Ashagga
09-19-2006, 09:32 PM
Cold.
The first thing I notice every morning is the cold. It is always cold. All day, I shiver from the cold, and at night, when I curl up in the sepulcher that my corpse once called home, the last thing to fade from my consciousness is the cold. I even dream of the cold.
Light, I wish the cold was all I dreamt.
There are others like me, many others. There are hundreds of us, maybe thousands. I can hear them at night, beneath the ground, shivering and screaming. They cry out as the hunger scythes through their guts, as the cold claws at their hearts, as the memories of the time before torment their minds.
I hear them, and I cry with them.
On the banks of Lordamere Lake, I once sat with a woman. On the banks of Lordamere Lake, I once kissed her lips, whispered her name, and listened to her song. I can no longer remember her name, or the taste of her lips, but I know the song's haunting melody. Through the trees of Tirisfal, the wind whispers it to me, and I would weep had I tears.
I remember when the snows came. I remember the monsters that came with them. From the darkness outside the walls of Lordaeron they came, and our light guttered in their fell wind. They came as screams, as whispers, as nightmares given twisted, rotting flesh. They came, and I lifted my blade.
To fight them was to fight Death.
In the end, I know, we were betrayed from within, but I cannot remember by whom. We fought the waves but we had as much hope as the shore does of withstanding the neverending tide. Others came from Stormwind, offering not aid but refuge for those who could flee. We gathered together those who would leave, and I sent her away. When my lord asked for men to remain and fight, I lifted my blade.
I cannot remember my lord's name.
They came again and again. They were as crows, and we felled ten of them for every man. They never ended. There was no hope. They numbered as many as the stars in the heavens. There was nothing in the world but their numberless hordes.
I do remember my blade. It was my father's, and my father's father's, unto the day when the last stone was placed in Lordaeron. It was forged of faith and fire, glass and steel. It was named Phoenix, and it was thrice blessed by the high priests of the Light. It could not break while my blood flowed.
On that day, my blade was lifted, and on that day, my blade was shattered.
For an eternity, there was nothing. There was no pain, no happiness, no memory, no future. It was oblivion. It was limbo. It was the worst thing I had ever known. All my life I had believed in the Light's reward, and in death, there was neither reward nor punishment. Now, I knew both were lies, and I could do nothing, feel nothing, think nothing, perceive nothing. Had I a mind, it would have driven me mad.
The first thing I felt was the cold.
At first, the sensation was so real, so true, that I could not name it. I had known nothing for so long. In the end, I knew it was cold because the blood on my lips, the blood she fed me was so hot that what I felt could be nothing else. It tasted wonderful, and my guts knotted in need of more. Since, I have known surcease from neither cold nor hunger.
I saw her for but a moment, the one who dripped the blood on my lips like a consecrating salve, but she was a terrifying apparition. My mind fled from her, and my body followed. I fled from my stony tomb, my limbs rotting beneath me. I knew in my heart that my spirit had reached hell.
Little did I know how right I was.
This is hell, but it is no afterlife. This is Azeroth, the world I walked when I lived, and I walk it now. I am one of them, one of the monsters that killed me. I have failed my love, for she lived and I died. I have failed my lord, for his castle has fallen and now belongs to them... to us. I have failed my ancestors, for Phoenix has shattered, and the shards scattered to the four winds. Everything I love has gone, and even the endless oblivion of death, the nothingness I once feared which now seems like such a salve, is denied me. I am the walking dead.
I am truly Forsaken.
I remember only fitfully, in shards and splinters digging into my mind's eye. I cannot remember her name, my lord's name, my name. For what, then, did I give my life? Was it meaningless if I cannot now remember it? The man I was... does he still exist? Does this shell still contain his thoughts, his dreams, or am I wholly the monster I appear to be? What makes me who I am? Am I my memories, or am I more?
While I exist, I am not done. My tale is not ended. I do not know what I have become, but I know what I am not. It has been said that a man's headstone is the last page in the book of his life, but my headstone is written and yet my book is not done. The next chapter must detail who and what I am...
