true reason for the migration back to the Eastern Kingdoms.

She should have opened her eyes; the world outside Kalimdor had not ended.

Be that as it may, deep in her heart, she knew a great conflict with the Warchief of the Horde was inescapable.

Theramore was abandoned for this reason. War was coming from the beginning.

The alliance of kaldorei, furbolgs, and half of the taurens choked out the Horde's ability to procure resources efficiently.

Jaina didn't wish for the Wild to suffer, but the interests of her people came first.

Her title of Grand Admiral had been a matter of urgency. If she so wished, she could have retained the title, but judged it wiser and more practical for the mantle of position to befall her mother.

From then on, she tirelessly worked toward the healing and rebuilding of the Alliance with Kul Tiras' full support behind her. Isolationism, as the island nation cultivated in the last decade, couldn't be continued.

Vengeance against the Horde was thirsted, bloodlust thick even in the common man, but it couldn't be attained in the short term.

Alone, they stood only to be pointlessly massacred; what unfolded on Kalimdor and the loss taken broke any illusion of the opposite.

It was on this very basis that the Alliance was founded, its finer workings and membership changing over time notwithstanding.

It wasn't the Alliance of Lordaeron but its successor; nonetheless, it remained the Alliance.

The efforts of Kul Tiras were shifted to a more productive end. Military, logistical, and humanitarian aid were sent in greater quantities than ever before.

Stromgarde had been one of its greatest beneficiaries, reinforcing the already present Stormwind forces spread thin. Traitorous Alteraci criminal organizations, trolls, ogres, and undead had not seen the defeat of the cradle of humanity.

Yet a failed coup during a banquet happened, leaving the orchestrator, the crown prince, and his collaborators six feet under, and his father was paralyzed from the waist down by a deadly poison.

The crippled king was only saved in extremis by priests and paladins sent to help the monsters scouring the Arathi Highlands. Duke Lionheart was the first at his bedside.

Thoras Trollbane left a shadow of his former self, yet still carried his duty as warrior king above all else, pledging allegiance to the Alliance as he did in the Second War.

It was an act of both logic and gratitude; his kingdom's chances of surviving alone were slim before he lost his legs. Now, this fate was inevitable if he did nothing.

The reprieve brought by the Alliance was neither free nor without expectation.

Thoras Trollbane was no ungrateful swindler or spineless schemer or treacherous man.

Unlike his failure as a human being, that was his son, and half of his court who served the nation better with a head shorter and six feet under.

He was a warrior, not brainless, unlike them.

Grand Admiral Katherine accepted with little fanfare. It had been the end goal from the beginning.

Stormwind, Ironforge–dwarves and gnomes–and Dalaran welcomed the oldest human kingdom soon after.

And help was funneled mostly to Dalaran through Jaina's proactivity. Grand Admiral, she may not be any more Archmage of the Kirin Tor than she became.

She stepped up to the position, increasing the number of members from three to four, making her one of the youngest members since the Council of Six's inception.

The sorceress had felt honored and accepted in heartfelt ways, even if she wasn't blind to the reasons outside her skill in the Arcane and ties to her mentor.

It meant more resources were allocated to Dalaran.

And with a mother willing to listen, the construction project went smoothly, but it was hardly the only reason for the magocracy regaining its strength.

The news regarding the treatment of the high elves–renamed blood elves by their prince–by the Grand Marshall under the name of Othmar Garithos had angered Jaina greatly.

She would have had the man imprisoned, executed even.

Arguably worse was the sheer passivity of two of the council members in the face of that man; none agreed, but inaction was no better.

Rhonin, absent, saving any managing to flee Archimonde's laughably easy destruction of Dalaran, shared her opinions and wasn't silent about them.

And as the leader of the mysterious group atop the Violet Citadel that was the Kirin Tor, his voice demanded obedience.

Perhaps some could see pragmatism in this choice; they had very little real political and manpower power at the time, but Dalaran could have been retaken without this senseless abuse.

Jaina did not reciprocate Kael'thas' feelings, nor was she particularly close to the elven prince beyond being polite acquaintances, but she grasped his character.

He was a kind and gentle person who equally loved humans and elves.

To have your entire life, and everyone you loved, torn asunder, only to be betrayed afterward, was something she wouldn't wish on her worst enemy. It was repugnant.

He did not deserve this.

Be that as it may, guilt and regret twisted in Jaina's heart; if only she had acted at the burning of Stratholme, stopping the spiral downward of her lover.

If only.

How asinine this wishful thinking was… yet it weighed heavily on her mind, as did too many things from the past years.

Things were not as simple still, but to enslave refugees was short-sighted, foolish, and unacceptable.

