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"There is no sense of peace, in what I do now."

Those words leave your lips, as you stand before her, clad in armor. Now you draw your blade--you must, it is the oath you have sworn.

You've seen it, time and again. You've cut the tie, felt the life ebb from a body you've cut down--another soul, freed from its worldly corruption--from the spirits of creatures, both mundane and otherworldly, run wild in a human form.

You've killed dozens. Women and elderly, possessed to take inscrutable forms. Sometimes even men like yourself--and children. The children are the worst. You remember, as the spirits take a child, youthful and energetic, and twist their teeth to cutting fangs--ratlike incisors--and coat their body deep in fur.

You've killed, and each time, a human form has vacated, releasing its captive soul, to lord knows what.

You've told yourself your victims go to a better place. You tell yourself this, even as you raise your blade, holding it high in the candlelight, above the raven-haired gypsy--a lady creature sporting downy canine ears, coated in fur the texture of human hair. She doesn't share your gaze. Her eyes remain lowered in shadow, as yours is raised in contemplation of your reflection against your blade. Then, you turn the sword, edge straight and ready to cut, and it catches a reversed image of your quarry.

You've told yourself this before: those who sport the mark of the beast, and trace their spoor upon the doorsteps of you and your people--they are no longer of the People.

Only this time, you do the unthinkable. You do not strike the woman down where she kneels, perched amidst cushions and mats of foreign ways--trappings of a merchant shining in the firelight, scents of spices swirling about you. No. No blood is shed.

"Tell me your story." You murmur. And you kneel, and lay down your weapon, tracing your gauntlet finger across her ebon tresses. Gently, you chill her face with a caress that is investigative--curious. You are not the inquisitor of old.

As she begins to speak, she traces patterns in the dusty floorboards, as if to draw her old memories.

And as you listen, you kneel, and feel that dread pressure, that reminds you, that you are no mere holy warrior anymore--but a condemned man, seeking an unlikely salvation--as your armor creaks, and snaps and crumbles at the waist, and a whispy, wild animal tail emancipates itself from your hindquarters, rife in foul, black, stinking musked fox fur, that now runs the course of your backside. The thing quivers, trembles, and stretches in fullness, by the moment--as if it is a thing that has grown simply by seeing the light. Now it casts a wavering shadow, obscuring its host's shining form.

When she catches sight of this development, she grins for but a second, as if the story she is weaving has taken on a new purpose--one you suddenly share knowingly, with your fellow beast-kinsman.

She too raises her tail--her tails, in fact, all eight of them. And you understand, you are not a noble crusader, but a confused zealot--a butcher--who has seen the futile floundering in your quest. Now you seek an answer.

"Why?"

"Sit, my blood." She whispers. "Let me tell you a story of better times--when your people and my people, were not so far divided."