Closed [The Wildlands] Running Blind (Abashai)

[Nya Winters]

Early Winter 512 AV

Nya was holding it together, but just barely. She wanted to shed her human skin and run, but she was stuck as she was and burdened unexpectedly by a rash judgement choice that had left her vulnerable in a way she never thought she'd be. A warm bundle sat nestled in her arms. Trailing her were a trio of goats that she no longer needed to lead. It seemed they followed instinctively now after having been dragged through the wilderness with halters for three days. They were a mother heavy with milk and two half grown kids that were almost weened off their mother. Nya had purchased them in Ravok with stolen coin and brought them into the wilderness in hopes the mother goats milk would keep the baby in her arms alive.

But goats were slow. Painfully slow. She had tried tussing them up and carrying them as her forest cat form, leaping through the woods and eating ground like it was nothing. The baby hadn't minded the smooth rocking gait and the furry padded side he swung against, but the goats had been spooked for days afterward and hadn't stopped bawling even tied up in large gunny sacks.

So she wasn't making any time, not really, not at the pace the goats set. And though that normally wouldn't have been a problem, she suspected she was being followed. If not by the Ebonstryfe, then by him. She did have, after all, something that belonged to him. Though in her mind, not any longer. The child was hers. It should have been hers to begin with. There was so much in her mind that was confused, fuzzy, and understandably lost. But something about the baby had hit home. Somehow she knew, just knew, that whatever the woman had planned for the child would not be fulfilled. Nya had other thoughts in mind, other plans, and they did not involve Ravok or the lessons she'd learned there. The woman was dead. She was a product of her own weakness. And her guard, her very attentive guard, was no longer a factor.

There were days as she traveled that she remembered everything. She knew who she was and that she had a higher calling being here. Sometimes the winds encouraged her, kept her company and urged her southwards. They warned her about storms coming and about where shelter was. They whispered her name when she forgot it, which was often. And when the babys fussing kept her awake at night, then breezes that sometimes flocked around her soothed the child so Nya could sleep.

But she didn't like sleeping. Sleep held dreams that were full of pain and fear and things she didn't want to remember. And even when she dreamed of times when she was stronger, faster, better... it all broke down in the end to the nightmare of bars and guards and pain. The child helped. Keeping him alive gave her something to do and someone to think about above and beyond herself. She even hoped to bond to him, probing him with her empty link, looking for some kind of acceptance from him. But he held none of that for her. He had strange blue-green eyes that called to her and made her fiercely protective. And even when she was half starved and the goats were looking delicious, she did nothing about it and kept up her herding, milking the mother daily to get food for the child.

She hated that she didn't know his name. Nya tried many on for size, switching back and forth from things in nature and to variants of people she'd already met. The Kelvic knew nothing about naming babies or even how humans named their children. She knew so many names, but many had no faces attached to them. Some names brought warmth and affection. Others brought anger. She picked one, almost at random, that she felt warmth and love for, and started eventually calling the boy that. Ulvik. He wasn't much of a human yet, but she had high hopes for him. He cried a great deal, which confused her, but she slowly learned when he did that he was hungry or his teeth hurt or his stomach ached. Often she could sooth him by switching forms and purring. Sometimes he needed fed, sometimes just the feces cleaned out from between his legs. Infants were not nearly as neat as baby animals. They soiled themselves, spit up, and when they drank milk too fast they got air bubbles that caused them to burp up or to even throw up.

It was a lot to deal with.

But in many ways watching out for him and the three goats made her life easier. It gave her something to do, someone to fuss over, and filled an ache she had that left a huge void in her heart. Her bondmate was gone. Missing. And with him was half her soul. The child filled a lot of the void, kept her going, but she did realize it wasn't the same. So between him, her freedom, and walking the wilds she felt better.

She began hunting again. Nya made things for the child with the skins and bones of the kills she made. Animal teeth became a rattle. Stretched skin that Nya boiled with the animals brains became leather for him to chew on. She made an awl with a sharpened rib bone of a rabbit and took the cuts from a cat, dried them, and sewed him clothes when his began to get worn. It was nothing neat, nothing that wasn't only functional. But it worked. She felt the seasons keenly, and her gauntness and paleness left her. Snow fell in the higher elevations indicating winter was coming and she kept to caves. Her body even regulated itself out enough on the twentieth day that she felt her aggression rise and she roared to the sky as her natural cycles reintroduced themselves. She killed an overabundance of deer and drank their blood and gorged her body cooled again, finding no mates in the area her equal. Taldera was far away, and she was on the move southwards.

