"Good." The woman neared Leiros. Her chest was pressed against his, and her face pivoted to hold his gaze. She wasn't letting him pull away or look away. "You will save that young girl. Not just once, but many times over the rest of her life. Later in your life, she will save you. When you will falter, she will be your guide. When you in the darkness, she will be your light." She reached up one of her hands and seized Leiros by the jaw. "You won't know it. You will come to hate her. She will come to hate you. But both of you are bound to each other. Once you take that first step on the path, the threads that weave both you and her, will become knotted."

"If I save her, I am damned to endure her?" Leiros' voice was thrown off by the strong and cold hand on his jaw. "If I let her die, I may suffer as she will?" He gave a chuckle, trying to pull his face back from the grip of Zerranistra. "Fine. I'll endure her. So be it."

"Good, it is done." The woman let her hand lower, letting the cold and slender flesh of her fingers slide down to Leiros' throat. "Now there is more to show."

Leiros felt her long and clawed fingers grab onto the sides of his throat with a grip that felt like a vice around his throat. The fingers pushed into his flesh and the space between the woman's fingers and thumb didn't allow his adam's apple to move. He couldn't swallow, and now realized that he couldn't breath as well. The woman lifted him up by the neck as if his entire body didn't weigh more than a single authroc feather.

He reached out to grab at her hand with his own. He pried and pressed with his fingers to find a way to break free. He began to kick his legs from under him, but not even all of his force would make him sway one inch from her grip. She was inhuman, no one he had ever met was this strong. He was a slender man, but he was not the lightest.

"Now it is time for you to know fear." Zerranistra's mouth opened while holding a strange smile. Her teeth were barred, her fangs seemed to grow even sharper and longer. Her eyes were alight again with their indigo tendrils. "It is time for you to feel what it's like to be prey."

Orange and purple dots began to dance around the edges of Leiros' vision. His neck and head felt swollen with blood and ready to pop. He couldn't draw a single breath in. He couldn't access any of his powers to try to thwart the fiendish woman. His arms and legs were beginning to grow numb with each struggle. Feelings of pin-pricks crawled all over his skin.

Then everything went dark.

***

The sensation of the woman's grip around his neck still remained, like a chilled, phantom sensation. His body felt fine, and he soon realized that he could breath once again. He felt the cloak over his body, his hands and feet were free. He could feel a cold and well-polished stone floor beneath him. It was smooth and cool like finely chiselled marble. The only element that was wrong with the situation was that he could not see.

"Are you still there, Zerranistra." Leiros' voice felt shaky and harsh in his throat as he spoke out. He lifted both of his arms to his sides, groping in the dark for a wall or presence of some person or some object.

"Yes." Zerranistra's voice felt very distant and echoed throughout the space that Leiros was in. He couldn't pinpoint what location she might be coming from. "I am, but won't be for much longer."

Leiros tried to activate his powers so that he might see in the dark. He pooled his energies but quickly felt the energy being siphoned away by something or someone. He couldn't concentrate with his higher self, the parts of him that called upon his powers felt disjointed and fuzzy.

"I am just to remain helpless? That doesn't strike me as a source of fear." He gave a chuckle. He took a few light steps to the left, still reaching out with his hand to feel for a wall or support of some kind. "A source of annoyance, yes."

As soon as his hand felt the same kind of cool marble in the form of a wall, his eyes were assaulted with a brilliant light from far-off and forward of his location. The light was traveling towards him, at first like a torchbearer running through a corridor ahead, but later looking like a halo as it got closer. He froze his body and looked as the light rushed towards him.

As the light neared, he saw that did seem to be like a light cast from the middle of a corridor, lighting up a section of the corridor around him as it neared. It was only a few hundred yards away and he began to notice that it was the stone of the corridor itself that became lit. He remained still until the light rushed over him and lit the area around him.

He looked around him, seeing white marble lit up from inside of itself. A flat floor, straight walls, and a flat roof above. Forward and backward were still cast in darkness. The marble itself was white with small specks of cascading gold, and faint veins of green. In his entire life, with all that he had been exposed to during his years with the Order, he had never seen stone that glowed like this before.

"So, what am I supposed to do with this?" He said wryly while looking around and above him. He motioned to one of the walls and felt the previously cool stone feel a great deal warmer.

"You run." Zerranistra's voice echoed throughout the corridor in all directions. "You run like your life depended on it." He could hear her give a cruel sort of laugh. "Because it does."

Leiros was overtaken with confusion. He felt himself draw his eyebrows down and purse his lips. He didn't understand what the fiendish woman meant. He didn't feel any sense of dread. He didn't hear any sound other than her voice in this area.

He looked over his shoulder, pressing his back against the wall of the corridor. He looked behind for a few moments, squinting his eyes while hoping he could make out any sort of shapes in the distance. He gave a shrug and turned his eyes forward to attempt the same. He saw nothing in either direction.

It took a few moments for Leiros to realize that he was clutching an item tightly in his right hand. His grip was so tight, it felt like his fingers were going numb and his knuckles would break through his skin. He looked down to see a curved chukranth dagger in his hand. The curved blade was covered with still-wet blood. His hand was covered with blood as well. He lifted his left hand to see that it was stained even more so, with blood dripping from his fingers.

Disorientation pulled as his mind while a strange feeling of deju vu took hold. He felt like he should be able to draw forth a memory, but that memory would not unfold his mind. He shook his head and began to feel a beating pressure in his ears. The pressure began to build until he felt an internal pop that broke out into yelled words from down the corridor behind him.

"There's the murderer!" The echoing voice was raspy and male. The voice was soon followed by the sounds of leather-clad feet pounding on the stone nearby.

"Draw your swords, lads! Don't let the rabid dog breathe another breath!" Another voice, more authorative and nasally. The pounding footsteps were drawing closer.

Leiros was frozen; he didn't understand what was going on. Who were these men clamoring towards him? What murder was he being accused of? The memories still felt foggy and disorienting in his mind. He knew himself well, he would never take another's life in murder. In self-defense he had maimed others, but he had never taken a life.

"Assassin! Ho! I'll rip you into pieces! Cowardly dog!" Whoever they were, they were almost on top of him. The sounds felt like a wave rushing to him from the darkness of the corridor. He had to move, he had to run.

Leiros dropped the knife, hearing the clatter of metal on stone as it hit the corridor floor beneath him. He wanted to approach the voices as the rational part of him wanted to talk to those that would accuse him of a crime. At the same time, the emotional part of him wanted him to run. The instinctual side was filled with dread far past normal levels of fear and panic. He felt himself push away from the corridor wall and begin a run in the opposite direction of the oncoming voices and footsteps.

