Losing Ground

[Sebilla]

"Are you sure this is how I'm supposed to hold the bow?" Sebilla asked as she puffed some hair out of her eyes. She was holding a bow pulled taut, sighting down the arrow, but the whole thing was shaking so badly that she could barely concentrate. She huffed loudly and tried to focus on the hay stuffed target down range.

"Can't we stop? I can barely hold this thing up anymore, we've been at it all day." She complained loudly as she put the bow down and let the arrow drop. The ground was sandy still where there used to be desert. The Jungle had been hacked back and the true Rivenfelde City was now a lake, but this city had been built closer to the ocean with a relatively large port. The waters surrounding the Island of Xexoria were still turbulent, but not nearly as bad as they were right after the upheaval.

Sebilla ran her fingers through her hair, her arms shaking with the effort. Her hair was a dark blue black and long, clearing her slender waist, and full of loose curls and waves. She looked more like her father than most of the Xanathi children, but that was because her father wasn't from the Xanathi line. She had been concieved by a secret lover that her mother had shortly after concieving Trydian. Sebilla owed her existence to a pearl that her mother had been given by her lover. Neither realized that the pearl would lead to...unorthodox conception. Caela always said that Sebilla was her miracle child, a child untainted and pure.

Purely human, that is. She was constantly under watch by her family or guards. She rarely had a moment alone, and when she did she was bathing.

"Please Trydian, can't we stop. My arms are shaking." Sebilla looked up at her older brother. He was only really older by about fifteen minutes, even if he was concieved first.

"I don't think I'm going to need the bow and arrows tonight, or any night." She gestured to the setting sun. "No one wants me."

[Trydian]

Trydian watched his beloved sister. She was doing everything right, but she lacked confidence. He knew that she would never survive in a fight and he would never let her battle. Letting her hold a bow, was just a way of humoring her nature. She was sweet, innocent and she constantly captured his heart. Moving behind her, he went to her left side, acting as though he were inspecting her form. She was holding the bow too lax, her nervousness screaming out at him.

“Go ahead and quit. I suppose I can't fault you for being weak- it's in your blood.” Trydian said, trying to provoke her. It took strength to motivate his sister, someone who was often coddled by him and the other guards. Because she was human, it made it difficult to really train her like the others.

“Would you rather work on sword play?” He unsheathed his chaotic sword, the one useful gift left by his father. Handing her the blade, he knew she wouldn't be able to lift it, but she wondered if she would take to the challenge anyway. The chaotic sword wouldn't react to a simple human -she didn't harbor the anarchic blood in her body like he did.

“Let's see what little sister is like with a sword?” Trydian unsheathed his spare blade, wondering if she would take the chaotic blade. His voice was patronizing, but he knew that she had to defend herself eventually- they couldn't keep protecting her.

It was easy to vex Sebilla. She was always trying to prove herself to him. Trydian wondered how she would react to his insult- it was common for her to go off in a huff. The other guards chuckled at his gesture, most of them used to their treatment of each other.

[Sebilla]

Sebilla pursed her lips and glared at her brother with her big sky blue eyes. He liked her eyes and she knew it. He liked a lot about her, but then she was attracted to just about everything in him.

Then he just had to go and goad her. He knew she'd do anything if he teased her about it. It was a bit of a sore spot with her being the only human in a line of brazenly powered beings.

"Oh you big jerk." Sebilla took the sword in both hands and felt her whole upper body lurch forward. The damn thing was heavy. She shifted her stance and managed to raise the tip out of the dirt but...not by much. She huffed and grunted a little and managed to raise it a foot off the ground before dropping it with a sound of disgust.

"It's too heavy. I'll never be able to pick something like that up and just wing it around willy nilly like you do." Sebilla glared at Trydian twirling his blade boldly. She'd be dead before she had a chance to breathe if anyone had it in for her. It was the sad and simple truth.

"I'm not even as strong as a man. This is pathetic." Sebilla grumbled and walked away from Trydian, crossing her arms under her breasts and shifting her weight to one hip. She was tired, she was somewhat sweaty from all the exertion, and she was tired. Sebilla wasn't a spoiled brat by any means, but sometimes given the humidity of the jungle they were in, she felt like she needed her space.

It didn't help that she was attracted to her brother either. She could feel him staring at her back and she pushed past the nearest guards and stood behind them, where Trydian could no longer see her, but she was still studiously close to the guards.

So what? She could sulk at the fact she wasn't better than...well...anything when it came to her brother.

[Trydian]

Sheathing his blades, he went after Sebilla. He ordered the men to rest, wanting his time with Sebilla. He found her, huffing and pouting from his show of arms. Sebilla had always been treated like a fragile thing- as if moving, she could break into a thousand pieces. His glare would catch her attention and Trydian would act infuriated, by her “higher than thou,” attitude that he always blamed her for.