Instinctively she was going to Syliras, even though she really didn't understand the pull. Thirty days into her journey she lost one of the kids to a predator - a wolf - that drew too close while she was sleeping. Nya was extra careful after that, moving forward only when it was safe.

She doubled back a lot, not leaving a singular trail blazed south. Sometimes she skirted drainages, and other times she cut across them. Ulvik learned to take baths in creeks and had a mobile made of captured impaled butterflies that Nya sometimes hung in a tree beneath when they slept. She was an awkward mother, but diligent. She even tried to nurse him herself, but for some reason her breasts gave no milk. The goat remained important. And while she tried to give Ulvik bits and pieces of meat, he always threw them up and refused them, even when teeth started appearing in his mouth.

She tried seed and grass as well, wondering if he was secretly a kelvic and not a boy at all. But those made him sick as well. She found that late fall berries were something he would eat, mashed up. Sometimes she'd chew them herself an pass them to him via kisses. The boy would laugh and delight. Nya thought him much like a bird, having gotten the idea watching hawks feed their youngsters.

Nya tried meat the same way, later, after she chewed it up thoroughly and Ulvik didn't spit that out and didn't seem to get as sick with it. So along with the milk she started adding other things to his diet, doing the best she could with the baby, wishing she had humans she could ask. But there was no one. Just the two remaining goats, herself, and a trail that would take not much at all to follow.

[Abashai]

He believed he had been close before. Abashai knew, for on occasion, he felt the strange sensation experienced at the Nitrozian mansion. Faint and obscure, it took several instances before the Benshiran discerned it was connected to the Kelvic woman. Those events were rare, but provided hope that he would catch up to the cat, and his son. Now, the feeling was as strong as ever, confirmed by the periodic roar that shred the Autumn air. Abashai recongnized that feline shout, though he had never remembered hearing it, and its sound caused his gut to flinch. He was close.

Abashai knew his son was alive. Several times through the season, he had found large leaves smeared with infant feces, evidence of milk and vomit nearby. Servants at the Salvatrice house testified that she had taken the child alive, killing several servants and a guard in the process. Night, and her ability to change forms, prevented him from finding the Kelvic before she left the city. The Benshiran had spent little time in planning, breaking into the family store rooms to take arms and supplies, some of it he believed to be his own. A bloodbane was taken from the stables and Abashai found the quickest boat to the mainland. With the death of Kialandra, the servant considered himself released from his servitude, and he left Ravok behind.

Tracking Nya Winters was easier than the Benshiran had expected. She had sheep or goats with her, from the scat and hoof prints he discovered. This also explained how she kept the baby fed. This also meant that the Ebonstryfe could find her. Occupied with the raid on Syliras, the order's resources were thin and only a few soldiers were tasked with finding the murderer. Abashai, feigning the devout servant, gave patrols misleading information regarding his efforts to find Nya, leading them from her trail. He had to find her before they did. He would deal with the treacherous woman himself.

Two tenday earlier, the bloodbane was slain by a viper bite, slowing the hunter's progress but allowing him to more closely follow the cat's serpentine trail. As the days passed, Abashai tried to reconcile his fractured memory and curious perceptions. They knew each other, he and the cat, that much was certain. He assumed it was an adversarial relationship, given the Kevlic's hostile attitude. His impressions was that it had been otherwise, to a certain time. All indications pointed to an act of betrayal, for Abashai sensed a distinct feeling of guilt and regret when he thought on the cat woman. Other, more vague recollections, hinted only in his moments of near sleep, revealed memories of great pain and pleasure tied to the brindle-haired girl.

The cry of a baby spun the Benshiran around, detecting its direction. An iron-tipped arrow was laid to the string of a shortbow as Abashai stalked in the direction of the sound. Fingers pulled back the string, the missile ready to strike the dire cat kidnapper. A small amount of concentration touched on that sensation, the one that made his senses sharper. He crept to the edge of the copse of trees he traveled, the land sloping down into a meadow. Beneath a lone tree, a woman tried to placate a whining infant as two goats grazed nearby.

He could not get a clear shot at the Kelvic, and the bow lowered. Abashai knew he would not have killed her had he been able to. Seeing her again brought back the flood of confusion, the cacophony of memory flashes, smells, sounds, emotions that made no sense. He scowled at the mystery of it all.

