season of passage. (kavala)

[Caelum]

write the note grab your bag and grab your coat tell the ones who need to know we are headed north one foot in and one foot back but it don’t pay to live like that so I cut the ties and I jumped the tracks never to return oh, take me in are you aware the shape I’m in my hands they shake, my head it spins oh, take me in when at first I learned to speak I used all my words to fight with him and her and you and me but it’s just a waste of time yeah, it’s such a waste of time what you were then I am today look at the things I do dumbed down and numbed by time and age your dreams to catch this world the cage the highway set the traveler’s stage all exits look the same the words that became hard to say I and love and you I and love and you I and love and you - the avett brothers – Timestamp: 3 Fall 511 AV The road rose up to meet him when the grasses chased him out. Leth glowered from on high, casting moonlit contempt to wipe all signs of his passage from the earth. Summer’s hot headed vitality ebbed beneath the thunder of the Windrunner’s hoof beats, beaten further down by Bala’s cooling promises with every twist of the path toward the Sanctuary. Though the cycle of the stars swore that it had been but a year since last Caelum had come by this way, it felt like a thousand. Black had long since climbed out from the feet of the trees, spindly birch scrabbling about the defensive flurry of sentinel pines. The foliage blurred into glossy leaves and spiky limbs the closer he came to the sea cliff and the Sanctuary. Green that was but beginning to drip from leaves in the light of day was stripped entirely by the night, leaving tar colored hand prints against the encroaching sky. It dappled him in star dust rather than shadow, speckling against the golden elflight lost in velvet eyes and catching on the gleam of metal from the dagger's hilt sticking out from a weathered boot. A tattered hood had been jerked out of his jacket's collar in a campaign against the chill air. He was a lean, lonely figure balanced with admirable comfort on the horse's back. The stallion glowed like pearl fog, skipping ever faster against the wind from the far off waves as if he, too, held memory of the Sanctuary's warm stalls. Memory was on their tail, nightmare shaped. He had fallen upon dawn a day ago, exhaustion bearing him to a hasty camp in a half-eaten copse amid the grasses. Midges had hummed frail wings in the air, released from their nest surrounding him, but within a wink he was asleep so it failed to matter. He was running, of course. He was always running. He had stopped but once since shattering the waters of Black Rock's shore all those years ago, sought something better, something more; but Lhex had stolen that from him too, leaving him with the road and the end and the way. "Faster!" Kas'bel Sunsinger had shouted in his dreams. The Drykas healer who had lived in the age of the Valterrian stood in a salt mist, black sand beneath his feet as he strode towards Caelum. Loose braids slipped of their heavy knots twitched down his spine as he rocked to a halt, toe to toe with his taller, broader shouldered future form. "Faster," he breathed. "Cyphrus doesn't want you. You don't belong, Caelum. You haven't since I left the Grasslands an eon before you fell. You must go faster. And remember. For fuck's sake, why can't you remember? It's the only reason you're here. You're wasting the world's time." The world's time, Caelum's former self had said, and those words clipped at him as Vega slowed withthe sight of the low slung buildings of the Sanctuary. They came out of the night fleet and stolid and Caelum found himself scouting the sprawl of the surrounding lands, from pastures to forest, with narrow eyes. The endless blood and triage of the past year, indeed of the years before those, had battered bad habits into his bones. It was late and there were few lights left un-doused, but Vega knew her stall though she had occupied it one night out of hundreds. Wearing the skin of Drykas, though he would have anyway, he dismounted in the courtyard to see to the corporeal beast that had born him here first.

[Kavala]

Kavala knew haunted. Not in the physical manifestation of ghosts, no, though those were familiar enough as is. She knew haunted in the actions of ones soul riding heavy on ones shoulders. In a way she was haunted as well, throwing herself into her work as she was prone to do. There were chores to do, fences to mend, patients to see too, and young horses to work. Haunted people threw themselves into activities. Sometimes they pretended there was nothing wrong. Sometimes they tried to work out their problems and the things that haunted them by exhausting themselves night and day just to get rest. Other times they did things to punish themselves for false wrongs or things that hinted blame towards themselves be it true or not.

Kavala was the type to suffer in silence and throw herself into her work. Luckily she had a whole property full of horses that she could try and escape her problems through.

