[Open; Outside the City] A moment of clarity

[Sorian]

Sorian started to lumber forward when Kavala did, his massive hulking form overshadowing the fiery red sun in the seemingly reachable horizon looming over Sea of Grass. His heavy feet pressed into the soft grass delicately, even though he was well over 250 points in weight, and he said nothing as they traversed the landscape, their odd pairing casting an epic visage across the distant landscape. The direction they were heading to indeed startled him, as his azure eyes began to make out the shadow of Riverfall's massive natural land formations inching closer and closer in the midst of the illuminated fog. For a moment his steps grew even more cumbersome than before, a bit hesitant to move closer despite the apparent length which it would demand for them to reach the foot of its mountains. A gentle hum began to palpitate the air around him however, and he lurched forward as best he could, trying to keep up with the surprisingly sprightly Konti. He felt a shiver run down his strenuous spine when Kavala's gentle and soothing hands traced the muscles of his arm through its entire length, her delicate skin brushing a light warmth to his. In a moment of instinctive reaction, he slightly pulled it back, to which her hands slid down towards his open, cringing hand. It took him but a few seconds more to realize that she was not going to harm him, and he slowly let his arm descend back to his sides. The continuous soothing she heaped on him made his face contort with confusion, then settle down into a more relaxed mood; he did not know how to feel, nor did he know what to do. What he did know was it was such a tremendously comforting feeling for him, even though the manner of it might have been better suited for a creature of less sentience than he. The way she turned around to address him while in a loose embrace on his beastly arm solicited a wide-eyed reaction from him, and he looked down on the beautiful creature beside him with an awkwardly amicable gaze. There was usually nothing around him that could faze him, but there was something so striking about this Konti that made his cold lips twitch into a small smile once more, albeit it disappeared as soon as it came once the question had been brought to light. His eyes turned towards the pale gravity her own blue orbs emitted, and saw that she needed to the question more than she wanted it. "I... Lost... Someone dear to me." he mouthed, his eyes closing and his head bowing in an expression of ultimate sorrow. He seemed more like a wounded beast then than he had at any point during their short time together, and his teeth clenched together in bitter revulsion of what had happened to him, to this unknown woman he carried within his culled heart. His free hand reached up to grasp both sides of his eyes, then he lowered them slowly, his eyes looking up to the rising moon. A streak of blue ran down his eyes. "I realized the importance of my battle when I began to lose it, and I lost the battle when I lost her." he continued, as he kept walking with her towards what appeared to be a fence by a clearing in the growing darkness. It made him feel a bit more uncomfortable, because he truly did not know when the ambitiously evil being within him would spring out. But he relaxingly kept his poise and his manners as he spoke. "I knew that I had lost when I found myself... Running away, deep into the woods surrounding the great river. I felt horrible pain, pain as I had never felt, pain... It had been with me, serving as my constant companion ever since." Vague as his words were, they were all that he could muster for her at the moment, as the evil monster within him was trying to eke out an opening by carving up this long-hidden memory inside him. Still his inner struggle manifested only in a light shudder, one that Kavala would have felt if her hand was still attached to his arm. He hesitated again to follow her when she entered the clearing, as his more feral instincts distracted him when they caught sight of a majestic and powerful looking stallion galloping down their way. His muscles tensed in anticipation, and his powerful sharpened teeth bared themselves in a low guttural growl. But a