Yes child. I see how you turn from me, how you shrink back under your hood to hide from me. Even one so young as you can see the mark upon me. Hurry. Finish your pitiful meal and leave me with my thoughts. I have no need of your fear, your pity. I see both when I catch my reflection in the still water. And pain. I see that too.

May Shadra have mercy on what I have been, for she will have no mercy on what I have become. That much is certain. Death now seems the easy option. But I fear damnation, though I am already many times punished, already long since damned.

I was a mage, by trade. An alchemist, of sorts. At one time I was intended for one of the Tzuelin, a priest of Shadra. But I lost control of my mind. I wanted power, yes. But as one of Shadra's chosen I would have had power in abundance. A strong force was at work within me. I concocted strange physicks and discovered weird sciences. But this alone did not satisfy me. I began to dream dreams. Illicit dreams. I began to see visions of other worlds and fantasies of another way. But there is no way beyond Shadra, I know that now. I should have known that then. But for this, I am punished.

Of twelvemonths I have already existed four score. And yet I may see many more winters. This curse that is upon me would keep me alive in this state- a frail, futile creature of sinew and bone. I am cursed by fate and by Shadra. I will live until my skin falls like paper, until my bones will crumble as dust, my veins become dry as a riverbed after a decade's drought. Maybe I will even outlive you, my child? And yet, this part of the curse at least is self wrought.