Trydian placed a hand on her shoulder, hoping she felt that he was being gentle with her. He didn't need her in a bad mood, when they still had training to accomplish. “I'm sorry, Sebilla....but you can't give up, because you feel a moments weakness. Haven't you learned anything from our private spars?” Trydian asked, wondering if she had any soul in her to be a warrior. He doubted it, given the stricken look on her face. It was always him scolding her, but he couldn't treat her differently in front of the other men.

“You will have to gain strength if you are going to be with me and my men. What did you think training was going to be like?” Trydian watched her face fall again, which looked like dramatic despair in his eyes. “As for the strength...you forgot I am a full blooded demon and could snap you in two. This blade was practically made for me- not a petite woman.” Trydian said, trying to make her see logic.

He gripped the hilt of his blade and forced it into an arched swing. The blade's tip struck into the ground in front of her. “Since you want to be strong like a man...we won't leave this spot, until you can lift the sword from the Earth.” Trydian leaned against a tree, wondering what her reaction would be to that challenge. He could easily, order his men to keep her here, until she accomplished such a feat- he had been a known bastard for such commands.

[Sebilla]

Sebilla frowned at Trydian and his display of power. She pulled her long black hair over her shoulder and looked down at the sword quivering at her feet. She felt like she should slap her twin, but she took a deep breath and pushed her hair back over her shoulder. Trydian would notice it as one of the things she did when she was nervous or upset.

"Fine." Sebilla noticed that the blade was buried a full two inches into the earth and she used the toe of her boot to clear out the sand and dirt from around the blade and pushed it to the ground, uprooting some grass in the process. She then pulled the sword over to her brother, picked it up a few inches, and dropped it at his feet.

"Hah. I win!" She stuck her tongue out at him, very much like a two year old than an eighteen year old youn woman. She giggled and ran back in the direction of the clearing they had been practicing all day in. As she ran her hair swarmed about her like fresh tendrils of darkness, a power familiar to her brother and yet so lost in her. She had sweet tan skin and a pretty face, everything about her was something that men desired but refrained from showing. Especially around Trydian who glared at any man that got within three feet of her on a good day. He had been known to knock some men a few feet back away from her on a bad day.

It had gotten to the point that men avoided her entirely, except to watch her from afar. Sebilla wasn't really that aware of the attention she brought, she was in love with her brother -- though she would deny that to anyone that asked.

[Bæn'Deyanira]

The sun was slowly beginning to set behind the woods, casting intricate tall shadows through the hedgerows and groves of ask, oak and thorn. Balmy, sultry sunshine streaming through the whispering leaves, causing them to shine iridescently through their transient flesh. With the biding and sigh of the forest came another sound, faint but summery sweet- the cadence of melody, misleading, or did it truly sing the child’s name "Sebillllllaaaaaaaaa!!!" pitched on the zephyr of wind-song and the mild harmony of twittering birds preparing for their dusky songs to welcome the cobalt’s of twilight. Again, the song so perfumed...compelling in its enchantment "Sebillllllaaaaaaaaa!!!" each syllable potent in its mechanism and magick, cloaking all in a beguilement of silence, so that only Sebilla would hear it, but also applying the confusion of not being able to decipher if in fact the sound was actually her name- it was obscure to the plain shot of hearing, and working through more of a compelling magick, opposed to a commanding one. Brambles of squall swept across the ground, sweeping up the leaves, sending them up into the dusky air in vibrant billows, colours dancing around the youth in scarfs of wintergreens, reds and ambers. Hypnotizing in effect, for in something so beautiful lurked something so sinister, that even the forest ceased its breath, except for the wind and the sporadic murmurs of the faintest of lullaby, called 'Sebilla'.

No bird continued with its harmonic salute to the sun, no scuttle of smaller woodland creatures through the debris covered grass, not even the liberated butterfly combed the elements with flutters of radiant blues and purples. Complete stillness, except for that calming breeze, stroking towards the cheeks of the beautiful maiden- tender kisses akin to the softness of butterfly wings, and the breezy caress through Sebilla’s ravenesque hair. How the elements would appear to adore her, though quite in their reverences. Another sound soon bled through the haunting soliloquy, it came taunting and tugging on the emotions, and certainly if Sebilla was an empathic, she would feel it with more dismayed emotion... the sound of a child crying, far off into the depths of the forest. Gradually it grew louder, gripping to the heart-strings...sobbing....soft whimpers...a child's cry for help?. A wounded, lingering resonance, that was soon accompanied by those tearful and fateful words "Heeeellllllp meeeeeee! Pllllllleeeeeassssseeeee....." The voice sounded distressed, as if this small child had fallen and hurt themself, unable to seek help, trapped and scared with the oncoming night... and soon it would be dark, soon she would be lost to the forest and its predators.

