"I am proud of you, son."

Lord Jacyn Ayreg, Blessed of the Light, Defender of the Truth, Shield of the North, High Seat of House Ayreg -- was a man with sensibilities and techniques, with an imposing aura, a commanding demeanor, an intimidating figure, and a strong sense of right and wrong. He was a brutal man, a hard man; one of the old knights of the Great City, he was once Lord-Captain of the Militia until his 'retirement.' Even in retirement though, he never ceased to rage against the enemies of the Great City. He had dedicated himself to the furtherance of the Great City, of the Rule of Law, and the lofty principles of Justice. He was old even when his son was born, nearly seventy. Now, he was nearly eighty, though he was still as hard as iron.

He stood with his shoulders back and his legs parted to his shoulders, wearing a gold-slashed black coat of fine silk with embroidered brambles down the sleeves. His high collars also bore embroidered golden brambles, though his wide belt was unadorned leather.

"Thank you, father," his son said, trying to copy the pose as best he could. He was young, though, as such things went even with humans. Barely old enough to be considered a man.

His son was dressed in similarly-cut clothes, but his silk was green with only a bit of embroidery across the chest in stylized horses, and a touch of lace at the wrists. Father and son alike wore scabbards on their belt with sheathed swords.

They were standing together in House Ayreg, in the great manor house, nearly a palace, that Lord Jacyn Ayreg had earned and built onto through his service to the Great City. The Map Room, so called because the north wall was covered nearly from corner to corner with a map of the Great City and a few miles beyond the gates, drawn in precise detail nearly three hundred years prior. Many of the tiles that made up the wall had been replaced, citing the expanding city as new buildings were constructed and old buildings were torn down, streets closed off or new ones opened, but the last time it had been updated had been nearly ten years past. In other words, except for a few buildings that needed to be added to it, the enormous map of the Great City was, more or less, exact.

"Though I'd have been even more proud of you had you decided to join the Militia..." his father's voice was hard as stone, but it always was. At least he had given his son a flash of teeth that was likely meant for a smile, but Jacyn Ayreg's scarred face, along with the thin strands of silver hair combed back over his head and his beard, cut into a sharp point and oiled, did not take well to smiles. It looked more like a cat hissing than a friendly grin.

His son squared his shoulders firmly, and lifted his chin. Jacyn was taller than he was, so it was only partly out of stubborn pride. Only partly. "We do as we must, father."

"That we do, son. That we do. I am proud of you, all the same, and Broemere Du'Leran is a good man. He has assured me that you will not receive easy tasks."

Strange as that might have sounded, his son nodded once, firmly. The son of the esteemed Lord Jacyn Ayreg might well have been kept far from fighting, perhaps at a desk somewhere pretending to be a clerk. Some people in the Great City might have wanted to curry favor with House Ayreg by doing just that. Broemere Du'Leran, however, was a personal friend to Jacyn Ayreg, and had given him assurances. His son would be no clerk.

"I will bring honor to your name, father," his son said again. He tried hard to be strong, but he was so young. Already a tear was welling up at the corner of his eye, but he ignored it. No Ayreg could easily be reduced to sniveling.

"I am certain of it. Go and see your mother, boy. She wants to hold you one more time before you put on your white."

"And will I see you again, father?"

"Not until later. There are matters that I have to tend to, and I can't be there to see you go. Nerim has saddled your horse, and you're ready to leave. Do not tarry too long with your mother, boy, because the First Prime is awaiting you. You are due there within the hour."

His son bowed formally, hand on the hilt of his sword. "Thank you, father, for everything you have given to me. I walk in the light by your teachings, and stand with a ready sword to defend the Great City."

Lord Jacyn Ayreg smiled, but it seemed more like a wolf's grin than anything containing warmth. In truth, it held very little; it was a fierce smile. "Tend to your mother, and when you grow hair on your chin and have bloodied that sword of yours can you come and declaim that to me again. I do not doubt your spirit, boy, but your mettle has yet to be truly tested. Go now, Jodiah, Guardian of the Temple of Life, and seek your honor."

