Haena

[Haena]

Haena

Here is a woman, broken but not beyond repair. Driven, but not without her vices. Peaceful but fierce. Protective yet distant. A woman who has suffered, but who chooses to keep going. Someone who lives to let the world live. Self-sacrificing yet ultimately selfish. A medicine woman with no care for the people she presides over. Someone with a difficult past... and a future to be discovered.

Upon First Appearance

Full Name: Haena Stormblood, of the Diamond Clan (Previous Horserun, of the Opal Clan- ended Winter 516)
Race: Human, Drykas
Gender: Female
Age: 29
Birthday: 70th Fall, 487 AV
Birthplace: Endrykas, on the Sea of Grass
Eye/Hair Colour: Brown/Dark blonde
Skin: Tan
Personality: Distant, Intense
Voice: Mellow
Job: Philterist
Current Location: Endrykas
Religion: Caiyha, Zulrav, Kihala, Tavasi
Languages: Fluent in: Pavi
Conversational in: Common

Some More Information

Medically speaking...
Haena has come to the conclusion that she was rendered barren after giving birth to her last child, due to the difficult labour and the fact that she has not been pregnant since. This is one of the reasons why she is distancing herself from motherhood- she is scared to think that she may never make another child, and things that she fears, she hides from.

Socially speaking...
The woman gives off a vibe of distance. She appears as if she doesn't want to be approached, and for the most part, this is entirely true. Haena appreciates the wisdom of plants and animals over the noisy and ceasless chatter of humans. This isn't to say she doesn't like other people- if she gives someone a chance, then she may just end up finding she actually gets along with them.

Religiously speaking...
Haena is a strongly religious and devout individual. Her primary goddess is Caiyha, the mother of the plants and the animals that live in, and walk on, the earth of Mizahar. She worships Caiyha and is one of her witches, with her Phylonura gnosis marking her as one of them (approved). On desperate days she sends her prayers to Tavasi, in the hope of a renewed fertility. Oriana lingers on her tongue when she thinks of her children, and Kihala every morning and every night as she wakes and goes to sleep. She also prays to Zulrav regularly.

Psychologically speaking...
Haena used to be a strong-minded, loving, confident woman who was proud of her pavilion and a kind but firm mother. That was before the growing fears of being barren tainted her life with worry, and before the disaster which tore her pavilion apart and forced Haena to become the withdrawn, downtrodden, yet resolute woman she is today.

Appearance

Haena dresses simply. During Summer, the woman wears cropped clothes, and on her feet a pair of leather sandals. During Winter, she dresses more for the weather, with furs and thicker, more stout shoes on her feet.

Her thick, blonde hair tumbles roughly down her back, and her brown eyes stare at you through her wild fringe. During Summer she sports a tan that speckles her face with light freckles. During Winter, her tan fades to a naturally paler skin colour.

Her left arm is emblazoned with Caiyha's mark: a triskelion made and fashioned from twisted wreaths of grass, where horses seem to leap in patterns ringing the design. The mark is coloured and emphasised by Haena's windmark on her lower arm, that of twisting black lines that curl around her wrist and arm in a mesh and maze of Drykas patterns.

Her lower legs have a couple of faded scars, and ringing her right ankle is a thin tattoo of a black snake. Where it's fangs would be is a small birthmark- two dots of pigmented skin on her lower leg that look for all the world like snake bites.

Gnosis

Haena has the first mark of Caiyha's gnosis, Phylonura. She has the grassland biome, characterised as follows:

Grassland - Primarily found in Cyphrus and on the sea of grass, Grassland Witches are often found to be of Drykas blood and generally spend their whole lives on their grasslands. Managing wildfires, guarding predators that sometimes get over hunted, the Grassland Witches are often the first line of defence when it comes to what's best for the people verses what's best for the land. For example, the Drykas might want to see all Glassbeaks dead, whereas a Grassland witch will know how important the glassbeaks are to the environment and will protect them the best he or she can in order to keep the Sea of Grass stable.

The first mark gives Haena the following abilities:

The singularly marked individual is granted the language of Nura and begins to learn to communicate with plants and animals of all sorts. Nura can even cause the witch to actively associate with insects which are vital forms of life in Caiyha's domain. The witch is granted one biome to look after, and is given often multiple years to hone her skills and branch out to invest time and energy in the space she or he protects. The more skills a witch learns and perfects, the more likely she will feel the urge to move and resettle, especially when her current biome has been in balance for a significantly long period of time. Many witches at this stage can also 'lose' their marks if Caiyha finds them lacking in motivation or determination when it comes to being her guardians of the world.

