A True Witch is Not Born....But Made (Limey)

[Tinnok]

A True Witch is Not Born....But Made
Spring 24, 513 AV

She remembered hearing for the first time, a tale of a woman...who wore a head dress to cover the face...just as Tinnok did, made of feathers, ridiculous and strange by Myrian standards. Heard rumors of her power. No one said her name with disgust, but with fear. A strange hooded respect that truly ancient women and Myri received in their culture. And of course...comments that she was insane.

Asheera.

Tinnok had to know. If there was a being like her, she had to find it, should have discovered her long ago, when she was young. Illusions of a life raised by someone who understood her were squashed in an instant, but the instant after hearing the sorceress's name, Tinnok was out for the scent like the Iganu Deepwoods Dog that lay outside the door of her hut in the woods.

It had been a slow and arduous process. Whoever this woman was, she did not reveal any details about herself easily, and unsurprisingly. She seemed to come to town very rarely, to get supplies and items, and returned to the jungle just as swiftly as she came, an enigma to the Myrians of Taloba. And a puzzle Tinnok was positive she would be the one to solve.

Which was why she know found herself, lost in her own jungle, trying to track down the half breed known as Asheera, strange images and words faintly echoing within her mind as she considered the possibilities that a meeting like this could hold. Part of her urged her not to get her hopes up, while another side of her knew....it was already too late.

She looked at one of the great jungle trees, a section of moss shaped like a strange drooling skull upon its trunk, cursing. She had passed this tree three times before, now coming to it a fourth! Was this person so powerful she could create illusions around her home?! No, Tinnok reasoned with herself, that certainly could not be the case. She just did not know her forest as she should, did not have the skills of Dog, and did not rely on herself overly much. Which had to stop now.

She paced past the tree, eyes trained upon the ground. There was the broken branches she had seen before, clearly a sign that someone taller than the average bird or small mammal had passed through. And just a few feet farther was a print, definitely human...or close to it within the loamy soil. She just had to follow this scarce trail to wherever it would lead, and if she came around to the tree again...well she would figure something out.

Stalking quietly through the forest the half breed hunted for this woman, unsure of the fact that these tracks might not even belong to the creature she was looking for.

[Limey]

She did not have much in the way of entertainment out in the wilds. Then again, she did not often seek it, or require it. Her solitude was her sole requirement, her isolation from the rest of her kind. And at that thought, her pale lips would twist into a bitter smile. Her kind? She had no kind. She walked like them and spoke their tongue, but by bearing and blood and mind, she was as far from them as deer was from tiger. Or Myrian from snake. So what was it, when she sensed trembling in the earth that she had lived on for decades and felt the presence of a questing soul? Trespassers, that was her first thought. A rare occurrence, since most who knew of her knew the rough stretch of thick vines and broad trees she called her home, and steered clear of it. But there were always exceptions. Anomalies. Much like her, she supposed. But this one... A deep breath and with the swell of her lungs the leaves around her shuddered. The dirt and moss under her feet undulated as if in pleasure and she felt the footsteps. Careful... deliberate... not lumbering and unsure like so many others, but... ... searching. Tracking. Pallid eyelids snapped open and black slits that served as pupils stared in a moment of surprise. So... someone was trying to find her. How... peculiar. Her tongue snapped out and then back again in an unconscious parody of the marred, hated side of her blood. Quick, sure feet moved across the branches and narrowed eyes soon found her- No. It. "Abomination..." One monster knows another. The scent wafted off the figure below her as clear as smoke from dry ice, and the watcher's heart shook and roared that yet another cursed by the gods had come to pollute this hallowed patch of jungle, her asylum from the world, her sanctuary. She glared, but the hateful gesture had barely settled onto her face before it was usurped by an eyebrow-raise of surprise. A headdress, the visitor wore. Much like hers. Covering her eyes, covering her shame, shame that... that... She made a thoughtful little noise and she studied the female... and yes, it was a female... as she looked down at the tracks she had left as she made her way during her hunt, leading to... "No..." The watcher placed her hand on the tree, and the bark seemed to stiffen and shake as she did... the effect continuing all the way down, like a sudden earthquake tremor travelling down and down... to the root... through the ground... The Watcher gritted her teeth as her insides flexed and the second skeleton that was her res groaned in complaint as her magecraft. But she felt it... gods, how she loved that sensation... Felt to clearly that she could see her tracks muddied and obliterated as she manipulated the earth they were set into, changed it so that her tracks vanished and left bare earth... and then changed again... Her mind and res and power creating new tracks, identical in almost every way to the last... leading away from her treehouse... deeper into the jungle... The watcher smiled, revealing yellowed teeth more like fangs, as the intruder began to follow them. Her eyes saw and her mind saw but her lips moved of their own accord, fractured mind taking its helm as she giggled from the canopy and whispered-gurgled a song from her childhood. "Hither and thither, We wandered the day, O, sprites! How you lead us, In the jungle to play..." OOCAs you suggested before, there will be some kind of goose chase afoot for a few posts, just so, ahem, "the watcher" can feel Tinnok out a little. We know each others' style well enough for you to know how far to go with your reply.

