Entrance, entrance...no fucking "plate" on this side. Felina glances around warily for the trawlers that can't be far away, remembering what sort of pain they can cause quite distinctly.

The beasts can be heard screeching in the background, but the old castle welcomes Felina inside with a groan of gate. Moorn isn't far behind.

The construct's face forms by the moment, first it's eyes, crystalline ruby and beautiful beyond description, and then it's brow and cheek, defined in elegance. Rei-ono hadn't been dicking around with her construction. The construct stands taller than Felina by a good ten inches, though the emerging gold of her hair is of equal length. 

Moorn, once he's about, glances at the construct with a critical eye. 

"What an exquisite creation," he murmurs, "I feel vindicated already."

Felina's head is tilted just a little from where she sits cross-legged a few feet off the ground. "She's beautiful," she observes softly. She doesn't mean just the creature's physical appearance, though that's outright humbling. The power void that's filling itself is quite as stunning. "I can't believe he wanted to simply bind the poor girl's mind...."

"It would be the thing to do. Can you not sense the... sheer mass of power welling within this body?" The sorcerer walks all around her, appraising her in every aspect. "It is something of a surprise to me that she is not modelled as you and the double are... though she isn't quite human, is she? The slight elongation of her ears, these marks upon her face - much like yours, though they do not give her face the dirty look of yours - and the star-shaped pupil..." he glances into her face. "Smile." The construct's lips pull back, revealing a set of decidedly non-Serinian fangs. "Tell me," Moorn asks of Felina, "what sort of data did the wizard collect for her creation?"

"Outside of Mara and I, I'm afraid I can't be very specific...Kaishen just noted 'a number of women, some of whom didn't come back.'" She ignores the jab at her own appearance.

"The teeth are vampiric," Moorn continues. He blinks. Shakes his head. "Do you feel that, Felina?" He steps back, somewhat awestruck. "Her raw power is greater than mine."

Felina smiles. "You'd better be nice, huh?" She can't say she isn't nervous...something dangerous could have already been inlaid into the other construct's personality or mindset. She puts her feet on the ground. "I have no idea how even Ahmin Rei-ono was able to focus this much energy into a single place, so quickly...even Mara and I, designed to surpass our creators' power, can only do that by a trick and technicality, nothing either of us can access as of yet. But I guess that isn't what matters right now." She steps up a respectful distance from the other construct, tilting her head a little and looking up at her face, a gentle look in her own eyes. "Miss? Can you hear me?"

Moorn simply sits back to watch. He's interested in a dozen different ways in all of this.

The construct gives a slow, considerate nod. "I hear... you."

"It will take some time for the nuances of language to register, Felina. Though it seems to be doing quite well," Moorn interjects. "Go ahead."

Felina nods a little. She's accompanying what she says with the subtle telepathic indication of meaning, the psychic equivalent of speaking in tongues. "It's okay, Miss, take all the time you need. We've both had a long time to practice speaking." The guardian smiles. "My name is Felina. I'm glad to meet you."

"... Felina?" The construct blinks. "Are you... you are my child?"

Moorn's eyes brighten. "Oh, this is simply delightful."

Oh dear... So she really is meant as a mother figure. "Do you have a child, Miss?"

The construct nods, her eyes still wide with wonder at something so simple as existing. "I have... many children. Felina. Mara-kuru. Saea. Amilei. Those are their names."

"And yet," Moorn notes, "she has the ass of a nubile virgin." The glee in his mind is simply impossible to peg. It's as if irony is water to him.

Shut up, Moorn. "I see." Felina has a very sick feeling in the pit of her stomach, thinking she may have made a very serious lapse of judgement. "Well, I'm guessing that I'm that same 'Felina,' miss..." She's not sure how to handle this anymore. "Do you know your own name as well?"

Moorn simply sits back and smiles.

"My name?" The construct tilts her head slightly to one side, a movement that resembles very much the characteristic swaying of Mara-kuru. "Senowin. My name is called Senowin."

"I see. That's a very pretty name, Miss Senowin." Felina smiles despite the turmoil in her own mind. "Tell me, what would you like to do now?"

"I do not know. I am not sure what there is to do." Senowin finally breaks posture and sits, chin leaning firmly against fist. In thought, her face reflects centuries of wisdom held behind a case of youth, and her eyes are those of the truly devout in whatever they believe. She is perhaps a bit too well designed, or at least, that is what Moorn thinks.

