User:Joshmaul/Telek Eaglespear

"'I have been involved in every major conflict since my people joined the Horde - against Illidan and the Legion in Outland, against Arthas and Malygos in Northrend, and against Deathwing and Cho'gall here. Non-stop, glad to help, death to our enemies. I feel five times older than I am...after Northrend, I wanted nothing more than to retire and teach the whelps how to use the Light. Now I have that chance...and so it falls to you, young Belor'malanore, to take my place. You will carry my sword and my standard into battle against the evil that permeates this land. I have trained you in every way I know how, under the guidance of the head of your order - and so I give up my duties gladly, knowing that they will be carried out by an honorable being.'"
 * - Master Taeril'hane Ketiron, to Telek Eaglespear

Telek Eaglespear is a young tauren who decided to join the Sunwalker order after a chance encounter with a powerful paladin in Silvermoon. He has currently joined the fight against the Twilight's Hammer, laying siege to their bastion in the Twilight Highlands.

Biography
Born in the Stonetalon Mountains two decades before the Battle of Mount Hyjal, Telek belongs to the Eaglespear tribe, a small offshoot of the Bloodhoof tribe that retains their loyalty to them, and fiercely opposes the Grimtotems. Raised in the traditional tauren way, to respect the Earthmother and to participate in the hunt, the Eaglespears settled in Thunder Bluff, high above the plains of Mulgore, when Cairne Bloodhoof united the tribes. Telek's elder brother, Ublaz, went to fight for the Horde and was killed during an attack on Naxxramas prior to the re-opening of the Dark Portal. Ublaz later returned shortly before the war against the Lich King, having been resurrected by the Scourge as a death knight and freed by the efforts of Tirion Fordring and Darion Mograine.

Touched by the Light
After the death of the Lich King, Telek decided to explore beyond Kalimdor, and journeyed to the Eastern Kingdoms. Not comfortable with being around the Forsaken, Telek travelled to the blood elf city of Silvermoon. In the Court of the Sun, he saw something that would change his life...

A group of blood elves had gathered outside a stately manor, watching with awe as a venerable nobleman demonstrated his powers to them. The blood elves were aspiring Blood Knights, and the nobleman was a Blood Knight Master named Taeril'hane Ketiron. Back in Mulgore, as the war in Northrend went on, Telek had heard about a movement of the tauren people, who looked to the sun as a source of power, much as their night elf allies called on the moon - the embodiment of their goddess Elune. What Telek saw in Silvermoon was a man wielding power very similar to what he had heard, the ability to heal or call holy wrath upon an enemy.

Entranced, Telek watched as the Master demonstrated his art to his pupils. The Blood Knight neophytes laughed and mocked the young tauren, but Ketiron silenced them, sensing something within him. Switching from his native Thalassian to Orcish, the language of the Horde, Ketiron spoke with Telek and listened as his guest told him of the movement in Mulgore, about using powers like his. Smiling, Ketiron blessed the young tauren and hoped to one day see this idea become a reality.

Three years later, the world altered irrevocably by the Shattering, Ketiron ventured to Thunder Bluff. By this time, Cairne had been killed by Grimtotem treachery, and his son Baine had solidified his position as the new High Chieftain of all tauren. The Master was pleased to see that the movement, now known as the Sunwalkers, had taken hold, consisting of people who not only used the powers of paladins, but of priests as well. As Telek arrived in Thunder Bluff to receive wisdom and instruction from Aponi Brightmane, leader of the Sunwalker movement, he was surprised to see Ketiron standing at her side, pledging to teach the new Sunwalker what he knew as well. Ketiron called him "Belor'malanore", the closest approximation in Thalassian to "Sunwalker".

Ketiron's Successor
After months of training and study under both his mentor Aponi and Master Ketiron, Telek became a powerful Sunwalker, skilled in both the healing arts and in the arts of combat. During a battle in Twilight Highlands, Ketiron was seriously injured, and despite the efforts of both himself and other healers, he never possessed the same stamina again. Ketiron's wife, Areinnye, believed that Ketiron had suffered a serious physical breakdown and suggested that he retire, as he had after the death of the Lich King. Though loath to leave the battle so early, Ketiron knew that he could no longer keep up the fight as he had in Northrend. Thus, Ketiron informed his leader, Regent Lord Lor'themar Theron, that he was retiring from active service and returning to Silvermoon to assist his old friend Bloodvalor in the training of the Blood Knight initiates.

Upon his return to the Whitehair House in the Court of the Sun, Ketiron summoned Telek from Mulgore. Much to the young tauren's surprise, Ketiron held out his sword hilt-first, saying that he was to take Ketiron's place in the greater battle against Deathwing and his Twilight minions. Telek was horrified at the idea, wondering what thing had happened to the elf who had inspired him, but Ketiron reassured him that it was merely his desire to rest after having spent the better part of the last four years fighting enemies of the Horde. As a token of his training - as Ketiron had trained Telek in the Blood Knight way - he also gave him his old tabard, which had been awarded to Ketiron by his own master, Ordevaas Portalseeker, four years earlier.

With his mentor's blessing, Telek departed for Orgrimmar to begin his service to the greater Horde. Travelling from Thunder Bluff, he made his home in Orgrimmar, in the Valley of Wisdom, a section of the city given to the tauren by Warchief Hellscream. Telek preferred it to the jagged metal spires of the rest of the city, which he believed were sacrilegious to the Earth Mother.

Memories of Destruction: The Vision Quest
Disturbed by what he had seen in the war against the Twilight and recovering from his injuries sustained in the battle against the Zandalari, Telek returned to Silvermoon to seek counsel from Master Ketiron. Telek wondered why these wars had to be fought, why peace could not reign after the fall of the Lich King - why all of these cultists were bent on the destruction of their world, and why the Zandalari were trying to provoke a war while most of the world's forces fought against Deathwing and his minions. The idea of using the elements as a force of evil was anethema to him, and having seen it in action made him doubt whether he was on the right path.

