The sun was well over the horizon at this point. It had been a few hours since Conroy had encountered his guardian spirit, Monoch, and already he’d been seeing the sorts of benefits this companion came with. Well, aside from the companionship and possibly someone to talk to, after all.

Firstly was the complete lack of the horrifying ambience from before. Though it had died down considerably when the sun had risen earlier, it was dead quiet. No witches cackling, no predatory beasts howling, no giants peering out to crush him to death, nothing. A pure, if not somewhat eerie silence.

He welcomed it either way. He’d put two and two together, assuming that Monoch had something to do with the silence that pervaded throughout the air, as well as the ease of a journey he had on the way down. Another unusual factor was the fact that he wasn’t almost unconscious with how tired he’d normally be after having stayed awake for so long.

In all fairness, he’d had a spirit going in and out of his mind earlier, so it made sense for him to not be feeling in any sort of mood to be dozing off or the like anytime soon. An uncommon sensation, but a welcome one nonetheless. His sleep pattern was gone with the wind as it was, something to fix that up was needed at this point.
The mountain pass became distant behind him as he ventured into the woodlands. Cautiously glancing around as he did so, still wary of his surroundings and the dangers he knew possibly lurked in the trees around him, or behind the occasional shrub or boulder scattered around. Even though he had magic to defend himself with and a guardian spirit alongside him, it never hurt to be careful. After all, heading recklessly into anything without sufficient preparation would lead to a bad time.

That, and manifesting a Water Elemental without a source of water nearby was far more taxing than it needed to be.
Speaking of water, he was incredibly thirsty. Turns out walking up and down a mountain in the span of a few hours was thirsty work. It seemed as though he’d spend all his luck getting up to that shrine he’d been to earlier, seeing as upon further inspection, the canteen he always made sure was full, was now completely empty. What a bother.

Though he could last a while longer, Conroy wanted an immediate solution to this problem. And drinking a Water Elemental wasn’t one of them. Though, in a wooded area like this, there had to be some water nearby. A lake, a river, something of the sort. There was just no way there was no fresh water. After all, how could the wildlife flourish here without it?

He stopped a moment. Taking a deep breath, in and out, as his body very briefly shone with the flow of mana. A gentle blue shimmer shrouded him with one, fleeting pulse as his senses picked up, though he couldn’t really see too much further due to how bad his eyesight was, his hearing, amongst other things, had picked up tremendously. Remembering that basic utility magic he’d learned in his youth had really come in handy. [ Conroy casts Hunter’s Instinct. ]
The hearing was all he needed at this point, regardless. Because sure enough, as he’d anticipated before, the gentle rushing of water made itself apparent. There was a river close by, and he was determined to get to it.

With a few educated guesses and a few moments of his robes being caught in underbrush later, a genuine smile spread across his face. The river he was looking for was in sight. The cool refreshing water gently flowing down a small slope, a conveniently placed clearing directly adjacent to it.

Wasting no time, Conroy approached this godsend of a water source and knelt by it. Quickly uncapping his canteen and filling it to the brim. He took a moment to make sure it was as full as possible, not before going right ahead and drinking literally the entire thing. As handy as it was for holding water, it didn’t really do a good job of holding a whole lot of it. He went ahead and filled it up again for good measure. Better than running out when he’s thirsty again and not within a stone’s throw of a natural source of water.

Though he did need to move on, the scenery here was so beautiful. The morning sun was gently filtering through the canopy above, and the cheerful, albeit distant, chirping of birds brought delight to his ears.

Speaking of his ears, that spell he’d casted earlier had worn off already. It might have been because he didn’t spend enough time casting it, but he didn’t care. Hearing and smelling that well got frustrating at times. [ Conroy’s Hunter’s Instinct has expired. ]

He went ahead and took a seat close to the shallow riverside, taking advantage of the clearing he’d found himself in to take his backpack off and take a moment to rest his aching legs.

“I wonder if there are any other people hanging around here…?” He said, presumedly speaking to Monoch. “I’ll probably need someone to help guide me to a town nearby, anyway. Ah well, I’m sure someone will turn up.” 
And so he sat. His gaze drifting around the quiet, natural scenery that surrounded him. Secretly hoping that another person might show up somewhere in this forest.

