She'd never been so afraid of anything in her long years. Her breath was catching and every second beat of her heart was skipping. She'd seen her share of fights. She'd watched from afar as wars raged. She'd lived her wild life for so very long, and yet, she'd never been so terrified as today. Her stomach had been trying to jump out of her throat every few minutes, and the morning sickness she'd been suffering of late was in no way helping.

As afraid as she was, however, Kaesian had at the same time never been so excited and happy about anything, wither. The day had finally arrived that she would wed the man she'd found to be her soulmate. She would no longer be alone. It seemed like no time ago, and yet centuries, since she had met the rebellious Eyrien who had stolen her heart. Nobody had ever annoyed, intrigued, seduced, or enraged her in so many wonderful ways so very often, and she couldn't wait to share that feeling every day of her life. Damiar Marcus was the love of her life, and it had taken her months to be able to write the vows as perfectly heartfelt and meaningful as they needed to be.

It had also taken her months to find the right dress. The one she had initially wanted had been a stunning basque with a pencil skirt made of fine ivory satin. She had trailed her fingers over it in the shop and the fibres of both the dress and her entire self had resonated with eachother. She'd had it inlaid with flecks of Rose Jewel from the small piece she had left, and the veil had a small grip for her hair with a chip of her White. It had been so perfect, it fitted her so well, and then, only a week ago, she had gone for the final fitting, and had felt the excruciating pain, like a fire deep withing her soul. She'd scrambled out of and away from the dress and criee in regret, grieving over the loss of such a beautiful item. She knew then why she couldn't tell Damiar until today was over - if he thought she was weak, he might call the whole thing off. He might not have loved her anymore. He might have left.

Kaesian shook her head. The hormones were driving her crazy, and thinking about that damned dress was making things worse. The one she had chosen as a quick replacement was a simple silk halter-neck with a long fishtail. It had an ever-so-pale pink hue to it when the sun hit it. It was beautiful, by all accounts, but it wasn't perfect. With a sigh, she turned back to the mirror and continued pinning her long hair up, pulling a few strands back down. It was a tedious task, especially for her lack of Craft use at present, but her makeup had t least proven to be simple enough. A little eyeliner and mascara, white highlighter on her brow bone, and a pale rose gloss on her lips - it was vastly different to her usual wear, but she'd been pleasantly surprised by the minimalist effect. She smiled at the nervous girl looking back at her. She noticed the swirling rose tint to her iris and felt the unwavering intuition women were designed to understand. Something would go wrong, but as long as Damiar was there, and his warm, strong arms were around her at the end of it all, she'd never be alone, and she'd never need to be afraid again.

In the soft sunlight that was filtering through the makeshift window in the huge hollowed tree that was serving as her dressing room in the forest of Darkwood, Kae saw a shadowy reflection behind her and felt tears well in her eyes as she stared. She heard the almost-forgotten voice echo around the bark. "You look beautiful, Kae." She let out a soft sob and willed herself not to turn away. She knew only too well that if she turned to face him, he wouldn't be there when she looked. "I wish I could hold you, sweetheart, I really do." The tears fell as she bit her lip hard and nodded in sad agreement. "So do I, pops, so do I." she whispered, looking sadly at the man stood behing her. She closed her eyes to her father and felt a whisper of wind caress her cheek.

Only a few seconds passed as Kaesian thought of the many who wouldn't be here with her today. Bryn being at the forefront of her mind. She hadn't heard anything in weeks, and she worried for him. As she lifted a tissue to her smudged eyes, she caught sight of a real reflection. She turned with a fierce snarl. "Yorian."

Her mother stood with a black veil and dress, a dagger to Kae's heart, and a sly smile on her face that struck fear into the young witch. She knew. Kaesian tried to shake the feeling and turned back to the mirror, reapplying her fine eyeliner. She glared at the woman as she slinked further into the room. "Well, you look wonderful, darling." Kae raised an eyebrow and snorted. She wasn't supposed to even know where the ceremony was, let alone turn up at it, and in black no less. Why had she come here? "Really, Yorian? I'd have thought this little flesh on show would have been too prudish for you."

For a moment, the patronising smile on Yorian's face faltered, and Kae smiled triumphantly. It soon returned, however, and Yorian looked her estranged daughter up and down with a scathing eye, ending with a small shrug. She moved forward and slowly pulled one of the black silk gloves off, flexing her fingers as the sunlight caught the glowing Rose Jewel on the gaudy ring she wore. "What do you want, Yorian?" Kae's teeth were clenched and she desperately wanted the woman out of her quiet sanctuary.