With the presence of the Banshee, only the animals would sense her- the birds and smaller critters first before the wolves arched their dissonant napes and howled with protest; for at HER coming came the suppressed blood-curdling scream- signifying that this was her time, and this, while her presence demanded it, HER woodlands. In unison with the child’s weeping, the wolves certainly provided another urgency- perhaps the wild hunt was in pursuit of the child, and soon, if not haste was made, the wounded infant would be silenced by the hungry maws of the wolves. Would Sebilla be in time to save this child’s life if she alerted the guards and her brother? Every second impressed its value, time was of the essence, and a second lost meant the wolves yards in advance. Over the horizon the pallid moon had already crested, rising above the majestic mountains like the portent of doom, encircled by a haze of reddish-mist (like blood, the portent of an ill-omen and misfortune). Already the shadows snaked their way along the ground, coiling around the trunks of the trees and shrouding all within its obsidian maws. "Hellllllpppppp meeeeeeee!!!!!!!"

Bæn'Deyanira, gifted in the perceptions and emotions of her targets, knowing where their weaknesses truly rested, the worst of their phobia’s and nightmares- how to drive the needle of darkness deep into the palpable flesh of their heart. An Unseelie of winter, a harbinger of decay, bringer of destruction and harsh blizzards... conjured by the weavings of her cruel fingers and entropic breath, the pitiless westerly winds scathing the snow-capped hillsides downwards towards the lush valleys. Her form appearing within the plumes of frosted vapours which appeared like heated breath across a mirror’s surface. Casting outwards, so that ripples of illusion appeared simultaneously, amorphously fluid, at first- until shape began to take shape to that of an adolescent. Employing the appearance of the beauty she once possessed when she cared for such trivial things. A pretty little thing, no older than twelve, with chocolate curls that fell like autumnal waves down the length of her back. Soft kin like cream and peaches with the bluest of eyes, brighter than any sapphire... iridescent cerulean glistening like the sun on the surface of lake. Garments were opulent, to display that she was not a commoners child but one of nobility.

A ball of crystal fitted comfortably in the palm of child’s hand and nursed as if it was a prized possession given by a deceased mother, but one that hid a deadly purpose- for should Sebilla or anyone take possession, or touch this precious magickal artefact, she would find herself trapped within its crystal walls, unable to break free. Deyanira, manipulating the lengths of gnarled fingers, weaving them as a puppet-master would control a marionette; moving them to control the illusion, and the manoeuvring of the glamour that she would not be seen, fully shielded by the naked sight or magickally, and only those who were close to death would be able to visually see her. The girl was made to semi-curl beneath the overhanging oak, clutching her prized possession as crystalline tears streamed from her glimmering eyes and down cheeks. Lips of coral quivering, while her free hand gripped the ankle, and again "Heeeeellllllpppppp meeeeeeee, theeeee wolvessssss, THEEEEEE WOLVESSSSSSSSS!!!!!!" [color=#F000000]but it wasn’t the lips of the girl which moved, it was the blackened lips of the Banshee that accentuated such heart-wrenching cries for help. The baying of wolves erupting louder, much closer this time, but also they served another purpose at the command of the Banshee who controlled all the creatures of winter; these wolves would attack any of the guards who dared follow Sebilla into the woods, however they were not permitted to touch the brother....if his inquisitiveness got the better of him, it would be the blade of scythe that would measure his worth. [/color]

[Sebilla]

Sebilla stopped and frowned, spinning around in a circle that would look almost like a pirouette. The wind was calling her name? Surely not, perhaps she was just hearing things. Maybe Trydian was playing tricks on her just to tease her again. Sebilla frowned and crossed her arms, her back to where her brother was.

The sound hit Sebilla first, before anyone else happened, and it never crossed her mind that it was made only for her ears. She wasn't as wise to the realm of magic as someone with magic was. Her sky blue eyes widened as she heard the shrill call for help and she bolted in the direction of the sound. She knew what it was like to be scared of the dark and to be defenseless. The fact that someone with magic might want to hurt her, or lure her away, never once entered her thought process.

"Don't be afraid! I'm coming! Just listen to the sound of my voice!" Sebilla called as she hurried through the woods, her pace quickening at the sound of wolves. Once she got closer she was startled badly by the sound of a wolf very close by, she put her arms up and ran toward the sounds of the pitiful girl, crashing through the woods like only a human might. In reality she made only moderate sound in her hurry, Sebilla was a slight woman. It would be enough sound for Trydian to pick up on though, but she would be so far ahead of him that he would have a hard time coming after her.

