Blood Ties (World of Warcraft, page 1
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Leave us a Review
Copyright
Dedication
Map
Prologue Felsoul Hold Ruins, Suramar
Chapter One Light’s Hope Chapel, Eastern Plaguelands
Chapter Two The Nighthold, Suramar City
Chapter Three Felsoul Hold Ruins, Suramar
Chapter Four The Nighthold, Suramar City
Chapter Five Suramar City
Chapter Six Shattrath City
Chapter Seven Auchindoun
Chapter Eight Auchindoun
Chapter Nine The Dark Portal
Chapter Ten Felsoul Hold Ruins, Suramar
Chapter Eleven Suramar
Chapter Twelve Dreadscar Rift
Chapter Thirteen Dreadscar Rift
Chapter Fourteen Dreadscar Rift
Chapter Fifteen The Nighthold, Suramar City
Chapter Sixteen The Nighthold, Suramar City
Chapter Seventeen The Nighthold, Suramar City
Chapter Eighteen Lunastre Estate, Suramar City
Chapter Nineteen Felsoul Hold Ruins, Suramar
Chapter Twenty Felsoul Hold Ruins, Suramar
Epilogue Light’s Hope Chapel
Acknowledgments
About the Author
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World of Warcraft: Blood Ties
Print edition ISBN: 9781835417522
E-book edition ISBN: 9781835417539
Published by Titan Books
A division of Titan Publishing Group Ltd
144 Southwark Street, London SE1 0UP
www.titanbooks.com
First edition: December 2025
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead (except for satirical purposes), is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2025 by Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. All rights reserved.
Christie Golden asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
Warcraft, World of Warcraft, and Blizzard Entertainment are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Blizzard Entertainment, Inc., in the US and/or other countries. All other trademark references herein are the properties of their respective owners.
A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.
EU RP (for authorities only)
eucomply OÜ, Pärnu mnt. 139b-14, 11317 Tallinn, Estonia
hello@eucompliancepartner.com, +3375690241
This book is dedicated to my mother,
Elizabeth Colson Golden
(March 25, 1925–July 22, 2024)
Who instilled in me a love of reading and respect for writing;
never judged me when I wept for characters;
and never, ever stopped being curious about the world.
I love you, I miss you, and I wish you could read this one.
PROLOGUE
Felsoul Hold Ruins, Suramar
The Broken Isles
YOU’RE HAVING SECOND THOUGHTS.”
“No, I’m not,” Dionaar lied. He winced inwardly as he heard his voice quivering. “I just think . . . we may be pushing our luck. That’s all.”
The nightborne youth craned his neck to look up at the demonic structure. It was broken, a ruin created by a long-defeated foe. Dionaar knew it ought to have signified nothing more than a reminder of the past—a reminder, in fact, of a great victory.
But the stories of what had happened here were not easily forgotten, and this unnerved him.
“You’re certain no one followed us?” Corentyn stood up a bit straighter. He was taller than Dionaar, slim, almost bony. He had all the recklessness expected of his seventeen years, a confidence that Dionaar could only dream of possessing. The flickering orange glow of the torches played over his frowning, knife-sharp features, casting a capering shadow of his profile.
Confident and clever, but not too wise, Dionaar thought. Two weeks ago, in an act of rebellion, Corentyn had carved a protection glyph onto the back of his hand, bragging about it to all the students who would listen. If he’d spent even a little time studying, his bravado would have been productive. But he hadn’t, so of course he’d messed it up, and now the glyph etched into his very skin meant nothing. When his parents discovered it, they’d been furious with him, told him he’d simply have to wear it until he could earn enough coin to have it removed himself.
He’s all talk, Dionaar thought, though his stomach clenched. He shook his head vigorously. “Not that I saw, but . . . a patrol might come by here. Eventually.”
Corentyn gave a careless shrug. “We can just hide—wait until they pass.”
“If we were noticed . . .”
Corentyn laughed and prodded him in the chest with a forefinger. “I’ll just shove you out in front of me. You’d take the fall, right?”
Dionaar looked down and didn’t answer. It wasn’t fair, of course; Corentyn was always out in front showing off, and Dionaar was just his lackey, spreading the stories of all the great things Corentyn did or the creepy abandoned places they’d checked out together. Even now Dionaar was expected to convince the others that they needed to sneak out, see for themselves if the horror Corentyn warned them about was real.
Corentyn slapped him on the shoulder. “Ah, cheer up, I’ll get you out if your parents lock you up. But I need you at your best tonight because I have something special planned.” He toed the large sack he had brought. Its lumpiness shifted slightly, but Dionaar had no idea what might be inside it.
“What’s that?”
“Can’t reveal the trick.” He sniffed. “Don’t be too scared; you at least know it’s all fake.”
Even though Dionaar was in on every prank, sometimes Corentyn’s antics still scared him. “You sure about all this? Vanaur and the Mystralin girls are coming, and their uncle is part of the Duskwatch. What if they tell—”
“They won’t, or they’ll get in trouble, too.” Corentyn rolled his eyes. “Don’t be such a baby. Go on, get going. Oh, wait—tell them before they come that orc warlocks used fel magic to steal years of life from their own children so they would be old enough to fight!”
