4I froze, as the blood on the comb slowly beaded, one bead sliding towards the tip and falling onto Esuana's back.
"Esuana?" I said softly, shocked.
She didn't respond. Her hand fell to her side, and she seemed to be trembling.
"Esuana?" my voice rose. As her head fell forward onto the desk and her hand dropped the comb, I ran over and turned her over.
A trickle of blood was drooling out from her mouth, and her eyes were closed. She was mouthing the word "Mentor…" over and over.
"Yes, I'm here, its going to be all right," I babbled. Realising what I was saying, I paused, and, turning her over, began a Spell of Antipoison, that should clear away any of the common assassin's weapon from her blood. I watched as it sank in…and passed clear through the wound, indicating that there was no poison there.
A slow panic began, as I hurled my awareness into her body, to physically exterminate every trace of any poison from her body. I went into her blood, 'hands' blazing with a purifying fire, searching her entire body for any trace of the poison, that I may burn it out.
Nothing.
I couldn't believe it, so I searched again.
Nothing.
I was growing desperate, and as I did, my control over my physical form faded, and radiance blazed forth, filling the entire tent. As it did so, my spectrum of vision shifted, until I was looking using Sight, which may See everything that is.
And I was almost thrown back, as the wound, the comb, and the blood pulsed with a powerful dark aura of malevolence, as her eyes, opening, began to burn with the dark fire that was consuming her.
Frantically, I threw myself into her again, burning away the darkness. Yet, no matter how much of the darkness I destroyed, I realised that it was too late, that I had looked for the wrong things, and as a result, the Balefire had set in irreversibly. She was doomed to Fall, unless I saved her somehow. There was only one thing I could do at this point.
I flew back into my own body, and as I did, I tugged, hard, at the Bond, the invisible, sacred link that bound her soul to mine. Not again, I cried, in the silence of my mind, just before the overwhelming agony that is a part of such tearing overcame me, sending me writhing on the floor before a blessed darkness took my feeling.
I regained consciousness almost immediately as the physical pain stopped, and looked around.
On the floor before me lay a shimmering 'replica' of Esuana, her eyes closed and a look of peace on her face.
The Soulsaver ritual had been completed. She would no longer fall, but instead go into the final resting place where all normal men went.
I levelled my arm above the fallen, soulless body, palm down. A stream of argent fire poured down, incinerating the body, the cursed comb, and blackening the land around it.
Taking her soul into my arms, I spread my wings and rose into the sky, ignoring the startled shouts from the sentries on the ground, of a crowd looking into the air and gaping, of the King himself acting like a stunned fish. Tears falling, I streaked into the air, burning a hole in the Fabric of Time and vanishing through it, leaving the Plane containing the world of Pyrrashik behind.
Emerging from the Planar Tunnel, I arrived at the City of the Light. The world, the only one that was supposedly untouched by the Dark, was the Headquarters of the Messengers. I landed outside the gates, still carrying Esuana's soul, and the Guardians at the Gate let me in, murmuring condolences. One of them removed a horn from his side, and blew a long, wailing note that announced to all within the city the death of yet another Potential. As I stepped through the Gate, the people within stopped their activity and cleared a path, bowing their heads in respect. When I had passed, the business was continued in subdued tones.
"What is the City of the Light doing with mortals in it?" You may ask. The City is not merely the home of the Messengers, but also the Capital of the world of Shinaz. When the first Messengers approached the natives of the land, they not only gave us the land for the City, but helped us build it and transformed it into the capital of their civilisation. They even named their world after us, as 'Shiraz' in the Old Tongue meant Sons of the Light. In return, we maintain peace in all the land, and act as judges as well as a policing force. It has been the only place where crime has never occurred, and at the peak of its glorious days, it was undoubtedly the richest, safest, most beautiful, and peaceful world that has ever existed. It was also the only place where any Potential who was born there were almost guaranteed to survive their training and become Messengers.
I was met at the entrance to the Temple itself, at the heart of the City, by two of the greatest Messengers that had ever been. In the days when they had openly shown themselves to Man, they had been called the Archangels Gabriel and Michael. I knelt down before them, offering up the soul of the dead Esuana.
As Michael took the soul, tears began running and falling from my eyes. This always happened whenever a Messenger lost one of the potentials and offered the torn body or soul at the Temple. It was only in this stronghold of the True Light that the Messengers felt safe enough to openly weep, to let the grief pour out of them as they healed emotionally from the brutal experience that had rent them.
Gabriel brought me into the inner sanctum, into the crematory, where the bodies and souls of the dead Potentials were burned. As always, when I looked upon Esuana's face for the last time, I remembered the first time I had met her…