Arielle awoke at sunrise with a start, glanced down at the rug and saw that Eden wasn't there. She quickly got out of bed in a panic and rushed out of the hovel, bursting out of the door and sweeping her eyes across the empty, but battered land in front of her, her heart practically hammering in her chest, the memories of the previous night rushing back to her mind.

"Eden?" she called in alarm.

Eden suddenly appeared to her left, emerging from the lean-to where she had stabled the horse.

"What is it?" Eden asked, a little startled.

Arielle just looked at her, blinking, trying to register what she saw. When she finally grasped that what she was seeing was real, she began to calm down and relax.

"Nothing, it's just... a bad dream." Arielle answered.

"Alright." Eden said, a little unconvinced, but deciding not to push the matter and after some thought added, "Come here."

Arielle walked up slowly to Eden and the horse, standing in the opening of the lean-to.

"This is Arion." Eden announced, stroking the black horse's forehead.

From afar, Arion caught everyone's attention; he was blacker than death itself and the shine in his coat almost gave a metallic undertone as if he was armored. Yet up close, he was absolutely stunning. He had a powerful and noble presence. No movement or sound was unnecessary or for show and his eyes were always closely watching, judgments forming in them and reflected back. He was reserved, but held such a pulsating strength that one could think that he would tear apart anyone who crossed him in any way. He was both beautiful and terrible and Arielle found that he reminded her a lot of his rider.

"Arion?" Arielle repeated in surprise and scoured her mind, tapping her finger on her lips, "Arion... I know that name from somewhere... I think... Arion... An immortal, black horse known for his swiftness..."

Eden looked at her a little surprised.

"Oh, well," Arielle mumbled sheepishly, dropping her hand and trying hard not to blush, "um, I read a lot, you know. I like stories. And I have a, um, good memory."

"Well, you're right. I took a while for me to find a good name for him. I found that the old myths of Greece and Rome had lots of interesting... creatures to choose from."

"You chose well. If I believed in myths I would say that the true Arion is standing in front of me right now." she said and saw the corner of Eden's mouth twitch up in a barely visible grin and then fall again. "He really is frightening although even more magnificent. Even if he doesn't like me."

"He's just a one rider kind of horse. It's not that he doesn't like you, he's just rather distrustful."

"Like rider, like horse." Arielle said lightly and then her eyes widened when she had realized what she had said and silently cursed her big mouth.

Eden said nothing, took a few steps towards the horse and began brushing him down, her face unreadable. Arion turned his gaze calmly to the blond and snorted loudly.

"I am so sorry. I didn't mean-"

"It's alright." Eden said, cutting her short and letting out a sigh, "Not that far from the truth, I guess."

If Arielle could, she would have literally kicked herself hard enough to fly over the hovel. She saw Arion turn to Eden, nicker and nudge her arm at which Eden smiled lightly and it only made her feel worse.

"I'm going to make breakfast. Maybe I'll be lucky and accidentally burn my own tongue out." Arielle said in exasperation, tossing her hands up into the air as she stormed back inside the hovel.

Arion snorted again and Eden chuckled lightly.

"Be nice." she said and Arion replied with a shake of his mane.

They ate breakfast quietly. Arielle felt like an idiot, but had no idea how to talk about it with Eden without making it even worse. She didn't know that Eden didn't really mind, she had heard it all before. Compared with the sensation that she was drowning inside herself, Arielle's words meant rather little. There was a strange gnawing in her, like a relentless black dog gorging on her soul ever since the last raid. And though she hadn't been swallowed by it in the end, it was still there, making Eden uneasy and spent. When they had eaten, Eden went out "to do some things" and Arielle left her alone, thinking it best. The raider returned just when Arielle had finished making the dinner she had promised. Arielle had hoped the fresh air and time would have lightened Eden's mood, but she saw there was no change and that there was something bothering her still.

After dinner, Eden rose from the rug and said she was going for a walk, grabbed her sword and left. Arielle let her go, not really knowing what else she could have done. She found her journal, little ink well and quill and spent some time scribbling down the thoughts in her head and the things she had gone through. She finished, closed the journal, and looked around the hovel, feeling rather useless and got up with a sigh and went out for a walk herself. She hadn't gone out to look for Eden; she somehow thought she would find her eventually. She wandered among the trees, rocks, and bushes, trying to keep out of the thick mud that was still in some places. She took in the beginning of a beautiful sunset when she reached the riverbank and watched the deepening light envelope the dark figure sitting at the edge on a large rock. She walked up to her slowly and quietly sat down on a rock beside her. They sat there, both staring out onto the flowing water, finally letting the weight of the previous night's events slide slowly from their shoulders.