Snapping his heels together, Jodiah, son of Jacyn, turned and walked-- marched, really --stiffly from the room. He had to bid farewell to his mother, Talana Ayreg, first, and when that was finished he was mounted on his gelding and was making his way toward the Temple of Life near the center of the city. There, his future awaited him. As the tall spires of the Temple of Life, and the great golden dome of the Hall of Truth on the other side of the plaza from it, came into view, he could only ponder what fate life had in store for him.

Two years. The training was not difficult, not really, not after the rest of the students had finally given over the teasing and the trickery. It helped that he was able to hold his own in practice duels with the sword, and if they still had problems with him for the higher education he had over them, well then that was put aside too, eventually. In any case, those that had been some of the worst of that lot were now fast friends, or at the very least comrades-in-arms.

Snow blanketed the countryside for miles and miles, as far as the eye could see from the tallest tower in the Great City. Winter was not a harsh time in the city if you had proper clothes to wear, and the farmers knew their business well enough to ensure that the supplies of food did not stop. A little less than fresh, perhaps, but still good enough to fill the hungry belly. All over the city, in the common rooms of taverns and inns, wine casks were cracked open and bottles of brandy uncorked, with great turkeys and chicken and mutton all around.

It was the time of the best-known winter festival. The Feast of Lights was a two-day celebration starting on the shortest day of the year, which marks the end of the year. It was a time of general relaxation, feasting, merry-making, and a cessation of most formal rules. It included the making and giving of small presents, including small dolls for children and candles for adults. During the Feast of Lights, even business was postponed if it was not direly urgent if the goodwill that infected the population did not merely begin giving away their wares for free out of the spirit of kindness. In tradition, every source of light that there was in the Great City was kept burning, lamps and torches, from the tiniest candle to the great signal fire that showed the way out from the sea. There was drinking, gambling, and singing. In many ways, it was the best time of all to be in the Great City.

The rule of law was kept, still, as it had to have been. The Militia patrolled the streets and had to break up the occasional fight or two when drinking carried on a bit far. When they were on duty, anyway. When off, many of the Militia would be carousing and celebrating as well.

Within the Temple of Life there had other matters to see to. The Feast of Lights marked not only the end of the year, but also a coming-of-age for the Guardians and Givers that had moved on from their training. The last, final task that lay before them before they were allowed to take their vows of service and be considered full members of the Temple of Life in their respective branches was the Illuminated Ball.

Everyone had dressed their best. Knights of Truth were often invited to the Illuminated Ball, and their uniforms were similar to the Guardians. A red silk coat worked in gold, compared to the Guardian's white silk coat worked with silver scrolls and embroidery. Those that would be joining the Givers wore white silk coats without embroidery of any kind save for blue threadwork across the shoulders. The men, anyway. The women wore the proper colors with the proper embroidery, though theirs was not on silk coats, but on fanciful gowns. The great hall of the Temple of Life was a thing of splendor as well, with decorations in white covering as far as the eye could see, lace and ribboning, silken throw tapestries and drapes and tablecovers. It was a time for the soon-to-be members of the Temple of Life to show that despite the rough training they had received, they still had a good shred of common decency among them, as well.

Jodiah Ayreg's hair black hair stood out in sharp contrast to the white coat he wore, and was long enough now for the beginnings of a tail in the back that required to be bound. Little stump of a thing that it was, he had no great desire to cut it now. His father, after all, had long hair, as did his father before him. In many ways, it was considered to be a common trait amongst all the men of House Ayreg. He had cousins, of course, some bearing the Ayreg name and some not, but all wore their hair long.

