This story is set in WoW during the very start of WotLK. I have slightly changed the timelines for events, mostly by expanding them out so that events take place further apart, but eventually it will be be more AU. Thanks for reading, and feedback is welcome. Later chapters will be more action, less brooding.

I trudged slowly through the towering woods, blessedly alone. For the first time in years, decades, I couldn't feel the weight of another mind overlaying my own. I relished the freedom to choose my own thoughts, my own path. True I could distantly feel my breth… former brethren, but on the whole my thoughts were my own. I suppose technically I could also feel a dull presence from my blade, but distance had muted her litany to a quiet mental grumble.

I had left my runeblade, my armor and my mount in Barrens out of respect for the Night Elves, as it had seemed unlikely that re-creating the Dead Scar would endear me to anyone. Unfortunately this meant I felt the full crushing weight of all the life in the Ashenvale woods on my own. I had tried to explain this sensation to Tirion while I was… recovering I suppose is the best term for it. I thought of it as life-sense. I have no idea what anyone else calls it; I have never been comfortable talking about it.

It wasn't quite a smell, sound, or temperature, but something like all of those combined. It was as though even the smallest living thing gave off a feeling of what I used to think of as heat. Perversely this "heat" feels like it only burns by stealing away the warmth from within you, leaving you colder. At the same time it's like someone has shoved something unpleasant under your nose, while whispering in your ear, and brushing up against your skin. Lastly, this maddeningly faint taste of something absolutely divine fills your mouth, flooding you with hunger. The effect that is caused by a small amount of life is deeply annoying.

The feeling generated by a forest this size is absolutely maddening. It's an all-over sense of unbearable pressure, of deafening noise, of pure wrongness; it filled me with hunger and rage.

So far, I have found nothing that will totally fill that aching void. Not one life, not a thousand lives. The hunger is always, always, there, but I have gotten better at resisting it. Still, it took more of my concentration then I would have liked to keep from reflexively destroying everything around me. I would have liked not feeling this at all, but over the years I had almost gotten used to it. With enough time one can get used to almost anything I suppose.

I had almost gotten used to not sleeping.

I had almost gotten used to never being warm, to not even being able to remember what being warm felt like.

I had almost gotten used to the sharp and irrational hatred I felt for anything still alive, to the burning rage that a peaceful forest like this brought forth…

In the past when traveling through such an appallingly verdant place, being surrounded by other unlife had helped insulate me from this sensation. When on my own, I would have attempted to blunt my life-sense by gorging myself on the lives of others, as feeding enough would bring me closer to a semblance of life. Failing that I would at least have had my plague-soaked armor to mute it; the tiny undead bacteria are capable of warping my life-sense enough to be tolerable. I had occasionally traveled bereft of all these protections before, but this was the first time I had done so without even having my thoughts filtered through the icy film of… The film of someone I was attempting to keep from thinking about. Though I was hardly likely to avoid it in my upcoming visit.

After all what was I going to be able to say? "Yes, sorry I was gone for the last 20 years, oh and I'm a little undead, I might have been the Eboncloak, I sort of loyally and fiercely served the Lich King, and I kind of killed a lot of people including our father but I really don't want to talk about any of that." I am sure that would go over even better then my attempted reunion with Alex. Alexander. Idiot little brother. I had known that was not going to go well from the start, but I had needed to try. At least no one had actually died.

I had little reason to suspect that my reunion with my sister was going to go any better, but I still hoped. Alex had always been quick to anger, I think. It was hard to remember anything specific about most details of my life, but I was fairly sure I remembered that Leia was gentler, and certainly less full of rage. Or had been two decades ago.

I sighed at the woods around me, trying not to resent the very existence of them, trying to remember how to enjoy myself, trying not to take too many unnecessary lungfuls of this life-filled air. I think I used to like walking like this. In theory it was a lovely morning, with the sun shining and the flowers blooming, not that I could really appreciate either. Soon I should be coming up on the path that branched off for my sister's house. Well technically for her and her husband's house. I had been shocked when I learned Leia had married, and to a Druid at that. It was still a struggle for me to remember that the sister I saw would not be the same little girl from my memories.

I gave even odds that her husband Ireclaw was going to try and kill me, again, regardless of the pardon I carried. Certainly I had given him no reason to love me during the war, and he didn't seem like the type to forgive easily. Well, I wouldn't worry about that; I wasn't coming out to this reeking armpit of the world for him. After walking over a small bridge, I spotted the winding road that led further into the woods and allegedly to my sister's cottage.