"What did he want from me?" Arielle asked quietly, "I just... I just don't understand any of this."

Eden realized that the whole experience with Karas was painful for her. She hadn't harmed anyone and there was a man who wanted to do all the harm in the world to her.

"He didn't really want anything." Eden answered in a sad and knowing tone, "He wanted to have you, like a spoil of war."

"Why couldn't have he just left me alone?"

"He probably would have, but when we met him in the desert, he saw a chance to hurt me as well."

"But you were a part of his band."

"No... I rode with him, but I always kept my distance... He really always hated me because I wasn't... submissive."

Arielle turned to Eden and looked at her with an intense curiosity.

"Eden... why did you ride with Karas at all?"

Eden exhaled loudly. The question seemed simple, but it was, in fact, complicated and sometimes she herself felt that she didn't have an answer.

"Sometimes I don't know." Eden replied slowly and quietly, looking out onto the water and watching the setting sun turn it to black and gold, "I just... I was... I was... wild. No path. No purpose. And he just kind of appeared and I had nowhere else to go, so..."

"Were the both of you somehow...?"

"Oh, God, no." Eden snorted, "Karas was heartless. And I... well, I'm a demon, remember? No, it was out of punishment more than anything else. And now... well, don't really know what now..."

Eden's voice trailed off and she drew her knees in and wrapped her arms around them, close to her chest, resting her chin on top of them. In the light of the setting sun and dressed in something other than her black clothes, Arielle suddenly noticed how delicate Eden actually looked. She saw a young woman, gazing out in front of her with unspoken questions in her eyes. She looked hurt, lost, and alone, very in need of some quiet and a friend. It stunned the blond to the very core when she remembered the completely opposite version of Eden from the day before. Fierce, frigid, and unstoppable, she seemed almost inhuman. She had survived thinking that her greatest gift was that of taking life. But now she saw that it was also her greatest curse.

When the sun had almost completely disappeared, Eden finally got off the rock and the both of them headed back to the hovel quietly.

"So what will you do now?" Arielle asked, linking her hands behind her.

"I don't know," Eden said in frustration and disgust with herself, fiddling with a blade of dry grass, "probably ride around in circles until I hit something again. Just like a whirlwind..."

Arielle said nothing, but knotted her brows and gazed at the ground in front of her.

"Have you planned out the rest of your pilgrimage?" Eden asked a little later with a slightly calmer tone.

"Yes... for the most part. I found some travelers at one of the inns in Antioch, they said that they could take me along. They leave tomorrow..."

"That's... good." Eden replied curtly and sped up a little, wanting the awkward conversation to end.

They went back inside and Eden took her black tunic, a needle and thread, sat down near the fireplace, and began quietly mending the tears. Arielle sat on the edge of the bed and idly moved some things from one place to another, pretending she was packing. The mending felt wrong to her. The black tunic was torn for a reason and mending it was a kind of surrender. Eden meticulously worked away at the blood-stained, black fabric, resigned to being the demon everyone saw in her. The blond would have never for the life of her interrupted the raider, but their was some deeper instinct pushing her to go and finally do something. You can't be scared of everything for the rest of your life. She finally tossed the bundle she had in her hands back onto the bed and got up, walked over to Eden with resolve and sat down next to her.

"No." she simply said, covering the tunic with her hand.

Eden first looked at her with surprise that then quickly turned to annoyance.

"What are you doing?" she asked rather sharply and Arielle swallowed.

"Leave it alone. Leave it ruined."

"Why would I want to do that? What would I wear then, duchess, hm?"

"Eden... you, you're not a demon... You don't need this." Arielle stammered out quietly and tried not to collapse under the suffocating silence that fell over them.

"What would you know about me?" Eden finally answered in a low growl and that made Arielle begin to tremble, knowing she was treading a fine line.

"I may not know much, but I know you are not like Karas."

"You know nothing about me. You don't know the things I've done, the things I've seen." Eden continued to growl practically through her teeth, her eyes beginning to freeze, her body starting to coil up as if about to strike.

"I've seen enough to know that what I'm saying is true." Arielle countered, determined to hold her ground and looking straight into Eden's eyes, "If you were the demon you say you are, then you would have let me die in the desert like a squealing pig. But instead you saved my life more than once. Everyday you have the chance to decide who you will be. Maybe it's time for you to start being a warrior instead of a demon. Stop being Zauba'a and begin being Eden of Florentia."