The past year had seen his face bear a wound during a training exercise from one of those that had been mocking him the most. He claimed it was an accident, but the knife cut had come very near to blinding him in his right eye. It had been healed, after a fashion, but the scar remained. A vertical slash that ran from the middle of his forehead down his brow and then jumping to his cheekbone beneath his eye and on down his face, stopping a few inches short of his jaw. Had there been another iota of strength behind it, the blade very likely would not have jumped at all, and then he would have been half-blind before he was even twenty years into life.

"What's the matter?" a voice rose from his side. Jodiah turned his head to look. He was an older man, nearly ten years or maybe more Jodiah's senior, and already a member in good standing of the Guardians of the Temple of Life, as denoted by the open palm with an eye set into it crafted of silver embroidery on the man's breast. His strong jaw and eyes, like beads peering out from dark caves, marked him as Garen Corlagon. It's not that he looked unhealthy, though -- the man had not an ounce of fat on him. He looked nothing like the innkeeper's son he had once come to the Temple of Life has.

"Sir Corlagon," Jodiah said, dipping his head in respect.

"Yeah, yeah," with a dismissive wave of his hand, Corlagon settled in on Jodiah Ayreg's shoulder and turned to examine the room, "what's the matter? The greatest single event you're likely to see in your life, and you're standing here like a shoulderstriker waiting for a drunk to stumble out so you can take his purse."

"Sir Corlagon, I assure you I would never--"

Garen sniffed, breaking in, "Shut up. I was just teasing, Ayreg. Now answer the question."

Jodiah Ayreg shifted uncomfortably and folded his hands behind his back. "I am... uncertain. I've known many of these people all my life, or close enough, and have thought many things about them. But never to dance."

"It's a girl, isn't it?"

"That obvious?" Jodiah's lips turned into a grin as he glanced up at the older man.

"Very. Who you have your eye on?"

Jodiah paused, his eyes searching the room. The occasional gown or coat of scarlet from female Knights of Truth attending the event interspersed here and there, but for the most part it was a sea of white dresses and white coats, some worked in silver, some in blue. He was searching for a white gown with blue embroidery over the shoulders, and-- ah, there she was. He lifted his hand as if to point, then wisely put it back down and simply nodded his head.

"There she is. Kasiyah."

"The Giver?" Garen Corlagon said, smirking. Kasiyah was a Giver, true, already a member of the Temple of Life. She was three years older than Jodiah, but he didn't care much for that. She was beautiful. Her hair shimmered like black silk in tight curls over her shoulders, but he knew that it was naturally quite wavy, and prone to looking like a waterfall of polished obsidian. She had a bold nose but it was not overly large, and her big beautiful brown eyes were slightly slanted, and set into honey-colored skin. "Well, only one way to do it, boy. Go and ask her to dance."

Ask her to dance? She moved as if she wasn't really walking at all. She was dancing now with no less than three men, two Guardians and a Knight of Truth, flowing between them as if all three belonged to her. That was a good word for it, to flow, graceful and elegant as if she levitated an inch or two off the ground and merely glided in time with the music. He had never seen anyone so graceful in all his life.

"I don't think so," Jodiah said nervously, and shifted his feet again.

"No Guardian should be a coward, Ayreg," Sir Corlagon snorted, but there were traces of suppressed laughter. If he said anything at all about this to the other Guardians, then the mockery would probably begin anew, "Still, I don't blame you. You know as well as I that relationships between Guardians and Givers are forbidden. It'd just be a dance, and nothing more. Pity that, too; she's from the outlands to the northeast. You know what they say about that area."

"Yes, I do," Ayreg said trying to stall for time again, "They're some of the best mounted horsemen to be found anywhere. Lancers from the northeastern province make the heart of any charge of heavy horse."

"And light horse. But I meant, specifically, their women. Mysterious and graceful, dangerous if you cross them, and firmly willing to stand up to any man who lays their ears back on 'em. Way I figure it, a woman like that could give you an education that any man should have at least once in his life," Corlagon laughed, "as I said. Pity that."

"Yes..." Jodiah Ayreg said, all too aware of the heated fire burning in his cheeks then. He hadn't quite needed to start shaving yet, but he had all the same, "pity that."

