<span style="color: #4da6ff">"b-but would it st-still be h-her? wh-what are we if n-not the body w-we were b-born with and the s-sum of the m-memories we hold? wh-what is a soul?"</span><br/><br/>Relene screamed in frustration and glared at him. "you've been saying it since breakfast! your too serious Relene, your too tense Relene, your too somber Relene, relax Relene... all i ever hear from you is how i am a terrible daughter! well I'm sorry i am not as good a liar as Amber is! if you think she is half as happy and bubbly as she acts your even more blind then i think you are! she acts like she does because she is terrified you and Amere won't want her if she is sad! she watched her mother get murdered but you two don't even question her smiles. you don't read minds and you don't listen to a word anyone says so what do you expect me to do? carve it into a hammer and bash you in the face with it? you can love someone and not like them... i love mom, i do, but i do not like her. she is selfish, too involved with her own life to pay any attention to me or my life and while i understand that she doesn't know how to be a mother she doesn't try to learn. she just takes care of my basic needs and goes back to whatever she wants to be doing and you do the same thing! your never around, you can barely be troubled to come home for dinner and then you vanish again. that's fine, i can deal with two absentee parents who don't care about how i feel but you will not barge into my life and tell me who i should be! if i want to be grumpy in the morning because i barely sleep that's my business! if i want to be upset because someone or something nearly killed mom you have no right to tell me that i am wrong! and if i want to keep you at arms length so it hurts less when you vanish again you have no one to blame for that but yourself. you have never had time for me and you never will, today is just your guilt twisting your arm... but i recognize it for the pale gesture that it is! you'll b gone again tomorrow and everything will be the same way it has been all my life and i refuse to be bought with cheap gestures!" she reached up to grab fists of her own hair and definitely pulled a lot of it out and hardly seemed to notice. "i am not a monster, no one has the right to tell me that who i am is wrong..."<br/><br/><span style="color: #003366">"my point exactly... and please, feel free to tell everyone their fate without my help. i am so sick and tired of their suspicions and their mistrust that i can hardly see straight. i bent over backwards for nearly every member of this family and even Ophidian here regards me suspiciously. Whisperia wouldn't have even picked your egg if i hadn't made it glow just enough to get her attention... it was hardly the closest one to her and she was terribly nervous about where she was and the fact that she would have to sneak back out in Elven form. she took the glowing as a sign from Elune and here you are, happier then you ever dreamed possible, your welcome."</span>she looked at Kitori and sighed.<span style="color: #003366">"even you, Kitori, Fandral's punching bag... i know precisely how you suffered and i do confess that i prolonged your suffering by saving your life twice. but isn't your life now worth it? you have a man who worships the ground you walk on, a Succubus who delights in your fantasies and you need never suffer again a day in your life. would you really choose to die five centuries ago knowing that you will have over ten thousand years of happiness with Ophidian?"</span><span style="color: #00b300">"but why Sharindia? why did you help us? what are your motivations?"</span><span style="color: #003366"> "because Ras loves you, Ras needs you, and i love my Ras. he always wanted a brother, i found him one with honor and integrity even if you are thick headed and a little single minded. you never figured out how you got to the place you met him did you? i sent you there. but then you were unhappy and that bothered Ras so i went back to work. you dreamed of a beautiful Night Elven woman who would love you and never abuse her inherent power over you, what could be safer then an abused woman who survived her misery and still had a kind heart? i did not arrange Kitori's abuse, that happened all on it's own. in fact i had a long list of possible candidates and after careful review of the timeline i arranged for Kitori to survive Fandral and then nudged her into your path at the earliest chance i got. you weren't really ready to meet her, you were still so hurt but i was forced to choose between pushing you two together now or letting Fandral abuse her for five more years and saving her life a third time. and so Ras has the happy brother he always wanted, even if he is a big, thick headed brute of a  Naga."</span>Sharindia looked at Ras and shrugged.<span style="color: #003366">"i can't say i care. Order will keep our world in tact despite The'kal's stupidity and she will mercilessly eliminate any of the others if they try to cause problems. as for the Harpy, i have a little hope that she will decide to stay just where she is, with her head buried between a pair of shapely Blood Elven thighs." </span><div class="messageTextEndMarker"> </div>