The young were important to Kavala. She routinely handled all of her foals, yearlings, and unbroken two year olds and above. Once they were weaned from their mothers, all the horses at Sanctuary by necessity looked to her for guidance and she gave it to them. Each one daily got attention, sometimes more than they needed, sometimes less than they deserved. But each one got it, nonetheless.

Currently, while Caelum was riding as if every glassbeak in Cyphrus was hot on his tail, Kavala was working with her weanlings. They didn't have as intense of a lesson as the yearlings and two year olds did. But they got worked nonetheless. She had sectioned off the main arena into two big sections... the 'Have worked with' and the 'Have not worked with' and kept them seperated that way. Her process was simple. She woudl wander into the 'have not worked on' section, select a weanling, coax it to her, and halter it and lead it out to the round pen. There, it would get all sorts of attention and treats. Kavala began with grooming it, picking up its feet, tapping on them, gently lifting its tail, fiddling with its ears, and slipping her fingers into the animals mouth. No part of its body went untouched. Horses had to get used to having all sorts of equipment and people on them with straps touching everywhere and medical people being able to treat an animal's wounds no matter what part of the body it was on.

She hung leader loops around their necks, stroked them and found areas they didn't like her to touch them at and then proceeded to gently but firmly fondle them near the trouble spots moving her hands closer and closer until they relaxed and didn't seem to mind her touching wherever she wanted. It was tedious repetitive work, but she didn't mind it. It was work that gave her a chance to think about things... sometimes good things, sometimes things best pushed out of her thoughts.

Each problem area was different on each weanling, just like some hauntings on people were different. Some didn't like their feet picked up. Some hated their ears messed with. Some didn't like faces touched and some hated their bellies tickled. Kavala sought out all these trouble spots and gently worked them through it until she could move them past the fear or uncertainty or even feeling bothered by being handled in odd places. Once a weanling had basically had enough of her attention for the day, she turned it into the 'have worked with' section of the area watching slowly as one section emptied out and another filled up. When all the weanlings were in one section, the completed section, she turned them back out into the pasture, took a break to feed Tasival and eat something herself, then started on the yearlings.

Then she started on the yearlings.

The process repeated itself and lasted all evening... until she was tired, cranky and loosing her patience with the slightly older and wiser horses that sometimes fought her at every turn. Kavala was also loosing the light. She was on the verge of needing a break and calling the day to an end when a horse and rider thundered into the yard. Kavala recognized Vega in the way a horsewoman knows her horses even before she confirmed her rider.

Giving a firm pat to the yearling she was working with, she freed the young stallion from his headstall and shooed him from the round pen and into the area to join the others. She'd start with the remainder in the morning, moving backwards until she finished all of them and once more worked on the weanlings.

Kavala brushed off her hands, slowly made her way across the courtyard, and nodded to Caelum. "You ride in here as if a pack of glassbeaks are on your tail. Vega will need walking around the courtyard a while, healer, until she's cool enough for her stall and some feed. Do you want to do it or shall I have Aweston take a stroll with her? You were riding hard coming in... what's wrong?" She asked quietly, glancing over to note the safety of her sleeping son tucked up against the fence rail ouside the round pen in his carrier..

[Caelum]

