She's your daughter

[moonshadows]

“Ember! Stop that!”

With a feral growl, the girlchild sank her teeth deeper into her brother’s arm. He screamed louder, calling for his mother while the other arm flailed around wildly, wanting his sister to stop but not wanting to hit her. Malfurion Stormrage grabbed his daughter beneath the arms with the vague intent of lifting her off of her twin, but she released her brother’s arm and sank her little teeth into Malfurion’s, instead. The druid yelped, hands relaxing instinctively, and Ember swung up to cling, monkey-like, to his arm with arms and legs. He could swear she was smirking around the mouthful of his flesh. Sighing, he picked his son up with the other arm and carried both twins down the hall to where his wife was enjoying a cup of honeymint tea.

“I don’t know how you dealt with these two for four years,” he sighed, setting Falarien on the couch where he promptly snuggled into Tyrande’s side, sniffling. “For that matter, I’m not sure how Illidan dealt with her for one.”

Tyrande tugged her husband’s arm out until she could peer into her daughter’s face. “Ember,” she chided. When the child just gripped tighter, she sighed as well. “She’s not gone feral, she’s just doing it out of spite. Ember, let go of your father’s arm.”

“Not Daddy,” mumbled Ember around her mouthful of druidic flesh. For emphasis, she growled and bit deeper.

“See what he’s done to her?” Malfurion demanded. “I don’t know how you can keep defending him.”

“Furion! He did nothing I didn’t ask him to do.”

“You asked him to replace me as her father?”

“I asked him to try to help her where Elune’s power failed, and you know that. I do not believe that Illidan deliberately set out to usurp you.”

“Yet that’s exactly what he’s done,” Malfurion spat, his temper helped not in the slightest by Ember’s renewed attempts at ripping his arm apart with her teeth.

“You were gone for four years! How was she to know you? Illidan was kind to her. Is it any wonder she convinced herself that he was her sire instead of you?”

The druid scowled at his half-feral offspring. “He didn’t have to go along with it.”

“Furion…” Tyrande stepped forward, fearlessly pinching Ember’s jaws to force her mouth open and pulling the child off her father’s arm. “He didn’t. Don’t you remember?”

He did remember, actually. The look of anguish on his twin’s face as he turned away from them burned in his gut, an ulcer spilling acidic shame into his belly. He’d been selfish, driving Illidan away from his family, and instead of lashing out in rage, the half-demon had simply left. Malfurion had crossed a line and he knew it, but with Illidan’s forces having pulled back to Outland, there was no way to make amends with his brother. Ember’s refusal to recognize her real father fueled the fires of anger at himself, but ten thousand years of habit was not so easily broken and he shifted the blame to Illidan.

You have everything I have ever wanted, Illidan had said, and not once have I ever tried to take any of it from you.

“You’re right, of course,” he said heavily, the anger and frustration draining out of him. “I haven’t been much of a father to Ember. Falarien knows me because I was able to visit his dreams, but to Ember, I’m a stranger who came out of nowhere and drove away the one she cared about most. If I want her affection, I’ll have to win it.”

“Daddy played with me,” Ember interjected sullenly from where she hung, ankles firmly grasped by Tyrande.

Malfurion flinched slightly at the venom in her voice, and the reminder that his daughter despised his very existence. “What else did Illidan do with you?” he asked carefully.

“Camping,” she spat, her eyes hard and accusing.

“Camping…” Malfurion stroked his beard thoughtfully. “I think I can afford to take a week or two to go camping if I stay in Moonglade,” he said slowly, golden eyes silently begging his wife’s opinion. He failed to see the cunning look that flashed across Ember’s face and was gone.

“I think that’s a good idea,” Tyrande said with a tired smile, having also missed her daughter’s expression.

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“This looks like a good spot, don’t you agree?”

