Cold droplets fell from the ceiling at a steady pace, tapping against the damp floor. Once in awhile a droplet would stray from its usual path, touching Annie's bare skin with its icy teeth. Each little tap allowed her to perceive the passage of seconds, minutes, hours. She had no other concept of time. No one fed her, no one watered her. She was left alone.

She counted the seconds, one to sixty, counted the minutes, but it was no use. Every now and then she lost count and had to start over. It must have been years since they threw here in here, or months. She couldn't remember.

Another droplet fell, and she yelped as the cold water made contact with her burning skin. In a moment of lucidness she realized that she still suffered from the wounds, that she still suffered from the damaged they inflicted while questioning her. She banged her head against the floor, damning her stupidity. How could she have thought they would treat her any different?

She couldn't remember if she had intended to tell the Magister or not. She had played with the thought, jealous enough to disregard all other consequences...How could she? Tears began to pool in her eyes. So stupid!

She had tried to resist them, but it was useless. In the end she was left with no choice. She shuddered at the memory, and she cried out again, cried for the pain, cried for herself, cried for those she had betrayed.

The Magister took her to their headquarters, urging her to keep silent until they were there. She remembered the awe she felt when they entered the vast building. In fact, she had stopped and just stared at the splendor of the entrance hall, stared at the painted windows, the velvet curtains. She had been naive enough to think herself safe, that the beauty of the place somehow watched over her, when in fact she was far from it.

They had laughed at her, laughed at her feeble attempts at keeping their filthy hands off of her. The more she struggled, the worse it became. They whipped her unconscious, ripped her apart.

Annie closed her eyes as the memory battered her senses. She saw it, felt it, smelled it, as if she was there again. She heard their grunts as they came, their cheers as she stopped fighting.

When she awoke before them, they started the interrogation. They ripped away one of her fingernails without even allowing her to answer. Then they ripped another three when she refused to cooperate. For each and every nail lost, her determination not to betray her friends grew firmer, but then they had started to cut into her finger with a knife. She lost it, she lost her mind for a brief minute, and that was enough. She shrieked out, Wyvern, before the thought had passed through her awareness. They stole her thought, stole the only shred of dignity she had left.

No one... there was no one. Now there was no one to help her. The only thing she had left was regret. She owned nothing else.

Annie...

She jolted as the voice resonated inside her head. She knew what this was, she had known it would be coming. She was losing her mind, finally.

Blissful ignorance. She was ready to leave off, let it all go...

-----

He saw her lying on the cold floor, naked. He tried to touch her but there was nothing to reach out with. He had no body, nothing to comfort her with. He saw open wounds, lacerations lacing her backside, crossing over each other in a terrible pattern. She must be hurting, badly.

Tears fell from his eyes as he could do nothing to help her, he was helpless. Why had he let her go? Why had he allowed her to leave?

"Annie!" his mind screamed her name in frustration and pain.

Vito felt someone pull him towards reality, but he wasn't having it. No! He didn't want to leave her...yet he did, he couldn't bear to see her like that. So broken. Her pale skin thrashed. Her sobs faint.

"Vito? Can you hear me?" he recognized Qumo's calm voice, calling him back to the surface.

His eyes fluttered open, but it was a struggle. He didn't want to be here. He didn't want to be back. Reality had become wicked and mean, just as his dreams and visions. He wasn't safe anywhere. Not anymore.

"Your visions seem to come more often, how are you feeling?" Qumo asked. He didn't know how to answer, or if there even was an answer to be told. He felt awful, beyond exhausted. He let his eyelids fall together again. He wasn't ready to wake up.

"We need to move!" Vigilante said in a hushed but insistent whisper, and somehow her complete dismissal of his conditions helped him to clear his head. There was no point in lying here feeling sorry for himself. Annie was the one in need. She needed him, and he would find her!

He tried to rise, but his body didn't budge. Oh for Io's sake! Something within him snapped. He hated this feeling of helplessness. He no longer held any control of his mind, and now his body... He roared out his fury, but a hand quickly clasped down on his mouth.

"Quiet, you have to stay quiet, we've crossed the border!" the hurried insistence and the touch of fright in Qumo's voice cooled him down, but also the words themselves. They had made the crossing. They were in Westerland. They had made it.

He tried to throw off Qumo's hand, and was hit with a wave of relief as his arm actually did what he told it. His old tutor looked reluctant as he was shoved away. He wondered why, then he realized, he wasn't trustworthy anymore... Not being in control, nothing was more alien and dangerous to a N'aian. He was failing his tutor, failing by not keeping himself together.

"We need to move. If the soldiers didn't hear that the Sigyns definitely did!" Vigilante hissed, and Vito felt a shiver race down his spine as she mentioned the Sigyns. They weren't up for a walk in the park if those feral warriors were in the neighborhood. He slapped a hand over his face. So stupid! He had effectively put them all in danger with that scream of his.

