She would go again tonight to the tower of Semper Intus Noctem. And again she would wait. As she had, late in the evenings, every night for near to a week. Perhaps it was a test, but she would not be the one to disobey Trenton's wishes. He'd said a week. She had returned when the week's time had expired, and each night since. And she would continue to do so.

Before her, the tower loomed from between the trees. A dark presence, amplified by the setting sun. Slowing her new mount to a stop, she dismounted. In a flash of magical energy, the strange steed disappeared. In her steed's place sat a small statuette of a drow-bred riding cave lizard. Stooping, she lifted it from the ground and slipped it into her pocket. On the tower roof, she could see a silhouette. She opened the doors and climbed the stairs upward. It was Za'afiel. His head was down, his arms seemed to... hug himself. This disturbed Myra. Never in her entire time of knowing this particular edan had she seen him show a hint of weakness like this. If that was, indeed, what it was.

Despite her concern, she could rarely make heads or tails of Za'afiel D'Aerno and gave up on it as she heard noises from downstairs. Carefully she descended. The study was empty and the sounds continued - from below. Making her way down to the first floor, she saw Trenton. His form blocked her view of something moving in the chair behind him. He turned to face Myra.

"I hope I haven't kept you waiting."

Myra tilted her head to one side, more of an attempt to see what was in the cushioned chair behind him. "You have. Though I could forgive you that." A wry smile, seen often on her face as of late, touched her lips.

In response, Mord'sythe lifted his arms, a scabbard held in his hands. "Take it."

Myra shifted her attention to the object in his hands. With just a step and a half, she stood close enough, and took it from him somewhat uncertainly.

At that moment, she could hear steps from the roof. But they stopped, hesitating at the top of the stairwell to the ground floor where she and Sythe stood. Mord'sythe seemed not to notice.

"It is finished. It was harder to complete than I thought it would be." Myra only looked at it. "Open it...Unsheathe it for the first time..." His voice was always so compelling for her.

Wrapping her fingers around the hilt of the blade, she seemed to savor each movement - Half scared, half excited. She knew... Now there was no turning back. Slowly she drew the blade. Polished bone emerged, inch by inch. The only light in the room came from the candle mounted in a skull in the corner. The flame wavered ominously, its flickering drawing attention to runes inscribed along the blade. Each carefully wrought, and shone in the light. Red. The appearance of fresh blood. Myra blinked, but the appearance did not change. She carefully checked the weight in the blade. It's balance.... it was perfect. She never noticed that Za'afiel moved down the stairs to stand just at the edge of the candlelight.

She looked from the blade finally, to Sythe, and then back to the blade. She lifted her eyes again when Mord'sythe stepped aside, to reveal what had been concealed in the chair. A healer woman - bound and gagged, struggling. Myra paled somewhat, but quickly concealed her emotions. She hardened her expression into one that - she hoped - was unreadable.

Mord'sythe reached a hand out to her and drew his own blade. It was identical to her's, she noted. She looked again to the bound healer, swallowing past a lump in her throat, as Mord'sythe sliced the gag away. Suddenly terrified pleas for mercy flooded the room, as the woman began to beg for help from the elfmaid before her. Myra closed her eyes.

After what seemed an eternity she opened her eyes again, looking to Trenton. Waiting. His voice came to her like water to a dying man in the desert. "Are you ready to learn?"

Her voice seemed lost. Only a whisper emerged. "Yes."

"Take your scimitar, and hold it next to her flesh." He moved his own blade to the side of the healer's neck as she tried to squirm away. Her pleas had lessened into pitiful whimperings. Myra stepped over and mimicked his move on the opposite side of the healer. She looked at him, to avoid seeing the face of the doomed woman in the chair. "Your weapon," he continued, her eyes fixed on him, "It thirsts. It will drink of its own accord. But what it drinks will strengthen you. I want you to pay close attention to the sensations."

Myra's eyes drifted to her blade, then to the woman at the end of it, a small measure of pity for the woman was reflected in her gaze. Out of the corner of her eye, Myra noticed Za'afiel. He was simply standing there, his head lowered, not seeming to pay any attention to the happenings in the room. As she returned her focus to Sythe... his blade traced down from the woman's throat, over her chest. With a sudden motion, he pierced her heart. A jolt of energy came to Myra through her blade. Not a shock, but a steady feed of it. Exhilirating. Exciting. Invigorating. ...sinister.

"Do you feel it?" Trenton Sythe's voice came to her, through the waves of energy that lapped over her threatening to overwhelm her. Myra felt sick to her stomach. Appalled at the sudden and cold violence that had just happened before her. Her eyes were open wide, her mind reeling - taking in and memorizing all the new sensations. She managed to nod slowly. "But that is only a taste..." His eyes were on Myra, watching her as the last of the healer's life energies ebbed.

Mord'sythe turned his head, for the first time, focusing on Za'afiel. "I see that you remembered, Sunveil."

Myra slowly turned her gaze to follow Sythe's. "...remembered...?"

"To bring someone with you when you returned." Mord'sythe looked amused.

The realization slowly lit Myra's eyes.

