Varila sat cross-legged on the floor of the cathedral, right before the area where the altar would have been. Though she had no guarantees that she would be alone to complete the process, the substantial aura about her should have been warning enough. Dressed in a seamless black dress that pooled about her on the floor, she watched it flutter with the fluctuations of her power. This purging had been in her mind for many moons now, tormenting her with the thought that she could once more be carefree. Though she would remain divine, it would be something above the divinity she had once had. Today, in the ruins of a great place, she would restore herself.

Slowly, she began to move her hands through the air in a flowing pattern, something it had told her to do. Bit by bit, a thread started to appear in the air, leaving a trail where her fingers had been. It wove in circles, and then several complex patterns that she couldn't begin to comprehend. It was all automatic though. Each time her slender hand cut through the air with a flourish, she gasped in surprise at the complexity of it all.

The voices that had once tormented her, eaten away at her soul, they urged her on now, instructing her. Slowly, she could feel the last of her human restrictions fading away, letting her relax into the peace that was hers. Her family was long gone, she could not afford the danger of friends or close acquaintances. The only people she could trust were those who pledged their fealty to her and her alone, swearing that they would die if they served another master. Only fear of death could provoke trust in anyone. Now that she was transcending those things she had once longed for, she realized how trusting she had been to let so many people near her.

Now came the final part. She spread her arms out to the sky, and slowly rose, hovering in midair....spreadeagled. At her feet, she could see flames licking the soles of her shoes, then climbing upward, black as the moonless night. The pattern she had woven sunk into her back, appearing as a giant tattoo in blood. Although it sank into her skin, she felt thousands of knives shoved through her back as it forced its way in, completing her. "Hyrech olenia fruhyillh aniach! Fiore Ashnarallh," she screamed, clutching at her head in the pain, tears streaming down her face.

"Finrir," she muttered, falling to the ground in a broken heap. "Finrir allelach." Bent over double, she stared at herself, her hands, her body...it was the same. The dress she wore was torn so that the skirt only fell to her knees. The sleeves had been slit all the way up to her shoulders, so that the divided cloth hung limply at her sides. Blood dripped from her fingers, and as it pooled on the floor, she gasped at her reflection in the glistening field of crimson.....

(Hope it's okay for me to join?)

Velien had spent the last two days here in the ruins, since her exile from Celestia. She spent her time meditating, thinking, and trying to understand where she stood on the fine lines of good and evil, law and chaos.

She also had begun to explore the ruins, having visited the cemetary and cathedral earlier in the day. As she wandered the cathedral, she wondered which forgotten god it had been dedicated to, but found no answer in her aimless wandering.

Now she was resting outside, admiring the stars which seemed to shine extra bright that night. The moon, however was still covered in it's dark veil that had enshrouded it in the last several months over Imythess. Velien didn't know this, but many believed that the Shrouded Moon was an oracle of things to come, terrible things, such as the end of the world. Most didn't believe it was anything that extreme, but no astronomer had yet to learn the truth of the strange nimbus.

Velien sat with her legs folded underneath her, her scimitars laid out, crossed before her. They gleamed in the moonlight, though they were simple weapons with no true magical abilities. The night wore on, but she had little desire to sleep. Instead she gazed, as though mesmerized, up at the stars above, for hours. Eventually a light mist began to cover the ruins, clinging to the stones and trees, along with Velien herself.

Her silent peace was broken suddenly, though. Something happened to the very fabric of reality around her that made her gasp and cry out with a combination of pain and surprise. The pain was not bad, but unexpected, like a sudden pinprick. She fell forward, having to use her hands to stay upright, as her silver eyes searched around for the source of this phenomena, only to see nothing out of the ordinary. It was as though nothing had happened, the only one to actually feel anything being herself.

The only thing she felt was the great power seemed to be radiating from the cathedral, just behind her. She carefully stood, shaky as a newborn foal. The power continued to assail her senses, giving her a headache as her body tried to understand and absorb this excess of energy. Gingerly taking a step, she almost fell again, but she felt as though another presence was there, helping her back up and lending her strength. Iach, her guardian. When she made it to the ruined doors of the cathedral, she tried hard not to look away from what she saw there, as though a great light blinded her, though there was little or no light within.

Great power washed over her, and for a moment, she felt as though she might faint from it. Only once, in Izimet's field had she felt so overwhelmed by divine power. By all accounts, she should have been dead. There were very few mortal bodies that could withstand so much divine or magical energy running through them.

Looking within the cathedral's sanctuary, she sensed the center of all this power, but could not make out who or what it was. Velien could only see the waves of energy. Then, like a shockwave hitting her, the greatest wave of power hit her, this time forcing her to fall to her knees with a cry. Thankfully, it was the last...

When she finally was able to look up again, her vision was blurred by tears from the toll the power took on her body. She could finally see someone, though. Whoever it was, was now on their knees as well, and Velien could catch the slick, warm smell of freshly spilt blood.

