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Her voice was as soft and reassuring as she could manage. "Ariadne. I've been watching you for some time, Mrs. Daggett. I don't believe you're well."

Mrs. Daggett pressed herself back against one of the boulders, her voice stronger this time in reply. "Not well? Not well?! I'm losing my mind. He murdered my husband! I thought he had killed me too. Did he? Am I dead?"

"No. Not dead, though it would have been easier for everyone if that was the case." Ari eased her hand off of her gun a little, relaxing her posture andtrying to seem open and helpfull. "I know about your husband. What happened? Were you with him?"

Mrs. Daggett remained with her back against he rocks, one hand running through her hair. Bits of twig and dirt fell out as her fingers tried to find a way through the knots. "We were out to dinner for date night. Some time, just the two of us. We met another couple on the walk home and they managed to get us into an alley. I can't remember how. Next thing I know they're biting us. There was so much pain... I knew I was slipping away. He made me drink his blood before I passed out. When I woke up my husband was dead next to me. I didn't know what to do, so I ran."

There was some sympathy to be for for the woman, surely. She'd been turned without her knowledge or consent and left to fend for herself. Still, things had to be handled properly from here on out. "I am truly sorry for your loss and your trouble, Mrs. Daggett. However, I did make it a point to track you down and offer some sort of... assistance."

"Assistance?" Mrs. Daggett's posture changed immediately. "Like rehab? Do you know what I've had to do to survive over the past weeks? If this is living now I want nothing to do with it."

Ari nodded. Mrs. Daggett's comments made her job a lot easier. "Well, I can take care of that for you. I'm sure you know that you're no longer human. I can't promise you that there will be no pain or that there will be a light to show you to a better place. What I can tell you is that I will make sure you'll never come back like you did last time. If you're agreeable, we can end this right now."

Mrs. Daggett was on the verge of what would have been human tears as Ari spoke. "Why couldn't he have just killed me? Why did he turn me into this?" The woman collapsed to the ground near the rocks and heaved, the remained of the boy mixing with the autumn leaves and making a macabre collage of fall colors. "Why did he have to ruin me... ruin my life..."

"I have little knowledge on your maker. I have never met nor spoken with him so I can't even tell you why he does as he does. I wish I could offer you some sort of comfort of closure with this, but I'm afraid that I can not." Ari crouched next to Mrs. Daggett and places a reassuring hand on her back as she continued to be sick. "I can release you from this life. If you want to become a ghost and haunt his ***, be my guest. It's no less than he deserves for what he did to you. As a matter of fact, I may go fill him with hot led later tonight if it would make you feel better."

A small laugh escaped Mrs. Daggett's blood and bile stained lips. "Do bullets even hurt us? I always thought they passed through with little damage." She wiped her with a scrap of her sleeve and sat back against the rocks again. "I want you to kill me. However it is I can be killed, I want that. I can't forget what I've done and I can't live with it. This is not a life. It's a curse. Please... free me."

Ari stood, taking her gun out of her holster and stepping back a few paces. "Did you and your husband have any pets?"

"Why?" Mrs. Daggett asked, her eyes wide at the sight of the gun.

"Well, I've heard that thinking about loved ones or things can relax you. Might make the passing easier. Like I said, I can't promise that it will be painless." Ari looked back over her shoulder for her wraith. Pasi had been sent to keep an eye out for humans in the area just in case there was a chance of them being discovered.

"We had a dog. He died last year and we had been talking about getting a puppy. Are you really going to shoot me?"

Ari shrugged. "I could use a blade, but I find them messy. Bullets are faster and more efficient."

Mrs. Daggett cocked her head, looking quite thoughtful as she stood and brushed her clothes out as best she could. Then she did what Ari had most expected and least desired.

She ran.

Trees sped past in a blur as Ari pursued Mrs. Daggett through the wilderness. For a young vampire, the girl sure was fast. Ari could feel her arms and legs ripping as they ran through the underbrush and past low tree branches. Thorns, twigs, dead leaves, and growth of all kinds littered their wake and stuck to them like ticks. In all fairness, there were probably some ticks in there too... not that either of them noticed. Mrs. Daggett was running for her life. Running from a life she never wanted. Running from pain and loss only to find more mixed in with fear.

Ari lost her for a moment after about a mile. She guess that they'd been running further and further away from the city and she needed to stop and get her bearings before continuing. She sent Pasi on to keep an eye on Mrs. Daggett and inform Ari is she stopped at any point. The nice thing about young Necromancers is that they couldn't see wraiths. Made keeping tabs on people much easier.

Her GPS told her how far she was from the city's edge. Ari frowned when she saw her location blinking on the tiny screen. She had never been this far out before. Not even for the ritual supplies that the ladies in Ty needed for whatever they did. There was no going back now. Mrs. Daggett knew who she was, what she was, and why she was here. She needed to end this and get back to safety as soon as possible.

Tucking her GPS away she started off at a fast jog in the direction Mrs. Daggett and Pasi had disappeared to.

She ran.

Further and faster then she had ever run before.

