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End of Dreams

Narrator: Mirrors breaking. Burning. Pieces of glass rain in the ravine, as fire consumes them into black, smoked shards. It feels cold. She feels like she has been to hell and back, but now, she just feels... cold. Cold and naked, in a windy ravine between two sides of nowhere.

There is rock beneath her feet, and trees, but all seem broken, somehow.

It takes a little while to see she is on the feet of the mountain to Windia, that shines, so far above, shining figures filling its skies, flying beneath its arcs... but she is so far down, in the middle of the cold air, alone in a place that seems to always be night...

Iselsis: She wraps her arms around herself. She felt horrible. Like she had somehow messed up and got caught in a nightmare. That had to be it, a nightmare, just a dream.

But if this is a dream... why can't I wake up?

Not knowing what else to do, she simply starts walking, feeble and cold though she feels, towards the mountain. Towards home.

????: As she walks, she sees a sillhouette on her path, amidst the shadows. A tattered black cape, a mask with red eyes, a wide-brimmed hat. Someone she knew well, very well. Someone who taught her so much of what she knew now. He stands there, far up, watching as she climbs the mountain, in silence.

Until she comes closer. "Where are you going?"

Iselsis: "I don't know. I wasn't good enough and I failed..."

She clambers up a few more rocks, not feeling like she has the strength to fly, before speaking again, more softly.

"I'm going home..."

????: He walks towards her. As he had, so long before.

When she was a little girl looking up at him, with Faina at her back, leaving her with that terrible figure. Telling her to go and introduce herself to him. Her steps become so small now, as they were all those years ago, her body that of a young girl again... and she once again tries to stutter her name to him, to introduce herself.

Just like before, she sees his fingers, all bandaged, somewhat... creepy, coming out of the cape to take a bang out of her face, to lift it up. And speak. Not anymore, he cut her before she could finish speaking her name. You are not a person, with hopes and dreams. Not a girl with white-feathered wings. She died to the world in that chamber in the magic academy. She was torn asunder, screaming for unfulfilled dreams, childhood sorrows and a shattered family. She is dead. You are a soldier of Winlandia. You are light, wind and fire. You are a devil. You are a weapon.

The Weapon's name is Iselsis. Come.

He had walked her out of Windia, that day...

"Why are you going back?"

Iselsis: "Because..."

She reaches deep down and realizes she doesn't know the answer. She just wants to. Home is safe. Home is where she has a future, with Faina. Home is away from the complicated situations, away from the people she can't deal with, away from battles she wasn't equipped to handle. Away from everything, so she could be safe.

But why she was really going, she didn't know. It wasn't in her convictions to give up. But there it was, home, in reach. Why not take it?

All this rages through her mind, but she can't put any of it in words, so she doesn't answer.

????: He still looks at her, expecting her response. He had always been harsh. A very, very harsh teacher.

He pushed her until she was exausted and hurt and crying, and took care of her wounds in the utmost silence.

That goes through her, and she is clothed again, in her coat. And feels someone pushing it, behind her. A little girl, her younger sister, the same turquoise her, but a hint of their mother in her strawberry blonde hair. Viktoryia, looking at her with pleading eyes...

Iselsis: She narrows her eyes at the man suddenly. Something inside her welling up. Anger. She was tired of it all, she was tired of being pushed around!

"Why don't you do everyone a favor and fuck off, I don't need you anymore and you've got nothing left to teach me! Leave me alone!"

And then her coat is back, apparantly it came with her resolve, or her anger. And she turns around to look at a girl who had once been her little sister, and she blinks, wide eyed at her...

"Viktoryia... how...?"

????: The figure sighs, tipping his hat, but remaining there, in silence on the background, as Iselsis looks at her sister...

Same age she had when they had last met, before the Magical Academy, holding the little horned snow hunter plushie on her arms. "Don't go, 'sis... don't go there... it hurts. There is alot of hurt there..."

Iselsis: "What do you mean, where is hurt? You mean up there...?"

