You came to me, Sindaraen, with a difficult question, but it was not the question you came to ask. You asked of the Dryad's predicament, but I heard the more important, "Why am I doing this?"

When last we spoke, Sindaraen, I saw your person, experienced your demeanor, heard your voice, and was able to register your character. You are recklessly proud, egotistical and selfish. Moreover, you are not blind to your character. You recognize and embrace your character. While you may be blind to your own motives, I am able to provide at least one answer. It is not the only answer, however, and I will end with another possibility.

If you reflect upon your character, my first answer is simple, and contains two parts. First, having personally experienced the dryad's predicament, when you heard that she had been similarly victimized, you involuntarily projected yourself into her position. This was not done out of a desire to empathize or sympathize with her predicament. Rather, her position reminded you of your own weakness, and you reacted in the same way as you did when you were victimized - you boasted. To stifle insecurities surrounding your abilities and self-worth, you boasted that your predicament was insignificant and surmountable. Surmounting your predicament fed your pride, and so when you learned of her predicament, you projected yourself into her position and boasted that you would not let it continue. You did not boast on her behalf, however, but on your own. Freeing the dryad would be construct another wall to dam your insecurities, another bit of physical proof that you are victorious in all situations, and superior when compared to all others. So you set out to help the dryad, but when the chaotic sediment of pride and ego settled, there was law and reason. The problem was like a web, and you saw that the web was difficult to traverse because it had been spun by a more powerful and crafty spider than yourself. You saw that you were powerless, and you were frightened. You saw potential danger to your person and holdings, and you were frightened. But your pride drowned these incentives to give up the cause. You had boasted, and your pride would not let you admit defeat or failure. So, Sindaraen, the first reason that you are helping the dryad is to salvage your own reckless pride.

Second, you are attempting to free the dryad not for her own sake, but for what the act of freeing her represents to yourself and others. She is merely a pawn in your larger game of ego. To free the dryad is to best the best, to again prove that you are victorious in all situations, and superior when compared to all others. Just as the unfaithful married human sees his younger, beautiful target as a trophy object of self-validation, so you see the dryad.

If these are your answers, then I do not support them. This does not, however, mean that I reject your cause. I will aid the force of good and mercy wherever I may find them, even if they are committed by evil men (and do not balk or scoff at my use of the descriptor 'evil.' I have registered your character, and know that the storm of evil begins to cloud your soul. Granted, you have allowed another to mind your soul, and it has been returned sullied, but this is not the evil I sense. You are close, or have recently been close, to an evil act inspired by selfishness. I cannot predict past or future, but beware. If the test has already come, then you know already of what I speak). If these are your answers, then my offer of help is sanctuary and spirituality. If she finds her way to the temple, she will be protected and guided. If she desires to turn herself wholly over to the Goddess, then I will see to her spiritual training.

If your conscience still grapples with my answers, however, perhaps there is another answer, which lies in an analysis of why you are proud, egotistical and selfish. I know not of your lineage or socialization, but to characterize you, I can use the analogy of the feral wolf-child, raised not by society, but by the brutalities, and thus the requirements, of nature. Survival of the fittest. Like the feral child, you are largely devoid of culture. Culture is, of course, nothing but another self, another ego constructed from those without yourself, to guide man's morality out of the realm of the animal and into the realm of the civilized and the spiritual. Simply put, you are selfish because you cannot get past your self, your animal ego. However, you have not been able to escape culture. You live and breathe in a cultured world. You desire to be accepted, but culture evaluates not the animal ego, but the cultural ego. At some level, I see a part of you crying out to be accepted by the world, willing to perform whatever is necessary to be accepted - except changing yourself. Because, for whatever reason, you have not been socialized with a cultural ego, you compensate by acting outward upon the world in hopes of gaining others' respect. Unfortunately, your actions, which are intended to gain respect, are guided by your animal ego. Yet it is the cultural ego that will gain you the respect of others. You are proud, egotistical and selfish because you refuse, or are not able, to change your self, your animal ego.

There is, then, a third reason why you might seek to free the dryad. Like the two reasons mentioned earlier, freeing the dryad is still an act performed as a means to an end. In this case, however, the end is acceptance of yourself by others. Freeing the dryad is a crying-out of your unconscious, a covert communication skirting your animal self which expresses, above all else, a desire to be recognized, accepted and admired.

I have prayed to the Goddess on your behalf, and there may be a merciful path. The path is one of self-reflection and self-change. The two are intertwined. The act of self-reflection, of realizing that your animal self needs to be changed, is the first step toward actual change. Any act toward actual change of your animal self, including self-reflection, will be recognized, accepted and admired by those around you.

I offer a path toward selflessness. Know that socialization - morals, ethics, principles, etc. - is different from faith, and that this path would not require giving yourself wholly over to the Goddess. It would, however, require a genuine, selfless willingness to change. The Goddess is able to determine such a willingness, and I am prepared to provide the training. If you accept the path of mercy, and if the Goddess deems you willing to change, I am willing to offer you additional help in your attempt to free the dryad. I will need your answer before you leave the Temple. The craving for time to think is only your animal ego once again framing a problem in selfish terms of self-preservation. I have offered you a means through which your cultural self can emerge. Tell me which self now speaks, and my decision will follow.