Chapter 2: The First Lesson in Becoming
The silence after Lothar’s departure was a physical thing. It seeped into the stone of the room, into the rough wool of the blanket, into Khadgar’s bones. He sat on the edge of the bed for a long time, listening to the distant groan of the tower, trying to untangle the residue of the dream from the gritty reality of the morning. The visions of green fire were fading, but the echo of the voice—You will be the conduit—remained, a subliminal hum at the edge of his hearing.
His stomach twisted, empty and nervous. He needed to move. To do something. The academic part of his mind, the part that had dazzled the Kirin Tor, insisted this was all just stress and overactive imagination coupled with the unique psychic residue of Karazhan. The other part, the part that had felt Medivh’s cold, hungry stare, whispered that he was lying to himself.
A soft chime resonated through the air, not a sound heard with the ears, but felt in the teeth. A summons. It originated from somewhere above, a gentle, insistent pull on his magical senses. Medivh.
Khadgar stood, smoothing his robes. He splashed cold water from the washstand on his face, the shock sharpening him for a moment. His reflection in the tarnished metal mirror looked pale, shadows like bruises under his eyes. He looked like a man who hadn’t slept. Just stress, he told the reflection again, and turned away.
The climb to the observatory was a trek through the tower’s vertebrae. Staircases spiraled into utter blackness before emerging into slivers of grey light from arrow-slits. The air grew thinner, colder. The humming he’d felt since arrival intensified, a sub-audible vibration that made his molars ache. It was strongest here, a focused, rhythmic thrumming like a colossal heartbeat.
He pushed open a final, iron-bound door at the top of a seemingly endless flight.
The observatory was a ruin of ambition. The domed glass ceiling was a spiderweb of broken panes and skeletal lead frames, opening to a sky the colour of worn slate. Wind whistled through the gaps, carrying the scent of high altitude and ozone. The floor was a mosaic of inlaid star charts, now cracked and mossy. In the center of the room, floating about three feet above the stone, was a crystal.
It was large, easily the size of a barrel, and it pulsed with a deep, internal verdant light. Not the clean blue of arcane magic, nor the holy gold of the Light. This was the green of deep jungle shadows, of poison, of the strange, sickly hue that had tinted his dream. It hovered in perfect stillness, its facets cutting the dim light, and the hum that filled the tower emanated from its core.
Medivh stood beside it, looking even more frail against the crystal’s vibrant, sinister energy. He was tracing a finger in the air, leaving behind a faint, shimmering silver line that connected to a series of complex astral diagrams etched into the floor. He looked up as Khadgar entered, and his expression was one of focused, academic intensity.
“Ah. You felt the summons. Good.” Medivh’s voice was almost swallowed by the hum. He gestured to the crystal. “Magnificent, isn’t it? A focal lens of my own design. It captures and refines latent dimensional energies.”
“It’s… powerful,” Khadgar said, keeping his distance. The crystal’s light seemed to seep into his vision, leaving green afterimages when he blinked.
“Power is one word. It is also unstable. The harmonies are off. I’ve been trying to recalibrate it for weeks.” Medivh let the silver line fade and turned fully to Khadgar. He looked tired, but there was a desperate hope in his eyes that mirrored the expression he’d given Lothar. “This is where I need your help. Your unique sensitivity.”
Khadgar’s throat felt tight. “My help?”
“A simple experiment. In theory.” Medivh took a step closer, his movements slow and pained. “The crystal is attuned to a… a signature. My own, predominantly. It’s become resonant, like a bell struck once that refuses to stop ringing. I need to introduce a fresh, pure harmonic. A different kind of magic to balance the system.” He waved a hand towards Khadgar. “Your magic. Unburdened. Kirin Tor arcane, straight from the wellspring of Dalaran.”
The request hung in the cold air. Medivh watched him, his pale eyes earnest. He didn’t command. He waited. The choice, seemingly, was Khadgar’s.
“What would I have to do?” Khadgar asked, his curiosity warring with a deep, instinctive revulsion toward the glowing stone.
“Simply channel a steady stream of arcane energy into the primary facet,” Medivh said, pointing to a specific face of the crystal that gleamed darker than the others. “The crystal should absorb it, process it. The feedback loop will stabilize. I will monitor the fluxes from here.” He indicated the etched diagrams on the floor. “It is a diagnostic procedure. Harmless. I would not ask if there were risk.”
He said it with such weary sincerity. This was the Guardian, the protector of Azeroth, a man Lothar would die for. He was asking for help with a recalibration. Khadgar’s paranoid fantasies from the night shriveled in the face of that simple, logical request. This was why he was here. To assist. To learn.