Recognition was an unexpected blessing. Ever a stranger to this world, those who knew him well enough to identify him at any given hour were few and even farther between. It took him off guard with one hand flattened against the mist hue of the Windrunner’s coat. His shoulders were sagged, angled beneath the dark line of his jacket and eyes rising up from behind a thick veil of lashes. They were dark when Leth abbreviated him, much like the sleeves and legs of his clothing were long. They fit him only when Syna’s sun illuminated the earth and were otherwise ever a little too big. It made him feel not unlike a child in his father’s clothing, but with none of the happy and endearing connotations that invoked. If Kasb’el Sunsinger had ever known a father, he had no memory of him. There were those phantoms that pressed like light against the walls of his consciousness, leaving their gossamer handprints for him to try and riddle out like Lillis once did with fortune from the palms of strangers. Every now and then, in between and unprepared, they would catch him -- a stab through to clarity, old truths and new. A faceless man with Drykas braids in his hair had been, in the back room of a tavern once upon many years ago, the one to give him his name. Not Caelum, the dull reflection of what lingered so vivid and unspeakable in the celestial language in his mind; but Kas’bel. The story was woven into his windmarks, or so he had been told, the combination of them kept safe in verbal cages housing history and repeated in a pavilion or two through the centuries on occasion. It was a story he had made certain to not seek when amid the scattered tents of Endrykas, unwilling and wary to learn the future of his deep past. It seemed a sin somehow, and for what little he knew already of singing and a dead man’s revelations, he knew enough to be aware he had somehow failed. When he dared reach much beyond that, his mind threw up smoke and nightmares to baffle and confuse. What did not disorient and existed instead in unforgiving reality was the Lacun mark he had woken to discover on his chest. A frail feather and a heap of ashes it was then, to show that when whatever it was that had died – be it Lillis herself or merely her love – it had gone out burning. Staring now too long in silence at Kavala, tethering himself back to the earth again, a hand rose in a fingerless glove to rub up into the collar of his jacket, knocking back the hood to flatten against the stretch of skin where his Chevas mark used to be. The glove hid his Rak’kali’s kiss, though not from his fellow healer. He blinked. What’s wrong? “I don’t think anyone’s asked me that in a while,” he murmured slowly. The corners of his mouth twitched toward a smile but did not quite make it. “Hullo, Kavala. Mind if I stay the night? No, ah, no glassbeaks or anything on my tail. I wouldn’t ever intentionally lead danger to your door. There…” He trailed off and followed the drift of her regard. His focus came back upon the small, bundled figure of a baby. “Yours?” Dumb question, but he had been beaten down and dumb, maybe. He glanced swiftly back at her and his hand just fell down, away and empty, to try to bury itself in his pocket. “Congratulations. How are you? How have you been?” Vega whickered, calling back his attention. With a shift of lean hips, he turned toward the stallion to work long fingers into the knots holding his bags in place and begin working them loose. “I’ll do it. Don’t worry. That’s fine,” he remembered to answer her. There was no need to over stretch his welcome, certainly not by putting her employees to work doing things he was perfectly capable of himself. When he stooped down to drop his bags to the ground against the side of the stables, his shadow yawned too long in the moonlight. The past year had not done him any favors and he was still as lean and hungry looking as he had ever been. The real question was whether it was despite or because the nourishment Syna’s light provided him throughout the course of every day. A matter for philosophers, ultimately, not stable hands and physicians whether or not they wore horns and god haunted stares when the sun was up.

[Kavala]

Kavala followed his gaze, nodded and answered softly. "Yes, the child is mine. Caelum, some things never change. You look about to fall over. Just a moment." Kavala said, ignoring the Eth's wants in order of his needs. She went to the nearest empty box stall, threw it open, effectively and carefully piled it with hay, grain, and added a bucket of fresh water from the well across the way. She did this all while Caelum stripped Vega's Yvas off and unburdened the mare. A younger man appeared, Drykas by his attire, and Kavala moved back to Vega along with him and took the man's hand, and laid it on the mare's neck. "Aweston, this is Vega. Vega, Aweston's family breeds some of the finest Strider's in the Grasses. He'll take good care of you and walk you until its safe for you to have a bite. You probably need to get away from your rider right now as much as your rider needs to get off his feet. He's a good listener too if you have many complaints." Kavala said, gently separating Caelum from his mount and sending the young Drykas and his new charge off for their cooldown walk around the courtyard several dozen times.

"Come, get off your feet Caelum. You can watch them gossip about you from the Veranda where you decidedly need a meal." Kavala said, taking the route back to the structure that put her past Tasival so she could collect the sleeping child instead of leaving him alone out next to the arena.

"Now, rather than comment on my questions... how about you answer them?" Kavala said, all but pushing him down into a chair on the veranda. "And yes, you can stay here tonight and as long as you need too. You look like a tenday of sleep wouldn't go unappreciated." She said, setting the baby down at the end of a long table so she could slice some fresh hot bread for Caelum and fix him a bowl of stew from the bubbling pot on the hearth. She put some good quality wine in front of him as well as the simple meal and placed a spoon in his hand. "Eat." She said simply, studying his features and finding him lanky compared to when she'd seen him last.