"Well, come on then. At the very least you can dance with her."

Before Jodiah could raise a word of protest, Garen Corlagon had gripped a fist into the back of Ayreg's coat collar and started dragging him out onto the large wooden floor, enchanted tonight with powerful magics to shimmer white, and polished until it positively glowed. He tried to resist at first, yes, but Corlagon was older and stronger than he was, and handled him as easily as he could have a child.

The music struck its final note, and the dancers all bowed and curtsied to each other before applauding the work of the orchestra that had provided the music. In a few seconds, the next song would begin.

"Giver Kasiyah," came Corlagon's voice as he stopped with a click of his heels. Jodiah did his best not to look ruffled, but Corlagon's hand was still at the back of his neck.

Kasiyah turned her head over her shoulder to face them, then the rest of her body followed. Even when not dancing she seemed to flow more like liquid silver than flesh and blood. "Sir Corlagon?" she asked, lifting a finely-manicured eyebrow. Light, but she was beautiful.

"This little rapscallion doesn't have the nerve to ask you to dance," Garen said, pushing Jodiah forward. He stumbled the first step or two before he could regain his composure and tug on the hem of his white coat. The look she leveled upon him made his cheeks burn brighter.

"You're Jodiah Ayreg," she said thoughtfully, her words a little slurred with the accents of the outlands. Her eyes stared at him as if to bore a hole through his skull, and there seemed to be something there. Some kind of... "Yes. I've watched you in the practice yards. You have excellent forms," she paused long enough to insinuate herself against him. The music had already started; a slow piece this time, compared to the lively dance of the last one. She took his hands and settled one onto her waist, and clutched the other in her hand. Her own second hand lifted and stroked smoothly over his shoulder.

"...but you must find your nerve, good sir, for it is your duty to protect me, is it not?" Her eyes seemed to glimmer. Dark pools that a man could lose himself for wanting to swim in. Light, but she was beautiful.

"I... I..."

His stammering made her laugh at first, but soon her lips pursed together to make the noise to shush him, and an elbow in the back of his ribs from Corlagon reminded him that he was supposed to be dancing. "Just move with the music, and focus on me. Jodiah."

She laughed, again. There was a difference in her laughter. Those eyes held a certain softness, too, he realized. It had been the same from before but he could not quite put a word to it.

They danced. And on the air around them as they moved there was a hunger that even he could sense.

"What is the matter, Ayreg?"

Sweat beaded down across his bare chest, though the morning could hardly be called hot. Or even warm. Exertion always brought sweat, though, even if the chilly, crisp spring air made your skin want to shrivel. Jodiah Ayreg lowered his sword, and loosed his double-handed grip -- most sword forms taught by the Guardians required two hands, though there were some that incorporated a shield, and the Guardians were expected to be proficient in both -- on the broadsword's hilt wrapped in simple, unadorned leather. He turned about to face the voice, and lifted a single hand to his heart in a salute.

That salute was returned by the man with the thinning, graying hair, though he was fully dressed in his snowy-white tabard and flowing white cloak that he didn't bother to hold against his body.

"I don't understand, Prime. Something is wrong?" Jodiah asked.

"For you to have been out here for as long as you have been, and practicing as hard as you have been? You seem to be a student newly-accepted into the Temple, Ayreg, and I've not seen you like this before. Something must be vexing you."

Jereketh, named The Pious by the First Prime of the Temple of Life himself, Broemere Du'Leran, reminded Jodiah Ayreg a lot of his father. Not quite as stern, no, but every bit as hard. And despite Jacyn Ayreg only having the one eye, his left one having been lost to a werewolf in the wilds in his younger years, he was quick to spot anything out of place of where it belonged. Including Guardians who should have been in prayer, or in classes teaching the new recruits. Not out in the practice yard sweating themselves to death even as they freeze.