The light moved with him as he ran, a slow jog at first that broke out into a full-sprint. He looked over his shoulder to see only darkness behind him. The footsteps, yells and clanging of metal blades continued after him like a roaring wave that might overtake him at any moment. The panicked dread that pulled at his mind and heart ramped up to another level. It felt like his own heart might rip through his chest at any moment.

Leiros threw his weight forward, pumping his legs harder with every yard he ran. He wanted to reach out with his powers to enhance his body to run harder but the same haze and siphoning of his powers drained away at him. He was left with just the powers of his body alone. The powers of this body which he had neglected in his supernal studies over the last few years. A body that was already beginning to wear out from lack of proper oxygen. His legs screamed with pain and his lungs felt like they were on fire.

He continued his run, feeling like the wave of human violence was cresting right at his heels. He could feel hot breath on the back of his neck. The soft breeze of blades slicing through the air behind him. He wanted to give in to it all, be done with the running and finally surrender to the punishment these men demanded of him. His own innocence or condemnation didn't matter anymore to him, he just wanted the chase to end.

Before him he saw an end to the corridor. As he neared it, the marble illuminated just as the walls on his sides continued to do with each step. He slid on his feet across the smooth floor of the corridor. He looked forward and then to the sides frantically. His will was sapped, but the singing adrenaline in his system still told him to run, or if he could not run, to prepare to fight back.

The corridor split, that is why the wall barred his way forward. He looked to his right and beheld another corridor of darkness. He turned quickly to his left where he was taken aback by the sight of Grandmaster Toulam. The old man stood in the middle of the corridor, half obscured by the darkness beyond him. He stood as he usually did, like a still statue, with his hood drawn past the edge of his face. Leiros couldn't see the rest of his body as it was consumed within shadow.

"Grandmaster, please." Leiros' voice was frantic. He had to stop to draw in a wheezing breath. "What have I done? What must I do?"

The old man remained still and unmoving like the very stone of the corridor. Leiros took a step forward, lifting his shoulders up to protect his neck. He expected the men-at-arms to come at him any moment, with blades piercing through the air at him. He raised both of his hands up in dire supplication towards his mentor.

"Toulam, please." Leiros took another step into the darkness around the figure. As he neared he had to pull away quickly. Blood began to run down the face of his mentor. The blood flowed heavily, seeping into the hood of his cloak and spilling down to the embroided cloth of the old man's chest. Leiros took a step back in shock.

The figure of the old man seemed to glide backward, slowly being consumed in darkness. The last visible part of him was his face, which raised up meet the gaze of Leiros. Gaze wouldn't be the proper word, given that as the old man raised his head up, the empty sockets of where his eyes would have been stared like gaping voids into Leiros' own eyes. Blood ran down his face in rivulets as the old man gave a rictus-like grin.

"No, Leiros. You're on your own." The old man's voice echoed through the corridor as he finally fell back into the dark. The last vestiges of his mouth didn't move with the words that were spoken. "You've damned us all. You've betrayed us all. I should never have brought you in..."

Leiros stood in the corridor, dumbfounded, and too panicked to react. He had no clue what his master meant with the words he had spoken. He hadn't betrayed anyone, he hadn't murdered anyone. Why would his own master say such horrible things about him. The man that took him in, the man who was the only mentor that was ever kind to him, in his own way of course.

He turned on his heels and ran in the other direction. Just as he took his first step a sword was thrust through the air at his face. He narrowly pulled back within mere inches of the blade cutting into his flesh. He pushed himself downward and forward, sliding across the stone floor with his weight carrying him under the reach of the thrust blade. He began pumping his legs again as he ran forward into the darkness. This time the light didn't follow along with him. He had to push forward blind.

"Betrayer! Betrayer!" The men shouted in unison from behind him as he ran. The sounds of battering blades was deafening. "Murderer! Murderer!"

Leiros continued to run into the dark, holding his hands ahead of him to steer him between the walls of the corridor as the stone segments seemed to rush by him. He had only just caught his breath earlier and was now already at the point of exhaustion, once again. The pattering of his feet on stone started to take on a wet sound, like the stone itself was coated in blood. He could smell blood permeating into his nostrils and leaving its coppery tastes at the back of his throat.

"You condemned us all to death! You fool!" The voice of Grandmaster Toulam echoed ahead of him in the corridor, as if his grisly spectre floated along in the shadows. "May Olthenna damn you in the darkened depths!"

Leiros' frantically running footsteps started to become a monotonous beat of organic meat slapping against blood-drenched stone. He was getting ready to surrender once again. Perhaps the mob behind him might give him a clean death with their blades.

Ahead a light became visible, only slightly brighter than the rest of the darkness but it was enough to give Leiros another burst of energy. A few minutes more of hard sprinting, he had to slow his pace as he realized that the dim light ahead was that of a starry night's sky. He approached the edge of the corridor, which dropped off sharply. He could feel wind whistling from behind him out into the star-lit void.

He leaned forward holding his hand against the marble wall of the corridor for any kind of meager leverage. He looked downwards and could only see the sea of stars continuing on for as far as his eyes could see. Above him and on all sides was the same.

The clamoring of weapons and the rush of footsteps was growing closer. There were a few unintelligable shouts from the justice-craven warriors behind him. He had to make a choice fast, to jump into the unknown or to face a sure death at the ends of the blades those men threatened him with.

He ran through the whole situation in his head. All these people claimed he had done something wrong; claimed he had betrayed them, murdered someone. He could not remember what he had done, surely he wasn't guilty of such a mortal crime. He had always followed the Order's rules and laws to the very letter. He had never taken a life and he never would.

The unknown before him was a scary possiblity, who knew what pains, death or horror lurked beyond this gaping doorway into the celestial void. The prospect of being quartered by crazed men wasn't a very good prospect either. He wouldn't get an honest trial for his crimes, he wouldn't know what had happened, and those he might have hurt wouldn't see proper justice.

Leiros looked from the void back to the violent darkness behind him. He held his breath for a moment and suddenly becoming ever more aware of the sensations his body was giving to him. The cool feeling of the dark marble under his hand and his feet. The feeling of the well-worn cloak draped over his body. The feeling of cool air rushing in and out of his lungs. He turned back to the void, taking a single step forward and calmly falling over the edge.

***

The fall had felt like an unending travail that had cost Leiros hours or days of his time, yet when he looked back upon it in hindsight, he realized it had only been mere moments. His feet were firmly planted, if one could use such a description in a realm of the mind, on the slick surface coated with oily blood, once again. He stood in the endless abyss, staring out at the woman known as Zerranistra for some time before she finally opened her mouth to speak to him.

