I won't go into details about what I did then in the next month and a half. The memories of what I did sicken me, and telling them just makes it worse. Just suffice it to say that by the end of that month and a half, over half of the people in my village were slaves to Kur.

The way he had control over them was passive at that time. They weren't mindless, though the slightest thought from him could make it that way. They were almost unaware of the binding as well. They had no memories of what I had done, and so no one was aware that I was the cause of their bondage.

He had not sent me after my father or mother yet at that time. Neither had I been sent against any of the other members of the blood-aura sect. That was to end though, because that day, one and a half months after he bound me, he sent me after the head of my sect.

I went to him under the guise of trying to be raised to the fifth rank. I knew that he was going to think me crazy, but he would grant me an audience and he would test me. One and a half months was nowhere near enough time for me to get that much more powerful though, and he knew that I knew that. Still, he let me in.

"You don't actually expect to pass this test, do you?" he asked me as I entered.

"No," I said, and I locked the door behind me. He looked at me with a curious look as he heard the door lock.

"What do you think you're doing, boy?" he asked me.

"I'm sorry," I said, advancing on him as I had done many times before to many different people. Inside I was screaming that it was wrong, but I ignored it and continued forward.

I grabbed his wrists once I was close enough to him and I slammed them down on the table he was sitting behind. I muttered a spell that Kur had taught me, and shackles of pure magic sprang up to hold him down. Then I grabbed his head and looked straight into his eyes.

He struggled, and I almost lost my hold on his head. He was a big man, and very strong. But my strength was increased by my fear of the pain if I failed, so I kept my grip and I started the spell. Then he was locked by the spell and I could relax my grip.

As I started the spell and initiated the mental contact I felt him wondering at what I was doing. As I got deeper into the spell I felt him recognize it. All of a sudden, he surged up with a strength that I had never imagined and I was thrown back, the mental contact and the spell hold broken.

He broke the bonds on his wrists and stood over me, glaring. I stared up at him, fear building within me at what Kur would do to me. The head of my sect continued to watch me, and I knew that he could see me cowering inside myself.

"Where did you learn that spell?" he asked me, his voice full of anger. I knew that he was barely restraining himself from killing me right then and there.

"I..." I said, unable to tell him anything.

"Tell me boy," he said.

"I can't," I said, and he glared at me. He raised his hand to hit me, and I cowered from him. Then he noticed the expression on my face and he got a thoughtful look on his face.

"Boy, look at me," he ordered. I shook my head, knowing that he would try to get into my mind. I knew that the spell I was under wouldn't let me let him do that though.

"I can't!" I said desperately.

So he grabbed me and pulled my face to meet his. As I had done to him before, he locked my gaze in a spell hold and started to rummage around in my mind. I rejoiced deep down inside of me, knowing that he would find what Kur had done to me. I knew exactly when he found Kur's spell because I felt his shock. Then, he did something, and I felt the spell leave me. Then he left my mind and I sagged to the floor.

"Who did that to you boy?" he asked me.

"Kur," I said, my voice barely working.

"Ah, and so your little bonding ceremony comes back to haunt you," he said. "How long?"

"Since I was raised to fourth rank," I said.

"That will be much to undo," he said, sighing. "And I am going to have to do something about him."

"No!" I said. All of the rage that had been building inside of me suddenly burst out in that one word. I was ashamed of myself and sickened by what Kur had made me do, and I wanted revenge. I realized this as the head of my sect mentioned having to deal with Kur.

"No what?" he said, surprised at my outburst.

"Kur is mine," I said, my voice hard. "What he did to me was awful, and he will pay for it with blood."

"You would kill your own blood sib?" he asked me.

"Yes," I said, and he looked at me with pity in his eyes.

I then stalked out of his room and the building, in search of Kur. The first thing I did was to set up a construct in my own mind that would appear to Kur just like his spell, except that he would have no control over me. I had figured out near the beginning that he could not feel me, or his spell, while I was working the spell to make people slaves. So, he would assume that the loss of contact with me when the head of my sect broke his spell was just me doing my work. And so he wouldn't know that I was no longer his slave.

