Qalaya

[Gossamer]

Qalaya Qalaya is the goddess of memory and writing. She is the patron of storytellers, historians, and others who seek to preserve the past. To follow Qalaya is to believe that the key to understanding the world in which one lives now, as well as the world that will unfold in the future, is knowing and embracing the past. Qalaya generally appears as an attractive woman whose age is very difficult to determine. She is soft-spoken, and rarely smiles. Descriptions of her are often inconsistent and conflicting, perhaps because her appearance depends on the memories of each individual. Qalaya truly believes that knowledge is power, and that the key to the present and the future is the past. It was she who first gave writing to Mizahar, believing that without it, people would be unable to truly learn and grow. The Valterrian was a blow that she took more personally than most deities, because it destroyed so many records and interrupted so many oral histories. Perhaps because of this, she has grown more hesitant to push her influence on mortals, although she welcomes those who seek her. Qalaya will give Gnosis marks to those who truly seek her. She is defensive of those she considers her "sincere" followers, and many of her gnosis marks offer some measure of personal protection; as she protects her followers, they in turn preserve the stories and memories of the past. Higher-level gnosis marks may be highly individual, drawn from a follower's own memories, or allowing a follower a certain level of power over memory or the past.

[Philomena]

Winter 52, 512
Philomena Lefting's Flat, Zeltiva
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"Qalaya, oh my mother, oh, I can feel her. Lanie is here. I can feel her, I can… she's so close…"

It was very late, later than taverns shut and earlier than bakeries opened. The only light in Minnie's flat was a spermaceti taper that burned on the altar, the pure, clean whale oil glowing steady and bright. It cast its shadows around the room not with the wavering yellow desperation of a tallow, but with a quiet, pale, smokeless dignity.

Minnie herself lay on the floor of the room. The air was as cold and pure as the light, and Minnie, who was wearing only a thin, disarranged linen slip, shivered, her skin, even in the wan light, flushed and sick and sweaty.Her left arm was stretched above her, and she lay very still. Her right wrapped around a battered, ancient doll of Qalaya, the face of it pressed tenderly against her old, drooping breasts.

"I want to be this one for you, Mother Qalaya. I am trying, I am trying. I need help, I am not strong enough for this."

She started to cry again, the noise of it lost now - she was too dehydrated for tears to provide much lubrication for sound. But her back shook underneath the thin fabric - so much sweat was in the cloth now, it practically appended to and merged with her flabby back flesh.

"This is my trial? I don't even know, not really… I… sometimes, I do not know. I guess I can't. Maybe this is your way of asking me to choose, to pick one side or the other. That's what I think, mother, sometimes. Sometimes… I … sometimes I get angry wit' you. I feel like you are upset I migh' come off happy. I am angry that you would tell me this, that I can be loved by Lanie or by you, and not both. Can you forgive me that, mother? You can, I know you can. There is a story, in my head, a whole story, I can hear it i' my skull, I can."

She pulled herself shakily to a sitting position, and cradled the doll gently, peering into its face with her unspectacled, near blind eyes.

"In my story, you love me, Mother Qalaya. Is that a silly start? Maybe. Maybe you are na' paying n'attention t'me 'tall, not hate, just not s'important to you. I could understand that, I will not hate y'for that. But, in the story, Mother, you love me, you love me very much, only… it is like when I were a chil', when y'learn some things jus' as you have to do them with no safeguards. You just have to do them, and tha's how you grow, that's what makes we little weeds grow e'en without all the dandling the flowers get. And in my story, mother, tha' is what this all is, you leave me to a test, not to test me, but because you love me, an' y'are wantin' me to be closer to you. An' then, at th'en', jus' when I figger I cannae live nae longer in it, then I feel I feel your arms 'roun' me, and you take me away somewhere ver' quiet, and I rest, and rest, and rest, and rest…"

Her voice breaks, her eyes are dull and hollow, and hungry, and her lips are dry and shaking slightly with exhaustion, "I wrote the whole story, today, in our book, Mother, start to finish." She paused, closed her eyes and kissed the little doll's face, "Oh, how I hope it's a true story. Did Bethany ever feel this way, on the Circumnavigation? Did she lay a'bed and tell you how lonely she were, and how she donny know if she could do what y'needed o' her?"

Minnie sighed, now, and stared into one of the darker parts of the room.