sunny and musical laugh from Kavala stymied this development, and he soon found himself nodding in answer to her brief introduction of Wind to him, his legs striding slowly over the fence and into the Buckskin's territory. He felt no comfort when Wind started to trail them, and he moved forward more quickly, making sure its quiet movements did not make him revert back into a more unpleasant state. Two large gates soon came to view against, their rough hewn exterior standing proudly against the luminescence of the moonlight. The blue giant followed Kavala, only to be greeted by a large and courageous looking Ivaski, a growl shaping its lips into a toothy warning. Sorian's eyes sharpened, but he was not as anxious as he was earlier, and he merely let out a docile snort as he passed into the building's innards. His eyes carefully noted everything that is to be found there; construction tools, a fountain, a large circular pen. The sound of many animals filled his senses, but still, to his most pleasant surprise, he did not feel the need to take any of them for a meal. A large barn owl that rested on one of the parapets by the second story caught his attention, noticing that it had only one eye. He said nothing as Kavala introduced the place as Sanctuary, his head tilting with some train of thought. Perhaps the place could indeed be one for him, a sanctuary, though he highly doubted it. After all, casting off a hundred years' worth of self-doubt was no easy task for anyone, or anything. He followed her quietly into the building to the left, leading to a very large room with plain designs and little flavor. What unveiled before his eyes when she pushed back a large drape however, made them grow wide with remembrance. It was what a typical Akalak's habitation should look like, and it gently reminded him of the home he once had within Riverfall's steep rocks. He softly came back to a time when there was a gentler wind out to caress him, and when there were a lot more friendlier faces out to greet him. He could see clearly the faces he knew were long gone by now, especially hers. The hearth's empty furnace softened his gaze, making it lay back down onto the reality of his life: there had been nothing out for him but great tragedy and sorrow. He listened to her words with a feeling of rapture and regret, emotions which silently burned his heart with a desire to stay, yet he knew that he never could. He looked out at the open window, the blue moon casting a lonely feeling upon his form, and his next words revealed but a tiny fraction of the immense guilt he felt. If only his fate had been different, he would have been better able to find himself worthy of the treatment she had given him, and the kindness she had shown him. "I am... Not worthy enough to stay here, milady." he said, his eyes turning down towards the floors. "I thank you for your kindness, and I shall surely... try to harness my abilities to serve you in whatever capacity. I have not felt such kindness, not in an eternity of darkness. But I'm... Too dangerous to be kept around." A grieving bright blue tear ran down his scarred cheek. He had not felt so wanted and so unworthy at the same time as then. He mused over her last words, his towering form kneeling before her, his head bowed in another showcase of weakness. "I wish... I was worthy enough... To catch the tears that you shed in your heart. To soothe the pain that you carry inside you, and cast away the loneliness inside you. But I am not nearly good enough. If I had been like a stallion, or a wolf, I might have been. But I am so much less than they now. I am a beast, a monster. I cannot provide you with comfort or light. I'd like to stay, I'd like to so much. But like the song that you had sung for me... I cannot give up my pain. I cannot. And yet your kindness breaks my already broken heart." The trickles lapped down his chin, and fell on the floor, forming tiny puddles of sorrow that cast his reflection where they were supposed to be: downcast and downtrodden. "How can anyone save me now?" he asked out loud, his form trembling not with his inner demon, but with the unending pain he deeply regrets as an Akalak, as a sentient creature, as a being of thought and morality.