“What?” Dionaar had never heard this. “Cor, you’re making this all up. And no, I’m not going to tell them that.”
* * *
“THEY DID WHAT?” RENAE’S voice was a horrified whisper.
Dionaar nodded sagely. “They drained their lives with fel magic so that they grew years older in seconds!”
“I want to be older,” Julyan said.
“Not like that,” Vanaur said.
Each of the teenagers carried a torch, except for the youngest, who clung tightly to her sister’s arm. “Now, remember,” Dionaar said, “we have to be very quiet. No talking, not even whispering. Demons have excellent hearing.”
Their faces were turned up to him, their eyes wide, and they nodded. “I’m going to take you to where I last saw the fel magic, but we have to be careful to not attract any attention. Because if they find us . . .”
“They’ll eat us,” whispered Renae.
“No,” Vanaur said, rolling his eyes. “Haven’t you been listening? They’ll drain your life and make you old!”
“Oh, they might eat you afterward,” Dionaar said. “Probably shouldn’t stick around to find out, right?”
Energetic nods. “And one more thing. You can’t tell anyone what you saw here. Not a word. Ever.”
“But shouldn’t we—I mean, if there truly is a demon in these ruins . . .”
“I’ve, um, already alerted them,” Dionaar lied. “This is our last chance to see it before the Duskwatch takes care of it.”
They agreed silently, and Dionaar lifted his torch, stepping into the darkness.
It was a short, easy path, and Dionaar knew it well by now. He gasped and pointed at a puddle of “demon blood” (water thickened with luminous mushroom gills), a “victim’s bone” (which Corentyn had salvaged from a birthday celebration featuring roasted stag), and a “demon horn” (which had also belonged to the unfortunate stag).
The Mystralin sisters were properly alarmed, but Vanaur was growing bored. “You promised fel magic.”
“There’s only fel magic when they’ve fed souls of the innocents to the machinery,” Dionaar replied.
That was Corentyn’s cue, but nothing happened.
“And if we see that, we’ve stayed too long,” Dionaar said louder. “And we don’t want THAT.”
Nothing.
What’s going on? Corentyn had said something about a surprise, but maybe his trick didn’t work. This wouldn’t be the first time one of his pranks backfired. Still, by now he should have at least activated the lamp with the green glass, started the smoke . . .
“I knew it,” Vanaur said. “Just another one of your stupid pranks, you and Corentyn. You really shouldn’t—”
He broke off with a strangled sound, his mouth open, staring behind Dionaar, who exhaled in relief. Thank goodness. The audience was bathed in the familiar eerie green of the filtered light. But there was a smell . . .
Rotten eggs. Fel was supposed to smell like rotten eggs! So that was the surprise!
It was then that the sensation of fear struck Dionaar so powerfully that his knees buckled. The others shrieked, the promise of silence utterly abandoned, and they ran back the way they had come, the wildly bobbing orange flames of their torches growing smaller and smaller, then devoured by darkness.
Dionaar had dropped his own torch and made no effort to find it, his breath catching as he covered his head with his hands and curled into a tight ball. He tried to gulp air, but he could taste the awful odor, and there was another smell laced with the reek of rotten egg, a smell less innocently explained. The smell of something dead.
Then came the scream.
It was coming from right behind the rock, high-pitched and pure in its perfect terror, a sound that Dionaar had never heard issue from Corentyn’s throat but that was undeniably his. Dionaar squeezed his eyes shut against the green glow, but it seemed to penetrate his very skin. His throat hurt so badly, was so raw, and he realized it was because he was screaming, screaming to drown out Cor, whom he was sure was dying back there, dying—
And then there was silence, except for Dionaar’s panting and the pounding of his frantic heart.
“Are you all right, Dio? Looks like I scared you more than them!”
The voice belonged to Corentyn. He sounded . . . normal. Excited, even.
Dionaar’s body shook violently, but he slowly lifted his head to see his friend grinning down at him. “Good prank, huh?”
Emotions flooded Dionaar: Relief, anger, confusion. But most of all joy. He got to his feet and threw his arms around his friend.
“It’s all right,” Corentyn said, hugging him back awkwardly. “I’m fine. I’m fine.”
Dionaar pulled back and then swung at Corentyn, cursing him, but the young man ducked and laughed, fending him off easily. As Dionaar’s adrenaline ebbed, Corentyn explained what he’d done. He’d been hanging on to the rotten eggs and meat for a while, and he’d practiced his shriek several times near the shore, where his voice would be drowned out by the tide.
“I did too good of a job, though,” he said, relighting Dionaar’s torch from his own. “I suspect the Mystralin girls are going straight to Uncle Duskwatch now, to tell him they saw fel magic down here.” He flashed a grin. “Party’s over, but at least I went out on a high note . . . so to speak.”
“We should tell our parents the same thing,” Dionaar said. “So they won’t blame it on us.”
