The Sunwell is the fount of arcane power at the heart of Quel'Thalas, created by the Highborne exile Dath'Remar Sunstrider with a stolen vial from the Well of Eternity. It fed the high elves for thousands of years, was corrupted by Arthas Menethil in Warcraft III, destroyed by Prince Kael'thas Sunstrider, and reignited as a source of both arcane magic and the Light at the end of World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade. This GB Lore Corner follows the well itself from its creation to that restoration, using Blizzard's games, Warcraft: Chronicle, the official novels and the Sunwell Trilogy manga. Check out the official trailer down below:
A Stolen Vial From The Well Of Eternity
The Sunwell's story starts after the Sundering. The night elves who survived the War of the Ancients outlawed arcane magic, and the Highborne who refused to give it up were exiled across the Great Sea. Dath'Remar led them east to the Eastern Kingdoms, where, according to Warcraft: Chronicle Volume 1, they eventually settled in the forests that became Quel'Thalas.
Dath'Remar carried a vial of water taken from the Well of Eternity. He poured it into a lake at a convergence of powerful ley lines, and a column of energy tore into the sky. Chronicle has him proclaiming that the new fount would one day surpass the Well that birthed it, and his followers named it the Sunwell in his honor. The full history of the original Well and the war around it is covered in GB Lore Corner: Who Was Illidan Stormrage Before World Of Warcraft?
Over the following generations the exiles lost their night elf features, turned from the moon to the sun, and became the high elves, or quel'dorei. Here the sources differ. The Sunwell Trilogy manga suggests the well's creation changed the Highborne into high elves almost instantly. Chronicle Volume 1 describes a gradual change that was already visible when the exiles first landed in Tirisfal Glades, before the Sunwell existed. Chronicle is the newer of the two tellings.
The Heart Of Quel'Thalas
The well soaked the high elves in arcane energy every moment of every day. Blood of the Highborne, Micky Neilson's novella released in the World of Warcraft: Paragons collection on March 31, 2014, calls it the heart of their society and a seemingly inexhaustible fount of arcane power. Its reach had no border. A high elf bound to its energies could draw on them anywhere on Azeroth, and over time the elves came to regard its waters as holy.
That power built the kingdom. The magi raised Silvermoon City with it and enchanted Eversong Woods into an endless spring. They carved monolithic runestones along the borders of Quel'Thalas to relay the well's energy into a barrier that hid elven magic from outside threats. The Sunwell also powered Ban'dinoriel, the great shield over Silvermoon, which neither Gul'dan nor the Amani warlord Zul'jin managed to break.
The Second War tested those defenses. In Aaron Rosenberg's Tides of Darkness, Gul'dan builds his Altars of Storms from the elves' own runestones and tries to send his magic back along that link to destroy the Sunwell or seize it. The attempt fails, Silvermoon's shield holds, and the Horde abandons the assault. The cost of that dependence showed up later: the elves had been bathed in the well's energy for so long that they were addicted to it without knowing it.
Arthas, Dar'Khan And The Fall Of Silvermoon
The Third War brought the threat that the shields could not stop. In Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos, the undead campaign chapters Key of the Three Moons and The Fall of Silvermoon send Arthas through the elfgates and up to the Sunwell Plateau. His goal was the resurrection of the necromancer Kel'Thuzad, whose remains he carried in an urn. Ranger-General Sylvanas Windrunner died fighting him and was raised as a banshee, and King Anasterian Sunstrider was killed in the invasion.
The novels and manga add an elf on the inside. Dar'Khan Drathir, a magister who wanted the well's power for himself, lowered the defenses around the Sunwell, killed members of the Convocation of Silvermoon and began a binding spell on the well using instructions from the Scourge. Blood of the Highborne places him in a hall of the Magisters' Terrace when he starts that binding and launches a fireball to tell Arthas the time has come.
Arthas then submerged Kel'Thuzad's remains in the Sunwell's waters. The necromancer rose as a lich, and the ritual fouled the fount. Arthas left Quel'Thalas with Kel'Thuzad to continue his service to the Lich King, while a large part of the Scourge stayed behind among the ruins.
Kael'thas Destroys The Well And Names The Sin'dorei
Prince Kael'thas, a member of the Kirin Tor and Anasterian's only son, returned from Dalaran to find most of his people dead. Lor'themar Theron, Sylvanas' second-in-command, had organized the survivors, but Kael'thas learned that the greatest danger was the Sunwell itself. Its corrupted energies still ran through the elves and everything they had built, and left alone they would kill the survivors.
