Lieren

Lieren is the tomboyish adopted human daughter of Kardan and twin sister of Loania. Together with her twin sister, they faced the horrors of Darkshire and Karazhan to put their parents' souls to rest.

Biography


Kardan raised Lieren like any loving father would in Aerie Peak, teaching her the ways of the gryphon rider, and she became the only known human to have earned her own stormhammer. However, Lieren still felt like an outsider among the Wildhammer dwarves despite the insistence to the contrary of her dwarven friends, which led to an obsession with uncovering her past. One night, Lieren secretly followed Kardan to the high elf retreat Quel'Danil Lodge, where she made a shocking discovery of having a twin sister named Loania. Loania was raised by a high elf named Voldana.

With the truth out in the open, it is with a heavy heart that their adopted parents revealed how they both accompanied their father, a human paladin named Dougan, an old friend they fought beside in the Second War, on his mission to rescue villagers from the cursed tower of Karazhan. Unfortunately, brave hearts and noble intentions were not enough to defeat the evil from with in and they were forced to retreat. Dougan was killed in the process and was left behind. Feeling guilty that they hadn't gone back for their friend, Kardan and Voldana returned to Grand Hamlet and delivered the sad news to Dougan’s wife Adena. Yet so immense was her grief that her mind snapped and she became unfit to raise her twin baby girls. After some time spent with Adena, it became clear that she might not ever recover. And so, after arranging for Adena to be cared for by a healer, Voldanna and Kardan decided to honor their friend by raising the twin girls as their own.

While Lieren and Loania shared little in common aside from their appearance, they both insisted on seeing their mother. Voldana and Kardan accompanied the twins to the location of a house where their mother lived. However upon arrival of their old home, now called Darkshire, the twins found the house to be empty. While there, they were attacked by ghouls but thanks to arrival of Watcher Dodds and his soldiers, they were rescued. Eventually they learned from Commander Althea Ebonlocke that their mother was dead. After the loss of the good paladin and neighbor, Adena had committed suicide not long after Kardan and Voldana had adopted the twins, and was then buried in Raven Hill Cemetery. On the way to the cemetery with a Night Watch escort, it was discovered that Adena's corpse had been raised as one of the undead, and was headed with other undead to attack Darkshire. The girls set off on the grisly task of freeing their mother from the rotten prison of flesh by decapitating her.

It was then that with their mother’s soul finally laid to rest that Lieren and Loania swore an oath on her new grave in the Hinterlands, to go to Karazhan to free their father’s soul as they did their mother’s.

A few years later, and the teenagers are now young women. Lieren has become an even more proficient warrior, taking on two of her friends at once in a sparing match, and even holding back. Loania, having been trained as a mage, used a spell to contact their father to see if he still lives. Dougan’s spirit warns them to stay away yet Lieren is determined to free him. Without Kardan and Voldana's knowledge, Loania teleports herself and Lieren from Lieren's room in Aerie Peak to Karazhan in search of their father.

As the twins make their way through Karazhan, Loania, being a mage, starts seeing visions. The first was a vision of Medivh opening the dark portal to unleash the Horde into Azeroth. The second vision is of their father fighting the undead in the tower. Loania uses her vision to trace her father’s foot steps which leads her to Terestian Illhoof, their father’s murderer. The twins defeat him in battle but Loania is left injured. Lieren wants to get Loania to safety first before she rescues her father. They meet with the spirit of Nielas Aran who ensorcells Lieren in an attempt to kill her and trap her spirit in Karazhan forever. Loania uses a spell to call out to their father once more and Dougan’s spirit arrives just in time to save Lieren’s life, intimidating Aran into submission. Dougan tells Lieren that it is impossible for his spirit to leave Karazhan and that he has made peace with that.

As danger approaches, Lieren and Loania need to teleport out of Karazhan, but Loania is so weak that Lieren offers her access to her lifeforce to beat the the tower's pull. Dougan’s spirit holds off the horrors of Karazhan while Loania teleports themselves out of danger and make their escape. As Lieren could only use her lifeforce to power the spell rather than magic, the strain of the teleportation caused her hair to become streaked with white, which she uses as a reminder that she can’t win every battle.

Although they failed to free their father’s spirit, the twins take comfort in knowing that his spirit remains unbroken, just like theirs.

Trivia

 * The twins have a long portion of hair that tends to want to hang in front of the face, something they inherited from Adena. Lieren simply leaves it be, while Loania has a habit of brushing it out of the way and tucking it behind her ear.