She stares up the mountain, towards her little temple manse on a secluded part of the mountain. Then back at her little sister who could not be her sister.

"What's there?"

????: "Shadows... it is scary up there... it has so many things I don't want to remember... and you don't want to either!" She almost lets go of the plushie to say so, then cluches it as tight as she can against her little chest... "You don't want to remember..."

Iselsis: People really shouldn't tempt one such as Iselsis like that, certainly not in the mood she's in right now. She once again sets to climbing up, glad for the bit of warmth her coat provides to her once again. As she starts clambering back up the rock she comments...

"People need to stop telling me what to do."

This is a dream. And I'm going to find out exactly what's haunting me.

????: "Nooooo! Don't... don't go....!" The girl cries, vanishing into the shadows behind her, shedding a tear... and as her image disappears, Iselsis walks to Windia... and goes through its gates. And through its main gate, she walks through... her Manse.

Not her temple, but her home. Her old home.
The De Windia Manse...

She is on that house, that day. She sees her mother, beautiful as she was, dressed in full regalia of jade and power, reading a floating, shining book as she watched her daughters play. Izabella was playing with Viktoryia, trying to entertain the 'baby' while she waited for a friend to drop by...

And then...

The image of her sister standing there... hair so long. She was thin, a child, but without any baby fat then anymore... and the black wings. The black wings unfurling so far they seemed to darken the whole room. She stood there, with eyes wide open, insane, that grin on her face... and the ornate family knife on her hand, covered in blood much like her pretty green dress....

She ran towards mother. Mother tried to stop her with a spell, exploding the room... she sees herself protecting Viktoryia as the essence runs wild on the room, marring old paintings, exploding the fireplace... and turns, hoping to see her mother having her sister subdued, wanting to understand...

And then there was blood, the blood splashing on her face, her own mother's...

Her master is still there, behind her current self, watching.

Iselsis: She watches this all almost with no visible emotion. Almost, were it not for the slight clinching of her fists, as that horrible chapter of her life, that made it all go so wrong is replayed before her. She wants to do something, to stop Selina, to make it all go away. To make it never have happened. But this wasn't real. It had happened, and now she was just seeing the past, unable to act on it in any way.

"Why are you showing me this? Haven't you tormented me enough in the past, dear old master?"

????: The blood falls on her face just like it fell on the flace of her younger self, warm, sticky. Her mother, so powerful, so grand, even clad in her jade dress, in her great bracers and pendants, even with all of the great markings of her Mnemon heritage... falling in front of her. And her master, walking to her, so close, as always seeming almost like a head, hat and cape, and nothing more... "What did you see?"

Iselsis: "My sister. Killing my mother. The thing that started this whole mess. You actually need to ask?"

She sounds bitter.

????: "Not that. That happened to her. I am not worried about her. On the University. On our training."

"I mean that. What you know. What. Did." She feels something as he speaks, as if she was being ripped apart... broken a cow at a butcher's "You. See."

Iselsis: Hurt.

Angry...

So angry!

She'd forgotten all of this, she'd gotten over it, she'd dealt with it and moved on, she didn't want to see this again, she didn't want to think again!

On instinct her arm snaps out as she whirls around to face the figure standing behind her. A move she had masterfully executed a million times before.

She had no gun though. Except... once she faced him, with the intent to do what she was trained to do, with that instinct in place... it was suddenly in her hand, aimed at her master.

"Make. It. Stop." ... "Now!"

????: He holds her hand before she does so, holding the gun up, hurting her arm. "I am not doing this."

"You are. You have seen it."

It was her, walking, body bare, to the center of the mystical circle, the runic tatoos stretching accross her body to allow her to survive it... to survive the energy that filled the room, that lit the glyphs on the ground, that made the murals on the all move... that lifted her into the air... and begun to tear her body apart. She wanted to scream, but had no mouth anymore, no lungs anymore, just lost amidst the essence.... that was what had to happen. But what happened, was not what had to. She remembers coming to, strange, red, wrong, in the ruins of the room.... she could not hear anything. It was all so... silent.