Gnosis thread tracking:

Character History

Haena was born to a family of females in a pavilion which has since faded into the past. Being a female in excess, Haena was happily married off to another pavilion when she was just 16. To everyone's surprise, her brother went with her, and the two joined the stout and flourishing Horserun Pavilion.

She had always been a quiet and introspective child. As she grew older, this translated into a wonder towards the natural world the Drykas inhabited. She was a dutiful wife to her husband, and a loving one too. Her early marriage were some of the happiest times of her life. Her early adulthood was one of little excitement, but instead was a time of growth and development in which the young woman began to become the person she is today. With the arrival of her first child, Haena was delighted. She threw herself into motherhood, and took pleasure in being the Ankal's wife. However, when she gave birth to her second child after a difficult labour, her happiness took a hit when she developed postnatal depression for a time. Even after she recovered, the woman began to grow increasingly worried that she would never be able to concieve again. She began to distance herself from her children, fearful of being a mother.

Instead, she spent more and more time on philtering, a craft learnt originally from her mother, and then from her mother's journal once she passed away. The craft of medicine making, of herbalism and philtering, of taking the natural world and cultivating it to heal others was Haela's passion before all of her troubles, yet it was afterwards that it really started to bloom. She also took to visiting different parts of Endrykas simply to immerse herself in the natural world. She began to take notice of the Drykas' influence and effect on the environment, and it struck her as curious and intriguing. Caiyha was a wonderful provider, and as Haena began to realise her one true passion, she was provided in return with the gift of Phylonura. (Approved at the HD)

Then shortly after, a terribly, bitterly ironic tragedy struck. The backbone of the pavilion, the Ankal, his brother, and Haena's own brother all perished when they foolishly and accidentally stumbled into glassbeak territory. Left behind, the women and children of the pavilion are still desperately clinging to the Horserun name, whilst Haena throws herself into her work, and her sister-in-law bears the brunt of being a mother, a provider, and a huntress for the family.

Skills & Lores

 

A to E

Skill	EXP	Total	Proficiency
Cooking	5 SP	5/100	Novice

 

F to J

Skill	EXP	Total	Proficiency
Herbalism	10 SP	10/100	Novice

 

K to O

Skill

EXP

Total

Proficiency

 

P to T

Skill	EXP	Total	Proficiency
Philtering	10 SP	10/100	Novice
Riding (Horse)	10 RB	10/100	Novice

 

U to Z

Skill	EXP	Total	Proficiency
Weapon (Shortbow)	5 SP	5/100	Novice
Wilderness Survival (Plains)	20 SP	20/100	Novice

• Skill (Lores that accompany skills)
• Mizahar Knowledge, including:
  
  • Location and Geography (Cities)
  • Place and City Information
  • Races and Animals
  • Religion and Gnosis
  • Language
• Person and History (Meeting a person for the first time, lores about that person)
• Arcane (Magic-related lores and thoughts)
• Personal Knowledge/Misc. (Things my PC knows/feels/remembers)).

 

Skill

• Herbalism: Using Ginger to Combat Coughs (SP)

 

Mizahar Knowledge

Location and Geography (Cities)

Place Information

Races and Animals

Religion and Gnosis

• Religion of Caiyha (SP)

Language

 

Person

 

Arcane

 

Personal Knowledge

Possessions, Housing, & Ledger

Home
1 large tent, able to accommodate up to four people. The tent is simple in design. As a necessity, the ceiling is only just head height, due to the shortness of the poles. It is entirely open-plan, but members can fit temporary curtains to the roof to designate sleeping areas.
1 large tarp
100 ft of rope
1 lantern
2 torches
1 bedroll
1 blanket
1 set of fishing tackle & hooks
1 bonded Strider
1 Yvas
1 large set of Yvas bags
(All of the above is the starting package).

