[It's a small, icebound journal found discarded to the north of the Icecrown glacier. Beneath the ice you can make out a light spattering of blood across the sides of the pages.]

Day 4

My nightmares have started up again.

If I'm being honest with myself, I should have known it would only be a matter of time. They always get worse when I'm stressed. I think the bad dreams are just another way for my mind to say that I don't feel in control of my life right now. But it doesn't much matter either way. You can expect them, and you can figure out what they mean, but that doesn't make it any easier to wake up in cold sweats in the middle of the night.

This time it's been Icecrown, I think – I've never been to Northrend before. A vast, empty plain of ice, farther than the eye can see. For the longest time, nothing moves but the snow, pouring endlessly out of a dark grey sky. There's little to see and nothing to hear – almost tranquil, in a way. But I feel uneasy anyway. I can sense the dread building within me, a knot in my stomach, although I don't know why. Sooner or later, I look down – and I see them. Corpses. Hundreds, thousands of them, buried just under the surface in every direction. I couldn't see them before, but now that I know to look I can't turn away from them. Horror bubbles up in an awful instant and they burst out from the ground beneath me. Dead arms reaching out, grasping at me, dragging me down to join them.

This was the third nightmare in as many nights. I'm still shaking as I write, but even now I know that tonight's won't be the last.

I'm scared. That's what it comes down to. I'm on a ship sailing north, up to the frozen wastes, delivering me to a stint of service in Icecrown, and I'm scared.

I know I shouldn't be. The war's long past and the Scourge was defeated years ago now. And almost everyone who rotates up makes it back. It's only for a year, and I've trained and prepared for this, and I'm not alone, and any of a hundred other reasons not to worry.

And yet I can't help it. I can pretend to ignore that fear when I'm around the rest of the crusaders during the day. Act like everything's normal. But there's no hiding from my dreams. There's no hiding from the voice in the back of my head saying, "Remember what's waiting for you up there. Never forget that, don't get comfortable. You need to have your guard up, at all times."

The whole thing is just suddenly very… it feels real in a way that it hasn't before. There were so many crusaders who left in the name of the Light, to the exact same place, in a ship just like this one, with training just like mine, and never came home. So many names on the walls of Light's Hope Chapel, and so many empty graves behind. So many. So many men and women, better ones than me, who went up to the roof of the world to die.

And not just die. There's no reason to think that many – most? – of them don't "live" even now, in a horrible sort of way. That might be the worst part of it all. It's the realization that I think everyone who goes to Northrend has, sooner or later.

Deep breaths. There's nothing I can do about that from here. I think that for now, the best thing I can do is try to go back to sleep.

And in the meantime I think it's helped to write this – to engage that voice whispering from the back of my head instead of locking it away. I think I'd go mad if I didn't have a way to get these thoughts out. In honesty, I don't know whether I'm scared more by the prospect of what we'll find up there, or of being stuck waiting on this ship and not knowing. But either way, I still catch myself thinking of what it will be like to finally see land on the horizon. It makes me shiver.

Day 19

Something odd happened today.

One of the others, Bordin, had an accident. He wasn't in much of a state to talk, but from what the others were saying, it sounded like he got caught in the anchor line? Or something comparable – I'm not sure. Regardless, the dwarf's leg was severely mangled by the time they brought him to me.

That by itself wasn't what was strange; he wasn't the first person I've needed to heal on this ship, and I'm sure he won't be the last. Even getting to Northrend is a dangerous business.

No, the oddity was something I felt when I was healing poor Bordin. As always, I recited the prayers and looked within myself for the well of holy power that I use to channel the Light. Only – it wasn't there.

There was just… nothing. Where there was once Light, a shadow. Where there was once something, just an empty void. No power to draw from, and no way to heal Bordin. Mind, it lasted for only a brief instant. After I got over the shock of the moment, I looked back inside, and there it was, like nothing had ever been wrong. But in that moment, I felt like my entire world had been flipped over.

It's difficult to put in words how overpowering the difference between my expectation and the reality of the situation felt – it was a bit like walking down stairs and misjudging your step. Your foot goes right through where you expected there to be solid ground, and for an instant you're falling. And even though it doesn't last long, in that moment, what you thought you knew gets turned on its head. Part of you worries, absurd as it would be, that you might just keep falling forever – but then you hit the next step down, and the moment is over, like nothing had ever been wrong.

It didn't end up being a problem, practically speaking. I got on with mending Bordin's leg and sent the poor lad on his way to recover. The delay passed so quickly that I don't think anyone else even noticed something was amiss. But still, it was such a strange feeling that I'm having trouble putting it out of my mind. I'd never felt anything remotely like that emptiness, or the sudden surge of doubt that came with it, in all my years in the priesthood.

