The priest’s heart broke then - the sort of breaking that it would do again and again without shattering. 

"I believe you little one, that just like us the spirit wants to live. If I could I would offer it a Good life."

With a deep breath he continued: "But I cannot. And if we don’t act to stop it than someday many others will be hurt."

"What others?" asked Amina.

"Mortals, like you and me."

"But who?"

"I can’t name them. No one can, for as long as prophecy is broken the future is uncertain."

"But I can name this spirit, and it will certainly be hurt by its own destruction."

The priest smiled a grim smile - proud of the Good he saw in his pupil. He knew what lesson he would need to teach her, though it wasn't an easy one to learn.

"Even if we can’t say who it will hurt, we know it will hurt others. We’ve seen it before little one, in the lessons of ages gone by. Normally disciplines are only taught about this when they are older than you are now, because we do not wish to poison them against Evil and so first we teach mercy."

"But I don’t think it’s a favor to you, or to the world, to hold off on this lesson now." he said, his voice apologetic.

Amina didn’t think there was anything for the priest to apologize for in teaching her.

And so priest steeled himself.

"I can show you now what ordinarily we would wait to show you - the memories of pain and anguish of our past, and the lessons we learned from them." 

He held his hand outstretched, a spell of ancestral memory upon it.

Amina took the hand, drinking of the knowledge with less regard for her own self than the church would ordinarily teach her.

The history that the priest showed her was one of mercies gone wrong, of how lessons that they hoped Evil would learn were ignored, of the mortals and Gods alike turned to ends that hurt and broke more to Evil in turn. Brutal conquerors who grew their armies with the aid of healers, starvation caused by thieves who had failed to reform again and again, and how it took a grand tragedy to save everyone from the mercy and acceptance of Sarenrites when they had allowed an evil to fester above a vault holding the end of the world.

When Amina awoke for a second time there were tears in her eyes and the priest saw he had been understood.

And then she blinked, the tears falling across her face but her eyes steely nonetheless, while she turned to the fiend within herself once more.

"Would you do these things,” she asked.

"Yes", it answered - for it could not lie to her, "I would do all that and more, and delight in the doing."

More tears came then, even as she asked her second question.

"Would you prefer to never do such things, if that were the price of your life?”

"Perhaps, but I will make no promise to abstain for my life's sake, for I refuse to stay my hand from the Evil that I am," said the fiend.

It thought then that it would perish, and within the secrecy of Amina's heart it was glad that its death would wound her so terribly to allow. A final act of malice, for that was in its nature.

Amina cried for a moment, knowing the truth in the words of the spirit.

And then she raised her hand to wipe away her tears, leaving the same steely look that had been there before

The priest looked at her. Even if he couldn’t hear the spirit himself, he knew what it must have said to her.

"I will still not allow this," said the girl, "for it would hurt the Evil bound to my soul and that would be wrong. Nothing you showed me or that the spirit told me changes that rejecting this spirit would hurt it. I would help others as well, and protect them just the same, but right now the one who’s fate I can alter is the one clinging to my soul, and so long as no one else will take up its cause I will not put it down.”

The priest opened his mouth in surprise, but no new truths came out to dissuade her. No sympathy nor pleading on his behalf could alter her decision that night.

And so he left her to rest, and went himself to the center of Sarenrae's temple where prayed for guidance and mercy for Her daughter's great burden.

Weary and tired in body and mind if not soul, Amina fell into her own final slumber in Sarenrae's temple.

As she slept she dreamed that she was resting in a forest she remembered despite never having been - comfortable, safe, and supported by the evening light filtering through the leaves.

Sarenrae came to her there - beautiful and grand and without a hint of terror or aloofness despite Her obvious divinity.

"Little one, who is so brave and kind, you are welcome here to grow in my love and protection. Spirit of Malice, you too are welcome here to grow, for I love you just as well. And those that you may hurt, should you continue down your path, I love them all in equal measure."

Amina looked at her Goddess with hope and delight, for this was the One she had been chosen to follow.

"I cannot bring what you desire to all on My own, child. Even I only have so much of Myself to give. If I could I would walk through Hell and its kin and bring each devil their own Nirvana, helping them heal and grow as they have been denied for so long. Though I cannot bring them the light of Nirvana yet, My hope is not idle. I plan and design to one day to bring Nirvana to all of Creation in need of it."

Amina could feel the light Sarenrae spoke of, warm and caring.