Ember was silent, which was no more than Malfurion had expected. She had been stiff and silent the entire way there, glaring holes into his back but not fighting him. He was so thankful for that much cooperation that he didn’t think to be suspicious of her relatively good behavior. Perhaps she was struggling to not like him – that would be nice, he thought as he took the tent from his pack and looked around for the best place to set it up. The sun was shining, the day warm and tranquil, and he felt his tense back muscles unknotting as nature surrounded him. Again he missed the warning sign, caught up in his enjoyment of the morning. It wasn’t until a wolf yelped a minute later that he realized his feral daughter hadn’t been glaring at him, and in fact was no longer in the clearing at all.

“Ember?” Senses spread wide, he searched for the tell-tale demonic taint that suffused her little body. It was nowhere to be found. “Ember!?” Fighting down panic, he searched farther and farther out until he caught the faint indicator of his daughter’s presence – right before it vanished into the tainted forest called Felwood. “No…”

Too late, he understood her plan. She’d manipulated him into taking her here so she could make her escape and find her way back to Illidan. The problem was that his brother had left Azeroth within two days of having returned Ember to her family, and she was in all probability on her way to an empty encampment. Guilt boiled up in his gut until he sank to his knees, arms wrapped around his stomach, fighting nausea. All the things he’d ever accused Illidan of came swarming back like moonglaives with poisoned blades. He was the monster, not Illidan. His own daughter hated him enough that he was nothing more to her than an obstacle, or the means to an end. One tear, then another, escaped his tightly-closed eyes and he didn’t have the strength to hold them back. She was only a child, surely she wouldn’t be able to move that fast. He wouldn’t be able to track her inside Felwood, but he knew where she would be heading and stormcrow shape would get him there before her. Surely he had time to allow himself this weakness.

Malfurion cried.

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Faster! Faster!

Ember whipped the wolf into a frenzy with the aura of the demon who kept trying to claim her body, guiding the beast with nips on the ear or neck. She had to get to the encampment before Malfurion realized she was gone. It was all or nothing – either she found Illidan, or Malfurion would find her and take her away, and she wouldn’t get a second opportunity to get away. The thought of never seeing Illidan again, the one person who understood her and didn’t care that she had a smelly old demon inside her, nearly brought her to tears – but she didn’t have the luxury of crying. She urged the wolf on with growls and bites, all her focus on remembering the landmarks.

Sooner than expected, the wolf burst into the clearing that had been made for the Illidari forces, mindless with exhaustion. She left it where it fell, panting and foaming, and stared in horror. It was empty! The camp had been abandoned!

He abandoned you, the demon whispered. He left as soon as he was rid of you. He never cared for you.

“That’s a lie,” she growled under her breath. She knew the truth – their separation had been so painful that Illidan couldn’t stand to be here anymore. After all, that’s why she’d left her mother and brother behind. “I just have to find where he’s gone.”

It’s hopeless. The whisper slid through her thoughts. You don’t know how to find him, or how to get there if you could.

And you do? She shot back. Smug silence was her only answer for a long minute.

I could…but you’d need to relinquish control to me.

Quickly, before her intent could seep out, she withdrew to the back of her mind as though uncertain. Archimonde leaped at the opportunity, quickly reaching out with demonic senses to find the echoes of the portal Illidan had opened to Outland. He pried it open just enough for the tiny body to slither through, and stopped on the other side to take stock of where they were. In that instant Ember struck, solid feral rage pushing his intellect out of the front and out of control. Her small form flailed, mindlessly attacking whatever was in reach while she flooded both of them with primal fury, preventing higher thought. He fought back, and she knew that in this place, he could easily rally an army of demons. She absolutely could not let him have control, even if that meant that she remained little more than a mindless beast.

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Malfurion Stormrage sat on the bare earth of the abandoned Illidari camp, staring sightlessly at the ruins with eyes that burned from the effort of weeping.

He’d been doing a lot of that, lately.

Tyrande’s words circled in his mind. You hurt him enough that he fled to a safe spot. His heart ached as he remembered his daughter, golden eyes hard and full of hatred as she muttered hate Furion. Not Daddy. But what drove him to tears again and again, what whipped his conscience until he fled from both home and duty to sit here for hours at a time, was the memory of anguish on his brother’s face as Illidan turned away from his family. You have everything I have ever wanted. And he turned his back on it, because despite everything Malfurion had done to him directly or indirectly, he still loved his brother.