[Kavala]

He was different than anyone she'd ever met before. He wore his pain like a tangible thing, blanketed about him like a warm tormenting shroud. But there was also a strange openness to him, a startling window of haze he seemed to reach out and wipe at, removing the obscuring fog that surrounded his sentient soul. She wondered suddenly, as they walked, how often he spoke to another living thing that spoke back. It created a sort of kinship within her for him because she suspected it had been a long long time, not unlike her own situation.

When the Akalak revealed that it was a woman he'd lost, Kavala longed to ask him if it was a mother or perhaps a wife or lover. The Akalaks were strange creatures though, and she knew it wouldn't have been a sister or daughter, for such words were not even in their vocabulary. They rarely had wives, that she'd seen, and ever rarely were there children out and about. His grief seemed raw, as if whatever happened to him had happened either recently or was such a profound happening that it never quite left him. She touched his arm again when he shuddered, comfortingly, and walked on until they were home, saying nothing more.

The truth was, Kavala had no idea how to talk to him. She wasn't good with people normally, and even worse with men. They spoke back, made demands, pronounced judgments, and complicated her life in ways she rarely appreciated. It was one of the reason that although she was one of Rek'keli's healers, she healed only animals under normal circumstances.

When she showed him the room, vacant and unused, then pitched her offer, his reaction startled her. When he went down, kneeling before her, Kavala's azure gaze widened. She stepped forward, capturing his chin in her small hands and gently tilting his face upwards. Soft thumbs stroked the line of his cheeks, wiping away tears as she stepped closer, completely undone by the creature before her. She took a breath, then another, then stepped even closer, releasing his face with her hands which could not even begin to cover the strong structure there. She twisted his head gently sideways and pressed it against her stomach, stroking his hair, comfortingly. It was a motion a mother would perhaps make with a child who'd tumbled to his knees and had cried out at the indignity of it all. Only she wasn't his mother, and though a kinship of sorts was slowly growing between them, she could not label it friendship either. Not yet. Kavala made a soft soothing noise, letting her gentle calmness surround him. She smelled of pine shavings and fresh grass, and a hint of lavender beneath that, perhaps from what she used to cleans her skin. There was no soft flesh across her stomach though. It was taught and rigid, smooth only for the soft linen tunic she wore. She said nothing for the longest time, relying more on her touch than her voice to sooth him.

"It is not for you to make such judgments upon your own soul, Sorian, no matter what the reason. We are so blinded when it comes to our own fate and our own worth. Leave such decisions up to the Gods and those around you. I offered you a place to shelter within Sanctuary. You, among all the beasts here, at least deserve that much. I harbor Glassbeaks and Cyphrus wolves and Suvan Vultures with equal weight to their worth. I refuse, absolutely, to acknowledge that you have less a place or right in life than they." She said gently, her words soft and thoughtful, with a tinge of firmness to them.

"And you need care, whether you know it or not. A bath, then ends of your hair trimmed, something to eat that's not raw meat if your coloring isn't lying to me, and I think just a simple long bit of sleep. Promise me those things, Navis, just those little things... and then you can be on your way if its still what you want." She said gently, using the pavi word for fierce rather than his own name. "And I assure you, you cannot do anything to me that others have not already done. If they couldn't manage to take my soul and break me, whatever it is you fear doing is for naught, because even death offers no comfort or fear." She said firmly, a hint of something well concealed, within her voice. Anger perhaps? The konti stepped back then, went down on one knee, and met him in the eye.

"I would be tired, in your shoes, and take this rest as its offered. It does not have to be complicated... not at all. Put things aside, just for a moment in your very long life, and let yourself rest. I... can tell there's something inside you... something dangerous. I am not... blind to it. And I do fear it, as I should. But I still want you to stay." She said gently, slowly offering him a smile, a smile that spoke volumes about choices and him being on a precipice of one.

[Sorian]

