[Cassandra Alana Skyisle]

I kept a lot of things from my husband. I didn’t want him to worry. Two weeks ago, I was struck by a Phantom through the ward at the Millizens farm. Since that day I had the [Soul Devourer] skill. I didn’t use it, didn’t tell anyone about it. I knew that it was a curse, for I could not remove it from my Soul-Song no matter how much I tried. Thankfully, I was already capped in my level, so this cursed skill wouldn't grow from level zero.

A week from the day when my son was born, I started seeing something out of the corner of my eye. A ghostly presence that haunted our house. Something that I could not see, but felt, knew that it was there. With every passing day it weighed on my conscience.

Last night, I met Midwife Tamara Agatha in my garden. She told me that she had ordered a new Eye and asked if she could scan my boy when she receives it. I told her not to worry about it and that everything is taken care of already. I told her everything about our many-times-great-aunt Delta Alana. I explained how an Elder, 200-some-year-old Wizard had come from distant lands to help us take care of Dante. I insisted to Tamara that a respectable ancient like her has already scanned Dante, making sure that he is not an aberration, and that an Elder Wizard doesn’t need to be disturbed further.

“Thank Ishira,” Tamara sighed. We chatted for a bit about things and then she left. She looked relieved. I, on the other hand, wasn’t.

I knew that midwife Tamara was right. Her Eye of Evaluation wasn’t broken.

I... was supposed to have a daughter.

When I was sixteen, I had a prophetic dream about it. In it I held a daughter with silver-blue eyes and silver hair in my arms. My newborn wore a silver crown atop her head woven from impossibly brilliant, blinding silver threads. I felt, knew her name… it was D.. De… I wasn’t sure of the rest, because I woke up.

I went to the Church of Ishira in the center of the village and told the priestess about the dream, asking about the future, asking about her name. The priestess completed the Ritual of the Seer and her face became as white as a bedsheet.

“Your daughter is destined to bring ruin to Skyisle,” the priestess uttered when she recomposed herself.

“What? The curse of the Alania?” I gasped. "But..."

“The curse of your bloodline, Sentinel.” The priestess of Ishira nodded, her eyes shining with divine radiance. “The blood of the Alanians in her is strong. Too strong. She is determined and curious enough. Like your parents, she will not be able to resist the call of the Quest of your Legacy. One day, she will run away from you, descend into the Valley of Death and enter the Forsaken city. There, she will awaken the long dead and bring them to Skyisle.”

“But… the air is poisoned down there! How will she surv…” I gasped.

“I do not see these details, Sentinel!” The priestess interrupted me with a shake of her head. “I simply know that if nothing is done, our town will be overrun and everyone here will perish.”

I started to hyperventilate. “What can I do?”

“Sacrifice some of your life, give your blood to Ishira, the Omniscient one,” the priestess declared. “The Goddess will wield me to snip this future away.”

I was terrified by the words of the priestess. My own parents had vanished in the poisoned mists of the Valley of Death just a year ago, leaving me as the last Sentinel, the last Alanian of Skyisle. I was young and scared and foolish enough to accept the priestess' offer of aid. I allowed her to cut my arm with a ceremonial rune-encrusted dagger. I poured my blood and my life into the rune-covered concave bowl carved like the eye of Ishira, the all-seeing one.

The priestess brought out gemstone-covered gold scissors. Using them she snipped away the thread of blood pouring from my arm, snipping away the future that was not to be. Another Vow resonated in my Soul-Song, the one of [Sacrifice of Life].

I had another prophetic dream, clear as glass, one year later. In it as I held my crowned newborn daughter, she slipped through my hands like a ghost. I didn’t understand what the dream meant.

I rushed back to the Church of Ishira wanting answers, but the priestess wasn’t there anymore.

The Redcapes arrived in their sky-ships that morning. They had executed the priests of Ishira and installed their own Order of Equality in the Church of Skyisle, one that was to be obeyed and followed. They had removed the altar of Ishira and changed the banners on the Skyisle Church. I saw the blood pouring down the steps of the church, saw the armored knights aim their ring-shaped artifacts at the people who tried to resist them. I heard the blasts of [Destruction] spells and screams of the villagers as I ran back to my house. The Imperial subjugation was done in but a day. Not much has changed in my life. The only people who knew who I was were now dead.

I met Georgi in Agamemnon when I was twenty three. He followed me to Skyisle. We declared our Vows to each other under one of the waterfalls in Skyisle. I sacrificed my [Fireball] skill to strengthen my love for him. He sacrificed his [Spelunking] skill to stay with me forever. I got pregnant at twenty four.

Midwife Tamara scanned me with her Eye artifact and declared that I was going to have a girl. I decided to give her the name Destiny.

I was no longer afraid of Ishira's prophecy. The Redcapes had killed the Ishira’s oath-keepers and shattered their altar. I stopped believing in Ishira that day. How could a supposedly all-seeing Goddess not see nor prevent the deaths of her chosen seers?

I thought that everything was over. Except… instead of a daughter, I had a son.

Ishira really had intervened, cut the strings of fate and woven new ones. Ishira had taken my... Destiny using the sacrifice of my own Soul-Song.

I didn’t know the exact will of the Goddess. Didn’t know why my daughter was forever taken from me, why the future was changed. It brought tears to my eyes every time I thought about what could have been… what should have been but was no longer. I didn’t tell Georgi anything. I didn’t want him to know about the ancient past nor the Quest that my last name carried. I didn't tell him that I was the last Sentinel, the last shard of Alania. He took my last name, not knowing much about my family. Not knowing why my parents died when I was only 15.

As I swaddled Dante, I caressed his silver hair and tried not to worry about the future.

I tried not to worry about Delta. I didn't trust her that much, but like my husband, I was extremely desperate for aid of a high-mage.

According to Great-Aunt Delta, my son was destined to be a hero. Not worrying about my son was very difficult. There haven’t been heroes in Skyisle for a thousand years, not since the time of the Alanian Empire. Not since the long forgotten dynasty from which all Alans got their silver hair and silver-blue eyes. I thought that the past was long buried and gone and yet here it was staring me straight in the face.

Because of my actions or perhaps in spite of them, the Alanian blood had awakened a hero. My little boy was a hero.

I knew that Dante would not have an easy future. If the Gregarius Empire Overseer found out about his level at birth he would be executed, killed for being unique... vanished just like the priests of Ishira. There were other servants of the Empire living Skyisle, vile people that would betray us to the Overseer... just for a bit of gold.

I tried not to cry, as I sang a song for Dante. A song of the Alanians. A song of the shattered Empire that conquered death itself. A Sentinel's song of our lost, grand, mountain-spanning cities that turned to dust when the stars fell from the sky. I felt that his eyes looked past me, past the song as if he was looking at something else entirely. As if he wasn’t paying attention to me at all, lost inside of his head.

Someday I would tell him… someday I would reveal to him about his sister that never was. A sister that I had killed with my own hands, Destiny… her name.