What hurt most was the feeling that of the two of them, Malfurion was the unworthy one.

You are too eager to see him as the villain, my love.

Yet, even after promising Tyrande that he would try to see his brother more fairly, he cruelly drove Illidan away without a second thought. Shame spilled into his gut, seeping sour into his mouth. He hadn’t even tried to understand, because he hadn’t wanted to.

I have known only ages of hate for you, but for my part, I wish it to end.

Illidan had swallowed his pride and resentment to extend his hand in peace, and what had he done in return? Generously allowed his brother to live after telling him there could be no forgiveness, after Illidan had risked his life and dropped everything to save Tyrande and deliver her safely to his arms.

You have everything I have ever wanted, and not once have I tried to take any of it from you.

It burned because it was true. And suddenly, Malfurion realized that what hurt the most was not what anyone else had said, but what he hadn’t.

Why?

Why had Illidan given Ember back, if she was so precious to him? Why had he delivered Tyrande safely, if he’d spent ten thousand years yearning for her? Why had he left so peaceably when banished? Why had he not fought as he was led to his cell deep underground? Why had he not refuted the accusations that made a cell necessary? Why had he never explained what had happened to him in Zin-Azshari?

Because I never asked.

The archdruid closed his eyes, seeking the clarity of meditation, trying desperately trying to divine the secrets of his brother’s bleeding heart.

Bleeding?

I also know that he’s bleeding from the things that happened to him, and I wonder what he would be like if he hadn’t been abandoned for so long.

Yes…the half-celestial that had bonded to him, she had warned him – but again, he hadn’t listened. He’d thought he was doing the right thing, the noble thing, trying to protect her from his brother…ah, but that was his arrogance again, wasn’t it? To even think that one such as she would need protecting, to casually paint his brother as the guilty party when stars knew she had probably been born specifically for Illidan. He’d been the one whose eyes shone with destiny, after all.

Mother Moon, is that the seed of the poison that sickens me? Am I…jealous?

Cold sweat prickled along his neck. It made too much sense; he’d started out jealous of what he thought Illidan would have had given to him, tried to take some of it or at least make an equal place for himself. But he’d gone too far; he’d never stopped trying to take, even when Illidan had nothing left. The conversation with Zul’vii dredged itself out of his memory to haunt him like the look of hurt confusion on Illidan’s young face as his twin’s voice passed sentence on him.

…everything I have ever wanted…

But the star-born…he had her now, didn’t he? Malfurion frowned. Such a bond would be more rare than golden eyes, and a surer proof that the gods smiled on him, wouldn’t it? And was Illidan not loved and respected by the forces he led? Malfurion’s hands curled into fists. He was trying to convince himself that he hadn’t taken everything that should have been Illidan’s, and he wasn’t sure it was working. It was one thing to simply be handed power, respect, and love; it was quite another to buy them with pain and blood.

The druid swallowed again, feeling sick. Perhaps he’d worked for the respect and admiration and power he now had as Archdruid, but he had not earned his golden eyes, nor had he done anything special to win the heart of the amazing woman who had chosen him and borne his children.

The children – oh, Mother Moon!

He’d only known them from the Emerald Dream, from Tyrande’s sleeping mind, from his son’s. His daughter had never met him, had no reason to love him when Illidan had been so kind to her – and Malfurion knew his brother, knew with a certainty beyond words that his twin would never let a child of Tyrande’s come to harm. No, he would have loved and cared for the little girl as if she were his own, and won her affection with patience and no small amount of his own pain.

And I took her from him. Everything he has ever wanted, I have taken from him, and still he does not seek to harm me. He left, as he did when I banished him, as he did when I withheld my forgiveness. He left because he is my brother and he does not want to hurt me as I have hurt him.

Impossibly, Malfurion found it in him to shed a handful more scalding tears, feeling as if he wept his heart’s blood.

I don’t deserve it. I don’t deserve any of it, not if it came at the cost of another’s pain.