While I wasn't looking forward to meeting her husband again, I was lucky that his druidic lifestyle had kept his home out here, and not in Astranaar proper. While the news that the Death Knights of the Ebon Blade were being accepted back into the Alliance was making rounds, I think I had beaten it to this particular part of the world. Though, unlike most of the other death knights, I hadn't joined the Ebon Blade. Or the Alliance. For now, for a little while, I would be my own person, and then I would repay the debt I owed Tirion and the Argent Crusade. I would not abandon those who had helped me find the Light again. Unlike those younger death knights, I knew I couldn't quench my rage with vengeance. On reflection, there were few ways I was like most of the younger death knights. Or at least younger in unlife, all of them had actually lived longer then I had.

I respected their cause, but I had lost enough of my existence to my King…

I meant the Lich King. Not my King. Frostmoune's teeth, old habits were hard to break. Sighing, I rewrote the sentence in my mind. I meant by the Light. Normal people swore by things like the Light and "my father's hammer." 20 years of word choice were going to be hard to change. 20 years of a lot of things were going to be hard to change.

I shook my head trying to clear it. This paladin-sanctioned journey of healing wasn't going as well as I had hoped. I had crossed over to Kalimdor via Ratchet, as I was trying to avoid major cities, which had failed miserably in terms of avoiding people. With the Horde and the Alliance both throwing all their ships at Northrend, the Goblin boats were more crowded then ever. I had spent the entire voyage locked in the back of the cargo hold for "my own safety" by the crew. It took 5 days to make the crossing and I was restricted enough in my movements that a relatively thick film of ice had covered me by the time we arrived. I spent 120 mind-numbing hours crammed in with the boxes without light, or air and with few distractions. With nothing but my runeblade for company. Crimsonrime is unpleasant company at the best of times, but with no other stimuli her oily suggestions of "What will it matter if you kill one or two of them," and "If only you make them bleed, your pain will stop" had reached new levels of annoyance. I had not been sorry to leave her driven into the side of a mountain on the border of the wood.

I had been somewhat more regretful to leave Hope. My lieg… Arthas never stopped mocking my choice of name for my mount. I had usually replied that Invincible was hardly the best in Scourge names for a horse either, certainly not compared to Bloodmist or even Thass' mount Dusk. This would inevitably lead to Arthas stalking off, irritated as always to be reminded of anything he held over from life. Yet he never renamed his horse. No one else would even dare mention such a thing to Arthas, but save for Kel'Thuzad, no one else would willingly talk to him either. Though since he had become the Lich King, he was much less enjoyable to tease. In fact, he…

As I was thinking of him, I could feel the Arthas reaching for his wayward commander's mind. A thin film of ice began forming on the path despite my efforts to not draw heat from my surroundings. I could feel the beginnings of his whisperings as it grew colder and colder. Frost had formed on the leaves overhead and it seemed the color was being drained out of the world as the plants around me started to die. Quickly I tried to clear my mind of him.

I thought of Tirion, and what I had rediscovered of the Light. I thought of my brother and sister, and of the love I used to have for them. I concentrated on what I could recall of light and warmth and traced the runes for "Light's grace" and "Light's protection" that I had drawn on my chest with blessed sky-iron. Slowly I felt the glow of the Light begin to fill me, calming my mind and muting the Lich King's whispers. I felt Arthas' specter flee my mind, even as my hands began to glow with the soothing white Light. And then slowly the Light edged from pleasant to hot to searing pain. My concentration was shattered and I watched my hands crack and ooze foul looking fluids.

Shortly though, the lesions closed and abruptly I realized I was still drawing the life out of the plants around me. I forcibly stopped myself, and the temperature slowly rose. I had channeled the light for slightly more than a minute that time. Apart from resisting temptation, practicing my Lightcalling had been almost all I had done on the trip here, and my personal best was still only around 3 minutes. Even then there had been burning; I had just ignored it longer. Tirion was hopeful about my progress, but I was doubtful this trick would be useful for anything other then driving back Arthas' seeking mind.

"Which you wouldn't have to keep doing if you didn't keep thinking about him," I muttered to myself.

I suppose it was also possible the Light would be useful for convincing Ireclaw I had changed, as almost no servant of the Lich King could wield it. Though the burning it caused would probably only show him how much I hadn't changed at all.

