Northern
01-26-2006, 02:20 AM
Hail all. Being inspired by our Regiment writters, and those others in the Twisting Nether, I've decided to give writing a try in an attempt to explain a little of Northern. And so, I give you this short story. Hope you enjoy it.
The Failure of Northern Ironhull
10 years ago, Northern would have without thinking twice grabbed a trustworthy rifle, his father’s old axe, and a yelled Magni’s name as he slew the unsuspecting Dark Iron dwarf before him. Instead however, he crouched nervously reluctant behind a massive stone pillar under the cover of the black moonless night, his usual grayish skin blending perfectly with the stone before him. Next to Northern, who also stood on the edge of the remaining bridge of the Thandol Span, was the human Lark Valimor, son of Tofer.
During the second war, when the orc horde had taken to the sea to pursue the refugees of Stormwind north, Northern and Tofer had served on the same battleship. They had not been close friends, but friends none-the-less, and it was actually Tofer who had first taught Northern to play the fiddle. After the horde had been defeated, Tofer had returned to westfall to his wife, while Northern had joined the merchant fleet in sailing materials south to aid the re-building of Stormwind. Since the break up of the fleet, Northern had never again heard from or of Tofer until this afternoon, when by chance he happened while eating to overhear someone named Valimor trying to buy a room at the Menthil inn.
"Valimor?!" Northern had blurted out as he heard it, his mouth still full of fish and beer. The dark haired man talking to the inn keeper slowly turned around looking squarely in the eyes of the dwarf.
"Yes dwarf, what of it?"
Northern pointed his fork at Valimor as he spoke, "Might ye know a lad by the name of Tofer? Must be bald now it’s been so many years." At that Valimor instantly brightened up, slipping back his hood..
"He’s my father, know of him?"
"Ah spent 2 years trying te keep a’float a bucket of a battl’ship with him!" Northern replied. "Sit down lad an’ Ah’ll tell you all the dirt on yer father from when he was yer age!
For the next 2 hours Northern held Lark hostage listening to his old naval stories, some interesting, most where not. It was then, when Lark could finally get a word in between the blabbering of the old dwarf, he mentioned what he was doing in Menthil.
"The Thandol Span Northern." Lark mentioned is a low voice.
"What o’ it?"
The human leaned in close. "Word has it that the Dark Iron are mobilizing to destroy the last bridge." He pulled a folded sheet from his pack as he spoke, which upon it’s unfurling turned out to be some contract. "I’ve been hired to investigate, and should it be true put an end to the threat there." Lark looked hard at the dwarf’s gray face, and then suddenly sat back and spoke in a normal tone. "Say Northern, what have you got planned for tonight? Not too old for an outing I assume?"
Had he mentioned orcs, murlocs, or just about any other fiend in Azeroth, Northern would have finished his beer, thrown Lark to the ground for calling him old, and be ready with axe and shield before the human to push himself up, but the Dark Iron...
"Ah don’t know lad, ah had planned to leave to Theramore this nigh’.." Northern replied, hoping Lark wouldn’t inquire further, catching Northern in his lie.
"Aw come on!" Lark interrupted. "The chance to spend some quality time with your old friends son, do a good dead for your king, make some money!" Lark pushed the contract forward towards Northern’s red eyes, which remained uninterested, and a bit nervous. Lark however, didn’t give up. "I’d hate to have to go alone."
"Yer going te fight the Dark Iron alone? Ye want to be put away in a box an’ shipped home?"
"If I must, Havn’t been able to find any others around who I’d trust with my back, and this has got to be done, if we loose the last bridge north..." Lark drained his flagoon as he let his words sink into Northern’s bald head.
"Damn this lad is stubborn" Northern thought, staring into the fire at the end of the room. "And why has it go’ to be the Dark Iron.." Northern switched his gaze to his own dark hand as he thought.
"Ah can’t let ye go alone, Tofer wouldn’t have it." Northern finally reluctantly stated.
"Excellent!" Lark pounded the table with excitement. "Just for that, I’ll buy the next round!"