And Jaina wasn't quiet about this madness; the knowledge was spread, and outrage was the standard reaction.

Until she revealed it, most had been kept secret or obscured by half-truths. But nobody was able to stop the sorceress from spreading the truth.

What mattered was taking the pieces from there, and that was her mission since her comeback.

If one aspect of her retreat could be positive, it was the relative shortness of her time in Kalimdor. She wasted far less than she could have.

The situation in the Eastern Kingdoms did not deteriorate further than it already had.

The loyal quel'dorei that accompanied her helped to mend the division resulting from this grave mistake; their small number was an equally minor hindrance, as their voices couldn't be drowned out.

They learned of what happened, both to their gilded kingdom and the treatment of their kinsmen. The truth was given to them first.

The general uninvolvement of Kul Tiras after the internment option was elected instead of extermination for the orcs, and the innocence of the islands nation concerning Garithos' wrongdoing created a much-needed distinction to the wider Alliance.

Quel'Thalas was second to Dalaran in aid received. Vital relief of every form was provided against the Scourge.

Initially, it was taken with great caution; the Regent Lord, Loth'remar, and his people were distrustful and defensive. Rightfully so, but like a storm, it wasn't monolithic.

The Alliance's help, funded in grand parties by Kul Tiras, tore through even the most resentful of sin'dorei.

Silvermoon was far from reconquered, as was the Eversong Forest and surrounding elven territories, but the capital was slowly won over, as were the lost lands.

Smaller villages and cities with pockets of forest were retaken with the force sent. Quel'Thalas was greatly diminished, but it remained proud and standing.

Anger and resentment remained in the hearts of many of the wronged elves, and Jaina found it impossible to see a fault in it.

Still, it was great to see these sentiments be whittled down in the blood elves and have their opposite rise. Only a fringe branch sliver of the population shared these vitriolic cocktails of hate and scorn any longer.

Then came quenching the blood elves' thirst for magic.

A known reality of any elves straying too far and too long from the Sunwell, one Jaina had grown familiar with in Theramore. How couldn't she have?

In the absence of the endless well of Arcane energy, this became a widespread pandemic. Like water, high elves needed it to live, but unlike the former, death was a slow, agonizing process filled with mental and physical deterioration.

It wasn't so easily tended, not entirely, at the very least. Infusion and concoction rich in Arcane or living in a place with a high and constant concentration were the solution.

This was manageable with a small population, but to something even a tenth of the high elves' number before the horrific tragedies wrought by Arthas…

It became exponentially complicated, but the difference between the two remained worlds apart.

And from this, the city of magic built above a potent leyline formation had even greater help.

Swiftly after, a new member of the Six was elected—Aethas Sunreaver, a blood elf.

An exceptionally young man by the species standard, but powerful, talented, and willing to stand above past mistakes.

With him, sin'dorei sharing his vision came by the thousands, wishing to reintegrate the magocracy, and through them, the tedious but necessary healing process became easier.

However, the war against the Scourge in their homeland, in an ironic turn of events, was aided by more than the living.

The Forsaken, led by Sylvanas Windrunner, the former Ranger General of Silvermoon, spared nothing to see the Scourge eliminated from the face of Azeroth.

They had spoken of the Lich King's shackles over their souls and bodies being broken: humans, elves, dwarves, and gnomes, with the majority being the first two.

They were mindless slaves no more and hated the Scourge as much as any of their victims as they suffered it in life and now death.

They were the subject of numerous debates within the Alliance, particularly in Dalaran. Many were heated, and these sentiments were spread throughout the social hierarchy. It concerned all.

Were they really free? If so, was it permanent or not? Was it a trap from the Lich King? One, they were unaware of themselves.

What differentiated them from the monsters they said they weren't?

To what point did their memories remain? Were they the same person or a new entity with a warped sense of self?

Was a mother, father, son, and daughter still the same person, yet in a different form, or something else masquerading as such?

Questions, questions, a lot of questions with no definite answers for the Forsaken lacked the answers to most of them themselves.

They were new to their conscious state of undeath. And many in the Alliance viewed them as abominations; regardless, a number of the undead didn't disagree as well.

Still, a war was unacceptable, but the matter couldn't be ignored.

Tensions were high from the initial failure of diplomacy regarding Stormwind and Ironforge, as well as the Scarlet Crusade's ceaseless aggression.

Even with the blood elves as a bridge–shaky even here–the understanding was fragile.

But nothing was impossible to recover, as shown by an almost recurring meeting in her quarters under the magical dome of Dalaran.

It was an absolute necessity; the Forsaken were neighbors to the city-state, and conflicts were to be avoided at all costs.