"I know." Senowim smiles up at Felina. "I would like to see my daughters together."

Felina smiles a little. "I can certainly see what I can do." She lets out her breath, then looks to Moorn. "I should probably run all this past the others anyway. I'm going to do a bit of planeswalking."

"However you like. I should seek some clothing for her, despite the benefits of refraining." The sorcerer gets to his feet, perfectly thrilled by all this. He almost can't wait to take her back with him. 

Senowin simply reclines upon an overturned pillar, gazing at the whirling vortex that is the sky over Moren Aiga.

Felina looks at Senowin a few moments, thoughtful. "I'm going to go look for the other, Miss Senowin. I shouldn't be long. If you need anything, I'm sure that you can ask Radivishe Moorn, the other fellow, else me if you touch my shoulder and then wait a few minutes." She smiles and takes a seat a short distance away, cross-legged, awaiting a response.

Kaishen's presence seems muted, somehow, but Mara-kuru catches hold of Felina's presence just as well.

"Felina? Is everything alright? Where are you, my love? You aren't hurt?"

"No, I'm fine...but very, very confused at the moment. Is Kaishen around, too? I'd love to run this by both of you...."

"He left. I think he went to check on Korliss and Amilei. Is something wrong, Felina?"

"We have your father's new construct..." Felina starts, almost guiltily... "and I'm not yet so positive that she was meant to be damaging to anyone." A slight grimace. "Do you suppose it was at all possible that your father really did mean well this last time? Like, before part of the citadel got blown up and we stole his prized creation right as he was finishing it?"

"I believe he did, in his way. Though... I would have stolen simply because he staked me up on a wall, my love. And if you had not done so, that frightening man would have."

"It's strange, Mara...she thinks you and Saea...and also Amilei and me, for some reason...are her children. She knew our names before I said anything." Felina is very clearly perturbed by all this. For someone who always tries to do what's ultimately right, all the time, she's not pleased at the possibility of having unjustly stolen something dear, despite previous offenses. "I can't figure it out. What use could something like that be? I mean, you and Saea I can kind of see the logic, however skewed, but what about Amilei, who has a father? Why me, who had a father and doesn't even live on this plane?"

Mara is silent for quite a while. However...

"Maybe because our information was used to create her? Father didn't take a runic copy of Korliss. Maybe because he is a guy?"

Felina blinks. "Mara, you're right. She only mentioned her 'daughters'...Kaishen is every bit as related to Ahmin Rei-ono as you are, and my Saea no less than me, and yet she didn't make any mention of any sons."

"But, even knowing that... what will you do, my love? You can't just give her back. Father is probably going out of his mind right now."

"Oh, I'm sure he'd kill me if he sensed me in the same hemisphere. I don't know how long it will be until he actively tracks us down. And...I don't know, Mara, I really don't."

Mara's quiet for another moment. Longer this time, though she's humming still. 

"Felina... I've kind of wondered what it would be like to have a mother. Amilei used to have one, but Saea and I never did. Did you?"

"In a way, a very long time ago...she died when I was about six, and I stopped wondering about growing up with one after my father and I became close. I just don't know, Mara. I'm not sure how your father will react if her signature shows up here. On the other side of the coin, Radivishe Moorn wants to keep her...that strikes me as a very bad idea. This is kind of becoming a lose-lose-lose situation."

"Maybe it was a bad idea. Felina, we all know what the end result will be." A pause. "Someone has to kill my father. Then she will be safe, and we can convince the girly man to go away. Right?"

Felina's quiet a few moments. "It would solve the problem, Mara, but...ugh, I don't know. Killing someone without imminent danger is murder, and, in this case, the 'imminent danger' may be due to something I did that I'm not sure was justified yet."

A pause, followed by a slight sigh. 

"Then I will do it. Someone will, eventually, my love... he is an imminent threat no matter what. He's just too strong, and besides, I hate him. Almost as much as I love him."

"Mara, don't. He'd overpower and kill you with hardly a thought, you know that. Look..." she lets out what would have been breath, if she had a body. "Let Saea and Amilei know what's going on...let them know that this Senowin character wants to see all of us together. Make sure that they understand that this may not be of any benefit to anyone, and there's nothing saying it couldn't be dangerous. Internalize that understanding yourself. I'll check back once more, probably not in full astral form...if anyone still wants to meet with her despite all that, I'll bring her here. And we'll see what happens from there. Fair enough?"

