Prologue – Pickles, Power Cores, and Poor Life Choices
Prologue from my Illidan & Syrona book, Of Grace and Light. A story of healing, magic, stubborn devotion… and one woman who upends Illidan Stormrage’s entire existence. Prologue - Pickles, Power Cores, and Poor Life Choices
Syrona Silvermyst had been a Priestess of Elune once.
But a thirst for knowledge has a way of stripping away more than just titles, and Syrona was not content to kneel in moonlight and whisper reverence into silence. Not when there were wounds to be healed, questions to be answered, and magic that no one wanted to look at too closely.
So she studied. Everything.
From Light-saturated temples in the Eastern Kingdoms to the scorched landscape of Desolace, from sacred Draenei prayer scrolls to crude troll anatomy charts drawn on bar napkins—Syrona consumed knowledge like breath.
By the time she arrived in Outland, she’d traded silk for leather, reverence for practicality, and the gentle blessings of Elune for an obsession with understanding what made Fel tick.
Not to wield it. To understand it.
The first Fel Reaver had been an accident. Mostly.
She hadn’t meant to capture it. But it wandered too close to her camp one night and left pieces behind. She did what any responsible scholar would do.
She took it apart.
Somewhere between the shattered chassis and the pulsing, green-glowing wreckage that had once been its heart, Syrona found a problem: the Power Core was unstable. Every spell she tried to contain it either cracked or backfired.
Eventually, she lobbed it off the edge of Netherstorm with the kind of force usually reserved for catapults and ex-boyfriends. It exploded gloriously somewhere over the Ruins of Farahlon, briefly improving the smell.
Lesson learned.
The second reaver lasted longer. The third taught her what not to do with Fel insulation runes. The fourth one, however, was the charm.
She stabilized the Fel Power Core.
No explosions. No accidental tentacle growth. No loss of eyebrows—well, permanent ones.
Naturally, she decided to keep it.
And once you’ve stabilized the heart of a Fel Reaver, the rest is just mechanical babysitting.
It called itself Pickles. And her, Mistress.
Pickles was about twenty feet tall, screamed like a banshee when annoyed, and had a tendency to stomp on things that looked even vaguely hostile—including mushrooms, rocks, and the occasional uncooperative tree. His first words to her, in a voice like grinding stone, were: “Mistress, I hunger… for adequate lubrication of my left knee joint.”
She adored him.
They traveled together. Mostly because he didn’t fit in her bag.
Her initial idea—using containment spells to disable other Fel Reavers across Outland and keep them from stomping on adventurers—ran into a minor issue: the Reaver’s body blocked her spellwork. No line of sight, no disabling pulse. No heroic dismantling from a safe distance.
Still, she had learned something. Several somethings, in fact.
She just needed a new direction.
She found it in the Temple of Telhamat, over a lukewarm bowl of stewed “tuber” and a conversation with a disturbingly cheerful Draenei who seemed far too delighted to report that Demon Hunters were exploding.
Literally.
“Unstable Fel reactions,” he said, practically bouncing. “Quite violent.”
Syrona set down her spoon. “And you’re… smiling about that because?”
He grinned wider. “Very dramatic.”
That wouldn’t do.
She’d heard of the Demon Hunters—brilliant, unhinged, half-mad warriors with burning tattoos and even hotter tempers. Their methods weren’t her style. But the idea behind it? Illidan Stormrage’s vision?
That had potential.
And apparently, a fatal flaw.
Syrona did not abide unnecessary death. Especially not when it could be prevented by someone with a better grasp of containment theory and at least one functioning braincell.
So she packed her gear, patted Pickles on the knee, and climbed aboard.
“Shadowmoon Valley, Pickles,” she said, giving him a little kick. “Time to meet the man who keeps setting his people on fire.”
Pickles screamed. It echoed off the hills, startled a herd of Felboar, and knocked three kites out of the sky in Telaar.
And they rode.
Because destiny waits for no one—and Syrona Silvermyst had never been afraid to knock. Thank you for reading. This is book is part of my Vael’theran Saga, and I’m nervous to share it.
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