[hider=Allura the War-maiden]
[b]Identity:[/b] Allura, the War-Maiden, Blade-siren
[b]Type:[/b] Scion
[b]Myth[/b]
[center][h3]Curse of the Ganden Abbey[/h3][/center]
“Sister Joyce, I would say it's a surprise but then we would both be lying.” Said abbess Mathilda. She put the book she was reading down and peered through her spectacles at the young sister entering her office. The contrast between them could not be greater. Where the abbess looked old but wizened and stern, sister Joyce was barely twenty-five and radiated a restless energy. It was a shame she was sentenced to the Ganden Monastery.

“You can’t keep making me scrub floors!? Is this how you all live!?” Sister Joyce yelled out. “Just praying and scrubbing and eating and- Aargh!” She burst out in anger. The abbess had seen it a hundred times over. Young girls doomed to the dullest life possible. It rarely worked out. Still, she had vowed to help them when she took up the oath of the abbess.

So she got up and took a torch from the nearby barrel. “Come with me.” The crone said as she moved past sister Joyce. The two of them walked through the truly ancient corridors of the monastery. It was littered with derelict furniture. Some of it was half chopped up, ready to be thrown in the fireplace for some warmth. There were cobwebs everywhere. A great many doors in the abbey were locked these days but at the end of a corridor, the abbess opened one that looked almost exactly like any other. Except behind this one was not an abandoned room but a stairwell going down. The two of them followed it down to the oldest depths. Somewhere along the way, the abbess had lit her torch. Yellow firelight burned away the darkness, but a place like Ganden Monastery could throw long shadows.

Eventually, the two of them reached their destination: the lowest crypts. Sister Joyce felt a cold sensation creep up her spine. There was something wrong here, but she couldn’t put a finger on it. The abbess gave no indication that she felt the same chills. They marched on. Until the stairs ended in front of a lonely hallway. The abbess motioned sister Joyce to come closer to the wall of the hallway lit by her torch. It showed a relief sculpture. It was old and weathered and showed a row of knights with their swords raised and shield held firmly in front of them. Sister Joyce could just recognize the carved halo around their heads. 

The abbess noticed her looking at the halos. “Once those halos were adorned with gold.” She said. “These were the champions of the Exalted One. They fought the darkness and slew demons. Nothing could stand against them.” She moved her torch to the left. Revealing the horrors that had fallen before these champions upon the mid-relief. There were horned devils and brutish orcs but they had all fallen to the ground. “On the battlefield, they could not be beaten. So the Dark One send something else.” The abbess said as she moved her torch to the right. The fire burned away the cobwebs revealing a knight carved like the ones from. But now he was on one knee and without a halo. He was kneeling before a woman dressed in a cloak and long flowing hair. In her hand she held some sort of crystal with beams radiating from it towards the knight. “It is said that she sang to them, and with her song she cursed the Exalted One’s champions and took their souls.”

“Lies!” A hissing voice whispered in the back of sister Joyce’s head. She looked back to see where it came from. She saw nothing but more reliefs upon the walls. There was not even a breeze down here.

The abbess saw her turn. “Ignore the voice, sister.” She said, before following the wall and the story it told. “She took their souls and corrupted them. They became stronger, yes but also colder and more menacing. When she was done with them, these champions were but pale reflections of their true selves. She put them into new bodies of black flesh, doomed to fight against the one they worshipped.” The relief showed the same woman holding up the same crystal. Its carved rays now touching something that looked human but was far too big to be one. It wielded a great axe and stood against a score of haloed knights. “Every champion sent after her was either killed or cursed. Until-“ The abbess continued on. Following the relief upon the wall further. “-the Martyred Lady. She was the wife of one of the champions that was cursed. She and the other grieving widows marched upon the Dark One’s servant with her lantern in hand.” And the relief did show this. “They surrounded her stronghold and prayed to the Exalted One. The servant attacked. Expecting an easy slaughter. But when the blood of our Martyred Lady was spilled the curses were lifted. The tears of the widows and the blood of our Martyred Lady broke the power of the servant and rendered her defenseless. But no prison could ever be strong enough for her and death was not as certain to her as it is to us either. So she was imprisoned here. Not with iron shackles and steel bars, guarded by men armed with swords. She is kept here and surrounded by just us.” The two of them reached the end of the hallway. Both of them now stood in front of a simple door. It looked old but still sturdy.

The abbess turned towards her wayward pupil. “That is why we are here. Not to seek glory. Not to be known. We do our duty as the Martyred Lady did her duty. We pray and scrub the floors because that is what is keeping that monster locked up.” The abbess paused for a minute then said, with a calmer tone: “I hope you will start taking your duties seriously now.” With those stern words spoken, the abbess turned on her heel and walked away. Leaving Sister Joyce in the lonely hallway. Sister Joyce was young and curious though. Despite the history lesson she couldn’t help but feel the siren song of curiosity as she rested her hand on the wooden door.

“Is this the life you desire?” The ethereal whisper said. “You will live for another forty years perhaps. You will toil in gardens for your own food and then you will die alone and forgotten. How many graves count your cemetery? Go and see how many of them still bear readable names. Is this your fate, Joyce of the young House of Clarfield? Or will you etch your name in history? I can remake-“ The whispers were cut off when sister Joyce pulled her hand from the wood. Every sane fiber in her body feared those whispers. As fast as she could she ran up the stairs again. Away from that crypt. The distance never lessened that lingering sense in the back of her mind though.[/hider]