Something that wasn't appreciated about the Syndicate was that those bandits were rapidly going extinct.

To that purpose, Jaian didn't stay idle and opened diplomatic relations with the Forsaken.

However, the real progress had been made with a male human undead in old priestly clothing, accompanied by a woman Jaina personally knew and had believed to be dead.

This led to the present.

She brought the cup of tea to her lips, her gaze drifting lazily to the undead sitting before her. He was a man she knew in life, a natural product of her younger years in Capital City.

To this day, she found it hard to see the resemblance, even with the carefully tailored, high-quality priestly garb he wore, which hid the most significant damage, from rotting skin to exposed bones.

His skin was a deathly pale gray, with purple and green undertones; his face was skeletal, with patches of hair where a beard once was.

Yet there was no grime, sticky hair, or smell of decay; he cleaned and perfumed himself.

He took great care of his body.

He had to, but even the most skilled undertaker was limited, and it showed, with obvious signs including paralyzed muscles, a lack of breathing, a permanent hunch, and almost mechanical movements.

Those details were deeply unsettling, plainly wrong, and led to a sense of dissonance that evoked a primal fear and disgust in the average person at first sight.

That was without adding the all-too-fresh and painful memories of the Scourge.

There was no mistake; this was a corpse. Yet one with eyes burning in the pure gold of the Holy Light. They glowed with conviction and hope.

And the sorceress knew what this represented. The Holy Light was agonizing to any undead, as the magic holding them was in part Shadow, with a larger portion of Death and a smaller portion of Arcane.

The Light was, as such, usable by any undead willing to go through immense anguish from an illusion of false life and burning agony at the most minute of usage.

It wasn't the magic she saw Ohto wield; he would have turned to ash any undead. This whole line of reasoning was born of surprisingly insightful discussions they had.

"Lady Jaina, I know that I must tire you by repeating myself, but I must thank you once more for welcoming my lowly person in your great city." Alonsus Foal, the undead, said his tone was respectful and gentle.

"Nonsense, you can come and go at your leisure. It's nothing illusion cannot hide, and my seal explains. And you, Calia, has the travel been fine? Is your daughter well?" Jaina queried, placing her elegant teacup back with the Proudmoore heraldry on the table.

The last member of the Menethil royal family of noble birth paused, the biscuit in her hand frozen for a brief instant as a soft smile graced her features.

Icy blue eyes blinking and blond hair shifting in the sun.

She had changed much since her time in the royal palace. Her reappearance was an upheaval as great expectations were placed on her shoulders.

Surviving Loardonian, believing in the rebirth of their kingdom, flocked to her.

And this wasn't nonexistent among the Forsaken; the bulk of their population were once citizens of Lordaeron, and the princess had never been disliked, the opposite.

Her husband, a mere footman, proved this much—a story of true love that easily spread.

Alas, she had no desire to rule over her kingdom; war would come if she did. Lordaeron was lost, but her birthright was undeniable and couldn't be ignored as the first-born daughter of Terenas II.

The Alliance gave her authority over what was hers, one of the last fragments of her homeland, and where she had been hiding, the Hillsbrad Foothills.

A verdant and fertile land of plains and hills known for a deep history of bloodshed, miraculously spared from wholesale destruction by the Scourge.

And New Lordaeron was progressively taking shape there under her careful watch, with Dalaran just North of it.

"It has Jaina. Lianne is growing well, and we believe her potential in the Light to be great with how she reacts when anyone near calls its holy power, even when she isn't watching," Calia said proudly. The former Archbishop nodded knowingly at his pupil's words.

"Excellent, I'm happy for you, then let's pass the pleasantries. I have heard of goods from the new farms near Tarren Mills. Is that true?" Jaina hummed, plucking a warm cookie from the cake stand, which was kept at the perfect temperature using Arcane enchantments.

And they spoke for hours. The Forsaken would never be unanimously accepted, even with living family and friends.

Even among the blood elves, this was undeniable; very few were actually welcoming the undead elves with open arms.

However, this harsh truth wasn't enough to stop Calia and Alonsus from trying to bring the much-desired stability and friendship.

Neither was alone in that mindset on either side, but its antithesis was also true.

The Alliance and Forsaken would likely never become whole.

Alonsus was scarcely part of them to begin with, as were any truly willing to follow him. Sylvanas Winderruner wasn't pleased about the implications regarding their loyalties.

Jaina understood this displeasing truth of political intrigue, the Banshee Queen wouldn't tolerate dissidents to her rule. The old Archbishop was dangerously close to this status.

But there was a much greater problem in the present and on the horizon. For now, this was a more convenient arrangement, but it would not last.

*

Chapters in advance there: patreon.com/thebipboop2003