Possessions
A wooden shortbow, with 20 arrows. (Starting Purchase)
Dark-brown Linen Shirt
Dark-brown Linen Breeches
Linen Undergarments
Light Brown Coarse Woollen Cloak
Leather Boots
1 Waterskin
1 Backpack which contains:

1 Set of Toiletries (comb, brush, razor, soap)
Rations for a week
1 eating knife
Flint & Steel

(All of the above (excluding shortbow) is the starting package)


Pharmacist's Equipment
Alembic
Mother's Herbalism & Philtering Notebook (Heirloom), "Harriet's Notebook". Title scrawled on the front. Contains various recipes and musings, as well as some personal reflections and hypotheses. LV1-LV2 Herbalism/Philtering information)
Mortar & Pestle
3x Ounce Decanters
Haena's Logbook, w/ Ink & Quill
Iron Kettle
Silk Filter Cloth
2x Clay 6oz Cups

Ledger

Item	Date	Price	Total
Starting	Fall 516	+100 GM	100 GM
Blank book	Starting	-3 GM	97 GM
Mortar & pestle	Starting	-1 GM	96 GM
Alembic	Starting	-50 GM	46 GM
Wood shortbow	Starting	-30 GM	16 GM
20 arrows	Starting	-1 GM	15 GM
Iron kettle	Starting	-8 SM	14 GM 2 SM
5 square inch of silk	Starting	-1 GM 4 SM	12 GM 8 SM
3x oz decanters	Starting	-1 SM 5 CM	12 GM 6 SM 5 CM
2x clay 6oz cups	Starting	-9 CM	12 GM 5 SM 6 CM
Quill	Starting	-5 CM	12 GM 5 SM 1 CM
Black ink, 1 oz vial	Starting	1 GM	11 GM 5 SM 1 CM

Haena's Shopping List

• Philtering Lab (400 GM)
• Apothecary Chest (40 GM)

Companions, NPCs, & Family

Horse(s): Alta'(re), Haena's Strider to whom she is bound. She is a cautious and careful mare, who is patient and kind. Given the freedom, Alta' likes to roll in the mud, and when she is with Haena she displays a confident and playful side when the two sprint through the grasslands.

She is dun-coloured, and is mainly brown-red, with a darker but not black mane and tail. She has a small, black, diamond shape on the underneath of her neck.

Family: The Horserun Pavilion

A brief overview of the Pavilion and their expected future:

The Horserun Pavilion used to be a prosperous family. That was until the three men of the family were all killed in a glassbeak attack in late Summer 516 AV, leaving the ones who were left behind shattered and distraught. With only two women to look after an elderly woman and three children, the pavilion is limping along and the members expect that they will have to find other homes by Winter 516 AV. As such, the family is not particularly happy, and a constant shadow seems to hover over them.

(The stationary NPCs will be absorbed into another pavilion (unspecified, probably another Opal Clan pavilion) come Winter. I'm hoping to only pay poor seasonal expenses for the ones that need it for Autumn, and I will make sure to write it as such! It's going to be a struggle for them all and I want to portray this. After the merger, Haena will not be with her sister-in-law and family. I am expecting Haena to take her son and daughter to join the Stormblood Pavilion! )

Living Members
NPC Type: Stationary
Name: Lauran
Relation to PC: Mother-in-law
Race: Human, Drykas
DoB: Winter 454 AV
PoB: Endrykas
Skills: Weapon (Longbow): 20, Meditation: 10, Teaching: 10,
Additional Info:

Having seen her husband die, and then her only two children, Lauran is a silent, meditative woman who is gravely ill and virtually on her deathbed. During her youth the woman was capable of many things, ranging from cooking to mending to archery to weaving. Yet in her later years the capability to do these tasks has slipped from her, leaving her in a pitiful state. She is only alive due to the administrations of her granddaughter and family, who cannot bring themselves to let her pass on. Although physically she is able to do basic tasks, mentally the woman struggles to remember much of her past or indeed her present, and often thinks she is a child or young adult again. She also struggles to understand the motions behind certain things, such as making food for herself.

NPC Type: Stationary
Name: Epaiza
Relation to PC: Sister-in-law
Race: Human, Drykas
DoB: Summer 491 AV
PoB: Endrykas
Skills: Hunting: 30, Weapon (Shortbow): 10, Cooking: 5, Riding (Horse): 5
Additional Info:

An internally fragile woman but outwardly happy, Epaiza is the smiling face of the pavilion, and the one the children feel most at home with. She is over-worried and over-worked, yet maintains a calm front. She only breaks down during long, sleepless nights of worry and silent tears.

