2017-06-19 Rei's tale

Today it would appear that Lyra is to tell a story, but she has not arrived alone. Lyra is carrying a small wooden stand of some sort and a soft cushion, and she look a bit prouder than usual. Beside her is a yellow footed rock wallaby that is lucky to be three feet tall at that. She has a soft smile and calm eyes even if they have grayed a little like her fur. Rather than being dressed in something outdated or foreign, she looks more like she has been out wandering with Lyra and picking up new clothes and maybe souvenirs along the way, and that only makes what resides in her right paw seem more awkward. A few inches taller than she is, the object might not be so out of place if it were a staff, but this women is instead carrying a katana that would seem oversized even in Lyra's paws. Lyra sets out the stand in front of the cushion and then accepts the blade with head bowed before she lays it in its cradle. Once her guest is seated, she turns to those gathered.

"While I have a few stories here and there that I could tell, I have an honored guest that has some of her own to share. I would like to say my life so far has had adventures, but in this case what I have to share pales in comparison. I would like to introduce you all to one of my clan's, my mother's side if you are wondering, eldest, Rei Ikari." Lyra moves off to the side and settles in to listen while Rei looks over the crowd. "As an elder, it is usually my right to embarrass the younger ones with tales of their past, but the story I have to share with you tonight is less about our family and more about one who found their hearts and souls tested against some of the direst of circumstances. To begin this story, I must first as you all the question I am sure is in at least a few of your minds: what is an old woman doing with a giant sword?"

Rei brushes the sheathed sword. "The truth is that this is my body. Before this, there was another artifact, one that crossed the path of Spindizzy as if followed in the wake of Hitomi Ikari, Lyra's mother, and for a time, that story ended here or at least paused. It would begin again with the end of Hitomi and Lyra's lives. Hitomi fell to a foe she could never have defeated, and she did not know she was with child yet. Hitomi and I have a long history, and Lyra takes after her parents in equal measure with sticky fingers being one of her mother's traits. Having stolen by previous body and carrying it here where it was undone, I had been with her long enough to make a bond such that when her life ended, her soul was kept lost just enough so she did not cross over. I knew a place for her, and with what influence I had, I made her reincarnation something unusual.

Far away, a man was building a planet for a sort of social experiment. It was a chance, he hoped, to see a society rise to enlightenment and thus be ready to journey elsewhere with him. There were many elemental gods, but in truth they were all machines or, in two cases, something just a little more. None of them understood mortality like a flesh and bones person would, and more importantly, the fear of death and judgement was not something the comprehended well. This necessitated a living person as judge, and so Hitomi Ikari became the goddess of death of a new world. She was also in charge of fate and winter, the latter of which kept the smell down in some cases. She knew she needed help though, and she knew I was still there watching over her, and so began the creation of something new. Keeping a forge going in a land of deathly cold and ice is a challenge, but a constant light burned from the windows of her castle as she forged a blade in the old ways that she still remembered. She imbued in this blade the essence of spring, change, and life. Most important, she created a blade that could decide its own actions, and those actions were guided by the spirit within it. It became my new home, and this relic would be one that would pass from one hand to another when their need for it was greatest. Three others were forged. The katana Fall Harvest remains with Hitomi, and it is as sharp as a reaper's scythe and it cuts fairly through all things. Spring Rain, this blade, will only cut that which is evil. Two tanto exist, and though they are smaller, their powers are no less. Both have yet to awaken, but it is Lyra's duty and privilege to carry Winter's Bite, and the Summer Sun will find its own home one day.

Now that you know of where this blade came from, I will now tell you a tale of where it went. As I mentioned, this world was an experiment of sorts, and the evolution of society and magic were parts of it. The druids and the shaman attuned to the natural world around them were the first to get a foothold in the new world. However, I am sure we all know by how that technology advanced and the views of the world are destined to change. Some of the first experimentalists were called, for better or worse, witches. They worked with one foot in the natural realm and the other in the realm of alchemy. Their familiars were important intermediaries of both knowledge and power, and at least for the eldest of the world's witches, they were a link to the older magic of the druids and shaman. Everyone had their interests in the new world though, and some paid terrible prices to obtain power from elsewhere while other groups formed colleges and fueled modern research. Still others found gods, true or false mattered little, and dominated regions by sword and faith. The more these groups advanced, the less room was left for the old ways, and the ancestral lands were pushed back almost constantly.