She could just feel the great power within herself...
Natural, and Unnatural.

"You saw it that day." He says, as his bandaged fingers dig into her red flesh like claws...

And sees his mask ragged. Like it had been in the day she learned the Caress of a Thousand Hells...

Iselsis: Pain.

She cries out, and the plasma repeater slips from her graps, shattering into so many pieces of dream when it hits the floor. She tries to fight, and struggle, but he's too strong for her. He always had been. That was why she was the pupil, and he was the master.

"Adorjan", she hisses, "the Silent Wind, she who wishes nothing but for all things to come to silence and fade forever into nothing."

????: "Adjordan, indeed. That is what you feel. But is it all you saw?"

It was his Manse, a dark place where the sun seemed to refuse to shine, forever lit by the stars. A place that made all lights shone crimson. It was where she stayed for long...

You are ready now. Channel it from inside you. You are the Righteous Devil, and all hells are yours to command. Feel the fire. Call it from inside you. You are a devil, and this essence is easier for you than most. Call it. Feel it. Be h... He was cut short by the light. The burning light that came from her as she lost consciousness due to the sheer power coming from her, as she called... that she had seen it. Burning through him, through his hat and cape...

"What had you seen back then? " Later, as she came to herself, she found him, without his mask. But his face was covered by crimson, blood-weeping prayer strips. And she felt she learned what he was trying to teach, she felt the mastery of the style... even though all that happened then.

The stream comes, and as it leaves, he is no more, and she is on the remains of the Manse, burnt by her power... and silent.

Iselsis: "I don't know!", she yells at him, "I don't know! I don't want to know! Just go away!"

????: She yells, breaking everything around her, feeling the light pouring from her...

And there is nothing left, not even him, just the remains.

Silent... the silence of a Manse broken, of a life shattered.

He had survived it... but she could see him turn away, in the middle of her own storm. To abandon her in her dream as he had in life, and for a similar reason. Leaving her in the silence... until she hears the noise of wood, breaking, not too far... someone walking in the remains of the Manse....

Iselsis: Half heartedly she tries to find somewhere out of sight to spy from. She was getting weary with this dream thing, and thought it was about time for herself to wake up. Unfortunately she wasn't the one to decide that, apparantly.

She shrinks into the shadows beside the charred remains of a closet, watching and waiting for the next chapter in this odd ride.

????: And then she sees the figure, a shadow at first... with her great wings that had just a tinge of rose color, her sleek green jade leotard, her long golden blonde hair with its flowers... walking amidst the debris, like an angel in the mud, a lotus in a swamp... Faina. Looking for something...

Iselsis: Before she can catch herself....

Before she realizes this is all a cruel play, a dream...

She lunges out of the shadows, hand reaching for her, for her warmth and comfort, and she calls out "Faina!"

And then she realizes. She stops, and waits. Not sure what to do now.

Faina: Faina looks at her, and smiles. That smile only she can have. "Izabella! What are you doing here?"

Iselsis: "This is ... this is my dream."

She remembers Gennadi for some reason.

"The more interesting question is; why are you here?"

Something the smug sidereal could've said. If he could only hear her, he'd be proud. Or at least vaguely amused.

Faina: "I was looking for you! You vanished. It worried us. Well, it worried me when I sent you for this.."

Iselsis: "I wasn't strong enough you know. They got me. For all I know this is what it's like to be dead, and not a dream at all..."

She still hadn't moved. She wanted to go over and have Faina hold her. But she wasn't the real Faina, just something she'd conjured up herself for some reason. Another piece in this odd puzzle.

Faina: Faina walked towards her, slowly, but surely. Like a huntress walking towards a hare, trying not to make her run.... "You are not dead, Ise." She says with a smile. "Or I would not have hope for you. As it is... you can die. But not before you fulfill our hopes... you have to hold to life. You have to. For me."