"You rather choose the unknown than suffer the known, if cruel, fate that others would have of you." She looked Leiros in the eye. Her words where rhetorical, yet she held her gaze as if she expected a confimration from him. He provided one with a single nod. "Good. There may be hope for your continued survival, yet."

"Was it necessary to choke the living life out of me?" Leiros crossed his arms and remained a few steps from the white-haired woman before him.

"Yes, and no." Zerranistra lifted a single one of her white eyebrows up, causing the severe line to bend at a right angle. "Yes, in that I needed you to be afraid. I needed you confused. So that you could fall into the vision and experience what you needed to." She took in a deep breath and a smile began to curl at the sides of her lips. "No, in that I enjoyed it a little bit."

"You, indeed are a fiend, then." Leiros feigned acting morose and broody. He wasn't as shaken up as he wanted her to believe. He wanted to play off of any sort of emotion the woman might have, so that he could know if he could trust her. As he had seen with exercises of telepathy over the years he had worked on his abilities, as well as the intrigues of court that he had learned from his father, he had found that any person that could be touched by empathy and percieve other's emotions could have some measure of trust placed in them. Those who only watched the cues of emotion, and then played off of them were often no more than monsters in human skin. Given that in this realm, with these visions, he was unable to access his abilities, he would have to fall back on the less supernal tactics he had learned from his father.

"A fiend, perhaps. But a fiend that still has blood in its veins. A fiend that still feels the passion of emotion as much as you. Perhaps even moreso." The woman crossed her own arms and began to mimic the same body posture of remorse and moodiness that Leiros was performing. "I am not heartless, if that is what you're getting at. I merely have a different set of desires when it comes to emotion." She smiled and those same fangs glittered in a light that did not exist. "You could say that my palate is more refined."

"Refined to the most blunt of emotions. The most visceral and the depraved. Rather like being jaded. You must go for the most primal. Fear, wrath, and no doubt some elements of lust." Leiros said that last word very trepidatiously. He could handle any of her violent or manipulative outbursts, but he did not want to be trapped in a vision giving in to nothing more than carnal appetites. Although the woman before him did seem to stir those emotions within him far more than any other woman he had met in his short life up to this moment.

"You are entitled to your opinion. Yet, it really does not matter to me one bit." The woman uncrossed her arms and approached Leiros. He flinched at her movements, beginning to wonder what new sorts of horrors she would visit on him. "I am here to perform a purpose. You are right, in that I am here to show you visions of the future. So that you can make the best choices for yourself and for those who will get caught up in your life. I am merely a part of yourself that you haven't exposed yourself to."

She began to walk around Leiros as he remained cross-armed and still in the abyss. She looked him up and down, analyzing every bit of his posture and physique. As she passed around him twice, she stopped and held his eyes from over his left shoulder.

"I am not here to be your plaything. I am not here to titilate you." She pulled her face back and put two freezing hands on his shoulder blades. "I am here to shake you to action, using the tools that I have at my disposal. Your fear, your uncertainty, your curiosity, and your rage." He felt her chill breath on the back of his neck as she moved her face to his right side. "Let's see if you can start to confront those aspects of yourself. You have darkness ahead of you. More than you could ever imagine." She whispered softly in his ear. A chill ran down the side of Leiros' neck to his spine, feeling like her teeth were just a hair's width from biting into his earlobe. "Let's see if you have what it takes to surivive."

He felt her give a hard shove. He felt his legs suddenly be swept from under him as he fell forward. The fall was far longer than the height he stood at in the former abyss of visions. A few moments passed before he felt the cold and clumpy earth of reality strike him in the face, chest and palms of one of his hands.

Searing cold roared through his exposed flesh, especially that of his hands that were now covered in snow. The temperature of the air was far past frigid and what bits of earth he stirred up with his fall were like clumps of muddy-ice. He lifted his head from the snow, looking down an incline towards a darkened realm beyond.

The incline slopped forward for a few hundred yards before coming to some flat land that eventually gave into a frozen lake. The lake itself was immense, trailing from the horizon on one side to the same horizion on his other side. In the middle of that lake, far off at the reaches of his vision was an inclined island. The island itself was huge, and framed in the middle of it were jagged lances of gleaming metal that stretched out into the sky.

The sky itself was a strange hue that Leiros had never seen before. Glimmering and cascading greens played over the sky in a great ring that seemed to stretch around the entire world from far off into the heavens. The light was a mixture of greens, with slight stripes or ribbons of oranges or purples riding like celestial waves throughout. Behind these brilliant lights, the sky was robbed of color, looking like it was covered in starry bruises.

Far off, beginning in the centre of Leiros' vision and stretching around and behind him to his left, he could see a roaring plume of darkness. It reminded him of some of the smoke and ash plumes that some of the still active volcanoes would spew out near the Loch of Flame in the old Morthavi Highlands he used to live in. This spout of ash was far too large to belong to a volcano.

As he began to watch it, almost as if hypnotized by its movements and strange lack of color, he soon realized just how alien this set of clouds was to how he understood such weather phenomena existing. These plumes did not roil and flow outward into the sky like those of volcanoes, mountain fogs, or storms upon the sea. These clouds flowed inward and downward, falling into some great chasm far beyond the horizion to the furthest north. His mind reeled at the notion that began to bubble up at the back of his conscious. The strange clouds he beheld were the roiling Gloom that many explorers called it. He was in the presence of the ultimate void that existed at the furthest north of the world. He beheld the very tips of darkness that was known as the Kytheran Abyss to scholars and those of his Order.

He was very far from home, thrown almost two-thousand miles to the furthest reaches that his people had ever explored. He was abandoned in the searing cold wearing nothing more than the cloak on his back. Bare-foot, bare-handed, bare-faced and exposed to the elements. Yet, as he realized it, just the same as his vision on top of Auhl-Keignfel Stohll, the weather and the cold had a strange sort of hollowness to it. He could feel it all, yet at the same time the worst affects of it all seemed to be denied to him. He would not die from exposure or feel the horrid sting of frost-bite, but the feelings of these things would still tug at his mind and body.

Leiros lifted himself to his feet and immediately began to dust off the snow from his cloak. The feeling of his bare feet in the chill snow was shocking for a moment. Feeling like when he would dip his feet in the ocean waves while riding his father's skiff from Maalute Harbor to the dreary coastal city of Caerna Fhailuggach in Ferrenth. A shocking chill until one's body acclimated to the temperature, or in this case the sensory dissonance of a vision.