This is where I must introduce you to Rose. One of if not the oldest witch of her kind in the world, she foresaw what was coming, and she took it upon herself steer fate elsewhere. There were agents, or at least one powerful one, sowing the seeds of futuristic magic and letting it bloom for good or ill. Rose became the antithesis of this force and strode forth erasing and undoing as many of these advances as she could. She wasn't alone, and while many of their armies were diminished already, those of the Old Ways sheltered her and made it nearly impossible to find her. Armies formed as she gained followers, and she may have even delayed the advancement of these foreign magic by centuries, she could still now stop it. Old, embittered, and fading from memory like the great leaders that came before her, she was still an excellent leader as well as a spell caster. Someone with longer sight than she finally came for Rose.

Hitomi knew well what happens when a heart freezes, and so she gave the rabbit purpose as one of her personal guard, a position that would sustain Rose long enough for other lines of fate to cross.

Elsewhere in this world where foolish and dangerous pacts were being made, a woman was handling the negotiations with her demonic affiliates for more advanced abilities. Buried in the cryptic pact that was set that evening would result in one of the most persistent beings of this new world. No offence to any demons listening, but these ones are by far the more unsavory sort but not quite up to flowing rivers of blood sort. Their clan, if I can call it that, was mostly tricksters. Heavy on the imps, goblins, and gremlins with a few bigger bruisers, they weren't out to ruin the universe but rather enjoy what chaos could be made. Still, this is not the sort of thing you should be working out while you are pregnant. Amaranth was born not long after, and it wasn't long before they realized the young possum was not quite right. Some people have a bit of bad luck in their lives, but Amaranth was taking collections from everyone with regard to bad luck. If it was going to happen to someone, it was going to happen to him. Burned, run over, decapitated, mauled, or turned into a pincushion, Amaranth was very death prone. he died at least a few times a week, and yet whenever he crossed to the other side, he would just get pulled back as his body mended itself. Well, mended most of itself. Amaranth has scars like other folks have tattoos at times.

Our possum was not alone though, and he was given an imp to watch over him, which often meant laugh and point at some new injury, and try to teach him some of the skills his mother possessed. The lessons never really stuck, but there was plenty of mischief to be made with a death proof child, so all seemed well, and on every birthday, a special guest would come for him. Bob, the pit demon, was there to ensure parts of the contract were fulfilled, but who couldn't enjoy an unbreakable trouble maker? It was Bob that noticed a fondness for music in Amaranth, and on this thirteenth birthday, Bob arrived with a gift. Able to produce the most beautiful or most insidious of sounds, the six sting demonic guitar that Amaranth later dubbed Infernal Racket was a change in Amaranth's life and the lives of others.

Guitar is not easy, and some might considering being made to learn it a sort of torturous ritual, but Amaranth took to it well. As his skills grew, some of his casting abilities did as well. His imp, nicknamed Bookie because she would handle concert bookings, started using song instead of the usual rituals to teach him. The duo along with the guitar soon had hordes of gremlins and goblins gaining access to the city. His mother nearly cried when they started their first witch hunt against him.

While he was skilled in song, he lacked much for any other skills, and it was only riding the coat tails of the demon next door that he made it into college. He gained two things from this: a pact of his own and a band. The first was made not to the demons that his mother consorted with but rather with the shadow realms who sent their of associate to accompany him. The Shadow of Amaranth, or Sammy, was a gateway to the power of the night as well as backup vocals and bass guitar. After some work, they managed, as a group, to drag Bob in more often, saving him from less amusing tasks. For Amaranth, music was the basis of magic, and it was the only thing that could keep his newly acquired shadow horde, lovingly dubbed Roadies, doing something productive. While Sammy and the roadies were closer kin to the twilight realm where Hitomi resided as queen of death, they could not follow Amaranth on those little tours of the afterlife any more than Bookie or Bob could. His guitar, however, could.

Plenty of bards come and go through the gates of judgement, so there are songs here and there among those destined to be judged and those who will likely stay forever trapped on the far side of what lies beyond, so when one voice keeps showing up regularly and does not linger, it draws attention. Songs of far off places, songs of places long gone, some outright impolite if not offensive, and even a song or so of longing for hope echoed across the frozen fields and well over the tall walls of the castle. From the walls Rose watched the possum with passing curiosity at first and eventually with some sympathy for someone forced to bounce between two realms as he did. One day he appeared at the wall in the usual way. Usual might not be the right word given yesterday was a javelin and today was four arrows in this chest, but dead and annoyed all the same, but with timing regular enough that Rose was starting to adjust her patrols to catch him.