"Apologies, Prime," Ayreg said, bowing his head respectfully, "I just felt some time in the practice yard would do me well."

"Well," Jereketh the Pious said, slowly, eying the younger man sideways, "we all have our own means and methods for helping deal with the stress of our lives. Myself, I read books."

"Books, Prime?" Ayreg asked, and instantly he wished he had the words back. One did not ask Primes of the Temple of Life about their personal time. It wasn't polite.

But if Jereketh the Pious were offended, he gave no image of it. He simply smiled, and folded his steel-backed gauntleted hands behind his back. "Yes," he said, "I read. Right now I'm working on The Flame, the Blade, and the Heart."

"That..." Jodiah said slowly, unsteadily. Again with the politeness, but he simply had to ask now, "...does not sound like something you would read, Prime. Forgive me, but it does not."

Again, if he were offended by the questioning, he gave no image of it. Instead, he simply threw his head back and laughed. It was not a great peal of uncontrolled laughter, no, but it was still genuine. "And what would you have me read then, Sir Ayreg? Dusty histories and even more dusty reports of the goings-on of the Temple of Life? It is good to be lost in a romantic tale of adventure and fantasy from time to time. Do you not do the same?"

"No," he said, slowly, "I never have. Forgive me, Prime. Forgive me. It was not my place to question you."

Unfolding his hands, Jereketh the Pious moved over to him, and clapped a hand onto his shoulder. "Perhaps, Ayreg, you should. It will do you well to ease your mind. Here," tucking his free hand into his tabard, he withdrew a leather-bound book about half again the size as his hand. An ornate symbol, faded, was embossed on the front. It looked like a flame encased within a heart, and pierced by a sword. Jereketh the Pious pressed the book into Ayreg's hands, "try it. That's an order."

Blinking, Jodiah Ayreg looked down at the book in his hands, and his eyes slowly crawled across the lettering down the spine. It, too, was faded, but it was still easy to pick the words out. The Flame, the Blade, and the Heart. When he looked up again, Jereketh the Pious was already moving away back across the practice yard, his eyes turning to follow the forms made by the new recruits and their trainers.

Another hand clapped Jodiah on the back of the shoulder, and this time Garen Corlagon swung around from the side. "Come on, little brother, we've been called to the duty rosters."

As he was being pulled away by Sir Corlagon, Ayreg looked back over his shoulder at the moving figure of Jereketh the Pious. Snow-white tabard and burnished breastplate worn beneath, with white undercoats and trousers.

And the long, flowing cloak of white, trimmed in gold, and embroidered in gold with the hand-and-eye of the Temple of Life fluttering in the chill breeze.

"If the Temple finds out, do you know what will happen?"

Adrianna De`Seis' voice was firm, and filled with a stubborn resolve the likes of which only a woman could have. Still, he didn't know if her indignation was actually formed out of some kind of anger at the knowledge of his affair with Kasiyah, or for the fact that he had kept it from her for so long.

"Yes, Adrianna, I know. But there's nothing for it now," Jodiah replied wearily. The Prime Healer's own truth, he was tired. He so often was now.

"Nothing except to turn yourself in, to face the strap, have your ranks stripped, and your sword broken," Garen Corlagon added, as if he were being helpful, "Rightly, I'm not certain why you ever wanted to plant that babe in her belly in the first place, what with facing a gibbet for it."

De`Seis huffed, and leaned her elbows behind her onto the edge of the table she sat in front of. That huff had to have been the most feminine noise Jodiah had ever heard her make, "And I don't understand why the Temple of Life's rules are so strict regarding it. Jachaim belongs to the Knights of Truth, and there's no problems with my marriage to him."

Garen shook his head, "The Guardians and the Givers work together every day. The Knights of Truth, less so. There's not as much chance of... clouded judgment." He raised his hands defensively, "Don't look at me that way, little brother, you know that's how the First Prime has always viewed it."