Once he was relatively dry and able to take some steps forward down the incline, he returned his eyes to the strange sight that lay before him. The great spires that strangely reflected the light coming down from the Scintilating Crown of the World in the sky. Some of the spires seemed to reach only a few hundred feet into the air while others seemed so high that they tore into a few misty clouds that moved by, falling into the gloom of the furthest north.

One of the most prominent spires, thicker than the rest, stood forked in the sky. Jagged pieces of metal were exposed from shear and slick metal frames on the outside. In the middle of the fork between great cleaves of ice-covered spires was what looked like an immense green gem. It was hard to understand the full scale of the thing while looking at it, as the frigid atmosphere played havoc with Leiros' sense of distance and porportion. Looking at the clouds passing by, and surmising that some of the sparkling reflective surfaces in the metal might be glass panes the size of a normal human, Leiros began to look anew at the spires before him. The great crystal in the middle of the forked tower would have to be the size of Auhl-Keignfel Stohll itself, about a thousand feet from the lowest face to the piercing tip.

Leiros had to use his hand to try and steady himself while looking at the spires ahead. The huge height and width of them, now that he could understand their scale made him dizzy. These things were taller than any mountain he had ever seen, taller than any fortress or citadel tower he had ever read about in the histories of the Order. There was no way that these spires, no doubt far more ancient than anything he had ever heard of, were built by human hands. These things were wholly unnatural and far more complex than any of the mechanical wonders he had heard of in ancient myths and traveler's tales.

This dead and abandoned city of elder things was not of this world. It did not belong in the world that he had read about and studied since he was a child. Was this a palace of some unknown god? Was this a gateway to some other realm that he had never heard of? Was this all some strange image of insanity called up from the furthest depths of his mind like some seething cancer or disease?

Leiros felt his knees buckle and he fell backward into the snow. The more he looked at the towers before him, the jagged spears and blades of gleaming metal, crystal, glass and other materials he could not understand, the more he felt a growing sense of dread spread up through him from the pit of his stomach. This place was not right, it didn't belong, it was unholy and nightmarish. The rational side of his mind was fully split from his emotions, once again. The rational part of him grasped at old myths and stories and tried to understand it as maybe some ancient city from the time of the Morthavi Ascendancy so many thousands of years ago. Perhaps this was a city of sorcerers who used vast magics from the ancient world of Hoelv to sculpt these wonderous things. Yet, his emotional mind took hold deeply and screamed at him to turn and run away. Something called out to him, some melody that only the most animalistic parts of him could hear. It was a cacophonous symphony of murder, played on vile instruments, by inhuman hands.

"The Dread City of Vorrginth." The voice came from his right side. Leiros turned his head quickly and saw the white-haired woman standing in the snow next to him. "You are familiar with what the name Vorrginth means, correct?" She kept her eyes focused on the spires before her, not turning her head towards Leiros at all.

"Y-yes." Leiros soon realized his mouth had gone dry. He swallowed hard and flicked his tongue around in his mouth for a moment. "Vhaltenesh, the primarch of the Authrakallin mentioned it a few times in his teachings. He said that he had gazed upon its spires only once, but that it had left a lasting impression." Leiros tried to push himself back up on his shaking legs. "He said it haunted him. He referred to the visions he had of it as the Vorrgistadt. The road to the ruined city of the Vorr."

"You have now traveled that same road." The woman gave a smirk and several steps forward. Her eyes were alight now. The icy blues were like flames in her eye sockets. Every step she took towards the city seemed to cause her eyes to glow all the more.

"Vorr..." Leiros steadied himself and focused on the misty horizon. He kept his eyes level and refused to look up at the disorienting spires scraping at the stars. He focused on the mists gathering at the base of the city on the furthest horizon. "...Ginnth." He lifted his left hand as a cover between his brow and forhead, preventing him from looking up.

"Yes..." Zerranistra cooed from further ahead. She was heedless and looked up to the spires without any sort of falter in her step.

"That sounds like Ancient Morthavi. I know that Vorrgistadt means the road or the quest to find this strange place. But the actual city name... Sounds like the city of the slumbering. The sleeping ones. Ginth like Ginnithol, the realm of the sleepers that Sethos gifts with dreams." Leiros began a small jog to keep up with the woman.

"There are truths in names. Especially when it comes to words in Morthavi. They knew this world better than most, even though they were not native to this place." The woman continued her stride down the incline and now approached the flatlands closing in on the frozen shores of the great lake.

"Is this where the Vorr dwell, then? Sleeping within the spires?" Leiros felt his curiosity gathering flame inside of him. It was said that only Vhaltenesh had been able to have a vision of this strange city. Now he was able to uncover secrets about it as well. Perhaps his destiny wasn't so bad after all.

"No. In that, this place is mis-named." The woman walked onto the ice of the lake, graceful and without the slightest hesitation to steady her balance. "The Vorr may once have lived here. If you call their existence 'living.' Yet, they remain here no longer. Perhaps they were called back to the place they came from, perhaps they ceased to be."

"Then..." Leiros stopped and looked down to his feet. He felt his face grow sour and his eyebrows lift with concern. "What is this strange feeling I have? This dread clinging not just to my mind, my body, but through to my very soul."

"That is the part of you that is human, recognizing this place as what it is. Not human." The woman slid her feet on the ice and turned around to face Leiros. "That is you feeling the strange energies that keep this place functioning. It is also your soul crying out to you, telling you of what lies beneath these spires, trapped in the darkest of places, waiting to be freed."

"If that thing you speak of is not the Vorr, then what is it?" Leiros' eyes were wide now and his body tensed as he was tempted with new discoveries.

"You don't want to know. Believe me. It is a being of immense power, imprisoned by the Vorr themselves in times so far gone that no human would ever have memory of it. It is a being that seeths with unholy rage at the prison it was cast into." The woman's eyes were hypnotizing with their strange light. The indigo tendrils were again flowing down from her eyes, over her pale cheeks, and trailing into the transculent white of her hair.

"I must know!" Leiros looked to the woman, stretching his right arm out to her while clutching his left in a fist against his stomach. He stood resolute, shaking and wide-eyed.

Zerranistra lifted from the ground, the same inky-smoke wings unfurled around her giving her an impossible flight. The wings were slightly different, more clawed and menaching this time. The tendrils around her eyes curled into the half-halo once again. Her eyes roared with icy flames ripping out from her sockets like her head was a great torch. Her fangs were fully elongated like the needles of a great serpent. Her fingers had snapped and grown outward like vast spindle-like claws tipped with razor-sharp blades. Her feet, no longer clad in metal and leather boots were like the clawed feet of a great dragon or wyvern.