"Sing to me a song of the forest kin long gone," Rose challenged him. Ammy was not used to such requests especially on this side, so he wasn't sure what to do. Given a guard from the castle was asking, he answered honestly, "I don't know one, but I will find you one." He was gone for some time after, the next time showing up emaciated instead of perforated. Having little else to amuse her, Rose stared down at him from the high walls as he walked closer to them.

"I'm sorry it took a while. I got caught in a cliche and I had to wait for Bob to fish me out of it. I found you a song, at least I think so." Staring down at him, Rose rested her chin on her paws looking bored as Ammy adjusted his guitar. The opening chords were pleasant and had a sort of misty quality of their own as they reverberated against the castle wall. In stark contrast to the soul-crushing darkness of this frozen world, Ammy sang of verdant green forests where the fairies once flew beneath skies unsullied by the lights of cities. It was a realm of great beasts and one in which each knew their part even if that day meant you might fall is prey. A song of thanks to the spirit of the forest, to the fairies hiding in the dense canopy, and the beasts residing in the shade of the trees. The song was a prayer to the spirits of a time and place that Rose knew first hand, and for the first time since she arrived, she felt something.

Ammy was rather worried by the silence that followed the melody, and wincing was an instinct he found hard to repress when anyone suddenly moved to fetch something within line of sight of him. Rose removed a small round stone and tossed it to Ammy. I was cool in his paw, and there was a feeling that there was far more attached to it than just memories. Rose called down, "A good performance ought to be rewarded. With that, you will know me anywhere you go." He had barely a moment to thank her before he was pulled to the land of the living once again, and no one was there to see her brush a tear from her eye that somehow managed not to freeze.

This is how the beautiful Rose and the undying Amaranth began a certainly less than conventional courting ritual. Sometimes it was something old, someone Rose would opt for something new, and with each death Ammy brought news and song to her, and to Ammy, Rose had hope that he might find this place in body and soul that he might see her for more than a song. Eventually it was Rose teaching Ammy the songs, and these forgotten tales and melodies found their way into pubs and campfires as he traveled. Sometimes, Ammy would come back with reports of how a story or a verse was received in the great courts of some ruling body or another. But as the years wore on and Ammy's deaths continued to grow with no way to find Rose but in death, darker things crept into Ammy's heart. Some of this was just the expected wear on a soul such as him, but there were other forces out to claim undying for their own desires.

As Ammy seemed to be missing or showing less often, Rose worried if she would see him again or if he was somehow lost for good. It was then that Hitomi approached her, and as a goddess of fate as well as death, the queen shared with Rose something the old which could not see far enough to know. "If you do not truly care for the bard with which you have been with, then you need do nothing else. However, if you search your heart and you find some part of him there, then you must leave this place with haste. There is not time enough to think on it, and you must be certain." Rose knew the queen herself would not intervene unless there was a reason, and she did not have to think long to know the truth. Since he started showing up and interacting with her, the winter world was not as cold as it once was. She wasn't sure if she would call it love, but she knew it was something because its absence was worse than having never known it.

"Where am I to go, my Queen? I suspect the answer does not lie within our borders."

"You are going to the Isle of Mist. There you will find a weapon suited to your task. It is impossible for you to make it to the island without one who is of the island as guide, so I will provide you with one. She will also serve as your proof of my word. Your stay there will be short, and it must remain so. Time has become precious."

"Where am I to meet by guide, and from where shall we set sail?" Rose asked professionally while the queen's sincerity and emphasis on speed made her worry in a way she hadn't since she was a younger witch. It was a wretched sinking feeling that made her stomach churn and her heard pound, and she hated it for why it was there and loved that she could feel it once again.

The queen moved her arm and a young girl emerged. She had fur just as black as her mother's and was dressed in a uniform that was one part some other land and another part the black, silver, and purple of the twilight kingdom. Maybe ten years old at the time, she was a fierce little thing that wasn't going to back down from a challenge for good or ill. "My daughter will see you to the island. She can get you into the high temple where you will find what you need. I have already sent for a boat. You will set sail as soon as you arrive."