Northern only nodded in response.
And thus, here the paladin dwarf was. Hidden behind a pillar high above the sea on the Thandol Span, cursing the man next to him for dragging him along.
The Dark Iron Guard they where watching was only guarding in the sense that he was physically blocking the doorway. He stood leaning against one wall, a stein of something good smelling in one hand, a pipe in the other. He was defiantly drunk, in fact Northern wasn’t 100% sure he was even awake. Lark silently drew his daggers.
Northern never saw the human leave his side, he only noticed him gone when the guard suddenly slumped to the ground, spilling his drink on the road. Behind him, Lark dragged the guard away to a corner where he would not be found until day-break. Northern stepped forward and silently walked to where the Dark Iron had stood, picked up his pipe and put it to his mouth. Lark again disappeared into the shadow and begun descending the stairs into the bridges infested guardhouse.
The Paladin took a moment to collect his thoughts, and calm his inner fear. "Why am ah afraid?" he asked himself.
"Ye don’t want to be discovered ye daft fool, ye know that."
"But it shouldn’t matter, ah have loyally served Magni since the day ah became flesh. And now as a paladin, my honor shall not be questioned. It won’t matter."
"Oh really?" he answered to himself. "Then why hadn’t ye told anyone? Why..."
A sudden scream and a crash from somewhere down the stairs broke his meditation.
"Damn that human, no patience." Northern mumbled a quick prayer of blessing, un-slung his shield and axe, and charged down the stairway. Three Dark Iron laborers lay already slain at the first room he came to, all leaning over a table of meat and ale. "He’s good" the paladin thought has he ran down a second flight of steps. The door to the next room had been picked open and left ajar enough for the dwarf to see Lark inside, a ripped-out chunk of coarse beard in his hand, and a slain dwarf at his feet
They where in a small room not more than 40 hands wide and long, and all along the walls where tightly packed crates..
"Blasting powder.." Northern mumbled as he surveyed his surroundings.
Lark seemed at loss as what to do next, and shot a questioning glance at Northern. "How do we get rid of this stuff? We sure as hell can’t blow it up." Northern however was already working to solve the problem. He stood before a large sliding wood door, that he thought must certainly face the outside of the bridge.
He examined the door as Lark looked on. "Probably a loading’ door of some sort, since the hallway we had come down be much too narrow fer a dwarf to carry so many crates. If ah get get it open, we can just push the blastin’ powder out te sea."
Northern found the lock near the floor, and with a swift downward stroke from the backside of his axe broke the lock free. In response, the door which had apparently been under massive tension shot over the side, hitting the end of it’s track with a heavy slam. A rush of cold ocean air flooded the room blowing back Lark’s tattered hood.
Northern cursed at the load noise, "By the light, ah’m going to get us kille.."
Footsteps and shouting from the stairway, descending fast.
Lark threw his cloak around him, disappearing from view. Northern ran and flattened himself against the inside of the door, raising his axe high to decapitate the first Dark Iron that entered.
"Next room ye worthless ticks, find ‘em else it’s yer heads." came from a distinctly Dark Iron voice from the room above.
Just hearing one of them talk irritated Northern, brewing a boiling confused anger inside of him. "Yer not one o’ them Northern" he told himself under his breath. "Ye never where." As he spoke he glanced at his dark forearm, hating himself for it.
The first thing to enter through the doorway was gray muscular arm holding a blunt stone mace, followed by a round wooden shield held up to protect the Dark Iron’s torso and throat. Northern waited in the shadow until finally he saw the beady red eyes round the corner, and then using his shield to protect his torso from any wild blows his victim might throw, promptly brought his axe down between them. The Dark Iron was killed outright, falling over backwards into the dwarves behind him. A racket of yelling started up from the stairway, but Northern was much too focused on his task of surviving to hear any of it. Northern swung another blind blow into the dark doorway as the dead dwarf hit the ground, but this time cut through only the ocean breeze.