Iselsis: She takes a hesitant step back, but finds nothing but a wall blocking her path. She waves out her hand, at an imaginary battlefield still all too fresh in her mind.

"How!? I don't belong here! Have you seen them? Have you seen the horrors of a real battlefield against the full force of the dead? Have you? It would drive any lesser woman insane. I gave it everything I had, but I can't win this war! I can't compete! They're all stronger than me!"

Faina: "No."

"You have read the stories, you occult bookworm. That has never happened before. It is a new age of necromancy and power you witnessed. We knew about the Lover, but... it had been more than any of us have been alive since a Deathlord took the field, accross the world." She sighs, walking closer and closer to Iselsis. "And they probably are. But you, Iselsis... you are our brightest hope. My brightest hope..."

Iselsis: "Why!", she demands of the other woman.

"Why me?", and then her voice breaks, "Why me? I'm not strong enough..."

And within this world where words have power, the weakness takes her and she slumps to her knees.

"I can't... can't protect anyone, not even myself... I couldn't even keep my promise to you. I failed, I failed my country. I failed our soldiers. I failed my companions."

"I failed you..."

Faina: Faina walks to her, picking her on her knees... picking Iselsis' limp body up and pressing against her own, the hat falling and allowing Faina to kiss Iselsis' hair, and whisper... "You helped them. You are still alive. You can still fulfill your mission... you can still kill her. And I will believe in you as long as you live."

"And if I don't..."

They were at the footsteps of Windia mountain, then, and it burned. It burned, the great black wings unfurled over it... no doubt of who it was. And there was a creature with the goddess greater than the mountain whose black wings crushed windia.... an eagle. She saw him from afar, but for a moment saw him up close, spreading his wings, looking at her and saying 'hello, Red.' with Moon's voice.

But then he was just far away, all was, so far up and away, and Faina held her during it...

Iselsis: She shakes her head.

"Moon wouldn't do that. He's a good guy. He wouldn't do that... And my sister..."

My sister

The split second she saw, before finding herself here. Her sister. So angry at the one who'd hurt her. So angry. Protective. She'd hurt him. She'd stopped him from killing her, delivering the final blow.

"She isn't evil! She saved me! She saved us all! I would be dead now without her! And you would have no more hope, you would have no more light, you would have nothing to believe in."

She continues, staring at Faina in a hard manner.

"I would be dead and you would be without hope, our soldiers would be dead, our champion would be dead, they'd all be dead if it wasn't for her! Moon, Alexsei, the healer woman, the creepy dragoness, Fiona, the prince, Moon, Gennadi, me, you, Windia, the Boil, everyone!"

"How can you ask me to condemn her just because she wields terribly power to protect? Just because she is under the sway of something far more powerful and sinister than her? Because her power could swing the other way and bring ruin and destruction of unimaginable proportions?"

"If you ask me to kill her, you would have to ask me to kill myself, and my brother. And the de Windias would finally plague this world no more! That's what everyone wants anyway! We're all too scary and powerful to leave alive! Isn't that it!?"

Faina: "Yes. That is what the world wants, what Windia wants."

Her hands cup Ise's face, and she sighs, not knowing how to say something so harsh... "But you can be spared. You will be spared, because you are our weapon. Iselsis... they are like you. They have monsters inside them. Those monsters will burn Windia. They will, and there is only one thing you can do, stop them. If you remember, what you saw, you will be able to."

"If you remember what you saw you will realise why you have to stop them..."

Iselsis: She pushes away, and her wings are finally capable of carrying her again.

"No!", she screams, "I will not give up on her because it would be like giving up on myself! And the real you would never ask me to unless I had no doubt she was evil! You're nothing but my own wretched mind tormenting me with the fear that you'll abandon me if I don't do what they tell me to!"

Faina: "Would the real me tell you to close your eyes? Not to remember, Izabella?"

"Not to save Windia?"

????: She flies away... and hits someone behind her, a shadowed, horned figure wih eyes that pulse in orange...

"It is important, Iselsis."

