Meditation and Water Are Wedded Forever - Faroul

[Colombina]

Continued from here. ___ “Emed… ” He mulled over the name, trying to connect it what scarce Shiber he knew, but came up empty. Rezon could hear the lack of mooring, though. There was no tent, no son, no history to bolster the man’s life. The loneliness of the name moved the young man toward compassion. His nature did not ask why the suffering of another should mean anything to him, it only heard and grieved. “I like Yahebah. The docks are terrible,” he smiled as if they shared a joke. “But the people are hospitable. More than here. In Ahnatep a host seeks to impress, in Yahebah to welcome.” He cast an arcing look over the city that was nestled amidst the small hills. Foundations made of bones and monuments long gone heaved the city closer to Syna. Mud brick and marble overlay were patched together, dappling the wide and high structures with glint and gold. And through it all weaved streams pressed underground until they found sloped shores. The water had traveled from Cyphrus and the red rocks to die at their feet, if any drops made it that far. Cisterns and wells were guarded better than the gates, briefly reminding the proud people of their dependence on gods and nature. Both were mercurial forces at best. “But today I am in the gold city tugging at Ovek’s fingers.” “I don’t know if it will work, Faroul,” Dimourla laughed in his memory a thrilling sound that bid one come closer. She was trying to pull herself into a saddle created to accommodate a recent injury. Everyone had asked her to stay at the palace and forgo her rambling desert rides. She scoffed at their valid concerns and cornered the nearest gadgeteer until she had precisely what she wanted. “But,” her mouth was rich with secrets and possibility, “I shall tug at Ovek’s fingers, nonetheless.” The young man bashfully bowed his head towards Faroul, remembering the setting in which he had found the man. “I’m spoiling things by staying.” Trying to mend his error he spoke a brief line of benediction for the dead in Arumenic and turned to depart. Faroul would note the use of the feminine in the young man’s phrase. Only a woman would embrace the offering of perfume.

[Faroul]

A moment of silence passed between them as Rezon mulled over the Benshira's name. “Emed” observed it without reply, supplying no further introduction or explanation for himself. He had lapsed into scrutiny instead, studying his companion with a reticence that seemed at odds with his race. Though he shared a desert tribesman's brown features, the gregariousness that should have illuminated them had been replaced with vigilance and subdued grief. At the same time, his plain, worn coats and economical movements suggested an austerity out of place in an Eypharian city. His appearance was as unmoored as his name. He smiled at Rezon's mention of Yahebah, but it was an empty and noncommittal gesture, made only out of politeness. It was not the expression of a man reminded of home. However, when he followed the boy's gaze over Ahnatep's glinting, sun-drenched hills, his face rippled with an undercurrent of passion. Love and hatred mingled there, purling together like the streams beneath the city. As the youth turned to face him again, he fought to drain them away into deeper, secret wells; both water and emotion were too precious to be left on the surface for long. The thought prompted wonder about Rezon, whose own countenance seemed to conceal nothing. Faroul had noticed the young man's unguarded transitions between solemnity and humor, contemplation and compassion, each without the customary veils of Eypharian guile. Nor did he seem scornful of a chupra's presence, otherwise considered an undesireable stink. Given that, Rezon simply could not be a native of Ahnatep. Perhaps they were similarly anchorless, a Benshira and an Eypharian adrift between cultures. Where was the boy from? Rezon spoke just as he opened his mouth to ask. “Today I am in the gold city, tugging at Ovek's fingers.” Cisterns of memory overflowed; breath escaped as he crashed into the waters. “But,” her mouth was rich with secrets and possibility, “I shall tug at Ovek’s fingers, nonetheless.” He had smiled and boosted her into the makeshift saddle. “Lord Ovek best take care, then, lest my lady win away with both His blessings and His rings.” The grin she returned was preening, conspiratorial, dazzling; he would have had to blink, had the grooms not swarmed around her steed, fussing and adjusting and hissing half-swallowed admonishments. She ignored their ministrations, emerald eyes already lifted to the expanse of dunes where she would soon ride. Faroul imagined she dreamed of conquering Eyktol, of sweeping across desert horizons as triumphantly as she had swept through the Pressor's palace. Wild and free, black curls streaming in torrid winds, a childhood face now thoroughly a queen's. In that moment, Faroul knew Lord Ovek stood no chance. Blessings, rings, and someday, a son – He'd yield them all to Dimourla, daughter of the West Winds, victor of Ahnatep. He surfaced. A slow pull of air filled aching lungs. Icy needles lanced his gut, and his head throbbed. Dread. Hope. Denial. It could not be. He struggled to think. He had feared this of Rak'kena, too. Living in the light had a way of transforming everything into an echo, a scattered reflection of his deceased past and perished desires. Chasing those echoes was like chasing a stray breeze; even if you caught one, your hands held nothing. This time, too, was surely an illusion, an empty echo, an unfounded hope. And there was not enough left of him to spend on hope. But the resemblance was there. Not in spirit or bearing, as Rak'kena's had been, but in form and in color. Rezon looked so much like her. Don't lie to yourself, he warned. But as the Eypharian murmured a prayer for a woman and turned to depart, it slipped free: “Wait.” Arumenic this time, pitched with desperation. Mortified at the weakness in his own voice, Faroul cleared his throat before crossing to the boy's side. He somehow found composure in the intervening steps. “You? Spoiling things?” He addressed his companion. “No, it is I who spoils Cheva's day.” He shook his head as if chiding himself, offering a self-deprecating smile. “Humor an old man with some company, neh?” With one arm, he motioned down the bank of the estuary, inviting Rezon to join him. “Just what boon do you hope Lord Ovek will give?”

