A Warlock's Tale

"Looking back on it all... my life has been quite a journey.

A warlock's life is seldom easy. We dont go sneaking around town guards and vanishing at the first sign of trouble. We dont play dead every time a big bad bear comes up to us. The very powers we command are fueled by our own life force.

Now, what you may not know is that all warlocks go through the same phases. In order to come out to be a very 'good warlock', you must first sink into the lowest, basest part of a warlock's path. The first introduction to the dark arts will spark a desire. And as you learn more and more about the craft, that desire will burn stronger. Sinking deeper, you learn to relish the powers that you can command. Before you know it, you are 'evil'. It is when you rise from this pit, that you start becoming a master warlock. One who realizes the differences between the age old war of Good versus Evil.

As with all things, one must start at the beginning I suppose. Very well then... I am the Baroness Virilith Talmane and this is my journey.

Things came into motion, when Medivh opened the blasted Dark Portal and the orcs came into our world. They sacked Stormwind clean. When they were finally pushed back after the Second War, my family seized the opportunity and helped rebuild Stormwind. Along with the other merchants and the Nobles of Stormwind, the Talmanes lent the initial gold funds needed by Edwin Vancleef and his Stonemasons to start the reconstruction of the city. King Varian was new to the throne at the time, and so lacked the experience his late father, King Llane had when it came to dealing with politics.

Because we were left unchecked, my family soon made a lot of profit. The Talmane Merchantile Barony was born, and with it, my father's title of Baron was bought.

I was so very young at the time, and to me, all of this hardly mattered. The only thing I knew was that my ruthless father and my quarreling older brothers were all the same. Greedy swine. And since my good mother had died in an orcish raid when I was too young to learn grief and anger, I had no voice of reason to keep me from... darker passions.

The grief and anger would soon catch up to me.

Reynald Beaubierre. How I hated that little arrogant prick when I was a kid. Just because his father was the Third Earl of Stormwind, he thought he could go around and look down on everyone, especially me. He said that I wasnt a real nobleman. And that our position was simply bought, not earned. He kept pulling pranks on me. It started light and innocent but little did I know that it was a setup for the Big One. I was sixteen years old and fresh into the Academy Arcane in Dalaran when it happened. The bastard stuck a transmutation spell into a gift box. I never saw it coming... for one week, the worst in my life, I was so humiliated. I walked around with a pig's snout for a nose. Booby-Ear went too far.

My eagerness for revenge was at its peak at that time. I wanted the vengeance so much that I could taste it. I spent many nights away from my dormitory sneaking into the Academy's Library Arcanum. Now that I think about it... I can't recall how I found the book. I think it fell to the ground from its shelf. Yes... that's it. I remember the shock I felt... afraid to be discovered stealing into the Library.

The book itself seemed unremarkable. The leather cover binding it was faded and the pages themselves were old and dusty.

But for every page I turned, more of my youthful innocence was lost.

At the end of the night, I felt utterly drained. I would crawl back to my bed, weary and tired.

I came back the next night. And the night after that. Before I knew it, the book claimed more and more of me.

There were gradual changes that came about me. I started dressing in darker colors. Black and purple. Dark red when I fancied. I kept to myself most of the time. Socially distant. Eerily unstable. The black sheep of the class.

As for my intentions with Booby-Ears, I was content to bide my time for the perfect opportunity.

And it came soon enough. It presented itself during Hallow's End, it was my newest favorite holiday.

I found an abandoned old cottage not far from town. With the book in my hands, I made preparations. Into a bowl of dirty water and crushed Gromsblood, I sprinkled the strange dust I stole from my enchanting classes. Using the mixture, I painted a runic circle upon the wooden floor, exactly as the diagram my book described. I closed the windows to keep the moonlight out and discovered that the color of the paint blended well with the floor in the darkness. Now I only had to wait.

Booby-Ear, like the rest of the arrogant upstarts in the academy, was older than me by several years. He was at the age when his desires for a certain dumb blonde robbed him of any measure of reason. Naturally, when a letter from the said dumb blonde mysteriously arrived at his doorstep, his head was not doing the thinking as he hurried out into my little spiderweb.

He knocked and I bid him enter. The shadows kept me hidden as I sat on my chair relishing every moment of my revenge. For a while he kept stumbling in the darkness calling out "Hehe, are you ready to raid with me baby?" and "Come on out, honey, let me show you my loot." I simply smiled in evil delight.

His eyes adjusted soon enough. He was dumbfounded to discover me with my legs crossed, sipping the mead from my goblet and fingering through my book.

I recall every word that was exchanged.

"What's the matter darling? Dissapointed?"

"Varilith?!"

I really hated the way he said my name.

"What is this?!"

"No one. NO ONE harms me with impunity!"

I started the spell with but a gesture. The runic circle he was standing on glowed a bright pinkish light. And all of a sudden he was on his knees clutching his chest.

"How does it feel to be toyed with? To be looked down upon?"

I never heard him utter anything after that. At least nothing coherent.

I didn't know it at the time, but the curse I had put on him was a particularly cruel one. It constricted his throat, chest and lungs. The very muscles of his body felt nothing but agony. I laughed at him for a bit and when I felt that he had learned his lesson, I proceeded to lift the curse.

A bead of sweat broke down my face. I was too centered on my revenge that I had failed to realize how to remove the curse after I had been satiated. Frantically, I was flipping through the book... but I could not find anything in it to help me. I turned to Reynald, hoping that the curse would go away after a time... but it only seemed to get worse!

I was in tears when he lay there, cold.

Fear gripped me. I couldn't understand what I had done. It seemed to me, that I ran on forever that night.

The next day after the holiday, I showed up in class. I was determined not to draw attention to my disheveled person. We were all sent off to our homes for the remainder of the season. I could not understand for my part, how I wasn't caught. They brought in the greatest Elven Mages and Seers to investigate the death of the boy of an important Stormwind Noble under Dalaran's watch.

But somehow, I was never caught.

I carry that guilt with me to this very day. I knew what had to be done. I knew that I should have burned that book. But there it lay, in my runecloth bag while I journeyed homeward.

It was my first step towards the dark, dark path as a warlock..."

~to be continued...