The Story of Rumncoke
The light was so very bright…that was how I awoke. I sat up and looked around; my head swam with many questions. Where was I? Why am I under a dock? Where are most of my cloths? Why does my head hurt so much? And I sat there and pondered these questions a horrible thought settled upon me…Where is home? And for that matter, who am I?
Suddenly I hear this odd snarling sound and look up to see this odd little fish creature running towards me snapping its jaws with some sort sword waving around at me. I jump up and run as fast as I kind, I suddenly feel this odd tingle all over, but as I was rather scared I ignored it and just kept running. Suddenly it felt as if I had crashed into some sort of stone wall, then I was on the ground again. I looked up to see a ship’s guard standing over me. He grabbed me by my shoulders, set me back on my feet and asked “Whoa there Priestess, are you ok? What is after you that you are not even looking at where you are running to?” All I could do what blink at him, he called me a Priestess…”Why do you think I’m a Priestess, sir?” The guard just sort of pointed at my general direction and tells me, “Only Priests and Priestess can cast shields like that one”. For half a moment we just look at each oddly, until I heard the snarling again, I turn and with a little scream I saw black smoke come from hands and suddenly the odd little creature started to choke and writhe in pain. The guard chuckled and with one swing, he buried his sword into the spine of the horrible creature and it died quickly. As he wiped the blood off his sword using a handful of grass he looked at me strangely, “That was a Murloc, and you are most defiantly a Priestess, you almost choked that creature to death with your shadow words, do you have a name Priestess?” I could only shake my head and I tried unsuccessfully to hold back the tears. I looked down at what was left of my dirty and torn clothing and then back at the dock where I woke up. Once I had calmed down some I suddenly felt this odd sensation all over, it seemed to be strongest in my hands. I looked down in shock to find my hands glowing with pure white light, suddenly all of the cuts, scrapes, and bruises were totally healed and gone, my head even didn’t hurt anymore. I could only stare in wonder at my hands, and at the ship’s guard.
After letting me collect myself some he shook his head and said, “Well, Welcome to the Wetlands Priestess Choker. Why don’t you come inside, we will get you something to eat and drink and I will tell you some things that have been happening around the world, maybe it will help you answer some of your questions about who you are. “ A drink is all I could think about, I was so very thirsty after that odd glow came over me and healed all my injuries, it was like a deep inner thirst.
We entered the inn that I had previously not noticed standing right before me, he pointed me to the hearth and went to talk to the inn keeper. After a few minutes of warming myself at the fire, a friendly barmaid came over to me with a bowl of some sort of stew and a strong rich drink. After gulping the drink the barmaid looked at me in surprise and said, “You sure do like your Rum, huh?” I could only stare at her, “Rum?” I ask. She explained that the drink I had such gulped down and was now warming me from the inside out was called Rum, some sort of alcohol from a place called Booty Bay, where ever that was before she walked away. I wondered if maybe I was from this Booty Bay and maybe that is why I liked this drink so very much.
After a while the guard came back to me and explained and started to tell me a horrible story of a place called Darkshore that was in the Elvin homeland that had been destroyed by the scourge. It seems that there was very little left of this place or of the wonderful temples that had been in the surrounding area. And that already only a few weeks since its destruction, the place was already giving way back to nature and the beasts of the area, even if all of those beasts seemed tainted somehow. All I could do is wonder why such horrors happened in the world and what this story had to do with me. Once he was finished I stared at him for a few minutes, then finally I asked, “What does this horrible story have to do with me? And how does this tell me who I might be?” He went on to explain that I was a Night Elf, the rather bright pink skin, bright purple hair and long pointed ears being a dead give away. And since he was most certain of a few facts, mainly being that I was indeed a Night Elf and that he had no question that I was a Priestess, he figured that I must have been part of that horrible story. And that somehow I ended up on the other side of the world in my attempt to flee the carnage. But other than that he could only guess.
