(date illegible)

I found Dalaran.

Twenty Fifth day of the first month

The mist looks very romantic in this place. High in the mountains it swirls and heaves like this living, breathing thing that slides past you noiselessly. It dives away from the ankles of the storm giants that go stomping fast, shaking the earth and stones. And it hangs like a curtain between the pines, as if they were shy and trying to clothe themselves modestly against our prying, Southern eyes.
It seems very romantic. Anywhere else in Azeroth, it would seem romantic, even mystic. But not here in this chilled place. As with everything else in this place, it has a hidden face beneath a mask of serene, still beauty.
Twice now I have gone in to the mists, thinking to scour the beach and look for items washed up on the shore, and twice now I have been horribly surprised by the large, angry beast-men waiting there. Not quite the Kvaldir, when they die their body dissolves in to fetid seawater and rotting, twined seaweed. It's puzzling such solid flesh could come from such strange substances.
They wield strange magics, not quite arcane, not quite frost. They seem to have the same division as most peoples, between those that wield those magics and those that practice the martial arts -mostly with spears it would seem. They are large, covered in hair with long bears and topknots, and I do not see a single female among them. Perhaps there are villages beyond the horizon where they stay behind and these are raiders of some sort, but it would seem from what I have seen that there are only males among these... things.
They attack any one and anything on sight, which is thankfully hampered by the mist just as much as my own is. It's possible to melt in to it and fade out for a bit, at which time they give up and return to whatever they were doing before I stumbled upon them. It's as if they accept it's a confusing environment, and just go with it.
They are a vicious race, whatever they are. Their language is unintelligible, and none of them has given me the opportunity to try and talk to them, simply attacking relentlessly until I flee or take them down. The usual heartsick feeling I get when taking down another sentient being has fled in the face of their aggressiveness. These are not men the way that I know men. But then... everything here is beyond my knowing, it would seem.
The naga asked for my help when I stumbled upon them in the mist as well. These things had been slaughtering their people as with any others they came across. I couldn't help but remember the angry screams of their kind in the Outlands when my clan breached the Serpentshrine. Apparently news doesn't travel via the underground streams they talk of, as they simply wanted help. They asked me to retrieve a spear and go kill a giant fish.
Well... I haven't done it yet. It's deep water, and at the risk of sounding like less than a champion of the Horde, it is freaking COLD. My people are tropical, and the fact that we aren't dying off from frostbite is amazing.
I suppose I'll go fishing. After investing in some very, very thick oiled wool. In the meantime, I am staying clear of the mists. Those things that hide in them are cruel and evil, and have ruined my taste for the storm, the fog, and for now my favorite place of meditation, my familiar retreat of the surf and the beach.

Twenty Third Day of the first month of the year.

