alex+evie+rei; monsters

[fadedsoldier]

Who: Alexander, Eveline & Reilanin
When: The last week of January
Where: Abandoned house on Willow St
Rating & Warnings: PG-13, murder



Initiates, with their standard grey garb, were easy to identify but increasingly difficult to flag down. The rising death toll had them wary, and rightfully so. Still, all he needed was a second of eye contact and they were his. She was a pretty one, far prettier than Isley, a she because Alex figured the would-be Occia might respond more favorably to one of the same sex. He sent her off on her mission, to summon Evie to the abandoned house on Willow Street under the pretense of helping her with two abandoned babes, then sat on an area of intact flooring, playing with the ends of the scarf Ravindra had gifted him as he and the other occupant of the house waited.

There was a creaky upstairs-more a loft, really- that she had set about exploring, perhaps enticed by some scent there, perhaps uncomfortable in Alex's proximity since their brief discussion over the ledgers. He seemed almost more her creation than Tansel, having taken to her advice with a sort of desperation she had been almost pleased to see. What would it have been like, she wondered, if she'd had someone to guide her? To reassure her? But it was useless to think those kinds of thoughts. Regret was a human emotion. Had she not already proven how inhuman she was?

Her footsteps from time to time could be heard from the upstairs area, the cold and dust coming from the floorboards to settle below. She was curious to see what would happen, but she had no desire to settle in one spot as Alex had, unless called for.

Alex had been right. Evie had been more accepting of the female initiate. Too trusting and too dumb, she didn't even notice if perhaps the other initiate's demeanor was different or off. She simply followed her through the streets of Tyrol, wanting to help.

Evie knew it was wrong to want a wig to cover up her newly blessed hair, but at the stares she drew while she walked, she couldn't help wanting one. She missed her anonymity. She liked being overlooked. More and more, she knew she was a follower and not a leader, but... Cita had spoken, and she would never disobey Him. He saw more in her than she knew she had, and she should be grateful, she reminded herself again.

When the other girl stopped in front of the abandoned house on Willow street, Evie looked up at in trepidation. A sudden chill came over her. "Here?" she asked. At the nod she received, the former redhead tried not shrink back. This wasn't any worse than the Grounds, and Evie had been there plenty of times. What made this different?

Taking slow, careful steps into the house, she looked around while listening hard for cries more than anything else. "Where--where are they?"

The initiate closed the door behind them. "Perhaps they've already passed," she murmured, fingers hovering over her lips. Holding her lantern out, as the boarded windows prevented the light of the sunset to pass through with adequate visibility, she started forward, passing what used to be a cooking area into a smaller room, perhaps, once, a bedroom or a study.

There was no child there, of course. Dust and spider webs, the skeleton of a long deceased rat, but no sign of the babes anywhere. If Evie made to exit, though, she'd find the initiate blocking the only way out, standing in the doorway with a blank look on her face.

Without sound, Alex appeared behind her, his steps light and noiseless. He leaned over the initiate's shoulder and into her ear whispered, "Thank you, Laurel."

Laurel made no response, but then, she wasn't meant to do anything other than provide Evie with enough light to see.

Straightening, Alex turned his attention to the former redhead. Upon seeing her nearly white head of hair, his smile faltered into something sadder.

"Hello, Isley."

From the moment the door opened Reilanin knew that whatever it was Alex had planned, it had begun. She wondered, idly, how it would play out, her curiousity piqued by the shakiness in the young girl's voice. She'd had Alex let her stare at the initiate he'd overtaken for a moment. What was it like, she wondered, that sort of blankness? Did the girl's conscious squirm somewhere behind those lightless eyes? Reilanin had grown more and more curious the more she thought on it, but then, they'd had to let her go, and she wondered still...

Alex spoke. Her ear twitched at his voice in the silence of the place. Winter had made everything quiet, people holed up in their houses when not out on errands. She walked down the stairs slowly, a creak here, a snap there, her presence known by the sound of her footsteps, heavier thanks to the boots she had taken from the Hour before her departure. But she said nothing, only watched, eyes luminous in the dim light.