Iselsis: "I can save both.", and those are her last words. She would not fail to protect anything again, not her home, not her family, not herself.

????: "You will not be able to."

"It is impossible."
"You have to stop them."
You have to remember."
"You have to save Windia."
"You have to."

Faina holds her down, as does the magus of the magic university, and her master, and all others, the demon trying to come for her aid, but unable to... as they call their chorus, the dream begins to unravel...

... streams of burning light begin to crash through the layers, ripping it like fire breaks through a sheet of paper...breaking her world, as they hold Iselsis down, pushing her towards the light... holding all of her limbs, holding all of her ego, as she begins to see the shape in the light, as she begins to understand.... and this understanding burns. It begins to rip her apart, worse than it had before... it begins to rip her soul apart, burn it in the light, replacing it...

Replacing her...

"You have to."

Ryshassa: The sky opens up from above. And from it pours a shower of purple blossom butterflies that Iselsis remembers from the battle just before. They belonged to a healer. The healer who had sung a sweet gentle song to counteract the soul-crushing dirge of the choirboys the dead employed -- or the abomination that had been crafted of them.

She descends from above, as if flying. And sure enough she is, on butterfly wings of stained glass radiating sunset shades as they filter the blinding light all around them. Through her wings the light is softer, gentler, calmer, enough that Iselsis can gaze up to the figure of the healer and see her without squinting her eyes.

She is dark-haired and pale, and wears a kimono of pure, lily white fabric, cinched by an obi of shimmering gold that extends all the way from her waist up into the distant sky, as if it anchors her somewhere beyond. Somewhere important.

"Hurry!" the healer insists, beckoning to Iselsis and stretching out her hands as she hovers close. "You must return before it is too late!"

Iselsis: Wait. That one can't be in my dreams. I don't even know her.

Making a snap judgement call she reaches her hands out to the healer woman, trying to latch on and struggling with all her might, but the bodies are dragging her down. Down to somewhere she doesn't want to go.

"Help me! They're dragging me down!"

Fingertips brush, but again she's drug down before she can latch on, closer and closer to the abyss that apparantly awaits her.

????: There is no darkness within. Only light. A burning bright light that fills it all with the winds, the killing winds that cut through Ryshassa's conscience... even as she sees the figures, now indistinct, dragging the demon-girl towards the burning light.... streams of it breaking from the ground, until there is no ground, just a pool of brilliance... a pool of brilliance and words, and memories, filling Iselsis with a voice not her own...

"You must remember" the voice calls, in a voice unlike any either women have ever heard before...

Ryshassa: Ryshassa snatches out at the hands offered to her, touches a fingertip, then air.

No--! What is this? I've never seen anything like this!

Her wings strain, as if she is reaching the very limits of the wide band of Essence that holds her anchored to the outside world. The band thins out, several fibers of it snapping with the effort, but it brings Ryshassa just that much closer to Iselsis... and the abyss of blinding burning light that threatens to engulf her.

Is this... you? No! It will unmake you!

"Stop!" Ryshassa cries, at the figures, at the oppresive light she does not understand but feels instinctively she should not give into. "You will not have her while I still breathe! "

Blossom-flies shower from the wings that bear her aloft. They surround Iselsis in a feather soft cocoon, cradling her with the warmth of a mother's arms, even as they push her from behind, helping to lift her higher, away from the mysterious and sinister influences from below.

And in the healer's hands coalesce the Caduceus Curatoris, her iconic golden staff twined with serpents and topped with a crown of wings. With its added length she reaches out to Iselsis again, beckons the other woman to hold on, and hold on tight!

Iselsis: "I will not remember! ", she screams in defiance at the abyss, and as she's surrounded by what makes up Ryshy's wings she manages to pry one arm loose, and elbows one of the figures, she kicks another with her newly found space to move, and as soon as she's shaking a few beats her devil wings furiously, trying to reach the woman above.

She reaches...

And the hand wraps around the lower end of the staff, holding on tightly, for dear life.