NPC Type: Travelling (with Haena)
Name: Tomas
Relation to PC: Son
Race: Human, Drykas
DoB: Autumn 23rd, 503 AV
PoB: Endrykas
Skills: Hunting: 10, Weapon (Shortbow): 10, Riding (Horse): 10
Additional Info:
Despite his young age, Tomas is already providing for his family as a hunter and man of the pavilion. He shoulders a lot of responsibility and acts older than he is. He is a proud little man, and quite serious. He often takes responsibility for his younger sister and cousin, and is more aware of his mother's feelings than perhaps she realises.

NPC Type: Travelling (with Haena)
Name: Julai
Relation to PC: Daughter
Race: Human, Drykas
DoB: Summer 73rd 506 AV
PoB: Endrykas
Skills: Rhetoric: 5, Cooking: 5, Riding (Horse): 10, Hunting: 10
Additional Info:
Julai is a weak child who wasn't expected to survive the Winter but did anyhow. As such, she has a devil-may-care attitude, and is often considered to be an air-head. She misses her father a great deal and still cries at night.

NPC Type: Stationary
Name: Lucia
Relation to PC: Niece
Race: Human, Drykas
DoB: Autumn 509 AV
PoB: Endrykas
Skills: Cooking: 10, Medicine: 20

Additional Info:
When Epaiza told her daughter that her father was dead, she refused to believe it. To this day, Lucia still believes her father might come home at any moment. She is a bitter young girl who acts a lot older than she is. But despite her naivety, she is helpful and caring and is tasked primarily with looking after her grandmother, Lauran.

Approved at the Help Desk

Dead Members
Sylvester (Haena's father-in-law, b. 446 d. 513)
A helpful, friendly man who was a doctor and a cheesemaker in his spare time. He was the Ankal until he started to lose his memory early, and passed the mantle to his son before he died.
Eikre (Haena's husband, b.481 d.516)
A happy-go-lucky healer with a love of racing. He was the Ankal after his father died, and was killed by glassbeaks in late Summer 516 AV. He was a much-loved family man.
Rolen (Haena's brother-in-law, b. 486 d. 516)
Rolen was a quiet man who had an unnaturally good voice. However, he only ever sang whilst making his father's cheeses. He was killed by glassbeaks in late Summer 516 AV.
Brandon (Haena's brother, b. 492 d. 516)
Ever an oddball, Brandon was a bit of a loose cannon. Much loved by Haena, Brandon was easily misunderstood by strangers, as he came off very angry. This was mostly due to him losing his wife and child in childbirth, and left him alone and a loner. He was killed by glassbeaks in late Summer 516 AV.

Thread List

Current season

Winter 516

• Placeholder: Job Thread One
• Placeholder: Job Thread Two
• 7th: Revelry and Revelations (Solo)
• 38th: Fish and Fowl (Solo)
• 41st: Lakeside Living (Khida's thread)
• 43rd: Remedy (Taurina)
• 49th: Dat Bone [QUEST]
• 77th: Trials of a Tempest (Open)

Archived

Summer 505

• 46th: Running, Fighting, Riding (Flashback, Baltair)

Fall 516

• 1st: Turning of the Tide (Merevaika)
• 9th: One For the Heart (Solo)
• Placeholder: Job thread 2
• 19th: Taking Heed (Solo)
• 20th: Little Seedling (Waisana)
• 30th: In Your Name (PM to join)
• 31st: Goodbye (Jasmine)
• 64th: What Desperation Leads To (Azmere)

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[Haena]

Gnosis Story

13th Summer, 507 AV
Speech
Others

Haena smiled.

That was a miracle in itself, she thought, as she glanced quickly at her Julai. The young girl was playing quietly in the grass, pulling at it as a beetle clambered slowly through the yellow-green grass. All around, sunlight cast beautiful shadows through the flickering clouds above. Up somewhere, birds sang with long, drawn-out streams of unending pleasure. A light breeze carressed the woman's hair, catching it and flicking it out. Endrykas buzzed in the early Summer, but Haena couldn't feel it.

A gentle touch on her shoulder came from her husband. The young woman started, twitching her head around only to relax again as Eikre's concerned face swam into view. With a dull pang of realisation, Haena realised her eyes were filled with tears. "Go on, girl. It's okay." His words were meant for her alone, and she took them, grabbed them, and held onto them as she stood and walked out towards the outskirts of the great roaming city.