[Tinnok]

Body bent, feet quiet, Tinnok moved slowly over the landscape, following prints...almost too easy to follow. Her desire and need to find the source of them, however, swept any truly logical thoughts from her mind.

Every now and then she would stop, resting her hand on the bark of a tree, wondering if she might glean some vital information from the forest of the jungle. Slow and methodical, the thoughts that ran through her mind spoke of age, earth, and sun, but not of things like creatures passing over roots too thick to feel anything less than a hefty blow from a wood cutting axe. Even smaller shrubs, whose leaves had been shifted, branches snapped, did not even seem to notice the loss of appendage, and Tinnok was forced to rely on herself to continue tracking.

She tried to figure out as much about the prints as possible. They were not bare feet as much as simple, nearly undefined indents that suggested passage, and the longer she followed them, the more uncertain she became. When they stopped she glanced around the forest. She had not circled around...not this time, but instead she found she was in a place quite far from the original set of tracks she had come upon. Something seemed off about the whole situation, and just then a breeze whipped by her face, carrying a strange whispered melody.

Tinnok's head shot up from its crouched position, for the first time considering the trees for all that they were above. Eyes scanned upward passingly, but did not see anything beside the ordinary pact of lush green leaves. Now, however, the feeling of being watched...or at least toyed with had been firmly cemented somewhere into her spine. Her scales seemed to prickle, and the half breed slowly rose. She turned around, determined to make her way back the way she had come, she was sure that tree with the strange moss face was closer to where she needed to go than wherever these strange tracks had led her. She found one print, then another...and then realized the rest were gone. Evaporated like sand in a breeze.

She stood, dumbstruck for a moment, completely unaware of what could do this, then grimaced and continued walking back he way she had come. So the tracks were lying? Well then she would rely on the brush alone, and she would scour these woods until nightfall if she had to, map out the area and learn its secrets. This woman would not be able to hide from her.

Though no heat was truly enough heat for the half breed, she was warm blooded after all, and she flipped back the hood of the wolf pelt, scratching her head as she walked and muttering faint curses beneath her breath. Clearly she could learn a thing or two from this sorceress about hiding one's home in the wilds.

[Limey]

The watcher let a smirk spread across her lips as the trespasser was suddenly a whirl of bewilderment, staring around at tracks that were... "Oh, there just a moment, were they not? Your eyes must be fading, young one..." Then the headdress came down, wolf head flopping down her back limply and the smile froze in surprise. Even from her perch in the canopy, the glowing golden orbs were clearly visible. No wonder she wears that wolf, was the first thought that shuddered through the watcher's mind, overriding the natural revulsion she would feel for the... half-breed. She kept watching as the trespasser backtracked, trying to find the way she came, but now the amusement had gone from her eyes. She saw a kindred spirit in that tall, wiry form, determined to mind what her mind was hunting no matter what the wear to her body. She saw her alone, and felt a twinge that made her frown. "No place for that. No-No-No..." The unseen figure dogged Tinnok's steps, the only hint to her presence being the occasional creak of the branches and a flitting shadow as she passed across a rare break in the choking canopy. But she knew all these trees, every branch; she had been here when some of them were no taller than a child. So quickly she had overtaken Tinnok, looming over her from above, where her trail had started... She grinned again. Some things should not be resisted, and when was the last time she had a chance to play? Her hand pressed against the tree again... no, both hands. That same tremor went down the trunk, only this time strong enough to provoke a moan from the wood, something between surprise and unease. The watcher hushed soothingly, begging Ciayha's forgiveness, but it would not take long... She felt... moisture. Water. The vast wellspring that permeated the jungle floor, just below the surface. She dragged it up, first drops, then mouthfuls, gallons, pools... and when her eyes closed she could see her efforts come together, water mixing with mud in vast globs under the debris, right in the path of- -a shriek and yelp of surprise and Tinnok went into the mud-filled puddle up to her waist, the solid trail that she had followed transformed into a quagmire. Harsh, barking laughter with a hint of hiss echoed throughout the canopy. "Be fleet of foot, My children, dear, For there are sprites, And monsters here!"