"Don't move Nya Winters." The Benshiran yelled. The arrow was still nocked, giving Abashai the leverage to threaten the woman. She was not harming the child, and the father did not demand that she relinquish him. "Is the baby well?" He inquired further as he drew closer. "We need to talk Winters, there is something between us, something that made you do this, something that explains why we know what we know, and feel what we feel." Abashai hoped the feral woman would concede to the truth and negotiate.

[Nya Winters]

The forest cat lifted her head and snarled. It looked all but ridiculous on a human face, but she was trapped with a child in her arms. His gums hurt again, where sharp points of enamel were erupting through, making him soar. She narrowed her eyes and came to her feet in one swift movement still holding the babe close. She was strong, even with her limbs gaunt. And she half turned, so most of the baby was concealed behind her body. Thus twisted protectively around the child she hissed at him over her shoulder and shook her head.

"No talking. He's not quiet. Talking will upset him more. He needs to sleep so we can move tomorrow. Here is too open. I could not find a cave." She said, looking irritated and disavowed. The kelvic shifted her body more, taking smooth awkward steps in a southern direction, placing her body away from the cover of the tree but closer to the goats. She was trying to protect all three without looking obvious.

Her moss green gazed bridged the distance between where the warrior stood and where she had set up camp. It was a pathetic camp at that. The fire was smoldering on the verge of dying, giving off no heat or light. There were no packs of food, no shelter of any kind, and it was totally exposed to the elements. Nya had never been good thinking like a human. When they'd traveled before, Abashai had done all the setup while she'd hunted or gathered what they needed to sustain themselves. And while the thin angles of her face that framed her gaze were clearly outlined in the fading light, he could tell she'd gotten thinner in the short time he'd chased her. But there was still a quiet rage in her gaze, a willingness to sacrifice so that the creatures weaker than her could survive.

Abashai looked strong. He also looked distant. Nya might have wanted to forget, but her mind was fully capable of remembering things. She remembered the quest. She remembered Shai, not totally, but enough to know something beautiful was lost. And as her eyes roamed his form, he looked so painfully familiar, so comforting. It was something she couldn't describe. Abashai had a way of standing, his shoulders back, the small of his back curved to flare over his hips and up across his shoulders. She wanted to curl up there when he slept and she knew it was her place and how warm he'd be. She studied the way the leather of his pants encased his thighs and how his boots rode up protecting his calves. He looked good in black leather. He looked proud. His weapons were not right. The musical instrument that should have been on his back was missing.

Her eyes continued to circle him, taking in information.

And she could tell from his face that he couldn't remember. Better that, she thought, than for him to know all of it. She didn't know who he was anymore. She didn't know what had changed. They had done things to her and worse to him. He hadn't had the cat to protect him. And she couldn't have been there, not like a good bondmate would have. Even now that which was inside her, the talderian feline, uncoiled from her robust rest and stretched out her front paws, reaching for something. Her back arched within Nya's skin and back paws stretched. Giant padded paws unsheathed razor sharp claws in her mind and threaded the ground casually in front of her. It was a calm threat display, all waged in her mind, but nonetheless it was there. The cat meant business. All business.

And in the end, Nya thought he'd broken. Or she had and he'd rejected her. Nya didn't blame Shai. She couldn't. There was too much between them and too much love in the past. But she didn't know him now. For all she knew he could be here to collect her child and leave. But she wasn't going to let that happen.

When Ulvik settled a bit more, Nya lifted her voice. "I am not well. You should stay back. She is inside me... she wants to eat you because she doesn't know you now, even as your scent comforts us. She's afraid you are different. She is protecting me and Ulvik. If you come closer, she will hurt you. I might not be able to control her. She has a lot of anger inside her." Nya said softly, knowing the cat and the human that Abashai had carefully worked towards blending in their time together was somewhat fractured. But it was true. Shai's scent was bathing them. He stood upwind from them and it was calming her by leaps and bounds. That was making the cat irritated. She didn't want to be calmed. She wanted to kill. The body she contained was starving again, bound by the baby and the goats and not as free to hunt. Human meat would do just as good as deer or mouse or even a rabbit or three.

Nya's stomach rumbled even as her mind settled.

[Abashai]

Though the Kelvic's snarl betrayed the threatening cat inside her, Abashai could see Nya's concern was for the child, and, for the moment, she would take no action against him. The bow lowered and the arrow was returned to its quiver. Crystalline blue-green eyes tried to catch a glimpse of the squirming boy, only catching a wisp of dark hair as the woman shielded the infant from his father. Abashai's gaze lifted again, catching the mossy green glance of the mysterious woman.