It had been a year since she had given birth to Julai in severe pain, only just managing to survive to cry the night through and see her little girl alive too. The days had passed and she had recovered from the ordeal of childbirth, but despite the joy she should feel, she hadn't felt anything for a long while, only detachment and sadness and a desire to wander out into the grasslands and never return. Julai turned into an anchor of agony, representing everything that was wrong. Haena didn't know what was happening to her, hadn't known for so, so long. Her mind felt uneasy and out of balance, but she existed, and got by.

Now it was Summer, and Julai was no longer such a burden. She didn't know what had happened, but she felt like she was gradually clicking into place. Eikre had helped, always. The rest of her family had too, despite their confusion. If they were to know to give it a term, they would call it post-natal depression, but that word was unknown to them and so Haena simply called it 'the blackness'.

The blackness was a place she never wanted to return to. She stared out into the undulating grasses, and let out a shaky sigh, her hair whipping around her face. Her eyes were clear now. It was the grasses that calmed her, always. It was her balm, when the darkness threatened to return, and when days felt rough and fragmented with the pain of her thoughts. She always returned to the edges of the city, away from the people and the noises and the confusion, and gazed out into the endless sigh of Cyphrus.

35th Autumn, 509 AV

"Alta're! Here girl!" Haena clapped, bright and loud, and smiled at her beautiful Strider as she trotted lazily towards the young woman. Despite the dull day, Haena was enjoying herself. She was taking up a new craft, and the blunders and acts of discovery involved in it were invigorating. It had all started when she had undertaken a reorganisation of her meagre belongings. She had always had an old, tattered book of her mother's, ever since her marriage. Harriet's notebook was full of scribbles and sketches that had never seemed to be of much fascination to her, but Haena surprised herself when she began to take a proper interest in her mother's work. She had spent days pouring over everything within, and then started replicating some of her recipes. Haena had started down the path, and philtration was her guide and mentor.

She was out in the wilderness, all her instincts on high alert. Somewhere nearby, her husband was riding, keeping a watchful eye on his wandering wife, but despite his safety net the young Drykas woman knew better than to let her guard down. She was wading through waist-high grass, looking for a particular herb for a simple tummy medicine for her little boy. She smiled and patted Alta's flank as the horse whinnied and nudged her nose against Haena's hand, asking for a stroke.

The grass they walked through grew taller still, almost reaching to her shoulders, but Haena didn't climb onto Alta's back just yet. She knew, from her mother's notes, that the herb liked sheltered places, and she hoped that the height of the grass here was shelter enough. In one hand she held the notebook, and she got down on her knees to look through the twisted maze of sprouting grasses.

It was another world down there. Haena knelt in the dusty ground, surrounded by swaying grass as she gazed in wonderment at the minute world she suddenly found herself in. Insects chirped loudly but unseen from the lofty heights of the grass, towering above her head like she was in a mythical jungle. A family, a herd of ants even paraded in a line past her fingers, oblivious to the Drykas-shaped intrusion who gently withdrew her fingers to let them through. Deeper in the thicket, an abandoned bird's nest could be seen. Haena gazed through spell-bound brown eyes as an indistinguishable creature scurried from the nest, flickering and disappearing away. She crawled closer with an undisguised eagerness, weaving her way through the miniature world until her fingers were gently gracing the grass-woven nest. Inside lay an old, broken egg-shell, but beside it were the clear signs of habitation.

She hadn't found the herb she was looking for, but instead, as she straightened and climbed onto Alta's back, she grinned with utter and complete joy as she thought of the home inside the grasslands. There were many things that she took for granted. Eikre joined her and asked her if she was successful. She smiled at the man. She took him for granted, sometimes. Her moving home, Endrykas... that she took for granted too. Yet never again would she take the land they lived on for granted. Not when it held such treasures as those.

The Passing Of Time...

Life continued in much the same way. Haena never once underestimated Cyphrus again. Daily she prayed to Caiyha, the mother of the land, and to her children. Her faith grew stronger, and she grew stronger. The lingering curse of depression slowly faded as she gathered confidence. She gained a job as a philterist, and slowly learned the ways of the grasslands. Yet as she grew older, it became more and more clear of the balance that the lands required. A drought passed by and she saw an abundance of grazing animals. Then a spree of attacks by predators. The land lived and breathed, not only with the animals, but with the plants and water and insects all in harmony with each other. Haena's eyes were still closed to this world, but she was ever so slowly gaining an appreciation and understanding of it.

