The young woman woke from dreamless sleep with a start; her hands shot to her sides, gloved fists closing around the hilt of a well-worn glintstone staff and a lovingly-maintained rapier. Eyes darting about, she examined the crumbling church she'd sheltered in; eventually, she let out the breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding, and set her weapons down.

The tension left her body, a little, and she eased herself upright and onto a nearby pew. The full night of rest had restored some life to her aching body, but it had not solved all her problems; despite her feverish prayers no divine entities had seen fit to replenish her meager supply of food, and so she broke fast with one of her last pieces of hardtack, washed down with a mouthful of water from the only skin she still carried.

"At least my wounds do not fester," the woman muttered, lifting her trousers to examine the bandages wrapped around both legs; the highwaymen who'd ambushed her on the roads two nights past should have been easy work, yet it had taken all her focus to strike them down. In the fury of the melee, she'd somehow missed the snapping jaws of their lone canine companion, and this had been the price. "Death at the hands of some highwaymen - ignoble, but at least honourable. I'll not be done in by the diseased slobber of some mutt," she growled, glaring at the empty church around her.

She extracted a tattered notebook from her pack, untied the small pen bound to its spine, and opened it; for a long while, she stared at the empty page, frowning.

There was nothing to write. She tried, for what could have been half an hour, to think of anything of import to add - and yet her mind was empty. The journey to the Lands Between had been eventful; three quarters of the crumbling pages before her detailed that perilous year, and yet in the past week she had used but the barest bit of ink.

Hunger, thirst, wounds - they had not stopped her before, and yet, now that she was at the destined place, it was as though the lantern of her mind was finally running out of fuel.

She shut the book, stuffed it back into her pack, and took up her weapons. She walked over to the doors and shoved them open-

-and the moon shone down upon her face.

We are not of the Tree, her mother said from behind the fog of time. We are of the Moon. It does not matter that our standing is gone; it does not change our nature that we do not kneel before our Queen each night. Do you see it, my little snowflake? Do you not see the majesty of the moonlit sky? If ever you forget your place - if ever you feel the walls of your castle breaking - take but a moment and gaze upon the shining light of the night, and feel the truth sustain you.

In recent days, the frailty of her body - of her mind, too, she was willing to admit - the nourishment of the moonlight had begun to lose its power. That silver orb which had been her guiding light fed her yet, though, and so with a shake of her head to clear the dust from her mind, she forged onward.

On she walked, careful and cautious; down a set of stairs, through a small courtyard and up to a wooden bridge. She examined its ropes and tested its strength, until, satisfied that it would not (probably) shatter and send her into the abyss below, she made her way across. Directly ahead, beyond a stone archway, stood a garden of some size, over which towered a statue of Queen Marika.

She had taken but a few steps into the garden when a horrid, many-limbed abomination flung itself from around the far wall of the garden; it held two massive blades of gleaming gold from its left arms, and carried a towering shield in its right. It bellowed a piercing, raging cry-

-and she was already charging the beast, her pack hurled into a nearby bush and her weapons raised. Sprinting forward, she landed a solid thrust with her rapier, striking the thing in what passed for its face before immediately throwing herself back from the horror's flurry of retaliatory strikes; even in mid-air she was already feeling for the stellar light within, and when she landed on her feet a trio of glintblades hung ready above her staff.

The beast surged forward, rearing back on a forest of legs before aiming a series of thrusts and swipes at her; she ducked and wove around the first few, and the moment she sensed her ailing legs would not keep pace she let the glintblades fly. The impact of the gleaming blue swords was enough to distract her foe for a just a moment - enough time for her to rush to the side of the creature and, with a mighty roar, she plunged her blade deep into its flesh once, twice, thrice. The creature howled in rage, whirling around to strike with its shield this time, and she yanked her blade free just in time to roll out of the way-

-and though the young woman, indeed, avoided the golden shield, she was not fast enough to dodge out of the way of the backhanded pommel-strikes from the beast's two blades. Both impacted her in the stomach, and for a horror-laden moment her vision went black; she slammed into the base of the statue of Marika, gasping for air that came in agonizing, bloody breaths.

Wheezing, ignoring the rivers of screaming pain tearing through her core, she got to her feet, weapons held at the ready; the beast, too, was recovering, its many legs wobbling and its weapons held in unsteady hands.