Like a fool, Evie followed Laurel into the room without question and without doubt. What cause or reason did she have to think that another Initiate would lead her to harm? "I don't s--" She broke off abruptly, almost jumping in surprise at the new voice.

Her eyes wide, she stared as she recognized the man behind her fellow Civitas. "Wh-what--... Mr. Bro--" Her voice had been shocked and confused until she remembered that no, he wasn't Mr. Brown. He wasn't human. Vampire. Other. Evie quickly looked at Laurel and gasped. "Wha--what?" What have you done, she wanted to say, wanted to accuse but couldn't find the voice to do so. Why had she been brought here? What was going on?

Fear filled her lungs, and she couldn't find the air to scream. At the sounds of footsteps and the appearance of a new strange woman, Evie's green eyes grew even larger. Would she die tonight? "What do you want?" she whispered.

"To see if the rumors are true," he replied calmly. "But of course they are. That is our city, isn't it?"

"No Cancellari?" Reilanin asked, distracted, head lifted and eyes elsewhere as though seeing beyond the walls of the house. "They must not know what to do with her yet. For her to have come so easily."

Inching back with every word both said, she couldn't look away from either of them even if she desperately wanted to look for a way to escape. Why did they seem so dangerous when they sounded so calm, so distracted? What would they do if she screamed? Was there anyone around to hear her?

"C-Can I leave?" I don't want to be here. "You--you've seen me."

"No, but they'll do something soon," he murmured, eyes flicking towards Reilanin for a second before alighting on Evie. "Do you look forward to it? Becoming an Occia."

Evie took a deep breath before answering. "If He has chosen me for His bride, I am more than honored and will do my best not let anyone down," she said seriously. She meant every word, but it was almost a rote answer. She was scared thinking about it even without two Others luring her out and scaring her senseless.

"Why do you want to know?" Defensiveness crept into her voice.

It was a text book answer, but the only sign of disapproval it garnered was a temporary frown. Then his lips went flat. "Are you willing to shoulder the responsibilities of that title?"

"The Occia is a pitiable creature," she said, stepping down the last few stairs, each steady footfall like a nail in a coffin. "Removed from anyone she might call friend. Placed upon a pedestal. Adored, revered... used, manipulated, hated... and cast aside when the next candidate appears. I have heard things of the old occias." She continued to walk, though she kept her distance, pacing the room. "Many kill themselves. Not directly after, some of them. It's simply a matter of time. Of course, You might become the True Bride, but..."

But, after what had happened, would she want that? Would she accept, believe, that her god would come after they had been fooled once already?

"Yes," she answered Alex resolutely. "Of course I am." What else could she do? She couldn't run. She wouldn't run. The initiate had been devastated when the former Occia left. Evie couldn't leave the Citadel. During the last couple of weeks, she had stared at her ledger with her quill poised over it, wanting to write to Moirine. What do I do? she ached to write, but she knew the older girl left for a reason--even if she didn't know why.

Evie pressed her lips together at Reilanin's speech, and her hands curled into small fists at her side. Offense radiated off her. "You are--" she broke off; her words had only come out as a sharp whisper. For the moment, her anger overrode her usual cowardice. "You are wrong!" As soon as the outburst ended, though, she shrunk back, scared again. Still, how dare that Other insult the name of the Occia? Even if her hair weren't changing colors, she wouldn't abide it. It was blasphemy.

His brows rose at her outburst, however short-lived it may have been. What admirable dedication. A pity it was for something like the Citadel and its followers. Her feelings seemed genuine. No, they were genuine.

Emotions were only part of the equation, though.

"Then, as the bride of your lord, you must abhor those like ourselves," he said softly, his hand coming to rest on Laurel's shoulder. The girl made no reaction, her gaze still as if it were fixed on something beyond. "We who are twisted by the beliefs of the people. You, too."

Yes, he was calling her a falsity.

