Welcome to Know Your Lore, where each week Alex Ziebart brings you a tasty little morsel of lore to wrap your mind around. Sweet, sweet lore. Mmmm. Have suggestions for future KYL topics? E-mail us!

Last week we looked at Alextrasza, and this week we're going to continue the Dragon theme with the Aspect of the Green Flight, Ysera.

Ysera is a dragon that goes by many names. Ysera the Dreamer. She of the Dreaming. The Queen of Dreams. The Lady of Dr-- you know, forget it, I guess it's just that one name, really. Just take the word Dream and add a title to it and you can probably use it to refer to Ysera. Though, I guess Commodore of Dreams doesn't really work, does it? Hm.

Welcome to Know Your Lore, where each week Alex Ziebart brings you a tasty little morsel of lore to wrap your mind around. Sweet, sweet lore. Mmmm.

Before we start this week, I'd like to let you guys know about a neat little thing we've set up for you. If you have requests for Know Your Lore or questions for that other column that I do, you can e-mail me at lorenerd@wowinsider.com ! I can't guarantee that I'll fill all Know Your Lore requests, but I'll certainly do my best. Now, on with the show!

My original intent with Know Your Lore this week was to go back to our preparation for Wrath of the Lich King with Kel'thuzad. I was pretty excited, because I adore the Scourge and c'mon, Kel'thuzad has to be awesome, right? Uh... no, not really, he isn't. He was shockingly boring and was only interesting in the context of the Scourge as a whole. He's definitely a pawn. He didn't stand up well on his own, so we're stepping away from the Road to Wrath a little longer.

Instead, we're going to focus on a topic suggested by my buddy Danny Whitcomb. Today we're going to look at Malorne, which conveniently goes pretty well with this past week's Ask a Lore Nerd. Malorne is one of many demigods in Kalimdor's history, but is/was generally regarded as one of the greatest. This makes sense, considering he and Elune hooked up once upon a time

Welcome to Ask a Lore Nerd, WoW Insider's newest weekly feature column. Have a question about the story and lore of the Warcraft universe? Click the Comments link below, ask your question, and blogger/columnist Alex Ziebart will answer you in a future installment!

Let's leap right into things, and see what Tyler wants to know, shall we?

Question: If the Ashbringer is really the Light's answer to Frostmourne, then why isn't anyone trying to use it, or destroy it? Is it because that Tirion Fordring has it? If he does, in WotLK then, he needs our help to weaken the Lich King and let him use it?

Answer: Nobody is using the Ashbringer right now because nobody has the Ashbringer in its true, Light-blessed form. Last we knew, the Ashbringer was still in Highlord Mograine's hands in a Corrupted form. The latest Know Your Lore covers the events leading up to that in a little more detail. Currently, we either need to purify The Ashbringer or forge a new one to be able to use it against the Lich King.

Over the past week, particularly in the last few days, the crisp Internet air has been abuzz with news from the upcoming expansion, Wrath of the Lich King. Fear you're out of the loop? Here's a quick round-up of all the information being released, along with analysis and opinion.

Don't forget to keep checking back, as this page will be updated as information becomes available:

Dungeons and raids

1. An analysis on Arthas as a ten-manned event, including its impact on the 25-man raiding structure, as well an exploration of its consistency with the lore.
2. Did you know that all expansion raids will have a 10-man setting, as well as a 25-man?
3. Read through some of our initial impressions on the 10-man raiding set-up.
4. We also wrote up a concise overview of the ins and outs of dungeons post-expansion, including a new token system, similar to [Badge of Justice].
5. The Nexus has been announced on the official site as one of the new dungeons.
6. The WoW Insider Show discusses 10-manning Arthas.

Zones, factions, and relevant lore

1. Alex has written an excellent overview of the Grizzly Hills, a soon-to-be zone for low to mid-seventies. With old factions reappearing, along with other surprises, it's definitely something to look forward to!
2. If news of the Dragonblight has intrigued you, you'll be pleased to know that more information has been made available.
3. While we're brushing up on our lore and learning about new areas and factions, Alex thought it fitting to illuminate the lore behind Azjol-Nerub, as the Nerubians will have their own role in the expansion.
4. Alex asks us about lore figures we'd like to see in the expansion.

