((OOC note: The following takes place after the events that take place in the Exodii System folder.))

"My friends, we are here today to mourn the loss of one of our own, and to celebrate her life."

He looks around at the assembled before him. The four remaining Guardians, Cadence, Onyxia, Shariane, Alex, and Aquilonius. Most friends, a couple that had not known her but still knew the loss and had shown up to pay their respects.

All are welcomed to the service. Currently they stand on the site of the first ritual completed when the new Guardians had formed, in the woods north of the Marketplace. The Portal is no longer here, of course - when the Circle is broken the gates to the Chamber close automatically until it can be reformed.

Which will happen soon enough, he knows. He has the Amulet that Valeria had worn in his possession.

He steps forward and into the circle they stand in and begins speaking again, the words that he speaks known well to him before this service had been thought of, before he had been certain they would survive the battle for Exodii.

"Valeria Persphone Raxollen was born of a line of powerful magical blood, a family of guardians whose sworn and sacred duty was to protect their power and their world for as long as their family endures. She was not like the rest of us - not a knight, or a trained fighter, or a soldier. And yet she was a warrior nonetheless, and a protector. And she would not hesitate to protect those she loved most, those that she cared for. She met her death with honor and courage, a fighter and a Guardian to the end, a duty and role she was born to fulfill. A bright light has been extinguished, her life taken and laid down in the finest traditions of the Guardian's Circle, and she will be missed."

He finishes and steps back into his place among the others, waiting for the next person to step forward and speak as they wish.

There was an awkward silence that fell over those assembled. Alex had thought long and hard about what to say, struggling for those right words. Nothing came to him until that silence fell upon them all. All he could think about was the brave little one he never really got the chance to know.

?I ? uh?? it surprised him that his voice cracked and he paused to find his voice again, clearing it briefly before he continued with softened baritones.

?I didn?t know Valeria, never even had the chance to meet her face to face. Yet she gave her life just coming to help my people. I will forever be grateful to her and the sacrifice she made. My biggest regret is that I won?t have a chance to tell her.?

His emerald hues gazed over those assembled and settled lastly over the remainder of the guardians with a mix of sorrow and comfort. "May her soul find peace wherever she is. May the path of it carry her to a place of light and drown out the darkness that took her away."

He could only hope. The circumstances of her death left a bitter edge in the mystery surrounding it. Her soul was never found.

"Rest in Peace, Valeria Raxollen."

There seems to be no order to this, but as Shariane steps back into her place he finds his own voice and steps forward. It's almost strange to him - he's never been the sentimental sort, perhaps because the greater majority of his life has been death and destruction and dark dealings.

McCarty would understand better than the rest - the world they came from is even even more harsh and unforgiving than this one.

But being in this world, fighting not for money or to pay back a backbiting doubledealer but for something righteous, has worked a change over a man once hardened and nearly completely jaded by the evils that beset the world he had come from.

"I've known a lot of people in my life. A lot of them were fighters of some kind or another...soldiers. People trained for combat on some level or in some way - be it with knives or guns or magic or the mind or the body. I've fought against some, and beside others. More than a few of them were good soldiers...good men and women."

He pauses, taking a breath, surprised to find it is just a tad shaky when he does so...but when he speaks again, his voice comes out strong, the depth and regal richness of his Amerind ancestors coupled with the discipline and pride of a Marine.

"But few of them could be called warriors. Valeria was one such. As has been said, she was no trained fighter, and yet she was a warrior of the highest caliber. I have known few such that faced their duty with such fearless dedication. Her last act was in defense of not only those she loved, but for an entire world she never even truly knew, a planet of people whose faces she never got to see. I have never known anyone who was capable of such a selfless act."

Now he bows his head, his eyes falling closed as he speaks softer, stepping back next to Shariane as he does so.

"Go now, Valeria Persephone Raxollen, and take your place at the council fire with your ancestors. Be at peace."