"You..." The woman's voice boomed across the landscape, creating a shattering echo like chilled thunder. "Will..." Her claws unfurled and grasped out around her form in all directions like spider's legs. "Not!" Zerranistra gave an inhuman and piercing howl that began to shake and shatter distant parts of the ice. Several large pieces of ice and snow from the distant spires shook and fell unfathomable distances to crash into the ground of the island ahead.

Leiros clutched at his ears, feeling the warmth of blood trickle from between his fingers. He shut his eyes tightly feeling blood vessels burst around the edges of his eyes and salty fluid drip from his tear ducts and then down over his cheeks. He felt the earth beneath his feet heave and shatter like the ice of the lake before him. The woman's scream seemed to drone on and reach ever higher and more painful levels. He soon felt like the very flesh and bones of his body would shattered or rip off of his body.

Then he was thrown into a sense of calm silence. He cautiously pulled his hands from his ears. He expected to hear the incessant ringing of deafness, yet all he heard was still silence. He opened his eyes, expecting to feel the burning sensation of blood and seeing nothing more than blotchy smears over his vision, yet all he saw was darkness. He let his hands fall down to the ground in front of him and he felt the same warm and thick oil as he felt with his feet in the abyssal realm.

Leiros lifted his eyes from the reflections of himself playing out in the ripples of the slick blood beneath him. He didn't have the heart to get to his feet or look fully upward in case Zerranistra was still standing before him in her wrathful form. He lifted his eyes carefully to look at the feet of the woman before him. She was back on the ground -- such as it was -- and her feet had returned to being those of her leather and metallic boots.

"My apologies for the outburst." Zerranistra said curtly and with a monotone voice. She didn't sound or seem sorry, but she needed to say the words. "I lost control of myself, both because of your own safety and because of my dark attachments to that place."

"You lost control of yourself, 'for my safety.'" Leiros gave a chortle and let his eyes slowly move their way up the woman's form until they met with her eyes. He lifted himself to his feet, lowering his eyes to her neck level for a moment and then returning them. "If you can't control yourself, and you refuse to let me know more about that place, then why show it to me at all?"

"Your fate is drawn there. I can't refuse that. I must show you it and let you know of it." Zerranistra took a few heavy breaths and clenched her fingers into fists. "But I don't have to show you the horrors of that place, just yet." She unfurled her fingers and returned to a state of calm. "You must understand, just as you say that Vhaltenesh did. There are some places that are haunting. There are some places in this world that will shatter your mind if you get to close. There are others that will steal and devour your very soul if you walk into them heedlessly."

"And the Dreaded City of Vorrginth is such a place." Leiros said it more assuredly than that of a question. He wanted to lead the white-haired woman into divulging more information about the place, yet not earn her ire through direct confrontation, again. "I understand. But, if my fate is to go there, I should be prepared, should I not?"

"There is no preparing for what awaits you, or I, or anyone else that goes to that forsaken place." Zerranistra held her right hand out in front of her, curling and uncurling her clawed fingers. It seemed like she was reaching out for a memory, one that both seemed familiar and vexed her at the same time. Her eyes were off in the distance, many miles away. Perhaps she was looking at the spires in her mind.

"Then, I will take what you have shown me as preparation of a kind, none-the-less." Leiros felt a cool confidence and sense of resolve take hold over his voice. "No matter what you say, I am drawn to that place now. I must uncover more. I don't expect you to guide me there again. Obviously, you can't handle it. I will research what I can, I will press forward no matter the cost."

"You are stubborn. I remember being equally such when I was much younger and still had a mortal heart." She gave a cruel laugh. "Fine. Do as you wish. Seek your own folly, if you must. You have been warned."

Leiros gave a nod and smiled. He crossed his arms and spun slowly on his feet in place. As he began to turn away from the white-haired woman, he soon began to get a gnawing sensation at the back of his mind. Perhaps she was tricking him, just like his old mentor loved to do in the waking world. Goading him into things through a kind of reverse-impulse that was all orchestrated to lead him where the other wanted him to be. To take advantage of his curiousity, his stubborn nature.

He shook his head and spun back around to face Zerranistra. Perhaps his doubt was the case, or perhaps she was legitimately scared of the place. None of that mattered, ultimately, as his path was now set to go to the Dreaded City. He would follow the path of Vorgistadt as set out by Vhaltenesh an age before. He would uncover the hidden wonders of that terrible place and do what he could to turn it into a beneficial discovery for all humanity. Surely there must be something of redeeming about the place, some wonder that his people could use to better this dying and decrepit world they were trapped within. Some ancient lore, some ancient artifact, some hidden miracle of the gods, hidden away by an ancient and powerful people that lived on this world before even the Morthavi came here. In all dark and terrible things, there must always be a ray of light and hope.

Zerranistra openly scoffed and rolled her eyes. "Your hope will lead to your destruction. Shatter it while you still can. Fool." Leiros began to wonder if it was her that was preventing his abilities, after all. As hard as it was for him to pool and focus his energies, it seemed like this woman was able to pierce into his thoughts just fine, as if she were a member of the Authrakallin herself.

"I learned from one such as yourself, how to do that." Zerranistra shrugged her shoulders and rolled her eyes once again. "I'm not limiting your potential, young oracle. That is entirely of your own doing. These are your visions, in your mind." She lifted one of her fingers to poke him in the forehead. "If you aren't able to summon your powers, it is because you don't want to do so. Somewhere you realize it won't help you on the journey you have before you."

"Are you telling me not to use my powers then? That they are meaningless in my future?" Leiros squinted his eyes and tightened his brow. "I would trust the Grandmaster of my Order more than a fiendish illusion in a dream. He told me I must use my powers to the fullest in my future. That I need to embrace them more than I have."

"I said no such thing." The woman smiled broadly, letting the tips of her fangs flow over her bottom lip. "You jump at my words like a frightened man at shadows in the dark." She gave a light-hearted chuckle and took one more step forward. "I have no stake in you using your powers or not. In you using them for good or ill. I'm simply stating that some things are beyond your ken and beyond your abilities for now."

Leiros held his tongue for a moment and stared the woman in the eye; a look of challenge, expecting her to slip up somehow. He may not have used his powers as often as he could have, but it was not because he didn't like or trust his abilities. He knew fully well how powerful the rituals, powers and miracles of the Authrakallin were, which is why he sought out tuteledge in the arts of divination. He had seen masters of his Order pull of feats that seemed almost as if the gods themselves had incarnated in flesh and blood to do them. He had heard the tales and histories of those who had performed feats beyond even what was possible now, back when the world still had more magic and mystery in it. Before the corruption of the world as the world-mother Myrris slowly sunk into her own grave. He knew he had such power within him, and it was the abuse of those powers that he feared. That he had the same ability, the same taint, flowing in his heart and mind that would condemn him like Merithault had been condemned, to be a monster of the ages, preying upon those he was meant to protect.

