Chapter 4

Azran's reminiscing ceased as the current situation became more critical. The incident in Duskwallow had transpired a year ago. Gharni was now a permanent fixture in their bed. The trio had been on too many missions to count and their successes had led them to their current situation, trying to forge an alliance with the Blood Elves.

Standing before a massive pile of broken trees strewn across the entrance to Quel'Thalas. They had scouted the entire vicinity from the Temple at Zul'Mashar to Quel'Lithien Lodge. At the first they found only unfriendly Forest Trolls who had attacked them on site. At the second they found a small enclave of High Elves, possibly one of the last on Azeroth. Azran's skills with the Thalassian tongue had helped them enough that they were simply told they were not welcome. Despite his best efforts, none of the High Elves would give him any further directions on getting into Quel'Thalas. Though they tried not to show it the elves appeared to be unwell. Looking upon this monstrous pile of dead wood, Azran suspected that their unwillingness to help was partially a result of not being able themselves to enter their own homeland.

"I'm afraid that Xlandria is right," stated Azran. "This is insurmountable and any further travel at this point would only serve to force us to camp in a less safe area. I didn't see any signs that the road leading up to these gates is being used. The trolls and elves seem to regard this as a neutral border and the Scourge are nowhere in sight."

"Well then, I'm going to see if I can find us some decent supper." With that the Orc put her fingers to her mouth and gave a sharp whistle. From out of some nearby bushes a large black worg appeared, running towards the Orc. It stopped in front of her, then rolled on its back and made a mewling sound. Gharni knelt down and rubbed its belly. "Who's a good boy? Who's a good boy!? You're a good boy Frekaz! Yes you are, yes you are!" said the Hunter. She then stood and addressed her companions. "I'm tired of the dried meat in our packs. I'm getting something fresh."

Azran chuckled at this. "Just remember, 'fresh' can be a relative term in the Plaguelands. The meat in our pack is was more recently fresh and alive than some of the meat walking around out there. Just make sure it isn't diseased." Then, as an afterthought, he added, "and I'm not eating grub meat."

"Picky, picky," Gharni replied before heading off with Frekaz in tow.

As Azran and Xlandria assembled their tent (larger now that it was meant to sleep three) the couple reminisced. "Azran, do you realize that as of tonight, it will have been one year since Gharni became our lover?"

"Really? How the time flies," said the Warlock, nonchalance dripping from his voice.

His minion stopped her work and stared at him, her left eyebrow raised. After several moments Azran finally noticed that Xlandria had stopped moving. He looked up at her to see her incredulous expression.

"What?" said Azran, with a 'who, me?' expression on his face.

"How can you be so clueless?" chided Xlandria. "Gharni expects you to at least take note of the occasion and, if you know what is best for yourself, you should also say or do something to celebrate ... and I'm not just talking about doing it twice."

"And you know this how?" asked Azran.

"Duh! I'm a woman. Women like their men to make big deals of anniversaries, even if they say they don't. They like to be fussed over and, most importantly, they like to know that their men don't take them for granted."

"What about gifts?" asked Azran.

"Gifts?"

"A present that commemorates an occasion," he explained.

"That would be nice, but I doubt you'll be lucky enough to find anything out here in the next hour or so before the sun fades, and I doubt that she'll fail to notice if you spend the night running back to Light's Hope Chapel to buy something at the last minute. Not that they would have anything there." Xlandria laughed, then added, "If you leave right now though, you might be able to borrow a bat from Georgia and fly to the Undercity. I'm sure she'd lend you an extra fast bat, she was giving you bedroom eyes you when we landed."

Azran recalled the bat handler they'd met with at the Lights Hope Chapel. After summoning up the image from his memory, he was now the one with an incredulous look. "Now I know you're teasing me. She was wearing those pink goggles the whole time we were there. No bedroom eyes to be seen."

"She thinks her eyes can't be seen when she's wearing her goggles so she takes the opportunity to ogle her customers. They only hide her eyes from the visible spectrum though. They're totally transparent to the colors just below red. What I guess you could call the heat spectrum."

"I wasn't aware you could see that ... or that anyone could see heat for that matter."

"It's one of the ways Succubae perceive arousal."

Azran nodded filing the information away. "Well, whether the local flight master wishes to bed me or not, running back to the Undercity to fetch a present for one of my lovers seems like rather a lot of work when I could just give her this instead." As he said this he drew a small, black, velvet box from his robes. He opened the box and showed the contents to the Succubus.

Xlandria gasped and put both of her hands over her mouth as she stared, wide eyed. Inside the box was a ring formed of three strands of silver braded together. A large, deep-purple amethyst was set into the ring.

"Oh, Azran. Any woman would be thrilled to receive such a gift, particularly from a man of your character," said Xlandria with a hint of wistfulness in her voice. "She will love this gift."

"It's more than just a gift. By Orcish customs, it's a promise, much the same as human tradition."

"You mean..." began Xlandria, unable to complete her words.

"There probably isn't either a Shaman of the Earth Mother or a Priest of the Forgotten Shadow who would perform the ceremony for us, at least not one in good standing, but according to the tenants of both faiths, if we are one in our hearts then it is as good as any ceremony. Both faiths view marriage as a sacrament we grant to each other, not granted to us by a presiding religious."