[Yshania]

Rather than ride, she chose to walk in her pensive state of mind and the sun was high when she settled her pack beneath the reaching branches of an aged oak. Still, she felt unsettled. The dreams were becoming more frequent, yet each time she felt something was missing…becoming disconnected.

Her long walk from the gardens of the Keep had taken her far, keen to place as much distance as she was able between herself and the rotting mortar, as she herself felt had surely become tainted by the touch of the Shadowmaster. The fact she was now running, from the pit, from the Drow and their minions… from her dearest friends …she was running, running, and deserting her responsibilities, succumbing to fear and selfishness. Years had passed, and yet the guilt remained, she knew nothing of their fate, only of her own uselessness and what vague memories remained of the final battle in her fire elemental form. Sooty and naked from her transformation, she had quickly sought cover in order to heal her wounds and find peace to rest, though rest did not come easy, plagued by guilt and loneliness and a sense of unworthy disbandment. Still the memory of the Lady With Stars In Her Eyes somehow held some level of reprieve, of justification, yet Yshania was unable to logically make this connection. As the months passed, so her memories of that darkened place became secondary to her need to move on and carve herself a new life, one that became satisfyingly mundane in comparison, despite the niggling conscience late at night when she wondered after her Dark Flame comrades and their fates.

Settling herself, she drew her journal from the pack, and berated her lack of discipline, since all she seemed to do these days was to read back and never add to. It was easy bathing in the midday sun and denying this uncertainty, easy to blame too much time alone with her thoughts, even despite the company of Githra and Pridwen. It was the early hours that she feared the most…even though this was once a time she relished: before the waking world. Now the early hours were lonely, and deceiving. Shadows walked where questions remained unanswered. Yet the midday sun denied their presence somewhat, so she placed her journal back in her pack and only wondered occasionally about the Lady With Stars In Her Eyes, since her remaining grief was for those she left behind…the heavy rock heart being the last physical link…the Lady being there briefly when she awoke, the final remaining connection.