A sudden flash light up the hall and something moving fast caught the corner of Northern’s shield throwing wood splinters in the air. The paladin quickly cleared himself from the door just as a second dwarf leaped into the room and brought down a heavy two handed axe on to Northern’s buckler, splitting a deep gouge into the wood. The third dwarf who had shot at Northern earlier then ran into the room, throwing his empty musket to the side and readying from his shoulder a second rifle. Behind him though, two daggers and a grim shrouded face emerged, and Northern knew the rifleman would not live long enough to take aim. The heavy axe came down a second time, though this swing Northern used his shield to deflect the axe blow downward, leaving the his attacker open to the axe chop that landed deep into his shoulder. The crippled Dark Iron shuddered and fell to his knees, looking Northern straight in the eyes.
"Mercy" Northern briefly thought, but being so close to the Dark Iron was causing rage to overtake his paladin training, and with a trembling second stroke he crushed the Dark Iron’s head.
It was then, he felt the shadow. It entered his soul and began to leech upon it. Already shaking with anger and Dark Iron bloodlust, the shadow brought on full convulsions that brought him to his knees.
"Ligh’ give me strength.." he mumbled, yet the divine inner fire which gave the paladin their strength, seemed very dim, and Northern knew not why. Worst of all, the shadow touched a part of him deep inside that seemed to enjoy the darkness, something that hungered for it.
"Ironforge scum.." and voice said from above.. Northern lifted his head to a dwarf standing above him dressed in a dark hooded cloak and unnatural darkness.
"Ah’m not one of you.." Northern meekly whispered.
"Taste the fire and shadow." A strong hand grabbed Northern’s black beard and pulled him up to his feet, a second hand went to his throat and let loose a shadow hell. Northern briefly blacked out and came to cautiousness again to find himself in the same place.
"Yer still alive.." the Dark Iron slowly spoke. Through the hood, Northern could make out an eye searching his face. "Ah dare say ther’ be some Dark Iron blood in yer veins traitor. How’s the shadow taste?"
Dark Iron blood...
Northern saw only red as hate consumed him. A sudden blow to the chin threw the shadowmage back, where he quickly drew two cruel axes. Before he could lift them though, Northern was already in full attack. The Dark Iron dodged the first axe blow and quickly swung two of his own. Northern answered with a shield bash that destroyed what was left of his buckler and threw the mage to his back. Springing back to his feet, the mage through a quick strike somewhere to Northern’s torso and brought the second axe down in a fight ending chop towards the bald Paladin’s head.
Northern however, didn’t feel a thing. The torso strike was deflected by the chain mail he wore, and the Dark Iron’s second blow landed on Northern’s raised forearm, the axe notching and sparking as it hit the living-stone appendage. One last slash at Northern’s face the last the shadowmage did before Paladin came down upon him with his bare hands. It wasn’t justice, nor even vengeance that fueled Northern, but pure irrational hate, and it didn’t leave the paladin and allow him to see clearly until the Dark Iron was barley recognizable as a dwarf.
Slowly, his sense started to return. The numb pain in his right eye, the stuffy smell of blasting powder, the taste of blood in his mouth, and crashing waves breaking on the rocks many feet below, and finally the dimly light body of Lark near the loading door.
"Lad..." was all Northern could get out as he knelt down beside him. Lark was pale, covered in burns from the dead shadowmage.
"Thank the light you’re a paladin," he whispered with as much of a smile as he could muster.
The blood drained from Northern’s face, his heart sank to his stomach. He couldn’t feel the inner fire, the divine that gave him the strength to heal. He placed his strong hand on Lark’s scorched chest and concentrated.
"Help me Northern," this time Lark sounded afraid. It wouldn’t long if the paladin couldn’t find the strength to help him.
"Ah..ah’m..ah’m trying.." he mumbled in response, his eyes starting to tear for fear of his failure.
Concentrate...
The dwarf searched with in him, and found only the smoldering coals of hate.
"Damn!" he screamed. With his red eyes, Northern helplessly begged his hands for their holy healing light, but saw only their coating of foul Dark Iron blood.
