There is a woman laying on the ground beneath me, covered in black material, her
veins like black worms in her skin. As I look upon her face, our eyes make
contact; mine are fierce, savage with battle, while hers are filled with tears
and fear, and at that moment I am rocked backwards in time, to another
day...another place.

Snow was spiraling down through the air like thousands of dancers, and the air
was so thick with it, and with the shadow of dusk, that I could barely see a
few meters ahead of me. But I was one to love this type of evening, and it was
rare for snow to come as low in the Basin as Magnagora. Despite the cold, I
felt unusually cozy. Layers of fur caked with snowflakes have an eerie way of
cutting you off from the rest of the world, securing in you a tiny pocket of
warmth.

I was so lost in my daydreams I nearly missed my stop, a little tavern on the
outskirts of the center of the city. The Stone of Truth was barely visible from
the corner window in the back of the lounge. I ducked through the door at the
last second, and a blast of warmth hit me from the crackling fire place, and
the snow on my coat settled into a sublime evaporation, tendrils of steam
rising off me as I shook the icicles out of my hair.

I glanced around for an empty table, and found none. This particular tavern was
a bit different than the usual stereotype, which was the main reason I came
there for my drinks. It was crowded, but quiet, with glossy wooden furniture
and lit with a warm golden light that reminded me of honey. I conceded to sit
at the bar, and began to fumble through my pockets with half frozen fingers,
until I found my book, and settled in to read. The bartender, an old, balding,
tough looking Krokani brought out my usual beverage, a dark kafe drink spiked
with some milk and chocolate.

I planned to spend most of my night there reading and drinking, but then I
heard her voice, a beautiful blend of joy and melancholy. She was ordering a
drink, but I can't remember what it was. Sitting just a couple of seats down
the row from me, I hadn't noticed her come in. She was Elfen, with dirty blonde
hair that settled down around her shoulders. As she pulled a book out of her
pack, she glanced up at me and smiled, and despite being caught staring at her,
I smiled back, completely unembarrassed, as though we both knew we were going to
meet each other at this exact place. At this exact time. In this exact way. I
would learn to call it destiny, or some personal form of Fate that put us there
together, as though our threads had been bound into a single lifeline.

But at the time we were just two people sitting in a bar drinking, our pretense
of reading quickly fading into a conversation that would never end for all the
rest of our lives.

We went out together that same night, stepping into the cold blackness of the
street. The snow had slowed down considerably, but it was still freezing. I
remember reaching and holding her hand, and suddenly the cold was gone too. We
walked together down a couple of streets, talking and teasing, until we finally
arrived at what I was looking for. It was an old building, tall and empty. I
guess it had some use in the past, but tonight it was ours. We ran up the
stairs inside, chasing each other, until we scrambled out onto the roof. The
crown of the building was surrounded by ancient gargoyles, each one an odd,
mutated version of the one of the races of the Basin. We took a seat on the
very edge, under the wings and steady gaze of a grotesque, stone Trill. She was
setting in front of me, her back leaning against my chest and my arms around
her, her wool toboggan tickling the sides of my cheeks. Maybe we didn't love
each other yet, but I could feel in my chest and in my mind, and in my arms,
that it was coming.

Years and days and eternities passed in the blink of an eye, each one filled
with more love than I would have thought possible. Did I even believe in love,
in destiny, before that day? All I had wanted that night was a drink, but I
received someone who loved me beyond the shadow of a doubt, who would die for
me. Who would kill for me, if she had to, and I the same for her. I saw days
and nights flicker for so many moments in my minds eye, before spiraling away
in bizarre fractals. My memories began to slip out of order, and bend like a
bottle back through time - the past condensing and the present expanding.

I saw her sleeping with her face on my shoulder, her little hand on my chest. I
saw myself tickling her, and giving her presents on her birthday. She always
loved her birthday. I saw our child...a beautiful little girl, more Elfen than
human, like her mom, who never let me live it down. I saw us learning together,
her magic flowing through the earth around me while my sword flashed through the
air. We were both good at what we did, certainly not the best, but fair at
combat none-the-less.