Rose was a little surprised first to know the little shadow sometimes haunting the castle was Hitomi's daughter, and she feared what it meant when the queen's daughter was sent as an escort as it was unheard of. Short of armor and implements, there was little in the way of preparations needed to depart. Woken from an ages-long sleep, Rose's feline familiar joined her and Lyra on the ship. Rose knew this would be an important task, but upon seeing the vessel she was to sail on, she knew she was going to war. Not visible from the side of the castle she had met the queen on, the sails of one of their greatest tall ship awaited her and Lyra with a full escort of four smaller vessels, and every one of them was brimming with cannons, mages, and even some of the old druids and shaman Rose knew long ago.

With the last of the provisions and crew on board, the ships set sail with a strong wind to carry them from the land of the dying to the borders where they would rejoin the living world. The use of portals had to be avoided for the attention they might draw, so everyone took turns on shift while still on open waters, and Rose lent her skills in powering the enchantments that kept winds fair and seas calm. Come time for her to sleep, she shared stories with Lyra about old wars and places forgotten to keep her busy until they came to the mist wall at which point only Lyra could direct them.

The Isle of Mist is an unusual place. It home to those that are living and dead, or better said, they and their spirit are connected but not always one and the same. Deep ties to the Ikari family and water magic give rise to the sort of mist-like transformation these people and their blood kin can manage. To those of the island, the Wall of Mist is just an extension of the spirit of the island, a spirit that they share. To anyone else trying to pierce the wall from above or below, it is a fog that at its kindest reject you and at its worst leave you lost for eternity. Thus you need a true child of the island, Mist Thieves as they are called, to get you there. Playful as Lyra was as a child, she knew the importance of what she was doing.

They sailed until she could no longer stay awake, weigh anchor when they could, and start again when she woke. Even with a guide and strong winds, it was two days through the mist before they reached the island. The largest island was capable of handling a population of nearly one hundred thousand people, and four smaller islands formed ring of calm, deep water. They passed the shores where they could see the rice fields, the colored archest and lanterns giving color to the markets, and the temple upon the highest peak of the main island. Blue and white, it looked like a piece of sea that tried to take to the sky. As the ships approached the docks, they ran up a second flag that Rose had never seen. Black with a blue central dot and a symbol she did not know, the appearance of them caused dock workers rush from the markets and aid the vessels.

The people on the island left Rose stunned because she could recognize what must have been family lines and traditions lost to the world back when she was still leading an army. The rice fields were build to work with the land rather than take it over, huge parts of the town were built into the forest as part of it rather than on it, and while she did not know all the spirits of the shrines in the city that she could see so far, she knew what they meant.

Lyra takes over for a short while, "Questions later, we have something important to do!" I remember pulling on her sleeve and then hopping onto the rail. As soon as the dock was close enough, I jumped. I figured as a rabbit she could manage, and she did. This island is my home. Full of old spirits and such, everyone was a thief and that was just how it was. You had to steal your way off the island as a kind of coming of age ritual. But there were some places off limits to such, and that included the temple. Rei and mom's, Hitomi's, traditions are more like Japanese than anything else, and this island was a place for rest when it was too hard to keep being a death goddess.

I took Rose up the long stairs and showed her the proper rituals for some of the crossings we padded before we reached the temple. As long as she was with me, it wasn't any harder for her to come in than it would have been to enter her own home. I had been told where to take her, back near our family's private quarters, and when I arrived with Rose behind me, Rei was already there. That was where my job ended though and something new began for Rose.

Rei nods, "Just Rose and I, I brought her to the sword, and I started to lay out what kind of enemy we faced. There are places and things in the vastness of the universe that can undo what makes the undying what they are or, if they fail at that, erase them from memory. There is a beast that has crept into our world and hides just beyond this plane and something darker. It has poisoned Amarath but has kept him alive rather than unmake him." From Rose's expression, she knew what that meant, but I made sure it was clear. "It seeks to undo you and all you have done. You can leave Amaranth as he is, or you can face it and risk everything you ever did coming apart and all the change that will come from it."

Rose sorted her thoughts carefully before answering. Her eyes were stormy and her fists clenched. The rabbit hadn't felt these sorts of emotions or with such intensity since she last left the mortal world, but it was all returning with the ferocity of a dam bursting. There was logic in sacrificing Amaranth for the great good, or at least the status quo, but again that sort of thinking made her ill. "I will go, and I will bring him back. Where are they?" Rose did not know who or what she was speaking with, and I am very selective about who I allow to carry me. It is not the perfect heart that stands to learn the most from my companionship. One like Rose, having the strength inside, whether or not they know it, but without a guide, that need a little nudge in the right direction at times.

