What they want you to believe…
They are merciless killing machines. They have no emotions, except the thrill of the hunt, the delight of shedding blood, and the lust of hearing the screams of terror and despair from their victims.
What we see…
Their history as pawns of undeath, the captains and commanders of endless leagues of sleepless, 'perfect' soldiers. While they, themselves, are the pinnacle of that so-called perfection. Eyes like ice, hearts dead and black like their souls, we remember the terrors suffered as comrades, friends, even our family fell prey, only to rise again, enslaved. Because of them.
What I've done…
I met him. And my blood ran cold. My stomach churned with sick nerves. I had never gotten close to a Death Knight who wasn't out to destroy me. Not until I saw him. That's because for these past years, I've been in hiding, learning, living, training on my own, secluded from society. Imagine my shock to finally cross paths with a monster which haunted my dreams. And yet, he was just standing there in the Plaguelands on his mount.
Why not?
Why not torment him. I torment everyone else with sharp tongue and quick wit. Laughter and swearing can both be roused from my foul temperament. He tolerated it. It's not as if I could do anything to him, anyway. Lowly paladin I was.
So I grew stronger. I challenged him over and over. Sometimes I won. Sometimes I lost. But he always loomed ahead of me, indifferent to my very existence. I enjoyed it and I was enthralled by it… and I was pissed the hell off about it.
Until I asked him why he wears his helm. Always, he covers his face. It made no sense. Why? Why are you doing this? What purpose does it serve? His answer was far too human. He couldn't face the living after what he had done. What his kind had done. Such a stupid answer.
It took weeks to get that helm off of his head, to face me for the first time. Grief struck me, to see a man so like the one I had recently lost from my life. So I smashed my face into his. It only made sense. He remained patient, hardly phased by the hint of pain the strike had caused. But beyond that moment, I began to learn. And I enticed him into an experiement.
I used him. I manipulated him. Oh, poor Malathir. He knew that I was using him, and yet he knew nothing of what I was doing to him. I didn't know what I was doing to myself. The insanity, the audacity.
Our lives have been strung together over slow months. We are in no rush to discover the truth behind the theories of a Death Knight's existence. His darkness and cold flesh, my life and warmth. There is very little that the dead and the living have in common, and that is what made me so angry. I realized that I will truly never understand that part of the Death Knight whose life I have turned inside out by resurrecting scant fragments of his being.
I try. I listen. I offer a shoulder to cry upon, not that he would waste precious energies to shed tears for himself. Not when the preservation magics can be used for other things. Though I am no necromancer, I have grown familiar with his darkness. I have healed wounds that he couldn't reach, wasn't even aware of, and yet I am still cut off from that dark kinship that Death Knights show amongst each other. Their bonds. I have seen them with my own eyes. They understand something I cannot, and even without their true feelings brought to the surface, they value the faded 'positive' emotions. Either they believe that they can never feel happiness for anything other than slaughter, or they have been fooled…
The theories continue to twist and turn. My experiments are a double-edged sword. If I succeed in truly bringing everything to Light for those clad in death, I ruin their 'perfection'. They do not like it. I have been warned severely for tampering with one of their own. Not that I care. I have to know. I need to know. I need to understand just a little more about him every day. But I'm afraid to ask him… Even when we reaffirm these bonds which were once built upon mistrust and a master's hand laid upon a pawn to see just where it would land next…
I will not hurt him again. Not like I have.
They don't want you to know…
Death Knights are the most fragile beings of all.
~An'giel
They are merciless killing machines. They have no emotions, except the thrill of the hunt, the delight of shedding blood, and the lust of hearing the screams of terror and despair from their victims.
What we see…
Their history as pawns of undeath, the captains and commanders of endless leagues of sleepless, 'perfect' soldiers. While they, themselves, are the pinnacle of that so-called perfection. Eyes like ice, hearts dead and black like their souls, we remember the terrors suffered as comrades, friends, even our family fell prey, only to rise again, enslaved. Because of them.
What I've done…
I met him. And my blood ran cold. My stomach churned with sick nerves. I had never gotten close to a Death Knight who wasn't out to destroy me. Not until I saw him. That's because for these past years, I've been in hiding, learning, living, training on my own, secluded from society. Imagine my shock to finally cross paths with a monster which haunted my dreams. And yet, he was just standing there in the Plaguelands on his mount.
Why not?
Why not torment him. I torment everyone else with sharp tongue and quick wit. Laughter and swearing can both be roused from my foul temperament. He tolerated it. It's not as if I could do anything to him, anyway. Lowly paladin I was.
So I grew stronger. I challenged him over and over. Sometimes I won. Sometimes I lost. But he always loomed ahead of me, indifferent to my very existence. I enjoyed it and I was enthralled by it… and I was pissed the hell off about it.
Until I asked him why he wears his helm. Always, he covers his face. It made no sense. Why? Why are you doing this? What purpose does it serve? His answer was far too human. He couldn't face the living after what he had done. What his kind had done. Such a stupid answer.
It took weeks to get that helm off of his head, to face me for the first time. Grief struck me, to see a man so like the one I had recently lost from my life. So I smashed my face into his. It only made sense. He remained patient, hardly phased by the hint of pain the strike had caused. But beyond that moment, I began to learn. And I enticed him into an experiement.
I used him. I manipulated him. Oh, poor Malathir. He knew that I was using him, and yet he knew nothing of what I was doing to him. I didn't know what I was doing to myself. The insanity, the audacity.
Our lives have been strung together over slow months. We are in no rush to discover the truth behind the theories of a Death Knight's existence. His darkness and cold flesh, my life and warmth. There is very little that the dead and the living have in common, and that is what made me so angry. I realized that I will truly never understand that part of the Death Knight whose life I have turned inside out by resurrecting scant fragments of his being.
I try. I listen. I offer a shoulder to cry upon, not that he would waste precious energies to shed tears for himself. Not when the preservation magics can be used for other things. Though I am no necromancer, I have grown familiar with his darkness. I have healed wounds that he couldn't reach, wasn't even aware of, and yet I am still cut off from that dark kinship that Death Knights show amongst each other. Their bonds. I have seen them with my own eyes. They understand something I cannot, and even without their true feelings brought to the surface, they value the faded 'positive' emotions. Either they believe that they can never feel happiness for anything other than slaughter, or they have been fooled…
The theories continue to twist and turn. My experiments are a double-edged sword. If I succeed in truly bringing everything to Light for those clad in death, I ruin their 'perfection'. They do not like it. I have been warned severely for tampering with one of their own. Not that I care. I have to know. I need to know. I need to understand just a little more about him every day. But I'm afraid to ask him… Even when we reaffirm these bonds which were once built upon mistrust and a master's hand laid upon a pawn to see just where it would land next…
I will not hurt him again. Not like I have.
They don't want you to know…
Death Knights are the most fragile beings of all.
~An'giel