She stood on a hill high above a village near Sailoon and looked out over the land. She was a beautiful woman, few people would deny it, but even fewer would actually tell her how lovely she was. She'd been known to kill people for being overly familiar, and there was in fact exactly one man she'd let speak to her as an equal. She could have shifted her foot two inches and touched his prone form.
She sighed deeply. It had almost been too good to be true - they'd been perfectly matched, and after a few initial... misunderstandings, they'd gotten along perfectly for over a thousand years. Of all her servants since the beginning of time, he had lasted the longest. He'd been one of her favorites, too. Poor child. Her eyes lingered on his face, memorizing the details.
She leaned to caress his face, and withdrew her hand as if burned. No. She'd learned not to become attached to her servants... Hadn't the entire business with his predecessor taught her that?
She knelt beside him, ignoring the blood that slowly soaked into the silver silk of her dress, and concentrated. Energy leapt from her fingertips to his body, as she forced the worst of his myriad wounds to close. Healing wasn't her specialty at all. Someone else would have to finish the job...
How strange. She'd decided his fate without really even thinking about it. She couldn't let him die. He'd been so loyal, didn't she owe him more than that? Of course, if she let him keep running around, that could be a problem too. He'd eventually seek her out, and L-Sama only knew what would happen then. She clicked her tongue as the answer became obvious to her. Very good, how to go about it... ah, yes... She'd left in some triggers the first time she'd worked on him.
Her fingers prodded at his throat, searching for the threads of her power woven into his aura. She slid her finger under one, pulling it away from the rest of the strands. It shimmered delicately, then a silver claw of her power flashed and the thread snapped, the tiniest chiming sound accompanying it. He moaned slightly, and she froze for a moment before returning to work. She grasped both ends of the thread and tugged, pulling it loose from the tapestry of his aura carefully. One end began to turn from silver to blue, and she cut it an inch into the blue. Tears ran down his face, but she forced herself to ignore them and keep working. She pulled out the last of the other piece of silver and watched curiously as something she couldn't quite describe faded from his face.
He looked so small.
Her gut clenched, and she dove back into her work, unwilling to look at his face any longer than she had to. The threads of silver pulsed with light faintly, and she wrapped them around her fingers. They shone a final time, and began to melt into her skin. She shuddered as the lost power flowed back into her, then returned her attention to the frayed life weaving. The next threads were purple with flecks of blue and a myriad of other colors. She touched them gently to get a feel for what was there before unceremoniously ripping them out in handfuls, ignoring the music his screams created to the beat of her work. The pile of purple grew next to her as she reached the end of the threads. Hm. What was this? She carefully parted the next threads to reveal a handful of intertwined red and purple threads. Why would he have hidden memories of HER this deeply, unless...? Oh no. That was too rich. Hundreds and hundreds of years with her, and the memories he chose to keep close to his black little heart were the ones of that sorceress? Her bitter laugh echoed in the air crazily, and she finally had to bite hard on her lip to stop laughter from burbling to the surface.
There were other threads hidden, too, most buried so deeply that she was afraid she'd damage his mind if she tried to extract them. For them to be placed like that they'd have to be dreams, anyway, and she didn't care about trifles like that. She surveyed her work quickly and nodded. It would do nicely. Her nimble fingers pulled the red and purple threads together with the older blue ones, weaving them together with ease. Finally, she pulled away the blocks to his old spells, and smoothed everything over with a strangely gentle sweep of magic.
When had he stopped screaming? Alarmed, she swept him with her power to make sure she hadn't done irrevocable damage to his mind or body. Ah. He'd screamed his vocal cords raw. She checked the position of the sun, and realized she'd worked well into the evening. Hmph. He'd probably ceased his screams twenty minutes ago.
She slid her fingers into the pile of purple threads, and they leapt to life, straightening and twitching in response to the tiny movements of her fingers. A shape began to emerge, roughly as long as her forearm, and as wide and thick as her two fists. Sweat beaded on her brow, an unnecessary thing she had picked up from humans. Damnation, but this was easier with complete material and a dead subject. She withdrew her hands and considered the shape. A few final threads twitched, and she nodded in satisfaction as the entire thing shrank down and crystalized. It dropped from the air into her waiting hand with a solid "thunk."
She rose, brushing her long nails along his bloodied jaw as she did. She turned to leave, then paused as a thought struck her. She bent over him and fumbled at his clothes for a moment before pulling her prize from him. She dropped both Stone and cloak clasp into her belt pouch. They clinked together as she rose to look out over the hills once more.
Her predator's eyesight could pick out people gathered near the edge of the nearest village. They carried torches and weapons. Probably coming to investigate the screams now that they had stopped. Cowards.
At least she could leave now, assured that someone would find him soon. She turned slowly in the direction of her home and began to walk away slowly. A casual observer, if they were to survive long enough to watch, would notice that the further she walked, the more landscape you could see through her, until finally she disappeared entirely.
A wolf howled in the distance, breaking the long silence that had been imposed by the presence of the world's foremost predator. It was answered by another, and before long the night was alive with wolf gossip.
She is hunting, they said. She has her prey in her sights.
And the wolves laughed slyly and cruelly, as only a wolf can.
Dainala jogged toward the hill where the men with torches had gathered. A boy had pulled her from her chamber in the temple ten minutes ago, giving her only a few seconds to gather her supplies, insisting that she was urgently needed. All she'd been told was that they needed a holy woman, a healer. Inside the walls of the temple of Cepheed she'd been unable to hear the screams that the boy claimed had plagued the night, but she could certainly hear the wolf calls now. She shivered slightly. At least the men's torches should keep the wolves at bay.
She stopped running just outside the crowd of men, and pushed her way through. When she saw what they circled, she gasped, and flashed the sign of Cepheed with her fingers. She dropped to her knees, and called for the men to move back and give her space to work. She placed her fingers lightly on his temples, and let a light flow of magic pass into him. She recoiled with a sharp hiss.
She raised her hands to one of the men, and he helped her stand. "Lady Dainala," he said, shocked, "Aren't you going to heal him?"
She shook her head, long earrings swaying. "It is not Cepheed's will. I can feel it. We shall do everything we can to help him, but we will not take him into the temple, and we will not use white magic on him."
There were angry murmurs among them, and finally one spoke up directly. "But Lady, why not? What happened to him?"
She cast a glance at the ragged cuts and gashes that covered his body, then looked around the ground until she found what she was looking for. She pointed. "A wolf. He was attacked by a wolf." The men looked at the huge wolf print, one of the few they hadn't trampled while gawking at the injured man. "Come," she said. "We shall take him back to the village. Cepheed does not will his healing, but that will not stop me from attempting to save his life." She gestured to the temple novice who was pulling a stretcher up the hill. "Load him on to that. I will supervise."
Some minutes later, as several of the hardier men were bearing away the stretcher, a hunter came forward bashfully, and drew her off to the side. "Lady Dainala... I don't mean to doubt you, and I definitely don't mean any disrespect... but... " He twisted his hat nervously in his hands.
She gestured encouragingly. "What is it, Child? I will take no offense."
He drew a deep breath and nodded. "Lady, I've lived and worked in wild areas most my life, and I've never seen anything like this from a wolf attack. Are you sure? He was screaming so long..." He trailed off uncertainly.
She stared at the departing stretcher, and the purple hair that swayed slightly where it had spilled over the edges, then calmly obliterated one of the last wolf prints with her foot. "Oh, yes," she said calmly. "It was most definitely a wolf, my child."