Fearbreaker

I

A Bronzebeard Heirloom

Fearbreaker is an ancestral hammer of the Bronzebeard clan. It had been passed down in Magni Bronzebeard's family for many hundreds of years and had been used on both Azeroth and Outland. The Shattering describes it as "gleaming as bright as the day it was made although it was quite old. The head was silver, wrapped in intersecting bands of gold that had runes etched into it. Small gems dotted it here and there."

Shortly before the Cataclysm, young Prince Anduin Wrynn visited Ironforge, and King Magni gave him the heirloom. Magni warned that "it's known the taste o' blood and in certain hands has been known to also stanch blood." The weapon could heal as well as kill. When Anduin took it up, the Light seemed to flow through him from the hammer, as if the weapon liked him.

Then the throne room fell apart. Moira Thaurissan, Magni's daughter, took the city hostage with her Dark Iron forces. Anduin hid the hammer, because he guessed Moira would not be pleased that her family's heirloom had gone to a human boy. When he escaped by hearthstone to Theramore Isle, he took Fearbreaker with him.

II

The Poisoned Axe

Meanwhile, Kalimdor was burning. Magatha Grimtotem, elder crone of the Grimtotem tribe and Cairne's long-time rival, had failed to remove him politically. So she turned to treachery. When Cairne challenged the new Warchief, Garrosh Hellscream, to mak'gora, Magatha offered to bless Garrosh's axe, Gorehowl. Instead of ritual oils, she put poison on the blade. One glancing blow paralyzed Cairne, and Garrosh killed him.

Cairne's body was barely cold when Magatha ordered her tribe to attack Thunder Bluff and the other tauren towns, and to kill everyone, Baine included. A Grimtotem shaman named Stormsong warned Baine in time and helped him rally a force to strike back.

III

A Prince's Gift

In Theramore, Baine met Anduin. The meeting started out uneasy, but Baine warmed to the young prince, who was so unlike his warrior father, Varian. Anduin felt deep empathy for Baine's grief. In an act of friendship, he offered the tauren Fearbreaker, but only after checking that the hammer would accept Baine as it had accepted him.

It did. A dwarven relic, made by a very different culture, felt to Baine like the power of An'she and Mu'sha, the sun and moon of tauren faith.

IV

The Battle for Thunder Bluff

Magatha begged Orgrimmar for help, sure that Garrosh owed her. Garrosh had learned what she had done to his duel, and he answered with an insult-laden refusal. The Grimtotem stood alone.

Baine led the assault on Thunder Bluff with Fearbreaker in hand, and personally struck Magatha with it, forcing her to yield. He crushed her totems and banished her from the tauren lands on pain of death. Grimtotem who would not follow her could stay if they swore allegiance to him. Magatha and roughly three-quarters of her tribe went into exile in the Stonetalon Mountains.

Later, Baine carried the hammer against the quilboar when he rode to rescue Garrosh Hellscream. Fearbreaker shone like the Light in his grip.

V

Given Back Before Theramore Fell

Then the Horde marched on Northwatch Hold and turned toward Theramore. Before the city fell, Baine sent Perith Stormhoof to warn Jaina Proudmoore. He also sent Fearbreaker back with Perith, asking that Anduin take it, because Baine did not feel he was worthy to hold it.

Jaina later returned to the ruins of Theramore one last time. Among the wreckage she found the hammer, undamaged. She took it with her and eventually returned it to Anduin.

VI

In a King's War Room

In War Crimes, Anduin carries the mace on the Isle of Thunder during Garrosh's trial. In Before the Storm, the newly crowned King Anduin keeps it at his side at Lion's Rest, and his manservant Wyll Benton hangs it on a hook on the bedroom wall so the king can reach it quickly.

VII

Home to the Bronzebeards

At the end of the Fourth War, in the quest Return of the Warrior King, Speaker Magni asked for his weapon back to face the return of N'Zoth. Anduin admitted he was relieved, and repeated that neither he nor Baine had felt worthy. Magni said he would never have given it to Anduin otherwise. Anduin still felt it belonged in a mountain king's hands.

During Xal'atath's assault on Dalaran, Magni lost his grip on Fearbreaker, and it fell into the depths of Khaz Algar. Moira tracked it to the Ringing Deeps and took it back from an earthen named Berrund who had run off with it. She used it to help evacuate the earthen from the Rumbling Wastes. When she offered it back to her father, Magni declined, saying it belonged with her. His only request was that she pass it on when the time comes.