There was a terrible something that squirmed in her heart, ink spilled across clean paper, spreading and flooding, staining the clean white with oily black, rotten, ill, nefarious. It grew in her chest, blossoming pitch flowers, spreading obsidian branches, curdling the already-dire situation, until the girl flinched, recoiling away from the scent permeating the air already smelling of death and rot. She stepped back, confidence momentarily sapped by the growing sense of unease, squirreling deep into her body, and then she shrieked, for something was coming, sliding out of the darkness in thick tar goop, red eyes glowing and glistening, voices chuckling with a horrific intent. Her voice rose in pitch, becoming a shrill and petrified squeak of terror, before her voice drained away.

Dimly, first, her horn began to glow pale blue and violet, then brighter, cleaner, and sharper, it's translucent form turning hard and difficult to see through.

The screams grew louder around her, drowning her, sending her sputtering into the depths of darkness, and fear was closing up her throat, sending her backing away before her resolve hardened, solidifying into sharp belief and confidence. Her horn grew brighter and brighter, blinding nearly, and then her horn dropped, sweeping her head desperately and wild as the clammy substance began to clamber up her legs, turning her skin cold and thick. What would happen if it reached her heart, her lips, her nostrils, her eyes? Bad enough it was ugly and dirtied her coat.

Of course, Raeden didn't know it, but her special brand of magic was a purifier, a cleanser of the bitter and dark, meant to drive out illnesses and infections. Would it work on the vile monsters?

Wading her way through the substance, she moved as quick as she could to the deer, protecting her. Maybe she was a lost cause already, but she had had something to say. Back and forth her horn goes, making work (she hopes) of the tar monsters with her activated magic, the darkness disrupted by the brightness of her glowing horn. "It'll be okay!" She screeches, her voice cracking, composure crumbling as she leans in to the near-dead deer, putting her horn to the substance crawling up her legs, praying the bizarre glow from her horn might do something, anything.