[ Springstar is a wasteland. Supplies are few and far between. What exists is either spoiled, dust, or merely destroyed. Either from the force of a crumbling structure or otherwise. Though some homes seem to have weathered it, and Akua has found that she can put something together in the approximate place of her own home. It is in the same place, and perhaps if she were to wipe away the dust and grime of the rotted wall-hangings and curtains, she may find that it is still hers.

There is no time for it, and within the crumbling walls and miraculously still-present ceilings, Akua Sahelian opens the windows and doors, and begins to work. There is no water to speak of, but the Praeis is used to living in a desert. She covers her head with a magically washed cloth, and summons water to start filling jugs and bowls. She has no Walin-Falme to seek others out, so it is only on their own merit that the would find refuge in her home, but if they are an ally Akua knows -- they may receive an errant communion in the first day -- 'Find my home if you need shelter. I have water.' Her magic was spotty, but she tried it occasionally, to attempt to summon more, to ensure there was enough for survival. If you join her, she will greet you with an outstretched hand, with water offered to quench thirst. ]

[ On the second day, she can feel the errant tug. That pull toward the tree, and so she follows it, knowing full well that it could mean death for her. The longer time passes, the less her gift works, and by the time she nears the tree, she can feel it fully whittled away and gone. Like someone had reached out and tugged the magic she held so dear off from her, like sheets of her soul had been peeled back, and harvested, and all that was left was something dark, and sinister in its place. She was Prasei, it was not as if she did not welcome and accept the darkness in all of its forms, but this is different. This feels like the sickening slide of an insidious madness that she'd once held so dear. The promise of power, of glory and destruction. She had once promised to reign it down upon the world. She had once promised that she would destroy Praes if she could not rule it, and she had made her madness manifest.

It feels like that once again. In communion there is guilt so thick it feels like it rolls off the woman in waves. She could never seek redemption, it would never happen. Had she been so foolish as to rope herself in to eternally chasing something she would never find? There's resentment baked in, too, thought it's not clear to whom it's directed. Whether its herself, or someone else -- or both, but she breathed in and out, her hands clenched at her sides, occasionally, the Praesi Sorceress would stand, and pace back and forth, as if the nervous energy would do something to resolve the pangs of frustration, anger, guilt building in her. She thinks of something better than creation, and hates herself for it. She thinks of her lost worlds, and feels the pang of grief that waves through communion, before she spirals again. It's loud, her pain, her frustration and disgust, and though she knows it is, she cannot help but continue her pacing -- she cannot stop the spiral, and the longer it goes, the worse she becomes.

Perhaps distraction will work? ]

[ The longer it goes, the more she feels something in between rage and despair bubbling within her, pushing out from her in waves. Akua Sahelian had always been a controlled woman, but she was also a villainess whose own madness and destruction had ended her life once. It was only the thought that she would be a jailer -- I'm not asking you to; I wouldn't have, if you would have asked -- a path toward redemption was a path without end. She knew that. She had accepted it, but the despair that came with it settled in her heart.

She was teetering closer and closer to falling, yet again. It was that reminder, that falling might come once more, that it was ever only one misstep away. She had chosen her path, the knife Catherine had plunged in her belly the moment they'd finally -- finally -- kissed, had cemented it. She had held locked the bronze bracelet onto her wrist, and though her skin looked ever-wooden, the bracelet glittered in dim light from the mosses, a bronze working, that had snapped on with a finality that reminded her of who she was.

What she was. She was Calamity, the will of Below, a restraining hand that would force villains to stay within the constraints, lest they be forced to fall to the Providence over and over again. The winds had been too strong, for too long, because of the Hidden Horror, and she knew that if she were to fall, accept Zenith, she would be turning away from her promise and her path.

So why did it feel so easy, even now?

Why did she want it? ]