“Alright,” Khadgar said, the word leaving his lips before he could second-guess it. “I’ll try.”
A smile touched Medivh’s cracked lips, a fleeting thing of genuine relief. “Thank you, boy. Position yourself there, by the focal node.”
Khadgar moved to the spot Medivh indicated, directly before the dark facet. The hum was a physical pressure here, a bass note vibrating in his chest cavity. Up close, the crystal wasn’t perfectly smooth. Its interior swirled with smoky tendrils, and deep within, he thought he saw shapes moving—flashes of impossible geometry, glimpses of burning eyes.
“Ignore the phantasms,” Medivh said softly from his place at the edge of the diagrams. “Residual images. Like shadows on a wall. Focus on the flow. Clean, blue arcane. As you were taught.”
Khadgar took a deep, steadying breath. He pushed the lingering dread down, buried it beneath layers of academic discipline. He centered himself, feeling the familiar tap of the ley lines far below, drawing the cool, intellectual energy of the arcane into his being. It filled him, a calming, blue clarity. He raised his hands, palms facing the dark facet.
He began the channel.
A stream of pure, sapphire energy leapt from his fingertips, striking the crystal with a sharp, crystalline ping. The green light within flared, swallowing his blue beam hungrily. For a moment, nothing happened. Then, the crystal pulsed.
A wave of energy washed back out of the facet. Not blue. Not anything he recognized. It was a warm green, that flowed up his arms and into his core. It wasn’t hot. It was deeply, profoundly warm, like submerging in a perfect bath after a year of cold. The tension that had knotted his shoulders since waking melted away. The fuzzy, tired thickness in his head didn’t just clear—it was replaced by a soft, green haze of contentment.
His body relaxed. A sigh escaped him. The channeling became effortless, the arcane power flowing out of him not as a draw, but as a natural exhalation. And in its place, the warm energy cycled back, filling him.
Feel it, a voice murmured, not from Medivh, but from the warmth itself. It was the dream-voice, but smoother now, intimate. The friction is gone. This is power without struggle. This is how it should be.
He felt stronger. Not just mentally, but magically. The well of arcane inside him felt deeper, more accessible. The simple act of channeling, which usually required focused concentration, felt like breathing. He could see the weave of magic in the air around the crystal, complex patterns he’d only read about suddenly making visceral, intuitive sense.
“Steady,” Medivh called, but his voice sounded distant, unimportant. “The readings are… stabilizing. Remarkably.”
Khadgar barely heard him. The warmth was spreading, a delicious lassitude pooling in his limbs. His vision softened at the edges, the jagged, broken observatory melting into a pleasant blur. The green light of the crystal was beautiful now, a promise, a source. He wanted to be closer to it. He wanted to give it more.
He increased the flow of his arcane energy, not because he was told to, but because it felt good. The crystal glowed brighter, the hum smoothing into a purr. The warm feedback intensified, a gentle current carrying him away.
Medivh watched, silent now, from his station. The silver lines of his diagnostic diagram were blazing, not with silver, but with a reflected, sickly green. He wasn’t monitoring stabilisation. He was charting an infection. He saw the exact moment the boy’s shoulders lost their wary hunch, the moment his face went slack with placid acceptance. He saw the faintest trickle of emerald light dance along the channels of Khadgar’s own magic, a stain taking root.
Inside Khadgar’s mind, there was only the warmth and the whisper.
You see? This is not theft. This is a gift. I am not taking from you. I am making you… more. So much more.
Khadgar, adrift in the blissful current, could only agree. It did feel like more. It felt like everything he’d ever wanted power to be: easy, vast, and forgiving. The last sharp fragment of his doubt dissolved, washed away in that soothing, green-tinged tide.
The last sharp fragment of his doubt dissolved, washed away in that soothing, green-tinged tide.
He wasn’t sure when the channeling stopped. Time had become a soft, meaningless thing. One moment he was standing, arms outstretched towards the crystal’s glorious light. The next, he was lying down, the world a gentle sway. A ceiling of dark, unfamiliar wood beams swam above him. This wasn’t the observatory. The air smelled of dust and old sweat and something cloyingly sweet, like decayed roses.
His body felt heavy, insulated in wool. A profound warmth radiated from his core, the same delicious warmth from the crystal, but now it was inside his skin, humming in his blood. He tried to turn his head. The movement was slow, requiring immense effort.
Medivh’s face hovered above his own. The Guardian’s features were softened in the dim light, the deep lines seeming less like cracks and more like gentle shadows. He was close. Too close. Khadgar could feel the dry, cool brush of the man’s breath against his cheek.