"We can talk after your belly is full and even after you sleep if that's what you need. You look like you need even more than those two things, but first things first." Kavala said, glancing at Tasi then turning to follow the progress that Aweston was making with the winded mare around the courtyard. "He'll romance her and give her carrots, but in the end... she'll still be yours." Kavala said, a smile on her face as she indicated the young Drykas with Caelum's mare.

[Caelum]

A misplaced concern grew buoyant in him as Kavala drew him away and her doubtless capable employee led Vega off. It was strange because he had no reason to worry for his Windrunner at the Sanctuary and, having never been offered anything but welcome and kindness from the Konti who owned and ran it, no reason to doubt her judgment of her own employee’s ability. Boiled down to the bones, his unease sprung from the fact that the fog colored horse had been the only constant creature in his life since fleeing Ravok as if devils were at his heels. They had been, of course, but that was a different matter entirely. He shook the concern off literally and stopped briefly to hoist his saddlebags over a shoulder. Tasival was given a quiet study when they paused to collect him and as Caelum fell into step with Kavala’s shadow he offered the child a smile he did not know was mostly broken. “He’s perfect,” he told his hostess, bare truth evident in every genuine murmur. His words were still strange-shaped, constantly trying to fit within the inordinate space an accent that did not work with physical mouths gave them. His voice was yet musical and dark. He wondered after her present status within Riverfall’s societal structure, if it had changed since he had seen her last what with the birth of that beautiful boy and growing sprawl of the Sanctuary itself. His bags were dropped against the veranda railing before he found himself gently nudged into a seat, quite capably handled by Kavala into where and how she wanted him. It was bemusing and that emotion settled more lightly than his others in his eyes as he considered the hearty food placed before him. “You’re kind, Kavala,” he said at length and peeled off his gloves to tuck them into a pocket. Elbows settled to the table despite his best efforts to be polite and his shoulders hunched up beneath the weight of something far greater than he. “And generous,” he added while reaching for the spoon. “I, uh…” The spoon was used to draw a vague gesture in the air as he hunted up the appropriate words. “I can’t pay you for my stay, but I can help out with chores. I’m sorry. Wrong?” His mouth skewed to the side. He had never been a talker, nor had he ever been good at it. There was a loneliness in him that roamed. His attitude had only corroded with every drifting step. Stew was spooned up for a large bite and he took his time chewing, swallowing and then thinking to nod his appreciation for it. It was good. He watched Tasi across the table for a minute before, finally, responding. “I don’t know. Lots of things. But, ultimately, I don’t know. Pretty crap, isn’t it? I wish I had a ten-day to stay, but I’ve to go… She’s calling me. Mercy,” he blew out a breath and, not unaware that he sounded mad, looked up at her with an apologetic grimace. “It’s been a rough day. Forgive me. There was bad news. The gods only ever seem to have bad news, don’t They? None of Them ever show up just to hang out, say hullo…” He trailed off again, raising his eyebrows at himself. Clearing his throat, he dropped his eyes to his food and took a few more heaping bites. Maybe by the time he was done he would be capable of acting like a normal person.

[Kavala]

The konti listened, moving through her fussy chores, settling a piece of napkin with a sugar cube tied in the corner for Tasi if he were to wake and need something to chew on. She also collected a pouch of various herbs, a large drawstring with smaller drawstring bags inside it. To Caelum's comments about her son, she only offered him a smile and nodded. "Thank you." It was an abrupt response, but then Kavala had complex emotions where Tasifal was concerned.

She made herself a bowl of stew as well and sat wine and bread down next to a second place beside Caelum's own. Then Kavala sat down beside him, turning her chair so she more faced him than sat beside him. She pulled out bunches of herbs from the bag she still clutched in her hand and sprinkled them over his wine openly drugging him - the human him - so that eventually he could rest deeply before the Eth took charge again with the sun's light.

"There might be bad news, Caelum, but there are only good days. You live. Vega is strong and healthy. You have a purpose or else she would not call. But you will be useless if you answer such things exhausted. Even the Gods understand this. Go more gently into the world.. at least for a few days. Whatever's haunting you will still be there even after you rest. And by the looks of it, you sorely need it." Kavala said softly, concern filling her azure gaze. "And as for your coin or labor, neither are required. Your company is a rare treat for us. Just accept it and relax." Kavala said, smiling gently. The Konti paused then, to begin eating her own meal, hungry in her own right after working the young horses.