"It's okay, don't cry, I'm coming! My name is Sebilla, what's yours?" Sebilla called out, trying to calm the young girl down. Nightfall was deepening the shadows and Sebilla despaired of ever finding the girl until she stumbled into a small clearing. Her arms were lightly scratched in places, with small beads of blood budding along their lengths. She saw the little girl holding her ankle and curled around something she obviously prized. Sebilla rushed to the girl, her breath frosting on the dusk air, but she ignored the ominous sign. It was the wrong time of year for such a powerful reaction in the air. All Sebilla saw was the sweet young girl, beautiful like herself, and completely defenseless like herself.

"Oh, there you are." She said as she settled on her knees near the girl. Her hands were gloved for working with the bow and arrow, and so when she touched the girl's arm to reassure her, she was not aware how cold the girl was. She looked warm, she looked alive, and she was hurt. "Oh no, your ankle! You poor thing!"

Sebilla hovered over the girl's ankle, looking at it to make sure that it was okay, that it wasn't broken. "I can't carry you out of here, but my brother or our guards will be able to. They will be along shortly, here let me call to them." Sebilla twisted at the waist and cupped one hand against her lips to help funnel her call. Her other hand was touching the girl on the shoulder.

"Trydian! Guards! Come to my voice! There is a hurt girl over here and she needs help! I can't carry her out myself!" Sebilla's voice echoed through the dead quiet woods. She was oblivious to the increasingly intense quiet, and she ignored the disquiet that was slowly creeping into her bones. Just because she was afraid of the woods and the wolves didn't mean she had to show it to the girl.

All it would take, for her to touch the crystal, would be a simple shift of the girl's body. Her hand was just lightly resting on her shoulder and her attention was focused on making sure that the men heard her call and would find them.

[Trydian]

He was accustomed to her temper tantrums. It wasn’t very becoming of her, but he doubted she noticed what a nuisance she could be. The sword fell to the Earth and he watched her giggle. Sighing, he lifted his sword and sheathed the blade. He wandered away from her, needing a moment by himself. The other guards more than likely pitied him, but there was little they could do for the man. He was cursed with Sebilla, although it had been through a consented oath.

Trydian was alone in a wooded clearing, where he often meditated. The winds shifted, almost suddenly for normal weather. The animals were silent and his senses were picking up on something unnatural and foreboding. His eyes immediately went the path from which he had come- Sebilla would be by herself, the danger very present.

Even though her voice pierced through the woods, he wouldn’t hear it until much later. Some sort of dark magic was present, something that made the chaotic sword seem sentient. The runes on the chaos sword, held a different hue, warning him of the dark nature, that seemed to be abound.

He saw swift movement from the brush, but it was just one of his guards. He had been hopeful that it was Sebilla. With the worried look on the guards face, he knew that something else had happened. The guard could barely catch his breath, the fear obvious in his eyes. Something was very wrong.

“Sir, your sister…she’s gone.” The nervous guard stuttered. The guards had been watching her, but before they knew it, she had sprinted off into the woods. They knew the anger that Trydian could give, the young man felt his life on the line. There was no other explanation for her disappearance.

When he saw the tense face on Trydian, he attempted to bring peace to his mind. “She’ll return, sir. She does this all the ti—“ the guard didn’t get to finish his explanation. Trydian had pushed the sword through his chest, making the man fall to the ground in a heap.

Trydian glared at the guard’s body, as if daring it to come alive. He was more pissed at her ignorance, but took his anger out on his men. The other guards neared the clearing, but quickly moved toward the camp when they saw the fallen soldier.

“I will search for Sebilla. Unless one of you want to try my patience, you will wait here for her.” Trydian paused, wiping the bloodied sword on the ground. “I blame all of you.” Trydian followed the ominous feeling in the woods, knowing that he needed to stay clear of that presence. It was powerful, his body shivered with delight from the power he was feeling. He knew he could get Sebilla killed if he rushed in, so he kept his guard up, both blades resting by his side. Trydian was ready.

The demon walked ahead, knowing better than to call out to such a presence- it would be like inviting his death. Since the presence was felt, he noticed a difference in his chaos blade. He couldn’t explain it, but it was as if the blade had become sentient with power.

“I’ll come for you Sebilla…or I’ll be damned.”