"In time." The phrase didn't settle well with Rose, but she listened to me. "Before you is a blade. Its name is Spring Rain, and it is no ordinary weapon. That you have never carried one like it will not matter when is in your paws so long as you remain true to your heart and strive for the good of more than just yourself. This blade will harm no innocent but will cut clean the forces known most for evil. I will leave you now, and you will or you will not take on this weapon. You must be sure of yourself regardless of what you choose." Though I left the room, I had not left the room. With no one looking upon her, she was her true self, and that self was frightened. She lost the wars of old, she had little else by memories of Amaranth now to give her strength, and even her arriving here was because of him. It was not the enemy she would have to face that made her pause but the one inside. Rose was a woman, a war veteran, a general, a servant, and in many of these roles, she drew power from spite, rage, and anger. If she had asked for forgiveness of these things alone, I would not have let her lift the blade. If she just wanted to make things right or fix things, I might have considered it, but she instead said four words before she reached for the blade. "Help me save him." If I hadn't budged, I might have broken her heart, but her heart and her soul were aligned in this, and so upon lifting this long blade, it had no weight.

"You have chosen and the blade has chosen you, Rose. It is now up to you to uphold that which it stands for and keep your word. You asked for something, and it will come to you if you stay true. We cannot send you by portal to where need to be, and ships are too slow, but as lady Ikari has seen, she has also called upon a friend to aid you. She will wait for you in the courtyard." I paused to look into Rose's eyes, and in them I could see something in her that she had never had prior. She had cared for the old ways, for the forests and plains that were her home, and for the world that she thought was good and fair, but she had never before realized what it was to give your heart to someone instead of something, and it terrified her. It wasn't he she was going out to save but both of them, and she was not sure if she could do it. She was, however, certain she would try.

From the temple, Rose emerged to find that anyone that saw her moved out of the way and bowed with respect, but she was not sure if it was the she or the blade they revered. In this way, she had nothing to slow her progress to the courtyard where a solitary figure awaited her. She looked like a rat but with a more draconic nose, smooth with just slits for nostrils, and fangs as well as sharp incisors. At least seven feet tall, this odd rat woman was dressed something like a priestess, but she smelled of damp forests and cloudy mountaintops. On her back were feathery white wings that begged the obvious question be answered.

"Are you the one I was told who could help me find the borderland?" Rose asked while finding herself having to look up unusually high compared to normal. "Are you some kind of angel?"

"Yes and no, in that order. I'm going to fly you out of here, though try not to panic. I'm going to need to be a bit larger than this to manage a passenger. My name is Celeste." At this point the tall winged rat stepped back and began to change from a rat to an enormous white dire wolf still equipped with wings. Her body was as large as a draft horse, so finding a place to ride would not be an issue.

"You're a lycan!" Rose said startled. She didn’t think the civilized world had suffered that sort of creature any longer.

"This is the best I could do. This was, well… Just call it a battle scar. I'm not strong enough to assume any other forms. I can fly you faster than most, including outrunning any dragons we might find. I don't bite, not even if asked, so don't worry. I'll have you over the water well before there is a full moon."

I waved to Celeste and Rose, never letting either know I was still with them. Celeste is a woman of two worlds. Child of a distant star, she landed her long ago while trying to mend and refuel from her travels. Her adventures are the stuff of other tales though. If she had anything going for her though it was that she was indeed very swift in the air. What might have been days of sailing through the mist was covered in hours thanks to fair winds and a quicker exit from the mist. Celeste was not always such a goof flyer, and the sides of a few mill houses would agree with that, but at this point travel was almost luxurious. In total it was almost a day of flight before Celeste landed on the edge of a marsh. There were two beings waiting there: an imp and a shadow.

"I can go this far but no further, Rose. I can't speak for those two, but I wish you luck. I will stay as long as I can and wait for you." Celeste settled down low for Rose to dismount before returning to her tall rat shape. The rather adversarial glare between shadow and rat was lost by the far more direct approach of the imp.

"You're the woman Ammy told us about, on the walls of death's castle in the land of ice and darkness, aren't you? I hope you have a plan because whatever that thing is will take an army to defeat. They're following you, right?" Bookie was ready for a fight even if she couldn't win, but size be damned, she was ready to do as much damage as she could.

