Khadgar turned back to the death knight and dropped to his knees beside the creature.
"Why did Ner'zhul send orcs to the Tomb of Sargeras?" he demanded. Gaz Soulripper laughed, foul breath from dead lungs caressing Khadgar's face. He'd pulled tightly into himself in the few moments of respite and was not about to say anything. Khadgar frowned. He extended his magic once again, this time without any effort at finesse, and the illumination of his spell was like a lance to the creature's forehead. Soulripper arched in agony, but stayed silent.
"Tell us!"
"We — care nothing for your world!" Soulripper grunted, his hands clenching.
Khadgar made a subtle move with his fingers, and this time Gaz Soulripper cried out. "I need better than that."
"Ah!" The dead thing bit its lip in pain, teeth sinking easily through rotted flesh. "Our destiny — greater than you can imagine, human!"
Khadgar's heart sped up. These half-truths, these hints… What was the reality? Sweat dotted his forehead, but not from exertion. He tightened his grip, and the death knight convulsed.
"Khadgar …" said Turalyon, wincing a little.
"I can keep this up all day, Soulripper," Khadgar said. When there was no response, Khadgar lifted his left hand to join his right.
"An artifact!" the death knight screamed. "From the tomb. The Scepter of Sargeras."
"That's better. What about it?"
"W-with that, the Book of Medivh, and the Eye of Dalaran, Ner'zhul can — no!"
Khadgar was surprised at the level of resistance the death knight could put up. He shared Turalyon's distaste of torture, but they were so close… .
"What can he do? Tell us!"
"He — he can open portals from Draenor to other worlds."
Khadgar immediately ceased tormenting the death knight, who flopped over, groveling in recovery. He sat, stunned for a moment, then looked up at Turalyon. He saw his own horror mirrored in the youth's face.
“Other… worlds?” Turalyon said, his voice faint with shock. "Azeroth and Draenor… aren't the only ones?" He stared down at the death knight, his mouth working for a moment before anything came out. “Worlds… more than ours. Worlds without end, innocents without number falling before them… Light save us."
Khadgar nodded. "I know it's difficult to grasp. The Horde we've faced was half-crazed with desperation and hunger. Their world is dying, and they needed to take ours. Now they're going to open portals to countless other worlds as well. This same scenario will be repeated again… and again and again."
Turalyon barely heard his friends words. They seemed to fade away, smothered by the thudding of his own heart in his ears. The hideous visage of the death knight, too, was fading, drowning in a slow but steady glow of white light that seemed to be coming from inside the paladin's own head.
He burned to protect his people — the Alliance — all life on this world from the havoc that the ever-hungering orcs had chosen to wreak. That seemed daunting enough, but now — worlds! Just how many were they talking about, anyway — one? Two? Two million?
Hysteria bubbled up inside him as he sat in the white, empty space and danced on the verge of madness as he tried to comprehend the incomprehensible. The innocent were his charge. He had to protect them. But how could he possibly do so? So many who —
The pounding of his heart suddenly paused.
And in that place of pure, brilliant light, he saw a figure that was light — the Light — itself. It hovered and glowed, gleaming as if its form was hard and crystalline but also soft, unspeakably soft, as soft as a tear, as soft as forgiveness, as soft as Alleria's pale skin. Golden strands draped the being, and Turalyon could not tell at first if they were leading from or to the creature — and then he understood, it was both. All that was, was this being, and this being, was everything. Awe flooded him and he drank in the sight of this beautiful, luminous being, feeling it fill him with hope and calm as if he were an empty vessel.
Do not despair, came a voice like bells, like chimes, like the sigh of the ocean. The Light is with you. We are with you. No matter how vast the darkness, Light will scatter it. No matter what world, no matter what creature, the Light is there, in that place, in that soul. Know this, and go forward with a joyful heart, Turalyon.
As if it sang in response, Turalyon's heart began to beat once more. He realized it had never stopped; that the long, frozen, rapt moment had been less than the blink of an eye.
Khadgar gave Turalyon the space to let it sink in. Finally, Turalyon lifted his head. His eyes were focused, clear, and his face was resolute.
"We have to stop them," Turalyon stated firmly. "We can't let other, innocent worlds have this… this… unleashed on them. It ends here. On Azeroth. No one else should have to suffer as we have. The Light shines on other worlds than ours, and it needs our help. It will have it."
Khadgar heard some resentful murmurings from some of Turalyon's men. Turalyon heard it too, for he stood, frowning.
"If you have something to say, say it clearly," he ordered. The soldiers who'd been talking exchanged glances, then one stepped up.
"Sir… why don't we just let them go? If they have fresh worlds to take, maybe they'll just go away and leave us alone."
"Even if it were that simple, we can't let that happen. Don't you understand?" Turalyon said. "We have to stop them. We can't save our world at the expense of countless innocent lives!"
"Besides," came Alleria's clear voice as she strode up to them, dusty and sweaty and spattered with blood too dark to be her own, "what is to stop them from returning once they have gotten fat off plunder?” With her sharp sense of hearing, of course, she’d heard everything. Khadgar thought her a trifle paler than usual, but she was almost eerily composed. Would you like to battle a Horde twice the size of the one we faced during the Second War, completely united, and with the ability to open portals to Azeroth from anywhere?"
Khadgar saw the disappointment in Turalyon's eyes. The paladin had hoped the men would understand his point. And more, he'd hoped Alleria would. But it seemed that Alleria was still consumed with hatred for the orcs. She did not really care about other worlds. She wanted to hunt the orcs down and kill them herself; she had no wish to let others share that particular cruel delight. She turned to Turalyon, and color rose briefly in her face, then subsided.
"Sir, while we were fighting, I saw something I think you should be aware of. We noticed a group of . . ."
Khadgar was barely listening to her musical voice. Something else was nagging at his thoughts… something was not right. He gasped as understanding burst upon him.
"I'm an idiot!" Khadgar cried, cutting Alleria off in mid-sentence. "They're not losing!" he shouted. "They're retreating! They've found all the artifacts they needed and they're returning home to Draenor! The entire invasion was just a feint to distract us, and now they're done!"
Gaz Soulripper glanced up at him, shock and fear in his glowing eyes. The death knight surged to his feet. snapping the stout ropes that bound his hands and feet and chest. Terror lent him magical strength as well — from somewhere deep inside, Gaz shunted aside Khadgar's mental lance and raised fresh shields that blocked the archmage's reflexive attempt to regain control.
"You will not interfere!" Gaz roared, leaping atop Khadgar and wrapping mailed hands around the archmage's throat. "You will not thwart our destiny!"
The death knight began to squeeze, and Khadgar gasped for air, struggling to push the creature away even as his vision swam. Blackness crept in along the edges of his sight, framing wild colors flashing before him. He couldn't push the hands away, he couldn't think to summon a spell.