The intense emotions that simmered in his heart was slowly grinding down the blue creature in Kavala's gaze, and the evil within him rejoiced, finally believing its time for retribution upon the meddlesome Konti who had cast a delay upon its' appointed time for supremacy had come. As it started emerging from the shadows in the form of darkening eyes and a fierce moment of trembling, the gentler Sorian's eyes flew open in thundering surprise, the pain--and indeed the mad one's escape--fleeting away at the feel of warm hands pressing against cold, stinging tears. An indescribable feeling washed through the powerful mass of blue, and his eyes remained transfixed in a quiet trance on a piece of space he had entrusted them to, which was now occupied by the lower half of Kavala's body. He found his gaze reaching slowly and gently more to the right, his cheek being laid to rest on something more tangible and comfortable. Sorian's arms flinched into tension, plunged into a tug-of-war battle between the two warring sides of his nature. His first instinct, the feral one, berated him savagely for allowing anything, let alone a potential prey touch his face. The second instinct was telling him to calm down and let her take him back to some distant fantasy he had never been to, the result of more amorous feelings that had laid buried away in limbo. His arms quivered on the floor as they lifted up from being weed-like, both sides of him wanting to push her away from him; one wanted to stun her permanently for an easier time with what he truly does best, the other to tell her to stay away for love of life and limb. But the gentleness around him was too overpowering, bordering on otherworldly, and it brought so much clarity back to his dimming sense of self. His massive arms, which had already reached up to level near her neck in confused absent mindedness, slid back down and closed up by her waist, encasing Kavala in a light, but sincere and unwavering embrace. Both of them said nothing for what seemed like an eternity, Kavala's comforting touch lapping every nervous moment at the back of Sorian's mind with a tinge of some fleeting paradisaical quality. He had thought earlier that he had an hour at the most before he succumbed to the calls of darkness, but time seemed to tick away so much more slowly then. All that could be heard against the peace of the night was the beating of two pained jewels that seemed to have found some small measure of peace near each other. He listened with no qualms to her words this time, letting each and every tone and syllable of her voice enter his remembrance, for within each was the promise of a redemption that he had so long given up on. Curses and screams of anguish had been the staple of his life, but tonight he had borne witness to what kindness life could met out, even to a creature such as he. He suddenly felt some spark of humanity flicker within him when she mentioned the glaring deficiencies of his life; a proper diet, a bath, sleep on a warm bed. How long has it been since he had even cared to groom himself before a mirror? Or when any sort of razor-sharp object that wasn't a sword, spear, arrow or claw had touched the thick, vine-like locks of his head? She called him Navis, and a thoughtful, yet puzzled look crept up to his face. Was this some sort of term of endearment? Maybe some term of insult he did not understand? Whatever it was was lost in the myriad of sad assurances that she heaped on him, for the hints of pain and sadness rung clear and true to his ears. The embrace he had wrapped around her pressed slightly tighter to her skin, hardening as if to tell her that despite his pathetic state of mind and perpetually hollow soul, he had finally found the courage to try a different thing: he was now determined to protect her. Perhaps, just maybe, in the process he could save himself too. As he let go of her when she knelt down, his hand settling on the floor near her entrenched legs, he realized another thing. Like any wounded animal had to return back to the wild, such an arrangement would be, must be, and will be temporary. He allowed her to stare straight into his eyes, the few drops of bright blue still wetting them giving them a luminous shine. She professed to know of his inhibitions, and admitted her fear of him, yet she said that she wanted him to stay. A great sigh of unknown kind escaped his lips; was it relief? Comfort? Sadness? Anger? Even he did not know. What he knew was that he found some small hope in her presence, and he found himself trying desperately to return her smile in kind. It came out as another curl up on one side of his mouth however, but he did try his best. "I will... Stay, milady." he softly whispered, finally making the choice she had. He looked straight on to her for directions, as if some toddler child in lost wonder as to what to do next. For he was indeed like a lost child, albeit one pleasurably lost in a friendlier world.

[Kavala]

She smiled gently, tired in her own right, though she was used to fighting battles with wild things that had incredibly strong wills. Normally she didn't win on the first round, and usually not on the second. Beasts were stubborn at best and the least one could do was keep asking until they gave in or let down their guard when nothing was forced upon them. Sorian was different. He was trapped in some in-between realm fighting a battle she could barely discern let alone understand. The pale woman's gentle fingers took his and she rose. She acknowledged the look in his eyes, well able to understand his gaze far better than his words. There was not much to say, not now, as she quietly lead him back out the door and into the starlit courtyard. Streamers of light floated down from the moon, unobstructed by clouds which put a brisk chill on the night. She paused at a stall in the corner near the entrance to the room she'd offered him and opened it, letting herself in for a moment and leaving him to wait. "I'll be just a moment." She promised.

There was a second door leading out to the pasture within. She opened that one as well, letting out a small soft whistle. An answering call rang out across the pasture and the same stallion that had been their silent escort moved like the wind fluttering golden curtains through the outer door. Feed was already laid out as she secured the stall's outside exit for the night. Sorian, of all of them, was well aware of the dangers and what could lurk in the night to prey on unsuspecting horses. She was back in an instant, leaving the stallion with only a gentle pat.

Then she rejoined the Akalak, taking his hand, and continuing on around the interior of the courtyard. Sorian could tell it would be a beautiful place when finished, though it did have the aura of being rundown and only recently re purposed and rediscovered. The stalls were new, constructed of old worskshops and divided unevenly though somewhat artistically. But it was not to another stall she took him. Instead, she trailed the front of the northern side and ended up in the corner across from where the stallions stall was. There was no doorway, only an alcove that lead to a deep stone pool that had a ledge in it for resting upon. Kavala paused, released his hand, and leaned forward to work the tap. Hot water began to spill from pipes that had seen better days, harnessed somewhere underground - like much of Riverfall - where hotsprings boiled water and heated things naturally.