The journey away from the shrine took far too long and yet was over too quickly. The winds were with them and there seemed to be fewer wild beasts or witches in their direct path, but Monoch couldn't keep from noticing everything along the way, from the way a cart-road wound its way through the fields below her to the intricate ways the top of the trees wound together to form ominous, snaking clouds that passed over the half-moons. She had taken this route only once before in the past, when she had been marched up the mountain to be sealed away. Even now, if it weren't for Conroy, the mountain would have just been the background scenery on her path to freedom, something for her to fly over and ignore. Now she saw each individual patch of flowers, every single bend of the road, and every wild animal that leapt out of the way of her shadow. She saw a family of rabbits trying to flee, only for one of the babies to get picked off by a hawk. She saw a school of silver fish riding the current of a river. She saw a distant giant in the valley floor leisurely leading a pair of oxen going the other way.

So many things were happening all around her, each with a story of their own, and she had never noticed until now. But not all was peaceful in the Highlands.
The distant, weeping howls of banshees ripped through the silence of the night like a hot blade, wearing on the ears and sending chills down the spine. Their baleful, mournful wails threatened to split Monoch’s head apart - but Conroy never had to hear them. The spirit spent her power to create something of a “bubble” around her charge, muffling the cries of the night creatures to little more than vague whispers, indistinguishable from the breeze. She was satisfied.

The distant covens of witches were known for their rituals, and there were no better time to perform them than in the cover of the dead of night. To the foul maidens, their dances were intimate and sacred, and night gave them their privacy. The half-moons were said to have a certain magical power in the witches’ beliefs, and it is said that the half-moons’ energies were most conductive to attraction. Great plumes of smoke rose from mighty bonfires in the distance, marking the land as the territory of dark practitioners. But with a push of Monoch’s will and about a minute’s worth of waiting, those fires were snuffed out. She was satisfied.

The mighty giants of the Highland were a nonissue; at this time of night, not a single one of them would be an active threat. Very few would be left so much as awake, and those that were would be keeping guard around their camps, protecting the women and children. There was no need for the evil spirit to influence them. She was satisfied.

And the shrine?

The shrine was gone. Monoch's emancipation had still left all four walls and their roof, though Conroy had picked the place for its valuable scraps. Offered jewelry, gemstones, precious rocks, all non-perishable offerings that could be sold for high prices to shops. But now, even any evidence that the shrine could have existed had disappeared. Where Monoch's tomb had stood was now a few odd shrubs and some wild grass, nothing more than an unremarkable plot of flat land on an otherwise rocky hillside. She was satisfied.

There were no more contingencies. There would be peace.

A low wind brushed past Conroy’s legs as he stopped by the river to rest, a subtle reminder of her presence. When he spoke, Monoch heeded his words, a simple response forming in Conroy’s mind - a reaction that would have been indistinguishable from his own, if he weren’t expecting a ghost to answer him.

Travellers.

Monoch’s presence shot up and away, the spirit chained to no body and existing higher. She needed to find her limit, to push herself so that she knew where the end of her spiritual mana pool ran dry. She felt no shame in a method that would cause her some pain. Perhaps, in her death, because it would cause her pain. She had felt nothing for so long, that the fresh experience would be welcome.

She ignored the sensations of the Highlands, pushing them away from her mind. She focused, concentrated, gathered, collected. Monoch summoned herself to a point.
She would scour the area around them for another's aura.

She fed herself into Revaliir’s magic. She sent it into the earth like a sinuous feeler. Precise and seeking.

The power of her mind sought along the connection Monoch shared with Revaliir's spiritual energy. Her will burrowed through the land like a subterranean rodent, but traveled with purposeful speed, taking no turns or detours as it coursed to its target.

It found her.

She was an unassuming woman, one who wasn’t very tall, and didn’t stand out much in a crowd, Monoch assumed. She was armed with a bow, and the spirit assumed that the woman was out hunting in the Highlands - but she couldn’t have known for sure. She had a somewhat narrow figure and a decent amount of visible muscle. Her face was human in shape and structure, with fair skin. Long, black hair framed her face, reaching her mid-back. Monoch had to admit that the woman had a gorgeous profile with full lips, a button nose, and noticeable eyelashes. But most striking were her eyes - they almost seemed to glow in the dim light.