"Friends," a voice rose from behind them. At once, three heads turned to glance at the source of the voice, and before him Jodiah saw a vision of beauty so potent it made him want to weep. Her hair shimmering like black silk, longer now than when he had met her, she stood in the doorway between the sitting room and the kitchens. It was not a large home, but it had several niceties. Such as a sitting room, "remember to keep your voices low. You wouldn't want to make her cranky with all of your noise."

Yes, she was beautiful. Her dark skin was smooth and soft, even to look at. Kasiyah's dark, tilted eyes regarded each of them warmly, these people she had once considered almost like family. Despite her earthy beauty, though, there was something that made his heart nearly leap into his throat as soon as he saw it. A bundle, wrapped in swaddling, pressed close into Kasiyah's chest. His babe. Oh, how his chest wanted to swell with pride when she first grasped his finger with her tiny hand. True, he had expected some word in choosing the child's name, but Kasiyah had insisted that she take the responsibility herself solely. In the end, he saw the logic of her argument: if he were to disavow any knowledge at all of who the child belonged to, if he were to keep their unlawful relationship a secret, then even the child's name could bear no hints of Ayreg in it. And it certainly did not. His mother, the Lady Talana Ayreg, would probably have kittens if she had heard about it -- she seemed to have strange notions of how names were supposed to be given to children.

His child. His daughter. Ariaya.

Adrianna De`Seis rose suddenly to her feet and glided across the sitting room to Ariaya, who offered her the babe to hold with a gentle coo. She laughed and writhed, as if wanting to flail her arms but unable to due to the swaddling, and Adrianna's nose wrinkled up as she grinned and spoke no-words at his daughter. Light, but that was one of the strangest things he had ever seen in his life. Evidentially, when it came to children, Adrianna really was a woman at her core, and all women seemed to babble when a babe was in the room. Jodiah Ayreg exchanged glances with Garen Corlagon, who laid a finger alongside his nose and grinned. Apparently, he had been having the same realization.

For her part, De`Seis seems to have forgotten entirely about her outrage at Jodiah and Garen from just moments before. A pale pink hue even rose in her dark cheeks, nearly as dark as Kasiyah's own skin, and she stuck her tongue out at the two men. "I know you can keep secrets, you two great-shouldered louts. Speak a word of this and you'll find your smallclothes hanging from the bannerstaff in the Courtyard of Life."

Garen and Jodiah both laughed; Garen moreso, throwing his head back completely. This is the way life was supposed to be, he decided. Not a care in the world, and nothing but the company of his good wife, his darling daughter, and his two best friends in the whole of the world.

The way it's supposed to be.

"Come along, Ayreg," Corlagon said a few hours later, putting his now-empty cup of what used to be brandy onto a side table. He rose to his feet, clicking his heels together sharply before bowing to Kasiyah. She returned the bow with a gracious nod, and then he turned back to Jodiah. "We've got to get back to the Temple of Life and get in a good night's sleep. Prime Jereketh tells told me earlier that there's going to be some mission tomorrow. Apparently, a patrol of the Militia did not return as scheduled, and they were traveling through gnoll territory to the north."

Jodiah scratched his chin, and then lifted his hand to drag it through his hair. Rich and dark, but not so near as black as Kasiyah's, it was long enough now to need a leather cord wrapped around it to keep it back in a tail, and out of his way. "The Sharptooth?"

"Aye, little brother. And that, combined with these... rumors... of a plague from out of the north... well. Let's just say that Jereketh wants to make sure we're all in our top condition when we ride out after briefing tomorrow morning."

Ah, well.

"Until then, my heart," Kasiyah said as she kissed him on the cheek while he bent close. He pressed his forehead to hers, then pressed a gentle kiss to Ariaya's tiny forehead, and smiled. Lords and Saints, having a daughter and seeing her nearly made him babble like a pride-stricken fool. Women could be such a bother sometimes, but all of the impact that they made on men!

"Until then, my love."