[Bæn'Deyanira]

The feigned maiden cried out in her pitiful response, the beguiled utterance of hope in the tremble of her voice "I’m over herrrrrreeeeee!" there was a certain urgency in the voice, sweet and innocent as if she was not born with original sin or any stigmatic marks above her head; pristine. "My....my....name is Lydia....and I’ve lost my way!!!" she quickly cooed through the forest, it’s silence carrying her voice far like an enchantment which wasn’t too far from the truth. It demanded all life to cease breathing, and brought a chill through the air like winter. No sooner had Sebilla entered the forest, motioning deeper into its dark greens and woody groves of ancient sentinels, the winds picked up their talons- howling through the forest, muffling any sound and carrying it away from the direction of Lydia- perhaps even misleading some of the guards away, the rest would find their blades busy with fang and maw. "The wollllllves!!! The wooooollllllvessss, they’re coming!!!!" Quivering with fear, the Banshee knew how to work the sympathetic heart-strings and work them purely towards her nefarious deeds and desires, using these energies to heighten the senses of urgency and dread. At the appearance the girl smiled, her lips the softest of pinks and hair that danced around her face like sun-kissed maple and the bluest of eyes, like crystal lakes- with hope those lips arched, and she moved like a wounded animal only to flinch.

"Some...thing.... chased me through the woods and I got lost from my escorts..." her words suggested that she was no commoner, but her accent was not of these parts of Rivenfelde.... "I, I....tripped and fell. I don’t think I can walk...my brother and father are going to be so angry with me" Her face lowered, and she wept crystal tears. The winds would carry Sebilla's voice away from their location, tossing it to some far darkened shadows that loomed with heavy fogs and mists slowly setting in to obscure all view. Congealed and immense, with howls and horrific growls lurking in the black thickets of the forests, giving the impression that the wolves were closer and soon to be upon them. Free hand nursing her ankle, that even gave the impression of being swollen and bruised, the blackening of the flesh was not bruising but the decay of the image that pleaded towards the human maiden, Sebilla. Waning and wilting from life as she did in death. Tiny hand gripping the crystal tightly, and lifting it towards Sebilla- "Please take it, if anything should happen to me...this needs to be kept, safe. It is the only thing left of my mother- it is supposed to ward of evil. My mother said to keep it safe, that inside a silver-star sits, and to use it wisely."

It was a long shot, but Sebilla had to touch the crystal of her own free will, therefore accepting the magicks of the item, much like many of the fae spells and enchantments that required the victim to take it, by their own choice. All part of the Unseelie glamour and spellbinding influences so long as it did not defy nature or nature’s alignments. Kindness, cruelty, beauty and the ugly- light and darkness combined. If this did not work, the banshee was already looming unseen, coming behind Sebilla as she crouched down and tended to the wounded butterfly with caring and compassionate hands. If the crystal charm failed, then she would have to resort to more conventional means and grab towards the girl from behind- but, with the amalgamating fogs thickening all around, Sebilla's sight would be obscured and ran the risk of running the wrong direction and coming face to face with the wolves. Preparing scythe, in the blanket of her invisibility- the only evidence of her manipulations was the frost upon the ground and the wilting of all the vegetation within the radius of where she stood. Creeping death all around, even the shadows rose like black winged demons rancour on their frozen breath.

Monsters and wolves, and the gathering of mists perhaps would urge Sebilla to take the crystal and throw it towards the direction of the heaving ominous woods; no sooner if she touched it, the effect would be immediate. Finding herself somehow sucked within and trapped on the inside, unable to make sound- a crystal chamber designed only for this purpose for it was an easy means to transport ‘living’ victims to the Unseelie Kingdom and escape impossible. Bæn'Deyanira, could of easily have just frozen the girl into a state of rigor, frozen of life so that her brother would find her, in a state of death unable to revive her- another trick of the Banshee, and a tormenting one to loved ones who must mourn while the person trapped in that state screams from the inside voiceless. The thought did cross her mind; she wanted to see the brother squirm in his suffering. These were must the first three methods she would use, the others, were more physical and she could not guarantee bringing Sebilla to her King, unharmed...unsoiled and whole.

[Paroxysm]

And so it appeared that cruelty was an inherited trait in the Xanathi line. Not that Jack was particularly shocked by what he had witnessed, of course; it came as little surprise to find a weak-hearted demon lashing out at whatever was within arm's - or sword, in this case - length whenever something went wrong. Why, with just a bit of direction . . .

An eerie silence that neither animal nor insect sought to disrupt fell over the clearing.

Jack emerged from the Dead Lands just beside the guard’s body and lifted the corpse up by its neck. With his opposite hand, he entered the fatal wound that Trydian had inflicted and began to rip and tear pieces from it. There was no pattern to his removal of innards, however, and he tossed bones and organs alike to the ground with distinct, wet sounds whilst staring into the sunken, lifeless eyes of the cadaver with his own full of fire.

