The place was a stone structure that smelled old and dusty. The stones were not the source of the strange smell, but they held it. She chose to still avoid the ground and instead flied to an opening much higher up. Her wings could not lift her weight higher, so she climbed the stone wall with her sharp claws piercing the stone. When she reached the ledge of the opening, she peered inside cautiously, sniffing for any other presence. There was no one and nothing but a large stone tablet.

She glided down and landed in front of the tablet. She traced her hand across the smooth surface, the lightly engraved markings that might have once meant somthing to her. Her claws ran over a set of set of markings that seemed slightly deeper and very familiar. A snake. A stick. A fork. Two strange identical markings. A triangle.

A sudden fury overcame her and she slashed that marking with her claws. Three shallow gashes were made in the stone, and drops of blood began to fall from her now bleeding fingertips. She barely felt the pain.

She fled the place, leaving a small trail of blood as far as the window. She took to the sky and glided away, seeking a place to hide.

The sun of morning slowly rose until light shone through the window and upon the stone. In a concealed cavern not far away, the Beast cried out in agony cause by some unseen wound. Only in late moring did the pain end, and the vampress fell into an unpleasant sleep, haunted by dreams of something before the Dreaming that she hated.

Harburn stared blankly out the entrance of the cave, barely moving at all. He had been that way for three nights now, ever since Selena, his lover, gave herself to the sun, unable to cope with all that had been lost. Sierra feared that soon he, too, would give up. One by one, they each went that way or into the Dreaming. Nearby villages that found themselves in the path of a wandering Dreamer had begun sending out hunters. Soon all that she had made would truly be lost. Those who didn't destroy themselves would be weak enough for a mortal to do it instead. Sierra knew she wouldn't be her own killer, and was too stubborn to give in to the Beast, for she still had things to settle. Damn you, Renny.

One of the little ones who had been sobbing in a dark corner began to stir. "Hungry," she whimpered. Sierra felt as though a very large stone had landed in her stomach. Not again..

The girl started to get up, and others moved away from her as best they could, too tired to care much anymore if she attacked them. They'd seen this all too many times before. Her short nails turned into sharp claws and fangs appeared in her mouth. Her eyes turned feral as the Beast took her. In rage, she lashed out at others around her, but didn't bite. Even the Beast could tell they didn't have enough blood left to come close to satisfying her thirst.

She made it out of the cave and ran, and would continue running until she found something to feed on or died of the hunger. If she got enough blood to become herself again, she would likely destroy herself upon realizing what she had done.

Sierra transformed into bat form and flew after the girl, though she knew it would do no good. Her children were dying, and she couldn't do anything to stop it. She flew after the dreaming child, hoping to be able to do something.

She'd already gone hoarse from screaming and now could only sob in Sierra's arms. The Beast had left her now, to deal with the horror she had committed alone. Thankfully Sierra had come, but she still couldn't stand the thought of life after what she had done. Her hands, and teeth, were stained with blood and she would never be able to change that.

The sun began to rise over the horizon and in seconds she was gone. Sierra watched the dust that remained blow away with sadness. She had lost another of her children. Sierra stood slowly and looked around at the remains of the town. In a few days those who had fled would return, but for now it was a ghost town.

How many times will this happen? How many more of my followers will I watch loose their minds and then die?

Sierra left that town of misery, and flew away from it, her clan, and her past. Even the Coven Mistress cannot watch such suffering of her own people forever.

The Beast awoke at sunset to a hunger. She had to find blood to state that thirst. She went hunting.

She returned to the place she had found the night before, but this time entered from the ground entrance. Food did not often locate itself so high as the tower-tops, and surely this structure must hold some mortal creature to feast upon.

The inside of the place was made of stone just like the outside, not like some places a part of her remembered. Those places were so much more easily destroyed... There were doorways leading into side rooms, but all were bereft of life. Such a large place, but no one living there? It wasn't possible. It couldn't be.

She found a door that was closed and smiled slightly. She knew there had to be someone. She sniffed carefully and detected a faint smell of life. She opened the door cautiously and looked inside. There was her prey. A mortal female lay unmoving on a raised surface - a bed, was it? - in the middle of the room. Too pale to hold much blood, but she was hungry and this mortal wouldn't struggle. She crept across the floor to the girl and began to lower her lips to meet the mortal's neck.

"Stay away from her, demon!"

She hadn't even heard the arrival of the woman now standing in the doorway. That struck her as odd, but that didn't matter. This woman would have far more blood in her. She could drink both dry and then be strong enough to hunt more thoroughly. After all, if she had not noticed one woman, there might be more somewhere in this place, even where she had already looked.

She lept at the woman, but the woman side-stepped and she ended out in the hall instead of at the woman's throat. The door slammed shut as soon as she was out of the room. The woman thinks that she can protect the girl - her young? - that way. But the Beast would simply destroy one and then the other anyway. Even so, she was annoyed at having been tricked so.

She slashed at the woman, but missed. More tricks.