Her name was Ailis. She looked a fragile creature; hers was a slight frame, and the youth was still evident in her features. Her hair was the brilliant reddish colour of a flame, and in its artful disarray, seemed to resemble flame in more than merely colour. Something about it managed to lend it the raw beauty that only flame truly possesses. Though her eyes were deep blue, they were not cold. They shone with the light of the inner fire she seemed to possess: not the fire that consumes and destroys, but the fire that warms and cheers, the pure, innocent glow of an everburning candle. I would call her beautiful, if I dared, and if her beauty was not so... other. It was the beauty of innocence, of purity. To corrupt or taint such a creature would have been an unspeakable evil. I could will her no harm, nor did I believe her capable of dealing it, even when she was trying to kill me.

Such a claim must have a tail behind it, you say? It does, friend, believe me. Not if I courted angels and battled demons would I have greater pride in its telling. And who am I, you ask? I am even as you see me: a lover and a fighter, a scholar and a fool, a jester, a trickster, a rogue.