After enough time among any one group with which you don't share a common history or cultural values and I think two things happen; either you acclimate to them and whatever originally bothered you about them develops a deep, hard callous so that you can move among them, or, it blisters up like a foot in a new sandal and pains you each time you take a "step".
In my case, the callous would not grow and I am simply too thin-skinned to spend a great deal of time among the Forsaken. It all the talk of plagues and using it against every form of life, with a general blase' attitude towards the damage they would do. Looking at the sesspool of Halgrin, where I ventured to help them test their vile concoctions out, made my stomach turn each time. They never reacted, simply staring down in to the small vale they had pumped full of a green haze, watching without much emotion.
I suppose when one is like that and survives it becomes rather obvious that the rest of the world could probably continue to survive that way as well. I've seen the pines of the Eastern Plaguelands gasping for air with with branches, their trunks covered with pulsing tumors. Life always continues in some form, and there's is just a different one. But for those that don't make it through the transformation.
I'd run in to the Kvaldir away from their mist-weaving beach brethren at the great lift on the way to New Agamand. They are ferocious, huge men. They tower taller than even a tauren or one of those ethereal draenai. When I stepped forward and began to help cut through their numbers to secure the lift and the waypoint they fought like some berserking druids I'd seen in the past, whipping in to a frenzy of knotted shoulders and beards and heavy, heavy axeblades. Initially I thought their entire race to be composed of males, perhaps propagated through some mystical means. But later, when I was sent in to one of their towns to try and obtain information I found the female of the species patrolling with wolves of some strange sort, and these women were as tall as the men. I wonder if the diminutive humans of Stormwind descended from these beast-people.
Here is the difference between the Forsaken and the orcs. The Forsaken, in the course of a week, asked me to go trap spectral shades for ectoplasm, desecrate corpses, poison local wildlife, steal the eggs of an endangered species of drake, THEN poison it, and to top it all off hunt down and slaughter the head of one of the Kvaldir houses, kill him, and then bring a sample of his blood to them to aid in the preparation of the final plague for the purpose of genocide. The orcs asked me to go help the local people defend their land and do what they asked of me, save the local wildlife from poaching, and help quiet down elementals that were angered by the travels of the Lich King's host across their lands. I was asked to scout out map points, release prisoners, and bring in poisoned kodos to be healed.
One group works to subjugate the land and poison it, the other tries to rebuild it.
But before anyone might laugh and tell me that I jumped to conclusions too soon, I should point out that I am currently bunked at Agmar's Hammer. Tomorrow I travel to moonrest to try and attune myself to the ley lines there with the hope of finding my way to Dalaran.
Wow. Dalaran. The word makes my head spin. Center of magely studies and arcane knowledge the likes of which haven't been seen in a while. I might soon have access to the libraries and resources there to train myself. Excitement doesn't touch on the emotions this stirs in me.
Backing up to pick up Agmar's Hammer again, I said I'm bunked here. I hope not to be for much longer after the attunement. Yes, it is orcs. It is, in fact, the Kor'kron guard, elite troops of the Horde. And let me tell you, in the case of a siege, really you can't be anywhere better than behind the Kor'kron. I've seen them at work in the Outlands and it is a spectacular thing of singular, brutal beauty.
However, something is very wrong at this outpost. Anyone who doesn't do exactly what is commanded of them is branded a traitor. I've seen notices on the walls to bring people in who did that very thing. I have no intention of getting too comfortable here and letting them start to think of me as anything more than a civilian with a few handy icicle-tricks. The feel of this place is very military and cold, and I have never been one for steel. Give me paper and scrolls and candlelight any day. At least I had that in the crypt at New Agamand. Hopefully I can return to that when I drop off these ectoplasmic samples at Venomspite, a wyvern-hop up the road. I'm hanging on to them for dear life so there's an excuse to disappear in the near future.
It seems no matter where I go, my expectations will not be met in this place. Nothing is going to feel comfortable to me and no place will ring familiar enough to take the edge off my nerves. I'll make do with a rope hammock and a fire for now. Part of me craves the sands of my home island where I could dig my toes in and smell the saltwater tang on the breeze.
Really the only thing that keeps me from doing that right now is me. I have the ability to get to Orgrimmar. Perhaps it's the stubborn streak from my father that tells me I need to stay here until I grow accustomed and make it a second home. Or maybe it's the fact that when I go back what I want won't be there. I'll still see those crazy witch doctors in the places my family and friends once danced and all the rumors of retaking the place will be lies.
It doesn't matter. My family isn't there any more, and I suspect what I want is not the warmth of the sun, but the warmth of their company.
This has all grown too serious and the torches have given me a headache with their raging bright flames. I think it's time to rest.

Nine days in to the month of the new year

This is very judgemental of me, but I just can't have a conversation with someone who is missing the lower half of their face. The tongue flops about, somehow they still make the sounds, but there is something about watching that displaced organ work like a wet worm crawling around in grey soil that makes me shudder. And visibly, also. It's so rude I can't help but blush profusely when I do it, even if I'm just containing the reaction.

Why the alchemists couldn't wire up a prosthetic jaw in the meantime.... after all of their concern over appearances and seeming "normal"...

I think deep down they probably don't really give a damn and think it's funny to watch the likes of me squirm in discomfort while we chat.

I really, really wish I didn't have so much to learn from them. And I'm mad at myself for being so shallow.

One of the things asked of me was to go round up infected whelplings. I don't look forward to it because of the risk it poses should some of it make contact with the fluids on my body (something the royal society took great joy in relaying the details of in splendid and abhorrent detail). Nevermind that the little bastards can and will bite at any given opportunity. I remember Blackwing Lair. I still have a scar on the back of my thigh where one snuck up on my clan in the Supression Rooms.

Oh, the joys of being a lauded hero of the Horde. Duty is expected and encouraged. Saying no renders you a bitch. It also cuts off the free mead and beer.

So, right. Whelps it is, bright and early tomorrow while they're still groggy from the evening's chill.

Day 3 after the celebration of the New Year

I don't know why this strikes me as funny, but everywhere I look in the inns and buildings there are portraits on the walls of the Undercity, and of Lordaeron. I even saw one on the wall of those strange windmills they used to employ on the farms.

