Liliscea stress rages...

Liliscea sits against the wall as everyone else crowds around the newly resurrected Xylund, sixth cigarette that day alone dangling from her lips, and she thinks about what an utterly terrible day it's been.
 
Damned sadistic Queens, damned noble prats, damned busybody castle, damned smug and insufferable mind reader....oops, did she hear that just now? Hope she doesn't stick her sword in my face again....I don't exactly have the energy left to even try to fight back...though is it weird that as insufferable and arrogant as she is, I still like her? I mean she is helping when she doesn't have to, even if she's abrasive as hell about it. Still though, this day...at this point I'm not sure any of us are coming out of this alive. Liliscea scratches at the mudcolored skin on her legs. Sure Xylund came back in the end, but Kern still died, the noble prat, forcing us all to watch him drown. Then Xylund, who's just as bad as Kern decides he wants to also be a noble prat and sacrifice himself for Kern! Madness! What is wrong with these people?! I get it, I do, at this point I would consider them dear to me, even with their outrageous suspicion of me earlier, and I have to admit I was tempted....but I couldn't do that to Lana, and...well it wouldn't just affect me now would it? None of them seemed to have thought about it did they? What their noble sacrifice would do to the rest of us. Not only the trauma of losing someone we care about, of watching them die in front of our eyes, but did they even stop to think of what would happen outside of that? How many times has Kern had to save our lives when a battle has gone horribly wrong? How many times has Xylund pulled our asses out of the fire with one of his mad genius ideas?! What, were we supposed to go and fight Temlakos with one of them gone? Were we supposed to expect to survive that without one of them? If the grief didn't distract us and get us killed, not having their insanely powerful abilities to keep us on our feet and keep the enemies attention off of us would have done it...especially with how exhausted I am...Liliscea's eyes droop for a moment, before jerking back to wakefulness. She checks that her magic is still up and running, before breathing a sigh of relief. I'm tapped. I don't have that many spells left in me, which makes me largely useless, and all my alchemists fire and acid were in that bag that the DAMNED INTERFERING CASTE MADE ME LEAVE BEHIND.
 
Liliscea falls for a moment into a memory of that moment, not even half an hour past, that moment of realization, that she was powerless. That she had to give in to the whims of an inanimate structure. That she had to leave behind one of the only things she was able to accomplish under her own merit, out of her own desire, and not some insane, crushing responsibility. The betrayal, the humiliation, being dragged around the room trashing illusions in the vain hope that she wouldn't have to do what she was afraid she'd have to. Useless in the end, the sheer impotent rage flooding through her as she threw the bag into the room.
 
Temlakos.... it's all his damn fault. These are his machinations I'm sure. As for Katt, I might like and somewhat respect her(I at least definitely respect her ability to kill me.), but the nerve she had..."You want this, you think you need this, and the castle is giving you what you think you want, to be here, stuck. This is all trash, and unless you accept that, you'll sit here until you die, a statue..." All of them, calling it a crutch, calling it trash, like it's useless, like it's so much GARBAGE, WHAT THE HELL DO THEY KNOW! A CRUTCH?! I've never heard so much inane, uninformed, CONDESCENDING, EGOTISTICAL TRASH IN ALL MY LIFE. Liliscea's eyes darken and she absentmindedly crushes the remains of her cigarette between her fingers, she notices, and cursing to herself, lights another one. I get that they care, and they meant well...but they don't know me, nor do they know my life. Acting like they did...yes it got me out of that room...but a crutch? No, Alchemy is my trade, my profession, it's the work I can actually take pride in, it doesn't leave me feeling like I'm betraying my mothers memory every time I use it. Of course they didn't notice that my sister of all people didn't weigh in on that conversation. Sometimes I think that Lana doesn't really see me, but I often forget she's more perceptive than I give her credit for...she knew the truth. She couldn't say anything because she also knew we had to play this castles game...Alchemy makes sense to me. It's all actions and reactions, and knowing what actions to take to get the desired reactions. It's hard work, research and an ungodly amount of time, but it's worth the effort you put into it. It doesn't solve everything, but if you're clever, and can think outside the box, the applications are incredible. Calling Alchemy my crutch is like calling Kern's connection with Inelene a crutch, or my sister's ability with music and people a crutch. Or Davynn's love of Jack Dangerous and always wanting to help people, and do the right thing a crutch. It's a part of me, it's something I put the time, and effort into and got damned good at it. I desperately wanted to find another way not because that kit was irreplaceable. Everything in there I can replace...even easily. It wasn't even because I had come to rely on it so much I couldn't let it go. That's insanity, like I said I can replace that kit easily, and it's not like it got much use here in this castle(though there were a few times that it was incredibly useful, and Kern saying that he could easily get rid of his mace..I'd like for him to think about that, abandoning his mace in a castle trying to kill us. Even if he could do that, as paranoid as he is, that's just dangerous. Obviously.) No. The reason I was so loathe to do it, the reason I was and still am so angry, is because a damned CASLTE had the temerity to JUDGE my life and tell me that this is my crutch! I didn't want to let that bag go, because I didn't want to let this damned castle win! How the hell is all I want to be trapped in a room of illusions, stuck as a statue for eternity, when all I wanted right then was blow that entire damned room to kingdom come for patronizing me like that. I need Alchemy?! NO. I don't need anything but my sister, whole, healthy, and alive. Do I love Alchemy? YES. It makes far more sense than people do.
 
Ugh....my familiar died, Katt nearly managed to kill me, two noble self sacrificing idiots broke my damned heart, not to mention Davynn and my sister(Mooshnik seemed fairly ambivalent to all of it). Then they had the nerve to judge each other for it, like it's fine if they do it, but heaven forbid that someone else puts them through that pain. Then I get told that I'm overly reliant on my passion, in an unintentionally patronizing and condescending manner, lose my tools, get judged by a castle, and my legs are still MADE OF STONE. Apparently I didn't fully understand the lesson. Hah! I'll take that as a victory you damned hunk of rock! I think this is the first time that I'll take pride in that.
 
Oh... it looks like we're moving again...Liliscea tiredly pushes herself to her feet, and hobbles her way behind the party in silence, more than content to be ignored for the moment. OH AND I'M SIXTEEN AGAIN, THANKS FOR THAT YOU DECREPIT RUIN.