Even in the middle of the day, no one paid too much attention to Commander Rellion as he dragged the prisoner out of the cell, half holding her up so she could walk. He nodded away the guards, and they seemed rather happy to oblige. No one gazed for too long at his victim. Some of them would have gladly agreed to the old fashioned and fast hanging. Everyone understood the need to torture prisoners to obtain information. But needless pain was...different. So they looked away as he passed, pretended not to see, not daring to interfere and maybe find themselves in the same situation all too soon.

The woman walked awkwardly, blinking often in the crude light reflected by the snow. Wearing just a torn and dirty shirt which came only half a palm over her thighs she soon started to quiver and tried to wrap her arms around her for a bit of warmth.

The spring was right behind the prison cells, a half filled dig in the ground. He pushed her in front of him and she stumbled, splashing into the icy water with a pitiful whimper. Then suddenly, coming behind her back, he pressed his hand in the nape of her neck, forcing her head under the water surface. The woman's arms flailed around desperately, as she tried to come out and breathe, but he held her there a little more, until he felt in her tensed muscles the small convulsions that announced suffocation. Only then he released his grip and watched her grinning as she coughed and frantically struggled to fill her lungs with air.

Still smiling, Adair Rellion abandoned his prey – she wasn't running anywhere too soon, and went a few steps aside to peer over the edge of the precipice. The mountain jutted out towards the sky, like a fang, its slope steep and covered in a thick layer of snow. Rocks dotted the bottom of the narrow valley beneath and a narrow path winded through it, heading east. The blizzard has ceased only minutes before, so it seemed and the snow looked anew, fresh and untouched.

Suddenly he realized he didn't hear anymore the woman's ragged breathing. And still, she was there as he turned, kneeling near the spring, her hair and shirt dripping with water. Watching him. He didn't know fear, of course, yet the stark determination in those pale green eyes made him feel a worming of snakes in his middle. It all took a second, not more – a fraction of a second. Something glowed around her and then, in a heartbeat, the woman threw herself forward, catching him out of balance. He wanted to scream a warning as they fell, but the shock of being flung over into the abyss under his feet turned the sound into a pathetic squeak. They rolled together down the slope like boulders, the woman's fingers clawing into his neck as they did, the snow barely enough to dampen the contact with the stony ground underneath.

Abruptly, the fall stopped. He lay on his back, nausea making his stomach lurch. The woman had landed on top of him, panting. The Light faded around her even as he tried to sit. Pain made him grunt, strangely unexpected, even if on a conscious level he knew he probably had more than one broken bone. His former victim stared him down in the eyes, her entire weight pressed against him. Normally, he should have been able to push her off, his frame being larger than hers and more powerful. Except his muscles wouldn't obey anymore. Panic bubbled inside his chest as he became aware of it. Gods, did that fall let him crippled? Would he die there, slowly and horribly, unknown by any living soul…The woman's gaze bore into him, sharp and unyielding like a drill. Her hands fumbled after something, what was it? – and then he groaned at the feeling of cold metal pressed against his skin. His own dagger.

"I've considered letting the wolves take care of it", the woman said calmly her expression grim as three days old death." Weird, she did not shiver despite being soaked in freezing water. "Then I thought I might pluck your eyes out before."

He gave a start, swallowing hard and trying to form words but they would not go past his constricted throat. His eyes bulged, mouth gaping soundlessly.

Please…

She stood over him, disgust warring anger in her gaze. "Maybe it's your turn to scream for me…"

In a fit of despair, Adair Rellion tried again to move, arms and legs twitching uncontrollably.
He was going to die, he understood. He didn't want to. Abject fear took hold and he howled, struggling in vain to push her aside. The blade ran smoothly across the side of his neck, opening his carotid and the last thing he felt was the hot rush of blood, with each maddened beat of his straining heart…

Severinna put the knife aside and watched him die.

"It's been three days." Gavin's voice broke and he buried his face into his palms, squaring his shoulders as if expecting a blow. "She will not last much longer if we don't do something…Light, I should've…"

"I'm pretty tired of hearing what you should've done". The death knight craned his neck a little, enough to shot him one of those glares that could make shiver the bravest of men. Gavin didn't notice though, which was all for the best, since he refused to let himself impressed by it. He still couldn't come to terms with the situation. This man, or another like him, puppets of the Lich King and the Scourge had probably slaughtered his friends, and their families back in Havenshire. He could only wonder if he had done it as emotionlessly as he now studied the Onslaught camp through the looking glass.

It was as bad he couldn't help himself from speaking out loud his mind. After they had sailed north he had wowed not to care any longer. Not to love, not to lose, not to suffer. He would be cold as ice, unyielding as stone… But he could not hold on his wows for too long. His heart went out to the suffering, regardless of how hard he tried to steel his mind against such weakness. That poor woman hadn't been the first one whose torment he had tried to ease. Prisoners of the Onslaught never lasted too much, but even a small mercy, such as a glass of water could make their last hours bearable. He also knew one day he would get caught and what his fate would be then. And he accepted it, because no matter how much he hated the perversion that the Onslaught had become, he had no where to go, no place to call home.

