[Grim]

There was no sound in that crypt for some time but the heavy breathing of Shiandi. As the dull throbbing of her tongue abated though it became obvious that Lady Shiandi was not done quite yet. At the edge of the circle they were beginning to flock. Spirits and ghosts. The dead and the not-living, side by side. Watching her carefully. Amelia could all but see the blood that had been painted on her writhe uncomfortably in the meagre light offered by the braziers.

Shiandi rose, her weariness evident in the way she held herself. Pulling herself up by her own hands. Her body seemingly unwilling, but her eyes still gleaming with pure will. She opened Amelia's mouth, her hand surprisingly strong as it pressed against her jaw to get her to open, a series of bitter tasting leaves spread themselves around Amelia's mouth, "Do not swallow them, they will stop the swelling and dull your pain," her voice seemed almost gentle for a change. Pitying, perhaps. She reached behind Amelia's head, releasing the leather strap that held her head so tightly.

It was not over though.

The cold hands of Shiandi roamed over Amelia's body, one hand splashing cold water onto her, the other rubbing away the stains of blood which covered the apprentice. She did not stop till every one of her signs and sigils had been removed from Amelia's pale skin.

The ghosts and spirits at the edge of the circle were formally tittering amongst each other. And for once, for once it seemed to the young half-Vagaran that she could understand what they were saying. Not all of it, they were not speaking to her, but the snatches she could hear, they were understandable. "Soon," one of them said, "sacrifice," was another caught in the susurruss. They wobbled back and forth, their half forms shifting back and forth, the ghosts seeming stuck in something resembling their long gone flesh bodies, the spirits shifting back and forth like between overcoats.

And though her tongue was clearly foreign, Amelia could suddenly understand what Shiandi was saying to them, "stands before you this brightening, naked, bereft of any defence."

Then her black foot stepped across the bloody circle on the floor and they flooded in, flocking around Amelia like vultures, some pinching idly at her skin, others starting to pick her father's hand out of hers. The ghosts who had held her up till now, removed themselves. But around her they swarmed, the ghosts and the spirits.

She could feel them brushing against her, like a silken sheet being tossed against her by the wind, only considerably more unpleasant textures were present. Some were gabbering amongst themselves, not inaudibly, just too quickly to be understood. And across the room, visible through the throng of ghosts, Shiandi was leaning against the wall and watching. Some of them, the ghosts in particular were talking quite vividly about what they were going to do to her, things that made what Shiandi had done seem a walk in the park. The spirits seemed more manageable to that effect, they seemed merely interested in consuming aspects of her. Some wanted sixteen eras of her life, others her innocence, others again wanted her warmth, some wanted her joy, some wanted torture, some wanted slavery. The debate rang back and forth over her.