In that moment, the moment that Monoch’s spirit found Julie’s, a cold shiver went down the woman’s spine. There was a tingling sensation in her mind, one that compelled her to travel along the riverbank.

There was a subliminal tingle to travel along the river that would lead her straight to Conroy Rannalon.

With Monoch’s intent planted in the woman’s mind, she broke the connection, and her presence returned to Conroy. She was spent. She had used up a fair amount of her power so soon after being freed, and she was tired. A reassuring word entered Conroy’s mind.

Soon.

And Monoch rested alongside Conroy, invisibly leaning against him.

Julie was done hunting for a while. She was on her way to the river. The water had called her. She hadn't been in the Highlands for long, so she didn't exactly know her way around, but the elements and the animals helped her, and she had it quite well. She didn't like to hunt or kill animals except fish. She usually ate fish or plants, but there weren't any rivers or lakes near her at that time and the plants weren't filling enough. She couldn't grow fruits or vegetables since it wasn't enough space. When she neared the river, she felt something that surprised her. Something that wanted her to travel along the riverbank.

She had noticed an unusua presence. A presence that wasn't common to encounter. A spirit with physical form. Her connection with the element spirit had made her able to detect wandering souls. She also noticed a human presence. As she made her way through the forest she saw the human. It was a male. She had taken notice that she often met human males. The spirit however was female. Julie knew that the spirit could see her, but the one thing the spirit or any other race for that matter, was that no one could tell her species. No one could detect a fairy. Yes, the air and aura around them were different, but since fairies rarely or more like never went outside their kingdom. Very few or no one knows how to detect a fairy.

Julie was hiding behind some trees, but decided that it was futile to try and hide when they most likely already knew that she was there. She walked along the riverbank towards the human and spirit. She could feel the spirit's presence, but also noticed that it was weak. The human was sitting on the ground staring at the forest she just came from, as if he was waiting for someone. She pulled her hood more down. It had slipped a little while she was in the forest. She arrived by the river and gracefully reach out her hand over the water to control the water to her hand. It gather itself into her hand before dividing into pearls, before one by one float into her mouth.

After she finished, she decided to make a tree to relax and read in. She place her hand on the ground. A greenish, yellowish light softly fade into the ground. When she take her hand away a tiny sprout pops up from the ground and grow fast up to a big tree. It was a fully blossomed cherrytree with cherries and flowers. Its pink flowers moved softly in the wind as the flowers smell is carried by the wind. Julie decides to ignore the two for now and used the wind to carry her up to the highest branch. She lay down, takes out a book and starts to read while also eating the sweet and juicy cherries. The calmness and sweetness that filled her made her smile inside her cloak.

Soon? Soon? Just what did Monoch mean by soon? She’d disappeared one moment after Conroy had spoken earlier, only to return with the word soon?! That could mean anything! He felt a wave of panic briefly wash over him as he wondered just what Monoch meant by soon, what, was something coming? Was something happening? What was coming soon?!

His panic rose as he heard footsteps coming from nearby, fearing that a witch or the like had moseyed on over before hurrying away as the sun rose, but he settled down as the figure emerged from the underbrush, his gaze locked curiously onto the cloaked woman, his brow furrowing as they came into view.

Already it seemed as though Monoch and himself were being ignored. Though, in all fairness he wasn’t sure how aware other people were of the ghostly entity alongside him, he was sitting right here in plain view, and they instead were manipulating water into their mouth. Seemed a bit extra, but, it’d make sense if they didn’t have a canteen or something to hold water with, any opportunity to practice magic was a good one after all.

He ran right out of reasons to explain the way this person was acting the exact moment they raised a tree out of the ground, while then proceeding to sit up on said tree. Wha- what was the reason for that? They were literally surrounded by trees, there was no shortage of trees in a forest, he was sitting right by one in fact. It wouldn’t take him very long to charge himself with a moment of magical agility to scale it himself.