"What kind of mother would I be if I didn't come here to wish my darling daughter well on her wedding day?" She fingered the tiara on the small table and smiled sweetly at Kae. Kae pulled her teeth back and smiled a feral smile at the woman. However, the mirror betrayed her. The smile never reached her eyes, and the brightness that had coursed through them recently was slowly fading. Her mother's words had never touched her, until now. Would Damiar back out on the day? Would he come at all? What if he didn't want to spend his years with her? Her mother's last words sliced through her from so long ago, 'What are you?'. The loathing and revulsion in her eyes so very evident. and so very painful for a young witch. Kae felt the blood burn in her veins. "The same kind of mother you've always been. Useless. Don't try and bullshit me, Yorian. What do you want?" Another step forward from Yorian, and another sugary smile.

"I know about the baby," she chuckled at the young woman's expression. "Oh, don't look so surprised!" Kaesian felt her stomach constrict around the young being growing within her, but Yorian continued. Taking a deep breath and blinking back cold tears, Kae picked up the small crown of white and rose diamonds and placed it on her head. She solemnly picked up the pink danglies Dam had given her as a gift for the ceremony and accessorised herself. She slid the thin band of metal onto her finger that had been her first piece of jewellery from a man. Her eyes glazed over as she felt his psychic scent on the pieces, and still, Yorian went on. "When I found out you really were intent on marrying that bonehead, I decided to find out why." Yorian took the young girl's hand as Kae stood stupified. "But then it hit me," she let out a venomous cackle and Kae winced, "You've got yourself knocked up, and being the conniving little witch you are, you've ensared the poor, stupid fool." Kae shook her head and tried to pull away from the woman, but her grip was too strong. As much as she struggled, she couldn't get free, and the more she fought it, the tighter the grip became. Yorian's burning gold eyes bore into her as her smile grew wider and wider still. Kaesian warred with herself to call in her Jewels, but she was terrified beyond her own comprehension to do so in fear of her unborn child.

Something was very wrong.

As painful as it was, Kae called in her Rose Jewel and growled against the agony that coursed through her, knowing and pushing away the danger of her doing so, and not doing so. Kaesian let out a psychic scream to her love, a plea, as a blast of Rose power shot up her arm, her shiled only just surrounding her in time to shade the effect a little.

*Damiar!*

It took what felt like hours for Kaesian to stir enough to open her eyes slowly. A deep throb in her head made her groan quietly. Her eyes swam through a variety of colours around the room, and eventually focused enough to pick out the shadowy figure stood over her. For a precious few seconds, Kaesian believed in her heart that the figure before her was her love, her salvation, her Damiar, and her heart began a slow dance. It was short-lived hope, however, as the pain that seared through her shoulder grew, and Kaesian adopted the sad realisation that he hadn't come. No, the figure she saw standing over her, the one whose edges seemed to dance in a peculiar assortment of wavy lines and sharp angles, the one watching her writhe occassionally in pain, was her mother.

A quiet whimper escaped her lips through gritted teeth as she struggled to move, and the sensation didn't immediately register as wrong. Kae tried to lift herself up on her elbows, only to find one wouldn't move in time with what her blurry mind demanded from it. It was only as she glanced down at the phantom limb that Kae noticed it's absence. The source of the pain was not, in fact, her arm. But rather the lack of it. The small whimper slowly transformed into a high-pitched whine, occasionally interspersed with a few high-pitched giggles from across the floor. Kaesian was almost ignorant to it. Barely heard the sound of her mother congratulating herself, let alone register the words. She was too focused on the horrific image before her. What had once been her arm was now simply a mess of tattered fabric and a raw stump. The skin was no longer a creamy gold, but instead a painful red. The Rose power that had knocked the Eyrien unconscious as her own Rose shield snapped up had been enough to sever and sear the limb so much that it was barely recognisable as an appendage.

Kaesian began to pull herself up slowly, allowing for the swimming sensation her mind felt whenever the pain intensified. She remained as quiet as possible, gritting her teeth, until they too hurt, to avoid hearing the gurgle of excitement escaping from her mother. Kaesian eventually stood at full height, her head and shoulders swaying from the conscious effort not to plummet back onto the hard, welcoming wooden floor. It was no wonder she found the forest so comforting, the wood was so inviting, she thought idly. Taking a deep breath to refocus, Kaesian winced and lurched forward into a dizzying array of colour as a stab of pain pierced through her abdomen. The longer she wore her Jewels, the worse the pain, and the greater the danger to her unborn child. Kaesian knew she needed to finish this quickly. Even with only one arm, and a swelling agony in her gut, Kae knew she could defeat the bitch before her. Even without Damiar. He just might have to clean up the mess when he did arrive.