[Tinnok]

For sure the half breed did not know precisely what was going on...but the more she became confused, the more she became sure that she was on the right trail. After all, the more difficulties put in her path meant that whoever was out there wanted to prevent her progress, no?

Pleased with this little discovery Tinnok almost could have smiled if the whole turn of events wasn't so petching frustrating. Whoever it was following her, was quick, agile, and stealthy. All traits Tinnok liked to see in herself, yet clearly she was dealing with someone far more used to hiding than she was, a very strange idea indeed.

Making her way backwards she bent and studied the brush carefully. She tried to imagine how her hunt-mates would see the signs around them. Surely they would discern precisely the size and direction of the creature that had broken these branches, and all Tinnok could tell was that...they were broken. For all she knew it could have been a peccary....or tinamou, or petch even Dhani.

She rose frustrated, stepping forward and then gasping in shock and surprise as her foot sank into the ground as if it was made of water, whole body following suit. She could feel the bottom with her toes, but was suddenly up to her waist in this strange muck, and the abomination gave a guttural snarl of anger. Who the shyke was this Asheera?

Then she heard it...the faint words that she had barely caught from before and tossed tot he side...now they were clearer. Singing? Tinnok's brow furrowed in confusion. None of this made any sense at all, was the fellow half breed insane, driven that way because of her isolated life in the wilds? It said a lot for Tinnok's future, to be sure.

"I will take no part in your games! If you want me dead than kill me, if not, show your face!"

Someone who enjoyed making false tracks, turning solid earth into a liquid and...singing strange children's songs didn't seem like the kind of individual who would just murder Tinnok outright, but then again she hadn't had much experience dealing with the insane, so perhaps the shout out was too much of a gamble.

Her eyes sought out the trees in earnest, for it was the only location her assailant could move so swiftly and silently without drawing Tinnok's notice. Eyes squinted, body struggling against the strangely laborious substance she found herself immersed within. Figures she would walk right into a trap.

[Limey]

Gods, it was such a trial not to reply! But the watcher knew that would but spoil the game, announcing her presence in such a manner. And where was the sport in that? Myrians, she knew, felt fear and dread like any other mortal creature, but death was not one of them. Death was but rebirth to the Children of Myri, and while their consciousness was lost, their essence was not. But the unknown... the unseen... that which could not be fought or named and thus bound by the mind's past experiences? That terrified them. Like it did all other races. Asheera knew that very well. Another laugh went whispering through the trees above Tinnok, making her squirm and turn and twist as she tried in vain to pin down where it was coming from. More trees creaking. More branches shaking. But whenever she turned, she seemed to be just a blink too late. The hint of a shadow. The briefest flash of movement. The tantalizing, peripheral glimpse of a foot vanishing behind a tree trunk. And still the jungle laughed at her, making her choler rise, her face redden. Asheera chuckled silently as she wound her way down from above her. Oh, the half-breed was upset? How tragic. Finally her bare feet touched the rich dirt of the jungle floor, maybe thirty feet to Tinnok's left. She cocked her head to one side and studied the intruder carefully. Young... barely out of her childhood years. Lean and wiry, but with her height, perhaps in need of a few more decent meals to fill out her frame. A tawdry mass of dark hair hung in braids and her eyes... well, there was no mistaking them. Asheera's eyes narrowed a touch, and she placed her hands onto the ground. The... price, she guessed was the best word for it, was coming back harder now. The more she tried and the more she accomplished, the more her djed was drained and railed against her or doing so. Head bowed and teeth gritted, she felt the vibrations along the jungle floor travel up her arms and shake her. The half-Dhani actually managed a grim smile. So little did mortals like her think of djed. As if it were merely a tool to be used, but... but what was it compared to the latent power of a place such as this? A jungle the size of a continent, teeming, overflowing with djed from billions, trillions of lives ranging from mites to Tskanna. Her own life was but a passing fancy... So what is hers, then? Tinnok saw the ground shifting in front of her, the earth forming, denting, shaking... and deepen far too precisely to be anything but the will of another. She frowned deeper and deeper as the marks became more distinct, and from her hidden corner, Asheera smiled thinly as realization dawned on her fellow outcast's face. It was a question mark. And right next to it, an arrow pointed at Tinnok.

