User:Joshmaul/Vorian Tanis

"'What manner of insanity could turn an honorable warrior into a bloodthirsty servitor of death, you ask? I fear that we shall never know the answer to that, Marcus. It's enough for me to know that he's at peace, and that, Light willing, he will rest easy.'"
 * - Saavedro of Stratholme, to General Marcus Jonathan

Vorian Tanis was a general in the army of the Alliance of Lordaeron, and one of few to have fought in all three great wars that have wracked the world since the opening of the Dark Portal.

Biography
Vorian Tanis was born in Grand Hamlet, now Darkshire, in the Kingdom of Stormwind (then called Azeroth) approximately seventeen years before the opening of the Dark Portal. His father was the caretaker of the Tranquil Gardens Cemetery outside the town, and his mother a barkeep at the local tavern (now called the Scarlet Raven).

Service in the Army
When the orcs arrived and began to lay waste to the kingdom, Tanis joined the Royal Army of Stormwind and fought against the Horde in many theaters, including the final confrontation at Stormwind Keep. He conducted himself well in the battle, rising to the rank of Major at the age of 25. After the death of King Llane and the fall of Stormwind, Tanis and his three-year-old son Oren (his wife Estelle and his parents remained in Darkshire, which was untouched during the war) joined other survivors of the army in the exodus to Lordaeron, led by Knight-Champion Anduin Lothar. Upon their arrival in Southshore and the events of the following months that led to the foundation of the Alliance, Tanis and other Stormwind survivors became part of the Army of the Grand Alliance under Lothar's command.

With the fall of Khaz Modan, Tanis was sent to Ironforge to assist the dwarves in their battle against the Bleeding Hollow Clan, which kept them locked up inside Ironforge Mountain. There he met Korogh Madeyes, a dwarven commander who had also distinguished himself in the siege. By the time the siege ended - with the Horde's rout at Lordaeron - both Korogh and Tanis left the battle at the rank of General. Tanis served at the side of General Turalyon, the new Supreme Allied Commander after Lothar's death, until the time Turalyon joined the Alliance Expedition beyond the Dark Portal.

Shattered Peace
After the end of the Second War, Tanis served as an advisor to the military governor King Terenas sent to govern Alterac's holdings, and was present during the bid by one Lord Daval Prestor (secretly the black dragon Aspect, Deathwing) to claim the kingdom. When Prestor disappeared, Tanis returned to Stormwind and assisted in the reconstruction of the city. He agreed with Edwin VanCleef, the master of the Stonemasons Guild, that they should be paid for their efforts, and was angered by the Council of Nobles' refusal to reward the good works of the Stonemasons. Afterwards, he returned to his native Darkshire and settled with his wife Estelle and his son Oren, now ten.

But with the Horde's return under the command of Thrall, a tactical genius who had roused the orcs from their demon-induced stupor, Tanis was requested to return to Lordaeron to aid Uther the Lightbringer in hunting down the Warchief, and in fact encountered him - along with Urgan, the shaman he had fought at Ironforge a decade earlier - at the internment camp outside Dalaran. But far greater problems arose in the years following Thrall's escape from Durnholde...a problem in the form of the undead Scourge. King Terenas had been killed, and Lordaeron had fallen into ruin.

Uther had tasked Tanis and his army to join the paladin Gavinrad the Dire - like Tanis himself, a native of Stormwind - in guarding the tomb of Kel'Thuzad, the necromancer who had instigated the Scourge, in order to prevent the undead from claiming his body. But they were woefully outmatched, and perhaps shocked to inaction, by their enemy - Prince Arthas Menethil himself. Arthas made his way through the camp of the Champions of Peace and killed most of the army, then battled Gavinrad and Tanis. Arthas ran his evil blade, Frostmourne, through Gavinrad's skull, then wrenched it out and stabbed it into Tanis' chest before the general could react. Arthas couldn't touch Gavinrad - the plague had no effect on paladins - but Tanis, he wanted intact...

After killing Uther and the other paladins, Arthas resurrected Tanis as one of the walking dead, and Tanis had retained enough of himself to be - at first - disgusted at his new form and what Arthas had done to him. Once the Lich King asserted his control, however, he accepted his charge, using his military expertise to serve the Scourge.

Fall at Stormwind


Tanis disappeared after the battle at Sorrow Hill. He was believed to be dead, and a small memorial service was held for him in Darkshire. They did not realize, however, that six years later he would return to plague his homeland. During the Scourge invasion marking Kel'Thuzad's re-emergence in Lordaeron, Scourge necropoli appeared in the skies over the capital cities of the world, as well as strategic locations such as Winterspring, Azshara and in the Plaguelands itself.

Tanis returned in one such necropolis to Elwynn Forest and led the attack on Stormwind, his battered and corrupted armor and Alliance tabard clear for all to see. There he was confronted by Stormwind General Marcus Jonathan, who had fled along with Tanis to Lordaeron nearly two decades earlier, and a paladin from Lordaeron named Saavedro. Facing Tanis in combat, Saavedro discovered his identity upon seeing the hammer symbol carved into his right vambrace - Korogh Madeyes, whom Saavedro had gotten to know quite well, had a similar marking on his own bracer, carved after the battle for Ironforge. Calling upon the Light to give him strength, Saavedro lashed out with a holy bolt, crushing Tanis' chest - and simultaneously cutting off the Lich King's control. Tanis was finally granted the peace of death.

Discovering Tanis' family history and finding out that the General had left behind a son, Oren - then a lieutenant in the Alliance army - Saavedro took Tanis' sword, ritually cleansed it in the Cathedral, and gave it to the young man. Upon the conclusion of the Scourge invasion, Tanis was given a military funeral and buried in the Tranquil Gardens Cemetery, still tended by his parents (now in their nineties), outside of Darkshire. After Andrew and Helene died, Oren - now a general himself, a veteran of the war against the Lich King - had his father and grandparents transported to Stormwind, where they were buried in the city cemetery.