These letters are penned quickly, bearing the official seal of the Phoenix Guard and Commander Dawnblade’s embossment. They are delivered by courier to Josrial Sunspear and Arthamir Tyrellian.
Centurion Josrial Sunspear,
Champion Arthamir Tyrellian,
I will make this brief, as I am sure…
Letters: Josrial, Arthamir
When Ina'thia's letter reached him, he was already embattled.
He had brought an expeditionary force of one hundred to the Blasted Lands to assist the 133rd Mobile Infantry - twenty heavy cavalry and forty archers, plus his own elite battleguard. He intended to test the waters before committing troops.
That was before the full fury of the Iron Horde's invasion struck. He had expected the Legion, perhaps in alliance with the remnants of the Infinite Flight - not an industrial behemoth operating with clockwork efficiency under highly skilled and veteran generals. In mere hours the battle-lines had been shattered, Nethergarde had fallen, Dreadmaul Hold taken, and the Portal overrun entirely. Thought Arthamir had managed to follow the rest of the Horde in regrouping, it was not without cost.
Hundreds of broken Horde soldiers fled for their rallying points, pursued by this Iron Horde. Though Galadir had wisely pulled back the moment it was apparent there would be no stopping them here - Thalassian lives were not so easily replaced as orcs - Arthamir had remained with his personal guard to do what he could to harry the enemy and buy his allies time to regroup. It had seemed a perfect opportuntity - a scattered unit of axemen with their backs to his cavalry. His charge was eminently successful... by design, he found, as the axemen wheels around in perfect order to hem him in and push him back onto a wall of pikes. He heard his men dying, screaming their defiance even as death drew near. With a bellowed, "To the standard!" the Lord of Tyrellian plunged headlong into the pikes that blocked their way to safety, throwing their cruel iron tips aside with a shield of Light...
Though they ultimate made it back, it was not without cost. Their dead could not be retrieved, and the casualties were many - of the forty he rode with, twenty returned. The camp was somber as the regulars saw their elites trudge in, some riding the horses of their fellows after their own had fallen to weapons or exhaustion, or thrown their rider and fled in panic. Growling, he summoned his aide and penned a response.
"Champion Dawnblade,
I will be at this council. On my honor, this "Iron Horde" will pay a hundredfold for every Azerothian life they stole here, today, and a thousandfold for every Sin'dorei.
The Sable Vanguard marches with you.
Arthamir Tyrellian
Champion of the Order
Marquess of Tyrellian
Captain-General of the Sable Vangard"