A sense of shame washed over her even as she thought that.

Malfurion had gone in search of a possible threat. He had had the best interests of not only the druids, but all Azeroth when he had gone… just like so many times before —

Tyrande shook her head, trying to clear it of her regrets. She gave thanks when she heard Broll stir.

He did not notice her expression shift, his attention first on the human. “Still sleeping, I see.”

“I have my doubts that he will awaken.”

“Me, too. He doesn’t act like the others, but to sleep the day through after half the night before that …”

The high priestess toyed with her glaive. She was glad that she had taken it from Jai’s saddle. If she had not, the weapon would have been left behind in Auberdine. While Tyrande carried within her the gifts of the Mother Moon, they did not make her invincible.

The glaive was a sturdy and necessary weapon. “Do we leave him here? I dislike doing that, considering how he helped us.”

“I’m of the same mind. Still, we need to reach Ashenvale and while I could carry him for a time, he’ll slow us down even more.”

She finally said to him what she had been considering for most of her time awake. “You should go on alone. You planned to do that when first I suggested Ashenvale.”

Broll looked aghast. “I wouldn’t abandon you here! Especially after Auberdine! We proceed to Ashenvale together”—he thrust a thick thumb at the human—“and hopefully with this one in tow …”

“Then what do we do?”

The druid looked guilty. “Something I planned to do beyond Auberdine, anyway.” From his cloak, he produced what he had taken from Fandral’s dwelling. “It’s time I tried to bring some worthiness to my theft, if that’s possible.”

She could not believe what she was seeing. “Is that — is that the Idol of Remulos?”

“Yes.”

“I had heard that you passed that on to Archdruid Fandral’s keeping—”

“And now I’ve borrowed it.” His expression asked her not to pursue that matter further. When Tyrande nodded, Broll, appearing no more relieved, added, “It may be our best hope if we’re to make successful use of the portal.”

“How so?”

“Remulos said it was linked to a green dragon of great power. The Aspect Ysera would not tell him which when she added her influence in its crafting. He suspects the identity, as do I, having faced it briefly when seeking to cleanse the idol of its corruption. Though I didn’t know the name, I felt its great power. It should be one of her consorts.”

Which meant to the high priestess a dragon with knowledge and might comparable to few. Tyrande understood Broll’s reasoning.

“You think you can contact him through the figurine?”

“It was worth my honor to hope that, yes.”

She did not like the sound of that. “What will Fandral do when he finds out you removed this from his sanctum?”

Broll shrugged. “I’ve no idea, but if I survive all this, I’ll find out then.”

Tyrande studied the figurine, praying that it would be worth the price for the druid… and for them. “What do you hope to do… and can I help in any way?”

“There’s nothing you can help with. I’ve got to do this myself.”

Broll set the figurine down on the ground in front of him, then sat with legs crossed. The eyes of the dragon stared directly into the druid’s. “I’m trying something different. Don’t want to use the idol itself …” He suddenly choked up. “Never thought I’d have to see the damned thing again, for that matter …”

The high priestess said nothing, aware of the pain involved in Broll’s previous encounter with the figurine. She knew the agony he had suffered when, weakened, he could not save his daughter from the idol’s twisted forces. He was speaking more to himself than her.

Facing his palms toward the idol, Broll began muttering. The idol was still bound to the dragon, wherever he was. The druid hoped to tie into that link and touch the dragon’s mind. Tyrande knew exactly why. The green dragon might be able to give them a clue to what was happening, but, more important, it was possible that he might be able to assist them in passing through into the Emerald Dream.

Once, the idol itself had been able to do that — Broll had used it so, where there he had battled his own rage in the manifestation of his bear form. But that had been before the Nightmare had made even the untouched places difficult to reach. Certainly, having one of that realm’s guardians at their side would increase their chances of not only survival, but success.

A faint hint of emerald light softly bathed the idol and as it did, a faded stream of energies rose from the figurine.

The magic linking the idol to the mysterious dragon.

Her attention was suddenly taken by Broll, around whom another faint glow of a more forest green now arose. Curiously, it did not emanate from him, but rather had arisen from the grassy soil upon which he sat. As a druid, Broll received much of his power through the flora and fauna of Azeroth and for the first time, Tyrande was seeing it so. There was also power within him — she was well aware of that from Malfurion — but this was an aspect of her beloved’s calling that she had not really considered. In some ways it was akin to her calling upon the Mother Moon.

Perhaps Malfurion and I are not so different even there, the high priestess thought. And perhaps that is why we have been pushed apart so much…

It was a reminder of what she should have known so well, having experienced the teachings of Cenarius and having fought beside her beloved and other druids. Azeroth was so much a part of a druid; it touched them constantly. Malfurion, so attuned, surely felt everything much, much more than Broll.

He can no more turn from his calling than I can from mine…

yet those callings intersect just as our lives do… if we survive this… we will learn how to make both intertwine… and learn how to finally be together…

If we survive…

The forest green then began to expand to the magical stream that reached through the plane of Azeroth to wherever the dragon currently lurked. Yet barely had it begun when it seemed to falter.

There was resistance.

Broll muttered something.

The resistance lessened.

“No! You mustn’t!”

The human was in their midst, as wild-eyed as ever. He was half on his knees, desperately reaching for the idol.

As he closed on it, Tyrande saw around him a landscape that was and was not where the trio was situated. Part of it seemed so simple.

The other part —

The high priestess kicked out. However, it was not the human who was her target, but rather the Idol of Remulos.

The dragon figurine went flying. It bounced against a rise, then landed atop a small rock.

Broll, his spell shattered, peered at the pair with a combination of frustration and confusion. “What by the World Tree are you doing?

” he demanded of Tyrande. The druid leapt to his feet and seized the human by the scruff of the neck. “What mischief are you about? What sort of trick have you played on her?”

The man’s mouth moved, but no sounds escaped it. The images Tyrande had seen around him had faded, and despite her best attempts to sear them in her memory, they vanished into oblivion…

just as dreams both light and dark tended to do.

But she recalled one thing. Jumping to Broll’s side, she kept him from further frightening the disheveled human. “Leave him be! He was trying to help us!”

“Help us? He tricked you into breaking the spell just when it was starting to work!” Yet clearly respecting her opinion, Broll still loosened his hold.

“Wasn’t working, wasn’t working,” the man babbled, his eyes looking past them. “Only working for them, bringing them …”

“Who?” Tyrande asked, putting a calming hand on his shoulder.

Some focus finally came to his gaze. He glanced at her. “I… I don’t know… them… the nightmares …” The man looked down. “I slept… I can’t sleep… don’t sleep …”