"North..help.."Lark hissed.
The dwarf remained kneeled, unable to do anything but close Lark’s eyes.
The Failure of Northern Ironhull
10 years ago, Northern would have without thinking twice grabbed a trustworthy rifle, his father’s old axe, and a yelled Magni’s name as he slew the unsuspecting Dark Iron dwarf before him. Instead however, he crouched nervously reluctant behind a massive stone pillar under the cover of the black moonless night, his usual grayish skin blending perfectly with the stone before him. Next to Northern, who also stood on the edge of the remaining bridge of the Thandol Span, was the human Lark Valimor, son of Tofer.
During the second war, when the orc horde had taken to the sea to pursue the refugees of Stormwind north, Northern and Tofer had served on the same battleship. They had not been close friends, but friends none-the-less, and it was actually Tofer who had first taught Northern to play the fiddle. After the horde had been defeated, Tofer had returned to westfall to his wife, while Northern had joined the merchant fleet in sailing materials south to aid the re-building of Stormwind. Since the break up of the fleet, Northern had never again heard from or of Tofer until this afternoon, when by chance he happened while eating to overhear someone named Valimor trying to buy a room at the Menthil inn.
"Valimor?!" Northern had blurted out as he heard it, his mouth still full of fish and beer. The dark haired man talking to the inn keeper slowly turned around looking squarely in the eyes of the dwarf.
"Yes dwarf, what of it?"
Northern pointed his fork at Valimor as he spoke, "Might ye know a lad by the name of Tofer? Must be bald now it’s been so many years." At that Valimor instantly brightened up, slipping back his hood..
"He’s my father, know of him?"
"Ah spent 2 years trying te keep a’float a bucket of a battl’ship with him!" Northern replied. "Sit down lad an’ Ah’ll tell you all the dirt on yer father from when he was yer age!
For the next 2 hours Northern held Lark hostage listening to his old naval stories, some interesting, most where not. It was then, when Lark could finally get a word in between the blabbering of the old dwarf, he mentioned what he was doing in Menthil.
"The Thandol Span Northern." Lark mentioned is a low voice.
"What o’ it?"
The human leaned in close. "Word has it that the Dark Iron are mobilizing to destroy the last bridge." He pulled a folded sheet from his pack as he spoke, which upon it’s unfurling turned out to be some contract. "I’ve been hired to investigate, and should it be true put an end to the threat there." Lark looked hard at the dwarf’s gray face, and then suddenly sat back and spoke in a normal tone. "Say Northern, what have you got planned for tonight? Not too old for an outing I assume?"
Had he mentioned orcs, murlocs, or just about any other fiend in Azeroth, Northern would have finished his beer, thrown Lark to the ground for calling him old, and be ready with axe and shield before the human to push himself up, but the Dark Iron...
"Ah don’t know lad, ah had planned to leave to Theramore this nigh’.." Northern replied, hoping Lark wouldn’t inquire further, catching Northern in his lie.
"Aw come on!" Lark interrupted. "The chance to spend some quality time with your old friends son, do a good dead for your king, make some money!" Lark pushed the contract forward towards Northern’s red eyes, which remained uninterested, and a bit nervous. Lark however, didn’t give up. "I’d hate to have to go alone."
"Yer going te fight the Dark Iron alone? Ye want to be put away in a box an’ shipped home?"
"If I must, Havn’t been able to find any others around who I’d trust with my back, and this has got to be done, if we loose the last bridge north..." Lark drained his flagoon as he let his words sink into Northern’s bald head.
"Damn this lad is stubborn" Northern thought, staring into the fire at the end of the room. "And why has it go’ to be the Dark Iron.." Northern switched his gaze to his own dark hand as he thought.
"Ah can’t let ye go alone, Tofer wouldn’t have it." Northern finally reluctantly stated.
"Excellent!" Lark pounded the table with excitement. "Just for that, I’ll buy the next round!"
Northern only nodded in response.
And thus, here the paladin dwarf was. Hidden behind a pillar high above the sea on the Thandol Span, cursing the man next to him for dragging him along.