What was so mysterious was not that he did not know Nya Winters, it was that he did not know why he knew her, for sure. Even now, the lively color of her irises elicited visceral feelings. She was important to him once, her penetrating gaze opening past glimpses of deep affection and profound hurt. Everything about her physically was familiar. Scars marked her thinning body, and even as her threadbare garments shifted with the wallowing baby, he knew what marks would be revealed in the moving gaps of her clothing. The pads of his fingers rubbed together unconsciously as he experienced the feel of Nya's scarred skin from memory. He had know her body, intimately.

Abashai could smell the infant, the matted fur of the goats, the musk of the she-cat woman. He was smelling them through her. There was still a connection, he understood that. Why, he could not decide. She was not bonded, for the Benshiran had sensed the potential for bonding in Ravok. Perhaps, once they had been bonded. Lovers? Had he scorned her? The Benshiran's mind whirled behind the current encounter, searching for the missing pieces.

Nya warned him of the cat, as if they were two different people. Abashai looked at the woman with a furrowed brow. That was not right. No, that was not how it was supposed to be, his gut told him.

"I will not leave. Not without the child." At the beginning, Abashai would have stopped there, content to leave Nya Winters, or kill her if necessary. But not now. "...Or until I find out who you are."

He needed to know. Abashai was a lost man of sorts. Kialandra was his purpose, life had begun when she brought him from the prison to her bed. But the cat had killed her, and freed him. Now, having nothing, Abashai sought to find out who he was before, before Kialandra had fashioned him for her use. Nya was a key to his past, a critical key he believed, if not a willing one.

"I will not harm any of you, including the cat, I won't take the baby from you." Not at the moment, at least. "But let me help you. Neither of us can return to Ravok. I don't know your intent, other than moving south. You can't hunt to feed yourself and tend to my son. I know if I leave with him, the cat will find me much more swiftly than I found you. Let me stay."

His proposal was an offering of a status quo, an arrangement that kept him with his son, ensured the survival of them all, and satisfied the obsession Nya had with keeping the baby.

[Nya Winters]

Nya lifted her head, scenting the air again, drinking in her ex-bondmate's smell. The cat inside her roared with rage for she could feel his thoughts just as easily as he thought them. Yes, he meant he would not take the child, not now, at least. He wasn't lying. He wouldn't hurt her or the boy.

She curled more thoroughly around the child. Violence had touched her life repeatedly, and she'd done great wrongs in the past due to arrogance and the need to push harder and touch godhood. But now there was something more than her to watch out for. Shai could take care of himself, but he was equally vulnerable if he took the child. Nya, and more importantly the forest cat within, could go longer without than the man standing at the edge of the clearing could.

And so as she curled tighter around the boy, she bared her teeth at him and snarled, letting some of the cat's pent up frustration out through the human woman's lips. "I took her head... your mate's head. I took it from her body and ceased her evil in the world. But mate was the wrong word, Abashai. You were a kept man. You were her toy. You wear her lies like beasts wear chains. But no more. She is dead. You should take your freedom and thank me. My payment is the child. And he is fairly earned." Nya said, issuing a soft purr for the infant in her arms. He reached out a fist, grabbed a lock of her brindled hair, and tugged it roughly. The cat and the woman didn't even remotely flinch. Instead she nuzzled the baby, stroked it with her tongue in a display that looked wholly wrong from a woman wearing her human shape, and the baby laughed a moment before it fussed again.

"He's hungry. I should be able to feed him from my breasts like I have seen other women, but they will not cooperate. He is mine. My body won't recognize him as such though. I need to milk the goat." She said softly, her head swiveling around and glaring at Abashai like it was all his fault.

Had she of given birth to the boy, it was doubtful the Kelvic would have been able to nurse him. She was thin from her trip on the woods, and thinner still from her recovery after the prison. He could see her shoulder blades where the clothing she wore - Kialandra's clothing - slipped off her shoulders slightly. The kelvic did not have the curves the Black Sun had. Nor did her clothing fit Nya, for her breasts were not full, not feeding a child, like Abashai's former mistress had been. But it was ironic. She'd killed the child's mother and was now wearing the child's mother's clothing.

Nya rose, moving awkwardly towards the goat, grabbing a bag as she did so.