We were no where near good enough for her to defend herself when they came for
her; black, twisted hands reaching through the windows, clutching at her
throat. They had ropes, or some sort of corrupted cable, and they easily bound
her. I don't know what they did with my daughter, if she was even there at the
time...she was grown up by then. I think. My memory is breaking down even as
I'm thinking of
them, as though they belong to someone else, like trying to hold onto a dream.

I had been away, doing something. I can't even remember what anymore, but when
I got home the Stone of Truth was smoking like a black volcano, and the entire
city was engulfed in its cloud. I knew why it had happened at the
time...something about Hope...and I was even sad that I had missed it, before
seeing the smoke. Without thinking I rushed in, my only thought set upon the
two people who mattered most to me, lost somewhere in that vicious cloud.

I pushed through throngs of people, trying to get to them, but even as I walked
I could feel the bottom of my stomach turning ill with fear. The people around
me were watching me, and their stares were different. So different. They had
stopped choking on the smoke, and they were leering at me. But I ignored them,
nothing mattered to me anymore, although in the back of my mind I knew it was
too late. I finally found her, bound in the ropes, surrounded by about twenty
people of various races. Some of them were my friends, but not this day. These
must have been the people who were hit by the smoke first, their skins and furs
a rotten shade of purple, and small horns beginning at the backs of their
skulls. The ground around her was cracked and deformed, where she had tried to
defend herself with her magic, but it had been too little against them. They
were forcing bits of black gunk down her throat, and the veins in her face and
neck were a vibrant shade of black.

I ran away then, pushing my way back to the Stone of Truth, now a decaying
megalith. I shoved my face into the source of the smoke, and breathed in deep,
long, and slow. I felt my lungs contract at the invasion, and felt my muscles
expand. My skin almost immediately began to glow with purple light, and silver
horns sprung from my skull; large, crooked, and blunt. I felt power, such power
that I had never known before, and I knew that it would not be long before the
poison took my mind as well as my body. I heaved my twin blades out of their
sheaths...they were almost weightless to me now, like holding toothpicks,
albeit sharper. I moved back through the crowd, my destination fixed hard in my
mind. I had read once that some animals that migrate can imagine a path in their
mind before they take it. They know their path and their destination even before
they leave. Today that animal was me.

When I found them, they were still at it, laughing gleefully as they force fed
the tainted material to her, her skin now black with imminent death, and
slightly bloated.

I walked up behind the first person in their group, and old Aslarn wearing a
hooded cloak and holding a cudgel. I removed his head with a flick of my wrist.
The rest of the group just stared at me, malice filling their expressions,
unable to decide if they were excited to see someone killed, or angry enough to
come at me. They chose the latter.

The first to try me was a young Dracnari, breathing crimson and swinging a
battle axe with the foolish glamour of youth. I speared my sword through his
throat before he was close enough to touch me, black blood gurgling around the
blade.

I spun at the rest of them, my breathing becoming ragged as a I growled, nay,
roared, my battle cry like honey poured over lightning, and I knew that thunder
must have filled my eyes. I saw one unquestionable emotion flicker through my
enemies - fear.

I swung my blades with macabre precision, removing limbs, splintering bones,
and covering the street with my vengeance. When I was done, not one of them
remained...not a single one. Death had become my dearest friend in this, my
final hour...

And that leads us back to where we started. Me, standing over the woman I would
love eternally, two blades in my hands, and my memories and emotions fading like
water in cupped hands, and I know it will not be long before they are replaced
by whatever the tainted smoke could conjure. Already I'm beginning to wonder
why I'm crying...why looking at this woman feels like a hole is being torn
through my chest. I should just leave her here...instead I'm kneeling down now,
putting her head in my lap, and I don't know why, but I'm being very gentle with
her. She looks up at me, and through blackened lips she says, "I love you
eternally."

Without knowing why, I say it back to her, and she smiles. For some reason that
makes me happy. Then I remove a vial from my belt, tip the contents into her
mouth, and watch as her face dims with death, then is lost to me. For a split
second my brain enters an ecstatic rage, as though half of me is dying. Then,
still without knowing why, I empty the vial into my mouth, and the rest of me
dies too.