She ran from the monster that she had become. Her life had been so happy before... she and her husband had only been married for a few years. Recently they had talked about starting a family and moving from their comfortable apartment to a nicer house a little more out in the country. It seemed so silly now, to think about having a normal life. Loving parents with a small child in a house with a white picket fence. That was what she had wanted. That was what she had wanted all of her life. She liked her job well enough, but she had a wonderful mother and she wanted nothing more for her life than to be a wonderful mother to her own children. Her husband was always so good with children too...

Blood streamed down her face and arms as she ran. She should have stayed. Should have let that other woman shoot her. Why was she suddenly so afraid to die? It was all she had wanted since she awoke in the alley next to her dead husband. She had tried many times but instinct always took over and she would feed or stay out of the sun for however long she had too. Damn her body. Damn the life in these dead limbs. Damn the man who killed her and yet let her live.

Her energy spent she fell at the foot of an old pine tree. It smelled like Christmas. She would never see another holiday. She would never open presents or hug her mother again. Why had she not called to say goodbye? Was there still time too? No, there was never time. There was nothing after that alley.

She didn't know why she had run. In truth, she was probably afraid that this wasn't the end. Somehow she thought that she'd come back and have to live all of this over. Her heart couldn't bear the thought of it, but there was still that fear. That linger notion that yeah, it would all be ok if she just ran. Ran to where?

There was nowhere else to go.

Mrs. Daggett had managed to run quite a ways in the short amount of time that Ari had paused to check her surroundings. No matter. Ari had experience and stamina on her side. And skill. Lots of skill. Mrs. Daggett also made no attempt to hide herself once her legs gave out under her. She was lying under a large pine tree sniffing the needles on the ground and crying, or she would have been if she could have produced tears. Ari stood beside her this time, not letting her guard down as she looked at the other woman. "I understand, Mrs. Daggett. You've been through some very traumatic experiences recently, and yet your body still fights to survive. It's only natural."

Mrs. Daggett's fists clenched in the dirt and needles. "Why do you call me that?" Her small voice asked. "I have a first name, you know. If you plan on killing me you could at least use it."

"I call you Mrs. Daggett because it is your title. I use it out of respect and because, believe it or not, you deserve that respect. Not all could have survived the way you did. And yes, I do call what you did surviving. You have a strength of spirit about you and it is something to be commended. Perhaps it's why you were turned in the first place." Ari lowered her voice, again feeling some pity for the woman. "I know you said that you didn't want this life, but if you changed your mind we could try to make it worth your time. You could learn how to deal with your new lot... maybe even find someone to teach you as your sire should have done. There are options here that don't involve death."

Options? To give this half life a chance would be to spit in the face of everything she had once lived and hoped for. "No, thank you. I can't imagine that any chance I gave this would end well. You may have to hunt me down again some day. I don't want to try any more. It's been so hard..." Her voice trailed off as she though back on all the terrible things she had done to the people and animals she killed to survive. No life that involved that was worth living.

"Very well, Alicia. I had to give you the chance though." Ari reached down and squeezed the woman's hand. "For what it's worth, I will miss you. I think we could have gotten along well had we met a few years earlier. Life seems to have other things in store for us though, eh?"

Alicia nodded, her fingers squeezing back as she sat against the trunk of the tree. "Life is funny that way." She closed her eyes and sighed. A perfectly human reaction that she forgot she no longer needed. "Will it hurt?"

"I'll try my best to make sure that it doesn't"

Alicia's eye popped open as Ari stepped back to firing range. "Wait! I have one last request. If you can, there a locket in my apartment. It's gold and the locket is an engraved oval with the initials C.H on it. It belonged to my grandmother. I want my mother to have it back, and since I can't give it to her..." Her voice broke as she trailed off. "It's the most valuable thing I can give her, and I want her to know that I loved her."

Ari nodded. "I'll make sure it gets taken care of. That's one thing I can promise. What would you like me to say when I return the locket?"

Alicia closed her eyes again, her head lolling back as she relaxed slightly. "Just say that I loved her. Make up some excuse for what happened. Tell her I ran off to Europe with a Frenchman. Tell her..." Shots rang out in the cold air and Alicia was cut off mid sentence as Ari shot her repeatedly in the head and heart.

Ari collected the body, unsure at first of what to do with it. She carried Mrs. Daggett back toward town with Pasi leading the way and on the lookout for humans. She someone that had a cabin near the hunting grounds and she expected that she could have a little late night bonfire if no one was around. As sad as it was, it was at least an end to Mrs. Daggett's nightmare. Ari could rest well knowing that she'd done what she could.

Letter posted November 1

Dear Mrs. Swogger,

You don't know me, but I was a friend of your daughter. Alicia disappeared some time ago and I was surprised to find a package from her on my doorstep not two days ago. Enclosed in the package was a locket that she told me had once belonged to her grandmother. She wanted you to have it back. She sent me a letter asking me to tell you that she loved you and that she would not be coming to see you again. She's very sorry, but she was dying and she wanted to spare you all the pain of seeing it.

This package and letter I now forward to you so that you may have her last typed words for your own. I truely am sorry for your loss.

Respectfully,
G