Maria woke up some time in the night as her back and neck made their opinions about her choice of sleeping furniture known. Much of it was displeasure.

As she used Light Magic on herself to ease her pains for the second night in a row, she had to agree. Maybe she'd sleep on a chair. That had worked for her for a time, until that rude person who had killed her had shown up…

Sighing, Maria stood up, working out the kinks from her awkward sleeping position, then padded across the sadly unfluffy and unsoft carpet towards her closet, where she put on some underwear, pants, and a night robe. By the light of Gwyndolin's celestial corpse filtering through the windows of her house, Maria decided to take a walk.

She supposed it was after midnight. From the window, her lands were bathed in silvery illumination, broken only by the dark shadow of the Nightflower Workshop and the torches lit to see intruders. Maria padded through the dark halls of her manor, silent as a hunter, a scabbard with a short sword thrust through the belt keeping her robe closed. Hunter, after all.

There was someone standing at the head of the stairs leading up to this floor. They were too tall to be a child, standing with their hands on the railing and leaning over to look out over the edge. Their fingers shook as they gripped the wood beneath them. Silently, Maria glided towards them, using the shadows and her bare feet to get behind the woman.

It was one of the Ashina women, her hair hanging long and limp over her face, concealing her features. She had a robe tied so loosely and shoddily around her form that one shoulder was bare. The manor was not so cold that she should have been shaking, however.

Silently, Maria stood beside her and peered over the banister. The stone of the first floor wasn't really visible in the darkness, making it seem like an endless fall into the abyss as the woman recoiled from her in surprise.

For a moment, Maria considered speaking to the woman, but she was fairly sure her limited vocabulary wasn't up to whatever conversation would likely ensue. She wasn't even sure how she was supposed to say 'go back to your room'.

So instead she drew her short sword and, as the woman recoiled even more, flipped it around so she was holding the blade and held it out to the woman.

For a moment, they stood in tableau, Maria standing tall and offering the blade, the woman crouched down, cringing and fearful.

Slowly, hesitantly, the woman reached for the blade.

Over the woman's shoulder, Maria said a shadow. She still had a hard time telling her older wards apart, something she hoped would soon change now that she lived with them, but even in the darkness, she recognized Chiharu by the shape of her hair. She had been watching the woman, it seemed. How often had this happened?

The woman touched the blade, gingerly wrapping her hands around the grip as if she expected Maria to take it away. Instead, Maria let go and for a moment the woman fumbled, nearly dropping it. For a moment, she stared at the blade. Then she turned to peer at the darkness over the edge of the banister.

Finally, the woman closed her eyes in resignation and abruptly sat down on the ground. Maria watched with morbid interest as the woman undid her robe, baring herself, and held the sword in both hands, point towards her stomach. Her breathing had quickened, clearly afraid. The blade trembled in her grip.

Softly, Maria padded towards her and laid a gentle hand over her mouth. With the other, she raised a finger to her lips, a gesture the women at least seemed to recognize, and pointed in the general direction of where the children were sleeping.

The woman at least seemed to understand, nodding at her. Maria nodded back and kept her hand on the woman's mouth.

The woman's arms seemed to relax for a moment, a tranquility coming to her eyes, as if content. Then her arms stiffened as she made her choice.

…

After some amount of blood and stifled screaming, the woman was clearly regretting her choice as Maria kept her mouth covered, using the other hand to take the bloody short sword away from the unresisting woman, tossing it away to the side. The clatter of it hitting the floor was unexpectedly loud and very brief. The woman was thrashing, her bloody hands pressing to cover the wound she had made and now seemed to regret, in what would otherwise have been a futile attempt to stay alive. She'd been initially enthusiastic in her decision making, entering deeply. Coldly, Maria assessed it a slow, painful death, one that would have the woman lingering for hours or days in agony unless she were given blood ministration.

As Maria summoned eldritch light, laying her other hand over the woman's wound, she felt tears falling down on the hand covering the woman's mouth, could feel the woman trying to speak. Slowly, she removed the hand covering the woman's mouth.

"Shinitakunai… shinitakunai… shinitakunai…" she heard the woman pleading, over and over again. Maria wasn't sure what that meant, or if she was even hearing that right. Still, she cradled the woman's head, letting it res on her chest, as the woman's body rocked from silent tears and the agony of a gut wound. Her hands clutched the hand Maria had over her wound, and Maria didn't let herself shudder at the smell of blood over both of them.

Out of the corner of her, she saw Chiharu creep forward, picking up the sword, looking lost as she looked between it, Maria and the woman.

Eventually, the woman stilled. Maria continued to cradle her, gently rocking her back and forth.