"Lady, get me out of here!", still kicking to keep the figures away from her, from dragging her back.

Ryshassa: As soon as the contact is made Ryshassa wastes no more time. Her butterfly wings lift -- carrying her and Iselsis to the opposite threshold of the dreamscape, up and up and up, as the cord of Essence tying her on the side of consciousness reels them in. Slowly at first, then faster, and faster, the sky becoming a blur of indistinct colors as they rush up to meet it as if they are falling in reverse.

"I have her," she hears Ryshassa saying, her voice strained and faint as if from a great distance, prompting Iselsis to wonder at first if the healer has let her go, back into that morass of whatever it was that wanted to be but was not her. "Just ...a little... more..."

Then, without reason or explanation, the sensation of both flying and falling is suddenly and irrevocably gone. In its place is a comforting stillness, a sense of safety and warmth which Iselsis partly attributes to the pressure of something soft and yielding at her back. A bed? The winds that had whipped about her are still now, and she feels that she is not alone, that there are people waiting for her in the room she has now been transported to. Or awakened to.

Selina de Windia: She was pacing. She always tends to pace, with more and more of an intensity when matters she can affect come to a head. Selina tried to keep it relatively unobtrusive, but at this stage, it is not something she can rightly help.

But now, she is standing, as if caught in the middle of pacing about one end of the room (which is exactly what she was doing), gaze focused on her sister. The turquoise eyes are no longer alight as they were during the battle, though the unbuttoned greatcoat cloaking the rest of her attire is only dusted off.

Her stare is one of intense interest, and focus.

Iselsis: She wakes up.

She then looks around the room and those gathered there, and croaks, "I need a fucking cigarette... and maybe a glass of water."

Selina de Windia: Almost instantly, the intensity of Selina's gaze drops off, retreating as she sees that her sister is reasonably ok. More then reasonably, if she wants to smoke.

Nodding a head to Ryshassa, the Windian moves to the other side of the bed, not getting in the healer's way in case something else needs to be done, and cocks an eyebrow at her sister. "So I take it you feel better then?"

Ryshassa: Ryshassa rests back on the chair she has pulled up near the bedside. This was tiring work. Even more so than the physical aspect of the healing, and her skin already bears the bruises and marks of that. Bruises that will soon fade, only to be replaced by more. So many to heal, so many to soothe. War has brought her much purpose, but at the same time her heart weeps that these wounded must suffer at all.

She tries not to smile, at Iselsis's first request upon waking. She does not have any cigarettes handy, but water is something that she had anticipated, The healer reaches out for the nearby pitcher and pours a fresh cold glass, handing it to Iselsis as she awakens. "Good. I'm glad you made it, Iselsis. And I apologize, but I am no smoker..."

Iselsis: She takes the glass of water and manages to get some down, which does her voice a lot of good, apparantly, as she answers her sister.

"No.", she states. She looks at Ryshy expectantly to explain in some way, shape or form. She sure as hell couldn't explain what just happened herself, trapped in her own dreams like that, and her own mind trying to kill her.

Ryshassa: As Iselsis takes the glass, Ryshassa acknowledges the nod Selina gives her. She had some curious questions for the black-winged woman, but this wasn't quite the time to say them, either. Not yet.

Iselsis gives her a pointed glance, and she gathers her thought a moment, smoothing her hands over a kimono that is, in this consciousness, a dusky rose scattered with a pattern of open fans and paler pink peach blossom flowers. She has bathed during her five hours or so of regeneration and recovery, and now wears her dark hair bound up in a single twist held firm by a fan-shaped comb, the many pleats of the fan formed in the shape of crane wings.

"I am unsure how to explain what had happened. Her dreams were certainly not restful as you can see." The rumpled, sweat soaked sheets spoke for themselves. "By the time I had arrived, her dreamscape was collapsing into a bright and oppressive light. There were figures there, hands dragging her down into it, and I just barely managed to pull her out."