[Caelum]

The herbs floated to the surface of his wine to swirl soft and slow beneath the rocking-cradle hand of the breeze. Torchlight reflected there as well, playing over the table with the fresh scents of salt and settling earth. His spoon had paused, a drip of thick gravy dropping back into the bowl as he studied her act -- no, he considered, her gesture. "What herbs are those?" He inquired with a mouthful of gruff, clearing his throat afterwards and ducking his head. Care could hurt sometimes, but with the worst of wounds one had to hurt before they could heal. "The dreams have been bad," he explained or, rather, attempted to after swallowing another mouthful of stew. "I don't want to be taking anything that'll just mangle them worse, but.. Alright. If they won't, I could use a serious sleep." This time, when he looked up again, he offered her out a smile faint as the sickle moon; but it was a smile and a better one than all those that had come before. "I, uh," he leaned back, bowl all but polished, and tilted his chair toward her with the stretch of weathered riding boots. "Chevas sign.. Her mark? It's gone." He was a healer. Rak'keli had known him long and well and he had fought and bled and gone many of his sleepless nights due to trialing for Her philosophies. He knew when a man needed to say a thing, even when that man was him.

[Kavala]

Kavala nodded and gently handed over the bag of herbs. "It's my own mix, but I keep them separate so I can control the dosage of each depending on the situation." Very carefully she began to indicate each herb in its little bag held together in the kit of the larger drawstring. "The first is valarian, its a strong sedative without hallucinogenic side effects. You won't dream with it." Kavala added. "Then there's dried and ground Impatiens. They help calm the mind for those who act and think quickly. It reins them in and slows down whirling circular thought." The healer pointed out. "It's also good for lowering stress and increases patience. I've seen people become more calculating on it without the frantic fight or flight instinct. I use it a lot on horses in training." The Konti added.

"The next is the Star of Wysar which is good for trauma and shock, whether experienced recently or in the past. It helps you deal with such things a little easier. I like to describe it as a distancing drug. It numbs the emotions slightly so you can examine something really scientifically without the pain associated with it. To me its a teaching drug." Kavala said, then pointed out another bag of herbs that smelled like prunes. "Cherry Plum helps for those who fear losing control of their thoughts and actions and doing things they know are bad for them or which they consider wrong. It curbs reckless instinctual behavior." Kavala added, smiling, slightly embarrassed she thought he needed a pinch or two. "There's also Rock Rose for situations in which one experiences panic or terror... again it mutes this so you can think. And the other one is Clematis because it basically grounds and makes you care about everyday life. I use it on people who are unhappy and withdrawn, such as children that have suffered trauma and don't want to face the truth like dead parents and things like that. It gives them the chance to escape that world where 'mom and dad will be home any minute' and they can often let the fact that their folks aren't coming home - usually due to them actually witnessing them dying - and suddenly they can face it. It's a little courage in a bottle, but don't use too much because its addicting heavily." Kavala said, smiling sheepishly.

"I'm sure you know the last one... Lavender. Use it sparingly though. I throw it in for the aroma, but too much will have you up all night because it will act like a stimulant." The healer said.

"Drink up. Drink it all." Kavala urged, retrieving the bag of herbs when Caelum was done with his investigation.

She gave him a few minutes, of looking uneasy, of shifting, of letting whatever was boiling up within him bubble forth. When it did, she blinked in surprise then understood his distress. Kavala didn't say anything for a long time then nodded. Her expression, surprisingly enough, was extremely uncomfortable. Her own hand reached up and stroked her neck where a Chavi mark would have been, then dropped to her right breast where a Lucan mark was now resting. "You have a lucan now I take it instead of a Chavas Mark?" Kavala asked, knowing the chavas marks didn't just disappear but rather transformed. One given, one wore them for life.

"It doesn't mean anything, Caelum... not really. It doesn't mean she's dead at all. It means the vow is broken, that's it, that's all. I had one of Tasivals' father - we promised our hearts to each other - then he disappeared and Tasival was born and my contract was given to another Akalak. The first moment I spent servicing his needs...." She trailed off then, the subject awkward, and perhaps best not talked about openly. "Anyhow, I had no choice. If you do not agree to the terms they lock you in a tower and make sure you agree. At least this way I have a bit of freedom. But the first time I was with him, my mark disappeared and reappeared as a Lucan. There's no way Hatot is wearing his either now. Neither of us is dead. It just happened that way. He left me here to the Oathmaster's whim and I was given away. It's as easy as that. She can still be alive, Caelum. Just because the mark is gone doesn't mean the worse." Kavala said softly, hoping he'd understand.