"Fine, then. Embrace your arts. Follow the Path of Haethupex to its final conclusion. To madness, folly, and slaughter." The woman continued that same smile, the tone on her face becoming more sadistic than mirthful with each passing moment. "I'll show you the fate your powers will cause, and that will be my final vision to you."

Leiros gave a nod and remained still. The woman reached up and passed a single one of her cold, clawed, elongated hands over his face. He felt himself falling backward, downward, and into himself. He embraced the vision this time, following after the fiendish woman's will.

***

Leiros opened his eyes to behold a familar, yet starkly alien sight before him. He stood upon the ancient and ruined patchwork tiles of the Elder Circle's counsel chambers on the great cliff jutting out over the city of Alsira Thaenat below. A sight that Leiros had seen several times before while he joined his mentor in games of intrigue, diplomacy, or favor-currying with the old Etharak Jhondd before he died and the temporary leader of Oelvann Molth took his position as acting chieftan. The shelders that many of the Etharalm and Oelvanti used were gone or cast to nothing more than burned out cinders and ash. All of the old and sun-bleached tapestries that hung over the shelters to provide some shade for the dignitaries that used the space were burned away or clinging to charred rock on the cliff-face.

Leiros took a few steps forwards, feeling the still warm ashes on his feet as he looked out over the great canyon-city below. He couldn't recognize it as first, it looked like some ancient site that had fallen to ruin. Then his eyes focused and he could spot the bodies piled up in the streets, with the blood-tinged, glacial river rushing beneath the city. The smell of burnt flesh and blood began to make its way up from the city and choke him.

The city was destroyed. As he let his eyes play over the city below, looking and hoping for some form of life to show itself amidst the flames, the ruins and the carnage, he could not find any. There were no candles burning in windows, no people staggering numbly through the streets, not even a single screech of a desert hawk in the skies above. The city was dead and all those within it had been taken by Olthenna.

"Are you saying that this is my fault?" Leiros steadied himself at the edge of the cliff. A voice in his mind pulled at him and made him want to jump off of it. This was his home, these were the people that took him in and made him welcome. These were the people that he served. "A-are you?" He felt his voice crack and with every breath the smell of the dead broke through his nostrils and clutched at his throat. "A-Are you?!"

"In a way, it is. In a way, it isn't." The voice of Zerranistra came from behind him again, this time a small distance away. Perhaps she anticipated Leiros thrashing out at her in his grief and fury. She was right to do so.

Leiros clutched his hands into fists, driving his fingers into the palms of his hands with so much rage that he could feel blood begin to run. He could feel his powers reaching out, as distorted and confused as they were. Pieces of burned-out wood and small rocks began to throw themselves forwards over the cliff's edge. He could feel his blind rage tainting the powers he was given, turning them from perception to forceful fury.

"Do I become as corrupted as you?" His voice was a whisper, yet at the same time a low scream that seemed to tear at his vocal cords.

"No. You become your own entity. Your own enemy." The woman's voice was further away from behind him, this time. "This fate would happen no matter your choices. Eventually all things must be destroyed. All people must die. All societies must be turn to ash and ruin."

Leiros remained silent and let the rage wash over him. He could feel a shuddering beneath his feet, like a slow rumble that hadn't yet found its voice. He turned on his feet to look at the white-haired woman. She stood a dozen feet off to his left. The look on her face was one of sorrow mixed with concern.

"Sacrifices will be made. Whether you chose to act, or you chose not to. All I can say is that if you chose wisely, some may be spared." Zerranistra began walking towards Leiros, keeping her eyes away and focused on the scene around them.

"No one should have to suffer." Leiros blurted out, clenching his fists even tighter.

"All people suffer. All people die. The point of the matter, is to give their suffering and their deaths meaning." Zerranistra closed the distance and pressed her chest up against Leiros' own once again. "You wouldn't deny them that, would you?"

"No." Leiros turned his head away from the gleaming blue eyes of Zerranistra for a moment. She reached a hand out and led his gaze back to her with a single finger on his chin. "All life is sacred. All souls must have their fate. It is better do die for something than to die a meaningless and empty death."

"Good." Zerranistra leaned in, pressing her icy cheek against Leiros'. "You're beginning to understand." She brought her face back around and continued to speak while her full lips began to brush against Leiros' own. "There may be some hope for us yet."

Leiros felt a stirring from inside of him, more than any sort of attraction he had felt before. He couldn't make sense of it all inside of his mind. He didn't trust the woman, and she was obviously inhuman, but there was something about her that was strangely familiar. He was attracted to her, despite her flaws, despite the blood that clung to the tips of her hair, despite her violence and her fury. He felt his mind split again, but this time between three different forces, not just two. His rational mind was intrigued by her, his instinctual mind was afraid of her, and his emotional mind was drawn to her more than anyone else in the world.

He pushed himself away from her, shoving his hands at the tops of her arms and taking a step back. He needed space, he needed to understand what was going on, and he needed some sort of clarity. There were too many emotions going off in his mind. Too many things that his visions were pulling and demanding of him.

"This is what I have need to show you, young Oracle." The woman took another step and closed the distance again. She swiveled her neck, looking over his shoulder and then back to his eyes. "Your path goes beyond what I have shown you, but this is what you need to begin your journey."

Leiros lifted his hands again, to press against the woman's shoulders and take another step back, but this time she caught his hands and held him still. He looked Zerranistra in the eyes, feeling closer to them than ever before. He saw a whole world in those eyes, flashes of memories he couldn't decipher, emotions he hadn't yet begun to feel, and the threads of fate that were being plucked that somehow tied him to this woman.

"Will we ever meet again?" Leiros gave a sheepish smile, pulling his face back a few inches so he could see her whole face.

"Yes. I may be different than you see now." She returned the smile, but with confidence.

"What do I need to do for that to happen?" Leiros tried to pull his hands back from Zerranistra but her grip remained firm around his fingers and wrists.

"You need to prove yourself worthy of me." Zerranistra leaned in, her lips again brushing his. Her cold breath playing off of Leiros' face, feeling like a chill northern wind.