His hand slid up Laurel's neck. The initiate exposed her jugular in response to the light pressure. "Do you really believe Cita has changed your hair?" he asked, his tone at once several degrees harsher than he had ever spoken to her.

She was silent again, having almost begun to smile at the girl's outburst. But Alex's words quieted anything she might have said in turn, and she stared at her again, waiting for her answer to Alexander's statements. It didn't seem she disagreed at all with him.

Her eyes turned to Alex and the initiate, and she felt things slowing down again. He was going to do this, wasn't he? But he was going to do it with or without her, she knew. Still, she could not help but feel she had ruined him somehow. She turned her eyes away from all of them, listening in case anyone came up to the house.

"Yes, I do," she said slowly, not quite understanding why Alex was saying something he already knew. It took her a few precious moments too long to realize the grave insult the vampire slung her way. Her mouth started to open in outrage before it snapped shut, and her eyes widened in terror.

"Wh-what are you doing?" It came out in a whisper. Her eyes were glued to the sight of the initiate baring her neck. "Let her go," she pleaded, trembling. "P-please. Let her go." What had she done to deserve this? Either of the initiates. "Please." Let me go, too.

"You would take her place?"

Every part of Evie screamed no. She had scrambled backwards until her back hit the wall, and her head started to turn left before she realized and froze. Slowly, she forced her head to nod slowly. "Yes," she whispered. It was what the Citadel taught. Again and again, she repeated in her mind, it's what the Citadel teaches.

She closed her eyes and nodded again. "I would."

His stare bore through Evie's skull, expression mixed. Disappointment, disgust, frustration. Sympathy, too, but fractional in comparison. She was an adult, after all. Finally, a reluctant acceptance that melted into a cold, skeptical shadow of a smile.

She wouldn't.

Without taking his eyes off of Evie, Alex descended on the initiate's throat. A short wince was the only reaction Laurel gave to the sensation of being bit.

"Do you know," Reilanin said as Alex stared at Evie, her voice even, factual, blending into the dimly lit room, "that there are at least three different effects from a vampire's bite, traditionally speaking? The first is enthrallment. A desire to be bitten again. Like a lover's kiss." She walked quietly to one side in the darkness. "The second is death. People don't last long when they've been drained of blood."

Her voice was quiet, almost a whisper, as Alex's fangs punctured Laurel's throat. "You don't want to know about the third."

Evie barely registered Reilanin's words; most of her fear and attention was focused on Alex. What she knew of was mostly the second and third. She didn't like hearing about the first any more than the other two.

Her scream when the vampire sunk his fangs into the initiate's throat was shrill but short-lived. It cut off abruptly as Evie sunk to the floor, huddling. She shut her eyes and covered her ears with her hands, vehemently shaking her head. After everything he had said, she thought. After everything he said. They were all lies. Lies.

How could he? How could he? How could he? How could he how could he howcouldhe howcouldhe.

She choked on a sob, shaking and whimpering as tears rolled down her face.

Alex was genuinely surprised at Reilanin's actions. He wondered if she enjoyed pushing the girl further, or if she was simply stating information she deemed relevant to share. The latter seemed more likely, but he wasn't afraid to admit that he did not understand the ins and outs of Reilanin's character.

Laurel's eyes widened just a bit in response to Evie's scream, but it was an eerie contrast to the faint smile on her lips. The arm holding the lantern gradually fell to her side as Alex drained the blood out of her and her breathing grew more labored. It wasn't until her supplies were dangerously low that her fingers began to twitch, her knee jerked, and her shoulders twisted with remarkable slowness in a sorry attempt to disengage.

That was when Alex broke the spell. There wasn't much for Laurel to return to -- her death was assured. It was a slow awakening. She didn't recognize Evie, seeing only a huddled mess of white on the floor, but then her instincts took over and she began to thrash, her motions violent, but weak. He brought his other hand to grip her shoulder, keeping her firmly in place despite the tearing at her neck caused by her actions.

She cried and gasped for breath and cried some more. And then she died.

"Ah," Reilanin said softly. "You missed it."