The trees, sickly and twisted as they were, tried in their own way to comfort him, but there was nothing they could do to ease his pain and with practiced resignation they left him alone.

Practiced…?

The tears dried up and Malfurion stared, too horrified to even be sick. The trees were accustomed to feeling intense heartache they could not ease. Here, in the camp where his brother had lived, the trees recognized anguish too powerful for comfort.

…bleeding from the things that happened to him…

Brother, my brother, what have I done?

If only…oh, Mother Moon, if only Illidan would come back. Just for a moment, just long enough for Malfurion to apologize for everything he could never make right. For being such a horrible father that he’d driven Ember to flee, for not being able to find her, for inadvertently taking away again something his brother cherished. He felt her absence keenly enough, and she was just one of stars in his sky. One of the brightest, to be sure, but he had so much to treasure and be thankful for, and what did Illidan have?

Mother Moon, bring them back. Bring them both back, give me a chance to make that right, at least. I beg you.

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Awareness came back to her slowly. Contented growls escaped with every breath as she gnawed the raw meat in her grubby hands, the chuckles of fel orcs accompanying the meal. Bloody flesh was quickly stripped from the tough hide and, still hungry, she gnawed ferociously on the bristle-furred skin. She didn’t know what animal it had come from, nor did she care. She’d finally worn the demon down enough that she could think again – as long as she cloaked her mind in savage fury. How long had she lived in this cage, the pet of these red-skinned orcs? There was no way to tell, but she did know one thing: it had been long enough that they didn’t bother locking the door anymore, confident in the false promise of her past behavior.

Growling around the tough hide between her teeth, she eyed the wolves they kept for riding. Archimonde’s brief control had left her with a rough map of this land, a topography of demonic energy, and somewhere to the east was the mountain of Illidan’s power signature. Tonight, now that she could think again, she would resume her search for the only one who cared about her.

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Illidan lounged in the uncomfortable stone chair the fel orcs had hauled to the front of the hall to be his throne, listening to a Dragonmaw commander give his report. The armed remnants of the draenei people had staged another hit-and-run attack on a wolf-mounted patrol. The madness cried out for vengeance, for gathering his troops and crushing them, and with an effort he fought it back. He’d thought the two years his angel-troll had been missing were bad, the empty link clawing at his already-tenuous sanity, but having to give up Ember on top of Zul’vii’s continued absence was worse. Half the time, he didn’t want to fight the madness. It was only a matter of time before he was little more than a crazed despot, huddled in his stronghold and raging against the world while everything that had been Illidan Stormrage lay in a heap of moldering shards, and he knew it. He just wasn’t sure if he cared, and that frightened him.

A ripple in the air, thick with raw mana and demon taint, caught his attention. Was it an attack? Whatever it was, it was powerful. Another ripple – it was on the move, somewhere out in Shadowmoon Valley but drawing closer. The Dragonmaw now ignored entirely, he stood up and faced the direction of the disturbance. His senses spread through the valley, searching for some clue as to what-

DADDY!

The cry rung in his ears, resonated in his bones. It was despair and bleeding faith, the cry of a child in dire straits who desperately wants to believe that its parent will save the day – and it was Ember.

Blind fury seized him and for once, he gave in to the madness for the strength it granted. The fabric of time and space parted before him and he was falling, plummeting out of the green-tinged sky to crush a wrathguard’s back with his hooves. The Warglaives of Azzinoth lashed out, separating two heads from demonic bodies, and then he leaped, wings beating once to carry him in a low glide over the huddled figure on the ground. In three breaths, the last of the demons who had surrounded Ember were disemboweled and bleeding out into the dead soil. Glaives banished, he scooped up the filthy girl in ragged clothes and pressed her to his chest.

“Daddy!” she sobbed, little arms going around his neck as she cried into his shoulder. Stunned, he held her and whispered soothing nonsense into her delicate ear. How had she come to be here? He didn’t have the faintest clue, but he did know that he had to take her back to her parents while he could still force himself to give her up.