He didn't have time to reply. His mind ran at something to say, perhaps a quip or jest to lower the tone of the mood, but he never got the chance. Zerranistra's lips pressed against his own and he felt overwhelming energy coursing through is body. It was as if some kind of connection had been made between both of their bodies and both of their essences. He could feel tingles of energy coursing through his lips into his mind, as well as from her hands touching his.

Something felt strangely familiar about it all, like they had known each other since they were born. With a single wave, all trepidation was bled away from Leiros' mind. He reached out and moved his lips in return, feeling Zerranistra's as if she were warm and human, once again. He felt his hand lifting from her shoulder, given freedom, and now he moved to to the side of her face. Her skin felt warm like her blood was pumping and her body was mortal. He felt the warmth from her breath mixing with his own. He felt her hold his other hand to her chest, feeling the skin there. He could feel her heart beating beneath her chest, as each breath she took moved herself up and down beneath his hand.

He had never felt such a connection before, and as he began to lose himself to it, he soon realized that his eyes were closed. He opened them and beheld the blue eyes of Zerranistra. No longer lit by some strange fire within, no longer encircled by strange indigo wisps, but normal mortal eyes that reflected his own in the the tears that coated them. Faint freckles were visible on Zerranistra's cheeks as he pressed in. Leiros looked up, pulling his lips from her's for a moment and seeing crimson-colored locks of hair flowing down and framing her face.

He wanted to look at her before continuing, pulling his face back just an inch, and as soon as he had done so he began to feel a strange sensation on his hand that was brushing her check and moving to the back of her neck. His fingers felt slick with some viscous and warm substance. He pulled his hand back to see his hand covered in blood. He looked back to Zerranistra, her eyes now closed. Her hair was now covered and running with blood which flowed like rivulets down her face and neck. She clasped his loose hand in her own, smearing the blood between his and her fingers and pulling him in against her chest.

She leaned forward and he felt like he could not resist. He didn't feel afraid of her or disgusted at all, but he was concerned for her. He felt a sense of panic that ripped through him, like he might lose her to some disease or malady. She shoved her face into his, her lips locking with his once again. He felt the same energetic charge as before, almost overpowering his mind. He opened his mouth to ask her a question and was greeted by the tip of her tongue. She caressed the peak of his top lip and lightly made her way over his teeth to touch upon his own tongue.

Leiros was caught between a sensation of longing and that of profound dread. His mind was reeling and shaking from one extreme to the other. He didn't want to let go, he didn't want her to feel spurned, but his mind cried out that something was very wrong with this situation. With the blood that now poured over his eyes and face from her scalp.

Just as her tongue began to lightly touch upon the tip of his own, he soon began to notice a strange taste of blood to Zerranistra's breath. The slightest taste became more present and he tried to pull away again. She wouldn't let him, her grip held him in place, her lips were locked against his own. He began to feel pain in his lower lip. Two points of pain as her fangs bit into his flesh and held him even further.

The taste of blood now became a torrent of blood. A mixture of his own as she pierced into his flesh, and a torrent of her blood as she began to cough it up into his mouth. A slight sputtering soon became a torrent as the blood ran into Leiros' mouth and down his throat. He tried to pull back so he could breath, but again she held him with an inhuman grip. The blood began to fill his throat and choke him beneath it. His eyes went wide once more, seeing nothing more than blood all around him. He was drowning in it.

He pressed the last air from his chest to scream, but the blood still flowed, drowning it away into nothing more than a gurgle. His whole body was drenched. He was trapped in a churning tide of gore.

***

Every vein, artery, and capillary in Leiros' skull felt like it would burst at any given moment. He had never felt so queasy or terrible since the time in his youth when he and his cousin had gotten drunk on Thernaki Fire-brandy. It was a day and night of partying at an infamous 'place of ill repute' in one of the coastal cities of the Arid Steppes that his father had been stationed at as envoy for the Hoelatha people. Both young men had filled their time with drink, with song, with the company of many accommodating women, and with the company of many unaccommodating tribal men. When the reddish morning light of Trallt had lit the sky with fire that morning, both Leiros and his cousin were found in puddles of their own vomit, spittle, blood and effluvia. It was the first and last time that Leiros gave in to his carnal appetites. He remembered never to feel like that again in his life.

He opened his eyes into the harsh flickering light of the fountain room. His vision was still bleary between tears and the accumulated sleep leavings of Sethos. He leaned forward, placing his face in his hands, and pushing his back fully against the side of the fountain. He gave a long groan, feeling every blood vessel in his head pounding in unison. Finally, he began to wipe away the drying mucus in his eyes.

"What in the depths of Gehemol was that?" He began to pinch at the bridge of his nose with one hand and massage the sides of his skull with the other. He lifted his head and opened is eyes to look at his mentor, still sitting across from him. The old man remained motionless, his hood still obscuring the topmost portions of his face. His stubbled chin and grinning mouth were the only things visible.

"What is so damned amusing, old man?" Leiros blurted out again. The old man remained motion-less with the same patronizing grin on his face.

"Ah ha! I see, you pierced into my mind during my visions. Did you enjoy what you saw? You perverted old fool!" Leiros leaned forward once again and prodded at the old man's knee, causing him to move ever-so-slightly.

Grandmaster Toulam took his time before responding. "Yes and no. The lecherous fantasies of your mind are entirely your's to enjoy. I did view the visions you had." The old man shifted on his rock seat. He let both of his hands fall away from his over-sized sleeves and whatever he was hiding in the rumples of his cloak. "I am happy on behalf of you. You dolt. And I am happy on my own behalf as well." He continued to extend his arms, revealing a glowing orb of quartz-like crystal, held between both of his weathered and skeletal hands.

It took a moment for Leiros to recognize the bauble that his mentor held. He had to take a double-glance from the old man's face, to his hands and back. The orb softly glowed a silvery light with small specks of gold glinting throughout its form.

"Is that one of the Nesharite Spheres?" Leiros' eyes grew wide and the pain coursing throughout his skull almost seemed to fade away. "There are less than a dozen still in existence. Only the Athulla of our Order, back in the ruins of Oerstav Caelii have possession of those..." His voice trailed off as he continued to stare at the strange item.

"Correct." Toulam continued to smile broadly. He almost seemed to relish the awe and attention that his student was focusing on him. "Last I heard, there were but nine of these damned things left." Toulam shuffled on his seat to move closer. "It wasn't easy to get my hands on it. What I did, I had to do. Understand this later."

Leiros seemed to ignore this mentor's cryptic rambles. "It's active right now? So you were..." He trailed off once again. He waited for his mentor to give a single nod. "It works? It records the memories, thoughts and visions of..." He took a deep sigh and scrunched up his face. "...Of me?"