It was only as Kae gingerly sipped from the low reserve of power remaining in the Rose that she became aware of another presence in the room. The scent disgusted her - a twisted mingling of a Summer Sky Warlord and her mother. This was obviously her newest lover, and the smile on his face suggested he was only too willing to delight in the darker aspects of Yorian's personality as warm her bed. Had he been here the whole time? Kaesian's vision swam in and out of focus too much for her to gain a true image of the male, and as her gaze fell upon the Jewel he wore, Kaesian's mind was flooded with harrowing images of the things a Summer Sky Jewel could do to a wearer of the simple Rose. Perhaps that was why Damiar hadn't arrived. A sad and frightening realisation crept over her and nestled in needles at the base of her spine. She had little concern for herself at this point, but perhaps her love had arrived, only to be met with his return ticket to the Darkness from which he came, all at the hands of this male, her mother's new reaper. She seethed quietly and glared at the man, unsure if he knew how little of him she could make out through the black tunnel encompasing her line of vision.

With her lips pulled back in a feral, if somewhat shaky, smile, Kae pictured Damiar the first night they met, saw the love in his eyes as he looked at her, saw the hopeful image she'd had of when he saw their baby for the first time, and in those few seconds, she called in one of her bladed sticks, her hand gripping it intensely. No matter how the odds stacked against her, Kae had walked away from harder fights than this. Driven by hatred, anger, loathing, neither of the two bastards who had taken everything away from her would stand a chance. With lightning speed, almost too quick to blink, Kae swung her stick at the anonymous male, cursing and crying out in shock and pain as she connected with a Summer Sky shield. Once again her vision swam, as she struggled to focus. It was almost like being hideously drunk and seeing too many of the same thing. As he turned to her, Kae saw the cold, unfeeling burn in his pale eyes as he stared into her very soul, a dangerous smile dancing on his lips. Another image of her lover, broken and bleeding, stormed through her, and with an ethereal ululation that scared the birds from their branches, Kae swung her stick backward in that very smae instant, bearing it down on the woman behind her.

Once again, she was over-powered by the Summer Sky as the man threw a shield around Yorian. With a cry of pain, Kaesian threw the stick away and dropped to her knees. She tore the depleted Jewel from her neck in time to feel its power dissolve completely. With burning tears tracing fine lines down the bruises she hadn't noticed, Kae felt the blood roar in her ears, and a brilliant white light weaved across her eyelids as she blinked slowly, sobbing. Rocking in her grief, Kae let out a piercing cry as something inside her seemed to tear. A bolt of agonising terror paralised her, and as she probed herself, she felt the tears fall harder and faster, and the sobs that sounded so painful and heartbreaking to her ears grew louder. The baby. She let out a harrowing, mournful sound, harmonised by her mother's despicable, and satisfied, cackle.

The darkness in her peripheral vision seemed so warm and inviting, Kaesian felt her head get closer to the floor as she leaned forward, her hope depleting as quickly as her beloved Rose had. The last thing she saw, a brilliant white beacon, was the page of vows that had somehow slipped under the dresser, obviously out of her mother's view. The last thing she heard as her mind gleefully skipped toward the warm, welcoming blanket of black before her, was Yorian's spiteful voice. "Shatter her. I want the bitch broken." As she felt the man move closer to her, a vague sensation of rough hands on her beautiful, bloodied dress, Kae let out a final soft whisper into the Darkness seeping into her consciousness. One final, fleeting plea for help. *Damiar...*

(( OOC - The following is written with express permission from Damiar's owner, Carol. Lyrics taken from 'Tomorrow' by A1 ))

A deep, maddening silence had settled in the carved-out tree that stood so proudly in the forest of the Windarian Province of Chaillot. Outside of the makeshift dressing room, it seemed as if the birds themselves had ceased to sing, and the sun had hidden itself behind a facade of raindclouds.

An Eyrien Prince stood, frozen, in that room. His head bowed, his fists clenched, and his jaw so tightly set, that the muscles may never uncoil again. He stood by the side of a broken, bleeding body of a once-beautiful woman. His bride-to-be. What would have been their wedding day had turned into a small wake. A day he would remember for all the wrong reasons.