“Is this the person you decided to bring here, Monoch…?” He quietly muttered, still not too sure if Monoch was capable of picking up his thoughts or not. “Kinda weird that they made a tree show up despite being in a forest, we’re surrounded by them, after all.” He continued to mutter quietly, but now he wasn’t too sure of what he wanted to do.

They’d ended up over here on account of Monoch guiding them as such, and he was sure that they’d seen him at the very least. After all, he was the one human wearing robes that heavily contrasted the area around him. There was just no chance that they didn’t. Were they ignoring him on purpose? Though, he did also find it odd that they picked a cherry tree of all things. Admittedly they were very visually appealing natural constructs, but if he knew one thing about making life, it was that it didn’t last long in a place that it wasn’t native to. Though he wasn’t so good at it just yet, he hadn’t seen a single cherry tree in bloom, let alone a cherry tree itself in this forest. It almost seemed wasteful, that tree likely wouldn’t survive out here for very long since it wasn’t native to this area, from what he could interpret. But, that was besides the point. What to do about the person sitting in said tree was the task at hand.

They were clad in a black cloak, which indicated to him at the very least that they’d rather not be seen without it on. Were they hiding from someone? Usually, the people he’d seen wearing black clothing to hide themselves with were often hiding from the prying eyes of the law, either that or it was a uniform of sorts worn by necromancers. But, there wasn’t a necromancer he’d ever heard of that used elemental or druidic arts such as giving life and growing flora. Conroy knew that necromancers toyed with what happened after life, as opposed to what it did while it was still around.

A direct approach didn’t seem like too hot of an idea either, if they were wearing a cloak like that to hide from the law, then chances are they weren’t too hot on people talking to them. He’d almost felt the same way the first few months after he’d abandoned his past. An unshakeable sense of paranoia, one that made him think everyone was, by some twist of fate, there to take him back to the cruel fate he'd ran and escaped from. He did eventually realise after a time that he, and the life he once lived must have been forgotten about. He heard nothing of the city he came from, the people who famously practiced magic there, or even the forms they’d taught him. Nihilomancy was a foreign concept away from his home, as it seemed. Wait, hang on, what kind of person hiding from the law would go ahead and sit up in one of the single most brightly coloured and obvious trees there is? There’s no way they’re hiding themselves because of a crime. They wouldn’t even be here in plain sight if they had been.

Then, what were they doing? Was this supposed to be them showing off? Was this a subtle display of power on their end? Well, if that were the case, there would likely be more peril. People who showed off magical power usually were much more ‘vocal’ about it, so to speak. This woman can’t have been here to do that, making a doomed cherry tree in a forested area of Canelux’s Highlands wasn’t really as much as incinerating said forest with an enchanted inferno.

“Hey! Mind coming down here for a second?” He said in a loud tone, waving at Julie as he did so. “I’m a bit lost out here, so I needed to ask if you knew the directions to a nearby town or anything!” A bit of a gamble on his part, but he figured that if this woman was going to talk to him he’d need to be the one to speak to them first. They were all comfy up in that tree they’d grown, after all. Conroy of all people knew the value of a good rest, since having one for him was a rare experience.
He was still having a little bit of trouble getting his head around how this woman worked, let alone thought. It was obvious that Monoch had done something to end up getting them over here, but what? Was this secretly just Monoch possessing this person, and trying to play some kind of weird joke? Wait, no that’s a stupid assumption, he felt Monoch’s presence beside him as he was sitting down earlier on. Either way, he patiently waited at the foot of the tree for this woman’s response. Surely they’d come down and talk to him after he’d directly spoken to them, right?
So, he got up, taking a couple of steps towards the tree and gazing up to the woman

The spectre was uncharacteristically silent as she waited for the hooded woman to enter the clearing. She had no words, no commentary, no explanation to provide to Conroy.

However, she only provided no explanation because she was enjoying his fearful panic. It reminded her of simpler times. She almost missed that sensation, the dread and terror that others felt in her presence. How easy it would be to make it so that fear was the last thing he felt…

She sighed. No, no. Those trains of thought wouldn't do anymore. She was a reformed spirit, now. The Butcher of Millingen had retired.