Kavala turned then, offered him a guarded look, and began taking towels off a far shelf above a bench. She rested them against the lip of the pool and added too it a basket of jars that contained soap sand, a clear liquid that smelled of honey for the hair, and a vial of oil which she added to the water as it began to fill the overly large tub. The Konti moved with precision, wasting no movements and making it absolutely clear by her body language that this was not anything other than a bath. "Please... strip down and get in. I'll join you in a moment, but I need to find my trimming scissors." She said softly, departing then, giving him space from her and time and privacy. If he wanted to take his leave, he could do so easily, without facing her. Or , he could slide out of his clothing in privacy and into the tub. It looked luxurious, for all its run-down state. He'd note, if he took the time to look around, that while some things were new in the bathing chamber, there were also more plans on the walls... hand written notes in a small precise script that outlined the need for a wash stand - hopefully plumbed, a table for grooming, and a whole host of assorted other wish-list type things. In fact, there were signs of such things all over Sanctuary. Kavala was a note person, one desperately needing to make lists and categorize everything.

It would make someone wonder what category they were put in within her mind.

She was back in a few minutes, bare footed, her long hair captured in a braid and bound at the nape of her neck, wearing a short tunic that revealed a long expanse of leg. Silver sheers were clutched in her hand, and Sorian could tell she was planning not only to use them on him, but to get into the bath with him to do so.

[Sorian]

Sorian followed meekly as the Konti took his hand and led him back out into the crisp winter wind, the chills invigorating an otherwise spent soul. He looked at her with a keen eye, his senses alert in every front and aspect. The night was no time to be kind nor complacent, especially when it was about him. He took a sniff of the air, discerning whether there was any threat to it. Apart from some harbored glassbeaks in the vicinity--a smell he usually craves to kill--he found no trace of anything, and patiently waited as Kavala ushered her fine stallions into the stables. He took note of everything about him, and his imagination got rolling for a better purpose other than devising better ways to kill for the first time in a century. Everywhere around him was an open canvass, ready for the maker's hand. He looked down on his hardened palms, wondering whether he had any skill whatsoever for such an application. A rendition of a chuckle came out as a snort, a feeling of amusement manifesting itself in it, along with a fickle eyebrow raising up to nothing in particular. His eyes beheld the pool, another snort coming flaring from his nostrils, his mind fluttering as another century-old trend was about to meet a sudden end. As Kavala worked on the tap, he walked over and crouched down by the poolside, his eyes growing sad at the reflection that stared back at him. He shook his head in disappointment, musing over how much his looks had degenerated, even though there was still a handsome quality to it. A weathered and beaten person, body and soul. It was a rather stupefying fate for an Akalak. A shock came through his body and mind as Kavala told him to strip down. "Strip?" he repeated, his eyes wide open, with an intense feeling bobbing in his chest. He had been tinkering with the thought of him taking a bath, but here was this beautiful woman asking him to strip naked. He could tell from her body language that she was serious, and not into any sort of... mischief. But what was a man to think or feel, even one as detached from normalcy as he? He watched her leave to get her scissors, continuing to ponder on what he should do. Should he strip now and get into the pool while she was out? Or should he just get in without taking off his battered pants at all? He didn't have anything else to wear, and he was more than sure that she owned no clothing that could be suitable for a man, much less a massive one such as he. So with a hesitant sigh, he took off his pants and cast it by the side of the pool, walking into the water slowly and easing into place. It was big enough to accommodate a lot of people, and it left him wondering if Kavala used the place to bathe her animals too. The sound of rushing water cooled his senses, and the steam that flooded the place made his ripped muscles sweat intensely, the stench of several years ebbing away with the clean moisture. When Kavala came back in a few short minutes, Sorian's eyes, which were starting to drowse off in the comfort of the warm bath, flew open in shock when he beheld her in her attire, and he found himself unable to think, and feeling red all over. He quickly hosed down his line of sight, neither moving nor saying anything, and waited on what she was going to do next with every patient cell in his body.