"... okay. I'll talk to everyone."

About this time, Senowin's hand rests upon Felina's shoulder.

Felina nods. "Thank you Mara. I'll talk to you soon. I have to go." She fades away, carefully making her way back to her body and being carefully alert to the trawlers that still present a danger to her astral self. A minute or two after leaving Mara, her physical eyes flutter open, and she looks up at Senowin. "Hello again."

Senowin smiles a warm, truly caring smile upon Felina. Moorn is nowhere to be seen, but a set of fine blue clothes not all that unlike Felina's suit has been laid out nearby. "Hello. That man brought these. I do not understand them."

Felina smiles a little. "Alright. It's easy enough after you've seen it once." She thinks a moment, then slips off her own vest, lays it aside, and picks up Senowin's shirt. "This is your shirt. It's the piece that covers your torso and arms, like this one." She tugs at her own a little with a careful claw. "Just pull it over your head," she feints a demonstration, "head through this hole, arms out these two long ones." She pulls her wrists out of the garment and holds it out to Senowin.

The other construct watches carefully, paying close attention, and has no difficulties in donning that particular article. It's snug on her, but not so tight that it displays anything in particular. She look on, amused, and awaits further instruction.

Felina smiles, and explains the other articles piece by piece, from with socks she has to explain despite her own bare feet, to the pants and tucking the shirt in, and finally to fastening the vest, tandem with her replacing her own. "Congratulations, you're clothed."

"Oh, I see." Senowin stretches her legs and arms, experimenting the fit and feel of these strange articles in a most satisfactory sort of way. "I like this 'clothes'. Thank you, daughter." 

"No problem." She doesn't think she needs to correct the "daughter" bit just yet...no reason. "I talked to some of the others...we'll see how many of your 'daughters' we can get together, and then go see them."

"How wonderful, thank you." Senowin's eyes sparkle with delight at this, her purpose having been drawn together in advance. "I am so blessed to have such kind children. But, I must ask you, Felina, what weighs so heavily upon your heart? I feel as if you harbor some... ill feelings."

Felina smiles, a little wryly. "Oh, that's a quirk of me. There's always something. Please don't trouble yourself for it."

"I must trouble myself, it is my duty to you. You are my beloved daughter." Senowin steps close to Felina, and quite suddenly wraps her arms around the much shorter Serinian. "Talk to me?"

Felina's eyes widen just a little...she hadn't been prepared for that. She forces a smile. She really can't say she dislikes Senowin, far from it. It's just...strange. "You do understand that you're a construct, correct?" She finally starts.

Senowin sets her hand upon the back of Felina's head, stroking her hair as she ponders this question. "A what?"

Felina's distracted by that, but only a moment. This is a delicate question, one she approaches with genuine empathy. "You're...like me. A being built instead of born, designed instead of random."

"I do not understand, Felina." She squeezes gently, her mind conveying fluently how wonderful she feels to have her 'child' in her arms.

Felina's quiet a second. "I mean..." bites her lip. "Senowin...mother...my father was a wise man who wished protection for his son beyond his death, and also for an heir. He had no wife, and so used magic to fashion a new being. Me." Felina looks up at the much newer construct, eyes sincere. "I love my brother, that son, and fill the purpose gladly. I am content in my life, and I am protector because I choose to be, not because I have to. Similarly, someone wished us, the daughters of only fathers, to have a mother. A perfect being was fashioned for this, you...in the hopes that you would choose to be 'mother.'"

Senowin takes all this in, listening intently, and paying much closer attention than her placid smile would indicate.

"Then I have only to choose what I feel in my heart to be right...?" She pauses a moment, making up her mind in a sure and swift manner. "If my purpose is to live my life for you, Saea, Mara, and Amilei, then I happily choose to fill that purpose. I do not care how I came about, only that I love you, and the others." To look into her face then, is to witness a gamut of emotions that blends into something akin to contentment. No sniffles, no tears, only... resolution. 