84th Spring, 515 AV

Haena stilled her ferociously beating heart as she hid as low as she could at the top of a rise that fringed the edge of the silent waterhole in the basin below. There had been a tremendous amount of rain in recent times, so much so that the ground in places was spongy and treacherous. This wasn't the exception at the waterhole. Every day for the past six or so days that Endrykas had been in the area, Haena had gone to the waterhole to observe what was there. It was a ritual, of sorts. There were a number of special places to her on the Run. The first were the long grasses near to Zeis Lake. Another was a stunted, dead tree, filled to the brim with all other kinds of life. And here, here was another special place to Haena.

Although the Run usually followed roughly the same pattern, this Run had taken her so much closer to the waterhole than in previous years, and so she was glad to spend as much time there as possible before moving on. Yet out of every time she had been, this was the most amazing, the most awe-inspiring and terrifying all in one.

With bated breath and hardly daring to move, Haena watched the scene play out in front of her. The heavy rains had made the ground around the waterhole spongy and marsh-like, and as the nearby animals came to drink from it, the ground grew even more churned up. Haena had arrived to see a young antelope struggling, back legs stuck in the marsh. She had been startled, yes, but also worried for the creature. But just as she had been about to go down and try to free it, she had been interrupted.

A cheetah, slinking low and still through the grass towards its prey, had arrived. Haena had ducked down low, and prayed to mother Caiyha as desperately as she could, but she was upwind of the great cat and as long as it stayed that way, the stench of the antelope's blood would surely mask her own scent.

She was watching life in motion. Yes there was death too, but Haena didn't see the antelope's death as something terrible. She herself had eaten antelope in the past. Could she hate the cheetah for taking a meal so graciously offered? No, she could not. Besides, it was graceful to watch the way the cheetah ate, the gradual fade from life of the antelope, the suction of the ground as the cheetah claimed its meal. Haena didn't see the gore, didn't see any horror in what she was watching. She was respectful.

The moment seemed to last a lifetime. Throughout, she kept as still as she could, her heart beating like a drum she was sure the cheetah would hear. But it didn't, and she let out a brief sigh of relief many chimes after the cheetah had left the scene. It wasn't safe though, the corpse of the antelope still lay, half-eaten. The predator would surely be back for the prey, and Haena didn't want to be there when it did. So it was with a still-beating heart and a feeling of such connection to the land that Haena softly called for Alta' and climbed onto her back.

***

The tents of Endrykas were visible as smudges in the distance, but Haena breathed in the crystalline air, deep into her lungs and exhaled with a whoosh as she dismounted Alta'. The Strider wandered off to graze almost immediately, so the young woman walked forward softly, treading lightly across the earth. Her feet were bare, and her hair spun loose around her shoulders. The clear light of Syna shone in her brown eyes, and she laughed with a simple happiness that she marvelled at. Today was a good day to be here, to be Drykas, to be alive.

The sky seemed to bow down to the earth and the grasses whispered with joy throughout. And in the intersection between horizon and land formed the shape of a woman. She was iridescent, yet as real as anything else. She seemed to be made of grass, with hair like the wings of birds. Haena stopped dead, every nerve tingling with everything she had in her. This was a presence she'd never felt before, something more than anything else. The woman didn't say anything, but then she didn't need to.

This was the mother of everything she stood in. This was the mother of the earth and the birds and the animals that trod there. Caiyha. Haena's simple laugh of happiness broke into a smile made of pure joy and amazement, and she tried and failed to say anything. Caiyha smiled then, a fierce yet happy thing. "Child, you'll protect this land. Be a guardian of this place, like others before and after you. Come here, Haena." She gestured, and Haena could do nothing but obey as she walked closer.

The goddess took her left arm and gazed at her skin, and the windmarks twisting below. Then thoughtfully, although Haena wouldn't be able to remember exactly what she did later, Caiyha placed her hand softly but firmly on Haena's upper arm. When she removed her hand, a beautiful image was left in it's place. It was a mark of Caiyha. Phylonura. Almost as soon as the goddess had appeared, the sun sparked on the horizon and the goddess looked back over her shoulder at the stunned and grateful woman. A soft wind blew then, carressing the grass. Caiyha laughed like the song of a skylark, and then...

It was like she had never been there. The early evening was bright, and happy but perfectly normal. Except for the young woman called Haena, throwing her hands into the air and laughing with all of her being as Alta' whinnied and nudged her face and the sun cast rays of pure gold onto the clouds.

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