She settled by the goat, keeping one eye on Abashai, and called the creature too her to attempt to begin trying to milk it with the child balanced in her lap, and one eye on Shai's whereabouts.

"I don't want you to stay. You should not want to stay either. It is crazy that you should even suggest it. The cat inside me hates you. I hate you. You wear that mark because of me, the one by the dark God. You have done dark things, Abashai. Loosing this child is not at all what you should have lost. I do not know why you are even still alive." She said, managing to get a small amount of milk into a cup she pulled from the goats udder. She then tipped the cup into the baby's mouth awkwardly, and the infant choked. He spit most of the milk out and Nya cursed softly. An angry wind picked up and whistled around the camp. Nya hushed it with a single spoken word, and concentrated on trying again.

It was clear to Abashai the child was going to starve and in rapid order if the Kelvic didn't begin to either feed the child properly or somehow start nursing. She was trying, that much was obvious, but the baby wasn't as vigorous as he had been in Kialandra's care. The Kelvic was trying, very hard in fact, but she was awkward and untrained, an animal in human skin.

Soon she had another bit of milk in the cup, but in shifting to try to take it to the baby and with the goat's fussing, Nya spilled it. She cursed again, and hurled the cup away from her, bowing her head over the infant and whispering an apology to him. She released the goat which balked away instantly from her ire even as tears filled Nya's eyes. The kelvic knew... she just knew... the baby would die. She brought her hand up and rubbed her breasts, frustrated and angry.

"Can you make them work?" She asked suddenly, bitterly, as she tore her attention from the baby and the goat and trained her eyes back on Abashai. There was a dangerous look in her eyes, a desperate one, and a hunger there too. He could feel the kelvics frustration, her starvation, and her desperation. And he also knew he looked and smelled delicious to her. He could smell how good he smelled to her through her. And he knew suddenly that she'd tasted him before, many times, though not to feed but in passion.

[Abashai]

Abashai drew no closer to Nya. The tenuous nature of her temperament, or rather the cat's, felt almost palpable. He could see there would be no taking the child from her, for even as he looked on she shielded the infant even closer, doting on him. Where one may have cringed as the Kelvic licked the child, it seemed almost natural to the Benshiran. That is, to see Nya do it. It was almost familiar. The more Nya spoke, the more her alto voice resonated in his ears with its peculiar lilt, the more she moved, snarled, smelled...thought...he heard mistrust...

Then he remembered a girl with feral brindled hair crouching by a stream in the Bronze Woods.

More pieces fell into place. The emotions did not readily follow, but the facts congealed, images flashed in his mind's eye. They had been bondmates. It was why he felt the tug in her presence. And she had been the one he betrayed. It was why the cat hated him. Details remained elusive, and only the echo of a once devastating sorrow sounded in his soul. She had been in Ravok all along. Recollection began to explain the Kelvic's actions.

It was obvious Nya cared for the well being of the child, and to hear her bemoan her own milkless breasts, to see her pathetic attempt to guard the child and milk the goat pierced the hardened heart of the Chaon. She was a murder, a kidnapper and her own words confessed hatred towards him. He could take an arrow now and kill Nya before she could put down the baby and shift. Had she been anyone else he would have, Abashai had killed for Kialandra many times in the past season, and he found honor in leading others to Dira. But Abashai knew he would not. He could not even find the will to hate Nya. She was the key he needed to discover who he had been.

"I cannot change what I have done, no more than you can. You can hate me, I deserve it. I was evil serving evil. But I was not always like this Nya, you know it. I would not have these if I were." He raised his hands, palms toward the girl so she could see the shiber characters of Yahal's mark on his hands. "We still have one thing in common. We both want the boy to live. You cannot do it alone. Let me help."


The man wracked his brain, searching for a tidbit, a nugget of anything that would garner Nya's acquiescence. In the mean time he motioned towards the cup. "Let me get the milk." With slow steps, Abashai crept towards the cup Nya had flung from her. Scooping it up, the benshiran coaxed the she-goat towards him, and further away from the Kelvic. His eyes constantly darting towards Nya, Abashai kneeled by the animal, grasping its teat with familiarity and began the curl of movement that coaxed milk from the utter. It came natural to Abashai, as it should for a boy that started his life amongst the flocks of the Eyktolian nomads.

"I may be able to help you produce milk." His words came before a defined answer had been found. But the Benshiran's memory had begun to flood with individual memories, snippets that formed no continuity of understanding, but glimpses of history. One such was finding herbs. Her former bondmate remembered searching for herbs with her.