Felina smiles. She doesn't really want another parental figure...not at all. But that's not really the issue just yet. She needs to get Senowin involved with and accustomed to the whole "living" thing as well. "All that said..." she sits down again. "What has me perturbed is this: Moorn and I did not create you." She looks up at Senowin. "I feared what intention your creator had in making a new construct. The possibility that he may have intended harm to those close to me. Mara-kuru and Saea perhaps most of all. Neither did I like the thought of how a new construct may be treated, long-pondered pet project though you may be." She's quiet a moment. "Now, meeting you and with what some of what Kaishen, Mara's brother, said, I'm not sure that harm was intended at all. Though I still don't know how well you would have been treated--and maybe well, who can say despite precedents?--there may have been unsolicited harm done, possibly with severe consequences for the rest of us."

Senowin considers this with the same gradual ponderance as she has everything else.

"Then you have acted with the greatest possible good in mind," she answers Felina's statement. "My creator is a bad person, then? Surely this cannot be."

"It's...not really for me to answer that, Senowin. I don't really know him, and I'm biased. He's the double of my father, who I loved very much. But his personality's different in very key ways. He believes that pain and fear are good long-term motivators. He treats his children more than harshly, and is feared throughout the plane. And yet in the face of all of that, he created you because he felt his children had suffered for lack of a mother. And Saea does believe that he loves Mara-kuru despite all he does to her, that he only wants to make her stronger by way of pain."

"I will not tolerate harm coming to my children," Senowin quite firmly decides. "At least purposeful harm. I should speak with this man, this creator, do you think? Perhaps I could learn things?"

"I think a meeting will come before long in any case, Miss Senowin, but...I cannot say that I do not fear for you in it. There are things about you that were unfinished...you have more free will than you were meant to, for one, that I'm certain of." She tilts her head. "Caution will be advisable."

"Do you suppose this person would destroy me...?" 

"I would, in his position." Radivishe Moorn's voice calls from down the hall, his footsteps sounding to match a moment later.  "I am positive that you were intended to be little more than an attractive doll for him. What personality you would have retained could have served, at best, as a method of keeping you interesting and possibly placating his enemies." 

Senowin's face falls somewhat. "You are a candid person."

Moorn unslings a pack from his shoulder, and favors her with a quick grin. "Deception should be a tool, not a habit."

Felina looks at Moorn for a moment, then back to Senowin. "Constructs are kind of in a class by ourselves. Since we are created to serve a purposes, we'll often be viewed as tools, nothing more or less, usually because it's comfortable or convenient to think so. You get used to it. Anyway...I'm pretty sure Rei-ono is very attached to you as a project, though whether he won't have the heart to destroy you or wouldn't hesitate to just do it and try again, I can't guess."

"The interesting thing about those runic copies," Moorn begins, "is that by nature their power and information dissipates in consctruction. They are designed so that once a copy is made, the same rune cannot be used to make another. When a single man overthrew a society of wizards with an army of himself, that became the rule."

Senowin smiles at him. "You know so much. But what does this mean to us?"

Moorn glances at Felina. "If he plans to try again, the others are at risk. Not that I care, but I thought you might like to know."

Felina frowns, and nods a little.

Senowin shakes her head, as if distressed by this. "I have to protect my children! Show me to this place, wherever they are, please!"

"I'd like to check out the situation first...see that everyone's okay. If all's in order, I'll come back and get you, all right?" Felina's starting to feel at least a little confident that this construct really is on their side.

The distress shows now in Senowin's expression, as well as her voice. "If... that is how you must... I would much rather be there myself."

Moorn's expression sours somewhat. "Touching. Stupid, but touching. Your presence there would be like a nice sign reading 'this is where to kill us'."

"The only way Ahmin Rei-ono will sense me with this cloak is if one of his lackeys physically spots me." Felina looks over to Moorn. "Anyway, you shold be aware by now that I'm a complete dumbass when it comes to keeping my friends intact."

"Concentrate on killing him," Moorn answers back, "and you will not have to bother with keeping your friends intact. He is not invulnerable."

"No, he's not." Felina's quiet, thinking that over. "I doubt this will go on long without it coming to a standoff in any case."

"This is a fantastic place for a fight. Moren Aiga answers to me. If nothing else, we would have that advantage. And we could always feed him to the trawlers. With that sort of power, they would home in on him like a Serinian on a piece of string." Moorn pecks on the wall with his knuckles, listening to the solid thump it creates.

Felina nods a little, irked with the "string" bit but not showing it. "I wouldn't be too hard-pressed to lead him here. It would be damned easy, actually."