Falling to his knees, the Eyrien warrior had wept as he cradled his love. She had been his world for such a short amount of time, and now, he would never get to fulfil her life in the way she had graced and fulfilled his. He'd placed a kiss on her unfurrowed brow, and that was when he had seen the sheet of paper under the small dressing tabel. The monsters who had done this must not have seen it, for it was still heavy with her scent. He held onto it for the longest moment, savouring that last touch, before he had roughly wiped at his eyes in order to read it.

Damiar,
You came into my life so unexpectedly, and so forcefully, that you left a permanent mark on my heart. A tiny imprint of a man and his tattooed wings, that makes me smile to this day. I see you as the fiesty counterpart to me, only you are the one blessed with wings.
In getting to know you, I have learned that I, too, have the gift of wings, but only when I am near you. You are the part of me that has been missing for so very long. It's as if I can dance on the clouds if you're with me, and I do, my love, every single day that I'm blessed with your presence.
You are so much more than just a lover to me, Damiar. You are my best friend and confidant. You are my family. I love you with such ferocity that words could never convey, but you need only know that as hard and furiously as a warriors heart may beat in time with the drums of war, so too does my heart beat in time with yours.

I cannot imagine a time without you, for I believe that I'd simply cease to exist in your absence. The many long years I spent without you only reinforce how empty my life would be without you. Or your man-flu.

It's an old cliche to say that I loved you before I met you, but it's true, because until I found someone as nutty as me, I never knew what love could really be. You complete me, and it scares me senseless to need you in my life so much, but it's exhilarating all the same. I can't wait to be with you until the Darkness embraces us once more.

It fills my heart with joy; makes my soul sing, to know that today we'll be joined together in the closest of ways. And I can't think of anyone I'd rather spend that with. And now, a year after that rain-soaked eveing, we'll say these vows, and welcome the addition of a little one to our family. It's the most beautiful gift you could give me, Damiar - the gift of life, and I know you're going to make as good a father as you have a soulmate.

And now, in the company of few, but with many in our hearts, for me, my beloved Bryn, and my father, I thank you from the bottom of my heart for making me a wife, a mother, and a firend. I thank you for making me happy, and I give my heart to you.

As he had finished reading, the Eyrien had lowered his head once more, emitting a final, heart-wrenching sob, as he'd stroked the woman's stomach. She had been pregnant, and was going to tell him in her vows. His loss seemed only greater then, and as he'd gently picked her up, he placed a kiss on her cool lips and carried her out into the warmth of the re-emerging sun, though she would never feel it.
He had caught a familiar scent on the breeze, and his heart leapt. It was her deliciously warm scent, one that turned his head, and his heart. He had felt it coming from the old abandoned house a few hundred yards away, and his momentary hope left him. She wasn't in there. but something with her scent still fresh on it was.
He had sighed as he'd carried her closer. It was to be his wedding gift to her. She had loved this house deeply, for reasons unknown to him, and he had begun work on it to restore it to its original beauty. Now, it all seemed futile.

He'd laid her gently on the soft grass, and walked forward to the source of the Rose power, finding a small bubble around a tiny white flower. Reaching his hand forward to brush against the bubble, he had thought he heard a familiar voice whisper on the wind, telling him to pluck the small bud.
He had done so, and he had heard a strange, ethereal, but familiar, voice carry to him. He'd tried to focus on it, but felt as if he had been scolded by the entity like an inquisitive child. He'd made out "listen", and "always", and "love you", and the uncharacteristic tears had welled in his bleak, golden eyes once mreo. He dutifully listened to the song she sang through Craft, no doubt one of the last things she had done before succumbing to her injuries.

*You used to say that everyday we will always be this way: Flying Angels lifting high to reach the sun were I belong, you know you are the one.
Above the clouds I see you cry.

You know that when you smile you stop the rain, and we will be together once again.

I've always known the love you've shown means I'll never be alone, but there'll be times you wonder why. But seeing you with someone new will never make me feel so blue, because know I'm with you all the time.

From the moment that I looked into your eyes, all of my life I thought I'd be there by your side. I wish I'd took the time to find the words to say: You know when you stop the rain, and we will be together once again.

Although I'm gone, remember me.
Please be strong - I'll never leave.
Just hold on to the memories.
While I'm here, all I'm thinking about is tomorrow. *

She had held on long enough to sing to him once more.

As the final words had rung out through the deep maddening silence that had settled over the forest of the Windarian Province of Chaillot, so too, did the harrowing warcry of an enraged Eyrien Prince, set on seeking revenge for the beautiful woman, and the unborn child, who had been taken away from him.

THE END