It didn’t take long before Ember fell into an exhausted sleep, arms still locked tight around his neck. He pried them gently free and cradled the child he wanted more than anything else in his arms. Quickly, he opened a portal to Azeroth and stepped out into the abandoned Illidari camp. To his surprise, Malfurion was standing not ten feet away, staring in shock. Why the druid was in this place was a question he couldn’t afford the time to ask. Before he could change his mind, Illidan stepped forward and thrust Ember’s sleeping form at the druid’s chest. Startled, Malfurion reflexively took the child as Illidan stepped back.

“You call yourself her father,” Illidan hissed, talons digging into his palms to keep from snatching her back again. “How could you let her get into something that dangerous? I just killed demons that were about to-” unsure of what they were actually going to do, he gestured angrily. “Keep her safe, brother,” he spat. “Since she’s your daughter.”

Malfurion traced his daughter’s dirty cheek with one finger before raising his eyes to his twin. Illidan was shocked by how drawn and tired the druid looked. “No,” Malfurion said in a voice barely louder than a whisper. Looking as reluctant as Illidan felt, he pressed Ember back into his brother’s arms. “You keep her safe, brother.”

This was entirely unexpected. Even as his arms tightened protectively around the little girl, he choked out, “Why?”

“I was wrong,” Malfurion answered, sounding as haunted as he looked. “I’m not her father. I wasn’t there for her, wasn’t there to teach her or hold her or tuck her into bed. I wasn’t there to be proud of her and praise her and watch her grow up. You were. I-I don’t deserve her, Illidan, and I can’t help her the way you can. She hates me, and I don’t blame her. I drove you away,” he said quietly, tears sliding unnoticed down his cheeks, “and I couldn’t even keep her safe for half an hour in Moonglade. I…I’m trusting her to you, brother, because that’s the best thing I can do for her.” He swallowed hard. “You have no reason to do any favors for me, but please…I know you’ll keep her safe and raise her right. All I ask is that you don’t speak too harshly of me to her.”

“Brother…” Illidan murmured, stunned by the change in the druid’s attitude. His heart came to a decision his head wasn’t sure was wise, and one taloned finger ran softly down Ember’s cheek. “Wake up, little one,” he said gently, and her eyes fluttered open.

Unfortunately, her head flopped over to the side and Malfurion came into view. “NO TAKE!” she shrieked, skipping straight from groggy to hysterical. “No take! Not my daddy! NO TAKE!” She writhed in Illidan’s grasp until she could latch her arms around his neck again, sobbing wildly and alternating “Want Daddy” with “No take” and “Love Ember”. It took him several minutes to calm her down while Malfurion looked on, visibly pained.

“Shhh, Ember. Shhh, it’s okay. He’s not going to take you. Shhh, you’re coming with me. I won’t leave you again, I promise.”

Ember sniffed. “No take?”

“No take,” he reassured her. “You’re coming back with me. But,” he continued as hope filled her face. “Not until you let your Uncle Furion give you a hug.” Ember’s confused expression was drowned out by Malfurion’s look of guarded hope. “He loves you very much, Ember, and he’s not going to see you again for a long time, so I want you to give him a hug and then we’ll go home together.”

“Promise?” she asked solemnly.

“I promise.”

Kneeling, Illidan set her on the ground and gently turned her to face his brother, who kneeled and spread his arms with an expression half yearning and half apology. Slowly, reluctantly, Ember crossed the few feet separating them and half-heartedly draped her arms around the druid. Malfurion was not nearly so reserved, hugging her tightly. After a few breaths, he whispered, “Go to your daddy,” and released her.

“Thank you,” he said as Illidan stood up with Ember once more in his arms. “That was more than I expected.”

Still amazed that he’d really just done that, and not quite certain why, Illidan looked at the dark-blue head of hair nestled against his chest. “So was this,” he replied.

“Take care, brother,” Malfurion said sadly.

Illidan shifted the girl’s body until he could reach out with one hand. Startled again, the druid clasped it. “Until next time, brother.”

The portal opened; Illidan stepped through and it closed behind him, leaving Malfurion alone in an abandoned encampment with words of hope ringing in his ears.

Until next time.