“Is it not unfair?” Jack’s wheezy, hollow voice whispered to the guard as he shook his head sympathetically. “Cruel, too cruel--abandoned, even, by your fellows, weren’t you? Such nerve for cowards!”

The guard’s body convulsed in a sudden spasm and its muscles tensed, relaxed, and then tensed again.

Jack’s lips parted and words flooded out. Each word was complex, jagged and dark, and if a mortal were within earshot, it would have been enough to drive them insane. The stink of magic covered the clearing and the guard’s eyes grew wide and full of life--and fear, and, returning Jack’s gaze, the guard tried to form words, to scream and plead, but no sound came in spite of his efforts.

“Shush,” Jack soothed.

Somewhere in the distance, he could feel the Bæn'sidhe at work and he smiled because of it. Watching a banshee ... perform ... was entertaining, to say the least, but her role tonight was important and Jack had no wish to see his king displeased. Killing was easy, but to capture? A mortal girl with a demonic brother and a slew of guards all supposedly willing to die for her? Well, that may have been easy, too, but Jack needed to talk to the demon and he couldn’t very well have the guards, the banshee, or the girl interfering.

Tsk, he clucked his tongue.

“I think I’ll need more,” he said and then moved round the guard. “Go turn your fellows then,” Jack ordered, “and be quick about it. I should think the demon will race back when he hears the screaming."

With only its departure as acknowledgement, the dead-thing began to make its way back to camp and though falling apart, it would prove more than adequate a challenge for a mortal and, if it could turn the rest of the guards, perhaps, even, for a demon. Jack mostly only wanted them to distract the boy, however.

[Sebilla]

Sebilla fluttered her hands over the girl and shook her head as she was offered the crystal ball.

"No, no. I can't take that. We're going to get you out of here I promise. Your family will not be angry with you they'll be happy that you're alive. Just hold on to your mother's crystal. It will be alright." Sebilla turned and looked around the clearing. It was quickly filling up with fog and it felt incredibly cold, but then that happened at night in the area that used to be a desert.

"If it is meant to keep you safe then you must hold onto it. Really, don't worry." Sebilla reached out and took the girl's hands, looking at her and not the coalescing Banshee behind her. She was truely clueless about the creature behind her, the boiling fear that came with the presence of the Banshee. Sebilla attributed any fear she had to the fact that this young girl was in trouble.

When she held the girls hands they slipped to the crystal as she was saying "I accept what you're trying to do." She did, she really did accept the crystal at the time she touched it, very unknowingly trying to be helpful. She was just going to give it back to the girl, really.

She wasn't sure how it happened, but there was a sucking sound -- or maybe there was a distinct absence of sound and she could feel her body being sucked through something like a straw. Later, if you asked her, she really wouldn't be capable of saying exactly what happened. All she would distinctly recall was light. A lot of light and glass, so much glass. It sparkled around her like a thousand lights.

"What...where am I?" She said, stumbling around the small enclosed space inside the crystal. It was almost like being a genie, though she wouldn't connect with that theory until much later. She beat her fists on the glass enclosure but she didn't even hear a sound. In fact she couldn't hear anything but her own frantic beating heart and her panicked breathing.

"Help! Somebody help me!" She still didn't blame the girl, she was almost certain the girl had no idea what had happened to her, but she was positive that she had somehow ended up in the girl's crystal.

How the hell would she explain that to her brother? She began to panic even more as she slid to the very bottom of the crystal room floor. How would anyone know where she was? She would die in here and be forgotten if no one found her. She began to shake, the only spot of color in the room would be her blue black hair, sparkling in the beautiful crystal room.

[Trydian]

The scent of death was in the air. The silence made Trydian's nerves coil, with a great tension he couldn't understand. His muscles flexed, as if warning him to be prepared. The double blades he carried, were not twin blades, even though their steel might glint the same way in the light. His chaotic sword had practically come to life, since he neared the woods. Upon inspection, his body warned him about entering such a foreboding mixture of elements.

Whatever created this unnatural surge of energy, was not something to pursue in a fight just then. Trydian wasn't as headstrong as his father and often respected new-found enemies- especially when they displayed this kind of power. With the sickening feeling forming in his stomach, he knew that the maker of this energy, was responsible for the disappearance of his sister. He couldn't sense her and he could always feel her presence. It was as if she had ceased to exist entirely.

Trying to gain control of his anger, he forced himself back to he camp. The guards would make up excuses, or try to comfort him as they always did. He sighed, wondering who he should contact. Trydian knew he could easily contact Isabella, or Kahlan. He wondered if either one felt his sudden change in spirit, while his form appeared stoic and unemotional. The chaos sword reacted to him well, giving off a strange heat of energy. The energy darkened around the blade and stained it a deep red. Pulsating with unnatural energy, it not only responded to the change in its master, but also to the change in the natural world.