The Dark Iron Guard they where watching was only guarding in the sense that he was physically blocking the doorway. He stood leaning against one wall, a stein of something good smelling in one hand, a pipe in the other. He was defiantly drunk, in fact Northern wasn’t 100% sure he was even awake. Lark silently drew his daggers.
Northern never saw the human leave his side, he only noticed him gone when the guard suddenly slumped to the ground, spilling his drink on the road. Behind him, Lark dragged the guard away to a corner where he would not be found until day-break. Northern stepped forward and silently walked to where the Dark Iron had stood, picked up his pipe and put it to his mouth. Lark again disappeared into the shadow and begun descending the stairs into the bridges infested guardhouse.
The Paladin took a moment to collect his thoughts, and calm his inner fear. "Why am ah afraid?" he asked himself.
"Ye don’t want to be discovered ye daft fool, ye know that."
"But it shouldn’t matter, ah have loyally served Magni since the day ah became flesh. And now as a paladin, my honor shall not be questioned. It won’t matter."
"Oh really?" he answered to himself. "Then why hadn’t ye told anyone? Why..."
A sudden scream and a crash from somewhere down the stairs broke his meditation.
"Damn that human, no patience." Northern mumbled a quick prayer of blessing, un-slung his shield and axe, and charged down the stairway. Three Dark Iron laborers lay already slain at the first room he came to, all leaning over a table of meat and ale. "He’s good" the paladin thought has he ran down a second flight of steps. The door to the next room had been picked open and left ajar enough for the dwarf to see Lark inside, a ripped-out chunk of coarse beard in his hand, and a slain dwarf at his feet
They where in a small room not more than 40 hands wide and long, and all along the walls where tightly packed crates..
"Blasting powder.." Northern mumbled as he surveyed his surroundings.
Lark seemed at loss as what to do next, and shot a questioning glance at Northern. "How do we get rid of this stuff? We sure as hell can’t blow it up." Northern however was already working to solve the problem. He stood before a large sliding wood door, that he thought must certainly face the outside of the bridge.
He examined the door as Lark looked on. "Probably a loading’ door of some sort, since the hallway we had come down be much too narrow fer a dwarf to carry so many crates. If ah get get it open, we can just push the blastin’ powder out te sea."
Northern found the lock near the floor, and with a swift downward stroke from the backside of his axe broke the lock free. In response, the door which had apparently been under massive tension shot over the side, hitting the end of it’s track with a heavy slam. A rush of cold ocean air flooded the room blowing back Lark’s tattered hood.
Northern cursed at the load noise, "By the light, ah’m going to get us kille.."
Footsteps and shouting from the stairway, descending fast.
Lark threw his cloak around him, disappearing from view. Northern ran and flattened himself against the inside of the door, raising his axe high to decapitate the first Dark Iron that entered.
"Next room ye worthless ticks, find ‘em else it’s yer heads." came from a distinctly Dark Iron voice from the room above.
Just hearing one of them talk irritated Northern, brewing a boiling confused anger inside of him. "Yer not one o’ them Northern" he told himself under his breath. "Ye never where." As he spoke he glanced at his dark forearm, hating himself for it.
The first thing to enter through the doorway was gray muscular arm holding a blunt stone mace, followed by a round wooden shield held up to protect the Dark Iron’s torso and throat. Northern waited in the shadow until finally he saw the beady red eyes round the corner, and then using his shield to protect his torso from any wild blows his victim might throw, promptly brought his axe down between them. The Dark Iron was killed outright, falling over backwards into the dwarves behind him. A racket of yelling started up from the stairway, but Northern was much too focused on his task of surviving to hear any of it. Northern swung another blind blow into the dark doorway as the dead dwarf hit the ground, but this time cut through only the ocean breeze.