"I must admit, I did not think it would be him. I had hoped, perhaps, that it would have been that annoying elf that Khellenduras had once tried to kill."

Myra's throat constricted, her mouth dry. Her lips moved but no words came out as she realized just exactly what he thought Za'afiel was here for - to die.

Za'afiel's voice broke through the sudden and thick silence in the room, for the first time. "Hope is an easy enough notion to dispel, Trenton."

"Indeed." Mord'sythe grinned. "Now, Sunveil... It is time to take your first."

Her eyes shifted between them, horror creeping into her heart. "Not him."

Mord'sythe looked somewhat amused, if only for a moment. "It was your choice. You were the one that brought him..."

Myra forced all remnants of her shock from her face, setting her jaw. "Not him. He came of his own accord, before I arrived." She lifted her chin, a sure sign her stubborness was winning over all else.

Za'afiel stood there, unmoving.

Mord'sythe arched a brow. "Then... you brought no one?" He narrowed his eyes.

Myra drew in a breath to speak, but before she found her words, Za'afiel spoke. Quietly, but firmly. "You need not attempt to deceive him, Sunveil. I came as you bade."

Myra choked on the words that had begun to form in her throat., turning her gaze to Za'afiel. Mord'sythe only watched the two of them, as Myra stepped around between himself and Za'afiel. Her expression was contemplative as her eyes came to rest on Za'afiel.

"Make your choice, Sunveil." Sythe said calmly.

Myra frowned over her shoulder for a moment, taking a breath. "Za'afiel....."

"Make your choice, Sunveil." Mord'sythe's voice was more insistent.

Za'afiel gradually lowered himself to one knee, head bowed, fist pressed to the stone floor. Just as she had found him one day, not so long ago, kneeling at the Shrine of Justice. Myra gazed down at him, her fingers adjusting the grip on the blade hilt. For an instant she remembered what he'd said to her... "Then kill him" and she could see the action in her mind. A simple move. Executed swiftly, smoothly. Velkyn'uss would be proud. A simplistic backhand slash, as she spun. It would take off his head. At the same time, she could see herself as Za'afiel's executor. One downward motion...

Her hesitation must have been too much. "I had hoped..." she could hear the quiet rustle of his hair as he shook his head. She turned slowly to face him, speaking before he could again. "I will not kill him. I... want something else."

With blinding speed that she had no dream of countering, Mord'sythe brought up his scimitar, swinging it at her head. It cut through a few strands of her hair, deep into her ear nearly severing it and stopping short of cleaving into her skull like a knife into a ripe mellon. Just as quickly, the blade withdrew. Myra hissed in pain, her hand going to her ear in reaction. He took a step back to the center of the pentagram, a field of some force forming around him. Myra growled, a sound from low in her throat. His eyes met her as he stood there, staring at her. She watched his blade's runes drink in her blood.

"I would have made you an equal." He glared at her. "But now, you are bound to me, as I was to the creature."

Despair began to creep into Myra. "You did not ask what it was I wanted, instead of his death."

"Nor should I have had to. You will kill. Or you will die."

Myra narrowed her eyes and hissed at him. Then her expression eased into a smile, which faded to nothing. "So be it." Mord'sythe simply watched her as she spoke. "You would never have made me your equal Trenton. We both knwo it. Now... I am as you were. I hope this pleases you." Myra smiled a little sadly at Trenton, slowly sheathing her new blade.

Mord'sythe's expression changed angrily. "I was a fool to have offered you anything."

The sad, resigned smile remained with Myra. "That would make two of us."

Sythe shook his head at her. "Get out."

Myra stared at him for a moment and then bowed her head. "As you wish it..... My Lord." She pulled a shadow around her lingering to look at him a moment more. The expression on his face was almost human. Quite out of place on him. She turned, but paused at the door. She dropped the shadows from about her, resting a hand on the doorknob. "If I do not kill... I will die?"

Mord'sythe seemed very old in that moment. Not in body, but in spirit. The way she'd been feeling for quite some time. "You are... as I was."

"It is, as it always has been with me, as you will it My Lord."

His voice was tired. "Get out."

Myra turned her attention to Za'afiel, who had not moved or made a sound the entire time. "Za'afiel."

Mord'sythe turned and moved to sit down, staring across the room at Za'afiel. "Leave him, Sunveil. Just... get out."

"You'd not care if I died, would you Trenton? I'll not leave him here. I brought him."

Mord'sythe sat up a little straighter in his chair, holding a hand up. "You know I can remove you."

She heard Za'afiel then, his voice barely above a whisper. "As I said. No need to deceive him, Sunveil."

The sad expression returned to her countenance as she looked from Za'afiel to Trenton and back. "As you will it, D'Aerno." She turned and opened the door, keeping her face turned from either of them as she exited.

"Just leave, Sunveil." Trenton's tired voice came again.

With a murmured, "Yes, My Lord"... Myra Sunveil faded into the nearest shadow and lost herself in those 'lands between'. When next she came back to the physical realm, she sat on the hillside of flowers, staring eastward. Just staring, her shadow tending to the cut that had nearly taken her ear.