Alva looks down at her hand.

Absolution, shining with the last vestiges of the light, crumbled away without a trace.

Around her Barley was in ruins and silent. The bodies of the Chosen were purged by the light and left nothing but memory. Alva staggered back, feeling battered and broken and empty. Standing was agony and yet she still stood, blood pouring down her leg. Her fingers were numb from the blow and, as there could be no other, Alva wasn't surprised when they turned white and fell away in ash. The crumbling stopped at her elbow, and the world lost half it's light as her marked eye lightened with cataracts.

She groaned as the last of her magic started to knit her hip together. It was slow and weak, and left the wound looking like she'd gotten it weeks before. And then the magic was gone, never to return.

Alva the Exciser died in that moment and a simple woman with red hair limped away as voices, lucid and loud, started to sound.