Elshon duRalvden was a serious little girl. Her serious brown eyes and chubby brown face were always intent. Some servants claimed that the fifteen year old girl had never laughed after the death of her father, six years before. Her broad nose had been broken and never properly set, one of her brown eyes was completely white. She had a long scar across the side of her head that had cut her right ear in half. On her left cheek silver colored wire stitched together a long cut that still oozed blood which she ignored; the wound still unhealed, despite the fact she had been wounded over two years ago. On her right shoulder, from her neck to the curve of her shoulder, from collarbone to the top of her shoulder blade, was a black metal pauldron-like piece of armor that was anchored to her very flesh.

She was dressed in somber clothing - white for mourning, and a black band on her arm to symbolize that the Black Moon had touched her life - as she had been dressed for the last two years. She wore a steel headband with three ovals in the middle, which were red ivory bordered by steel, with sigils inlaid into the ivory with silver. The sigil of House Ralvden was on the right of the larger sigil of the Red City, while on the left of the central sigil was the oval containing the sigil of Alben. Unlike other children her age, her hair was cut brutally short and kept only a quarter inch long. Her shoes were not pretty or ornate like other little girls, but marching boots purchased from a phaelan trader, intended for phaelan scouts. The boot's black leather was highly polished to the point that they gleamed in the light of a false dawn as the girl stood outside and faced the gate, her face impassive.

Next to her was a mottled green peeper. The little raptor was not running after butterflies, nor chasing garden fairies as they gathered dew drops and danced around the opening flowers. The peeper - Talak by name - held a long spear, like a knitting needle, in its claws, the point sharpened, as it stared at the gate.

The servants had long ago given up on trying to break her of her habit of standing before the fountain, halfway down the driveway, starting an hour before dawn each day. She stood in the middle of the driveway, on the gated side of a large ornate multi-tiered fountain, the road piding to circle the fountain behind her. Her little eyes slitted against the dawning sun as she faced the ornate wrought steel, gold, and copper gate. Clenched in her hands was a sword, an orcish razor sword, almost taller than she was, from a time before even the Lich Kings. The point dug into the flagstones before her, the muscles on her shoulders were bunched as she held the haft in both her small hands.

She had been nine years old when Lich King troops had invaded Wret duAlben, and the scouts of that massive host had broken onto the grounds of Manor duRalvden. Everything had changed for little Elshon when the Lich King Army had descended on Alben, sweeping in from the ruins of a kingdom they had destroyed decades before.

Elshon had charged from the house, dragging the orcish razor sword behind her, screaming for the House Armsmen to follow her to death or glory in the name of House duRalvden, promising remembrance for those who fell, scars and glory for those who survived, and damning those who refused to defend the House to the Land of Wind and Ghosts. Her companion, Talak, had gone with her, despite being only a few months old, snatching up a knitting needle from where an elderly maid had dropped the sweater she was making. Talak had followed his soul-mate out onto the lawn, screeching as loud as his little lungs would allow him to.

Her voice, clear as a crystal bell, had roused Loyalty and Duty Bound from their tombs, awoken those deep in slumber, and she'd ruthlessly ordered the undead troops as if she were ten times her age with lifetimes of warfare experience. The peeper's loud cries had summoned the kobold servants, carrying ancient weapons that had been honored relics just moments before. The servants, the Loyalty Bound and Duty Bound undead, the Dread Knights who had been roused from their slumber, and the kobolds had all followed Elshon, fighting as they went, mustering in the small city and the farms surrounding the manor, even as the vanguard of the Lich King forces burnt the suburbs around the city and advanced. Those forces that survived, following her orders, had swept the Lich King Army from the city, and eventually from the district of Ralvden.

Once Bloody Elshon's War was over, much to her nanny's dismay, she studied beneath those Loyalty and Duty Bound that did not return to their crypts, learning tactics, strategy, intelligence analysis, and more from the Dread Knights. Elshon disdained, even at fifteen, the concerns of her peers.

Elshon had set aside her armor, stabled her cruel tempered omega-class war mount, but refused to give up her sword, and watched the gate each morning, despite attempts at getting her to stop

Behind her stood a large figure in archaic war-machine armor, the thick angled plates covered in ornately done enamel. The mask of the figure was a blank skull face, with barbed wire stitching the jaws together and runes of faith, loyalty, duty, and resolve upon its brow and cheeks. The man inside the armor had fallen in battle centuries before the war even officially began, and had been entombed for over three centuries and a half before the little girl's voice had roused him from his dreams of the past. Had summoned him from his spirit's eternal vigilance in guarding the entrance to the Cavern of Endless Summer and Songs where the souls of children and the innocent dwelt. His massive war-axe was grounded, his steel clad hands folded over the end of the butt of the axe. His eyes burned red as he stared over the small child's head.