"I remember we were looking for herbs. Your cycle was near, and the herbs your mother gave you to curb it had run out, though we found none of that variety. You had pointed out a plant that would induce vomiting, and one that fooled the body into believing it was with child. You said your mother taught you to avoid both. But the one would also fool your body into producing milk. I think I remember what it looked like."

The cup was near full of the goat's milk, and Abashai released it. Standing, he looked into the vessel. Then he tapped into the stain of Rhysol's blood in his own body, calling forth its power. The Chaon laid a corruption of sorts upon the cup, a magic that would work to twist Nya's perception of himself to one more favorable. Once she touched the cup, the seed would take hold and , he hoped, compel her to see him in a more amiable light. It would give him the window to convince her of his value in a more traditional way.

"Here." Abashai held out the cup. Whether she would let him bring it to her, or make him set it down for her to retrieve herself, the man would comply.

[Nya Winters]

They had both changed. To say they'd grown would have been wrong. But to say they had expanded would have been closer to the truth. Nya was once somewhat naive and proud in her view of the world. She'd had a mother that had prayed to the Gods to keep her safe and had set her out into the world because she couldn't handle her remaining at home any longer.

And as the memories returned, slowly, like the first flowers of spring carefully opening, Nya wondered more and more just how much her mother had knew and what she sheltered within her tower when she'd birthed the kelvic kitten and raised her as strongly as she had.

Then there had been Shai. He'd been her true teacher. Was the man before her still him? Nya didn't know and her memory was incomplete. Once they'd had something precious but Rhysol had torn it asunder using his minions and his curiosity. That was what hurt Nya the most. Her and Shai were not split for a greater good. They were broken to see how they'd react and what it would do to them. They were broken for curiosity and nothing more. She watched the man cautiously as he spoke and came into her piss poor camp. Even she knew how bad it looked. Two goats, a starving baby, and a woman with just the clothing on her back that couldn't leave for five minutes to feed herself.

"He's mine though." She snarled again, even as the man got close. But she made no move to attack him. He could tell. In fact he could tell everything she was thinking to some extent. She was exhausted, willing to deal, well able to tolerate him, starving, and everything she was giving him was a complete and utter show. What she really wanted to do was curl into a ball around the child and purr them both to sleep and let death take them because that's how tired she was. Because she knew - and Abashai could feel she knew - that they both wouldn't make it out of winter alive. Not at this rate, and not without help.

And she could feel him too. As soon as she quieted his mind. She could feel the pity and knew that the man understood what dire situation she was in. She also could feel his frustration and the changes in him. He was harder, ever so much more a warrior than he had been before. There was blood on his hands that he wasn't guilty about. And he hadn't even began to deal with his feelings of Kialandra's death. She'd been his purpose for a long time - his reason for living - and the object of her control over him was yet again in another woman's arms that just wanted to control him. Nya closed her eyes, opened herself, and felt all this. She saw herself as he saw her and felt the links between them reconnecting. Not the bond of the kelvic and the bondmate, but of something vastly different. She lived because he lived. He lived because she lived. There was no memory there of why. But she could read his thoughts, his feelings, and suddenly she knew he could of her as well.

There was no need for the facade. There was no need to snarl at him and reiterate that the child was hers. He knew she considered it hers. She knew he considered it his. The cat would have staggered had she been standing, but instead she was sitting down and simply slumped slightly over the child. Her mind didn't know what to think. She knew his thoughts. She knew his intentions. And they weren't solidified yet. But in the moment, he had no deviousness planned.

And then he did something. She felt his intent even if she didn't understood what it meant. The forest cat in human guise furrowed her brow, trying to understand.

She quietly held the boy, then set him down leaning against her knee as the man knelt over her and handed her the cup. Automatically she took it, glanced at him, and began pouring the contents of the cup into the baby's mouth. It wasn't ideal, but it was a way to save his life. Idea would have been a bottle, sheepgut nipples, and or a wetnurse.

Nya purred slightly as the child drank, spitting up some, but also taking more than it had before. She ignored Shai now, unconcerned with him, wishing him no ill will and not even remotely remembering to tap the link between them to see what he was thinking when he saw his son drinking. He was no threat to her and the boy. He wanted to help. He was a kind and gentle man. She accepted those thoughts without question even has her long slender fingers gripped the cup delivering its life giving contents to the child and its curse to Nya herself.