"No… No, I'm sure not. She 'ad Kena, after all."

This thought, sobering and heavy, drew Minnie back from the brink a bit, somehow. She gently took the doll, kissing it once more, and set it on the altar. She knelt again, and murmured softly, the normal closings of her prayers.

"Bless, for me, the ones I love. Bless Lanie first and best and most. Bless Gypa, that he is not trapped a ghost, and is happy in whatever life he went to. Bless all my books, and bless the Library. Bless Hannah's memory, that it not be forgotten. Bless the Evalin, as well, howe'er she should be blessed. And then if you've any left, bless me, mother Qalaya…"

She paused, her voice shaking there.

"…maybe… bless me just a little more than normal, now, mother, for I've need of it."

Then she leaned forward,and carefully snuffed the spermaceti candle, resting her hand on the doll, once more for just a few minutes.

[Castor Riley]

Day 13, Spring of 513 AV (Evening) Castor's Room, ZU Student Living Quarters Castor opened the door to his small student flat, walked to the bed and flopped down on it, exhausted yet satisfied. He had managed what he'd set out to, get a job at the library. Yet, for Castor, this had not been simply a job, but one of the cherished dreams of his childhood. Thinking of the morning's events, the bust of the goddess Qalaya arose in his mind. Memory. Such a beautiful woman, yet, to Castor at least, she had seemed a bit wistful, maybe melancholy. The past was always moving away at such an alarming rate, after all; it was hard to carry it with us. Still, Castor did not want to forget. Already he was desperately grasping at the threads of memory, trying to hold on. He'd always been obsessed with remembering things, memorizing his favourite books as much as possible. Yet, he had not been mature enough to understand what truly needed to be memorized. Now that he did, it was too late and the thought tore at him. For the first time since he'd laid in his bed as a child, asking Syna to hurry up and come so that he may play another day, since he'd looked out beyond the walls of Syliras as a teen and asked Ivak for courage in his upcoming journey - since he'd wept for Rak'keli as a young man to heal his father's illness, he decided to pray: 'Dear Qalaya. It's been a long time since I've done something like this, so I hope you'll forgive me if I seem a bit awkward and out-of-practice. I feel I lost my faith in the gods when my father died. Wait, that's not right... I stopped trusting the gods when my father died. You see, as a child, I had always thought the gods looked over all of Mizahar and made sure that everyone was all right. If bad things happened, I thought that they happened because the people they happened to were bad people. I was very naive like that. Then, when my father lost his speech and ability to walk, I thought all I needed to do was to pray and there would be a sudden shining and all would be well again. So I prayed to Rak'keli for his health, yet there was no light. I prayed to Viratas, for he was my father, yet there was no light. I prayed to Priskil and KelWyn, even Vayt... yet there was no light. And, eventually, my father died. So I understood that the gods may watch over Mizahar, but they do not watch us all equally, they do not care for all people, and I left behind whatever childish trust I had that things would all turn out alright always. So, what do I pray for now... There is one thing I cannot achieve on my own, or in any case one thing that I care about that I can't achieve on my own. I do not wish for my father brought back from the dead; I think you'd agree the past should be remembered in the present, yet stay where it is. No, what I ask for is much more simple, almost insignificant to anyone else, perhaps, but perhaps you alone might understand it. And you alone I still hope might grant me this small favor, which may appear miniscule to you, yet would mean everything to me. All I ask is that I remember my father. Not just who he was, and what he did, but all I once knew about him that I took for granted and did not take the time to inscribe deeply in my memory. His smell. His face. His voice. How he laughed, pretending to be the Steward of Death and chasing me through the corridors of Stormhold. How he cried when I asked him where my mother was. The way his eyes would sparkle mischievously when he made up a story. All the details of a life that I saw yet did not appreciate; details that I feel slipping away, every passing moment. For how can one write the color of a loved one's eyes, or describe the sound of laughter echoing off walls? Though you gave us writing, dear Qalaya, it is memory that has always been your most cherished gift. For memory alone can do justice to the details that writing cannot hope to truly encompass. For to truly describe one chime of precious time spent with my father I would have to write for a day. So please, Qalaya, I ask you this boon and this alone; let me remember my father.' Then Castor untangled the hands that had wound tightly together, the fervor of his prayer surprising even himself. He wiped some wetness away from beneath his eyes with the palms of his hands. He felt silly. He had not known what he had expected.