Roll me on your frozen fields,

Break my bones to watch them heal.

Drown me in your thirsty veins,

Where I'll watch and I'll wait, and pray for the rain.

Curl like smoke, and breathe again,

Down your throat, inside your ribs,

Through your spine, and every nerve,

Where I watch, and I wait, and yield to the hurt.

And if you don't believe the sun will rise,

Stand alone and greet the coming night,

In the last remaining light.

The seven moons, and the seven suns.

Heaven waits, for those who run down your winter, and underneath your waves,

Where you watch and wait, and pray for the day.

And if you don't believe the sun will rise,

Stand alone and greet the coming night,

In the last remaining light.

- The Last Remaining Light, Audioslave

Prologue

The end of the world begins, as it is destined, with tragedy.

As the Crone of Sassa shuffles down to the valley, her eyes catch on the smoking red-glow embers of the fallen Clan's valley with something akin to pity. The magnitude of the destruction is breathtaking, an entire bloodline wiped out in the single most horrific action that Crone had ever to bear witness. Where once a longhouse of ash wood and vine had proudly stood, there is naught but smoke and ash; where once the most gifted, if not revered, Clan in all of her country had lived, there is naught but charred remains that are unrecognizable. It is disturbing, to utter the least, but the Crone does not slow her steady progress, hip twinging in protest of her pace.

The Crone is not, nor has she ever been, an empathetic woman. Crones are meant to be wise and, weathered with age as she is, the burden of wisdom had ultimately led to a cold sort of indifference that hardly quakes at the sight of such a massacre. Not even the scent of burning human flesh ceases her progress down the steep hill.

She had, after all, known for quite some time that these events would happen, if not in this exact manner. She had tasted the travesty in the winds, had waited for the tides to change with grim anticipation. There were very few things that Maidens, Mothers, and Crones could not see.

The infant was one of those things.

Tuning her ear to the squall of a baby, cries loud enough to muffle the crackling-pop of logs set ablaze, the Crone frowns as she approaches one of her Maidens that she had sent before herself to survey the damage. In her old age, she knew she would never reach the House in time to find survivors - not that she had truly expected to find any - but she had thought that this Maiden in particular was too soft-hearted and took advantage of the opportunity to toughen the girl up. And yet, the plan seemed to have backfired, much to the Crone's bewildered astonishment.

Yes, the babe is a surprise.

The Maiden, a virgin girl no older than fourteen, cradles the baby in thin arms, the soot on her face doing little to hide the bewildered expression in her Seer-blue eyes set high above her freckled cheekbones. "She was among the timber," says the girl, nodding toward the crying infant, rocking the poor thing with an unsteady cadence that belies the clear maternal instinct flooding the girl's veins. "There are no others. Just…just the baby."

Indeed, thinks the Crone, gazing at the burning skeleton of the Clan's compound with a steady sharpness. There is seldom left in the flames; finely crafted architecture ruined, artifacts of the Solvej line forever lost, and only a babe left to tell the tale. An undoubtedly violent flame had crumbled through generations of Solvej magic, which the Crone knew to be exceptionally strong, if not near-impossible to control - and even still, the fire rages and ravages, a roar of heat that thunders in the Crone's ears. Firelight dances in the dark of the night, illuminating the sweetly rounded features of the infant - and highlighting the striking lack of soot staining her fair skin.

Somehow, the baby had not been touched by the fire that destroyed her bloodline. Or, perhaps, the baby had managed to remain undetected as her family was slaughtered by blade, and then survived the flame. It would be impossible to ascertain, even after the fire choked itself - the infant could not talk and no Seer could See the past.

A mystery, then.

"The child is unmarked," observes the Crone, thoughtful. It wasn't unheard of that children, particularly infants born to the Clans, were resilient, but the Crone had never heard tale of any child that survived such a fire and certainly no child so young. She found it peculiar, even as a Seer who had Seen many peculiar events in her long life.

