five gil fulmlong

[from the journal of Estelle de Laussienne.]

I am pleased to report that a quick death does not feel like much of anything.

The snuffing of a candle, more or less. In one moment, the room is awash in light, and then perhaps someone might rudely charge a spell of such ferocious density you can feel it tug at your aether, as if you might find yourself added to its mass if you do not keep your ground, and then — the room is dark. Not quiet nor gentle, but painless enough, if death finds you before your nerves can alert you to the fact that you will be dead shortly. Perhaps I should be flattered to be considered such a pest that I warranted this disproportionate response? Lahabrea brought the overwhelming might of his dark god to bear against me, tired and small and ragged as I was, as if deploying the payload of a Garlean flagship to kill a single cockroach.

Were it not for Hydaelyn, of course. She did not see it fit that Her holy warrior die in this holy war today.

Would that the rest of the lost souls of Operation Archon been so fortunate as to receive a divine intervention. Death came only once for them, much less kindly — and if they had prayed to their Mother before the breath left their lungs, She answered them only with silence.