"How so?"

"Guardians' Barrier jumps are all but untraceable because the crystals repair the fabric immediately and completely. But a clumsy jump executed too hastily--or with the proper interference with the sealing energy--will leave a tangible mark, albeit not a horridly obvious one. Lashrael will no doubt be out looking for us...if she finds out that I'm heading back to Senowin here and I just have to flee her too quickly, the energy trail left behind would lead straight here. Or, to make things less obvious, into the ether plane, where Rei-ono could no doubt track Senowin's energy signature anyway."

"Subterfuge and trickery from a Guardian?" The sorcerer claps his hands together, slowly, but several times. "Pure joy. Do it, but be watchful. He may expect a trick if he is a wizard of any competence."

Felina nods. "I guess I'll be back soon, then, with all hell behind me."

"I will be ready. Just get back."

Senowin is silent. She wants nothing more than to go instead of Felina, but it can't be helped.

Felina smiles at Senowin. "Dont' worry about it. I'll be fine." That said, she vanishes for Wu Yuan.

---

When Felina reappears and darts back into Moren Aiga, it's fast, so much so she skids a ways on three limbs. "Until about ten seconds ago I'd never seen anyone more pissed than I've gotten you."

"Such a charmer," Moorn is there with the reply, as well as an odd-looking metal rod whose ends are enlarged and look much like shiny black cantaloupe. "The trawlers are about. If we push him outside of the castle, we must be on guard."

Senowin is there as well, looking nervous and unprepared. The faint signature of her energy indicates only that she is holding it in check, like the low tide before a flooding wave.

Felina glances at her, eyes softening just a little, then back to Moorn. "He's in the ether plane. Everything's ready for Rei-ono, I assume?" Once Senowin lets her signature be known, things will immediately get interesting.

The sorcerer's expression hardens. "Quite. Give the construct the word when you are prepared."

Felina nods and walks over to Senowin, sitting on her feet beside her. "Hi. We're both ready if you are, Senowin."

The construct looks down upon her. "We are going to die, aren't we."

"No, I don't think so. It's possible. But I don't think so."

Senowin lower her eyes. "May I hold you... my daughter... one last time, in case this goes wrong...?"

"It'll be fine. If you start off with the notion you're going to die, you're probably right. So let's get rid of that, because it works two ways." Felina smiles a little, stands up, and hugs Senowin. "Okay? Besides, I know for a fact he wouldn't still be here if he didn't have an ace in the hole."

Senowin doesn't have much to say to that. She's scared witless... she knows that she has existed for only a little while, and has no idea how to fight for her life. So she simply puts all her attention into Felina, holding her, for a few precious seconds.

Moorn turns his head away.

"Alright," Senowin says to Felina, "I am ready. I am... showing myself now."

Felina smiles grimly at her, nods. "Thank you." She puts a hand on the other construct's shoulder a few moments, and walks over to Moorn, quiet a moment. She knows that this may very well be her last few minutes on this plane. "He's very straightforward, from what I've seen," she observes after a moment. "Overwhelming energy attacks, even direct physical charge, nothing tricky or subtle yet."

"Based on the established pattern of that nether plane, I doubt that he will do anything fancy." The sorcerer's expression is quite serious. He's not afraid to die, having done so more than once, despite the serious and likely chance that his methods of revival will eventually stop working. If nothing else, though, he's developed a grudging respect for Felina, and would see her survive if only to study how she grows in the future. "Do not die, Puss. If you have survived me, I will be insulted to see you fail against a shadow."

A section of the wall hums, the mortar taking on a bright orange glow as it bursts inward. Smoke and dust clear to reveal Ahmin Rei-ono's furious form, pulsating with energy, ready for a fight. Moorn smiles at him. 

"See you in ten minutes."

"I'll be around." Sword comes out smoothly. She feints back a few steps, to get closer to Senowin.

The wizard gazes upon Senowin, his expression filled at once with longing and hatred. It is to her that his attentions are set at first. A swing of his arm sends waves of sonic energy across the courtyard of Moren Aiga, shattering the ground beneath as if it were a sand castle. Radivishe Moorn moves in his image-throwing manner, sidestepping the crescent-shaped wave and responding with his characteristic sorcerous tendrils, snagging the wizard's ankles.

Felina flings a shield between Senowin and the attack and debris, watching Moorn and Rei-ono intently, ready to spring in to help at the first hint it might be needed or useful.