[Kavala]

Sorian would have been correct in assuming the overly large tub was indeed the place she bathed her animals when they needed it. She also used it for hydrotherapy, for wounds often healed faster when animals could weightlessly flex damaged limbs in the guise of swimming - a skill she'd learned at the opal temple in her brief time on Mura. There was no shame in such things, for as the man would soon learn, Kavala was fastidious about hygiene. Dirt and grime was one opponent even she could do battle with and know with a certainty the outcome of the war. And so, because she was so focused about being clean, the tub had been spotless and devoid of hair, even though she was in the habit of indeed taking dogs, cats, the occasional water fowl, or worse within it.

She wondered, absently, if Sorian fell into the 'worse' category.

The Konti knelt, rested the scissors next to the basket of soaps, and added a small fingernail brush to it. Then she sighed, slipped off the tunic, and slid into the water before Sorian had a chance to relax more fully and decide to look around. Pale skin and glittering exotically patterned opalescent scales would flash in captured reflected light before the water swallowed the sight in darkness. The water and the fact that there was purposely very little light gave the girl some semblance of privacy as she gathered the soap sand and worked it into a lather in her hands. Kavala was by her very nature a quiet person, but animals were often afraid of the water and she found her voice soothed them. The topics she tended to speak about mattered little, so she she often just picked something and began filling the silence with gentle words designed to sooth.

"My mother was drawn to the plains for her Call when she was in her early years. Each Konti has one, you see. It's a driving sensation, an urge, that takes us away from Mura, our homeland, and casts us out into the world. It is not something we can refuse."

As she spoke, she gently urged him from his relaxed pose out into the center of the stone tub to stand with her. She gave him directions with her hands using gentle pressure until he was arranged before her, facing away from her. Then she began to work the soap into his neck and shoulders, down the length of his back, and across the expanse of his arms. She was very gentle, in a rough sort of way, scrubbing everywhere as if her actions alone could reveal darker flesh and wash away the sickly pale pallor he so comfortably wore.

"She met a Drykas man, an Ankal - leader - of a pavilion. He had an important destiny, and when she saw him she knew he was her Call. They married and though she was not his first wife as he had two others already, she was the one he cherished the most. The Denusk are of the Sapphire Clan, a proud Pavilion and family, but they've had their share of problems. They are all healers, especially of horses, though they've been in disfavor a long time. My mother, Ay'aka, was Called to teach the tribes a new way of doing things - of dealing with disease in horses. There was, twenty some years ago, a great plague among the herds and when the Denusk healers couldn't halt the deaths, they were found in disfavor." Kavala continued, moving on with her story.

By this time his back was clean, so too were his arms and the places beneath them. She moved lower, to his waist, and began on his buttocks, scrubbing and removing anything that didn't look like it belonged - including a lot of skin. Sorian quickly realized that there was nothing sacred as she business-like washed more intimate parts and moved down his legs. She could almost reach his ankles just by kneeling, though if she had to dip lower, it was no worry for her body was designed equally for the water as it was for the land.

By the time she moved to his front, every inch of him in the back was carefully cleaned, examined for wounds, and then for parasites. She found lots of old scars, which didn't surprise her, though parasites were lacking, which did surprise her a bit. And the whole while she kept talking, speaking absently of the people she came from, presumably leading up to why she was there.

Standing before him in waist deep water, she continued her tale. The konti were excellent swimmers and could see long distances both above and below water, but when it came to darkness they could not see as clearly as some of the other Mizaharian races. It did not occur to her that Sorian's vision would be as good at night as it was during the day, so she stood comfortably before him, presumably mostly concealed in the shadows of the unlit chamber. She started the whole process over again, this time gently washing his face as a beginning.

"Ay'aka brought the knowledge of curing plagues to the Grasslands. She taught the Denusk pavilion to take the blood of sick horses that had recovered and make it into a serum using the old ways that you could then give to the healthy horses that kept them from being sick. Only the Denusk healers know the secrets of how this is done. And the Ankal married the Konti to protect the secret." Kavala added, gathering more soap.