When she heard Laurel thrash and cry out, Evie screwed her eyes shut even more and pressed her hands against her ears even harder. Her whole face was scrunched up in an expression of pain and fear. She couldn't watch this; she couldn't hear this. She couldn't.

Her body trembled from the mental effort Evie gave to reject the reality happening in front of her. She couldn't do anything. She was too afraid to. Her tremors stilled when she heard sudden silence and then the woman speak. No.

She couldn't keep her eyes shut forever, but she wanted to. Slowly, she opened her eyes, bracing for a horrid sight. When she saw how deathly pale the other initiate was, Evie let out a cry, and more tears found their way down her face.

"Y-you... monster." Her voice was quiet but forceful. Nothing would change her mind now.

Laurel had the mind to hold onto the lantern, perhaps thinking it a weapon, but with her death it slipped from her fingertips. With deft hands, Alex dipped down to catch it, releasing the initiate in the process. Her body crumpled to the floor with a dull thud.

A light hiss was the only sound he made before he set it down, removing the heat from his palm. "Am I the monster," he wondered, not yet lifting from his crouch, "when it was your imagination that contributed to what I am now?"

He lifted his head, once again staring directly at Evie. There was blood smeared around his mouth from Laurel's struggle and zero sympathy in his eyes.

Reilanin waited a moment, waited to see what would happen, then stepped quietly over, unnoticed between the two, and crouched down next to the dead girl, next to Alex, taking up the lantern and moving it aside. She touched Laurel's head gently, claws in her hair, her expression unreadable. Longing, perhaps, though through envy or hunger was hard to say.

"She will not listen, Alex," she said softly to him, her eyes still on the floor and the dead girl lying on it, twisting her fingers into the girl's hair. "This is foolishness."

Terror had taken over to the point that now all she could do was lash out. Shaking, shivering, and begging got her nothing. Her eyes crazed, she said heatedly, "Yes. You are." Whatever Alex had been trying to say, she couldn't hear it. She wouldn't understand it. He was the one who had done the murder tonight and no one else. "You killed her in cold blood." Laurel did not deserve to die this way.

She shut her eyes for a quick prayer for the dead and opened her eyes to see Reilanin's hand wrapped in the initiate's hair. "What are you doing?" Her voice cracked on the last word. "Stop!" she pleaded.

His only response to Reilanin was agreement, but the guilt that he felt kept him from airing it. Perhaps there would be two murders tonight, but in Evie's disconnect between her philosophies and her actions Alex put little faith.

Ignoring Evie's shrieks, he rummaged in the inside of his coat and produced a wooden stake. He had not mentioned it so blatantly to Reilanin earlier, but she was quick. Surely she had guessed where he was going with this long before. After all, if he died before her...

Now ignoring the second source of guilt, a dual betrayal and loyalty, depending on how one twisted it, to Rayna, Ravindra and Amelia, Alex held the stake out to Evie.

Reilanin looked up at Evie's protest, fingers still in Laurel's hair, before twisting a tendril about her finger and letting it go, not generally one to obey such orders but also not in the mood for listening to such high decible level shrieking. It was Alex's motion that caught her attention.

of course she'd been able to smell the wood, but it was all around them, nothing she would have picked up immediately. When she saw it, she stared at it, her expression shifting into something finally recognizable, but she looked away and stood, her back to him as she stepped aside, removing herself from the situation without a word spoken.

The small relief she felt when Reilanin released her hold was gone the second Alex took out the stake. Her eyes widened until they could no more when she finally understood what Alex meant. "No," she said, almost inaudible. "No," she said louder, shaking her head once.

"I don't understand you." He had just killed in cold blood. He had just killed in cold blood. What was he thinking now? No, she didn't understand.

She wrapped her arms tight around herself, wanting more than she ever had before to be back in the Citadel.

He caught Reilanin's movement out of the corner of his eye. It only served to drive the guilt in deeper.