“There now,” Medivh whispered, his voice a rasp of utter tenderness. A cold, bony hand settled on Khadgar’s chest, over his heart. The touch should have been jarring, but the warmth within him absorbed the shock, muting it. “You gave so freely. You took the gift. It’s inside you now. We are connected.”
Khadgar’s lips parted, but no sound came out. His thoughts were thick syrup, pouring in slow, disjointed droplets. This was Medivh’s room. He was on Medivh’s bed. The understanding was distant, clinical. Something was wrong. The hand on his chest began to move, sliding down the blue fabric of his robe, tracing the line of his ribs. A thumb brushed over the lean muscle of his abdomen.
He should move. He should push the hand away.
Relax.
The voice was inside his skull, layered beneath his own muddled thoughts. It was the crystal’s voice, the fire’s voice, but it was also Medivh’s whisper, now perfectly synchronized. It carried the same soothing, seductive warmth that filled his veins.
This is affection. This is acceptance. You have never known this.
Medivh leaned down. His thin, chapped lips pressed against the side of Khadgar’s neck. The kiss was dry, lingering. Khadgar’s body went rigid for a second, a primal alarm screaming through the haze. The hands exploring his body grew more insistent, one slipping beneath the hem of his tunic to map the skin of his hip, the other cradling the back of his head.
Revulsion, pure and bright, flashed behind his eyes. This was a violation. It was sick.
He offers what you have always wanted, the voice crooned, smothering the revulsion in a blanket of green static. Love. Adoration. The knowledge you crave. It is all the same gift. Let him give it to you. You are empty. We will fill you.
Tears of confusion and terror welled in Khadgar’s eyes, blurring the dark beams above. He couldn’t breathe. The warmth felt like a prison. Medivh’s mouth traveled up his neck to his jaw, the gestures grotesquely intimate. The hands were everywhere, claiming, possessive.
The hands were everywhere, claiming, possessive. A dry, cracked palm pressed flat against his stomach, the coolness of it a shocking contrast to the fever-heat blooming under his skin. The other hand cupped the back of his skull, fingers tangling in his sandy hair, holding him still. Khadgar’s muscles locked, a rigid cage around the screaming thing inside him.
“Shhh,” Medivh breathed against his jaw, the sound swallowed by the relentless hum. It wasn’t just in the air anymore. It was in the marrow of his bones, a vibrational command that dissolved will. “The struggle is the last echo of the person you were. Let it fade. It’s easier.”
Khadgar’s breath hitched, a sob trapped in his throat. He tried to summon the arcane, a spark, anything to push this away. His magic, usually a quick silver flash in his mind, was buried under layers of smothering green warmth. It responded sluggishly, not as a weapon, but as a contributor to the haze, amplifying the pleasurable numbness spreading from his core.
The fear was still there, sharp and bright, but it was becoming a distant signal. It was a book read in another room, a theory of panic that didn’t apply to him, here, now. The hum amplified, tuning itself to the frantic rhythm of his heart and slowly, deliberately, slowing it down. The warmth intensified, becoming a soporific blanket, heavy and final.
Medivh’s touches, once a violation of sharp edges, began to blur into the general sensation. The grip on his hair softened into a cradle. The hand on his stomach ceased its exploration and simply rested, a point of contact. The loathing and terror were being metabolized by the foreign energy inside him, converted into a deep, shameful lassitude.
Khadar finally relaxed, unable to fight the sensation. Enjoying them.
Resistance required a clarity that had been siphoned away. He had nothing left to fight with. His body went limp, a marionette with cut strings. The darkness behind his eyelids was a mercy, a quiet place where the hum was just sound, and the hands were just pressure. He let go, detaching from the horror, floating on the current of warmth that promised it was all for a greater, glorious purpose. The last thing he felt was the dry brush of lips on his forehead, a benediction, before the world dissolved into formless, green static.
Hours later, Khadgar awakens, the observatory ceiling above him.
Cold stone pressed against his cheek. He groaned, the sound raw in his throat. Every muscle ached with a deep, bruised tenderness. He pushed himself up onto his elbows, the world tilting violently before settling. He was on the floor of the observatory, near the etched diagrams. The green crystal still hovered, but its light was subdued, a quiet ember.
Medivh stood a few feet away, leaning heavily on his staff, watching him. The Guardian’s face was a mask of profound, weary apology.
“You’re back,” Medivh said, his voice hoarse. “I… I owe you an explanation. And an apology.”
Khadgar scrambled to sit fully, his robes disheveled. The memory of the other room, the bed, the hands—it crashed into him with nauseating force. He stared at Medivh, his mouth dry.
“What did you do?” The question came out a whisper.