By this time his shoulders and chest were clean with gentle swipes of her cloth. His neck was thoroughly scrubbed, and she had moved lower to cleans his more intimate areas. There was an odd stillness in her as she did so, as if she was careful to maintain a balance between providing him a service and becoming too intimate. Kavala was well familiar with the male anatomy, for a season ago she'd had a rather violent introduction to it with humans.

But somehow, with Sorian's skin color being even a sickly blue, it was easier somehow to deal with touching the Akalak than it would have been touching a human male. She cared for Wind, her stallion, and part of that care involved awkward things as well. Kavala realized that Sorian should be well able to care for himself, in this instant, but for some reason it was important to her that she care for him, as if he himself was just as wounded as some of the creatures that came to her door. Touching him in this personal way, wiping away the film of dirt and neglect was more than symbolic, it was personal. She hadn't meant it to be, but the Konti were healers to their core - and she sought however inadvertently to heal herself. This simple act of stroking his skin with the washcloth was something akin to that. And though he might not realize it, Kavala was issuing forgiveness. In that simple act of bathing the creature that was so incredibly infused with his beast, she herself was reaching out to the dead men the Akalak raiding party had killed that day, and was in some small way forgiving them for what they'd done to her. And she was also forgiving Sorian, but not for some woman long gone he had harmed as those men had harmed her.

She forgave him for harming himself - for all the harsh words he'd ever said to himself for loosing his own personal battle and taking all the blame for everything upon his own shoulders. Certainly some of it belonged there, weighing him down, but certainly not all the pain and grief he put upon himself. And as she did so, her hands passed over the rest of him, without shyness until there was not a part of him left unwashed. She stood for a long time, in front of him, until she smiled suddenly, in the darkness, her story half forgotten.

"Well, don't just stand there. Sit down and give me your foot." She said, then laughed abruptly when she found a large foot placed in her hands as the Akalak reclined against the far wall of the tub. The abrupt weight staggered her and she almost dropped it, which brought mirth bubbling up past her lips. She could hold a Seme stallions great hoof in her hands and work a stone free, but the man's wiggling toes were her undoing. She compromised and left his heel propped up on her foreleg which was lifted and balanced on the seat within the tub, which allowed her to trim his nails neatly. Right then left, and his feet were done.

The story was picked up again as his nails were examined, scowled over, and then subsequently trimmed with the same clippers used on his toes. "I was not the first daughter of my Drykas father. My sister Akela was. She's a strange creature. If you ever meet her you will stare, for she's as beautiful with a blade as any warrior could hope for. She was my defender in all things, and I in turn her healer. I have a brother too... well half, who's older than us both by my father's first wife. He will inherit the pavilion one day. And he'll make a fine Ankal for the Denusk." She said, opening up more to him sudden, almost friendly. The coldness was melting off in leaps and bounds, and while he could tell she wasn't ever going to be truly talkative, she was attentive which was in some ways more important.

Kavala had him dunk his head in the bathwater, which was not so clean anymore, and then she poured a clean pitcher of warm water over his head before she settled behind him to begin to wash his long locks. Her fingers worked into his scalp, loosing any dirt and oil, gently caressing his long dark locks. He then heard about cousins, uncles, and most of rest of her tribe, each given a name and identity, a distinct personality including funny stories of the past, until Sorian could have been part of her family himself. One thing he hadn't heard about was why she was no longer with them. He could tell she loved them, for in her quiet way she lovingly revealed their strengths and yet celebrated their weaknesses as if they somehow completed her family members and made them real in ways perfect people could never be.

She paused too, long enough in her colorful descriptions of life on the sea of grass to let him add anything he might want of his own personal story, and gave him plenty of opportunity to talk about his own family without feeling pressured to do so. It was like the Konti somehow transformed herself and as a spider wove a web of peace and safety about the tub so that by the time she rinsed his hair a second time with fresh tap water, he was well able to lean back against her like he had in the grasslands, and for a moment she'd drape her arms gently around his neck and make a soothing noise deep in her throat, letting him simply relax.

