[h1][b][color=#dfc3a6]Luna Emeraltide[/color][/b][/h1]

[i]Another night...[/i]

The reflections of the moon had long been dimmed. Ripples of white upon a wide lake before Luna were naught but faded, thin veils now. In the scant light, auras of blue and violet emanating from mystic flowers illuminated a path that lead up to the very edge of the lake. She took one step. A second. A third. Slow, heavy, and shaking. Each step left behind a print of blood where the soles of her feet pressed into cold stone. A thin, frail arm was lifted aside, beckoning to an unseen audience in the waters she approached. The other arm held tightly to a blade thrust clean through her body.

She was defeated, but now alone, for naught but true dead lay nearby.

The corpses of knights rested in the garden, their gleaming plate armor reflecting flowers' glow. Each petal lightly kissed at their forms with the wind, gently guiding them to eternal sleep. Their rest was reward for completing their duty: Luna Emeraltide, Vampire Siren, was run through with a half-dozen weapons, and left to slowly die; truly and finally this time.

Luna lived only to love life, even in an undeath, and yet now was robbed of it by fearful fools and tyrants. What was it that had earned her this spite? A spurned advance? A misconception of her intentions? Mere prejudice? The paladins could not answer her, now bereft of air in their lungs to speak. The keep from which they rode, wherever it originate, was too far to travel to now that she held only minutes more of life. Luna cursed this state of the world. The pallor in the moon, her namesake. The darkness in mortal hearts. The silence of the divine. Beauty was turning to dust at every corner.

The lake before her was to be the last vestige of goodness in her unlife. Luna sang to the skies, to the waters -to the tiny beasts of the night who scurried within the gardens.

[i]"♩ He longs for his green fields. His feathered bed.
He longs for his lover's voice. Now hears the dead. ♩"[/i]

She neared the water's edge, and began to step into the lake. Her legs sank below, and then her body, dispersing unending blood into the inky blackness. Her hair, which trailed at length beyond her heels, spread across the surface of the waters.

[i]"♩ Battle cares not for wishes. It sees but red.
Turn now to your own lands- ♩"[/i]

...

"My vision..." Luna croaked to herself. "I am tired." Luna swayed in the water, now chest-deep in barely-shimmering darkness. Her eyes fluttered, struggling to keep open. "Atmeria... I had left you long ago, but now I return to you in final moments. I can say naught but... Goodbye..."

The vampire's light left her eyes, and lids closed upon blood-red irises. Luna's body fell to the side in the lake with little else than a gentle rippling of the waters.

[hr]

Below the lake... No, it was not cold. This was a different sort of darkness. Luna's eyes opened to a lightless interior, and slowly became aware of the satin cloth that lined the cloistered walls around her. Her fingers extended, touching its surface lightly. She was in a coffin -an ornate one. It was certainly not her own, and she was quite dry. Someone... or something, had spirited her from her watery grave. But had she truly died, or something else? Luna pushed the lid aside, and sat up in the sarcophagus, looking about.

Alavaris. It was effortless to recall the place she awoke in now, dilapidated as it was. Luna stepped outside and felt the moisture of stagnant puddles splash upon her feet. As a once-cleric of Atmeria, she nary had to look down to intrinsically know that it was quite unclean. Two others were with her, she had similarly quickly realized: other vampires.

Luna stepped away from her coffin, eyes turned to the cathedral. Her hands clasped in prayer before her as she strode lightly forward.

"To awaken here, her voice crystalline in our minds... Yes. There is no question of our path forward," Luna replied to Dragan, each word of hers steeped in melody. She looked to Dragan and Illena with a pleasant smile. "Though we've not had each other's company much, I am glad to see your faces once more."