Medivh flinched as if struck. “The energy loop. It was too much, far too quickly. I misjudged it catastrophically.” He passed a shaking hand over his face. “The feedback didn’t just stabilize. It synchronised. Your consciousness and the crystal’s resonance… they coupled. You experienced a psychic fugue. A waking nightmare, drawn from your own fears and the tower’s latent memories.”
He took a limping step closer, his expression one of pure, guileless regret. “You collapsed here, in the observatory. You’ve been out for hours. I brought you water, tried to make you comfortable on the floor. Moving you seemed… unwise.”
Khadgar’s head throbbed. The memories had the hyper-real, disjointed quality of a dream—the feel of bedsheets, the smell of decayed roses, the intimate press of a body. But they were blurring at the edges, softened by the persistent, dull hum still present in his skull. The crystal’s hum. He looked at it, then back at Medivh’s lined, concerned face.
Khadgar paused, studying Medivh. The Touches he had felt. The sensations... They must have been a dream than. After all, Medivh would never.... Touch him so intently. Wouldn't give such strange affections.
It made a terrible, logical sense. The crystal’s energy had already given him green-tinged nightmares. This was just a more intense version, a psychic backlash from the “experiment.” Medivh looked shattered with guilt, not with predatory satisfaction. He was explaining it all, rationally. The alternative—that the Guardian of Azeroth had dragged him to a private room and assaulted him—was insane. It was the paranoia of a traumatized mind, influenced by dark magic.
“A fugue,” Khadgar repeated, testing the word. It was clean, clinical. It gave the horror a name that wasn’t Medivh’s.
“I am so sorry, boy.” Medivh’s voice broke. “To have subjected you to that. Your trust… I have abused it. Lore should come with warning labels, but some poisons taste sweet at first.” He extended the waterskin again, a simple, kind gesture.
Khadgar took it. His hands were trembling. He drank, the cold water a benchmark of reality. “It felt… real.”
“The most potent lies always do,” Medivh said softly, gazing at the crystal with loathing. “This artifact is more corrupted than I realized. We will not attempt such a thing again. You must believe me.”
The earnestness was total. This was the man who had patiently explained astral diagrams hours before. This was Lothar’s oldest friend. Khadgar grasped at that solid truth, using it to anchor himself against the sliding, oily memories. He chose the simpler, safer nightmare.
“I believe you,” Khadgar said, and the moment he said it, the dream-memories receded further, becoming just bad dreams. “It was the energy. It got into my head.”
Medivh’s relief was palpable, a slight sagging of his bony shoulders. “Thank you. Can you stand? You should rest, in your own quarters this time.”
Khadgar nodded, getting slowly to his feet. His body still felt unfamiliar, a used vessel. He took a final glance at the crystal, its green heart pulsing gently. A part of him, a small, cold part that had not floated away on the warmth, watched that pulse and recognized its rhythm. It matched the new, quiet hum now permanently settled behind his eyes.
It matched the new, quiet hum now permanently settled behind his eyes.
Khadgar walked back to his room in a daze, each step feeling disconnected from the stone beneath his boots. The tower’s corridors seemed longer, the shadows holding their shape a second too long when he passed. He kept replaying Medivh’s explanation—psychic fugue, waking nightmare—and wrapping the clinical terms around the visceral memories. The words fit, but they didn’t soothe the raw, scraped-clean feeling inside his chest. His skin still remembered the wrong kind of hands.
He reached his door and fumbled with the latch. Inside, the bare room felt like a sanctuary. He shut the door and leaned against it, closing his eyes. The hum was there, a constant companion. He focused on his own magic, trying to find the clean blue arcane current beneath the new green static. It was there, but it felt distant, like hearing a familiar song played in another room.
Exhaustion hit him like a physical blow. The energy from the crystal had left a void now that it was gone, a profound depletion that made his bones ache. He didn’t bother with his robes, just collapsed onto the bed in his tunic and trousers. Sleep came instantly, a black tide pulling him under.
The dream did not start with fire.
It started with power. A clear, intoxicating sense of control that made the fugue in the observatory feel like a pathetic tremor. He was in the library, but it was his library. The air bent to his will, silent and waiting. Medivh knelt before him, not the frail, ancient Guardian, but a version of him stripped of pride, head bowed. His white hair was thick again, his back strong, but his posture was one of absolute submission.
“Look at me,” Khadgar heard himself say, and his own voice was a deeper, colder thing. It was a command that vibrated with the green hum.