I've examined the Dragonblight before when Blizzard first gave us the preview of the zone, but some other news about the region has come into the spotlight in the last few days. I'm sure you've noticed, the Wrath news is everywhere, especially here on WoW Insider. Below I have a little breakdown of what we know so far.

• The Dragonblight is both the beginning and the end of the dragon life cycle. The Titans granted the Dragonflights their powers here, and this is also where dragons go to die.
• This zone contains a shrine for each of the Flights which surround Wyrmrest Temple. These shrines are under siege by the Scourge.
• Alexstrasza herself is lending a hand in recruiting for the war effort in the Dragonblight.
• The Scourge has been twisting the remains of fallen dragons into Frost Wyrms and potentially other monstrosities.
• The Scarlet Crusade returns in this zone, renamed the Scarlet Onslaught.

If your first time discovering Grim Batol was anything like mine, it ended in horrible, bloody, unexpected death. That experience sums up Grim Batol rather well. The fortress has stood roughly 250 years, give or take a couple decades, and has changed hands more than once during that time.

Before we get to Grim Batol itself, we need to take a look at a little piece of Dwarven history: The War of the Three Hammers. You see, the Dwarves of Azeroth, just a few hundred years ago, all carried one banner. They were the Dwarves of Ironforge, plain and simple. Their society was a large one, and their wise and powerful king Modimus Anvilmar was highly revered. Amongst the Dwarven society, though, there were three clans that stood above the rest. The Bronzebeard Clan, the Dark Iron Clan, and the Wildhammer Clan.

Each of these clans played a very specific role in the Kingdom. The Bronzebeard, led by Thane Madoran Bronzebeard, were the military arm of the mountain city. They were soldiers and defenders. They were the sword and the shield, and the clan closest to King Modimus Anvilmar. The Wildhammer, led by Thane Khadros Wildhammer, lived in the outlying regions of the Kingdom, in the... well, the wilds. Scouts, hunters, things of that sort. They held little real power within the city proper, and they didn't really like that. The Dark Irons, led by Thane Thaurissan, were mages and sorcerers. They were also jerks.

Tabot asks about Grim Batol, and he's right-- there is a bit of rumbling going around about that place. It started at BlizzCon, in the dungeons and raids panel, where Jeff Kaplan mentioned that Grim Batol, the huge fortress in the Wetlands currently surrounded by the Red Dragonflight, is one of the locations they're looking at adding content.

To find the past of Grim Batol, you've got to read Day of the Dragon, the novel by Richard A. Knaak. Basically, the Dragonmaw Orc clan had captured Alexstrasza in Grim Batol, and was using her to make their own dragons. Rhonin (who will be the leader of the Kirin Tor in WotLK) was able to break her out and free her. And that didn't make Deathwing (Onyxia and Nefarian's father, and the big bad black dragon aspect of Azeroth) very happy, because he was trying to steal Alex's eggs to make his own dragonflight. Rhonin eventually defeated Deathwing, and there DotD ends.

Cut to now. No player has ever been inside Grim Batol, and the only place it's ever been used in the game is as the spawn point for a dragon in the Horde's Onyxia key quest. Meanwhile Deathwing is MIA, or maybe even kept prisoner in Grim Batol (rumors say the Red Dragonflight may have taken him prisoner in there to get revenge).

However, things (as usual) are not always as they seem. Lately, there have been murmurs (in Outland of all places) that Deathwing is back. Grim Batol may not be a simple fortress-- it may consist of the whole coastline on the eastern side of the Wetlands. And if Deathwing is free, I've heard rumors that he, like Rhonin, may be found up north-- Northrend's Dragonblight is a place where dragons go to die, and Deathwing is supposedly headed up there, claiming that all he wants is to end his life in peace.

Of course, he's not to be believed. And the Red Dragonflight is doing something in Grim Batol, even if it's not keeping Deathwing prisoner. Only time will tell what Blizzard plans to do with the big fortress overlooking the Wetlands.