The temple still shook occasionally as the earth rumbled in memory, groaned as if it would deny what had happened. Bars of sunlight, cast through rents in the walls, made motes of dust glitter where they yet hung in the air. Scorch-marks marred the walls, the floors, the ceilings. Broad black smears crossed the blistered paints and gilt of once-bright murals, soot overlaying crumbling friezes of men and animals, which seemed to have attempted to walk before the madness grew quiet. The dead lay everywhere, men and women and children, struck down in attempted fight or attempted flight by the three that had flashed down every corridor, seized by the fires flung from their hands that had stalked them, or sunken into the stone of the temple itself, where the unholy-wrought flames had melted them to flow and devour.

Madness had befallen the Great City, but stillness had come again. Aftershocks still shook the city, but the worst was past, now.

Kasiyah wandered the temple, deftly keeping her balance when the earth heaved. "Jodiah! My love, where are you?? The edge of her pale gray cloak trailed through blood as she stepped across the body of a woman, her golden-haired beauty marred by the horror of her last moments, her still-open eyes frozen in disbelief. ?Where are you, Jodiah? Garen?"

Her eyes caught her own reflection in a mirror hanging askew from bubbled marble. Her clothes had been clean once, in gray and scarlet and trimmed in gold, the height of current fashion in the Great City; now the finely-woven cloth was torn and dirty, thick with the same dust that covered her hair and skin. Dirt and ash, and blood.

"Jodiah!" she called, turning around again. "Adrianna? Garen?"

The Temple of Life had been the source of it, and in places it was still aflame. The fire of the Temple had spread to the buildings around it, spreading to the buildings around those, on and on until the entirety of the Great City was consumed in fire. Were that all there was to it, it wouldn't have been so bad, really. Fires were a normally everyday affair, be it by accident or malfeasance, but these burned hotter and harder than anything she had seen before in her life. The fireworkers tried, true enough, but then the earth began to tremble and shake, quivering as if with rage at the affronting of evil that had befallen them. She had first gone to Adaliena, one of the druids she knew who happened to have been in the Great City when the quaking started, but she said there was nothing she could do. Whatever had been the cause of it, it was... not natural. Adaliena looked ready to bend over double and empty herself of every meal she had ever eaten in her life.

Kasiyah felt like sicking up herself. Even calling upon the Prime Healer for aid in healing an injured child had proven fruitless. It was like he had ceased to be there. That was a gut-wrenching thought. Had the Prime Healer forsaken the greatest city on the face of the earth?

"Jodiah!?"

Another voice spoken suddenly behind her, and she spun to face it. It was a man's voice, and the voice itself resolved into a figure a little taller than she was. Blood trickled down his face from a cut starting at the bridge of his nose and slashing out across his left cheek. Another scar ran from just above his right eye down onto his cheek, ending almost near his lips. It wasn't the scar she recognized, though, but the brilliant color of his eyes. More green than a flawless emerald shining in the noon day's sun.

"Jodiah!" she cried, launching herself toward him. She flung her arms about him, pressing her tear-streaked face into his chest. His armor was hard beneath his white tabard, stained with soot and ash and sprays of blood. There was blood everywhere. "Jodiah, what happened?"

"Something... terrible, Kasiyah," his voice was quiet, but he was calm. She loved him for that; no matter what happened, the man seemed to be completely unruffled. "Something very terrible."

"The city," she sobbed, lifting her head, "it is in chaos. Two of the districts burn still, my love, and the entire southern half of the city has been consumed by the heaving earth. And the dead... they're everywhere! Our daughter... Jodiah, Ariaya is..."

"What of Ariaya?" Light of the world, he didn't have to be so hard as to sound callous. But he was -- his voice was like stone. The Guardians were well-trained.

"Ariaya is dead, Jodiah!" Kasiyah shrieked, burying her face in his chest again. When the carnage began, she looked first out the window of her home in the Banking District. Flames danced from rooftop to rooftop, spiraling through the walls, consuming roofing tiles. And then earth itself trembled. "I could not save her!"