Arielle's heart raced in her chest so violently that she was afraid it might burst through her ribs and run off. Eden stared at her in a stony silence. The icy blue and emerald green clashed, their gazes locked. Arielle could almost see the waves of Eden's turmoil crashing in her eyes, the blond's arguments beating against the raider's own. But then Eden's vision emerged in the middle of the squall and she realized that some of the images had already become part of her real memory and some of the words had gained meaning. She had to choose between taking something on faith alone or probably never having faith in anything again; faith was such a fragile thing, but it was practically all she had left. Arielle watched the waves slowly calm, the ocean become placid, and the ice melt. They had both been holding the black tunic and Eden looked at it and slowly let it go. Arielle watched the raider moving her hand away and thought that she might just jump through the roof in relief. She held the tunic for a while in her hands and then squeezed it into a tight ball.

"This is where this always belonged." she stated and tossed the tunic into the fire.

Eden's gaze simply moved with it and she watched the flames devour the tunic, turning it into a black smoke that vanished up the chimney. Eden's gaze didn't leave the fire and for a moment Arielle began to worry if she hadn't pushed too far and too hard and if she had burned the woman along with the tunic she hated. Eden continued to look into the fire long after Arielle had gotten back up to pack and was still sitting there when the blond told her that she was going to sleep. Finally, under the heavy lids of the eyes that decided to finally defy her, Eden let herself fall asleep.

Darkness. Silence. And a bright yet easy light. The flame and snow she had grown to know so well.

"Eden."

"Gabriel."

"It's good to hear you speak my name." he noticed with a smile, "It is time."

"No Archangel, I can't..."

"Why?" he asked, titling his head slightly.

"I've killed. I've killed, murdered, and destroyed. My punishment for my evil was only more evil. I'm tainted, corrupt,... an abomination. I am not meant for this."

"You are mistaken. You are already on that road, Eden."

"Please, not me. I'm not worthy of it. I'll only bring more shame and dishonor. It can't be true that I am a chosen one.

"Eden, even the most precious of stones are hidden under mounds and mounds of earth. God sees your deeds, but He also knows your heart. Do you really presume that the Creator of all things would make an unwise decision?" he asked gently.

Eden shook her head slowly.

'Eden...'

"But I've killed... I killed Karas, his men. I just wanted to be left alone." Eden admitted quietly.

"You took lives Eden, but you also chose to endanger your own for another. The power you felt there was not that of the damned." Gabriel stated and walked up closer to Eden until he was standing right in front of her, "You felt it more than once, Eden. And you know the difference between that force and others."

Eden hung her head, but had to agree.

"Do you know why you are chosen?" Gabriel asked and Eden raised her head and shook it, "You are not chosen for your purity, piety, or innocence. You, guardian, you have been chosen precisely for the fact that you have seen such evil and destruction. You have felt it, tasted it, toyed with it even, yet you never succumbed to it. You were driven back, but never defeated, you sank, but never drown."

"That doesn't change the things I've done."

"No, but your knowledge of evil can help you combat it. How can you vanquish the monster if you know not where it lurks?"

Eden understood the archangel's reasoning, but somehow found it hard to accept. Gabriel sighed.

'Eden...'

"You were a chosen one before your eyes opened in this world. The Creator knew what would come to be, yet never once renounced His decision. If there is no other way for you to see this, then see it as a new war. You are being given a path to redemption and the solace that you so desire."

Solace. Yes, I do want to finally know peace so much.

"This isn't a cruel trick?"

"No," Gabriel answered, a small smile forming, "this is no trick, my ever suspicious guardian."

Eden sighed deeply.

"Show me." she told the archangel.

Gabriel looked straight at her with eyes of pure flame and images flashed in her mind for a brief moment, telling her of where she was to go and fragments of what may come to pass. He then closed his eyes and reopened them again, his eyes turning back to warm sparks. Eden looked at him wide-eyed in near disbelief.

"But that means-"

"Yes."

"So I... that feeling... I knew..."

"Yes."

"Does that... is that... no, that can't be..."

"That is of things whose time is not present."

Eden tried to wrap her mind around what she had seen and the words of the archangel and only seemed to come up with even more questions. Gabriel felt her uneasiness and confusion.

'Eden...'