I'm reminded of lectures on the Light from old Duke Zverenhoff back at the chapel. "The Light isn't about glory, and it's not about individuals," he used to say. Rather, it's about recognizing powers in the world beyond our ability to comprehend. It's about understanding that truth, until you can submit yourself to it. "Be a part of something greater, like a cog in a great cosmic machine." He said connection to the Light is about trust – you have to be open to forces beyond yourself in order to act as a conduit for their power to flow through you. Open yourself to the Light, and in return, you make room for it to serve you in time of need.

Or so I thought. I wonder what the Duke would have to say about the shadow I felt today.

It feels odd that I'm playing the same role for the younger crusaders as Zverenhoff did for me. I'm not sure if that's a responsibility that I'm ready for. But with that said, I am at least getting along well with my comrades, which is a bit of a relief. I've been close with Gregor and Mara for years now, but most of the rest I only used to know by sight, if at all. I've gotten to know many of them over the course of the voyage, as both a healer and as a mentor, and I think that's helped me to settle in, so to speak.

I had a rocky start in my first entry to this journal, but spending time over the past couple weeks getting to know the others has helped me adjust. The nightmares have died down, and apart from today's oddity, I've been able to focus on the mission, as well on my sisters and brothers in the Light.

I only hope that continues once we make landfall in a few days.

Day 28

I feel very out of my element here.

First of all, this place is freezing. It was still late summer when we set out from the Chapel, and even so, I'm far colder than I've ever been in my life. I don't know how I'm going to make it a year. We've been settled in for just a few days, but already I nearly can't remember how it feels to be warm. Or not even warm – I would settle for simply not being so cold that I can't feel my fingers underneath my gloves.

It makes it harder to write, too. That's the problem, this cold just seeps into everything you do, coming at you at all times and from all angles. You can never get away from it – it's inhospitable in every way.

On top of that, we're set up our base in the remains of an old death knight fortress, of all places. During the war its name was the "Shadow Vault", and it belonged to the order of the Ebon Blade, a group of death knights that betrayed the Lich King and fought alongside the Crusade to bring him down. And before they took over the Vault, they had to wrest it away from the Scourge itself.

Knowing who used to occupy this place is no surprise when you look at it. The walls and columns are rough and edged at sharp, unnatural angles that make it easy for the careless to cut themselves on. The Vault is hewn almost entirely from an eerily dark metal that Gregor said is called saronite. Where he learned that I don't know, but it covers the whole fortress in monstrous spikes that seem to swallow up torchlight. And it's especially unsettling to know that the grim footsteps of the dead once clattered across these ramparts.

So while I can understand that the Shadow Vault is defensible and well fortified, it's still difficult to call such a grotesque, unnerving place home. Gregor and Mara seem to be adjusting just fine, but me… it's not a place for me to come back to, to get away from all of Icecrown's forbidding frozen wasteland. I feel vulnerable here instead of safe.

And that's especially bad right now. Because what's been bothering me most of all is – my connection with the Light still isn't normal. More than once just this week, it's happened again. I concentrate on the prayers, I look inside and see… nothing. Sometimes I'm able to perform the healing magic with no problem, and sometimes the connection is just gone, with no warning.

Maybe I'm just thinking about it too much, getting in my own head. But it's difficult not to, when if anything it's getting worse. On the one hand, I know idea of the whole thing is just absurd – priests don't just up and lose their powers for no reason. But at the same time… it's real. It's happening. And it's worrying me. I dread the idea that when I look inward at myself, I don't know what will be looking back. And on top of that, there are people out here, good men and women, who are relying on my abilities. What if they need me and I can't help? What if I can't protect them from the monsters lurking out there in the frozen wastes?

I don't know what to do about it. I wouldn't feel comfortable telling anyone about it, but I also worry about letting myself stew with my own thoughts and grow more anxious. That would be exactly the kind of stress that brings on the nightmares.

I think I just need to take a deep breath and wait. In time, if I renew my faith and trust in the Light, it can see me through these dark times. In time, maybe I can hope that things will get better. But part of me says that they won't. The part that looks back out at me from the nothingness. The shadow in my nightmares, whispering that things will only get worse. Time will tell.

Day 41

Icecrown is definitely taking its toll on me. Just like I thought, the nightmares have started up again. I dream of darkness, the same emptiness that haunts me during the day. At first I don't even understand that I'm asleep. Eventually I realize with a start that I'm conscious and aware of my surroundings, only – there are no surroundings. Only darkness in every direction. Nothing to stand on, the weightlessness making me feel like I'm falling… but through what, I don't know. I don't know what is above or below me, or even where above and below are. In an odd way, the lack of sensation is overwhelming.