I looked around at the circle of lifeless forest that extended out a yard from me. While it was much smaller then it would have been if I had worn my arms and armor, it was still big enough that it was certainly going to be noticed by someone as attuned to nature as Ireclaw. Well, dawdling would mean that he would face me here, instead of somewhere where witnesses would help me keep myself from killing him. I started walking again, hoping to avoid conflict until I actually arrived at least.

According to the map I was close; the house should be just around the bend coming up. My dread, which I had been doing a fair job of ignoring, grew exponentially at being so close to my goal. True it was the memory of my siblings that had allowed Tirion to help me, but just because I remember loving them doesn't mean anything now. Certainly it had no bearing on any feelings they might have had for me, or if we could ever reconnect. Sighing I considered whether or not I was even capable of love anymore.

This mounting fear of rejection I was struggling with is why most death knights and Forsaken never searched for any family they might still have. That and the fear that they wouldn't be able to overcome their hatred of the living, even for ones they used to love. I almost wanted to give up and return to Light's Hope, but I am no coward. My siblings were something I had dreamed of finding again for my entire bleak servitude, and my memory of them is the sole reason that Highlord Fordring decided I might be worth saving. I knew that the fact I remember so much of them from before I… died... is unusual, especially for an undead as old as I was. I actually could recall very little of life except for sporadic memories my family.

If I am honest, as scared as I am of their rejection, I am more terrified of not knowing if they can forgive me for what I have done. Still Alex's reaction to my reappearance was not exactly heartening. Though given he fell in with the Scarlet Crusade, the fact he stopped trying to kill me when I told him I was no longer with the Scourge was almost uplifting, even if he no longer considers us family. And I had only slightly injured him in self-defense. It probably wouldn't even scar. That had been another reason to leave my runeblade far away.

I cut my musings short as I finished rounding the curve and a tidy cottage in the traditional Night Elf style came into view. I looked at it hungrily for some sense that my little sister lived there. I realized I couldn't remember enough about her to know exactly what I was looking for. I saw small touches that were probably from her: a small shrine to the Light, a curtain in a pattern I could almost recognize, a certain color overlaid over the house that reminded me of her. As I entered the clearing around the house I could see where someone, probably Leighara, had planted flowers that had once grown in Lordaeron. There were several objects strewn throughout the yard, less visible to me then the plants teaming with life, but enough of a life-sense had rubbed off on them that they stood out.

Carefully I picked up one of the items nearer the front door. Part of me felt ashamed for this stalling tactic, but not enough to immediately continue. I held to object close to my face, squinting at it and smelling it. From what I could tell, it looked like a small hippogryph doll. It smelled like a child had last touched it: sticky and happy and free and so alive. The amount of color I could perceive in it's wings and beak implied it was well loved or at least more so then the greyer toys I could hardly tell from the stepping stones. I stood there with the toy held to my face for a moment, trying to calm my nerves. I knew what it implied and was now even more terrified of actually reaching the house. Since I was so close to the house I could feel at least 3 beings inside, not the one or two I expected.

Where my life-sense of the forest was like a great weight, for sentient beings it was more localized, which thankfully made it easier to bear. I could feel one of them was much older in years and richer in life than the others and two of them had more focus then I would expect from an animal. None of them had the intensity of life that I would expect from a druid. I stared at the door in shock.

My sister, my dear little Leighara had children.

I was an uncle.

I felt an unexpected and intensely uncomfortable surge of joy at the thought. Joy was an emotion I had hardly felt since I died, and I was still not used to the sheer intensity of emotions when your soul was your own. Just as swiftly as the unbearable joy rose in me it was dashed by the much more familiar fear.

I fought the fear back down. Tirion and I agreed that I would take small steps with this. He had feared that I needed more distance from my… service before I tried to connect with anyone I had known while alive. But he had agreed that I would need help to throw off any lingering influences, and with everyone else needed in Northrend, I had few options.

The Lich King had no hold me if I didn't give him one, but my mind and soul had been his for so long. This would be the first step to secure my freedom: attempting to shore up the cracks in my soul. Most people would mean that as a metaphor; I meant it literally. When I had finally betrayed… When I resigned, Frostmorne had been plunged into my chest. Highlord Fordring had been with me, and he used the Light to rip my soul free of the blade. Most of it anyway. There were… complications, and to keep my soul, I needed help healing it. It would be difficult, but most worthwhile things are. Squaring my shoulders, I turned and faced the door.

My hand hovered above the door as I attempted to summon the willpower to knock. I lowered my left hand to my chest and traced the rune of Grace. I felt an echo of the Light fill me, and it did not burn. Reassured, I decisively knocked on Leia's door.