User:Joshmaul/Tergahn

"'Using the Light to blind people to your dark intentions is rank hypocrisy, and I want nothing to do with it - or you.'"
 * - Huntmaster Tergahn, last words to his brother, Vindicator Jeniraan

Huntmaster Tergahn is a veteran of the Army of the Light, having served since their separation from the remainder of their people during the long exodus from Argus. One of few draenei old enough to remember their homeworld in the "olden days", Tergahn's voyage came full circle with the final battle against the Legion alongside the champions of Azeroth, a world long spoken of by their commander, High Exarch Turalyon.

Biography
Among the Lightforged, it is far more common to find "elders" - those who fled from Argus twenty-five millennia earlier - than it is among the "normal" draenei, which were nearly wiped out by the Horde on Draenor. Tergahn and his younger brother, Jeniraan, were among those "elders"; born in Mac'Aree, both had been relatively young when Argus fell to the Legion, and both suffered a tremendous personal blow knowing that at least one member of their family not only stayed behind, but embraced the evil of Sargeras. For them, it was their father, Neferaan, who had been an alchemist specializing in healing potions.

At some point during the voyage from Argus, the draenei divided. Some remained with their Prophet, Velen, aboard the Genedar and voyaged on through the stars to stay ahead of the Legion, while Tergahn, Jeniraan, and their closest friend, Anchorite Jaren'kor, were among those who split off aboard the Xenedar to take a more proactive stance against the Legion under the banner of the Mother of Light, the prime naaru Xe'ra. Thus was born the Army of the Light, fighting the long war against the Legion in order to ensure that their people - and all life throughout the Beyond - would not fall to Sargeras' madness like Argus did...or be wiped from existence, like the aldrachi. While Jeniraan's temperment and zealous nature made him an ideal vindicator, Tergahn's skill was dedicated to the patience of the hunt. The millennia seemed to simply slip by as the Army settled into a long routine - fight, withdraw, rest, repeat.

The Army would soon have two new champions - Turalyon and Alleria, who had survived the destruction of Draenor and its transformation into the shattered realm of Outland. It was proof that the draenei were not alone in opposing evil; rumors of their world, Azeroth, had rippled through the Nether for millennia, ever since a great blow was dealt to Sargeras and the Legion there. Turalyon eventually became High Exarch, and for the next thousand years - as time moved differently in the Nether - he directed hit-and-run attacks to weaken the defenses of the Legion's greatest stronghold...Argus itself. It was during this same period that Tergahn, Jeniraan, and a patrol of other warriors discovered two strange figures huddled in confusion among the ruined world - an undead man who nonetheless seemed devoted to the Light, and a frightened elven child. They were the Forsaken archmage Gehn and his sworn charge, Ord'taeril Ketiron, who had escaped from an alternate Draenor and found themselves in the maw of hell rather than back home on Azeroth. The patrol delivered them to the Xenedar, where they would remain for a century before the naaru sent them back - with Ord'taeril now trained as a vindicator himself.

Sins of the Father - and the Brother
Shortly after Gehn and Ord'taeril returned to Azeroth, Kil'jaeden's command ship arrived in the skies above Argus, where both it and its foul master were destroyed by the champions of Azeroth. Illidan Stormrage, the night elf demon hunter who had fought his own "long war" against the Legion, used the Sargerite Keystone to tear open a rift between Argus and Azeroth, allowing the heroes to return... but ensuring that the hearthworld of the Legion and the world of those dedicated to its end would be literally facing one another in what was to be the final battle. Some time later, a draenei-built vessel, the Vindicaar, arrived over the broken wastes of Krokuun, and the Xenedar moved to meet them - only to be blasted out of the sky by hidden Legion artillery. Though their home for many millennia was now damaged beyond repair, Jeniraan and a number of his fellows were still eager to join with the champions of Azeroth in bringing an end to the Legion once and for all. The brothers were reunited with Ord'taeril and with another "elder" who had stayed with Velen, a venerable priest named Po'gaenus. Jeniraan would also find and slay their corrupted father - who had become Neferus the Blightmaker, a poisoner in the service of Kil'jaeden's chief lieutenant, Talgath - upon their return to Mac'Aree.

Po'gaenus found himself drawn more to the patient hunter than to the zealous vindicator. He confided in Tergahn his concerns about the brand of zealotry displayed by men like Turalyon and Jeniraan, which he had often seen in a number of Alliance warriors (including the night elves, the Gilnean worgen, the humans, and even some draenei) in wiping out "Horde filth". During the campaign on Argus, Tergahn was also introduced to the Unseen Path, and helped guide a number of its hunters through the ruins of Argus, his memory of the place undimmed despite the long millennia. After the end of the campaign, despite the dividing of the ranks that was about to come, Tergahn was inducted into the order for his services.

After the defeat of the Legion, the Vindicaar returned to Azeroth with the Army of the Light alongside it. As he arrived on this world from which the heroes of Argus had come, Tergahn began to see that Po'gaenus' concerns were justified; the Lightforged joined the Alliance - Turalyon's prejudices making any other outcome impossible - and rushed headlong into the Fourth War, the more zealous members sharing their High Exarch's belief that the Horde was no less evil than the Legion. While there were elements that gave him pause, such as the Forsaken - particularly after the burning of Teldrassil - Tergahn was sickened by what he viewed as Turalyon's hypocrisy, couching his hatred under the guise of righteousness. While he had been willing to fight the Legion, knowing of the evil they had become, Tergahn did not indulge in hate; he simply fought against them in the conviction that it was right, given what they had done to Argus. He believed Sylvanas and her loyalists would have to pay the consequences for their crimes, but he saw nothing right in the way the war was fought - particularly by those like Turalyon, feeling them too blind by hate to see that there were those in the Horde who were not the same as the butchers of Teldrassil. He thus left the Army of the Light and did not go to Kul Tiras or Zandalar for the war, believing it "wicked".

Tergahn entered into a bitter argument with Jeniraan after the endgame at Orgrimmar, when Jeniraan expressed the belief that they should have destroyed the Horde then and there. Tergahn accused him of being led astray by the human's prejudices; Jeniraan condemned him as a coward. Seeing his brother would not be swayed, Tergahn regretfully cut his ties to him. He would never see Jeniraan again; the vindicator charged headlong into the war with the Black Empire, and was killed in the Vale of Eternal Blossoms in Pandaria. Tergahn searched for him after the fall of N'Zoth, and found his broken body near Whitepetal Lake. Joined by Po'gaenus to give a benediction, Tergahn burned Jeniraan's remains on a pyre and had his bloodstained breastplate and greaves repaired by a blacksmith suggested by the elder priest, so that Tergahn could wear it "to remember the brother you knew, not the zealot he became", as Po'gaenus put it.