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Painfull pinches of cold all over his body, forced him to open his eyes and grimace in pain. Laying on his back, covered in white snow, Alfos tried to control his jaw which had started to tremble violently. He was naked, unnarmed and slowly, but steadily, a numbeness was taking over his legs and arms. He tried to get up but his body would not obey.Looking around, his neck protesting violently as he moved his head, he tried to see where he was. In the pale moonlight he failed to recognise the landskape. His comrades were nowhere to be seen, nor was any sign of their camp. He made an effort to rise again, to move and shake off the cold, but it was futile. His old body would not stir. With desperation covering his thoughts and heart, he left an almost whispering cry. He had faced demons and creatures beyond one's wildest nightmares, yet he would die of cold, alone, on a mountain slope in the middle of nowhere.

"Zarif..you fool...what have you done?" he managed to whisper to himself, draining his last strength.

As the Paladin wondered why there was only one moon in the sky, a blackness that felt solid as ice covered his mind, delivering him from his pain and guiding him to dreamless sleep.

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Thorodin Silverfist, was a dwarf who liked a solid roof over his head. Having spent most of his life inside the little studies of the library, he had developed a sort of dependace on their clostrophobic enviroment. Even the great halls of his hometown, sometimes made him feel...exposed. It is no wonder he was not in a good mood that night, when he was found taking a walk on the mountain slopes of hiw homeland.

"Nev'r agen!" cried the dwarf in a grumby voice. Covered in his woolen light-blue robes, he marched through the snow that coverd the mountain, mumbling curses.

He had been invited to a feast, in a village just a few miles away from his carved-in-stone hometown and he decided to attent, a decision he was now cursing himself for taking. As time passed and the stout and ale purred, he lost sense of time, only to find out, half-drunk, several hours later how late it was. Ofcourse, his friends offered him to give him a bed for the night, but he refused. Hand-built homes made him feel uneasy as he claimed they were too fragile.

So there he was now, walking to his home in the middle of the night, under a clear sky (that always gave him the sense he was being watched) and through the freezing mountain cold.

"Com' to the Inn, they said! We'll have a laugh, they said! Pah, I say! Fools! And ye fool for listening to 'em! Look at ye now, passed third wetch and ye 're walking in the fields, like some damn elvy telking to tress, when ye could have been sleeping under ye stone roof with a crecking fire to warm yer bones! Pah!"

Small critters that defied the cold in their search for some food, looked curiously at the sturdy, short figure, unable to decide if it was a threat or dinner. The brave few that optimisticly thought the second, soon found themselves been chased away by the dwarf, who kept throwing snowballs and fiery threats at them.

He was chasing a little snow-fox who made the mistake of an attempt to smell him from up close, wielding a fallen stick in his arms like it was a mighty dwarven Warhammer, when he stopped as his eyes were fixed on a shadowy rumble in the snow. He lowered the stick, ignoring the fox who kept running with her tail between her legs, and then walked cautiously to the..thing. As he drew closer and recognised what it was, he threw the stick to the snow and started running towards it, where he stopped and gasped at the naked man that was laying unconscious in the snow, his skin almost as white as the snow itself. He looked old for a human, at least in his fifties and the only thing on him was a silver ring that shone in the moonlight like a star.

"Titan's beards!" cried Thorodin. "What the heck?" The man stirred at the sound of the voice, prooving to still be alive and making the dwarf to take off his cloak and throw it over him.

"This ain't no place to take a nap, lad. Here ye go!" said Thorodin as he covered the man carefully. He did not now how long the man had be there, nor did he know how he had managed to survive in that cold without clothes in his age. But he did know he had to take him to someplace wark soon or the man was lost.

A weak Dwarf is stronger than a strong Man, or so the dwarves say. Whether that was true or no, Thorodin, for whom this night was already the hardest exercise of his life, lifted the old-man and started dragging him in the snow. After a long while and while wondering if the man was still alive, he saw the fires that lit the Gates of his hometown from afar. Screaming for help between his heavy pants, he started clumbing the steep slope that lead to the Gates, as he heard the cries of the guards responding. Soon, he was relieved from his burden as two guards rushed to him and took the man in their hands.

