Read The Shattering: Prelude to Cataclysm for Free Online Page B

here. Tell them that Garrosh Hellscream was both death and life to you and your people today.”
    Without another word, he turned and gracefully leaped back onto the deck of
Mannoroth’s Bones
. He spoke quickly and quietly to Tula, who nodded and issued orders of her own. Cairne watched as a few supplies and a single water keg were brought forth from below and two small skiffs were cut loose. At least Garrosh was keeping to his bizarre bargain. The tauren watched with mournful eyes as the humans scrambled into the boats and began to row back in the direction of Northrend.
    He shifted his gaze to Garrosh, who stood straight and tall, his arms folded, still in his armor this entire time despite the storm and near-drowning.
    Garrosh was a brilliant tactician, a fierce warrior, and loved by those he led.
    He also held grudges, was a hothead, and needed to learn the lessons of both respect and compassion.
    Cairne would speak with Thrall immediately upon their return. What Garrosh was had served the Horde well in Northrend, at a time of struggle unlike any they had ever known. Cairne knew it would serve the son of Grom poorly upon their return to Orgrimmar. Those who lived entirely by the sword sometimes did not know what to do in the aftermath of war. Out of their element, unable to channel their passions and energies the way they knew best—sometimes they ended up as belated casualties of the same war that had claimed the lives of their fellows, dying in taverns or in street fights instead of in battle, or simply becoming lost souls who continued to exist without truly living.
    Garrosh had too much potential, too much to offer, to end up that way. Cairne would do all he could to prevent such a fate from befalling the son of Grom Hellscream.
    But Garrosh would have to be a willing partner in such an endeavor for it to succeed. As he regarded the orc now, standing so certain in his rightness, Cairne was not at all certain that Garrosh would be such a participant in shaping his own destiny.
    He looked back at the slowly retreating skiffs. At least Garrosh had spared some lives, although Cairne had a sneaking suspicion it was rooted in arrogance. Garrosh very much wanted words of his deeds to reach Varian, to no doubt further irritate that leader.
    Cairne sighed deeply, and turned his face up to the sun, weak in these northern climes but still present, closed his pale green eyes, and prayed for guidance.
    And patience. A very great deal of patience.

F OUR

    It was a festival the likes of which Cairne had never seen in Orgrimmar, and he wasn’t altogether sure he liked it.
    It was not that he did not wish to honor the soldiers who had fought so valiantly against the Lich King and his subjects. But he knew as well as others, and better than some, the cost of war on all fronts, and frowned a little to himself at the lavishness with which the veterans were received.
    The parade, he had recently discovered, had been Garrosh’s idea. “Let the people see their heroes,” he had stated. “Let them march into Orgrimmar to the welcome they deserve!”
    An unkinder soul than Cairne might have mentally amended,
And make sure everyone knows that Garrosh Hellscream was responsible for the victory
.
    Still, Garrosh had insisted that everyone who had been involved with the campaign in Northrend be encouraged to participate. No one expected to see Forsaken or sin’dorei veterans in this parade, although they would not have been denied the right to march had they attended. They had their own concerns and had waged their own campaign in the northernmost continent of the world. No, this parade was mainly comprised of those who dwelt in the hot, dusty lands of Kalimdor—orcs, trolls, and tauren. And it looked to Cairne as if every one of those races who had raised a weapon ora curse against the Scourge had come. The line stretched all the way from the gates of Orgrimmar well past the zeppelin tower.
    Scorning the softer traditional rose petals