A twinge of concern tugged at her own heart, though, for differing reasons than Conroy's own frustration. If only for a fleeting moment, Monoch was worried that the woman she was attracted to hadn't picked up on her spiritual hint. "Subtlety" wasn't a strong suit of the vengeful spirit. She was far too used to acting as an otherworldly murderess, and her new role as an otherworldly guide would take a great amount of time to adapt to.

But the foliage parted, and a twisted sort of relief flooded into the spirit. Her plan had worked! Or, rather, the first part of it had. She had lead the woman to Conroy, but there was no guarantee that she would help him. Invisible to all, Monoch simply dispersed herself, losing any trace of her aura or presence, and quietly observed the proceedings.

Whether or not the woman helped anyone, the interaction was certain to be entertaining.

As the woman approached the clearing, a cold tingle went down her back as an uneasy feeling started to squirm in her gut. The place felt haunted, which was very strange. To most in Revaliir, saying that a place was haunted was akin to saying that it had a cockroach problem, and was usually met with a reaction of "Well, get out some charms and clean it up then!"

The stirrings of the supernatural provoked no fear from Conroy as they were just the feeling of dull routine. But Monoch's behavior was different, this time. Though he didn't actually sense any sort of presence over where Monoch's spirit had been, something about it still gave him the tingles. The wind picked up in strength, rustling through the leaves and bending the wild grass.

When Conroy spoke, searching for Monoch with his words, his voice was drowned by the gently babbling stream, his message so near-silent that even the dull thrum of natural ambience was enough to overpower it.

There was no actual answer; of course there wasn't. But damned if the sound of the wind through the trees didn't start to resemble a very smugly eerie laugh…

A gust stirred up the dead leaves on the ground and blew them towards the base of the newly-sprouted cherry tree. The ghostly message was vague, but was deliberately steering him towards the stranger clad in black. One could say whatever they wanted about Monoch - she knew how to put on a good haunting! When she wanted to be, she was subtle, and just the right amount of vaguely spooky, and there was always the off chance of an incredibly violent spirit deciding to drop her "playing nice" routine and go right back to murder.

Conroy made the first move of the two mortals in the clearing. Monoch watched onward curiously, eager to see if her intuition had been right. She sincerely hoped that she hadn't lured a useless girl to her charge - there was something sincerely unique about the woman's aura. Monoch's connection to the natural currents of Revaliir's magic and the idle thrums of the auras of other creatures could tell her that much for certain. She knew she had been attracted to her for some reason or another… she would have to wait and see how things went.

She hoped she wouldn't need to intervene. Monoch was sincerely enjoying being vaguely mystical. There was no mystery if she revealed herself out of frustration, and so she had to be patient.

While Julie read her journal she thought about where to travel next. She had had her fill of water, eaten food and collected herbs. She had also bought sweets that should last for at least a month. She looked down at the human who were talking. "Hey! Mind coming down here for a second?" He said in a loud tone. He also waved at her making her put down the book and tilt her head. "I'm a bit lost out here, so I need to ask if you knew the direction to a nearby town or anything!" Julie thought for a while contemplating. She were a little lost as well and it didn't seem like a bad idea to follow the two. She jumped down the tree grabbing the hood so it wouldn't fly off. Once she was on the ground, the tree started to wither. 

She watch the tree wither to the ground, rotting and become one with the earth. She make gras grow so it wouldn't look like a dirt pile. She then proceed with walking to the human male and his invisible companion. Her steps were light almost as if her feet didn't touch the ground. She was careful not to seem threatening.

She walked to the human and talked in a calm, cold, but surprisingly beautiful voice. "I am unfortunately just as lost as you, but if you would like. We could travel together for now. I am a lone traveler and haven't had any human interaction in a while." She said human interaction as if it was something she had never thought she would say. She decided to sit down with the human and sat next to him. Her cloak made the sunlight unable to touch her skin. And since the cloak was black, it got warmer both inside and outside. She were tempted to take off the hood, but didn't want comments for her unique eyes. 