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In his sight there was no little girl, only an adult woman blazing with authority and leadership like a raging inferno. The green peeper beside her was not an infant, but instead was a large, muscular kobold that looked dangerously competent. Attempts to convince the Dread Knight, which the girl called "Grandfather," that Elshon was a young child and the kobold was still apparently a summer peeper was met with stony silence. He, like all Dread Knights, could see the truth of the two.

Her voice had roused him from his endless dreams and eternal vigilance; first the war, and now the tidal surges of his duty to his House, kept him from returning to slumber. He could feel the shifting of destiny pulling and pushing at him, and could feel the fate's threads winding about him, preventing him from returning to his slumber. The blazing young woman in front of him, standing beside the muscular and scarred kobold, was reality as far as the Dread Knight was concerned. The fates were bound around her, linking her to the kobold, and them to him, and he could feel those strands deeply.

All who dwelt within the shadow of the Black Moon could.

The peeper suddenly peeped, breaking the usual morning silence.

"I see her." Elshon said. Her voice was throaty, the voice of an older woman, roughened by smoke, screaming, and battle cries. She narrowed her eyes as the small gate, which was set into the large main gate, was opened to admit a woman dressed in the smock of a woodcutter. The woman ran up the driveway and when she came within a few paces of the girl, the peeper and girl suddenly moved.

The peeper leaped into the air, spinning at the apex of its six foot leap, and bringing the metal spear point first into the cobblestone with a loud crack and the flash of arcane battle magics. The girl yelled out, "Halt!" in that too-old voice, bringing the large blade over her head in an upper guard position, her feet set to attack or defend. The runes on the blade flashed to life, and twisting runic script spread beneath her flesh from her hands, down her arms, and to her shoulders. The pauldron she was wearing flashed to life, blazing runes bubbling up from within the blackish steel.

The smock-clad woman stumbled to a halt, startled at the girl's voice and the peeper's flat menacing hiss, her eyes and her mouth opening in an 'O' of shock.

"Who approaches Manor duRalvden?" The girl asked, her one good eye burning with defiance.

The woman stared, looking at the powerful Dread Knight, the young woman, the hissing peeper, and back to the Dread Knight before finally settling on the small girl. "Jessalyn duTakket, milady." The woman began.

"My Lord." The girl growled, lowering the weapon.

"I meant no offense, My Lord." The woman stammered, going to one knee and putting her fist against the ground while shading her eyes. She looked up at the Dread Knight, her eyes wide. "There are others..." she started.

"She means her, good woman." The Dread Knight rumbled, his voice bringing goose bumps to the woman's flesh. "You will address her as My Lord, Battle Master, or Warlord duRalvden."

"Please, My Lord, I meant no offense." The woman started again, looking at the little girl.

"Rise. Those who address me do so on their feet unless they lay dying or wounded." The girl stated.

The woman nodded and scrambled to her feet. "We found someone, a man, dressed in..." the woman started.

The girl shook her head, and made a motion for the woman to stop. "Who are you and where does all this start, messha?"

"My Lord, I am Jessayln duTakket, a wood-cutter by the Alstead Forest, by the old border between Alben and Shulafta." The woman started. When the girl simply stared impassively she continued. "Four days ago, a man stumbled into the area where we were working. He wears the armor of the Stygian Wave, but the colors of the Iron Legion. He has been unconscious since he found us. We cannot remove his armor, although we were able to open his mask, so we know that he is a living man and not a Dread Knight." The woman blurted out. She stopped and stared at the girl, obviously uncertain.

"Does he bear family sigils?" The girl asked. The woman nodded. "Then his family should be notified that he has survived the war." The girl's voice rang with authority and command, obviously startling the woman.

"My Lord, he bears the sigil of House Ralvden upon his breast." The woman blurted. "His companion told us that his name is Daln duRalvden, and my foreman, she bade me to run ahead in order to present this for proof." She held out a dagger, usually carried on a boot, to the young girl. The young girl motioned, and the Dread Knight stepped forward to take the dagger.

He glanced at it but a moment. "The blade of Daln duRalvden, used to cut his bonding cord when he was born, carried with him his entire life." The Dread Knight let his armored finger run down the blade. "He does still live, My Lord."

The girl's eye blazed as she motioned to the Dread Knight. "Go with the wood-mistress to her people; escort our kinsman back to the Manor." She waved her hand at the manor behind her. "I will be enthroned. The Eternal Matron should be in the throne room by now." Her mouth twisted with distain. "I will await the visitors we are schedule to receive."

"The Eternal Matron merely wants what is best for the House." The Dread Knight stated.

"As so I." Elshon replied, turning and marching back into the manor, the orcish razor sword bouncing on her shoulder as she walked toward the battle scarred doors that guarded the manor entrance.

The peeper hopped next to her, tightly gripping his spear.