They were lead into the chambers at the top of the tower. It was a large, circular room of stone with arch windows facing the cardinal directions. Sitting on the wooden desk on the far side was a was an imposing, scantily-clad woman. The green elf addressed her: “Miss Esau… I have brought you some exceptional prisoners.”

“Very good.” Her voice was like velvet wrapped around a knife, speaking with the unique accent of the platinum elves; it was like nothing Livia had ever heard before, charmingly strange and strangely charming. It sounded like a mix of accents she’d heard from visitors to her home village when she was younger, but there was also something about it she couldn’t place… but also couldn’t help but like. “Leave us.” She stood up, looming over her three guests at six-foot-five-inches. She wore a strange ensemble entirely made of black metal, each piece of her attire filigreed; a cropped camisole, vambraces, thong, stockings, and heels. Her body was somehow slender, athletic, and curvy all at the same time; framed by the cloud of thick, wavy, waist-length hair, she gave off the kind of air one would expect from a being such as her: a platinum elf. Most only knew of them from hearsay and stories, being the rarest of the remaining elven tribes, with pale grey skin, dusty pink eyes, and near-white lavender hair. She looked to be in her late twenties or early thirties, but, knowing elves, she was likely quite a bit older. She dared not say it out loud for now, but Emilie could also sense a hum of power emanating from her, a silent thrum of magic permeating the air outward from her and making Emilie’s blood throb. It was a perplexing sensation, one she had never felt before.

“Well?” Miss Esau lilted. “Aren’t you going to introduce yourselves?”

“Surely,” Krey scoffed, “you don’t expect us to comply with Dunlark Spire, do you?”

Miss Esau sighed. “Very well, I will start, but I do expect you to play along. I am Florentina Esau, and as you correctly assessed, I command the forces of Dunlark Spire here in Calsa.”

“Since when did your little cult have such a large militant force?” Emilie interrogated.

“Ah,” Florentina chimed, “you need no introduction… Your Holiness.” She sauntered over to the hierophant and lightly pinched her chin, urging her head to tilt back so she was staring right up into her eyes. “I’m surprised you survived our attack on your temple. Tell me, how did you do it?”

“It’s a mystery you will have to live with.”

“I am content to live with the mystery, since your fate would seem sealed regardless. Once you were delivered to me, you were doomed.”

“We’ll see about that,” Livia interjected.

Florentina’s fun was interrupted by a new presence emerging into the room. Emilie felt it first, her back straightening to the point of nearly hurting herself. It was a potent, almost arousing presence… full-bodied. A red glow grew into existence next to the desk, swelling into the form of a person, and then stripping away to reveal a woman nearly as tall as Florentina. Her eyes and wavy, waist-length hair were luminescent with a vivid red glow, and though it didn’t give off any light, her matching wispy dress was just as fierce. She had a ruby resting just above her buxom breasts, hanging from a gold chain necklace. The nails on her hands and pristine bare feet almost seemed to be made of the colour red somehow, more than simply painted; her lips possessed the same quality, starkly contrasting against her skin, which had a fairly rosy complexion of its own.

I know her… Livia realised. The stained glass windows in Ardour Temple…

Florentina curtsied with an imaginary skirt. “Rajata, goddess… a pleasure to see you again so soon.”

“I thought I should come and see how you were treating my namesake,” Rajata said. “I wasn’t expecting you to have guests.”

“What?!” Emilie managed to restrain the volume of her voice, if not the unguarded outburst itself. “But the gods are anathema to Dunlark Spire… why are you…?”

“Well, shit…” Krey sighed. “I wasn’t ready to believe it, but…”

“What?” Emilie shot him a look, and her words flew from her throat with painful sharpness. “Wasn’t ready to believe what?”

“Ah… Emilie my sweet~” Rajata cooed. She glided over to the hierophant, Florentina stepping away at the same time. The red goddess cradled Emilie’s face in her soft, warm hands, smiling down on her mortal servant. “It is not my intention to shake your faith… you, our most devoted of listeners.”

“Then, please, goddess,” Emilie stuttered, “please, I beseech you… tell me why you cavort with those who hold us in such contempt.”

“Oh, Emilie…” Rajata’s luminescence pulsed once as she stroked Emilie’s hair. “Oh lovely, lovely Emilie… hush now… all will become clear in time.”

“Hey,” Livia said with careful attention to tone and volume. “How about answering the damn question? Y’know, for us less pious types over here who’re a bit more immune to your charms.”