Eventually, the woman gingerly tried to sit up. Maria let her, and the woman's bloody robes flapped wetly as she awkwardly stood, stumbling away from Maria and staring down at her stomach, feeling it over and over again. Moonlight fell on it from a window, and though her stomach was bloody, it was smooth and unwounded.

As she gaped, Maria stood, straightening her bloody robes, and extended a hand towards Chiharu, making a beckoning gesture. Hesitantly, the young Ashina woman held out the sword like she was holding something disgusting, and Maria took it from her hands. Resisting the urge to lick it, needing to remind herself that blood from gut wounds likely carried filth from the intestinal tract, Maria approached the still-unnamed woman, who stared at her on her approach.

Wordlessly, Maria offered the sword again, hilt first.

The woman recoiled with a muted cry, clutching at her bare stomach, her whole body shuddering in memory. She fearfully stepped back from Maria.

Maria nodded, and lay the sword on the ground before walking over it towards the woman, who now stood under the light from a window. She flinched slightly as Maria raised her unbloodied hand– which was only a little wet from tears and spit– then held still as Maria, gently pushed back the woman's hair away from her face, letting the light of the moon illumine it.

She was beautiful, of course. All the Ashina women were, given the depraved purpose they were intended for. Her eyes were lost and still a little pain, even if Maria's Light Magic had undone the physical harm she had done herself. The pain, greater than any she had probably experienced before, had left a scar that Light Magic hadn't healed.

Haltingly, hesitantly, she tried to form one of the basic phrases Katarina had taught her. "Anata no namae wa nan desu ka?" she said, fairly sure she said it in what Katarina considered the right way.

Sounding equally hesitant, the young woman said, "Namae wa Sadako, Maria-dono." Her voice took a subtle, bitter tinge at her name, for some reason.

Maria nodded, adding the name to the face and body. "Sadako…-chan," she said, remembering how Katarina had said using only names was too familiar. She tried to convey herself with her limited vocabulary… then sighed. Slowly, gently, she reached over to take Sadako's still-bloody hands. She pulled her close, and held the still mostly-naked woman, stroking their hair with her clean hand.

Eventually, the woman started to shake again. Maria felt tears against her chest as the woman's hands rose to hold Maria tightly, like a lost child seeking comfort from their mother. Maria could recognize the urge, having harbored it and been denied for so long.

The three of them stood in the hall, bathed in the moonlight from the window as the young woman cried and cried and cried.

Maria wasn't sure about the words. She was woefully unsure about the vocabulary. All she could do was hold the young woman in her arms and hoped she was giving comfort.

The young woman– Sadako– looked awkward, sitting on a stool in Maria's bathroom as Maria washed her bloody hands, while Chiharu poured water they'd heated in her room's fireplace– after rekindling the flames, a painfully long procedure that made Maria wish for a flamesprayer– into a wooden bucket. Two bloody robes lay in the corner, along with a bloody pair of pants.

"Tomorrow,"' Maria told Chiharu, who at least knew enough of Sorcier's language that between the two of them they could reasonably communicate, "her first chore is laundering the blood from those clothes. I made the rules clear: no trying to kill yourselves. There are children present."

Chiharu bowed slightly. "Yes, Maria-dono," she confirmed. "Chores, laundry, blood clothes. No kill, because children." She gave Sadako a flat look and repeated what sounded like Maria's instructions in Ashinago, as well as something else that sounded like a scold.

"Gomen nasai…" Sadako said. In the candles of the bathroom, she looked sheepish.

Maria nodded. She raised a now-clean finger and made Sadako meet her eyes. "Never do this again," she said simply, letting her tone translate.

"Hai," the young women said.

Maria gave her one final implacable stare before returning to washing the young woman's hands.

Eventually, Maria sent them off, one clothed in Maria's blanket, with a basket of bloody clothes. Naked again, Maria sat wearily on a chair and closed her eyes.

It actually was more comfortable to sleep in. She should have done this sooner.

At breakfast that morning, Maria stared as Sadako walked over to her and, with great deliberation, clumsily curtsied. "Ra-dy Maria… Thankyuu bery much… for saving… Sadako. Sadako… wishes to stand by your side…"

Oathsworn Armband
An armband meant to be worn over the sleeve and pinned in place, adopted to differentiate those sworn to the Lady Maria from those merely under her care and protection. In time, the difference became meaningless, and they became a mark of pride in their allegiance.

Despite many sordid rumors, the belief that the wearers of the armband were chosen to have unnatural relations with their lady is false.

All wearers have sworn to stand by their lady's side forever, leading to many comparisons to the mythical queens Shanalotte and Alsanna.