The sonic wave groans against the shield, but the force of it is simply off the charts. Whether it can hold is difficult to say. On the other side of it, Moorn's tendrils burst into white hot flames, drawing a cry of irritation from the wizards lips. He mutters something, and the flames flare up and outwards, spraying against their caster as if of their own will. Images spray in every direction once again, but only one is burning. The one that is charging the wizard headlong, metal rod raised high. Rei-ono, briefly distracted by his intentness upon Senowin, is the recipient of a blow to the chest with that weapon, which is nothing more than what it appears to be - a heavy piece of metal. He groans, but another movement of his lips flings the immolating Moorn across the courtyard and out into the vortex as if he were a leaf on the wind.

Felina grits her teeth. Considering the sort of beatings Moorn's given her in the past...his being tossed aside so easily is not a good side. A portal opens in Moorn's path to pitch him away from the trawlers and onto a watery planet. She vanishes herself, tearing off her cloak and wrapping it around Senowin so that her "mother's" signature is hidden. The other construct vanishes. This time she does her best to make the hole untraceable. And finally, bare moments later, tries to get out of the way as her distracted shield shatters.

Moorn, flying on the outside of the planet, inverts his pitch to miss the hole once he's out of sight, and casts the flames away with a flick of his wrist. It isn't quite that easy, but his presence must go unnoticed for this next trick to work. That said, he masks his signature and rockets off on his own to find a trawler or ten.

Meanwhile, Ahmin Rei-ono turns his full attention to searching for Senowin. Flares of black magic tear through the walls of Moren Aiga at regular intervals as he fires every which way, the well of power within him building for one very obvious, decisive blast.

"She's not here. You may as well just pay attention to me," Felina calls, ears back. She has an idea. But it's a long shot.

The wizard holds off on his mindless blasting, and turns to her. "The last thing you want to do is attain my attention." He whirls about, and flings a much more well aimed psionic surge in her direction, similar to the sonic wave of before.

Felina vanishes, leaving three parallel shields in her place, edges facing the attack. She'd been right on the attack...if it hits, she doesn't have a chance, it would shred her mind. As it stands...the attack is sliced into four parts, messily, as the shields disintegrate as they pass. Each part burns into a hole...and out of the ones that appear on four sides of Rei-ono. Felina ducks out of sight. Can't hide from him completely without the cloak, his senses are too much sharper. But it buys moments.

The wizard, irriated at this trickery, opens holes of his own that simply spray upwards from the castle.

"How long do you plan on wasting my time?" Rei-ono looks around for her, trying to feel for her power but finding his senses strangely muddled with interference. Senowin smiles to herself from her hidden place, and introduces all sorts of puppies and kittens into the wizard's angry mind.

"It's a great hobby." Her voice doesn't come from where she's standing, but she seriously doubts he'll be fooled. She's ready to jump.

The wizard lashes out one hand, detonating the stones beneath the spot where her voice had been. He can't concentrate at all, with Senowin sending out that interference, and it is making him angrier by the moment. Another lash, another explosion, this one much closer to Felina.

Felina's grateful, but doesn't dare verbalize anything even mentally. He'll hear. A thought occurs to her. No, it's stupid. Eh. Anything she can try against him is stupid. She takes a deep breath, and appears just barely in sight, as though by accident.

"There!" The wizard sees her, of course, and flings both arms forward to detonate a massive section of the castle around her, aiming to obliterate her completely, along with her holes and shields.

Felina's eyes snap open. She'd made the mistake of assuming he'd attack like her father...he hadn't. She leaps straight up and forward with truly insane speed, but it isn't quite enough...she's caught in large part by the explosion, the double shield set she'd thrown around herself shattering, pitching her with literal breakneck speed through one wall and finally slamming into another, just barely saved by hasty, physical shields. Ugh... she starts to push herself up until the world spins so severely that she has to pause at that. Great. Plan B. Not that she has one.

The wizard grins from ear to ear, eyes aflame with pure mania. He moves in to finish her off, but Senowin reappears just in front of Felina before he reaches the Serinian.

"Do not hurt my daughter any more," she pleads, "you can have me, but please, spare my daughter."

Felina's eyes widen. "Senowin, get away! It's under control!"

The wizard growls. "Move."

Senowin stiffens. "No!" 