Lost in his black sleep and carried by two plate-clad dwarves, Alfos de Lerac of Dargonthar was led into the city of Ironforge, an Expatriate once again.

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Alfos opened his eyes with an effort, only to shut them again a moment later. Even the pale light of the single candle that burned in his little room, was too much for his tired eyes. He sighed and layed still, waiting for his sense to slowly wake up again. He felt weak, exhausted, but what troubled him most was that void he seemed to feel deep inside his heart. A void he hadnt felt for almost 50 years. His lips begun to tremble as his whole existance protested against that feeling.

Gathering all his strength, he opened his eyes and slowly got off the bed, only to kneel weakly next to it. Facing the little candle, the only source of light in the room, he begun to pray, whispering his gratitude to his God for sparing his life. As time passed, his prayer was growing more intense, more desperate. But the more the Paladin prayed, the more his pain seemed to grow and relief getting hopeless. His body began to shake from his sobs and tears run down his face, as if his body could not withhold the emotions inside. His sobs echoed in the little room as the Paladin felt alone, helpless, abandoned.

His God would not answer his prayers.

When Thorodin came to his room, he found the old Paladin lying on the floor and the candle nearly burned out. He sighed and walked towards him to help him crawl on the bed. After he had lit a new candle and as he was ready to leave the room again, the man spoke.

"Thank you" he whispered. Thorodin simply nodded. He was not rude but this last week was not easy for him. Apart from the man he had to take care of, his duties at the Library were a heavy burden at this time. Some newly discovered documents taken from the Blackforge Mountain by a dwarven party of explorers had just arrived and his new assistants were less than incompitant (at least in his opinion), so he had to do all the work to decipher, transelate and preserve them by himself. he was ready to leave the room when the man wpoke again.

"You seem troubled" he said. "Can I help somehow?" The Dwarf turned in surprise. The man was exhausted, he could barely speak and it was obvious that apart from his fever, there were other troubles in his mind, some great loss. Yet, he had noticed Thorodin's troubles.

"Wouldn't went to trouble ye, lad. Ye're bad enough as it is" replied Thorodin.

"No, please." spoke the man again, smiling faintly. "Tell me. If the solution to your problem does not involve me getting off the bed tonight, I would be glad to help somehow." Even with those few words, even if the man was lying helpless on the bed, his voice was calming to the dwarf, compationate and his smile was filled with care. And even more surprisingly, the man's confidence was such that made his words believable. Thorodin looked at the man with admiration, wondering who he was, as he closed the door and sat on the bed near the man's legs. Soon he was talking to the weird man about the documents and the problems that appeared to have followed them. When he left the room several hours later, he felt relieved he had at least talked with someone about his matters. The next day, he would do his job with renewed strength.

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Weeks had to pass before Alfos was ready to get out of the bed. Thorodin spent more hours with him in the little room and soon the two men developed a friendship. From the information he he had gathered without asking directly the dwarf about their location and his familiarity with the built of the multiverse that his travels had given him, Alfos soon realised what the Rod had done. When Zarif tried to unite the two pieces without the proper magical preparation, the pieces reacted as they were ment to: they scattered violently, teleporting far from eachother. Though the Paladin knew the pieces had that ability, he did not expect them to travel to another world. Even worse, taking him with them. His guess was that Zariff was probably transfered to wherever the other piece was and that the other piece was in this world with him. Or so he hopped.

