Originally Posted by
Sylvanas: First Blood Part II
INTERLUDE
Anduin had listened without interrupting. Sylvanas had not thought in detail about her childhood in years. She was surprised at how clear some of her memories were, even now. It stirred within her the old, familiar combination of pain and then anger. But somehow, now that a solution, a rectification of all that had gone so horribly, cruelly wrong in her life, was so close at hand, the memories did not hurt—or anger—her as much. She had let go of many things, walking this path, and perhaps this weight was some of it.
She fell silent, unwilling as of yet to revisit the moments where the tight-knit fabric of family, friends, and a future full of hope began to unravel, and the silence between them was long. Anduin broke it by moving the tray forward with a scraping sound, nudging it with one armored finger until it was partway out of the circle.
“Why do you tell me this?” he asked quietly.
“You did not know it,” Sylvanas said.
“Did you hope to play on my sympathy? Did you think your story of a strong, loving, present family would move me somehow?”
Of course she had. She’d all but told him that was what she intended.
His face was hard, his expression flat, and she could hear his anger simmering beneath his words as he got to his feet.
“I’m certain your various spies have ferreted out all the details about my childhood, but let me remind you, just in case there are any gaps in your knowledge,” Anduin said. “When I was an infant, my mother was killed by a bloodthirsty mob. People she was standing up for. I imagine you know what a stone, thrown with angry force, can do to a skull.”
Sylvanas did. She remained silent.
“You remember how hard your mother drove you. I don’t remember mine at all. My father saw it happen. It . . . broke him. He could barely stand to look at me as I grew up. I have no warm, wise conversations with him during my childhood to look back on. Then he vanished when I was ten, and I suddenly became the king of Stormwind. You?” he scoffed. “At that age, you still were using a child’s bow.”
He was calm, but also angry and he was hurt. Anduin was right. She had been fully informed of almost every moment of Anduin’s brief life thus far, but it had always been comprised of cold facts. Sylvanas knew what else he would say, and abruptly wished he would not say it.
“Varian returned full of anger. It took us a long time to reconcile. But we did. We did,” he repeated, more softly, as if to himself. “And then . . . the Broken Shore. But you know about that.”
“I do,” Sylvanas said, not rising to the bait.
“Your life,” Anduin said, quietly, “was filled with riches. Riches I’ve never known. Your world was one of safety and certainty. Of harmless pranks and easy forgiveness. You knew both of your parents. You had sisters and a brother. Your youth was filled with grace and laughter, beauty and love and support, and friendship. And yes—I know that world is no more—for any of us. But at least, you had the chance to taste it before it was gone.”
Sylvanas rose now, too. “Do not envy me, Little Lion. You have lost much, certainly. But it is nothing compared with what I have lost.”
“Is it nothing compared with what the night elves lost? Or should I say, what you took from them?”
And there it was: the burning of Teldrassil. Sylvanas knew he would throw it at her but had not expected he would do so just yet. “I did what I did for a reason. For the greatest reason of all.” Her voice rose before she could properly guard its cadence.
“You became a butcher, Sylvanas, slaughtering innocents, all in the name of self-righteous lies!”
It was not the petulant cry of a child, but the just fury of what the world would see as a good man. She could not rely on his empathy, not yet. She wondered if Anduin had chosen the word butcher deliberately, but even now, after all that had been done to him, she did not think him that cruel.
They stared at each other for a long minute. Sylvanas tamped down her anger. “I will speak of that in due time. But perhaps you will feel better when I tell you all that happened after Alleria left Quel’Thalas. You might not envy me quite as much then.”
She sank down onto the stone again, indicating that he sit as well. He made no move to do so. “Stand if you must, then, but I will be here for a time, and . . .” Sylvanas couldn’t resist a hint of smugness. “You do not appear to be going anywhere soon.”
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