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Not found on any map, Endrykas is a large migrating tent city wherein the horseclans of Cyphrus gather to trade and exchange information. [Lore]
Wildfire snorted at her and stopped, stomping the ground in annoyance as she passed by the shop a third time. Rue ignored him, as she continued to worry over what was probably one of the biggest decisions of her life. She turned to she shop front to look at the designs there, but she had looked at them before and none of them seemed right. Besides, she wasn't even sure she knew where she wanted it to go yet. As a child it has seemed so much easier, she knew what she wanted and where to put it, but now, faced with the decision in the pale morning light, she just didn't have any idea.
She crossed the shop front once again, stopping in front of her steed. "Come on, Wildfire, I'll just come back some other time." She told him, patting his neck and starting to move away. He didn't budge. "Wildfire, we are leaving." He flicked his ears in her direction, then away a very clear -I'm ignoring you.-
"Fine, stay then." She turned to leave and the stubborn horse reached out and grabbed her sash in his teeth, holding her where she stood. Obviously, Wildfire was not willing to let her back out. "You stubborn- your ma must'a been an ass." She grumbled quietly. "Alright, let me go, I'll go inside." He made a noise that she swore was the horse version of a laugh and let her go.
Brushing herself off she stepped inside, "Hello?" She called softly, causing the woman inside to sit up from her drawing and smile at her.
"I was wondering if you would come in." The woman said, and Rue's face flushed softly.
"I had a little help." Rue replied with a smile of her own despite her embarrassment.
The woman made a show of eyeing the horse behind Rue who was halfway in the pavilion after his owner. "Looks like a big help to me." She laughed and motioned for Rue to take a seat. "I'm Rei'anta, and I'm the owner here. What can I do for you today, Miss...?"
"Rue, I would prefer Rue, thanks." She shifted in her seat, uncertain once again, she knew why she was here but what did she want? Silence reigned for a few moments.
"I understand how hard it can be to choose. Are you just here for a tattoo?"
"Windmarks." Rue replied, and the woman smiled.
"An even bigger decision then. Why don't we talk for a while, get your mind off it, maybe something will come to you." It sounded odd, but Rue was willing to try. Besides, Wildfire had his own plans for the day and they didn't involve her leaving the shop anytime soon.
Talking was easier than she thought, the woman sat in front of her - head and hands in a book of sketches - which had at first made Rue uncomfortable, like she was being ignored, but as she looked up and commented, or asked a new question easily and it became apparent that she was listening, but trying to make Rue comfortable as well. so the talk continued, topics changing and turning from growing up with out a strider -Lonely- to why Rue wears her hair with the three hidden braids at her neck -Defiance.
Eventually Rue began to talk on her own, offering up information like pieces of a puzzle that would somehow inspire her with an idea for her perfect windmarks. All the while the woman sat scribbling away in her book.
"That's why I work so hard to stay fit, and why I'm here alone, I guess. Because I've realized that in the end, I'm the only one who isn't going to let me down." She fell silent then, having come to a startling realization in that. She thought herself alone. That in the end, there was no one else who would come to her aid, who would be there for her when she was in need. The words hung in the air ringing with the truth, because at that moment she was alone during what was one of the most important events she would probably ever face.
Behind her, Wildfire whinnied loudly, calling a greeting to a passing horse, or even just calling out to be heard, and Rue was struck with another realization. She wasn't alone. Not anymore, because she and Wildfire had each other. She looked up at the other woman, and they shared a grin.
"I have an idea." Rei'anta said, "If you don't like it, there always other things we can try, but this is what came to me while you spoke."
She had been sketching while she spoke, Rue realized, and when Rei'anta turned the book around, for a moment Rue was speechless. Drawn on the page was a swirling image of a tree, twisted with age and hardship from years passed. Almost lost in the tribal pattern of the tree, a wolf stood nestled in the exposed roots, howling up at the sky.
"It's beautiful." Rue's voice was soft as she reached out to touch the design. It was perfect. Almost. "There is just one thing before we start."
