Bellora had been trying to sleep when she was tossed out of bed by a disturbance so great, it was nearly painful. Her mother's voice rang in her thoughts.

"Bellora, she had brought the woman back from the dead."

"Mother? What? Who? Dalia did?" Gripping her temples. "I felt it, but had no clue what it was. I will get right on it."

Dressing in the dark quickly, Bellora silently descended the stairs and headed for her workrooms in the back of the warehouse. Standing before her altar and the scrying mirror, Bellora called upon it to show her what had disturbed the Universe so harshly. A woman's face appeared, pale, obviously vampiric, but cool and slightly pissed off. Dalia's form hovered around the edges of the vision, but this woman was the cause. Who was she, and why had Dalia gone to the trouble to bring her back?

Her mother whispered to her, confused and worried. "The woman was in Hell, Bellora. She was not meant to go there, but she had been sent there. Dalia has just righted an injustice. There is nothing I can do about this. There is technically nothing you are allowed to do, either."

"Sh*t." Was all that Bellora could say. There was no way Dalia did this out of the kindness of her heart. How did she find the soul, anyway? Demons had to have been involved, but, what demon worth his salt would let an INNOCENT soul escape hell? I mean, sh*t, those things were priceless!

Heaving a sigh of frustration, Bellora set out to talk to those imps and demons that she knew, see if any of them could tell her anything. She'd call in a few markers and see what she could see.

Bellora paced the warehouse like a panther, growling softly, angered. Hunger bit her sharply, but she shoved it aside. No time for that.

Bellora was working on a plan, a plan to hunt down Dalia and send her back to the hell she'd been snatched from. It amazed Bellora still the depths of depravity one could sink to, and the evil that a single soul could possess. Dalia, she knew, was far more than she had ever thought she was; she was by far the worst Bellora had met against.

Smashing things, cursing, and even shoving her fist through the cinder block wall in her anger, Bellora was at an impasse. She knew where Dalia was, but she also knew she could not take her alone.

An informant had passed her news today, as well. The woman had another possible ally, some necromancer had been seen entering the shop through the roof. Wonderful. Bellora could only assume that the woman, Koya Ran, and the teenager, Lyric Danu were on Dalia's side, as well. Demon musk saturated the place, the stench wafted as far as Bellora's own building when the winds were right. For all she knew, Dalia could have an army in there.

Screeching her frustration, she began wailing and punching on a sand bag, hund from the ceiling for this purpose. She bounced on the balls of her bare feet, hitting, smacking, and ultimately splitting the bag at the seams with her strength. A final sweeping kick sent the destroyed bag flying from it's chain in the ceiling to land in a heap across the room. Damn. Second one today.

Turning her frustrations inward, Bellora tried to collect herself. She needed to hunt, she needed to kill. Time to pay a visit to that woman across town.

Bellora had had a confrontation with a woman in a dark alley the night before. Kay'ra had been stealing from her husband to support her drug habit, as well as "borrowing" the daughter he had custody of to pimp out while he was working nights. He had come to Bellora with their eldest daughter today, both of them crying over the loss of the youngest girl. Officially, the Watch could do nothing about her disappearance for 24 hours, but everyone knew Kay'ra had taken her. Bellora had no such restrictions, and she already knew where Kay'ra would probably be. She'd given her enough time to turn herself in, now it was time to play.

Lyric had been trying to follow Dalia, unsuccessfully. She had seen her leave the building alone, and in daylight, and curiousity had gotten the best of her.

Lurking in shadows, asking passersby if they'd seen her, and pure blind luck had lead Lyric to where she knew Dalia had been. She watched her back as it wove through the crowd, off to somewhere else. Lyric spotted the back of what seemed to be a woman on a bench. She wondered who she was, if she was another plaything of Dalia's. Jealousy reared it's ugly head.

Nonchalantly walking towards the woman on the bench, she smelled lilies. Being half pixie, she immediately knew the scent. Star gazer lilies. Her favorite. She took a seat beside the woman, not daring to look at her. Then she smelled it. Death.

Risking a look, Lyric shrieked and lept off the bench, eyes wide in shock at the sight of the woman, her eyes open in death, staring right at Lyric. She swallowed down the rising bile, and ran behind a building, where she vomited up the lunch Koya had made her. What had Dalia done? What should she do?

She ran.

Belle approached the new building, wary of those lurking in the shadows. She figured she was safe, however. Memories of her time with Bellora, of the memories she would forever carry of the deeds commited against her; they were haunted shadows in those emerald eyes of hers.

Knocking on the door, she waited, expectantly. She knew Bellora was here, she could hear her pacing, hear her murmurs through the stone walls. She whispered softly at the quiet question of "who's there?"

"It's Belle. I need to talk to you. I want to help."

She was ushered in, both women peering quickly around before hurrying the door shut, it's bolts sliding home with a soft 'snick'.

Belle wrung her hands, fighting the urge to flee as she was finally faced with the deep, ebony pools of Bellora's eyes. "Dalia and her husband took something from me. They have both saved and damned me, but that is not my sole purpose. I have a girl in my home, a teenager who has lost her mother. Dalia was behind it, was behind her kidnapping and she's been brain washed by her. I want to help you stop her."

She waited, breath held. Her eyes sought to read something in Bellora's steady gaze, in her immoveable expression. This one was cool as marble, and she scared the crap out of Belle, but she was her only hope. What had happened to her could not be undone, but killing Dalia would bring her peace, at the very least.

Belle did as told, and fed. She was ravenous, and it was easier to assuage the guilt by feeding from pre-packaged, voluntary blood packs.

Licking the last drop, having fed cleanly and neatly, she nodded her thanks to Bellora as she tossed the empty into the incinerator.

The last news, however, was a blow to her system. She gasped, nearly audible pain in her heart. A tear slid down her now pink cheek, and she slumped, defeated, into a chair. Her head hung, guilt and failure hanging heavy on her shoulders.

After a time, she spoke softly, nearly inaudible to anyone but a supernatural being. "Is she lost to us, then? Is there any hope?"

Bellora had heard about the murder, and had been laying low.

She was watching Dalia's place, now. Having rented a small room from a kindly old blind man across the street from the shop, she had set up surveillance.

Watching, even now, as the women had come to seek Dalia.

Fear pricked her skin as she stared through the binoculars.