Rei-ono's hand moves then, a flash of darkness blotting out all the light in Moren Aiga for a bare instant. Senowin screams, her senses assailed by the very new feeling of pain, as when the darkness fades her right arm and shoulder are simply gone, the wound still aglow with blackness. The wizard shoves her aside, ignoring her.

Felina grits her teeth, Senowin's cry giving her all the strength she needs to force herself up again. When she plants her hand, though, her head jerks down. Eyes widen. Is that...how did...? She jerks around, back to Rei-ono, and starts digging away the rubble as fast as she's able.

The wizard blinks. "You cannot escape that way. At least have the pride to face me when I kill you."

Somewhere far off, from the direction Moorn had been flung, the ghostly energy of a trawler approaches the castle. More than one, in fact.

Felina's hand finally wraps around what she'd been seeking, a thin, silver rod. She has no idea how this got here--or rather, none logical...but that isn't the point right now. "My pleasure." One planted foot later, she springs towards Rei-ono, an impact spell concentrated into the staff swinging martial-arts style towards his head. A plain, tapering silver staff with a pink orb imbedded near the top.

The wizard ducks the blow, but not quite in time... frozen by a realization. He drops to a knee, bleeding from his temple. "You are dead," he growls in disbelief, "dead, dead!! You..." It's fairly obvious he isn't talking about Felina. 

The essence of the trawlers grows stronger, and Moorn's presence can be felt as well. 

"Lives on because he isn't hated, bastard. My father's as powerful in death as in life." Bluff. She normally wouldn't try it, but...she's counting on his mind being clouded in a hundred different ways right now. Weilding this staff is dangerous...it works differently than Culheru, is attuned to focussed power. She could expend far more than she can handle in a single attack...but that doesn't matter as much now. Almost before the word's out of Rei-ono's mouth, she's vanished and swung again, from behind this time, spell strength doubled and moving nearly twice as fast, emboldened by the first small victory.

This time a shield forms between the wizard and the attack, but it doesn't fully hold, and Rei-ono is forced off his feet again. This time he vanishes as he hits the ground, reappearing above Felina's head with hands held down, raining psionic bullets in her direction.

Moorn finally comes within physical sight, charging directly towards the citadel. And he's not alone. First one, then two, ten, then a living wall of trawlers appears in his wake... based on the energy signatures, there must be hundreds of them, teeming, crawling over one another to get to the massive power source before them. Moorn's intent is broadcast instantly to Felina.

Feeding time.

Felina hears, on a level she's strangely aware of, but can't react. Her pupils are suddenly quite narrow, breath still. She hadn't seen an attack approached like Rei-ono's, ever. And she'd only partly been able to defend. Most projectiles had been deflected by small shields...the last two had pierced her upper shoulder and skull respectively. She's still a moment, then slumps to the ground.

And somehow catches herself on a knee, hands tightening on the staff. Her head hangs unsupported a few moment before her eyes close, then, slowly, open again, a very different light to them. Very quiet, very much older. She stands up. "Miss Senowin, this is not the place to be. Do not worry; you will be safe and your wounds tended." The voice, though hers, carries the same altered qualities. A slight, clawed hand sits briefly upon the construct's shoulder, and she's gone, destined for Saea's Gardens.

Felina's energy, meanwhile, is very quickly dropping to truly nothing. Face still alight with a quiet intensity, she takes two long leaps that end in a levitation backward, ending up on a high, broken wall. The staff is raised just a little, and a pale, orangish circle flickers around Ahmin Rei-ono's feet, springing a threadbare moment later into a binding spell far more powerful than she should be able to employ.

The wizard's teleportation spell had come a moment too late to save himself from this magic of binding. His arms and legs hold fast to the floor of Moren Aiga, the unimaginable power of his black magic fickering and boiling in the air around him as he struggles to free himself. He knows the spell, or a variant of it. Knows just how it came to be, too.

The wall of trawlers breaches Moren Aiga's perimeter then, shattering stone in a wave of monsters that is too thick to be withheld.  Radivishe Moorn shoots up and around the wall where Felina stands, calling out to her.

"It is time to go! Now, unless you want to be devoured!"

She stares at Ahmin Rei-ono for a few moments, face somber, before looking to Moorn, nods once. And they both take their leave of the pocket dimension, winding up on the nearest planet to its walls.