"There's no army coming for this," Sammy's voice was smooth and almost identical to Ammy's but with just enough attitude to tell the two apart. "No more than ever came for him. Now that we have the pleasantries out of the way, why don't we get down to the killing." Sammy walked past Rose. He wasn't among the dead or she could have sensed it. He was an animate shadow, something not unfamiliar to some realms but uncommon in this one. "And you are ready to do some killing, aren't you."

Looking back once to Celeste, Rose stroke forward with Bookie and Sammy flanking her. "I'm here to do what has to be done."

"Pull it open, Bob!" Sammy called. The pit fiend was almost completely hidden in the fog and dead trees, but when he moved, he could see the enormous creature bend and pull at something at first almost invisible. "We figured out where they came from, and we got Bob's foot in the door before they could close it. Still, I bet it’s a trap." Sammy continues and poked inside what was now a gap about five feet wide into what seemed to be absolute darkness. "Places like this are just as likely to be death to shadows as to you."

Bookie came up front with a ball of hellfire to light the way, and it took such a foul light to illuminate anything on the other side. Rose was familiar with many different dimensions that paralleled and sometimes touched hers. Even the frozen land of darkness she had spent so long in was a mirror of a brighter world. This was a kind of night that no one would want to find themselves wandering, but they pressed on regardless. The ground was cold, hard, and smooth like river stones exposure during a drought. Bookie's light could barely pierce the darkness, and that made seeing more than a few feet in any direction sufficiently difficult that Rose opted to call forth her oldest companion as she drew the sword from its scabbard. A simple light spell cast through a blade like Spring Rain can pick up aspects you might not expect unless you had the experience of one such as Rose. There is true light and there is the light of truth, and it was the latter that she invoked though the blade, and the sea green light of the blade, much was revealed.

The stones they were standing on were not rock but a glossy black sheet of what looked more like bone. These formed the floor of a chamber that stood too tall for the blade's light to penetrate, but the walls were visible. Black sinew and an oily black sheen covered the walls, but it was the bumps in the walls that were most disturbing. Each one resembled a spider silk wrapped body, and some of them still moved on occasion but none made sound. The walls parted on one side to a hallway that seemed to be endless, and Rose was beginning if they had walked from the borders of their world into the home of nightmare itself. Searching the place could take forever, but Rose remembered what had brought them together in the first place. Rose chose a song and sang it, letting it struggle down the hallways that refused to produce an echo. She chose a tune she had taught him but that he have loved most, and while she tried to find him, there was more than just the cocoons stirring.

Somewhere down the hall, they finally heard what might have been an echo but was instead a voice calling back with another line of the song. The sound was so heartbroken and hopeless that the trio wondered if they were too late, but call and answer it was as they tore down the hallway as fast as they could manage. Past several branch points, they finally found another large chamber where one of the cocoons was not fully closed. From the top of it could be seen the head of a weak, sickly possum swayed a little while singing sorrowfully. Never had Ammy sounded so defeated or hopeless, and while this place had done much to break him in the time it took to reach him, but killing him was not one of them.

As Rose went to cut him down, she was struck hard in the back from something in the darkness. The enemy wasted no time on speeches or declarations, and Rose was knocked to the ground where she lost a grip on the sword which skittered away towards a wall. That which lived here could not touch the blade, but it could prevent anyone else from doing to same. The assailant was a long, vein-like tendril more like the inside of some beast rather than the growth of vines choking trees, and they moved with alarming speed. Bookie was the smallest and most nimble, but between acrobatics and hellfire, she was barely holding her own. Sammy fared better but only slightly, and he struggles to reach Rose who was being hauled up by her ankles. Rose called upon a silvery white flame, a power of illumination and piercing pain to those of darkness, and upon its impact she was dropped hard on her side and nearly winded.

All the while, Ammy hung his head and neither called out or looked at anyone, and it was Bookie that finally got close enough to do anything about it. "I love you kid, but I really need the old you back!" Getting the old you meant Bookie turning her power against him and burning out his throat. Of course this killed him, but that is what she meant as she yelled to him in his dying moments. "Don't take too long!"

Those that still lived fought on with Sammy and Bookie counting on Ammy's return as their lived were bound to his. With tooth, claw, spell, and pure grit, each of them fought against the growing masses that reached for them, and unlike them, these things seemed to be tireless and nearly invincible. Bookie was the first to be caught and immobilized, but for whatever reason she was not slain, and Rose found all but one arm restrained as she was pulled towards the wall. Sammy escaped only on the basis that he was closer to these monsters in being than the others, and it was trickier to grab a teleporting shadow that anything with a warm body and a beating heart. Even he was tiring to the point of desperation, and so he tried to lift the blade.