But if his wife was dead... she wondered if he wouldn't know it in his heart. But it was something she couldn't mention, couldn't plant into his head. The heart in pain lied... often a lot.

[Caelum]

The non hallucinogenic valarian was an herbal drug with which Caelum was overly familiar. The bag offered to him by Kavala was cradled in to he cusp of his palm, head bowing in a spill of reams and knots of bark colored braid work as he stirred it with a breath. A few flakes floated up, light as ashes, before drifting down once more. "I'd not cross paths with the Star of Wyser before," he admitted in that crumbling accent that caused him to feel constantly as though he were chewing on stardust. "Sort of anti-anxiety, then? After a fashion..." Clematis was mulled over as well, Kavala's quick and dirty education on herbal remedies filed away by a brain that tended to do better with such things while wearing its Drykas skin. There were other things, frightening and compelling in turns, that his brain did better with while in Syna's sun blessed form. Carefully setting the bag of herbs aside, he slid calloused fingers around the base of his wine glass and drew it slowly up. An elbow collapsed to the table and he drank, drank deep. He kept drinking, too, when his hostess began to speak of her situation, the condition of the Lacun mark upon her and the circumstances that had brought it into being. Concern crept into his regard, dimming out the sun spots to make velvet of the dark. His eyebrows began to nettle and it was easier, was it not? To divert your energies of worry and hurt to another, to a woman who was as close to being a friend of his as any had come. A patient? The world was the patient of Rak'keli marked, even one with a busted heart and a soul that kept threatening to follow. The herbs mixed with the wine in his stomach having burned a mellow path down the back of his throat, leaving him trying to clear it but with a softened, almost comfortable sensation. "I had wondered after your situation, Kavala," he spoke slow, trying to rub out a frown with his hand and failing. She shone in Leth's shawl of shade, pallid and glimmering so that he thought of porcelain. It was a soothing sight, but one that ached somewhere as well. The company of any Konti had that dual effect on him, eclipsing recollections of the relative peace he had won with Lillis with the torment having lost her twice over now birthed. "It isn't.. Ideal," and he was delicate with his word choice, the last thing he wished to do being offend. Of course, this continued to aid him in not talking about himself.

[Kavala]

Kavala nodded, agreeing with Caelum run-down on the drugs and approving him drinking them down. "I'll give you enough to take on the road to help for a few days, maybe through some of the worst ones. You're going to be here a day or two anyhow. Vega needs to rest. You ride her any harder and she's going to break her wind and be useless for you. That's the problem with good horses, they are so loyal they don't know when to let common sense intervene on their behalf and put the breaks on even when we don't think they need any." Kavala said, smiling softly, and spooning more stew into her mouth. It was obvious she was hungry, moreso than usual.

"Enough about me though, Caelum. My situation is what it is. What do you think has happened to cause your mark to disappear? What does your instinct tell you? Ignore your fears, they will always lead you astray.. but tell me what you really think is happening?" She asked, uncertain as to the story and how he got separated from his wife. "Sometimes it helps to talk about it. I know very little of your story, just that you've been looking for her... for a long time. You told me that when we last met. Has anything changed or has there been any news?"

She asked, curious. Kavala didn't want to cause Caleum pain, but she could sense deep down that he really really really needed to talk about it. If he didn't tell someone, anyone, and let some of his fear out, it would be like a festering wound and the stress of it would make him sick. Quietly, in no uncertain terms, she told him this. He knew it already, of course. Any good healer did. But sometimes people were too close to the situation and had no idea what they were doing to their own health. "If you don't talk about it, then it will just eat at you inside. By holding it close and not putting it out into the world, you give it power. And that power turns it into a festering wound that needs to be lanced sooner or later or you risk dying of it." The konti healer said gently, taking a bite of her bread and continuing to eat heartily. Her eyes were concerned, but she was no sage, one that could council him on the right thing to do. All she was truthfully, was nothing mystical or magical, compared to the near immortal Eth that sat beside her.