...and what I choose to become.
The first thing I notice every morning is the cold. It is always cold. All day, I shiver from the cold, and at night, when I curl up in the sepulcher that my corpse once called home, the last thing to fade from my consciousness is the cold. I even dream of the cold.
Light, I wish the cold was all I dreamt.
There are others like me, many others. There are hundreds of us, maybe thousands. I can hear them at night, beneath the ground, shivering and screaming. They cry out as the hunger scythes through their guts, as the cold claws at their hearts, as the memories of the time before torment their minds.
I hear them, and I cry with them.
On the banks of Lordamere Lake, I once sat with a woman. On the banks of Lordamere Lake, I once kissed her lips, whispered her name, and listened to her song. I can no longer remember her name, or the taste of her lips, but I know the song's haunting melody. Through the trees of Tirisfal, the wind whispers it to me, and I would weep had I tears.
I remember when the snows came. I remember the monsters that came with them. From the darkness outside the walls of Lordaeron they came, and our light guttered in their fell wind. They came as screams, as whispers, as nightmares given twisted, rotting flesh. They came, and I lifted my blade.
To fight them was to fight Death.
In the end, I know, we were betrayed from within, but I cannot remember by whom. We fought the waves but we had as much hope as the shore does of withstanding the neverending tide. Others came from Stormwind, offering not aid but refuge for those who could flee. We gathered together those who would leave, and I sent her away. When my lord asked for men to remain and fight, I lifted my blade.
I cannot remember my lord's name.
They came again and again. They were as crows, and we felled ten of them for every man. They never ended. There was no hope. They numbered as many as the stars in the heavens. There was nothing in the world but their numberless hordes.
I do remember my blade. It was my father's, and my father's father's, unto the day when the last stone was placed in Lordaeron. It was forged of faith and fire, glass and steel. It was named Phoenix, and it was thrice blessed by the high priests of the Light. It could not break while my blood flowed.
On that day, my blade was lifted, and on that day, my blade was shattered.
For an eternity, there was nothing. There was no pain, no happiness, no memory, no future. It was oblivion. It was limbo. It was the worst thing I had ever known. All my life I had believed in the Light's reward, and in death, there was neither reward nor punishment. Now, I knew both were lies, and I could do nothing, feel nothing, think nothing, perceive nothing. Had I a mind, it would have driven me mad.
The first thing I felt was the cold.
At first, the sensation was so real, so true, that I could not name it. I had known nothing for so long. In the end, I knew it was cold because the blood on my lips, the blood she fed me was so hot that what I felt could be nothing else. It tasted wonderful, and my guts knotted in need of more. Since, I have known surcease from neither cold nor hunger.
I saw her for but a moment, the one who dripped the blood on my lips like a consecrating salve, but she was a terrifying apparition. My mind fled from her, and my body followed. I fled from my stony tomb, my limbs rotting beneath me. I knew in my heart that my spirit had reached hell.
Little did I know how right I was.
This is hell, but it is no afterlife. This is Azeroth, the world I walked when I lived, and I walk it now. I am one of them, one of the monsters that killed me. I have failed my love, for she lived and I died. I have failed my lord, for his castle has fallen and now belongs to them... to us. I have failed my ancestors, for Phoenix has shattered, and the shards scattered to the four winds. Everything I love has gone, and even the endless oblivion of death, the nothingness I once feared which now seems like such a salve, is denied me. I am the walking dead.
I am truly Forsaken.
I remember only fitfully, in shards and splinters digging into my mind's eye. I cannot remember her name, my lord's name, my name. For what, then, did I give my life? Was it meaningless if I cannot now remember it? The man I was... does he still exist? Does this shell still contain his thoughts, his dreams, or am I wholly the monster I appear to be? What makes me who I am? Am I my memories, or am I more?
While I exist, I am not done. My tale is not ended. I do not know what I have become, but I know what I am not. It has been said that a man's headstone is the last page in the book of his life, but my headstone is written and yet my book is not done. The next chapter must detail who and what I am...
...and what I choose to become.