Dahere, the Royal Palace.
"General! What in the name of the Mother possessed you to withdraw!? You're supposed to defends the city! Keep its peace!" General Bealian shouted as he stormed across the chamber, with the steel of his boots clattering as he moved on the stone floor, and his fist raised to point an accusing finger at general Alean; a man who so far had kept his temper in check, but was not looking rather frustrated.
"I withdrew my troops, general" Alean spoke with a harsh tone, while facing the younger general with a cold glare. "Because if I hadn't this massacre would still be ongoing, and all I'd have to show for it would be a higher death-toll."
He finished.
Bealian didn't flinch, and opened his mouth again to speak. "You're a co-..." He began, but interupted by a sharp "Enough!" spoken by high priestess Kiyona. "What done is done, Baelian. This couldn't have been avoided, troops or no." She added as calmly as she could manage. "The question we should ask right now is not what happened with the troops, or who withdrew them! But what will happen now. How long until they retaliate? We must appease the followers of the Two-paths, tell them this was a terrible, terrible incident."
"And what, exactly, would that accomplish priestess?" Another elf spoke, general Morolan. "It will not stop their council! Or their lords from striking at us" He approached the trio. The priestess sighed, turning her head to glance at the general. "No, it won't save us from the lords, but appeasing their populations may delay their militia to form. It would give us time." She explains, trying her best to stay calm. "I know that we cannot delay them forever. And, Mother forgive us, I also know that by the end there will be many more of her Children who will shed their blood before this is over..."
Sicranniye Kelmoriel sighed deeply in his throne as he listened to the continuing arguments and blame-casting of his trusted servants and friends. They were right of course, in being upset and terrified, the thought of a struggle with The Two Paths drained him too. He knew that, by the end of this metting, he would have to make a decision that everyone in the room already knew, but feared to say outloud. The decision to prepare for war.
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Dahere, the city. One day Prior.
Fiandel ran. He ran as fast as his legs would carry him through the narrow alleys behind Aluin Square. Chaos; everywhere around him chaos. Shouts and screams, noise and a taunting chant "Heretic! Heretic!", and bodies, countless of bodies and people everywhere; also running for their lives, or chasing, pursuing and attacking others. The heavy beating of his own heart, and the breathing of his burning lungs lay as a constant noise that drowned out all other --- He had to get away from it all.
He saw a girl, she couldn't have been older than a few decades, who lay sprawled on the cobbled ground infront of him; silver hair soaked red by her own blood as it seeped out of her skull. She looked at him; a blank stare of amber that lifelessly bore into the back of his head, and forced him to pause.
A split seconds pause was broken by the sudden cracking noise of breaking wood, and Fiandel reacted by instinct. He threw himself forward, and dove beneath a falling log from a building; smoke and cinders thrown into the air as a burning roof came crashing down into the alley. Fiendel struggled back to his feet, but he slipped on the ground as he stumbled forward; coughing violently as he dodged more falling wood, cinders and fire. Something struck his arm, and he heard himself grunt from the pain, but he managed to keep himself moving.
His eyes watered up; the smoke and heat burning, and everything blurred up for a moment before his stumbling feet finally carried him to an opening in the destruction around him. Rounding a corner he thought that he had avoided the worst of it, and he continued down this new alley, but adding to his panic he now heard shouts behind him. "There's a runner! Get him!". Without looking back Fiandel desperately sucked more air into his lungs and darted through a small garden; turned left and around another corner and....
Something struck the back of his head, and he strumbled down onto his knees. The whole world spun, and a metallic taste quickly spread in his mouth -- blood --- all the noise around him drowned out completely by a heavy pounding of his skull. He felt distant, numb, as his body continued to struggle forward; a desperate movement that caused all of his limbs to ache. Another blow came; this one over his back, and with a sickening wet crack as he was knocked down against the stone. He screamed as agony wracked his body; surging through his back and down into the arms and chest, and with a spasmic movement he coughed again; a red mist leaving his mouth.
Time seemed to stand still, only for a moment, and Fiandel saw a blurr of movements around him, and blackening fields in the corner of his eyes. He gasped and exhaled, and then, then he saw nothing...