[Abashai]

As Abashai drew nearer, he worked to make sense of the cacophony of consicousness in his mind. Immediate were the tangible issues of the moment. The child Nya claimed for herself needed to have nourishment. He needed to make sure the baby was safe. But then there were the memories. He did not need to summon them, for the more time he spent in the presence of the Kelvic, they returned like images in an artists portfolio, separate yet vivid. Most were mundane, setting rabbit snares, building sandcastles, curling up in a bed, but all a testimony to the history the strangers had shared. Then there was the awareness. Like sleepy eyelids fluttering before opening to reveal the world, Abashai discerned impressions, perceptions, thoughts that were not his own. The consciousness was not frightening or even surprising. It simply felt like something he did not realized he missed until it returned. It was Nya's consciousness, and its manifestation attested to some greater bond that still existed between them. The Benshiran had to compartmentalize these stimuli, or be overwhelmed by them. With some effort, Abashai focused on the task at hand...feeding his child.

It was true, the situation was obvious, as was Nya's state. She insisted the child was hers, though she sounded more like an ill-tempered child claiminig a doll she had found abandoned by the road. Abashai made no rebuttal, simply offering the milk. He watched, without interrupting, as the woman gently lay the baby down and begin to trickle the goat's milk into his mouth. She was supposed to be a mother, itoccurred to him. She was supposed to bear his child. he recalled images of a brutal mating that concieved the child, visceral emotions that were both humanly passionate and carnally raw fluttered his stomach. But they lost the baby, he didn't remember how, but she never bore his child. He watched her devote full attention to the dark-haired baby. Now, she had what she was not able to produce, his son.

Nya started to purr. The noise resonated within the Chaon, stirring long buried comfort that the sound had once given him. The purring, the sight of the woman holding his son, played heavily on his soul, chinks in his hard heart forming as he began to see what had been taken from him. Kialandra said Rhysol saved him, that he was in bondage to his old life, held back. He believed the vague memories that occasionally haunted him were of those who had prevented him from his reaching his full potential. Kialandra had freed him, given him purpose, acceptance, and Rhysol a mantra for living and a power greater than that of the god who had stained Abashai's hands with his mark. And Nya was someone, maybe the someone, who had repressed him, who held him down. She killed Kia. At first, Abashia had hungered to avenge that death, to punish, even torture the murdering kidnapper. Why then, did Nya evoke sadness, confusion and profound regret? Why could he feel her....feel what she feels? The Oneness was incredible, and had to have great significance. No, he would not leave his son, and he would not leave Nya. He knew she would not make him leave, for his corruption had taken seed in the Kelvic, soothing her mistrust. Why did he feel the kernel of guilt in his gut?

The man stood to his feet, turning. But even as he tried to look away from the woman, brindled hair a tangle, clothes stained, lean, scarred body grayish from lack of nourishment, he felt responsible for her well-being. He wanted to want to kill the wretch, even use her for his pleasure first. But the merciless memories persisted, the contentness she felt as she fed his baby seeping into his own emotions. What had happened to them? That horrific truth his psyche would not reveal, for it would bring down all that Kialandra and her dark lord had constructed. But that construct began to disintegrated when Nya tore the Black Sun woman's head from her body.

"He is drinking, that is good." Abashai spoke softly. He turned to his pack, digging through his belongings until he pulled out his spare shirt and a towel. He tossed them next to Nya. "Wear the shirt, the season is changing. You can wrap the baby in the towel, it's clean. In a while, maybe I can bring down some game, and we can set some snares." Nya had shown him how to set rabbit snares. She had shown him that one could adhere to tradition too strictly. She showed him that sex was not just manipulation. Abashai turned away again, looking out over the forest, the memories were too strong.

"As we move, we'll look for that herb that may bring milk to your breasts." There was a long pause.

"How much do you remember?"

[Nya Winters]

Nya glanced up at Abashai. She blinked, wondering for a moment why she'd considered him a threat. The Kelvic put the cup down, studied the child, then picked him up and laid him gently on her shoulder. She then patted him gently and repeatedly, her brow furrowed as she listened. The boy belched loudly and the forest cat put him down once more in the filthy blanket he was wrapped in. It'd need washing soon, for sure.