Perhaps it was especially interesting because she had known the infant's family and was in the odd position of bearing particular knowledge about the babe - specifically, the knowledge that the child had not yet shown signs of bearing any of the Clan's gifts.

And yet, the babe lived to scream and wail, lightening-orchid eyes eerily bright in the darkness, brighter even than the destructive flames that had made the infant into an orphan. The babe looks directly at the Crone and whimpers, reaching a small-fingered hand forward, grasping at air with her face scrunched in upset. She cries louder as the Crone does nothing but stare, perturbed. There is a glint in the baby's eyes, a spectacular intelligence tempered by sedated peace, even as she expresses her discontent and confusion. It reminds the Crone of a vision she'd had long ago in a dream - the first Sight the Crone had ever experienced, truly.

The Crone purses her lips at the whimpering creature.

The Maiden hushes the child, licking her lips nervously, her attention continually torn between the girl and the furious blaze. "How can this be? How could this happen?"

"It is the times," remarks the Crone, clasping her hands together in contemplation. She is certain in her knowledge, in this relationship of cause and effect. "Our dear King all but signed the Solvej Clan's death warrants in light of that dreadful decree. It is unfortunate that this Clan was the first, as I suspect once news of their demise reaches other Clans that precautions will be made. The Clan of Solvej had no clear forewarning and it left them vulnerable."

Or rather, the Crone had no clear forewarning - just the Sight and the tremulous inkling that wickedness was fast approaching. Not a thing specific or particularly useful. But she had long since dispatched any feelings of guilt for the inability to stop events. The albatross of the Seer was to witness, not to change.

"But the other augurs," says the Maiden in confusion. "There have been other deaths."

"Aye," replies the Crone. There had been deaths but they had been clumsy murders fueled by passionate ignorance as augurs traveled the countryside to reach safe havens like Sassa. There had not been news of another deceased augur since the Clans had finalized their relocation, and that had been a handful of years ago, right before the birth of the first-born of the House of Elric. The situation had been considerably more calm since; the mundane were terribly easy to distract, especially in light of good news. "But no genocides such as this. And, I fear, none to follow."

The truth of her words rattles through her chest. A sober realization - indeed, it was genocide, and it was genocide of a feared Clan only because of the power that linked to the Clan, power that often manifested with great and terrible abilities. The Clan of Solvej in particular was a source of wariness for augur and mundane alike; while quite possibly being the oldest of the Clans, they were also a Clan intricately linked to dubious magic that seemed so much darker than the magic of other bloodlines. The Crone saw no sense in fearing the rumored gifts of the Clan, as her own gift was Spirit itself, but then the Crone had been raised in the Old Ways and tutored by the Old Religion, both of which were dwindling as the mundane populations grew. Their own King was of mundane origin, his line untouched by the Old Ones.

The mundane would always fear what they could not understand, this the Crone knew with absolute certainty. That was why their kin were pushed to the outermost territories. That was why this tragedy occurred.

She shifts her focus to the babe, tracking fire-lit tears down smooth cheeks with her wizened mouth pulled into a frown. She did not understand how the child survived, but she knew better than to fear it, just as she also knew that none could know the true story of how the baby remained living after the massacre of her Clan. In all likelihood, the babe was probably gifted beyond compare, possibly because of this tragedy. Fate was self-fulfilling in that way.

As she had survived, it was obviously imperative that the babe should grow into a woman. The Crone had been aware of that truth since the babe was born. But the struggle of living the life so destined for the child would be harrowing and the Crone felt a sense of concern for the ugliest side of human nature sure to rear its head as the girl aged. With a sigh, feeling the weight of destiny on her shoulders, the Crone comes to a decision.

"We will tell the others that she was found near the well," she murmurs, casting a glance to the perimeter of wet soil around the stonewell that prevented fire from reaching the structure. A flimsy story, but one that was believable enough that questions would not be asked by those who would dare question the Crone. "None must ever know that she did not burn. So mote it be."