In response, Ketiron instructed the tauren to accompany him to Sunfury Spire, to the mage room. They would journey to the Dark Portal in the Blasted Lands, and through it into Outland. On the flight across Hellfire Peninsula into Terokkar Forest, Ketiron revealed that he had been waiting for Telek to return from the war, and that he had something to show him...something that would help the young Sunwalker.

After stopping briefly in Shattrath, Ketiron led Telek into the crashed naaru starship in Nagrand, known to the orcs as Oshu'gun, or "Mountain of Spirits" - the holiest shrine of the orcish clans prior to the first union of the Horde. There, an old friend of Ketiron - the Farseer Jaeden'laek, a fellow veteran of Northrend - awaited them. As they entered the lower depths of the ancient naaru vessel, Ketiron bade his student sit before the reflective pool in the center as the draenei shaman set his totems around him.

As the Farseer worked, the Master explained that in order to truly understand what was at stake, he had to see what Ketiron himself had seen in Northrend. Three years earlier, during the great siege of Icecrown Citadel, Ketiron had accompanied Highlords Tirion Fordring and Darion Mograine into the fortress with an army of both Alliance and Horde, and had witnessed Tirion strike down Arthas with the Ashbringer, ending the reign of the Lich King - or so it was thought.

It was then that Telek realized that Ketiron had arranged with Jaeden'laek for him to undergo a form of vision quest. This quest would involve Telek fighting as part of the army that had taken Icecrown Citadel. In this way, Telek would see what Ketiron had seen, experience what he had experienced.

As the ritual preparations were completed, Ketiron explained:


 * "The battle before the Frozen Throne had been my blackest hour of despair, and my greatest feeling of triumph, all at once. The removal of the gravest threat to the world in modern history, since the great war with the Legion ten millennia ago...and seeing my homeland avenged at last, the souls of Anasterian and all those killed by this man's foul treachery at last free. In order to defeat your despair, you must first have the courage to face it. I learned that here. Aye, I faltered at first, we all did - and it nearly cost me and my comrades our souls. But in the end, Tirion showed us how to defeat our despair, and triumph. Learn from this example, Belor'malanore, and you shall triumph over your despair."

With that, the vision quest began - and Telek found himself standing outside Icecrown Citadel. To himself, he looked like a tauren. But as he saw others speaking to him and urging him to enter, he realized that they saw him as Master Ketiron himself. In this way, he would feel everything that the Master had felt, and experience the war for Icecrown from the eyes of one who had been there. Steeling his nerves, for he had heard much of what had happened here, Telek-as-Ketiron entered the Citadel and prepared to face his mentor's greatest trial - to prepare him for his own.

The first part of the quest involved making their way through the Citadel to the upper spire. As he provided heal support, Telek participated in the battles against Lord Marrowgar and Lady Deathwhisper, rocketed across the sky during the battle between Orgrim's Hammer and the Skybreaker, and witnessed the pain felt by the venerable High Overlord Saurfang as his son, Dranosh, came before them as a death knight, raised by the Lich King after his death at the Wrathgate. By the time he was pulled from the vision, the party had destroyed Professor Putricide and his two "sons", Festergut and Rotface, as well as their "pets", Precious and Stinky.

Two weeks later, as he continued his work in the "present", Telek returned to the vision quest, wherein he aided in the restoration of the green dragon Valithria Dreamwalker and destroyed the Frost Queen, Sindragosa. In the Crimson Hall, Telek saw the painful experience that Ketiron had went through when he was forced to kill people who had once been his fellows, including former members of the Whitehair House Guard led by its believed-dead captain, Kaleris Skyfire. With the way cleared, only the Lich King remained. As he was brought out of the vision quest once more upon the death of the Blood-Queen Lana'thel, Telek listened once more as Ketiron spoke:


 * "You have seen the evils that Arthas committed, corrupting life, denying rest to noble beings. The way to the Frozen Throne was open, as you have seen - the Lich King awaited us at the summit of the Citadel. It was a fearful time. None of us knew if we would prevail against a being of such power. You will soon see the answer to that."

In-Game Accomplishments

 * Current Gear, Reputations and Raid Experience
 * Carrying On the Fight

Appearance and Personality
Belonging to a tribe that is an offshoot of the Bloodhoofs, Telek has white fur and white horns, and is still relatively young, having been too young to participate in the war in Northrend. Knowing little of war and death, or indeed of any life beyond the normal life of a tauren tribesman, Telek possesses a youthful innocence, one that he will likely have a difficult time breaking as he carries on beyond the borders of Mulgore. He is fascinated at the similarity of powers between the Light-wielders of the Alliance and Quel'Thalas, believing that even non-tauren were guided by the Earthmother.

During the assault on the Bastion of Twilight, Telek lost his left horn in battle against the twilight dragons Valiona and Theralion - one of the more obvious of the severe wounds he received during that battle.

The Sword of Taeril'hane Ketiron
Master Ketiron received an exquisitely-fashioned warblade for fighting in the Crucible of Carnage in the Twilight Highlands, the third of the great arenas lorded over by the goblin entrepreneur Gurgthock. Along with Saavedro of Stratholme and his mentor, Ordevaas Portalseeker, Ketiron had fought in the first two, the Ring of Blood in the hills of Nagrand in Outland, and the Amphitheater of Anguish, amidst the ruins of Zul'Drak in Northrend. Upon his retirement from the field, Ketiron gave this sword to Telek as a gift from teacher to pupil.