"Your visions weren't just idle fancy, young man." Toulam lifted the orb into one of his hands and pulled his arm back into his cloak to deposit the orb in a hidden pouch for safe-keeping. "Nor was I spying on you for any nefarious reasons on my part." He brought his arm back through his sleeve. "As I said before you departed for realms beyond..." He gave a cough. "I've been waiting for these visions for decades."

"Why?" Leiros felt his jaw grow slack and lips began to pout. He was confused, unable to reason why his visions would be more important than anyone else's. "Why mine?"

"You, Leiros, must walk down the path that I have been building for the whole of my life." The old man lifted his hood to show his bleached eyes. Despite his blindness, Leiros could still feel the old man's vision settle upon him like rays of sun through cloud. "There are revelations to be had. You have quite the journey before you."

"Why would you need to record my visions into that sphere?" Leiros pressed at his mentor.

"So that when the time comes, you will remember them. Your visions and thoughts aren't the only ones recorded into this particular sphere. I have been placing my own, as well as those of my master, her master, and onward before. All the way back to that senile old fool Vhaltenesh." Toulam gave another cough into his hand. He stood up, turning away from Leiros for a moment. He gave a few wheezes and caught his breath, again. "I'm mortal, boy. Just as you are now. Eventually I will fade away, like those who came before. I refuse to leave you alone in this world, without guidance."

Leiros felt the weight of the old man's words and the entire situation keenly. He let his eyes slump to the rock-hewn floor of the room. Time seemed to pause for a moment, the candles ceasing their flickering. The visions he had were both a boon and a burden. What awaited him in the future must be severe indeed for his master to risk his life, his station, and his very soul to have such an item. No one was allowed to personally hold one of the Nesharite Spheres. Only the twelve Athulla of the Order were permitted even to use them, see them, or even speak of their existence. To have one in secret would draw the eye of the Athulak Pharreida; the inquisitor-knights of the Order.

"You needn't worry about such things." The old man gave a laugh while scuffling away from the fountain. "We've kept this orb secret for almost a millennia." Toulam turned on his bare feet to look back to Leiros. "Just don't go blabbing to anyone about this. I'll keep the orb in safe-keeping until it is your time to take it up. I fear that time draws close." The wizened man gave a grunt at the thought of his own mortality then continued to walk away. He reached the doorway down to the lower levels of the mesa and with a thought, blew out all the candles in the room.

Leiros remained on the stone slab, with his back pressed against the cool stone of the fountain of visions. He was in complete darkness, alone with his thoughts. He was beginning to fully realize just how complicated and strange his life was about to become.

"Don't dally, boy!" Toulam's shouts echoed through the halls and back to Leiros' ears. "If your vision was correct, you need to save someone's life tonight." He could hear a crackling laugh break through the darkness. "I think that's more important than your studies. Or your sleep."

Leiros lifted himself to his feet with a loud and exaggerated groan. His life was indeed becoming more difficult and filled with adventure. He didn't much like that, one bit.

***

The billowing clouds were gathering and growing dark across the evening sky. The winds were picking up and beginning to howl and bluster. Leiros lifted himself to his feet and looked over the hounds-tooth rock that he was using for cover from the wind and early gusts of fine, white sand blowing in from the Jolash Duenr in the south-west. He could make out the great wall of sand and debris filling up the horizon. Tonight's storm would be one of the worst he had seen this season. Anyone left up on the summit of Auhl-Keignfel Stohll would be flayed alive in a matter of hours once that wave of razor-like sand hit. The winds at the heart of the storm on the horizon were whipping around at speeds exceeding the fastest of desert cats. Perhaps even enough to blow the feathers off of an authroc.

Leiros pulled his white scarves over his mouth and nose to protect himself from the sand and the wind. He pulled pieces of his new traveling cloak around his body with tight leather straps. The trailing tails of his cloak snapped in the wind like the mouthed tails of a frenzied ghellorth beast. He pulled his leather gauntlets tighter around his hands to make sure no sand got in. The soft furs inside his bracers and gloves felt warm and soothing on his skin.

He sat back down behind the cover of the hounds-tooth rock. He stretched his arms, his legs, then crossed both in front of him. He began to reach out with the powers he was now beginning to embrace in full. He could feel the young woman's energy as she climbed the side of the mesa. Her soul felt like it was on fire from within and burning with a frantic energy that made Leiros dizzy.

He understood now why she was doing what she was doing and although it was a foolhardy act of rebellious youth, it was something that he found amusing. He had been rebellious himself when he was younger. He had wizened up by the time he had reached the young woman's age, however, and he was only a few years older than her. He had to realize that people grew into their paths that their souls would follow at different times and in different ways. Still, despite this understanding, he had resolved not to make things easier on the young, crimson-haired woman.

He would make her realize things, he would shake up her life, and he would beat some sense into her if it was necessary. He would teach her indirectly, just as his own mentor had done, and just as he realized the young woman's mentor had done for her, as well. He would be the distant light that guided her in the darkness, yes, but he would also be the shadows that clawed at her if she strayed too far off the path. He had thought long and hard about this throughout the day, going over and over the visions he was imparted. This was the only way to guide her. She was too reckless, too rebellious, and too immature at this point in her life for any other kind of tutelage and protection.

He would influence her to safety and he would subtly coerce her mind through his telepathic powers, guiding her to the fountain of visions. He would force her to wake up. He would force her to unlock the powers within her blood. She was the descendant of Merithault, after all, the last of her bloodline. She deserved to suffer as all the Authrakallin oracles had suffered over the ages. She would be burdened with the sight, with the powers beyond mortal ken. After all, by climbing this very mesa, even if she was not yet a full adult, she would pass her Kollishi Authrak to become one of the oracles, herself. Since it would be him to greet her at the summit, it would also be him that would become her mentor once she had passed her proper rite of adulthood.

The visions were right and the words that Zerranistra had spoken into him were coming true. He would be bonded to this crimson-haired, young woman. He would be responsible for her as her mentor, her guide, and her distant protector. He would endure her follies as his own master, the cantankerous old Toulam, had endured his.

Leiros leaned forwards and picked up his quarterstaff from the rocky plateau of the mesa. He placed it across his lap and continued to reach out his energies to feel the young woman approach his perch. His mind began to drift off in part, wanting to recollect the features of the woman in his visions. The enigmatic and otherworldly Zerranistra. She said to him that he would be united with her in the future, once he proved himself to her. All he had to do was endure the tutelage of this crimson-haired woman, named Ghelta, and he would eventually be able to find the woman of his dreams. He would do what he needed to do, to find that strange woman once again. His mind, his body, and his soul cried out for her.