"So mote it be," the Maiden agrees breathlessly, Seer-blue eyes white with the uprising of the magic of the Old Ones, a sign that her tongue would be forever tied in the events of this night.

A secret sealed, the Crone's shoulders sag. The infant, as if sensing the ancient power shifting around her, grows silent, wide orchid eyes and soundless attention fixed on the brittle Crone. The intelligence in the gaze unsettles the Crone, though she doesn't let it show. Rather, she studies the baby closely, noting dismally that the babe's ears were ever-so-slightly pointed. Unmistakable evidence of at least some of the Clan's bloodline was particularly strong in the girl, though the Crone would rather spare the child her inevitable fate.

"Let us pray that she is more her mother than her father."

oOo

It is a prayer unheard.

oOo

The girl is one of astounding beauty. It seems as if each year passes only to grace the child with more striking features - rosy cheeks, hair like starlight, and eyes ever-so aware of the cruelty of the village. The Crone, like the girl, is not blind to the orphan's treatment, nor is she deaf to the rumors bestowed upon the child as the only survivor of the Solvej Clan.

The Cursed Child, the villagers whisper as she passes through the streets, timid and dressed in reluctantly donated rags. The most evil seed of the most evil Clan.

The Crone could do nothing to sway the murmurings - it was the curse of human nature to think the worst of tragic events, especially in light of the Crone's correct prediction that it would only be the Solvej Clan to suffer such a massacre. The other Clans in Sassa had indeed taken extreme precautions and the King had issued grave consequences to any caught in such a cold-blooded act. It was too little too late.

Under the rule of the well-meaning good King of the House of Elric, the newly-minted liege had incited unintended violence with his proclamation that all pagans of the Old Religion be sequestered to the farthest reaches of his rule. The consequences of such a decree had led to the untimely demise of the once-sacred and noble Clan of Solvej. An unfortunate series of events, to be sure, but nonetheless events that are still vulnerable to the worst of humanity.

The Solvej Clan must have been evil, she has heard the villagers reason on occasion, hushed conversations in the open market, over steaming cups of tea, across the drying lines of freshly scrubbed laundry. Surely that is why they were the only Clan to be eradicated. And any other augurs who die, well, surely they must have been evil, too, though not as evil as the Solvej Clan.

It was foolish nonsense, if anyone asked the Crone. Fretful and cowardly. Heedless and tactless gossip. The Crone had been alive long enough to be privy to the truly ancient power that flowed through the blood of the Solvej Clan, had even been aware of a few of their secrets due to her own gift - and she did not think the Clan any more evil than herself. Powerful, of course, and misunderstood. But not evil.

The Crone knew there was no true evil in the world - not yet.

But she could not force the village of Sassa to understand that. She could not force the other Clans in Sassa to see reason beyond their own ignorance. She could do nothing but watch as the girl grew, each year more beautiful than the last, each year more solemn than the year prior. She could do nothing but keep a watchful eye on the girl and wait for the girl's fate to be sealed.

There is a certain kind of strength that the Crone admires and the girl has this strength in spades.

Still the Crone prays that this strength grows as reliably as the girl's beauty.

oOo

It is a prayer answered.

A/N: If you were reading this story when it was still classed , then my apologies for the removal without notice. I appreciate the reviews, favorites, and follows for this story when it was pinging as Original Fiction. Thank you. I hope that you come back and relive these chapters with the translated Twilight names and continue to enjoy the story!

That said, to new readers, this is my normal schtick - I have a story that I've written with original characters and I have simply changed the names to match the Twilight fandom. You may notice this in the rather unique character descriptions and details that are embedded in this story. The characters will look different because that's how I wrote them originally. The characters will behave different because that's how I wrote them orginally. The situations will be different - because, yes, that's how I wrote them originally. If that's a problem for you, then I am sorry but I will not be changing this.

As it is - welcome to the story! Buckle in! I'll be updating a few times a week until I catch up to the backlog, so be prepared for a binge!

As always, be brutally honest. I can take it.
~cupakeriot (Rae)