Julie looked at the water that flowed undisturbed in the river. The trees that moved in the wind and the birds that sang. The nature was so calm and relaxed here. Undisturbed and peaceful. She let the wind blow in her face making the hood slip a bit showing her pale jade-like skin. It was only her chin that was visible, but she pulled the hood fast down hoping that the human didn't notice. It was already bad that they saw her use magic. She continues to stare at the peaceful scenery. 

The woman was doing something now, at least. Though Conroy was slightly more concerned at the subtle stirs that Monoch was whipping up here and there, the wind vaguely resembling a smugly eerie laugh really laying the icing on top of the cake. He wasn’t sure if it was a response to what he’d said or not, but either way, he didn’t think anything about this was all that funny.

As Julie hopped down the length of the cherry tree, Conroy took note of how they clutched the hood of their cloak down as they did so. They really had to be hiding something, but that was what he couldn’t figure out. From what he’d seen so far, the way this woman was acting indicated to him that they didn’t really have anyone in particular to hide from. It must have been a personal reason, if anything.

…Well, his idea of the tree manifesting being a simple means of showing off did sort of seem to be correct, seeing as the exact moment she hit the ground it started to wither and die. Seemed like a waste of mana, if anything. Making a tree non-native to this environment from seemingly nothing must have ended up being quite an exhausted usage of magic, after all. He kept his eyes carefully on them as they approached.

He listened to every word the woman spoke. Quietly sighing with disappointment as they said that they were also lost in this area. It was more an inconvenience than anything, though. After all he had the entire day to get out of here before it ended up getting dangerous, having to spend a while longer without a guide wouldn’t be too much hassle. Though, he was a little bit offset by how calm they were being. He figured it was best to be cautious around this person, for the moment at least.

Wait, hang on, did they just ask to travel with him?

He stood silent for a moment, there shouldn’t have been any sort of weirdness coming off of a question as simple as that, but really? Usually, when you want to travel with someone you at least introduce yourself first, talk a bit, get to know each other and such. Though it’s quite possible to do that while walking, he was a firm believer in at least knowing someone’s name before trusting them to travel with himself for any length of distance. Just so that way he could call out to them if need be, or he’d remember the name if the bastard tried attacking him. …He wasn't even that vengeful of a person, he just felt comfortable knowing if the need arose.

Then there was the way she enunciated the words human interaction. That was also weird, every time he thought he had something figured out about this woman, something else just came along and kicked that thought right to the pits of the shadow realm. Though, this did give him some sort of idea. Maybe this person wasn’t even a human? No human he’d met that wasn’t an introverted shut-in or some kind of mushroom muncher used either of those words with such heavy emphasis. That might explain why they were hiding themselves, maybe they were an elf who was trying to hide their identity for some reason or other? Ah well, that wasn’t really important right now.

“Just a second there.” He spoke simply, raising up a hand as if to interrupt her. “Don’t you think it’s a bit weird to be going around asking people to travel when you don’t even know who they are?” He took off his glasses a moment as he continued to speak, by some miracle of nature they’d been smudged by a seemingly unknown force, despite them not having been touched once the entire time he’d been here. He suspected Monoch for a moment, but ghosts didn’t have fingers to smudge people’s glasses with. He gently cleaned the delicate lenses of his glasses with the sleeve of his robe.

“I’m not sure if you do that often, but it can be dangerous practice if you just ask any old person you bump into to walk with you through a place you know nothing about.” He slipped his glasses back on, blinking a couple of times to make sure he’d scrubbed off the smudge. Haha, eat that dirt. No more smudge. “Some people you bump into won’t have the best of intentions, guess that means you’re just lucky you bumped into me instead of a group of bandits then!” He laughed lightheartedly for a moment as he finished speaking, trying desperately to shoo away the mildly awkward air that had started to fester.

“Anyway, my name is Conroy. Great to meet you.” He reached towards Julie with a hand extended, subtly motioning for her to shake it. “So, you gonna tell me your name as well?” He asked, a subtle smile spreading across his face as he did so, putting on a friendly aura to see if that’d make a dent in this person’s eerily calm guise.

What he found worse was that he was finding this person weirder than the literal ghost he’d met in a shrine earlier. Some would say that he was the one being weird by thinking that, he’d go right ahead and call them stupid. Either way, this woman surely must have had a name. If she didn’t, well, he’d probably just end up more confused than he already had been. Not to mention he’d then have an excuse to use the word weird more. Which, well, he really didn’t need to be doing.