[Colombina]

The young man stopped when bid and bowed slightly, a respectful genuflection to an elder. The motion had a touch of habit to it, crisp like a soldier or sailor's acknowledgement of his captain. "Of course." He walked down the estuary, his arms swinging lightly. Joining a stranger for conversation seemed as common to him as bright days in Eyktol. When asked what he wanted of Ovek, his youth slipped through his passing decorum with a reckless glint. "Enough luck to not get caught." He looked across the water as if something watched him from the sea. "My brother thinks I'm at the Librum growing wiser. He'd skin me if he knew I was here. He hates Ahnatep." His features were weighted, grieved with this thought and all it represented, but his grave countenance did not last long. "If that is too generous a boon" he grinned, "Maybe a kiss from a pretty, spirited girl before I'm flayed alive. I'm a simple creature." On cue, the crowd a ways behind them rose in pitch as laughter and girlish shrieks warbled above arms thrown up in sudden delight. Music possessed the happy throng, throwing them into rapid fellowship. Rezon was momentarily distracted, as if he'd never seen such a display. The dance required a jarring closeness between strangers and had complex transitions, likely created to weed out the foysha who didn't have the leisure to be tutored in forms. "Too simple for here," his hand swept over the scene, "Even something as common as dancing requires study. Everywhere else you can get by with clapping and spinning." The obvious questions were being avoided. Rezon was easy company, because he had a talent for respecting privacy.

[Faroul]

“That is because the dancing is not about dancing,” he answered wryly. “Not here.” He had paused beside Rezon as the boy turned, distracted, to survey the scene. They made for strange companions – divergent as they were in race and age - but they watched the spectacle together all the same. Faroul had no training in dance, but he could see the complexities that Rezon had remarked upon. Intricate footwork and intimate distance left little room for error, and bronzed limbs swept with practiced grace despite the spontaneity of the gathering. He had discreetly avoided such activities in the parties of his youth, too dearly reminded of his want of two more arms. “Look, eh? See how they separate the wheat from the chaff.” He lifted his chin toward the fringes of the throng, where those who had fumbled bowed out, displaced. They ringed the remaining dancers, both cheering to cover their failures and watching for an opportunity for re-entry. The center of the formation had been won by a willowy woman in a red sheath and her muscular, kilted partner; other couples circled about them, twisting and strutting, skin flush with vainglory. It was a fitting representation of a city obsessed with posturing, Faroul thought. But if Rezon looked on the display and saw an enviable sophistication, the Benshira was more keen to the danger. Every moment he spent with the boy drew him further away from his initial pain and shock and towards a prickling awareness of what Rezon's presence entailed. The red woman's motions only served to remind that the queen, too, had once danced at the whirling center of Ahnatep's intrigues – and fallen down, trampled. If Rezon or his brother – he had a brother! - were truly her sons, if one or both of them were products of Teremun, the late pressor... The gold city would not be kind. His eyes narrowed and began to search the crowd. Meanwhile, his tongue shaped a lure; Rezon's respect had afforded him a hollow of privacy, but he had to draw the youth inside. “Even the Pressor's court is no different.” Pressor's, not Pressorah's. “Only the dance has greater stakes, more veils, more hidden knives. Your brother is wise to hate this place.” His gaze met Rezon's and held it for a heartbeat. And then it broke, a smile marking a turn into nonchalance. “Still, I can't blame you for sneaking here. Not on a day like this. I chased girls at the festival too, when I was as young as you.” The smile deepened into an indulgent grin. “Is this your first time in Ahnatep?”

[Colombina]

OOCExcellent post, btw. As Faroul showed the mean shape of the dance, Rezon's expression took on tones of pity and pain. He had seen only a pretty, complex thing, and was disheartened by this new taint. The red woman was a victor in a battle, and she won only through humbling others. This was a taloned creature compare to his sylph of youth delighting in its prime. "No," he answered distractedly, "I have been before." His eyes returned to the Benshira, still shaking disquiet. He was easily moved. It could be a peril or the core of uncommon kindness. "But I wasn't given room to wander." A quick smile tempered his mild criticism, "My brother can follow closer than a Kelvic. It is only Ovek and cunning that keeps him at bay today." Rezon's focus stumbled backward over the conversation. Confusion touched him sincerely, slowing his phrasing. "I do not doubt the noble dance is treacherous, but I was told the Pressorah," he knew who sat on the throne and mistook Faroul's use of the term for generic designation, "Is fairly just. She is from the common people, yes? Not raised at the table of nobles." While one man could not sway his whole understanding, Rezon was hoping for encouraging answers. The Pressorah's comparative goodness seemed especially important to him. As an expatriate, a citizen's maternal love for the Pressorah seemed out of place. He did not demand she be painted as just out of racial piety. There was some deeper need being met by this belief. "No city is perfect, just as no man is perfect, but I have not seen oppression beyond tolerance in Ahnatep." His hands sought to console one another, clutching or kneading away the nervousness they betrayed. "Then again, my experience is small."