Even the Forsaken seem to need their familiar sights and sounds around them. For some reason I thought them beyond sentimentality.

~Addendum~
I asked later today about the purpose of the paintings and was advised that they were brought along to "create a semblance of humanity".
When I appeared to be comforted by this thought I was quickly assured that it was not out of any need to have them there, but to make their visitors more comfortable. Everything else about them would seem alien, so they bothered to include furniture and paintings on the walls for those of us that were familiar with human settlements.
I'm somewhat sorry I asked. I liked my romantic notion of sentimentality more.

Feast of Winter's Veil and New Year's Beginning.

Northrend.
There were always rumblings about it, mentions of it in conversation around Orgrimmar that no one in my circles really got deep detail on. Thanks to the battles of recent years we all knew of Arthas, the Lich king, and the horrors that had come from there. The humans I spoke with at the centers for learning and among the Violet Eye could tell me all I could bear to hear on the subject.
Then came the reports of Arthas attacking the Plaguelands and northern regions in Azeroth. Even in the city of lights where I'd made my home the reports came with crashing alarm in to the very center. Shortly after that came the battle at Light's Hope Chapel where Arthas was directly seen on the battlefield. Then the cast off Death Knights began to straggle in to Orgrimmar and present themselves to Thrall. It was said that the prince's grasp weakened on these poor blighted creatures and they had no where else to go. Some of them were even still recognizable to their family and friends.
Even now just thinking of it makes me shudder.
I find myself now at New Agamand. For quite a while I was at the western reaches of Northrend. To tell of everything that was done would take more pages than this journal has parchment scraps. I was among the orcs for a long time, then amongst the humans to try and learn more from them. At the time I discovered the existence of something called "mage hunters", and while I tend to shy away from actually striking down a living thing, these made it very easy. The second they felt me begin to draw forth energy from the ether, they attacked me. I heard tales of what had happened to my compatriots who were not able to focus quickly. I am grateful to have been able to walk away.
The Taunka and the Tuskarr, new peoples to be encountered in these lands, make me uneasy. The Taunka seem very suspicious and uneasy, -and who can blame them, being that we the outsiders spawned the horrors that are rising against them now- but they also appear very wise. They have lived in this country for as long as they've had a recorded history. So, too, have the Tuskarr. Both have shamanic traditions that would be fascinating to delve in to, were there any written records of which to study. Theirs appears to be a majority oral tradition. What writing they have is ceremonial and hard to derive true meaning from. The elders that I might talk with have been scattered, slaughtered, or are currently hard pressed to defend what is left as they fight off the same siege of Death Knights and undead minions that we have come north to battle against ourselves.
It is very hard to be in their presence. They gaze at me and I have a feeling that the winds or the low grasses are whispering things to them about me. I'm a stranger here, and having to look at them reminds me of this every single day.
What does any of this have to do with being in New Agamand? Well, I must admit with some embarassment that the pressure from the orcs to become fast friends with all these new peoples was too much. Already being among this cold and ice makes me uncomfortable, as I am, by blood, a tropical creature. There are other reasons that I'm not ready to go in to. But with the added underlying distrust, I moved away from the orcs and their all-encompassing plan to welcome anyone against the Scourge and towards the Howling Fjords.
Believe it or not, I was more at home amongst the undead than those with warm blood in their veins. Perhaps it is because they are so upfront in their intentions and do not really take the time with niceties that I found them more easy to be around. No hidden agendas or niceties. Or perhaps I'm being idealistic in my assessment and it was nice to be around dry humor and familiar prejudices.
so here I find myself in a land stewing in poisons and plagues, scribing this by the flickering candlelight the forsaken so love. In a moment I will take my cloak, wrap it around myself, and rest in a pine-hewn box propped up against a wall. But it will be the most familiar thing to me in this place, so I expect to sleep far better here than back at Taunke'le.

~*Explanation/Method of Operation*~

I've been playing World of WarCraft for at least 3 years now and spend a large part of it on an RP server. Perhaps out of need to establish meaning in an electronic game that was sucking up so much of my time (and because I found myself on an RP server) I began creating a backstory for my main character that I played. Being a writer, I dabbled a bit in journal entries prior to this, but never really had a place to put them down.
Now that I'm trying to focus on writing more, and with the release of the latest expansion, I'm giving all of this a home. Take it as you will. If you enjoy it, fantastic. If not, there are many other blogs out there and I hope you find what you like out there.

Here begins Kaetze's journal.