When he decided to share his story with Thorodin he was happy to see that the dwarf was familiar with the concept of multiple worlds, as he claimed that the Orcs of this world had come from another as well. In a manner much different than would have been expected from a dwarf, Alfos found that his saviour was very open minded in intelectual matters, so as soon as the Paladin was able to get out once more, they beguan researching the Great Library of Ironforge for information about a possible journey back to Dargonthar. When that research prooved futile, Alfos begun to come to terms with the idea of him staying in this new world, at least for now, so the dwarf started tutoring him on some basic knowledge of the custoums and history of that world, known to it's inhabitants as Azeroth. He spent his days in the Library with Thorodin, taking short walks outside the city Gates once in a while. While he felt deep sorrow for loosing his comrades after all these years and being forced to stay away from his Mouintan once again, this time probably forever, the thought of him finally settling down begun to grow in him. Then one night, he had a visit.

It was late in the night and even Ironforge seemed to have grown silent for a while. Alfos was fast asleep in his room at Thorodin's house. Though not unpleasant, his dreams were vivid, almost real.

He was sitting near a lake, a lake which he recognised all too well. He was young and vigourus in his dream, as he was the first time he went to that lake, during his first travels. He smiled, recognising the place and time his dreams had led him to and looked at the crystal waters with a smile of sweet memories in his face. Then, just as it happened before, just as it happened the first time, the lake stirred. Bubbles roared, killing the calmness of the water, but the sight was not unpleasant to him. He felt happy and started laughing with joy as the void in his heart slowly begun to give place to a sentiment of friendhsip, loyalty, companionship. Then, out of the boiling water a large, black figure emerged, covered in roaring blue flames as the smell of cinammon and rose covered the air. A neigh of joy and magesty echoed in the air, as Dreamwalker rose galloping in the air and landed infront of Alfos. Feeling tears of joy running down his face, the Paladin run to him and hugged the neck of his old friend, his soul mate in battle, his ever-faithfull comrade, as the demonic steed kept licking his neck. Soon, they found themselves galloping in the air, laughing as the world below them grew smaller and smaller, making the old man smile in his sleep.

The dream seemed to go on for hours as the two of them played with the clouds. Then, after a long while, Dreamwalker landed to another place and time which brought tears to the Paladin. He was back in the field of battle where the blue-flamed Nightmare had died. Slowly, Dreamwalker rode to where his own dead body was lying. Alfos gently carressed his friend's neck. After a while, he spoke.

"This is not just a dream, is it, my old friend?" The Nightmare nodded in reply. "Why do you show me this?" said the Paladin after a while. Dreamwalker neighed strongly, hitting the earth with his flaming hooves, all the while sending images to the Paladin's mind, like a dream within a dream, in the way their two souls were alloud to communicate. He told Alfos that a demon, even one such as him, could not trully die. His incarnation to Dargonthar was dead, yes, thus making impossible for him to reach that world again. Yet his spirit was alive, roaming the worlds of the spirits freely. He then told him that this world, Azeroth, was one whose boundaries with the demon world were loose, enabling him to contact the Paladin once more, after all those years. Finally he told Alfos that should he find a means to control those boundaries and if the Paladin founded the strength needed to summon him to this world, they would be able to be united once more, even if the steed was given a different incarnation. Then, both of them could fight again, side by side, praising Allagon's name.

When he finished, Alfos nodded in understanding. "Then I know what I must do" he said then went on "You have saved me once more, my friend. Not from a foe or death this time. But from myself. For a moment I allowd myself to grow tired and gave up. But I know now that the moment I stop fighting for Allagon and his Light, will be the moment I give up my last breath. Thank you, my faithfull friend!"

The Nightmare neighed once more in delight, his voice echoing in Alfos' ears as he woke up in his bed. The next day, he would leave Ironforge.

Dressed in simple linen blue clothes and armed only with a wooden mace, the sole weapon that Thorodin had in his house, Alfos found himself the next day in a merchant's carage, heading to the capital of Humans, named Stormwind, were he would present himself as a squire in Light's cause. He held a letter in his hands, that Thorodin had wrote to some friends of his in a little temple called Northshire Abbey. He would fight for Light again and win his God's favour as he had done before and littel by little his old strength would return. The difference was that he was sixteen then, with his future lying before him. Now, he was just an old man.

But that, matters little to a man with Faith.