Tears fell in a torrent now, tears blackened from the soot and ash that dirtied her face, falling into little tiny splatters of black gunk onto the floor, onto her feet, onto his tabard. A violent shudder collapsed a wall in her home, and the ceiling with it. Half the room was exposed to the sky, but she had eyes only for the crib that had been crushed under the weight of the stonework and the tiled rooftop. There had never even been a single cry of pain from their infant. It had been quick. She could thank the light for that much, at least.

"She is dead, then?" His voice was cast-iron, not stone. Worse, he almost sounded as if he were discussing the weather.

She looked up to him in amazement. And in horror. He almost... he almost didn't even seem to care. "Jodiah.. yes, Jodiah, Ariaya, our daughter, she is dead. We've got to get out of here, Jodiah, while there is time!"

"Time?" Another voice said. Kasiyah turned in Jodiah's arms, glancing over her shoulder. The image she saw was of a man in draping black, completely and totally, and plates of black armor overlaying one another like a serpent's scales. A black cloak hung to his ankles, but it didn't move a whisker in the gentle breeze that blew Kasiyah's own black hair into her face from time to time. His face was pale, too, white, as if he were dead. And his eyes... as black as his clothes, and dead. "What time do you think you have, human?"

"Who are you?" Kasiyah asked, lifting a hand back over her shoulder, fingers outstretched to Jodiah's arm. Was this man the one who had caused all of it? All of the pain, the destruction, all of-- She yelped in surprise when an iron-firm grip viced onto her wrist, and twisted her arm backward. The world spun, moving in a singular blur until it made an abrupt stop. It took her a few seconds, dazed and confused, to realize she had been put very roughly face-first onto the ground, with her arm twisted up behind her until she thought it would snap off. "Jodiah!? What are you--"

"Is it time?" a new voice said.

"We've done all we can here," said another, "we should be moving on."

Kasiyah turned her head as best she could, coughing in the cloud of dust and ash that exploded up from the floor from the force of her fall. Two more figures stood in the broken hallway of the shattered Temple of Life. One was a tall and imposing man in what appeared to be plate armor whose eyes shown like augers. The other was a female with short hair, slim and athletic. They stood in the shadows of a toppled column, behind a gash torn in the dome above them. Sunlight beamed directly into Kasiyah's face, making the two of them silhouettes save only a few scraps of light glimmering off soot-stained armor or, in the female's case, earth-colored sun-darkened skin. The man sounded almost like Garen Corlagon, but there was an edge to his voice now as hard as any mace she had held in her life. She could not have placed the hateful twist in the woman's words to Adrianna De`Seis if she hadn't heard her unique accent.

"It is time," the dead-eyed man said without turning to look at either one of them.

"Get it over with, Jodiah," Adrianna said.

Corlagon spoke next, "Come along, little brother. There's work needs doing."

"Wring the little sparrow's neck and let's be off," Adrianna sounded almost bored.

Kasiyah gaped. She was too stunned even for tears, now. They had been behind it!? Jodiah, Adrianna, and Garen!? She wouldn't believe it. Only...

Her howl battered at the walls, a wordless scream of despair cut off sharply by the piercing pain of a blade thrust to the middle of her spine. Electricity shot out through her limbs, and her hips and legs and feet went numb. Kasiyah struggled to breath and tried to move, but the sword that had cut through her spine cut through the stone floor beneath her too, and she was held as securely as a tent peg. A shadow passed her eyes, and she looked up to see it. The image of her beloved, of her Jodiah, wearing the white of the Guardians of the Temple of Life, bloody and filthy, going to join the other two. He gave her a single glance back over his shoulder to her and met her gaze.

She had only thought the other man's eyes were augers. They were cold eyes. Hard eyes. Cruel eyes. He turned about again and continued on, growing dim as her vision clouded.

"Jodiah..." she whispered, weakly.

And then she said no more, and was still.