She locked eyes with the thing, staring deep into its malformed eyes; it glared back, and for a moment there was only the breeze and the battered gasps of two injured warriors.

The beast bellowed with an ear-piercing screech; it tossed its shield aside, passed one blade into a hand on its right side, and held them both aloft. Streams of blasphemous fire surged out from the guards, and once more the beast shouted, readying its weapons.

Her vision was fading again.

It was taking more and more thought to even remain upright-

-and she glanced up once more at the moon.

It shone back, bright and everlasting.

Service, my little snowflake, is its own reward. Do not shame yourself by betraying that, the most noble and righteous of duties. Stand tall, and stand firm! Your ancestors did so, and so shall you do the same - for in your blood flows the lineage of those who fought exile and torment and suffering and never, ever turned their backs upon their honour!

"Well," the woman muttered, standing tall, "a noble end is more than I can ask of you, beast."

The creature cocked its misshapen head, pacing back and forth with its weapons raised, waiting for her to reveal her intentions.

Come then, beast. I shall show you all you wish to know.

All her energy. All her focus. All her will.

She channeled what she knew to be the last of her strength into herself, felt the energies of the skies themselves burn away all the pain and set her mind alight with cold, flaming clarity.

She did not crawl or whimper or shy away from her fate.

Her rapier, she sheathed in the shining light of the stars; from the cracked glintstone embedded in the simple staff she held in her left came an entire phalanx of enormous, seething blades.

"YOU FACE MAIR GWYNNE, SHE WHO HOLDS ALOFT THE ANCIENT BANNER OF THE EXILED KNIGHTS OF CARIA! COME, ABOMINATION! FEAST UPON THE BLADES WHICH GUARD THE FULL MOON!"

Mair bested the creature.

Of the fight, she remembered little: just a whirling blur of blades and entrails and screaming.

Mair bested the creature, but, in turn, it had bested her.

As the beast faded into motes of ash and light, she crumpled into the ground. The pain was fading, but there was enough blood spilling from the countless wounds rent across her body that she knew her journey was at an end.

She crawled, teeth chattering, to the edge of the cliffside garden, flopped onto her back and stared up at the night sky.

There were no regrets, or wishes, or thoughts; she had expended the life necessary for such things, and so she simply gazed up at the moon.

The last thing Mair Gwynne saw before her vision faded was a twinkling, shining light next to the moon.

She closed her eyes, her ragged breathing slowing-

-and the final sensation that came before the end of all things was like warmth, and love, and the feeling of tears that were not hers running down her face.

The Gentle Mother loved all that was Hers, and since all was Hers, she loved all.

Her many hands grasped the skein of that all that was Hers, across all time and all spaces.

Once, she gazed upon a land between lands, and saw one of Her children: frail and thin, with white hair that shone like moonlight, or snowfall.

She remembered, faintly, of a woman whose beauty was the equal to her bladework; a woman who lent her features to a Doll of impossible value.

And She wept.

And Her tears fell, through the gaps in time and space,

and touched the dying child who gazed at the night sky.

The woman gasped, one hand reaching out, another clutching at her stomach; the last thing she'd seen was the Hunter pulling the saw-cleaver free from the killing blow, gazing down at her with eyes that held a world's weight of sorrow in them.

She paused, frowning, as she realized her stomach didn't hurt; she looked down, and found that not only was she unharmed, she was wearing a ragged set of trousers and a well-worn tunic instead of the coat and cap and knee-high boots which were as good as a uniform.

Which was strange, because her favoured garb was not a long coat and cap that was already fading from her mind's eye, but an ancient, fading cloak and robes set in brilliant blue; and what was this thought of a "hunter?"

Hunters, she thought dimly, carried bows, not...saw-cleavers.

Pushing the confusion from her mind, she looked up and took in her surroundings: a damp, musty cave of some sort, lit by the glow of a tiny, golden tree. A stairway at the far end of the cave, lined with statues depicting some sort of robed female figure, terminated in a large set of wooden double doors. She looked down at a nearby puddle and examined her reflection; a deathly-pale face stared back through glacial-blue eyes, snow-white hair falling loose and wild around her neck.

Those were her features, yes - they felt right.

And what, then, of her name?

The words crept into her mouth as she fought through a labyrinth of cracked memories.

She spoke it aloud, hoping desperately to gain some assurance that her mind was intact.

Maria, she remembered. I am Maria.

And so she was.