"It was if whoever, or whatever was there, wanted her to burn in that light. To be dissolved in it. I... I have no idea what it might mean."

Selina de Windia: It is an odd thing for Selina, the Dark Angel, to feel awkward in the presence of others. Even when she is not in control of the situation, she does not have this feeling of being...out of her paradigm. But it has happened before -- with Vorpal and a few others...though she usually had other things to focus on, with them. And they were not blood family.

A lover is different, in a way.

They especially were not blood family she had betrayed. Ruined.

"I see." Ryshassa's statement gives her something else to focus on, for the moment. "I could hazard a guess as to what it was. But let's not darken the moment so."

"No smokes on me, sadly. Or not so sadly."

Iselsis: ... "So did we win? ... That's the second time I've had to ask that in a way too short period of time. In fact, unconsciousness seems to happy to me too often lately.", she remarks.

Alexsei Krauser: Amazing, how one moment one can be dancing on the verge of death and the next enjoying breakfazt as if nothing had ever happened. Such is the way of life...

Walking is still not a very graceful affair for him - he had been heald of his wounds by his wife earlier, of course, but soreness still remained. Coming back from near-fatal wounds was no small business, after all, albeit one he was familiar with.

But then again, who better to understand the very nature and essence of Death other than one who flirted with it on so many occasions?

His footsteps carry him to the room where Iselsis is resting, wanting to check on the condition of the woman who had so selflessly helped him during the battle of the Spire. Having mentioned his visit to Ryshassa, he had taken care of some business before finally passing by, a few freshly arranged blossoms in hand. Making certain his location is the right one, he raps his kuckles on the door a few times, then politely opens the door and peers inside.

"Ah, I see you are alredy awake, little one. I am glad to see you among us once more." He smiles warmly, glad to see the demon-woman at least conscious once again. He takes one step into the room, now noticing its two other occupants - his wife, Ryshassa, brought there to tend to the wounded, as well as the lady who had rend the General asunder - the one who called herself Ausra.

"Ah, Ryshassa, and lady Ausra..." He wondered what reason would unite them once more, they who had found themselves ensanred by Laken Knute's idea of a 'birthday party' a few years ago. He had not expected to see her again in these circumstances... Especially not here. The motivations of the woman remained a mystery to him, but they were a mystery he would not delve in in this very moment.

"I hope I am not interrupting anything important... I only wished to see how lady Iselsis fared, as well as bringing her this humble gift for her speedy recovery..." He puts forward the flowers he had brought, peonies and magnolia, an arrangement of whites and purples. "Of course, if I am interrupting anything..." He gestures towards the door, implying his polite withdrawal if the circumstances were not favorable to his arrival.

Ryshassa: Ryshassa closes her eyes, trying to remember what else she had seen. Would Iselsis want her to speak of those things?

There had been a voice, telling Iselsis to remember. Remember what? Ryshassa had no idea. There had been a demon there, too, or what she assumed had to be a demon. a shadowed figure with horns and eyes or orange. But the black-winged woman (whom she had by now heard called nothing that resembled "Ausra", except by Alexsei) did not seem to want to hear more of it now.

It worries her, though. But she keeps her silence.

"The General is dead now, if that constitutes victory to you. As are most of his minions. Including the one that nearly struck you down."

Ryshassa turns, a smile on her lips now, as Alexsei enters the room. The sight of the flowers brightens her even more, even though they are not for her. "Beloved. Yes, she has just recently awakened." Though she looks quite heartened to see him, Alexsei knows well the strained look in her eyes that her smile hides. The next couple days would be long ones for her indeed.

"I suppose I should introduce myself properly, though," and she turns to Iselsis, giving a short respectful bow of her head. "I am the healer Ryshassa Krauser... I believe you and my husband have met, albiet on the battlefield..."

Iselsis: She scratches her head as she takes the flowers. Partly because Ryshy's explanation, well, explained a lot, and partly because she had no idea what to do with flowers. It wasn't like anyone had ever given her any that weren't stuck in her hair.