“Good idea. Let’s get going. Do you need to change your pants?”
“Oh, shut up!” Now that Corentyn had officially ended the hoax, Dionaar could laugh about everything. Even if his parents found out they’d been behind it, he was just glad that it had been a foolish joke.
Corentyn placed a hand on his friend’s shoulder and gently started to turn him around, but then Dionaar froze.
A hand was sticking out from behind the boulder.
A hand with a half-healed, miswritten rune carved into it.
Corentyn laughed, following his friend’s line of sight. “Looks pretty real, doesn’t it? I was going to wave it like I was trying to climb out, but those kids ran before I could even use it! What a waste.”
“Y-yeah,” murmured Dionaar, staring at the hand. “A waste.”
“Come on,” Corentyn said, “let’s get out of here.” He had already begun talking about their next prank before they reached the exit.
But as Dionaar glanced behind them, searching the green, unnatural glow, he could have sworn he saw the hand twitch.
CHAPTER ONE
Light’s Hope Chapel, Eastern Plaguelands
The Eastern Kingdoms
CLANG. CLANG. CLANG.
The sound of hammer against steel was a familiar one outside Light’s Hope Chapel. But this time Master Craftsman Wilhelm—who usually repaired the weapons and armor of the Knights of the Silver Hand—was not the one producing it. The gruff dwarf was instead leaning back against a grassy hillock, peering up at the brown-gray sky of the Eastern Plaguelands and belting out a smithing song between swigs of Thunderbrew lager. He paused long enough to pose a question to the half-elf champion who had offered to take his place.
“How long can that skinny little arm of yers keep this up, laddie?” Wilhelm’s eyes twinkled, his mustache wet with foam. The “laddie” in question, Arator the Redeemer, grinned at him as he wiped his brow.
“Yet again I lament that I do not possess the dwarven musculature,” he said with an exaggerated sigh.
Wilhelm guffawed. “Ah, well, we cannae all be so fortunate.”
Arator’s arm was certainly up to the task, but it was hot work, and neither his human nor his elven blood gave him the innate dwarven ability to long withstand the heat of the forge. He removed his upper body armor and laid it to one side, revealing a pair of dragon tattoos on his muscled upper arms. They were identical in style, both outlined in gold, but filled in with different hues: one bright as the White Lady moon and the other a shade of charcoal.
A human boy of about ten, Winthrop, sat beside him. Winthrop was the newest squire to the famed paladin Lord Grayson Shadowbreaker, a position that Arator himself had held when he was new to the order. It was the boy’s task to which Arator now plied his own efforts, working on cleaning and hammering dents out of the great man’s armor. Today marked young Winthrop’s first visit to Light’s Hope Chapel, and he was far too dazzled by the elite company he presently kept to have made much progress in mending his lord’s gambeson.
“I can’t believe you’re bothering to help me,” he told Arator. “I mean . . . you’re the son of High Exarch Turalyon and Lady Alleria Windrunner! They’ve statues in the Valley of Heroes, songs sung about them. You were practically born famous!”
Arator had heard all this before and had tired of it years ago. Still, it was hardly Win’s fault, and he meant well. Although Arator was much older than Winthrop, the years of a half-elf did not keep pace with those of humans. It was one of many challenges bequeathed by his unique parentage. For all Arator’s experience and all he had seen, in many ways, he felt more kinship with the new squire than with his lord knight.
Arator turned his smile on the boy. “As I said, I enjoy being of assistance.” Arator well remembered how many tasks had been assigned during his own time as Grayson’s squire. It was important to learn skills like armor repair, of course, but young Win seemed buried beneath mundane chores. Arator felt that there was no task so small it was beneath him, if he could help someone by performing it.
Winthrop’s brown eyes narrowed, and he glanced toward where Lord Grayson and another of his former squires were engaged in conversation. “I hope he doesn’t get angry at us,” Winthrop murmured.
Arator couldn’t blame the boy for being concerned. Tall, muscular, having lost his right eye in battle long ago, Lord Grayson could seem intimidating even when out of armor and chatting casually. As one of Stormwind’s foremost paladins, he’d trained many among their number, had even brought Arator with him to their order’s war council a time or two. It was hard not to see him as intimidating, formidable—certainly an enemy Arator would not want to meet in battle. Simply sparring with the man was hard enough. But Grayson had made a firm commitment to others in the order, and he’d served the Light longer than most.
“Don’t worry,” Arator reassured the boy. “He’ll know it was my idea, not yours, trust me.”
“I don’t want you to get in trouble, either.”
“I won’t.”
Winthrop sighed. “Everyone says I’m lucky he picked me, but . . .” The boy looked down. “He’s so . . . strong, and confident, and can knock me to the ground in seconds when we’re sparring. I’ve heard a lot of the stories—he’s a real hero! He’s more than just a knight, he’s a lord! I’ve got to make sure I don’t disappoint him.” As he spoke the words, Winthrop reached for the gambeson and set to mending it with renewed purpose.