Sammy was a being of darkness but not of evil. He and his kin, the roadies, were the souls of those too strong to be crushed by darkness. They were the crazy folks that shouted at the night and cackled madly at the belief that they could chase off anything with sheer will and volume, and in believing so strongly in it, they did just that. This was darkness, and an enemy of my enemy is my friend, but more importantly, a friend of my band was a friend of his. He wanted no long lasting power or boons of the blade. In truth, he never knew it held a spirit with in it, only that he needed to get Bookie and Rose out of this place, and so he reached for the blade and lifted it. The moment the walls realized they were being cut into, they changed priorities. As one slide split Ammy's cocoon open and another liberated the guitar, everything that wasn't holding Rose or Bookie down turned on Sammy.

"It is over now, Rose. You will watch him falter, you will watch her fade, and when all is done, you will be forgotten. Your interference in the end of this world will be undone, and it will fall into darkness once more. Resist if you will, it makes no difference." We all heard it, and it was then that I understood. In erasing Rose, these beings could undo a timeline and lead the world to a premature end as if she had never been. Sammy couldn't teleport with the blade, and he was getting trapped quickly, so he did the only thing he could thing to do: he threw it to Rose.

Something cold and dark was trying to force its way into Rose's chest. It was different from the cold indifference you gain standing guard on the walls of a castle in the depths of ice and death. It would have her not care and would have her forget everything. It would have sorrow claim all things until there only the wish for oblivion, a place these monsters could readily grant once the spirit was amenable. While she was able to catch the sword, she wasn't able to bring herself to act until she heard a cough. Ammy was returning to this side, his body healing for the better part, and when he lifted his head to see her, he was not the hopeless sorrowful being that had been hanging on the wall. Someone had given him a bit of a pep talk on the other side, and you can be assured that some royal assistance may have been given because as soon as he could see her, he was ready to fight.

Rose knew there was no way he could clear what this thing had done to her heart. She couldn't die and shake it off like Ammy could, and as she felt the cold darkness behind her of the wall and whatever sickly body these things had, she decided there was only one thing to be done. As hard as she could, she plunged the blade into her chest and into the wall behind her. Ammy's cry at seeing her skewered sent him running for the wall. What was left inside him was nothing less that rage, and thought it burned his hands to hold it, he tried to pull the blade out. When it woudn't obey, he clawed and tore at the walls until Rose came free of it. She lay there with the sword still in her while her sobbed and tried to decide what to do at least until Rose closed her eyes. Never in all their years did Bookie and Sammy see or ever again see Ammy in such a rage. If he could how remove the blade and save Rose, he opted to take his guitar and destroy everything. It was an ambitious plan, and while that guitar should never be taken for granted any more than the blade, the damage done could only be so much. If not for the situation, Bookie might have cried at finally hearing him use every curse she ever taught him. And while Ammy became a whirlwind of destruction, Rose reached for the blade and slowly pulled it from out of her chest.

That which was trying to grow into her heart was gone, and much that had darkened her heart before was not forgotten but was forgiven. The scar it left behind would remain a reminder of what was, but she was once again drawing breath. Just the sound of her calling him name made him drop the guitar and with teary eyes stare at what he thought to be impossible. He thought it an illusion until she wrapped her arms around him for the very first time, and after so long having a wall to separate them, he could feel the warmth of her both and the beating of her heart near his.

"Hire an artist, it will last longer. Now get us out of here!" Bookie was rather irate about still being embedded in the wall, and that was a situation quickly remedied. What to do with the place though, well, they were not sure. They weren't even sure what this place was, and so I returned for my body which was still on the ground.

"This is a matter for death and fate to handle. Your fate is not here any longer, so you must go. I will show you the way." Rose explained who I was to the others, and the journey out was much longer than the way in had seemed. Places like these, however, were not unknown to me, and it would be the duty of myself, Hitomi, and Celeste to purify it and sort out what still remained. With the heart of the beast wounded, we had time and could send Ammy, Sammy, Bookie, Rose, and Bob to safer ground, something that they did not argue against even slightly. Thus one passage of this blade ends and returns to Hitomi's side. That is the end of this tale, but I can say that Rose remained with Amaranth afterwards, and the band has been doing quite well.

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