He looked around, instantly worried that a red haired Sigyn would jump out of the undergrowth. He had never met one, never even seen one, wasn't even sure he ever wanted to, but he knew their story. The Sigyns had a terrible history, a tragedy which had pulled him in and made him immerse himself in dusty books and faded scrolls.

He knew them to be of Fire. The element had become so strong in them during the last centuries that they could no longer reproduce within their race. Their males couldn't reproduce at all, or at least they chose not to. That was their biggest tragedy. If a child was born of a Sigyn father, the child lived, lived and laughed all through its childhood years until the young Sigyn burned from within as its body awakened during puberty. A terrible inevitable fate.

The strain of the situation, and the males' frustration at not being able to father children caused a split in their society. Males and females no longer lived together, and what was worse, the women had to part with their sons, sending them off to the males before they were five years old. The young males were brought up in training centers around Westerland, honed to become living weapons, while the women were free to live as they chose as long as they stayed far away from cities. The Westerlandic army let these "recruits" spill blood instead of their seed, and the arrangement seemed to work pretty well in the Westerlander's favor. They got soldiers who possessed speed and strength much greater than any human's or Gaian's, while they could blame the Sigyn if anything went wrong. Perfect solution...

A twinge of unease grasped at his stomach. He really didn't like to think about their situation. It was awful, but at the same time it was hard to feel for them. They were violent and dangerous, and their reputation was terrible. It was fine to study them from a distance, but he didn't want to encounter them.

He heaved himself up from the forest floor, struggling to rise. The fear helped, but he was still fighting to just stay awake. An arm grasped around him and he fell into the body.

"I've got you," Qumo said, holding him steady. He closed his eyes, resting them, but it didn't help. He was back where he started: his eyes on a naked body, covered in dried blood and dirt... Annie.

"Annie needs help!" he cried, silently, but was interrupted.

"Seriously? We'll have to talk about that later. Now, we get the hell out of here!" Vigilante snapped back. This time, instead of waiting for them, Vigilante followed her statement with mounting her horse. She was ready to go, and the determined line of her mouth spoke volumes: they should be ready as well.

Vito knew that he should agree, but his heart wasn't helping him. He didn't want to continue, he wanted to go back. However, he wasn't given a choice. Milo was there, out of nowhere, and threw him uo on a horse.

"Try to stay in the saddle. They're coming!" Milo said, and the Nyx's mechanical voice finally made him realize the danger they were in, because of him... He nodded in response and it didn't take long until they were all riding off at a full gallop through the darkness.

-----

Milo rode at the rear, scouting for movements in the dense forest. His heart pounded in his chest. This was exactly what he hoped to avoid. He swore as saw the forest come alive, branches moving, leaves trembling, first behind him, then to his left, then his right, as if they were moving with unnatural speed.

He was sure it was the Sigyns, not the soldiers, but their females. If provoked, they were known to attack, and what counted as provocation seemed very arbitrary. Had he been traveling alone, he wouldn't have worried; he knew that he could outrun them in the night. However, he wasn't alone. He looked ahead and saw Vito swaying in his saddle. Hold on, he thought, and he was surprised at feeling so protective of the young man. Something about his fragile condition made it impossible not to care. Then Qumo, if the old N'aian, no...ancient N'aian, died on his watch... it would be such a waste. Qumo had lived too long to die for nothing. Vigilante could probably take care of herself, it was the men the Sigyns wanted, only the men...

A battle cry sounded behind them, and another one responded in front. A third one thundered on their left side and he noticed that Vigilante steered them towards the right, away from the danger. He let out a silent groan, but he didn't dare to call out. Perhaps he was wrong.

He wasn't. He could see the Sigyns before the others, although the light was scant, he saw them perfectly; their red eyes, their fiery red hair, and then their slender staffs. He eyed them and counted. He wouldn't stand a chance against so many of them. They were going to lose. Vigilante was still riding right at them, and he felt the blood drain from his face.

"No, Vigilante, they're in front of you!" he yelled, but it was too late. Red headed warriors flew out from the darkness and grabbed the reins of Vigilante's horse, dismounting her swiftly. The assassin cried out in rage and fought like a cat with claws, daggers already in her hands.

He saw other Sigyns swarming the other two and he knew their game was over.

"Vigilante, stop fighting!" he voiced in desperation, scared that they might hurt her because of her resistance.

To his relief she did, she stopped and let them touch her. He regretted his decision, but then again not. His admiration for her increased, he didn't know if he would have been able to give in like that, even if it was for his own good.

Then he paused, losing his train of thought: no one was attacking him, they just looked at him and held on to his friends with their eyes burning red. What was going on?