[Tinnok]

At the very least she got the singing to stop. Tinnok gritted her teeth as the silence stretched on, only the latent sounds of the jungle there to make sure she knew what was happening wasn't simply some strange dream.

Her body writhed uselessly in the strange liquefied ground to no avail, and every time her eyes seemed to alight upon something, she realized it was nothing at all. A growl emerged in the back of her throat, and she found herself poised to yell again, to tell this jungle just how she felt about trapping her within it, how mistaken this individual was...

When she saw the very obvious imprint of a question mark sink into the ground...and an arrow pointing straight for her chest. It seemed like such a frivolous use of whatever power was responsible. Tinnok could have laughed or screamed then. Whoever this was...whatever she was. She was strong, and strange. Tinnok was not so foolish as to think she could simply fight her way out of whatever mess she had entered, and her jailer had asked ehr a question.

Perhaps she should answer it.

"I am Tinnok of the Tempered Steel, marked by Caiyha and here to see the hooded half breed of the jungle!" She paused, wondering how to continue.

"As you can see I am like you, yet if our places were reversed..." She couldn't help but smile. "I would find a more interesting way of testing my kin than in mud." A strange sort of bait, but there it was. She was in no position to bargain with...this Asheera, but bluffing was the only option available to her at this point.

[Limey]

The singing may have stopped, but all Tinnok got as a reply to her challenge was yet more knocking laughter. High and lilting, it seemed to echo and reverberate around her, nearly impossible to pindown. Were those lips in the canopy high above? At ground level? Next to her ear? "Such courage...?" There was the definite suggestion of a question mark at the end of those two words, the first she had heard spoken aloud since becoming enmeshed in her little pit. The voice were deeper than hers, obviously older, with just a trace of the sibilant hiss of the Dhani. But the accent was not what was of import. The question. Implying doubt. Disbelief. Perchance even... "You seek Asheera, disgrace of the Tempered Steel?" The voice said again, unseen lips smiling wider as she saw the flush come to the younger female's face. "Oh. My apologies. Clearly you are the pride of your clan, hmm? Ah. And now you come. You seek She Who Crafts Earth And Water. Such a strange name. Can you craft those two? No. One merely wields them..." The voice trailed off and for a chime or two there was nothing but aimless, even argumentative chattering from the canopy, though Tinnok could see or hear no-one else to argue with. Then there was... noise. Rustling. Movement from above that was not or perhaps could not be hidden. The faint aura of pain washed over her through her prowess... And then she saw it. Small, at first. Looking like just another vine, which was, of course, half the danger of those things. But vines did not move with purpose, did not curl or twist or slither, scales shining in the dirty light. Larger and larger it became... and longer... and longer... Forty feet of thick, sinuous muscle wrapped in brown-and-green scales. Eyes wide and golden and slitted, mirrors to Tinnok's own but much larger. A forked tongue as long as her forearm that tasted the air experimentally as the huge beast finally touched down. Eyes never leaving hers. Approaching in careful, languid movements even as the halfbreed in the wolf-head started to panic, twisting and squirming against the implacable thick and sucking mud. It stopped. Ropes and ropes of muscle and scale curled under it, to Tinnok it seemed as if the constrictor was... getting comfortably. Settling its head section on top of the rest of it. Especially when it stuck out its head towards her... and cocked it to one side in a gesture that snakes simply did not make. Silence. Just the reptilian patience of those bulbous golden eyes, watching Tinnok's and drawing out her uncertainty, waiting for more words to spill forth...

[Tinnok]

Well she had asked to be tested, hadn't she? Strange to think that until the female had said her own name, Tinnok had not been truly sure she had even found the strange creature that only once in a great while traverse Taloba's streets...much like her in that way.

Yet their mannerisms seemed so distant, each an extended product of how their society saw them, yet she...as far as Tinnok knew, had never truly been Myrian. Her lips pursed a little as that thought flooded through her brain. Who was she to look at this woman and judge, after all, had her people ever truly seen her as Myrian either?

