The Bodyguard Rota
(~1400 words)(Illidari, Illidan, Sentinax)(tw violence, heights, falling)
It had been decided that Lord Illidan needed a bodyguard. No less than two people, no more than four.
It had also been decided he best not know about this.
The last time Illidan had been alone they’d returned to find him dead! Clearly his warrior’s spirit was so fierce that he didn’t know when to retreat from combat. The Broken Shore was a dangerous place, and the Illidari had gone to a lot of work to return their beloved leader from the Nether.
Thus, he needed a handful of warriors nearby to leap into action should he be accosted by assassins or other nefarious agents.
Like Maiev.
However, their Lord and Master was a largely solitary and self-sufficient creature. He would be aghast at the thought of his hunters protecting him rather than battling together on the frontlines or raiding demon camps.
Thus, they would keep the bodyguard rota a secret. Their war efforts would not suffer on account of missing a few people. The Illidari had learned much in their Lords absence, and gathered more hunters into each wing of their army. Jace wasn’t the only mage anymore, Allari wasn’t the only soulweaver.
They were so many and so strong that Kayn could set them on a rotating placement. Each fighter spent two weeks on the front lines and combat heavy areas before been brought back for camp defense. The injured were also pulled back, least their slowed reactions lead to their deaths. This had initially been met with some resistance. There were no merry chases to be had, guarding the camp, and no jolly bloodshed in counting out rations. But soon it became a badge of pride to heal up completely, to get strong and fat so as to launch themselves with fresh vigour at the demon incursions.
Lord Illidan certainly seemed pleased to have left a strike force and returned to an army.
Today the Guard consisted of Asha, Sevis and one of the second generation hunters, a Sin’dorei named Thal’asi. He had never been on Guard before and took his duty very seriously, squinting at every suspicious rock along the trail. Illidan made his home just outside the main Illidari camp, in an immense hollow yew tree. The gnarled deadwood stood half way up the lee-side slope of a rocky mountain side, sheltered from the cold sea winds and prying eyes alike.
Asha directed them to settle on an adjacent slope and huddle down.
Illidan stepped out from his den and immediately moved into pre-flight checks, stretching out his wings and lifting his feet so as to rotate and loosen his ankles. Sevis looked on with a wistful expression. Every Illidari dreamed of true flight. A rare few had even achieved it, although no one could take to the sky with the same mastery as Lord Illidan.
The main hunting party was preparing itself with much glee in the camp below, feinting at one another and dashing to and fro so as to warm up and show off. Illidan watched them a moment before crouching and launching himself upwards, vanishing into the low slung fel-clouds pouring in over the mountains.
The three guards set off, Asha guiding them in a deadly sprint along the narrow goat trail. The Spires were a jagged geological oddity, towering above the Shore and almost of a level with the low-flying demon ships. Loose rock crumbled as they darted perilously close to sheer cliffs, weaving through river caves and gliding across crevasses marked by previous guard-teams. Their claws found purchase on even the smoothest surface and their ability to jump twice their own height let them clear rock falls and scree slopes with ease.
More importantly, it let them climb till they were level with the Sentinax. The ship hovered low over the Isles like some great hunting bird. But today they would regret such arrogance.
Asha was the most experienced of them and tilted her head up as they ran, tracking Illidan through the felstorm. The magic-charged lightning could dazzle even their sight, but between flashes they could see a familiar silhouette making its way gradually through the storm, towards the hulking outline of the demon sky-ship. The Sentinax would shoot down at any non-demon flyer it registered. But the storm confused the ship’s sensors as surely as it overwhelmed the Illidari.
Thal’asi reached to touch his pocket, where he carried a summoning crystal. Using that would materialise his mount in front of him. Sevis snapped his teeth at him, meaning stop.
“But he’s up there alone!”
“Flying to him will draw the demon’s attention. We wait.” Asha perched on a chunk of fallen ice and flapped her wings, dusting them both with snow. Sevis hissed. He disliked snow and its cold consistency, the way it inexorably covered the world.
Overhead, Illidan glided up into a blooming tower of fresh stormclouds and begun to climb vertically, spiralling so as to remain within the blinding luminescence of the stormhead. The churning stormwinds within would buoy a flyer up, so long as they were alert to sudden down drafts and clusters of hail.
Their target lay aboard the Sentinax. Specifically, on the open platform atop the ship. The demon admirals liked to look down on the worlds they burned, directing the movements of their troops and relishing the ashes of dying civilisations.
“He’s falling!” Thal’asi hissed, flapping his wings. Asha cooed at him reassuringly for she knew that their master was not falling but diving, accelerating down towards the eredar like a rocket. The demon turned as Illidan rammed into him and knocked the two of them off the ship, tumbling towards the canyon floor below.
This was the part where their job began in earnest. The three Illidari moved as one, letting themselves fall into the open air. It took much training for a hunter to forget their instinctive fear of falling. Up here with the mountain wind in their face, it almost felt like flying. They spread their wings wide and circled, peering down at the combatants.
The eredar had height and weight on Illidan, but their Master was more cunning. Though the demon immediately sprouted arcane wings of its own, Illidan sent them both into a dizzying spin to prevent them leveling off. He battered the demon with his horns and kicked savagely at the eredar’s wings and legs, sinking his talons into its armour and shaking it like a rat so as to prevent the eredar bringing any magic to bear upon him.
The goal was to get the demon on the ground. Down there, the hunting party waited ready to finish the demon off. The Legion became ever more chaotic as they carved great swathes through their leadership. If they were killed fast enough, it didn’t matter than a demon could return.
But Illidan was so taken up with fighting the demon general that he had no attention to spare for the minions, already streaming out of the Sentinax aboard dire bats.
Asha chirruped and the three of them folded their wings in, swooping out of the clouds to tackle the succubus riding to the rescue on direbats. Asha dodged a cracking whip and sliced right through the leather tack straps with a swipe of her claws. The succubus shrieked as the saddle slipped off her mount, carrying her with it.
Sevis dived after her. A waste of time. Succubus possessed wings but they were poor fliers- besides, the hunting party frothed over the mountainside below. Any demon that fell from the sky would be torn asunder by their waiting claws.
Thal’asi in the meantime had taken to sky-clearing like a natural, leaping from bat to bat and slicing through leather and metal harnesses to send their demonic riders falling to their deaths.
Did they realise how close they were to the ground? Asha thrilled out a warning and the two men disengaged, spreading their wings wide and gliding towards the ground. The eredar had survived his fall and now battled against Illidan and the Illidari of the hunting party. They swarmed over him fearlessly, weighing down his arms and flapping their wings around his head so as to distract him. Such was their concentration that none of them could be trusted to notice the Sentinax demons streaming down to their leaders defence.
Asha gathered herself and tackled a Sentinax felguard who had made it to the ground.
A demon lord did not die easily. But neither did Illidan, and neither did they. And it was their job to keep it that way.