“Charms? Immune?” Rajata let go of Emilie, and when she did, the hierophant’s posture buckled, as if something inside her had gone into shock. The goddess stopped in front of Livia, and pouted playfully. “You make me sound so nefarious, Miss Sasna. I assure you, my love for my children is pure.” There was another pulse of increased luminosity from her as she reached out and touched Livia’s face with the back of her hand. “It would please me to count you among them. Would it not also please you?”

“How do you know my…?” Oh… Livia felt her mind slipping. Oh no… what is this?

“I know all about you, Livia.” Rajata’s smile was a thousand kisses, a thousand thumps of a lovestruck heart.

It was all enough to make Livia’s knees tremble. Amid the chorus of noes, within her roared a yes that tasted like wine, like poison. And yet, though she was aware of the intoxication now coursing through her, aware that it was not her own, she couldn’t help but want to surrender to it.

Krey, too, now found himself unable to speak. Inside, he was screaming, trying to stop drinking in the poison, trying to ignore the warmth washing over him and the almost painful yearning that was swelling in his nethers. He was in no position to actively resist; it took all his strength just to stand still, just to not throw himself into Rajata’s embrace and beg her to never let go.

“Remove your talons from my flock, harlot!”

The voice snapped them out of it, the mere sound of it seeming to push Rajata back. The goddess of passion’s red light was also challenged by a new radiance, a glow of green with faint wisps of yellow. They didn’t need to turn and look, for the new presence stepped through their line and put itself between them and their captors. Phyrn had returned, and in the light of the three’s guardian goddess, Rajata’s hold on them was broken. “I shall suffer your insidious seductions no longer!”

“Well, well, well…” Rajata toned in a voice of velvet laced with venom. “If it isn’t the bumbling bumpkin herself. Tell me, Phyrn; how long did it take for you to look up from wallowing in filth and finally notice the machinations taking shape around you?”

“Not long enough, unfortunately for you.” She looked over her shoulder, but Livia, Krey, and Emilie weren’t quite lucid again just yet; they were still reeling from the incursions into their psyches. When she looked back at Rajata, she was smirking with the back of her hand hovering near her face.

“Now now, Phyrn, I know that look— that scowl! Are you really so upset with me?”

“I have never been more upset with someone in my entire life!” Phyrn stomped her foot, and from under it darted roots that immediately began sprouting leaves of greenest green. “The only reason it took me so long to finally get to you was because, with each of our brothers and sisters I found… I mourned. I have mourned every one of them that you have allowed to die. Tell me, Rajata… why are you in league with him? Why are you letting him kill the other members of the Decakon?!” tears began welling in her eyes, her usual serene composure fractured by the quakes in her very soul, her being racked by each and every comrade’s demise she had so far discovered. Those tears fell, pushed from her by the thought that yet more of her closest friends might be dead— that they might all be dead by now.

“It’s really quite simple, my unrefined friend,” Rajata guffawed. “None of us have the strength to match him in battle. He is a god of judgement, Phyrn…” her tone turned dour. “He is the strongest of us by far, and that fact is beyond dispute. However, in my bailiwick did I find an opportunity for survival— a way to spare myself from his executioner’s duty.”

Phyrn’s eyes widened, her realisation punctuated by a sharp inhalation. “You… you seduced him?”

“Only partially. The man is resilient in all respects, damn him, but I have managed to convince him to spare my life in exchange for my assistance.”

“So… you would aid in the dismantling of all we have worked for just to save yourself? You would sacrifice eight lives - eight beautiful lives - and abandon all principle in the process… for what?”

“I already told you, you stupid, mud-swathed yokel! To survive!”

“Do you really think he’ll spare you? Do you really think you can charm your way out of this one?” Phyrn shook her head. “Fyren is an executioner, Rajata; executioners don’t let their targets go— not without a pardon from the high royals. And, last time I checked, no member of the Decakon - barring him, of course - has ever seen them, let alone stood in their court.”

“I will get my pardon,” Rajata proclaimed. “As soon as our work is finished, and we are able to leave this broken world we let ourselves foolishly make.”

Phyrn straightened her back, touched her ankles together, and she began levitating just above the floor. Her palms floated to her sides, open and facing forward. She closed her eyes, took a deep breath… and then they snapped open. “I must stop you. Whether you are being deceived or not, it doesn’t really matter… I must stop you.”