She had challenged that. Changed it entirely. He'd known from the first moment she thought the same as he did. Oh, she had snapped at him a couple of times, called him 'boy' and told him rather roughly to stop 'ogling'. But then, that night when he was discovered and she had stepped forward and took the flogging for him…it had been as his very soul was dragged to searing flame, melted and remade anew.

It hadn't always been like this, she had told him afterwards. He had been surprised to find out she was so much older than him – old enough to have been raised during the last glorious years of Lordaeron and to take the first consecration wows in front of Uther the Lightbringer – Uther the Great.

She'd made him see the horrendous reality of what his life had become. She gave him a choice, another way to follow, one that did not lead into slaughter and madness. And what had he done? Ran like the coward he were, when he should have stayed and fought, when he should have…

"What's done is done, no less and no more", the death knight said absently and Gavin snapped out of his thoughts, almost panicked that – again – he had spoken out loud. Did he? "If we could just wash ourselves clean of our faults…" There was no emotion in that voice, only plain acknowledgement of a truth Gavin struggled yet with. "But we can't. The sea does not hold enough water for that, so stop whining for once and try to think…!"

Gavin forced down a grunt, but he thought he could sea reason in that. Even if the one lecturing him was a death knight. Crawling forward, he lay on his belly too, peering over the edge towards the tents that lay more than fifty feet below them.

"Tonight after dark", the death knight continued as plainly as before. Suddenly he shifted, pausing as he raised again the looking glass. There was a hint of motion around the barracks, as far as Gavin could see. A gust of chilling wind stirred out of nowhere and he had to take hold of his cloak to prevent it from flailing and maybe give away their position.

"What is it?"

The words that rolled from the other man's lips were in a language Gavin didn't understand but he could make out a curse. He backed away from the edge with the deadly gracefulness of a predator, despite the heavy armor that limited his movements, and then went back to his feet, all the time still staring down into the Onslaught Camp.

"What is it?" Panic crept on the edges of Gavin's voice as he imitated him. "What did you see? Is she…"

Again he broke and he had to make efforts to steady his ragged breathing. His gloved hands gripped the sides of his belt until they hurt. "Light, no…"

Dark mist coalesced around the other man's hand and Gavin could feel the odd presence forming itself in front of them, like a cry ripped from an unwilling throat. He gaped at the skeletal beast, its wings spread open and nearly stumbled as he tried to pull back.

The death knight gripped his upper arm though and yanked him forward.

"Move and, by the bones of Kel'huzad, keep your mouth shut!" For the second time in that day, Gavin found himself with little other option than to obey.

She wanted to run, but all she could do was crawl, one step at a time. Pain surged and faded with each move, searing her to the bone.

How far..?

No, definitely not far enough…

She heard steps. Voices. Closer, stronger. She fought the mist drifting into her mind, the carved hilt of the knife the only real thing in a shifting whirlwind of forms and color…

Death comes, the voice cackled again and she knew it true. There is no need to fight. No escape…

Still, she crawled.

"Light…"

The body lay grotesquely sprawled on the ground, head resting in a patch of crimson red snow. The slash that had cut his throat open was clean, but not the way in which his eyes had been plucked out. There was nothing neat in that. Gavin's stomach lurched and he clasped a hand over his mouth, struggling to keep himself from throwing up. The death knight didn't spare a second glance to Commander Rellion's corpse – he just side stepped it and followed the trail of blood that lead east.

He had seen them fall, tumble like boulders over the ledge. A fall like that would have knocked the senses out of the most resilient human. The Light must have truly protected her.

Of course, he did not believe in the Light, but his breath hitched a little when he distinguished the dark shape in the snow. The wind stirred again. A storm would come soon. He intended to find shelter before that.

The knife came up blindly as he bent towards her. Instinct made him grip her arm, snatching the blade out of her numb fingers. The woman's fist connected hard with the plate on his chest and she gasped. A fall of tangled red locks almost hid her face as she struggled desperately to break free from his grasp. Putting both his arms around her torso the death knight knelt in the snow, cradling her into an awkward embrace.

"Easy, sister", he whispered in her hair as she collapsed in a shuddering pile, her forehead leaning on his shoulder so close he could feel her ragged heartbeats, like the flailing of a caged bird.

"Light", Gavin mumbled again. He had finally caught up with them, but he didn't seem able to say anything else. Pulling off his fur lined cloak, the death knight wrapped it around the shoulders of the shivering woman. He didn't truly feel the cold anyway. Or rather, he was so deeply chilled it didn't matter.

"Did she…" The young man looked over his shoulder, uneasily. His face was ashen gray, stricken with horror. The expression of annoyance, forgotten for a second, crept back in the death knight's features.

"Oh, shut up!" he commanded sharply. He rose, lifting her with him, a feather-like weight. She had lost her consciousness, he thought, but surely she needed warmth and healing…There was no time to make their way to Wintergarde, but an outpost of the Argent Crusaders lay just a mile to the north…

The Argent Crusade. The death knight gave Gavin a wry look. Of course, never a shortage of fools and lost causes, he thought.