As I searched for him, I worked out a plan in my mind. The month and a half of working for him had hardened me quite a bit, and what I planned for Kur was something that would have frightened and disgusted me before then. It only seemed fitting to do it to him though.

I found him in the main hut of the water sect in our village. Being the head of the sect, it was his hut, for his own personal use. No one ever entered that hut without his permission, and no one besides me entered the room in back, where he had his personal "office." He was waiting for me to bring news that the head of my sect was now his, so when he received word that I was there he bid me enter right away.

"Is it done?" he asked me without preamble as I entered the room. I nodded, and he smiled, showing me that evil grin that had graced his face so often in the previous month and a half.

In that moment I saw something more than just that evil, sadistic grin on his face. I saw longing, the same longing that I had heard in his voice that night a month and a half ago. And with that realization, I knew just how I was going to kill him, my earlier plan fading at this new prospect.

He didn't say anything about the longing that I could see in his face. I never thought he would. He had too much control over himself to do that. But I smiled at him, and I let my spell show him just what he would want to be feeling from me, had his spell been working, despite the revulsion I truly felt. He returned my smile with a confused expression that was full of hope.

"Adaluc?" he asked me tentatively. "Are you..."

But he didn't get to finish his question, because in that moment I rushed forward and kissed him full on the lips. Despite the disgust I was feeling at even the thought of what I was doing, I forced myself to stay there, and after he got over the shock, I felt him responding to the kiss. I knew then that I had been correct, and I knew that that was the moment to strike.

I let my spell fall then. I let all of my anger and disgust, and hatred flow, using my training as a blood-aura wizard to augment them so that Kur could feel them clearly. I smiled inwardly when I saw his eyes widen as he realized that I was free from his control. And then, while he was still surprised, I took out my dagger, and I stabbed him in the side, twisting the blade as I went.

I didn't want to give him a quick death. I wanted him to suffer, and to be in pain. And most importantly, I wanted to make clear to him just how I had felt that day when he had betrayed me. It was as I stabbed him that he fell backwards, releasing me from that horrible kiss.

"Adaluc, why?" he asked me as he fell, and the pain and sheer shock in his voice almost reminded me of the old him, before he had betrayed me. I steeled myself against it though, thinking of what he had done to me and reassuring myself that he deserved no less.

"Now you know what it's like to be betrayed by someone you trust," I said. "It's not very fun, is it?"

Again I let my anger and hatred wash over him. I didn't hold anything back, and I let him see it all. It must have been too much for him after being stabbed, because it was then that his body fell limp. And so I knew that he was dead.

And with the knowledge that he was gone, all of my anger and hatred fled, their fires spent in that moment of revenge. It left me weak and trembling. No matter how awful Kur had been, he was my blood-sib, bound to me by my own magic. And I had killed him.

I stared at him in shock. As my thoughts raced every which way, I found myself absently rubbing at my palm, where I had cut myself for the blood-sib ceremony. There was no scar there because of the magic that I had performed, but at that moment it was as if I could feel exactly where I had cut myself.

And then, as I stared at the dead body of my blood-sib, there was a scar on my hand. I remembered what the legends said about blood-sibs, and how the magic that made the scar heal would be reversed when the bond between blood-sibs was broken in treachery. I then started to cry, and the villagers found me there, sobbing. Kur lay dead on the floor, and the dagger that had finished him off lay in my hand.

What I hadn't expected was that my spells hadn't worn off. Everyone in the village who I had enslaved was still quite loyal to Kur, even if they didn't realize it, because I had performed the spell, not him. And so when they found me there were many who wanted to kill me for my crimes. I didn't know how to break the spell either. I couldn't even feel it, but I knew it was there.

I was saved from execution by the head of my sect and my parents. They wouldn't let the people kill me, but not even they could forgive what I had done. The only punishment we had for something this serious, besides death, was exile, not only from the village, but from the people as a whole.

So that is how I was exiled from my people. I've been told that if I am ever caught calling myself Shelachan ever again that my life will be forfeit. What I did was truly awful, but I think that if I was in the situation again, even without the pain and the hatred, I would do it again. And it would be for the good of the whole world.