Ignorance was a measure many claimed and settled within, embracing the ineptitude with a sneer, with a smirk, with a grin, but the filly, instead of settling into her delusions, proffered apologies for the strange circumstances. She hadn’t known what laid beneath the mighty walls, the keening fortress, the vigilant peaks and galvanized glaciers, perhaps lacked instruction in the art of kingdoms and empires, crumbling, faltering, rising, triumphing. He tilted his impassive skull for a moment, fixing his stare back upon the rendered confusion and peril drifting along her features: a witless fool though she may be (ironic, considering her given namesake), the youth were easily tendered into knowledgeable brethren. She was already far more equipped than the deranged idiots who wandered past their doors, awakened by the incidents of their impending slaughter, drifting amongst the chilling eaves with ebullience in their hearts and lunacy in their heads. The girl polished respect, noted regrets, furnished and finessed repose – other skills could come later, when it became clear what she craved (the strike, call, and drum of the battlefield, the furtive, wily glances of the crafty impersonators, the beckoning swirl of healing diatribes), hastened towards, yearned to call her own. The Reaper calculated, examined, crudely etched and sketched the ministrations and machinations through his cool mind – he was not one to pass and squander an opportunity for a fledgling to embark into their midst. There were already a mass of children, of youths, of lads and lasses, offering promise and distinction in the years to come: he had no intentions of wasting one more individual into their masses, combining strength, diligence, and perseverance into their coiled terrain. She could prosper, grow, in the chilling labyrinths and carnivorous caverns, seek their ways, sharpen her blade, learn who was friend or foe. He allowed her to shift and ruffle in the silence, stretching out the dominating sway, piercing and piecing together the justification of her arrival, of her acceptance. “You have not heard of us.” The behemoth almost chuckled, because there were always the presumptions they were the monsters parents told their children about before they tucked them into their beds, the demons, the infidels, the cretins stretching and crawling across the floor if they tread, wandered, wavered too far. Maybe their distinction needed to slither along the world once more, a proud, relentless force breathing molten brutality, rotten barbarity. His amusement died on his cool voice, on his penetrating essence, on the rapier tones erupting and contorting. “The Basin is more than snow.” He paused, sought to deliver a ricocheting speech about the sovereign lacquered behind them, eager to devour, ready to conquer, but ceased. She could explore and deign its potency on her own crusades. “You are free to live amongst us.”

Death, you bring death, and destruction to all that you touch.