And there's nothing I can do about it. I can't move, and I can't will myself awake. I can just continue to fall, endlessly, through the horrible abyss, and take in its incomprehensible immensity. Only when I am on the verge of breaking do I wake – never before.

I don't have the first idea of what to do about my powers. I've still managed to keep it all a secret from the others so far, but how long can that last? Is it even for the best? It all feels so convoluted. I've tried my hardest to put the whole thing out of my head, but if my dreams are any indication, that's been a miserable failure.

And there's something else. Yesterday, I was sent out on a patrol with Mara and Daltyn, one of the younger paladins. No sign of any Scourge this time, thankfully – but our path took us to the edge of an old wartime excavation site, further into the basin that makes up the Icecrown glacier. It's long abandoned these days, but Daltyn said that when it was still in use, it was the Scourge's source of saronite in the area, the same material that makes up the Shadow Vault. He called it the "Weeping Quarry," and he shared some old stories about it with Mara and me. Apparently, there are legends that saronite is actually the hardened blood of an ancient, dead god buried deep beneath the earth. Slaves forced by the Scourge to dig up the saronite would fall under the influence of the god and eventually go mad. I don't know whether that's a story that the Scourge made up to frighten the living back in the day, or one that someone else made up to frighten Daltyn. But either way, it's certainly an image that sticks in the brain, isn't it?

Well, it's anyone's guess how the Weeping Quarry got its name, but there was definitely something unsettling about that place. It is difficult to put my finger on what exactly that was – after all, it's nothing much to look at. Naught but an enormous pit carved out of the frozen ground, with a still pool of half-frozen water at the bottom. But as I stood there looking over the edge, there was something about the stillness of the place that made me feel very small and very alone, in spite of my companions. The same feeling that I get in my nightmares of late.

And… I know it sounds silly to say so, but I felt something else, something more. I felt like I was in the presence of something. It was almost like… like the touch of power a priest feels when channeling the Light, but in a horribly twisted way. Like a warped form of the same connection to the Light that I've been losing these past weeks.

I know what kind of foolishness that sounds like. I know that it seems stupid as soon as I write it down. I know that's what I get for listening to Daltyn's stories, and for letting my own fears get the better of me. I know all that. But I also know what I felt. And I have to trust that. If I can't trust what I'm feeling, if I can't trust what's in my own head…

[The paragraph finishes with: "then I'm already too far gone." But the words are scribbled through.]

Well, that's not something I can afford to consider right now.

Day 58

What's happening to me? This has progressed past the point of just being a problem – it's nearly all I think about anymore. Not the deepening cold, or the intimidating fortress we call home, or even the monsters lurking out there in the glacier. Less than two months have passed since we set out for Northrend, but already I feel like I can't remember what it was like to live without this awful shadow hanging over me.

On top of that, I feel like I'm a liability to everyone else. It's been weeks since I've healed anyone, and… to be honest, I don't know if I'd be able if I needed to. Luckily, the need hasn't arisen, but the longer I spend around the rest of the company, the more likely it is that I'll be put in a compromising situation. So I just keep to myself – but then I'm alone with my own thoughts, and that's not good either. I don't know how long it's been since I had a decent night's rest.

Each night, I have the same nightmare, falling forever into a vast empty nothingness. But recently that hasn't been all – at the point where I used to scare myself awake, now I go on. Through the endless void, for what feels like forever. But eventually, I start to see dim rays of light around me, descending from a murky circle above. With a start I realize that I'm underwater – and even though there'd be no way for me to tell, I know in my heart that I'm trapped deep in the pool at the bottom of the Weeping Quarry. I try desperately to swim for the frozen surface, but I know that I won't make it. And then, just as I give in, and just before I finally wake, I hear… a voice. Terrible and monstrous, but there's no speaker – it feels like it's washing over me from all directions. And despite the almost tranquil silence beneath the surface, I can feel it resonating in my head, whispering the same thing, every night. "There is no escape. Not in this life, not in the next."

I wish I had the capacity to think it through and reassure myself that it's only a dream. But the truth is that I'm frightened. By my nightmares, and by this Light-forsaken place, and by everything that's been happening to me. And I'm exhausted and I can't think straight and I don't see how to make it better and the only voice I can hear right now is telling me that there's no escape.

I think that, for now, I've managed to keep my troubles a secret from everyone else. But I won't be able to continue that forever. They'll find out that underneath the mask I put on, I've become… hollow. And then what? What will Gregor and Mara think? What will all of them think of me?

No one to turn to. Everything getting worse. I feel like I'm unraveling. What do I do?