The aftershock hung there for a moment, leaving her speechless. Blood--her own, she suspected--dampened the back of her seamless gown. Her ebon hair hung over the portion of her face that she had seen, the portion that had that same entangled pattern that was engraved in her back. "What have you done," she whispered to it, feeling the strength flowing through her. "Fiore Ashnarallh," she repeated, dumbstruck. "The Pit of Hell. That's where it came from."

After a couple seconds, she realized someone else was watching her. Velien, her name was, from what Varila could skim off of the surface. If she wished, she could send that same fire to soothe forth the information she might need. Slowly, she felt the rip in her dress that left her feeling quite exposed. The smell of blood made her nauseous....she had never seen nor smelt so much of her own blood. "Am I the same as I once was?" she pondered to herself. It seemed like another Varila, though. Her voice had become colder, with a blank tone to it. "Please," she said, "you are a half-mortal. It cannot have blinded you so easily."

As she stood up, her legs were very visibly bare from the knees down, and her entire arms were bared. Off to the side were her glaive and dagger, both of which she had not been wearing for the past hour. "Velien," she continued, "am I the same?" In her eyes was the haunted look befitting a madwoman, but a sharpness that defied that possibility. The cloth that had once been the flowing sleeves of her dress hung limply at her sides, adding to the elegance of this potent presence within her. It could kill, but it killed gracefully.

With each step, a tongue of black fire followed, remaining on the worn stone walkway. It drained all the light from the room, demanded a feeling of sorrow. And as it soaked in the light, it seemed to close in around the space she had left so that Velien wasn't swallowed in the most pure of darks.

Rith felt that his grace period he had given Varila due to Kore had gone on long enough, and unbeknownst to him he was only just about to find out how right his conclusion was. Rith would have left for temple, but she was not there. She had left earlier in the day and none knew where she went. A veiw of Norwood lake opened up on the mirror before Rith which had previously seemed to reflect only a blanket of darkness. It did not take Rith long to notice she was not at her habitual haunt either nor was she to be found at her house.

The mirror faded again to darkness as Rith concentrated on visualizing Varila. Much to Rith's surprise it took only seconds for Varila's form to peirce through the darkness. She seemed to be dancing skillfully, but even one who knew nothing of magic would know that this was something more than a dance, more than artful motions of the hands. The movements themselves seemed to have a peculiar mesmerising complexity, but it was not that held Rith speechless. Rith was watching her movements carefully tring to find out what Varila was up to. As Varila's act came to it's cresendo, the mirror began to shake and occasionally dark bolts of energy arced over it's surface. It was not long before Rith was left veiwing only darkness framed by the mirror.

Many questions coursed through Rith's mind, none of which could be answered by himself, and none of which could be answered by staying put. Rith hated his situation, because he knew absolutely nothing. He didn't even have time to learn a few things before he departed for the unknown. It was possible that he was running headlong into trouble, afterall if something was lefting off enough energy to put out the mirror, then it would clearly be hazardous to himself. It was a risk Rith knew he would have to take.

Rith left alone flitting though the shadows and appeared within the aged cathedral with Velein between him and Varila. He came in time to here Varila's question, a question that he doubted Velein could answer. "I beleive I would be better soul to ask that question, but for now would you like to have a seat? If this blood is indeed yours then prehaps it would be well that you rest a while," Rith answered. There was no lead that the blood belonged to Velien, but plenty that it belonged to Varila. The dark fires that Varila seemed to summon answered questions but brought forth too many more to call the difference even. The fire's themselves were beautiful, they consumed the light around them in a manner which Misery's flames would never compare. He wondered if they consumed heat as well, but knew that he should not allow his thoughts to drift away from the matter at hand.

Varila gave a haunting but invisible smirk when she sensed Rith. "Leave and you shall live," a voice called to Rith, not hers. "You have preyed on things that are not yours to touch. Depart from this world that your filthy presence has inhabited." The darkness closed in, leaving Rith completely blind. It was different than that which closed around Velien, though. It was suffocating, squeezing and tighter though nothing appeared to be there.

Varila waded through the pools of her own mind, waiting to find the enlightenment she had been seeking. There it was: age-old magic that belonged to her and only her. No one could read her mind....she was the goddess of deception. Something flickered within her. It was cold and cynical, the part of herself that Kore had locked away. It wanted to come out once more, to be what it had been meant to be.

"Rith," she said, cool as the wintry air that had begun to drift through the cathedral. The fire that her footsteps left behind began to flare, coming dangerously close to both Velien and Rith. In Varila's mind, she remembered a song her mother had sung to her, long ago....

Achellh, jhinuirh am nar teill,
Triell, rehinuu al yuhr sheill
Ashnarall, Ashnarall,
Fiore Ashnarall!

Back then, it had just been a story to scare her away from being a naughty girl, and fighting back when her brothers picked on her. Now, it was brutal reality, the thing she was becoming absorbed in. It wouldn't relent until she caused it to end.

Slowly, her detached voice began to chant, "Fiore Ashnarallh, Fiore Ashnarall, Irinye!" Every time she repeated it, her voice grew louder, until finally, it filled the entire room with its volume. Blood hovered in the air, following the pattern of a sun and moon, shimmering in its crimson glory.....