Indeed, the guard was lumbering forward, but in a haphazard, almost random manner. Not only was the wound to the one foot causing it to sway, but the entire upper torso was bathed in blood from the wound the ax had made.

Dwarves with pikes suddenly surrounded the dragonspawn. Grenda thrust first, her pike reentering the wounded throat. The dragonspawn slapped the weapon away, only making the rip bigger.

The guard teetered, crashing to one side. A dwarf ran in for the kill.

With a titanic effort, the dragonspawn seized him. Before anyone could do anything, the guard used one thick fist to crush in the dwarf's chest.

Grenda screamed and thrust with the pike again. Her momentum was such that she burled the point deep enough that the tip thrust out of the scaled hide behind.

The dragonspawn waved one bloody hand... then died.

Of the guards, only a pair of beaten and bruised skardyn remained. Grenda had them bound and tossed into the cell. That she let them live was no act of charity, to hear her explain it.

"When they're found like that with all the others slain, you can be sure they'll pay for their failure," she said grimly.

The female dwarf went back to the body of her brother. Her other brother, Griggarth, stood at her side, staring at his dead sibling as if not certain that he himself lay there instead.

Grenda touched the forehead and chest once, then her demeanor shifted. "Let's move before more guards arrive...."

There remained one problem with that. Even Vereesa's trained senses could not identify which direction they should head. Grenda thought she knew—dwarves well versed with reading tunnels and judging their ultimate rise or fall—but could not swear in the case of Grim Batol.

"Rom told me that the tunnels here have no rhyme or reason that he could recall. Those that would've made sense one way often suddenly banked, then went the opposite. 'Tis as if a bunch of mad diggers randomly carved it out."

"Probably a bunch o' Dark Irons," snorted Griggarth.

"These tunnels are older than even those bastards," his sister replied. She touched the corridor floor, studying it. "If these trace read right, I'd say we go left."

"What are you looking at?" the ranger asked, fascinated despite their situation by the dwarf's own tracking abilities.

"The striations, the patterns of the rock and stone, for one. They can sometimes tell you the right direction. There's also tiny bits of dirt and scrapings that these fiends've brought from outside." She grunted. "If there's anythin' we dwarves know, it's rock and dirt." "Then, we go as you say. Lead on."

Nodding, Grenda guided the weary band. They were armed with everything that they had been able to take from the dead. Vereesa had not accepted any ax or other weapon, preferring those to go into the hands of the ones who best knew how to use them. The only defense she took was the small blade that Rhonin had forged for her.

As Grenda led her people on, Vereesa fell toward the back. She followed on, growing more confident in the female dwarf's sense of direction. Surely, with her at the forefront, the band would reach the outside safely.

And, with that thought in mind, the ranger slowed more. When it was clear that the dwarves were completely focused on the passage ahead, Vereesa suddenly turned. As silent as the night, the high elf vanished down the deeper end of the tunnel.

Somewhere down there, Vereesa was certain, she would find Zendarin....

"Surely, we must reenter Grim Batol this very moment!" Iridi urged the wizard. "Each breath we delay, the others may suffer!"

"You think I don't know that?" Rhonin snapped. He sat with the draenei on an old log, his hands before him. A faintly lit blue glow arose from the ground before both, the wizard's version of a campfire that would not be seen from far away. "My wife's in there, priestess. There are no more important people to me in the entire world than she and my sons. None."

"Then, why do we not just materialize there as you did previous?"

He spat. "I don't know how magic works with draenei in general or you in particular, but that sort of thing takes a lot out of a person, especially as it wasn't my first or even second attempt! I'd been in two other locations there, using this to hunt for her!"

Rhonin held up the talisman that Vereesa had been wearing. Iridi could not sense anything from it, but then, she was not its creator.

He was growing more upset. The priestess berated herself for adding to the pressures on the human. She was showing many failings as a priestess these past few days. The draenei wondered how she could have ever considered herself the one who needed to find the captured nether dragon. Such hubris in the face of her results was laughable.

The pair sat in the wilds of Grim Batol, near an area Rhonin had called Raptor Ridge. The name had shaken a weary Iridi, for she recalled the battle at Menethil Harbor. However, the wizard had assured her that most of the raptors had moved toward the direction of the dwarven settlement.

"They sense what's going on in Grim Batol," he had told her. "That's why they're giving the dwarves so much trouble right now."

He had provided her with simple fare from a pouch on his person, a pouch with incredible depth, it appeared. The red-haired wizard pulled out much more food than should have been able to fit inside, and even after that the pouch had not looked flattened.

"There're some benefits to my calling," Rhonin explained as he and she devoured some unleavened bread and cheese that was actually cool and creamy. "But a lot more burden."

"You have great responsibilities among your kind."

"You mean wizards, the Alliance, or humans? Take your choice; I seem to be bound to all in more ways than I like. The Alliance is still looking to Dalaran for a lot and the wizards are looking for me to think different than they've been doing for the past several hundred years. As for the humans In general... I've seen too many die and I want it to end... I just want to be with my family...."

But Rhonin would never willingly abandon any of the groups that he had just mentioned, Iridi could sense that. The wizard wasmuch like Krasus, striving to make Azeroth better for all, even though it cost him so much.

Even though, at present, his beloved mate might already be dead.

"You are a being of destiny," the priestess quietly declared. "You will do great things, I know that."

"I haven't even been able to keep my wife and sons safe." He shook his head. "I've fought demons, dragons, orcs, and more, but the scariest part of my life has been trying to be there for those I care about most."

She put a comforting hand on his shoulder. Although Iridi had no close family with which to compare her situation to his, she was empathic enough to understand his trials. "It's often the most frightened of folk who do the greatest deeds."

"You sound like a demigod I once met called Cenarius—" He cut off, suddenly tense.

"What—?"

Rhonin hushed her. His left hand tightened into a fist as he whispered, "I think this should do the trick. It's more startling than it is anything else, but..."

The dim blue glow suddenly flashed a thousand times brighter, yet its intense illumination was limited to an area just a dozen or so yards in diameter, with Rhonin and Iridi at the center of that lighted circle.

But in that bright glow, the pair were revealed not to be alone.

More than a dozen tall, reptilian creatures surrounded the vicinity. They were not drakonid, although, like them, they walked on two legs. These were more primitive and more bestial and, to Iridi, the return of a nightmare.

"Raptors..." Rhonin breathed.

The brilliant light had stunned the beasts. Several still had their heavy muzzles turned away. More than one hissed. Talis swung back and forth in what was clearly anxiety.