He was taking the coward's way out. No one was left to him. Catherine was dead. Reilanin would not flee her death. Ravindra was with his daughter. What would they think of him now? It was a question he often refused to dwell on. What state of madness would he be in upon their return? That question was even worse. The possibility that he could be so far gone as to regard even Amelia and Ravindra has prey truly frightened Alex. And to think that he had been so angry at Ravindra for being scared of him...

Then there was Rayna. Oh, he had become such a disappointment to her, both as a friend and as a maker. If he wanted Rayna to survive, he had to set an example. She absolutely could not taste human blood, or she risked becoming as monstrous as himself. She would become a danger to Jon and Mirza. Alex couldn't stomach the thought.

Finally, his remaining family. He couldn't return to his siblings in Blomgren. He was a threat to all of them. Besides, it was unlikely that Tyrol would allow him to remain away for long. Distance was impossible.

So he was using Evie. It was a sickening action, but one Alex did not entirely regret. He was, after all, angry with her blind devotion to Citadel, and if she had the gall to turn a blind eye towards the whole picture of why there were monsters like he and Reilanin, then he had the determination to force her to look at it.

Or at least try.

"No?" he echoed, smiling faintly. "But you made me. Are you not the next Occia? Have I not committed a sin in front of your eyes?"

Made him? A flash of anger went through her before she shook her head. "No," she repeated. She would n-- No, she did not know how to use force, could not bring herself to kill. Even if he were a monster, an abomination, a stain of darkness against Cita's light... Evie could not kill him, as much as she thought he should be punished for all his sins. At least not by her own hands. "I did not make you." She would deny that every time.

"W-would you submit to the Citadel or the Guard?" She held more trust in the Citadel, but she had no bravery of which to speak to push for it. Even now, there was doubt and uncertainty on top of her fear. There was zero faith within Evie to think that Alex would do the lawful thing. He was playing a game with her, surely.

It was only a question of how long would he toy with her before tiring of it and would she survive to see the end now? Next Occia or not, all her thoughts were simply focused on if she would even get to leave the decrepit house alive. Her racing heartbeat told her no.

Submit to the Citadel or the Guard--? The absurdity of the question elicited a silent laugh out of him. "You're a coward, Evie Isley," he said, twirling the stake between his fingers. "Don't you care about your sister?"

He thought to toe the body, but couldn't bring himself to do it.

"She is little more than a dumb child, Alexander," she said softly, over her shoulder, her back still turned. The sound of the girl's heart beating, quick and fast like a rabbit's, was making her stomach flutter, and she swallowed convulsively, trying not to think about the scent of blood still lingering in the room. "Like the one before her. She cannot think beyond herself. Whatever you are going to do," she said, her straight shoulders not as straight this time around, "hurry and do it. I can only suffer so much of this idiocy."

A coward a coward a coward. Yes, Evie was a coward, but she would rather be a coward than kill. So far, that was one of the things that separated her from them. If she killed him, it would be a righteous kill, but still she couldn't.

"Of course I do." Her voice was quavering, but there was an undertone of anger. Angry and afraid. That was all she felt then. "I'll report you." If you let me live, she left unspoken.

Her eyes flashed at Reilanin's words. She knew she wasn't smart, but the Other's words gained no favors. "What more do you want?" More tears sprung to her eyes. As riled as she was, it was wearing at her nerves. When would they finally cast her aside?

Alex faltered at Reilanin's tone. He paused to look at her, and his heart twisted.

"I'm sorry," Alex whispered, feeling especially despicable at that moment. Placing his hand on her shoulder, he pressed a soft kiss to her temple, then withdrew.

When he turned his attention back to Evie, it was with a step forward and a hardened expression. "You won't have the chance to report anything," he said flatly. "Do you think I would let you leave so freely? Your choices are two: kill me, or become like me." He took another step forward. "Decide."

It was a lie, of course. Alex wouldn't dream of turning Evie, but he was loathe to repeat what he had done with Laurel. He almost wished Reilanin would kill him instead, but no. No. She was the next Occia.

