Well, no adventurer quite knows the path her life will lead
And no spellslinger really knows the road her feet will take.
Each listens to the voice within the soul, and tries to heed,
But no one truly knows the day her heart will start to break.

I wandered as a spellmistress, a lone shark on the sea,
And all who walked beside me stayed one hunt, and then were gone.
I never found it troubling.  Solitude: the life for me!--
I packed my gems and took my other prizes and went on.

And then I spent a day in hunt beside a man and maid
Who fought as two strong blades possessed by but a single mind
And, watching them, I felt a cold wind touch the wishes laid
To ground (I thought), the wishes never known, left far behind.

But I am no mere traveller, no normal hunter here;
I have made my sacred vows at the Destroyer's shrine.
So as I felt a foreign wish that dared to venture near
I fought it back and buried it as if in some dark mine.

I grew to know them better still, this pair who fought as one,
And often met them later in the dark within the crypt
And we three freed the creatures bound by demons whom lights shun
And in this time the chains on my desires somehow slipped.

Then one day in the crypt as we slew mummies by the score
A wizard came whom both my partners greeted as a friend
And, in my heart, I felt a deep joy like that of the shore
Of ocean beauty lost to me for time without an end.

Within myself, I set my wish to welcome him aside
And threw my deep frustration into every killing blow.
I counted four together just as four, but knew I lied,
For we were pair as they were pair; the signs had just to show.

I am, however, more than just a student of cold spell;
I owe my inner power to the Sea's protecting Lord
Who binds my soul and keeps me safe, a snail within her shell,
And grants me skill and strength beyond that of the sharpest sword.

The sea nymphs and the shelfae: these bright children of the wave
Are cut down by these city folk, these butchers who would slay my kin,
And I am torn each time I see one whom I could not save,
And curse the gaping passersby who whoop and howl and grin.

This grey-eyed elf should be a passerby, no more to me--
A dark elf-- haughty, proud-- he surely shares the blood of kings,
And knows not that, in time, all kingdoms wash below the Sea.
His life will be forever deaf to how the dolphin sings.

And I-- am doubly bastard, lonely daughter of the wind,
A memory of how a holy temple was defiled;
Reminder of a priestess broken, and of how she sinned,
And how they cast her out disgraced and heavy with her child.

So I thought, and so I sought to force my path to turn
Away from that brave wizard and my slowly waking heart
And sought to quench a flame that ever strove to rise and burn.
I knew then that our ways would have to quickly turn apart.

So I spent three long years away from paths where he might walk
And slew the monkeys and the mist wraiths by the river's bank.
Thus, far away, where loss would never seek my heart to stalk
I sought to drown my dreams in watching foes fall by the rank.

In time, my feet returned me to a more familiar land,
My bags heavy with coral and with many another prize
To seek my Lord's blue shrine among the rocks beside the sand.
I almost fainted when the wizard's form beset my eyes.

I hid from him in caves, among the golems and the trolls
So far from my beloved shore and from the waves so bright
I wandered in the dank, dark mines and hunted in the holes
That reeked of death and rotting blood and never saw the light.

But thrice I fell beneath cruel blows that struck me to the ground
And death came to me to destroy both voice and sight.
A few attempted rescue, but my corpse was never found
And I decayed in darkness begging my Lord for some light.

Then one dark day I fought a skeleton of monstrous size;
My airwall fell.  The giant left my body to decay.
I prayed for help and rescue; to my shock and great surprise
The grey-eyed wizard came and dragged my broken corpse away.

Two days ago I fought by him; we hunted side by side
And once more I was drawn to him by dreams of sea and sand.
We fought as pair united, and I could not help my pride
As that which slew me once fell down in death at my command.

Ah, Oleani, what great fury made you curse me so?
--For I am not for him, and not for any of this land.
These feelings are not ones that I was ever meant to know!
My heart is chained by sea-green wave and patterns of wet sand.

So now I kneel and pray, and plead my Lord to set me free--
A creature of the water should not know this blazing fire.
I swear myself storm's-daughter, swear myself child of the Sea
And beg my Lord to free me from my heart's truest desire.

Alone I walk the silent shore, and tears streak down my face
As memories of my mother's grave come crashing down on me.
I cannot let myself be drawn away from this cold grace
For I have vowed no force shall separate me from the Sea.