But when that massive snake came down from the green heavens, Tinnok was shocked, and in awe. She knew of no half breed Dhani to transform...she certainly couldn't, yet seeing this beast which could only be Asheera, her thoughts did a double take. Had she this power and she had simply been too disgusted to use it? It frightened and tugged at her curiosity in equal measure, but either way the entity that could swallow her in a few well placed gulps sat before her, eyes a giant mirror of her own...seeking something.

What could she want this giant serpent. Did she simply want a story? Was she looking for Tinnok to be like her, or was she searching for the differences between them? If she did not like what she heard would she kill her? Thoughts flooded rampant through her drenched mind, but finally Tinnok cleared her throat.

"I am a disgrace." She paused, trying to plan her articulations in the proper way, to tell a story as well as an explanation. To how she had survived in a much different way from the sorceress. "I do not know why...but my elder saved me when I was young. It was by her hand that my mother could not cull me at birth. I was raised...like a male with severe injuries would be, But I sought solace in those outside my race. Not Dhani but animal." Her voice stopped, as if she was forcing the story out of a wooden pipe. Why did she seem to get in these situations where she could't help to spill out those things most precious to her?

"I am Myrian, that is what I would always tell myself. And so I did as they did, I fought, I learned, and was hated." Dry tongue lapped cracked lips.

"I joined the military and would not have survived my term if not for the intervention of Caiyha, who gave me a gift just as invaluable to the Taloba military as it was to me. Once I left...I came out here as you did, and it is only now, apart from the people I called my own, that I am no longer sure of my allegiances....or perhaps I was always unsure, but the jungle has cleared my mind."

She shrugged, and then golden eyes bored into the two that sat, unblinking, staring at her. It was time to turn around this line back upon her captor. "What is your tale, Asheera of No Clan, what replenishes you apart from all?"

[Limey]

The chimes passed and the words flowed and spilled as a life story was passed from the half-breeds lips and oh those flowers and blooming early and is this wretched thing still talking?! The snake did not move but snakes don't do that very much. They don't need to, or want to, and when you're half-Dhani, staying still is second nature. She stared at Tinnok like she was a mouse, tongue flickering occasionally as a gamut of emotions pours from the half-submerged girl. Finally it rolled it's eyes (which is possible, if once tries hard... and is a snake) and- A question? For me? How droll... Tinnok didn't really have the words to describe what she saw next. Elsewhere in the multiverse, it might have been compared to a piece of visual horror fiction, or narcotic-induced nightmare, or perhaps some insectoid transformation sped up to take place in a chime what should have taken months. Scales sloughed away off skin now dark and rough. Arms grew from nubs to long and sinewy limbs. A large but serpentine head bulged and jawed and morphed, the features with it, until one of a harshly-attractive female in hr fifties crouched before Tinnok. Naked. And utterly shameless. "Such a disssgusting thing," it said to no-one in particular, just the merest trace of a Dhani hiss to her accent, "But undeniably cathartic." Her eyes snapped to a stunned and somewhat shaken Tinnok as if noticing her for the first time. Lips parted and sharp teeth smiled (or turned upwards at the corners, more accurately). "My tail? My tale? Why..." she glanced behind her and shrugged "... it was right behind me, girl. I would have thought you'd seen it. Now it's all behind me, so I don't know. I don't remember. Oh, and regarding your own...?" Even as a Myrian, Asheera moved like a snake. She stalked forwards and her muscles seemed to... ripple, well-preserved physique lacking the slack and wrinkles of some other her age. She came on until her lips were close to Tinnok's and... "... I... don't... care. I just wanted to see how much you babble, and gods, you did not disappoint." She straightened up with a carefree sigh at the sky, as if enjoying the thick canopy. "But anyway..." She waves one hand absently at the ground and Tinnok found the mud became... thinner. As if some of the water had been drained away and only loose (or looser) dirt was left, making it possible for her to limb out. She noticed, also, the barely audible little sigh from Asheera, the way she blinked for a moment longer than usual... paying some kind of price for her power over the jungle. Or at least her part of it. "You want something," she said, sounding bored and in need of entertaining, ignoring the outrage on her visitor's. "Everyone does. You're no different. So..." She waved her hand again, this time more firmly, and despite the tightening of her jaws that denoted some inner pain, two short spears of hardened dirt rose up from either side of Tinnok... and stopped a few inches shy of her throat. "Amuse me with your petty needs, snake shit," Asheera said with a sweet smile that slammed against her words, "You may just peak my interest... well, no, you won't, but that's no reason not to try..."