(No, but she was only a few years younger than Amelia--)

Evie flinched when he took a step forward. "I'd rather have you kill me," she whispered, the words coming out before she could think about them. They were true, though. Even if she was on the edge of becoming the next Occia, if she had truly been chosen... there would be another girl to be chosen after her. A better girl, surely. She had no illusions about being the Final Bride; she knew she wasn't.

No matter what happened, it would do the Citadel no good. She could not kill and be a good Occia; she could not be an Other and be the Occia. Dying was the lesser evil. (It was also the coward's way out, but what was she but one?)

A jolt of anger ran through him - frustrated that she wouldn't do as told, guilty for what he was forcing them both to witness and do - but it was that anger that spurred him into action.

Alex closed the gap between them and grabbed Evie's chin, forcing her to lock eyes with him. "Kill me."

His hand dropped away and found hers. He cupped her hand, placing the stake into her palm and covering her fingers over it with his other hand. "Please."

"It's not that simple," she mumbled to herself. It was her heartbeat now that was racing, her breath she fought to keep steady, her eyes to keep averted from the scene behind her. Alex's kiss to her temple burned from the cold of his lips and it made her shiver uncontrollably.

It wasn't that simple. It couldn't be. It wasn't that simple and it wasn't fair, to simply ask and expect to receive something like this. She'd been waiting for years for things to end- death coudn't be as simple as to simply demand it and have it done.

Like many of her resolves, she felt her decision to keep her back turned wavering and she turned back. Ah, didn't vampires turn to dust when they died? It would not be good of her, she thought, to have her last look of him be a quick glance away. She had not been much good to him, had she? Without realizing, she stood and watched, herself expectant and waiting, a strange sort of approval, of letting go.

A small scream escaped from Evie when Alex broke into her personal space. "Wha--" Her voice died in her throat when their eyes locked. Her arms dropped limply to her side, and her mind blanked. She was no longer as afraid as she was. A part of her was still panicking desperately, but her body did not do anything. Her more forefront thoughts and wants weren't of running away anymore.

Her hand wrapped around the stake obediently. Yes, killing the man in front of her seemed like a good idea. Why didn't she want to do it before?

She drew back her hand slowly. There was no fervor or vehemence when she drove the stake into the vampire's chest, only obedience. However, even a vampire's glamour could not change what little strength she had to something more, and the stake probably did not enter as smoothly or deeply as clean death required.

It was all beginning to bubble to the surface as she watched the pathetic display in front of her, and instead of feeling above it felt herself mired in it. Did the stake go in? Yes, but it wouldn't kill him. "Idiot," she said distantly. How could he have ever thought she'd be able to do it? "Fool." Why had he thought this was a good idea at all? And why had she gone along with it?

She stepped forward and reached out, taking Evie's hand, slipping her fingers from the wooden stake with some effort- while she might not have much strength, her grip was nothing short of troublesome, her free hand on Evie's shoulder to gently push her away as she worked the girl's fingers loose.

"Let her go, Alexander," she said, her voice level, her hands steady, her heart about to burst. "Don't make her a monster, too."

"She is a monster!" he cried out unexpectedly, eyes clenched shut from the pain of being stabbed. "This whole city-- This whole city!" It sounded as if he were mere seconds from breaking down into a sobbing fit. The emotion in his voice was enough to tell it wasn't only the stake that had snapped him.

He opened his eyes, pleading. "Reilanin," he rasped, sounding very much the part of a man who knew he was wrong but could no longer endure.

Tyrol had defeated him.

"Please."

Awareness hit Evie like an avalanche. Her hand dropped like deadweight to her side as soon as Reilanin worked the stake free, and she collapsed to the ground, staring.

No.

"No, no, no. No no no no no." What happened? What did she do? What had she done? What did he make her do?

Covering her face with her hands, she rocked back and forth. Tears only trickled slowly out the corner of her eyes even though she wanted to sob madly. A shivering, shaking mess on the floor, she barely paid attention to the other two. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I'm so sorry." She didn't know whom she was apologizing to. Herself? Her Lord Cita? Alex? No one? Everyone she knew?