Upon closer inspection, the guards were no longer guards- they were rotting corpses, that had somehow become animated. Trydian cursed, watching their flesh melt away from their body. Their faces were distorted, as if they were in a frozen scream. Launching himself at the guards, he quickly moved his blades in a rhythmic pattern.

It was the first guard that shocked him the most. He had already killed the man, the previous wound even more gutted. The creator of these animated corpses had to be near, but Trydian couldn't even pinpoint their energy- the scent of flesh and decay overpowered his senses.

Slowly, each guard fell lifeless again. His swords cut away at limbs, with an unyielding force. Trydian made sure to dislodge their heads, thankful that his common sense was overriding any other emotion. He called out to their maker, wondering if he would see a figure emerge. In his mind, he beckoned for some sign of his mother or Kahlan, his mind going into a crazed state from the loss of his sister. The torment slowly began to surface, knowing that she might be dead somewhere, and he hadn't been there to protect her.

His swords own energy was raw and cyclical. Trydian knew he could handle its power, wondering if maybe the sword was what had interested his sisters kidnapper. It especially responded to the blood of his guards, their reanimated corpses, having been just as unpredictable, as the disappearance of his sister. It fed off of his vehemence, slowly making Trydian lose control of his own thought. He would only concentrate on the rescue of his sister, the swords energy manipulating all reason in the young demon's mind.

Trydian was ready for a fight, but he wondered how long before he succumbed to the sword's calling. With little hope, he called to Kahlan or Isabella in his mind. His body prepared him for the inevitable, his muscles deforming into an unnatural strength.

[Bæn'Deyanira]

The anticipation of the hunt caught in the Banshee's throat, attempting to stifle the child-like giggle that threatened to awaken and break the silence of her malign presence. Of all the evil and sinister deeds that could be done to the human beauty known as Sebilla. Endless possibilities there was no determining which would be more enriching and satisfying—the pain or the delectable screams? Gnarled knuckles to their whites gripped the scythe to the verge that it looked like the bones would tear through the constricted flesh. Eyes of frost narrowing as Bæn'Deyanira edged forwards, her figure although unseen seemed to grow in length of height, nightmarish effigies rising in skeletal phantomorphic silhouette.

The girl apparition only nodded at Sebilla's words to keep the crystal ball and cherish it with all her heart, to keep it safe... and thus obliged, appearing to grip it tighter and move whimper like a stricken animal. Lydia moved towards Sebilla's form that would have leaned close by, permitting and accepting her aid, along with the fateful words of accepting the dark magicks of the Banshee. Unknowingly...she had accepted it regardless without being aware of the weight and the hazard that came with those flawless innocent words.

One moment Sebilla was there... and the next she was gone- evaporated magickally; pulled into the quartz enchanted crystal ball, runic symbols glowing on the outside. Illuminated by arcane spells of the Unseelie no longer clear with transparency by an eerie pearlesque: moonstone-- clouded and obscuring any possible means to glimpsing into the ball and seeing a while different world/dimension. No sound would emit instead only be smothered by its interior and exterior ancient wards. In good timing her plot had unravelled, already the area was beginning to rapidly wilt. Where beautiful life once stood, now it was decayed...dead of its lavish greens and thriving energy...the reason why would be unknown to most except to those knowing of the Fae and which their powers work. For all faery powers, life is of the essence—the drain the natural resources and perhaps why their time in the mortal world is greatly limited and her time was just about up.

With a cruel wave of her left hand, sweeping outwards towards the girl who too began to wane and age. Once beautiful and youthful, she now resembled a haggard crone hunched over and disfigured. Painfully twisted hands contorting to arthritis-like deformities. Wrinkling skin, diminishing features till the skin began to peel, parched akin to burnt paper... her face contorting, writhing as if thousands of maggots disturbed the surface. Wriggling beneath only to burst into a mass of pustulent platter, flesh matted with the hatching spawn. Body convulsing in violent paroxysm, animated like some large monster had gripped the diminutive form. Raising the girl upright upon her feet, standing there and shaking from the severity of necrotic failure. A once pink and pretty mouth now black, agonizingly wrenched apart to form a perfect 'O' as the blood-curdling howl of the banshee escaped. Such a scream, ear-splitting, glass-splinters driven hard against audible perceptions and enough to make the eardrum shatter and bleed.

It tore through the forest as if all the skeletal-reapers bows had broken their violin strings, a cacophony of harshness more deafening than the roar of hell’s thunders or the trumpets of Gabriel—announcing the coming of the end. Tormented and sorrowful, the girl (although an illusion of the flesh) deteriorated rapidly through the stages of a mortals’ natural life. From beauty to pallid cinders... the body grief-stricken with death was torn by the whips of wind... a boon of ashes leaving only the crystal ball sitting atop of her crumbled remains. Shining resplendently in the heinous twilight of hours between sunlight and darkness, Bæn'Deyanira morphing from the shadows.

