The witch had herself a long meditation on her position in the realm.
She thought carefully of who her actual friends and allies had turned out to be.
She thought carefully of who condemned and who supported these kindred spirits and who benefited from either action.
She considered real power bases versus primate dominance games.
She came to see all the protestations she had made about purity, no matter how true, had simply played into the hands of the petty power trippers.
Purity of heart has nothing to do with purity of blood or bloodline. Or of piss, for that matter.
Let them think her as tarred and tainted as the wraiths. Let them think her heart pumped poison.
Better to present a rotten mask over a pure spirit than a pure mask over a rot that spreads to the core.
Who cares what the naysayers think anyway? They are the same people who burned her predecessors half a millenium ago, no matter what they insist.
And the wraiths love her more than the naysayers could ever comprehend.
