“You picked the wrong mind to control and you picked the wrong elf to kill! Give me back my husband!”

And with that said, Ar’thilmus pushed the dagger forcefully against his neck. She had come to understand now that all his words and all his actions had not been his own. She had come to understand that the elf she called ‘husband’ was not acting of his own free will; that he was being controlled by something within him. He had long ago told her the story of the one he called Dhae, for it meant shadow, and she and she alone understood why he spoke as he did and why he mastered the darkness around him. Her knowledge now had become her strength.

The blood began to sprinkle itself down his neck, his eyes that usually were pale gold now flashing a dark shade of gray. For the first time, he began to question whether she had it in her to kill him after all. Until this moment he had be certain she could not slay the body of the person she loved; but as he saw the spots of color before his eyes, and the impassive fury in hers, his confidence was waning. He felt the control slip…

She was there before him, the anger playing her emotions in her eyes and it pained him to see it. The dagger’s edge was cold against his already blood stained neck, and he knew deep down from the expression on her face she was more than ready to kill him if he made a false move. He had no intention to harm his wife, and he forced himself to stand, her blade lifting with him to remain in contact with his neck. He could tell by the softening in her eyes though as he stood that she recognized the pale golden glimmer in his, and she had caught the words ‘I love you’ mimed off his lips. He lifted a hand to her cheek, his fingers dancing over her pale skin, soothingly, calmly... there was a tremor in her voice.

“Is that Di’thang or Dhae? This better not be another of your games…”

He gave her a reassuring smile. He had played perfectly into his own hands, his mind having worked exactly as he knew it would. Of course he wished to calm her, to sooth her; he had been weakened by the emotion of love. But he knew now that he could not remain in this body, with the dagger still held to its neck. And he knew he could not fight her; her abilities prevented him even getting close. She would have to die from inside. He made the transfer.

Shadow seeped out of Di’thang’s fingers, leaking from his skin and dissolving into Ar’thilmus’ face with just as much ease. Her eyes widened as she felt the penetration of her mind; she felt it there, cold and alive. Instantly Di’thang gasped out, tearing his fingers from her face only moments too late, realization hitting him painfully. He could feel the security of his own mind; he could feel the lack now of voices driving him, tormenting him, controlling every thought, every word, every emotion. He felt alone in his own head and, for the briefest of seconds, he smiled. The relief was painfully displaced, however, by the look of internal torment on the face of his wife now.

He had got into her mind as easily as he had got into any other. Typically he had found, to amusement, that the emotion of love had weakened every defense she had. She had been too keen to free her husband that she had forgotten to protect herself, and now he was within her. The memories of her past flashed like a motion picture in her mind’s eye… she held the dagger to her husband’s neck, demanding the half of his mind to let him go…her husband had stabbed his blade beaten her eyes and she felt the life drifting from her body… she was talking with Verin as she bounced Ela on her knee… she was putting her daughter, Aza, to sleep after a busy day… she had discovered the body of her baby son lying pale and dead in his bed… Di’thang held out a ring to her and begged her to marry him, but she had said no… she was giving birth in her place of solitude, and much to her surprise there were twins… he had said it was her; her and no other… she had demanded he make a choice; it was either her or it was Verin… they had shared a kiss in the Ashaba; Verin had been witness… he was cradling her in his arms and she felt the emotions of loss, of gain and of relief…they were at the ruins, and he had leant over and kissed her causing her heart to do a somersault in her chest… between the dummies he had first stood, his hand stroking her cheek as he turned away…

No more! The mind had rebelled, it had stopped the images; he would go back into her memories no further, he would learn no more and see no more. He felt the barrier collide with his crawling attempts to dig deeper and it burnt him. He felt himself becoming an entity; she was forcing him roughly into the shape of a shadow fiend within her psyche. His attempts to dematerialize himself failed and he felt her strike at him with a glowing scythe, still deep inside the depths of her mind. He shattered out of the forced form, but reacted quickly, pushing suddenly on her conscience to resist her. She felt for a moment that she would do anything; she would kill her husband, and Verin too. The town would suffer, each one of them falling before her, no, she would cheat and affair with all she met and… she pushed him off, enflaming him with cold golden infernos to keep him off the recesses of her brain. She heard his inhuman cries echoing through the passages of her mind, and they began to warp slowly into the voice of her husband Di’thang… it pained her for a moment to hear his anguish, but as the voice suddenly morphed again, now into her own she remembered herself and realized that Di’thang was safe whilst he was in her mind.

But from her brief lapse he had remembered her weakness, and the images began to flash in her eyes, thick and fast, as the memories had moments ago. She witnessed the death of her husband before her, Di’thang’s body lying in a pool of his own blood at her feet. His limbs were dissecting themselves from his torso, decapitating him gorily below her, his pale eyes distorted in agony, his pale lips curled in unnatural ways. The gasp of Ar’thilmus rang throughout her own mind, and she wanted to grab him, to hold and to comfort him. More and more images of her husband flowed before her eyes; he was being stabbed… he was being burnt… he was being eaten alive by a vaporighu... he was drowning at the bottom of Lake Sember… he was falling from a cliff to his death on the rocks below… he was eloping with Verin, hidden deep in the forests of North Cormanthor, his body and hers entwined romantically, his… NO! Concentrating the strength of her will, she broke past the images, her mind a flurry of anger but she calmed herself quickly and coolly, dismissing all she had seen in her conscience as unreal… they were untrue; she loved Di’thang and he loved her… he was alive and well…

…with a perfect mastery of her own mind, Ar’thilmus re-crafted the images he had forced before her. She forced him to see their first kiss, so wrong and yet so right, at the ruins so long ago… she forced him to see their immoral eloping into the forests when still on her finger there had been a ring of eternal binding to another… she forced him to see the kiss that had driven Verin away from Di’thang… she forced him to see the moment he had left the barracks with her and only her… and she forced him to see the marriage that had bound her to him. Each image brought forward a cry that echoed in her head and almost made her wish never to hear another sound again for its thundering reverberations. She could feel his presence shrinking, she could feel him becoming weaker and weaker in her mind. She called out to him, told him that she was the master of her own mind and she alone, and she warned him belatedly that he had chosen the wrong elf to inhabit. Her Seeing Eye searched her own psyche frantically looking to find him amongst her thoughts, emotions and memories. And when he had been found, seeking escape from her loving mind, she made sure to trap him. He was strong, she knew this, and she feared what destroying him might do to her husband, but he was not so strong as to oppose her mental binds. She pushed the entity of him hurriedly to the back of her mind, remembering when she needed to the images of love that had driven him to weakness, now for the second time in his existence. He was trapped now; trapped in the back of her mind, unable to move, unable to grow and to control and unable to cause harm… just locked away like a virus in quarantine.

Her eyes shot open and instantly she was aware of Di’thang’s arms cradling her against him. Her body was shaking violently in his arms, her skin pale and her lips dry. Di’thang stared down at her, thankful at least that she could now see the hopefully comforting smile on his lips, but instead she looked down, burying her head into his armored chest. Her long, auburn hair fell down the black leather, matted with her sweat. He could feel the breathing, heavy in her lungs, bringing her chest to rise and fall against him.

“He is gone?”

He had been unable to resist asking the question of her, hoping beyond belief that he already knew the answer. For the first time since he had intruded on her mind, she now lifted her eyes to meet his, and gave him a weak nod. She could not bring herself to tell him what had really occurred, and what she had really done to the shadow he had called Dhae.

“Yes…he is gone. It is over....”