The tattooing was sort of a blur for Rue, a haze of pricking needles and the stinging skin they left in their wake. She tried to follow the progression of the design as it went. Putting the swirls of ink together in her head to form an image, but as the clocks ticked the bells away, the image in her mind was lost, jumbled by the growing pain and the intricacies of the design.
The room grew dark around her, she could tell even with her eyes closed, and she knew that she must have dozed -not admiting to herself the possibility of unconsciousness- because soon the light that poured in through the front of the pavilion was no more, filtering in through the ceiling. Rei'anta stopped to break for lunch, and she offered food to Rue, but she declined, content to lay in the daze of the process, watching designs cross the backdrop of her eyelids.
Her mind wandered, falling back to the talk they shared before beginning the process. "There is just one thing before we start." Rue had said, and the other woman looked to her expectantly, "I would like to add a second, just here." She pointed on the drawing. And the woman nodded her head.
"I'll draw it up." Rei'anta replied, turning the sketch back to herself, but Rue shook her head,
"I'd like to start as soon as possible."
Of course, as Rue had soon realized there was more yet to be discussed.
Someone was talking, she heard her name, she opened her eyes, looking up at the woman who spoke to her.
"I need you to turn on your side." There was something weird going on, Rue thought, because her mind felt slow as though she had been drinking, and she spoke her concern. "It is the ink, Rue, the additive we discussed for such a large tattoo, to make the process easier on you."
That's right, they had talked about that too.
"Are you sure? It will take a long time to complete such a tattoo. Longer even to heal, and you will have to be careful with it stretched so across your skin."
"I'm sure." She had answered the older woman, and she had frowned a moment before mentioning the additive.
"It's a powdered herb, it relaxes you and helps keep the pain dull while I work. It doesn't last long after the tattooing stops, but it should get you home when we're done."
She turned onto her side as asked, facing the far wall of the pavilion, and the prickling pain began again.
She left at sunset that night, and returned just before sunrise the next day.
She returned in the morning to complete the tattooing across her back, arriving as the sun had just begun to spill it's light over the grasses. It was the same procedure as before, the same table where she lay in wait of the prickling sensation of the needle. She imagined she could feel the ink soaking into her skin, filling her back with pigment that would remain there the rest of her life.
She was glad to have the reminder that no matter what her father wished, she was now a Drykas full, and he could not take that away from her.
First chimes, then bells passed. Rue dozed, never quite falling into a true sleep remaining mostly ignorant of the passing of time. So, more quickly than Rue expected Rei'anta spoke to her, touching lightly on her unmarked left shoulder.
"It's finished." There was pride in her voice, and surely in her hands as well, but Rue could not see them, "If you would like to see it.." The older woman offered Rue a sheet and gestured to the mirror that stood in the back of the pavilion. Ignoring the cover, Rue stood walking to the glossy shape that her reflection danced in. Staring out at her from the glass was a woman that looked so much different from the one she had been only days ago. She stood proud and strong despite the slight pallor that danced across her skin.
Windmarked. Proof of her bond peeked around her left hip curling up around her side where it disappeared around her back, reappearing where it cupped her right shoulder, branches sprawling over her shoulder and around her neck. That was the only part that may show in her clothing, peeking out of the collar of her shirt if the cut was right, but that didn't matter, because the marks were hers to bear as she wished.
She turned to view her back, the main piece of the tattooing, feeling a twinge at the stretching of her skin. No matter, because the sight was enough to chase away the thoughts of pain to come.
Sprawled across her back was the same twisting swirls that had covered the paper Rei'anta had shown her, this one more twisted as it curved across her back. The biggest difference though was the wolf that she had drawn on the page, alone and howling up into the branches of the tree. The curling patterns that shaped its form were cut through by it's partner, dancing playfully in front of the other.
A wolf and its partner. A girl and her horse. A Drykas and her Strider.
Gave you a Negotiation point for that moment with Wildfire. ;D Too Cute