"Pleased to meet you. Yes, we have. We share a profession, apparantly."

She looks around again at the people in the room. A bit overwhelmed at all the attention.

"It's nice to see people worry and care so much.", glancing at her sister who'd started acting cold the minute she woke up.

Ryshassa: "Don't speak so ill of her," Ryshassa says gently, her eyes flickering to the other woman that she wasn't sure was called Ausra at all any more, "she was just as worried as the rest of us. If not more so." This she says as certainly as if she had heard Selina say it out loud.

"Everyone shows it differently, is all." Then she grows quiet, wondering whether she is overstepping her bounds with two people that seem to know each other better than she knows them.

Selina de Windia: "Aine Blackwater." She replies to the person she now knows is a Sidereal with another faint nod, then looks back to her sister. "We did win, thanks to everyone's efforts. For now anyway."

And her sister's comment puts it to a head. Despite her feelings of awkwardness, Selina is a person who is not accustomed to letting those kinds of comments go unanswered.

So she sits down on the bed, leans over to Izabella, and scoops her up in a hug, ignoring whatever protests she may give. And giggles faintly.

"Silly."

Iselsis: If she weren't red already, she would've blushed. Of course, the embaressment was still pretty clear to see, as her bigger sister hugs her, arms dangling limply in a sort of surprise state of shock.

"I guess you were worried, huh... I saw what you did to that man who hurt me."

"... Thanks for saving my life.", her gaze lifts and drifts over Alexsei, and then Ryshy as well. "You two, too. Guess I got way in over my head, huh?", she confesses reluctantly.

Ryshassa: Now Ryshassa smiles wider, watching the two together, wondering what relation they might have to one another. "You see. It is just as I said," she says merrily.

Aine, now? Well, I might as well play along.

"Please, Iselsis, it is my life's work and my calling to do just that. Saving llives. But your gratefulness is much appreciated." Thus Ryshy accepts the thanks with but a humble inclination of her head.

"I think that we were all nearly in over our head," she remarks thoughtfully after a moment. "You should have seen me by the end of it."

"But we survived." Not everyone. Many had died. But we, the four of us here, and Cael and the Pale Angel and even noble Ice, her steed, have survived.

And Gennadi... but where has that silly man gone off to now?

Selina de Windia: "You did what you had to in the battle, as did the rest of us. And you did well. We all nearly died there." Selina says with a squeeze, then she lets the hug go, sitting back up, on the side of the bed.

"My real name...has a problem related to how I am. Aliases will have to do for now." She says, to all gathered in the room. "But I am known as the Dark Angel, to those who know the story."

Alexsei Krauser: A smile plays on his lips as the black winged woman introduces herself, inclined his head again. "Lady Aine Blackwater it is, then. Pleased to make your acquaintance... once again." And she... remembered me, after all these years... But she is indeed more than it would appear, this angel of black feathers and turquoise eyes.

He focuses his attention to the injured woman, nodding to her politely. "I am Alexsei Krauser, yes. And it is a pleasure to be introduced properly, after the commotion has finally abated...

He watches with a smile on his lips as the other woman reaches over and hugs Iselsis... And so they are acquaintances... I see...

He ponderes for a moment as Iselsis' words, then shakes his head. "You fought just like the rest of us. Many of us did not make it - and many of us almost were gravely injured... Me included." He gives a side glance to Ryshassa, the reason why many of them managed to make it past the unforgiving assaults of the General's army. "Just like lady... Aine mentionned, this victory was a team effort - and you were part of this team, Iselsis. I am merely glad that I did not see you off before the Gate closed... Seeing you safe and sound warms my heart - especially since we will probably have more to talk about in the future, if you fancy it."

He listens to Selina's explanation, then nods slowly, his mind taking in the repercussions of this revelation - one he had considered after their last battle, but one he was not yet certain of.

And so, she is the Dark Angel.
Angels and Demons, Light and Darkness, Past and Future...
This war was getting more intriguing and complicated by the day.

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