Sorry. Sorry. No. Sorry. I'm sorry. No. Why? Sorry. Sorry sorry sorry. No, no. No no no no. Nononononono-- HELP.

"I know," Reilanin told Alexander, the words soft, standing out from the hysterics from the girl on the floor beside them. She let her touch on Evie go, instead pressing her hand on him arm to guide Alexander to the floor with her, her expression sad, understanding. "I know," she repeated, pressing her hand to his face. Then she turned and grabbed Evie's wrist and pulled her over.

"It's not fair," Reilanin told her, her voice patient, gentle. "I know. We know. Better than anyone." She really was barely any more than Evie in terms of physical appearance, in terms of apparent strength, but her grip was iron, drawing the girl's hand to the stake in Alex's chest and folding her own over it to make sure it stayed. "It's not fair. But that isn't the point. Some of the bloodshed that comes from your cowardice should at least get on your hands."

She looked back to Alex, the pain on his face, the desperation- he was close, so close to what he wanted. And for once she felt none of that black envy inside of her. She smiled at him. And then she forced Evie's hand to drive the stake through his chest.

Alex did cry then, a tear running down his cheekbones from Reilanin's touch, but he smiled, too. It was a weak one, hopeful and apologetic. Through his shallow breathing he whispered, "Thank you."

The piercing of his heart was swift and left little time for the agony of wood pulling muscle with it. There was a short expulsion of breath, and then the soul of Alexander Varista departed. To dust his body did not turn instantly but gradually, until all that was left was a shallow pile of dirt and his material belongings -- the clothes he had taken from the house he'd grown up in, the cloak and scarf Ravindra had gifted him, and the wedding band Catherine had slid on his ring finger so many years past.

When Reilanin took hold of her hand again, Evie blinked wildly, uncomprehending. When she saw that her hand was being led towards the stake, she shook her head furiously, pulling away with all her might. "No, no. Please, no. I beg you. Please." Struggling, pushing her feet against the ground, everything she had was still no match against the Other's strength. "Stop. Stop it. Please. Please please please no." Cita. Cita. Help me, please. Please help me.

Screaming when her hand touched the stake again, she sobbed. "Please. Please. Plea--" The stake penetrated Alex's heart, and her shriek was piercing.

She went limp. As Alex faded to dust, her eyes were wide but blank while her mind shut down. Still, her body gave way to weak tremors and spasms every few seconds.

Her hand kept Evie's steady until the last of Alex's frame melted away, then let go of hand and stake so that both dropped, one ot the girl's side and one into the pile of ash beside them. Her ears rang with the girl's shrieking, and the silence now was enough to finish the job of deafening her. She, too, sat a moment, lost in what had just happened. Then she leaned over and took from the pile the scarf, shaking it out, careful not to inhale the dust that came off of it. She then reached over and coiled it gently around Evie's shoulders, to ward off the chill of winter and horrifying reality.

The ring caught her eye. Hesitating, she picked it up, then put it in her pocket. Perhaps, she could take it to his family... and then... and then...? She picked up the stake as well, turning it in her hand as though expecting it changed. The ash was acrid in her nostrils but that was all. She tucked it away, too.

Her chest felt tight, hot. She managed to get to her feet, feeling somehow hazy, staggering a step back away from the pile of ash, the dead body, the broken girl. None of these things should have happened, and yet they had, and she'd allowed and encouraged all of them, and she was the one left standing, untouched.

No. Not untouched, not this time. Shaken, unknowing she could still be so, she backed up again before she turned and left the house. She pressed her hand to her mouth, almost choking on the sob that escaped her, and she had to hold herself up on the side of the house a moment before she could continue. Breathing in harshly she straightened up again and forced herself onward. Tell a guard about the girl. Then leave. Return the ring. Never come back to Tyrol. Ah, but she knew that was impossible the moment she thought it. Wrapping her arms tightly around her midsection, she could feel where she had put the stake in her clothes. No, she determined. She would never come back to Tyrol. She would make certain of it, this time.