A sudden flash light up the hall and something moving fast caught the corner of Northern’s shield throwing wood splinters in the air. The paladin quickly cleared himself from the door just as a second dwarf leaped into the room and brought down a heavy two handed axe on to Northern’s buckler, splitting a deep gouge into the wood. The third dwarf who had shot at Northern earlier then ran into the room, throwing his empty musket to the side and readying from his shoulder a second rifle. Behind him though, two daggers and a grim shrouded face emerged, and Northern knew the rifleman would not live long enough to take aim. The heavy axe came down a second time, though this swing Northern used his shield to deflect the axe blow downward, leaving the his attacker open to the axe chop that landed deep into his shoulder. The crippled Dark Iron shuddered and fell to his knees, looking Northern straight in the eyes.
"Mercy" Northern briefly thought, but being so close to the Dark Iron was causing rage to overtake his paladin training, and with a trembling second stroke he crushed the Dark Iron’s head.
It was then, he felt the shadow. It entered his soul and began to leech upon it. Already shaking with anger and Dark Iron bloodlust, the shadow brought on full convulsions that brought him to his knees.
"Ligh’ give me strength.." he mumbled, yet the divine inner fire which gave the paladin their strength, seemed very dim, and Northern knew not why. Worst of all, the shadow touched a part of him deep inside that seemed to enjoy the darkness, something that hungered for it.
"Ironforge scum.." and voice said from above.. Northern lifted his head to a dwarf standing above him dressed in a dark hooded cloak and unnatural darkness.
"Ah’m not one of you.." Northern meekly whispered.
"Taste the fire and shadow." A strong hand grabbed Northern’s black beard and pulled him up to his feet, a second hand went to his throat and let loose a shadow hell. Northern briefly blacked out and came to cautiousness again to find himself in the same place.
"Yer still alive.." the Dark Iron slowly spoke. Through the hood, Northern could make out an eye searching his face. "Ah dare say ther’ be some Dark Iron blood in yer veins traitor. How’s the shadow taste?"
Dark Iron blood...
Northern saw only red as hate consumed him. A sudden blow to the chin threw the shadowmage back, where he quickly drew two cruel axes. Before he could lift them though, Northern was already in full attack. The Dark Iron dodged the first axe blow and quickly swung two of his own. Northern answered with a shield bash that destroyed what was left of his buckler and threw the mage to his back. Springing back to his feet, the mage through a quick strike somewhere to Northern’s torso and brought the second axe down in a fight ending chop towards the bald Paladin’s head.
Northern however, didn’t feel a thing. The torso strike was deflected by the chain mail he wore, and the Dark Iron’s second blow landed on Northern’s raised forearm, the axe notching and sparking as it hit the living-stone appendage. One last slash at Northern’s face the last the shadowmage did before Paladin came down upon him with his bare hands. It wasn’t justice, nor even vengeance that fueled Northern, but pure irrational hate, and it didn’t leave the paladin and allow him to see clearly until the Dark Iron was barley recognizable as a dwarf.
Slowly, his sense started to return. The numb pain in his right eye, the stuffy smell of blasting powder, the taste of blood in his mouth, and crashing waves breaking on the rocks many feet below, and finally the dimly light body of Lark near the loading door.
"Lad..." was all Northern could get out as he knelt down beside him. Lark was pale, covered in burns from the dead shadowmage.
"Thank the light you’re a paladin," he whispered with as much of a smile as he could muster.
The blood drained from Northern’s face, his heart sank to his stomach. He couldn’t feel the inner fire, the divine that gave him the strength to heal. He placed his strong hand on Lark’s scorched chest and concentrated.
"Help me Northern," this time Lark sounded afraid. It wouldn’t long if the paladin couldn’t find the strength to help him.
"Ah..ah’m..ah’m trying.." he mumbled in response, his eyes starting to tear for fear of his failure.
Concentrate...
The dwarf searched with in him, and found only the smoldering coals of hate.
"Damn!" he screamed. With his red eyes, Northern helplessly begged his hands for their holy healing light, but saw only their coating of foul Dark Iron blood.
"North..help.."Lark hissed.
The dwarf remained kneeled, unable to do anything but close Lark’s eyes.