"Have faith, Eden, in your Creator and in your heart." he said warmly and she looked at him a little warily.

"I do not promise you anything archangel. But that you already know." she finally said and Gabriel put his hand on her shoulder.

"Be not afraid, Eden, guardian warrior, elect of Michael, chosen of God the Creator. The Lord, your God shall fight with you. Pax Domini." the archangel said, turning to leave.

"Gabriel?"

"Yes?" he asked, turning back to her.

'Eden...'

"Whose voice is it that I always hear calling my name? In the distance. Like a whisper."

Gabriel smiled.

"The voice belongs to the one foretold on your pendant."

And with that the archangel disappeared and Eden awoke with a start. It was the middle of the night and only the crackling of the fire could be heard. She lay back down and calmed her breathing and racing heart. She fell asleep again, feeling the black gnawing in her soul slowly disappear.

Arielle awoke, opened one eye and noticed with disgust that it was only nearing dawn. She was about to turn over and go back to sleep when she noticed Eden sitting in a chair next to her and staring up at the ceiling.

"Are you alright?" she asked in sleepy and muffled confusion.

"Yeah. Why?" Eden asked, turning her head to look at the blond.

"Because it's still dark outside and instead of sleeping, you're sitting beside me, staring at the ceiling, twirling a dagger around in one hand much too close to your face for my comfort. That's why."

"Oh." Eden said and slowly put the dagger down on her lap and returned her gaze to the ceiling, "I was just thinking... where to go, what to do..."

"Oh. Well, you know, everything always looks worse in the dark." Arielle commented sleepily, "In the morning, maybe you'll see things better. There's no rush. We're in no hurry. We'll think of something..."

And there was Eden's answer; "they" weren't in a hurry, "they" would think of something. She turned her head back to the blond whose eyes had almost closed again.

"Actually, I think I have a plan."

"See?...s'good..." Arielle mumbled drowsily.

"Sleep now."

"Mhm..."

Arielle fell asleep and Eden returned to twirling her dagger around. She searched everywhere, but the gnawing was gone. The charge, now a constant, gentle murmur, took its place.

"Arielle... Arielle..."

Arielle looked around, but saw no one and nothing, only total darkness.

"Hello?" she asked.

"Arielle..."

"Where are you?"

"Arielle... Protector..."

"Who are you? What do you want?" Arielle asked demandingly.

A light began to appear in the darkness, but didn't form into any shape in particular. The blond peered towards the light and though small, it hurt her eyes and she shielded them with her hand.

"What do you want? What are you?"

"Arielle... Do not fear me... Jerusalem... Arielle, be not afraid... in Jerusalem, protector..."

"Tell me who you are! Why do you call me protector? What is in Jerusalem?"

"Be not afraid..."

The light began to fade almost as quickly as it appeared.

When Arielle awoke, she felt a little foggy. The words of the dream echoed clearly in her head though she had no idea what they meant and whether to treat them with any kind of seriousness. She had read the writings of monks and priests about visions, that angels, saints, and God Himself came to man in visions during the day and in dreams. She shook her head a little and decided to think about it later. She noticed that Eden was up and about as usual, busy at the table making an unusually large amount of food.

"Morning. What are you doing?" Arielle asked, getting out of bed and walking up drowsily to the raider and sitting down opposite her.

"Food. Rations. For the road." Eden answered, concentrating on what she was doing.

"For me? Oh, you didn't have to go through all the trouble..."

Eden simply shrugged. Arielle leaned back in her chair and sighed. Of course, all in a day's work I'll bet. She looked at the raider compassionately and shook her head lightly.

"You know," she said quietly, "I wouldn't have minded if it was you I was traveling with now and not those... from the inn..."

Eden stopped her work, sighed heavily, and leaned back in her chair, catching the blond's gaze.

"Would you really want to travel with me?" she asked with knotted brows and a tone that betrayed a real, deep doubt that anyone would want to do such a thing.

About a hundred things ran through Arielle's head, but everything seemed to be something she couldn't say, didn't know how to say, didn't know if she should say, a lady shouldn't say, wouldn't say to Eden for fear of the loss of a limb.

"You know," Eden added carefully, "I happen to have a friend in Jerusalem... I haven't seen him for a while..."

There was an immediate gleam of recognition in Arielle's eyes and a grin that crawled across her lips and that was all the answer Eden really needed. Faith.

"It's settled then." Arielle decided and started happily munching on some dates before Eden could get them out of her reach.