Victorious, striding towards the crystal orb and picking it up delicately with left hand while misshapen claws furled around its surface only to violent shake it to and fro. Pondering to crush it between her very fingers including the 'Pretty One', "Ohhhhhhh!!! So pretty, pretty....pretty" spoken while she played with it, like a spoilt child "Now, what a delightful thought!!"

Bæn’Deyanira knew the Unseelie King wanted this one alive and whole; but there was this side of her that wanted to do cruel and malicious things—just this once she would refrain, even in vast disappointment. Keeping the ball firm in her grasp and the scythe in her other hand, there was no reason to tarry in this foul and wretched world. "Your way has been sealed pretty one, there be no use in crying, save your tears....it's a waste of good suffering" Vanishing to this world, delivering the pretty to the realm where the vengeful dead belong....

[Paroxysm]

Watching from somewhere in-between worlds, Jack was not surprised to see his newly acquired servants fall with effortless ease; in fact, he had quite suspected this was how things would turn out. These were not high quality humans, after all. Still, with the Baen'sidhe's scream on the air, it appeared that the corpses had served their purpose, and Jack commended them for it.

Singular applause began to ring out as Jack stepped from behind the spiritual curtain of Purgatory-the Dead Lands, an overlay realm that scarce few knew of-and stood on the opposite side of the camp.

“Positively wonderful,” Jack said from between his teeth.

There was a silent questing of will as Jack honed in on and inspected, from a distance, the power produced by Trydian’s sword. Once upon a time, Jack may have sought to take the sword as a trophy but... Well, times had changed, hadn’t they? Circumstances changed. Jack was an agent of the Unseelie King now and his orders were clear. The punishment he would receive if he deviated, too, was clear, and the Dark King of the Fae had power enough over Jack to make him both obedient and loyal. In any case, Trydian’s sword was but a bauble in the grand scheme of things.

“Killing your own men without hesitance,” Jack shook his head, although his smile never wavered, and, indeed, appeared a permanent fixture upon his face. “What would the sister think? She seems sweet,” he shrugged, “but I have been known to judge humans wrong before.”

He was stalling and egging Trydian on, not specifically to break down the walls that separated reason from fury, however, but because every second Trydian lost was a second gained by Jack and his allies.

“She’s gone now,” he said with a small, unconcerned shrug, “but we can talk about that later, can’t we?”

Hunger mixed with the fire in Jack’s eyes and his tongue circled the edges of his thin, cracked lips. Trydian needed to deliver two messages to his extended family: The first was obvious, really, it was the one that would draw the High Queen of Ulster out of hiding; however, there was a second message that needed delivering, too, and that one was meant specifically for the Xanathi clan: Stay out of Fae Business.

Jack would have to display the message clearly on Trydian's body so that there would be no mistaking it.

[Trydian]

Trydian stepped over the bodies of his guards. They had barely been decent soldiers. Their loss wouldn't mean much to him. The laughter from the forest made him quickly turn in response. He held his swords at his side, the chaos sword reacting more than its master. When Trydian saw that the voice and clapping belonged to Jack, he readied his stance again. Keeping his calm, he waited for Jack to make a sudden movement.

When Jack continued to speak, he realized that he wasn't here to fight him. Instead, it seemed as if Jack was some sort of messenger for the cause of his sisters disappearance. Trydian showed little emotion, only that he was prepared to defend himself. The Unseelie creature made his nerves tense, his nostrils flared from Jack's soured scent.

The warrior in him, wanted to launch his blades into the gut of Jack. If he let his anger take control, then he wouldn't be able to find out why they wanted his sister. Sebilla was a simple human girl, nothing distinguished about her- the entire thing puzzled Trydian. However, he couldn't let Jack see his uneasiness about the situation. He continued to keep his stance, his footing rooted. With an acknowledged gaze, he spoke in a nonchalant matter. Trydian was accustomed to the world testing his wit- Jack was just something in the way. He wasn't the main cause for his distress.

Unseelie were considered lesser beings to demons. While demons had at least some pride, he knew that this Unseelie creature would gladly kill his master to gain an upper hand. Shaking his head, he continued to watch Jack try to play the upper-hand with him. He could pretend to be unattached to Sebilla, but that could go very awry.

“My men served their purpose....so what is yours?” Trydian spoke in a very direct monotone accent. If there was something he had to prove, or deliver, he needed to know. He didn't have time to be impressed by Jack's ability to raise the dead.