Kael'thas decided the well had to be destroyed. With the strongest remaining magi, Lor'themar and a party of volunteer defenders, he fought through Scourge remnants and Amani trolls who had come to claim the plateau for themselves. The magi detonated the Sunwell and escaped as the blast consumed the undead and trolls left behind. Kael'thas then declared that his people would be called the sin'dorei, the blood elves, in memory of those who had died defending their homeland.
This is the clearest canon split in the Sunwell's history. Dragon Hunt, the first Sunwell Trilogy volume from March 8, 2005, says the well exploded after Dar'Khan bound it and something went wrong, leaving a crater. Blood of the Highborne revises that beat so Kael'thas and his magi are the ones who leave the empty hole, and that is the version Blizzard uses in its current histories. The loss also exposed the addiction: the youngest and oldest elves sickened and died without the well, and Kael'thas took his healthiest warriors to fight the Scourge in Lordaeron, a road that ended in Outland, where Illidan Stormrage offered a way to feed the hunger with fel magic.
Anveena Teague And The Sunwell Trilogy
Not all of the well's essence was lost. A wizard called Borel, one of the guises of the red dragon Korialstrasz, gathered the remaining energy and hid it as a human girl, Anveena Teague, living with illusory parents near Tarren Mill. Richard A. Knaak and artist Kim Jae-Hwan told her story across Tokyopop's Dragon Hunt, Shadows of Ice (March 7, 2006) and Ghostlands (March 13, 2007).
Anveena shelters the blue dragon Kalecgos from dragon hunters, is hunted by Dar'Khan, and is eventually dragged back to Quel'Thalas, where he begins harvesting her power. Her true nature awakens and she obliterates the traitor, who by then is more lich than elf. With Lor'themar's support, Anveena and Kalec stayed in Quel'Thalas under blood elf protection, and her identity was kept from almost everyone, including Kael'thas. Knaak came up with Anveena, while Blizzard built the larger plan to bring the Sunwell back.
Fury Of The Sunwell And The Restoration
That plan arrived in patch 2.4, Fury of the Sunwell, released on March 25, 2008. It opened the Isle of Quel'Danas with the Shattered Sun Offensive quest hub, the 5-player Magisters' Terrace and the 25-player Sunwell Plateau raid. Kael'thas, beaten in Outland and twisted by fel energy, had sided openly with the Burning Legion. According to Chronicle Volume 3, Kil'jaeden's agents learned of Anveena and ordered Kael'thas to capture her and the naaru M'uru and weave their energy into a ritual that would turn the reignited Sunwell into a gateway.
Players face Kael'thas a final time as the last boss of Magisters' Terrace. Sunwell Plateau's six bosses run from Kalecgos, Brutallus and Felmyst to the Eredar Twins, M'uru and Kil'jaeden himself, rising out of the well with Anveena suspended above it. During the fight Anveena gives up her life and unleashes her full power against the Deceiver, weakening him enough for the Shattered Sun Offensive to drive him back into the Twisting Nether.
The battle left the Sunwell drained again. The draenei prophet Velen then used the spark of M'uru, the naaru whose Light the Blood Knights had been stealing, to rekindle it. Blizzard's blood elf race page describes the result directly: Velen purified the Sunwell with the Light-infused heart of a fallen naaru, transforming it into a source of both holy and arcane energies. The Wrath of the Lich King manual follows the Blood Knights choosing to embrace the Light instead of forcing it. Blizzard's patch 2.4 trailer shows the Isle of Quel'Danas and the Sunwell Plateau raid:
Quel'Delar At The Restored Well
Wrath of the Lich King returns players to the Sunwell once, in patch 3.3's quest chain to restore the sword Quel'Delar. After the spirit of Thalorien Dawnseeker, the blade's original wielder, gives his blessing, Ranger-General Halduron Brightwing lets the player inside. Lor'themar, Grand Magister Rommath and Lady Liadrin wait at the well with blood elf pilgrims and the high elf Auric Sunchaser. If a non-blood elf submerges the sword, Lor'themar tries to claim it and is thrown back by the blade until Auric points out that Quel'Delar chooses its own wielder. A blood elf who brings it instead is hailed by Lor'themar and Rommath as a hero of the sin'dorei.
The fall of Silvermoon itself is retold in Blizzard's remade Warcraft III campaign, which opened with this cinematic trailer:
Which version of the Sunwell's destruction do you prefer: Dragon Hunt's failed binding by Dar'Khan, or Blood of the Highborne's choice by Kael'thas and his magi?
Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.