It was a beautiful day in the Highland valleys. Trees rocked back and forth in the breeze. Birds were circling above the river, skimming the water to catch their lunch. Monoch watched the birds and the fish, idly wondering what her last lunch was. She couldn't remember many of the details of her old life, and found herself troubled by that fact. She wondered if she knew, when she lay her head to rest on the night she was murdered, that it would be the last time she would admire the country she loved. She awoke to find herself not in her cozy bed, or even in the protection of her room. She awoke to find herself in another world. A world of suffering.

Her fight wasn't over. It was further from over than when she started this stupid quest. The problem has only one simple solution. No act of bravery, no overcoming of personal weakness, no sacrifice could save the day. That woman, Rosemary Antioch, was doomed. There was nothing anyone could do about it.

But the longer she spent wasting her time with this woman, the longer her vengeance went unfulfilled. And that was something that simply would not do. It could not do.

Monoch's fury boiled over, and gathered herself to a point. She needed to vent, or else it wouldn't be long before she lashed out against Conroy as a result of her own invisible turmoil. She tried to think about something else, something to calm her down. She mentally reviewed the techniques she knew of, self-help exercises that she made liberal use of in her time as a maid.

Deep breathing exercises? What a joke. They wouldn't do her much good, not in her current breathless existence. She didn't need to breathe. She didn't need anything. She didn't have anything to need.

Stretching? Hah! Right. She would have repeated the exact same reason that deep breathing exercises, but she didn't want to waste her own thought-space.

Jokes, maybe? She liked jokes. Maybe a joke would help? The only joke that came to mind at the moment is that some genuinely believed that when they died, they will meet a robed skeleton holding a scythe. She was starting to feel like a negative-minded one-trick pony at this point; she had to think about something other than being dead or killing her killer. There had to be more to her existence. Come on, Monoch. This wasn't the place or time to think retroactively about your place in the world. You literally just got back from thirteen years of banishment. Think. Focus, or something!

She focused on the gentle thrum of the forest, natural white noise.

The treetop chirps were from many kinds of bird, each of their songs coming together to make the dawn chorus as rich as any symphony. The chirps came in a repeated refrain, clustered, exact in their pattern and yet still so free. Though Monoch could not see the bird, she knew it must be small just from the sound. She pictured it, tiny and yellow with a round chest, singing from some branch way up in the pines.

How annoying.

Cold fury still gripped at Monoch's mind like a vice, clouding her judgment. Frustrated by her own insecurities, she lashed out. A needle of force shot out from her being, coiling around the bird's throat, silencing it.

It dropped from the branches, impacting into the grass mere feet away from Conroy. Mere feet away from the inconsequential woman.

To use her magic while tired already was dangerous. It hurt her, but it felt good in other ways. She needed to make her frustration known. She isolated the life-force of a different bird, listening for it, and enjoying the silence that followed once she found them. Then she did it again. And again. And again, until the clearing was silent and her frustration ran out of targets. Feathers mingled with grass, and corpses littered the clearing.

While the birds fell from the trees in silent rapture, a voice echoed through the clearing.

"…Wasting our time."

The voice was unexpected. It was low, with an agreeable trace of huskiness and with a hint of more power than was just displayed.

Her voice was sweet but venomous, like cakes sprinkled with poison.

The two mortal beings spoke and the third beyond mortality interjected. The shivers grew colder as the air in the center of the clearing started to ripple. A pair of empty gray eyes appeared over two rows of teeth, and then the rest of the speaker's body soon followed.

Monoch appeared, but she was not easy to identify in the morning lights. The apparition was no more than a distortion of the light, a human cut-out of colors that weren't right. Where she moved the things behind her appeared bowed, as if looked at through a mild fish-eye lens. She was like passing through an icy shower, like touching arctic air, like bathing in a tub full of ice cubes, suddenly chilling, like being washed through with ice water, like having every warm feeling and thought dashed away.

"Lead us."

It was not a request. It was not a suggestion. It was a command from a vengeful spirit.