When the warrior tossed the shirt at the woman and then the towel, the girl wrapped the baby in the towel then wrapped the shirt around that, securing the child in even more warmth. Her own thread-bare things were fine. And she didn't like clothing anyhow. "My clothes are fine. He needs them more." The forest cat said. She scratched her hair, which was a tangled mess, then scratched a shoulder as well which was visible through the thin silk of the blouse she wore. Then she thought about it. Kialandra's pants were thread bare, with no knees left in them. All Nya had really that was worth anything was the fur cloak she rolled herself and the baby in at night. But none of that mattered. She had fur to keep her and the child warm, even though it had been a long long time since she'd shifted her shape and taken on the forest cat's guise. With Abashai around, she could do just that. And bathe. Nya hated her stink. It reminded her of someplace unpleasant she had lived for a while.

"I will bathe." She promised. "So I do not have an unwashed smell for you." She said, knowing how it was with her, and what her condition really was. Her wariness of him was gone.

When he spoke of herbs, she nodded. "I do not remember herbs. I am sorry." She said softly, turning her head to stroke her tongue across her itchy shoulder. The motion was catlike, and done without the use of her hands which were still on the child. "With you watching him, I can hunt. I couldn't leave him alone to hunt before now." She said, watching the baby thoughtfully.

At Abashai's last question, she turned and looked at him. "I do not know how much I remember." She said abruptly. "If I have forgotten how do I know I have forgotten if the memories aren't in my head?" She sneered at this, as if Abashai's question was borderline stupid to her. "I know about pain... all the stages of it. Do you remember as well? I remember how things are broken and how things are lost. What about you? What do you remember?" She asked, not wanting to tell him the whole of it. Because the whole of it belonged to her and her alone.

[Abashai]

The magic Abashai employed had appeared to take hold of Nya easily, perhaps due to her weakened state. Sensing her basic mood came easier now, and the Chaon could see that he was no longer regarded as a threat, but was tolerated as a necessary presence and a resource for the survival of herself and the child. Though the Benshiran had employed Rhysol's dark gift in the employ of Kialandra many times without regret, a part of him wanted to believe some of the Kelvic's change of heart came on its own. Abashai refused to consider it a curse or corruption, it was simply facilitating what he hoped would become her true disposition naturally over time. It was necessary so he could help her keep his son alive, and to piece together their past. He was cautious still, for the cat still remained in there somewhere, unpredictable.

Though she was not adept at motherhood, at least in human terms, Nya had managed to keep the baby alive this long, and as she refused his clothing, choosing to wrap the child in it instead, Abashai saw the sacrifice Nya had made for the baby. It would not be easy to convince her to give him up. Abashai looked at Sychar, longing to pick up the baby and hold him. Shai never liked the name Kialandra had given their son, but he was not given a voice in the decision. He was the stud that provided her a child, and once he had provided the seed, his responsibility for the baby ended. But Benshiran blood still ran deep in Abashai's mangled, damaged being, and that familial tradition stirred the desire to be a father to the child.

Though she owed him nothing, from her perspective, Nya had promised to clean up, the first indication that she had any concern for the human in the arrangement. The Kelvic knew he could smell her with her own keen senses. The Kelvic was unwashed, her stink a combination of human sweat and the more favorable musk he found so familiar, and dirt still stained her where her tongue could not reach. Abashai remembered how Nya had appeared at the Nitrozian mansion, clean and dressed, her unique brindled hair made up in Ravokian fashion. The woman before him was a ghost of that attractive girl.

Dialogue opened on the sensitive subject of their shared history, and Abashai frowned at Nya's answer. He believed the Kelvic remembered more than he, but her answers were cryptic, only hinting that her recollections were not pleasant, and they were not for him to know. She turned his question back on Abashai, and he shrugged, picking up the cup to rinse it out with his waterskin.

"I don't 'remember', as such. I have brief memories of us, what our life was together. Of what happened in the end, I only know I committed a grave betrayal. I can only believe you were the one I betrayed. I don't remember what happened." Frustration and mental exhaustion seeped into the man's tone. As time wore on, Abashai had assumed whatever Nya and he had been was dismantled in the prison. But all he remembered was of Rhysol coming to him in the Black Sun dungeon, and then being taken from the prison to live in the Salvatrice house. The details of the horrors of their captivity still languished behind sub-conscious barriers.

Having washed the cup, Abashai gathered his gear and carried it into the makeshift camp, no longer fearful of the Kelvic. "With some milk in his belly, he should sleep soon. Maybe that would be a good time for you to take care of yourself." Even as he spoke, he realized Nya may not take kindly to his almost authoritative remark. But it came naturally to Abashai, not as an expression of control he desired, but of a role he seemed to fall into.