Medivh lifted his head. His eyes were wide, desperate for approval. There was no apology in them now, only a hungry need to please. Khadgar reached out and tangled his fingers in that white hair, not to cradle, but to pull. A sharp gasp escaped Medivh’s lips, a sound of pain that curled into something else entirely. Khadgar felt a thrill so potent it was like a new kind of magic. This was not stolen affection. This was domination, willingly given. It felt more right than anything ever had.
The scene shattered and reformed. He was in the Stormwind throne room, the polished stone cool under his bare feet. King Llane Wrynn, a man he’d seen only from a distance during ceremonies, lay back on the royal dais, his crown tilted on the stones beside him. The King’s weathered face was flushed, his breath coming fast. Khadgar stood over him, one hand pinning Llane’s wrist to the lion-emblazoned carpet, the other tracing the links of the ceremonial chainmail over his chest.
“Your kingdom is a fragile thing,” Khadgar whispered, and the whisper filled the vast hall. “You strain to hold it together. Let me carry that weight.” He leaned down, his mouth near the King’s ear. “You want to.”
Llane’s body arched, a silent yes. The surrender of a sovereign was a headier wine than any spell. Khadgar claimed it.
Another shift. Lothar. This was different, raw and physical. They were in a training yard, sweat and dust in the air. Lothar was disarmed, his famous strength meant nothing here. Khadgar had him pinned against a weapons rack, the wood digging into the warrior’s back. One of Khadgar’s hands glowed with a restrained, emerald energy, holding Lothar’s massive arms in place as easily as binding a child.
“All your loyalty,” Khadgar growled, pressing his body against the warrior’s, feeling the struggle of muscle that could not break his magical hold. “All your trust. You gave him to me. Now you give me this.”
Lothar’s defiance melted into a ragged, shuddering groan. The sound was a victory. It was conquest. Khadgar woke violently, his own gasp loud in the dark room. He was drenched in sweat, the thin blanket tangled around his legs. His heart hammered against his ribs, a frantic drum solo. For a long, disoriented moment, he didn’t know where he was. The sensations from the dreams clung to him—the feeling of hair in his grip, the heat of submission under his hands, the taste of absolute authority.
He sat up, pushing the damp hair off his forehead. A deep, creeping shame followed the adrenaline, hot and sickening. He felt aroused, his body traitorously reacting to the vivid, twisted tableaux. He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to force the images away. They were worse than the visions of burning worlds. They were his. They felt like desires, not invasions.
This is the truth of power, the hum whispered, a smooth ribbon of sound in his mind. You saw its shape with the crystal. You feel its nature now. It is not about destruction. It is about connection. Control is the deepest connection of all.
“No,” Khadgar said aloud, his voice cracking. He swung his legs over the side of the bed, the stone floor icy on his bare feet. The physical shock helped. “Those weren’t my thoughts.”
Aren’t they? You wanted to be more than a apprentice. You wanted your knowledge to matter. To bend the world to your understanding. The voice was relentlessly reasonable. This is simply that, made manifest. Why shy from it?
He stood and paced the short length of the room, three strides each way. The dreams had felt more real than the fugue Medivh described. They had a logical, predatory cohesion that his own fears never possessed. He stopped, staring at his hands in the weak moonlight from the window. They were just his hands. Slim, a mage’s hands. They hadn’t changed.
But he had. The crystal’s work wasn’t an external poisoning. It was a rewiring. The green hum was a tuner, adjusting his frequencies to a different, darker station. The dreams were the first clear broadcasts.
A soft knock at the door made him jump.
“Khadgar?” It was Medivh’s voice, muffhered by the oak. “Are you awake? I… I heard a cry.”
Khadgar froze. The memory of the kneeling, submissive Medivh from his dream slammed into the reality of the man on the other side of the door. A fresh wave of shame, mixed with a dizzying flicker of that dream-thrill, left him nauseous. He couldn’t let him in. Not now.
“I’m fine,” he called, forcing his voice to steadiness. “A bad dream. Just a dream.”
There was a long pause. He could almost see Medivh leaning his forehead against the wood, that burden of guilt he carried so convincingly.
“The residuals can linger,” Medivh said finally, his tone full of that practiced, weary sympathy. “I am brewing a draught that may help you sleep without… interference. I will leave it outside your door at dawn.”
Khadgar didn’t trust himself to speak. He just waited, listening to the slow, shuffling footsteps fade away. He looked back at his hands, then clenched them into fists. The hum pulsed in time with his heartbeat. It approved.
He didn’t sleep again that night. He sat by the window, watching the sky lighten from black to grey, the dreams replaying behind his eyes not as horrors, but as possibilities. And that, he knew with a cold, sinking certainty, was the most terrifying thing of all. The corruption wasn't just in his magic anymore. It was in his wants. It was learning his name.