"That doesn't matter." Charis's voice cut through the cold air of the lower regions of the palace. Servants scattered to either side, those with their hands free falling to their knees, foreheads pressed to the cold stone. "Tell me what you need. Raw materials-"

"-people-" Gulla muttered under her ( )eath, and was ignored.

"-my own blood, anything you need. I know you have the gift. I can't give you your freedom, but anything else is yours." They were underground by now, the walls stone and without windows. Gulla would have rubbed her arms had the empress's attention not been set on her. Charis produced an old iron key and unlocked a heavy cellar door. With her superior strength she pushed it open easily, but the slave girl would never have been able to on her own. Looking at it from the side the core of it was solid iron encased in wood, sealing it to all but the Riraen masters. The weight also served as another kind of seal, as a blast of cold air issued forth from the room beyond.

"I'm an adouva, yes, but my power is very weak. To do what you ask... I don't know if I'm capable, mistress." She flinched at the denial; Charis was the empress, her owner and mistress, and one of the most terrifying Riraen in existence. She had founded the empire on her own, gathered many of the Dasari in order to grant her upper ranks eternity, and balanced a court of vipers with ease and grace. She said "jump" and a slave like Gulla didn't dare ask how high but jumped as high as they could and hoped it was enough. Denial could cost her life, and that of her unborn.

Instead the corner of Charis's mouth turned down, but she said nothing as they stepped into the room and she closed the door behind them. Gull had a feeling of entrapment as the heavy door slammed closed, but she didn't dare to look back at it. The floor was cobblestone, large rounds the size of a palm, and the walls thick stone ( )ick. It looked like a prison. The room was an L, with the entrance along the longer section, a desk tucked into the corner on the lefthand side. To the right was the bend leading to a corridor. Pained sounds drifted softly from it but the empress led her to the desk instead, flicking over the pages of a book, her eyes narrowed and cold. Silence, aside from the moans, lingered for a long moment. Perhaps her refusal had simply been ignored.

"I will have you begin the project anyway. You will have the time to work at your own pace, as you have your own child to take care of. When she is born I will expect you to devote your time and strength to this. The child will be taken care of." Despite already knowing, Gulla's heart sank. Of course she wouldn't be able to keep her own child. She had been ( )ed like a dog for stronger adouv, and the child of a slave was a slave. All of the Dasari were slaves within Sezentia, but children were rarely traded at a young age. But all adouva belonged to the Empress herself, and Gulla had this little... 'project', as Charis had put it. Perhaps, if she finished it, she would be able to see her own child. If she didn't finish then she would be dead. She knelt, back straight and head bowed. Charis nodded and strode out, shutting the door behind her.

When she rose Gulla examined the book- the names of various human slaves and their family lines along with that of the daughter of a traitor Riraen. The "raw materials" Charis had mentioned, no doubt currently occupying the cells around the corner. She was expected to begin immediately.

Riraen, though long-lived and sometimes even functionally immortal, were few in number thanks to a low fertility rate and an incredibly long pregnancy. Empress Charis had one daughter by birth, the princess Elysia, but it was an uncertain world even in her empire. She had wanted a second child, one who could carry on her legacy. Elysia was a worthy enough heir, certainly, but Charis wanted something more. Something- someone- closer to herself but better, faster, stronger, less flawed. Part of adouv was being able to shape the flesh, to coax it into growing along certain lines. Gulla was tasked with using her power to create the perfect daughter, the perfect heiress.

It wasn't like working with clay, stretching and pulling and shaping inert material as you worked. She had to work with live flesh. It was a law in any magic: you could not create life from nothing. Hence the "raw materials" she had been given: several human slaves and one Riraen child. She couldn't afford a mistake on the child, there being few enough of her kind, so she started with the slaves. It pushed her loyalty, and the strength of her stomach, to its limits: one day she opened the skin on the leg of one slave to examine the muscles, carefully shaped and arranged them, and closed it back up before forcing him to walk on the altered leg. He had been awake the whole time, his screams filling her ears. Gulla opened chests, took apart arms, examined more ( )ains than she could count. Time and the faces of slaves passed without thought; she couldn't work on dead flesh and new slaves were ( )ought in every time one died from her dissection. For a while she worked on Riraen criminals, experimenting with their unique physiology to apply to her end goal. That was more dangerous, though they were starved to weakness and thoroughly bound, but she powered through.

Her pregnancy barely slowed her and she barely remembered giving birth. Though the door may as well have been locked to her there was a Riraen guard outside with a healer close at hand whose work was mostly with the slaves, but her skills turned out handy for childbirth. Gulla paused to name her daughter- Lilim, a daughter of darkness born down in this cellar to a bloodstained mother- and returned to her work as soon as the healer would let her. The daughter, as Charis had said, was taken away as soon as was reasonable.

The work was not easy, despite how little Gulla paused to rest. It stretched her to the limit of her abilities, stained her soul, hardened her heart. As she worked on the finishing touches, shaping the girl's features to match Charis's, filling her veins with the blood of the empress to cement the familial bond, she saw that the girl was rejecting much of her work. There was only so much you could do to a body without it giving out. Failure was not an option, never was when it came to the empress, and Gulla could see the seams between the girl's body and the new additions. The rest was done, but if she could flood the lines with power, blur them so the girl's body thought the changes were natural...

There was so little power left in her body. Gulla stood, wavering a little, and knocked on the door to tell the guard she was nearly finished. He called back so she knew he heard her and went to fetch the empress. Now knowing she would be found soon, Gulla tore up the last of her own power that was keeping her alive and poured it into the child, convincing her body that it had always been this way, forcing it to accept the changes. The air swam with red light, like blood in water, and then faded. She never felt herself hit the ground.