Still breathing heavily, Asheth leaned on the windowsill and looked out over his domain. He had been gazing at the reflection of the moon in the courtyard's fountain for some time now, trying to collect his thoughts, but no matter how long he watched the glowing, slightly rippling orb on the surface of the water, the answers simply didn't come.

Why did this have to happen to me? Asheth was the Lord Regent of the Lethvale Province, and resided in the capital - called Lethvale as well - a northern merchant city with a thriving mining and lumber trade. He had come to the post without any desire on his part, he was the third son of Lord Andbran Tarasanne, who had fallen on sudden ill-health some two years earlier and had passed away. Asheth had been upset, but his was a life of high class and luxury, one filled with parties, masquerades, fox hunting...and absolutely no responsibility, so he drank and partied to cover his grief. Upon Lord Andbran's passing, his brother Talach had assumed their father's duties, as he had been groomed for since birth. He wasn't quite as popular as their father had been with the general populace - accounting figures and reading legal documentation were better suited to him than making ball appearances - but he kept the economy moving along at a steady pace. What time he didn't spend in the courts or pouring over figures, he used the province's income to repair and update older parts of the city, rebuild the aging pier and even institute a refuse-collection service. Less than a year after he had become Lord Regent, their brother Aithend had fallen badly from his horse during a fox hunt and had broken his back. Aithend died in his sleep shortly afterwards, the physicians saying his spirit was as badly broken as his body, and he lost the desire to keep living. Talach and Asheth had eleven years between them and were never been close, but when the nagging and chastising began, Asheth took excess to a whole new level. His was not to be a life of servitude to the Province and it's populace, and he was not going to play second fiddle to his boring, uncharismatic brother. When Talach was assassinated, shot by a former city worker who had been caught embezzling city money, Asheth's world had shattered.

The room had begun to stink, rousing Asheth from his stupor. The brutalized man on the floor must have finally passed, his bowels loosening in death. He sighed deeply, straightened and tried to smooth back his tousled hair, but rather rubbed more blood into it. He tossed the fire poker aside, only slightly shocked that he had still been clutching it with a white-knuckled grip. Another body, another mistake he would eventually be held accountable for. He stepped around the pool of blood and other liquid that had spread across the floor and threw open the door.