He had been kind enough to arrange with the inn keeper during their talk for me to sleep there tonight, and a few minutes later the barmaid came back to show me up to my room. I’m afraid I was more than a little tipsy at this point as all during my talk with the nice guard I had been trying to relive my thirst by drinking several cups of that Rum drink and since I had no name that I knew of, she called me Rum whenever she needed to get my attention while helping me bathe some of the filth off me and get ready for bed, knowing I would look up for what then my new favorite drink.
The next morning, I woke slightly stiff and sore, but feeling much better compared to the last time when I had woken up under the docks. The barmaid entered the room shortly after I woke up to tell me that I had a visitor and that she had brought me some of her daughters cloths for me to wear since there wasn’t much left of the cloths I had on when I woke up there. I hugged her gratitude and promised I would never forget her kindness to me. She just gave me a motherly smile and once I was dressed she told me to be a good girl and go see what my visited wanted with her Rum Priestess.
When I entered the common room of the inn, a pleasant looking lady came up to me and introduced herself as Morgan, an alchemy master. She said that Svenen, who it turned out, after some questioning was the kind ship’s guard that helped me last night, had come and talked to her and asked her to take me in as an apprentice. We talked for a long time and she explained that while she knew very little of Priestesses she could teach me a skill that would let me support myself no matter where I went or what I did in exchange for me helping her in her shop and home. As I had no where to go it seemed if Svenen’s story was true, I gladly accepted. She then asked me for my name, I could only shrug and told her, “I don’t know, its one of the many things I don’t remember from before I woke up here yesterday. The nice barmaid calls me, Rum and Svenen called me Choker, so why not call me Rum and or Choker? “
I’m afraid Mistress Morgan didn’t have the best of hearing and she misunderstood me, and called Rumandchoker for as long as I was there. I studied the art of making potions and elixirs and flasks with Mistress Morgan until I was ready to set out on my own as a Master in my own right. And all the while I practiced the little bit of my magic that had showed itself over the years as best I could. I would stop any Priest or Priestess that passed through town if I could and ask them a million questions. They all said the same thing, go to Ironforge or Stormwind and study with the head Priests and Priestesses there, to relearn my lost craft. So when I was ready to set out on my own after all my years of study, Mistress Morgan handed me a small pouch of coins and bought me a flight to Ironforge. The townspeople had all come to send me on with fond farewells, there were so very kind to me in my time of need and I promised them all I would return for visits. I had tearful goodbyes with Mistress Morgan who had shared and taught me so much, Betsa, the motherly barmaid who was so sweet to me that first night and who in time had become like a surrogate mother to me and most especially to Svenen who will always hold a special place in my heart as my hero.
I can’t even begin to describe the view from that very first gryphon flight to Ironforge, it was so breathtaking, all the snow and mountains, I could only stare in awe. As the gryphon set me down right in the heart of this huge dwarf city I felt suddenly so very alone but I was determined to not let fear stop me. I right away found an alchemy shop and while they had no openings and it seemed they supplied the whole city with their alchemy needs, the shop mistress was very kind and pointed me to where I could find a guard to help me find the Priests and Priestess.
After walking around in an awestruck daze at the size and noise of such a huge city I did find the Priests and Priestess exactly where the city guard had said they would be. After a rather lengthy introduction in which I altered my name slight to Rumncoke instead of Rumandchoker, to sound a little less violent, and the story of, who I was, as far as I had pieced together over the years and what I was looking for, they accepted me into their training.
Very quickly the craft came back to me and while I might not remember learning it all the first time, it was very easy learning it the second time. I found that I excelled in both the light and dark sides of my craft and in time I was released to my own again as a fully trained (or retrained if you will) Priestess. In all my travels I have altered which side of my powers I use most depending on the period of my life. When I first set out I still harbored much anger at Eugene for taking my memories and for not letting me remember who I was and what had happened to me, so I walked in the path of the Shadow side of my powers. As time went on I gained some inner peace and joined in with a guild of other warriors and with that inner peace came strength to the Holy side of my craft. In time though no peace can last, even inner peace, when the news of the dark portal tearing apart the world, I once more left behind the Holy side and harnessed the power of the Shadows to fight this horrible evil before it could do to someone else what it had done to me.