She still had to cut his hair, and she'd do that in a moment when they both grew too restless in the stillness that never quite settled on busy people with too much ease. But for now she was content, sharing a moment of kinship, and hoping he felt the compassion and interconnection with all the wounded souls at Sanctuary too.

[Sorian]

Sorian kept on looking at his own watery reflection, feeling rather afraid to look at Kavala, despite his sharp peripheral vision catching sight of her sliding out of her short tunic. His thoughts, usually blank in the emptiness of his repertoire of things to think about, trailed away into another lucid feeling of comfort, the only sounds disturbing the calm being the sound of running water and the soft dip which Kavala caused when she entered the pool. Tiny waves rippled through the surface as she knelt behind him, the flash of the sharp scissors on her hand blinding his left eye momentarily. He had not expected Kavala to talk at all, half-expecting her to be just as embarrassed as he was, despite the fact that she moved with a professional's precision, or maybe more akin to that of a well-oiled machine. Another friendly story started to ring beautiful music to his perked-up ears, a deep breath of relaxation easing out of his mouth as he leaned to the side. He was about to ask her something, surprised at the willingness to converse that was welling up within his chest. Alas, he had to hold off the thought as the Konti immediately made it known that this posture of his was not to last, and he felt Kavala's hands pushing him to get up and wade to the middle of the pool. His body merely responded with obedience when Kavala ushered him on. The water reached only to the end of his bottom, and it left him in a far more revealing state than it would have Kavala, who was comfortably up to her waist area in water. His massive, heavily-built 6'9 frame faced away from the much smaller Konti, his eyes again catching notice of the luminous opalescent skin that she possessed, and it cast him into another tense feeling of uneasiness. His mind still savoring this train of thought, he let out a rather pleasured growl as she scrubbed away at the dirt and muck that had accumulated like a layer on his skin, feeling them as if they were dead skin being peeled off. The smell of soap and ointment filled his nostrils, and he closed his eyes, letting her do as she wished. He listened intently to Kavala’s history, answering her with a thoughtful sound on his throat with every pause she came to. His attention was most caught by the last words, as it gave him an idea of how old she is. Yet again he was about to ask her something about her mother, then something about her father’s nomadic tribe to assure her that he was listening, but the words drowned in his throat against the harsh, pleasurable scrubbing she was doing on his back. He felt it thoroughly trailing his neck, his shoulders, arms, all the way down to the waist, and his mind did not budge. When her lather-laden hands began to circle around his buttocks however, he flinched, his hand tensing, as if to debate on whether he should stop her. It felt intimate to him, this part of their little bonding session, yet as he peered down on her face as she worked—indeed she could see rather clearly in the dark, the result of many years in the deep woods around the Sea of Grass—that she had no trace of malice nor embarrassment on her, and he let her continue, his mouth drying up into a rather confused, perplexed line. She continued without pausing, going down his legs, his thighs, all the way down to his ankles, soaping every part of his body without neither loving care or perplexion. Another surge of tension filled his gaze, as he beheld the Konti before him, seemingly unfazed still, even though they were facing each other completely naked. He wanted to close his eyes, for the sight of all of her in total radiance divided his attention between the story of her origins and the tempestuous feelings starting to brew inside him, and he truly felt ashamed, not because he was totally exposed to her, but because he wanted to give her due respect by not making a fuss about it. While it felt casual and practical to Kavala, it was nothing short of new for Sorian, for he had not been familiar with the female anatomy, a stunning fact considering how much time he has lived already. She touched his face with the cloth, scrubbing it more gently than she had his backside. Sorian’s eyes looked up to the ceiling of the chamber, letting the darkness consume his sights so he would not behold her nakedness anymore and continuously disparage her dignity in his mind. He straightened his entire body, letting the muscles tighten as he stood there for her. He felt the cloth going down just as it had when she was behind him, down his neck, shoulders, his broad chest, all the way down to his muscle-loaded abdomen. Each corner of his body had been covered in soot and grime, but now the soap was making sure that nothing continued to feel sticky in his body, and for the first time in a long time he felt the true measure of the hotness and coolness of steam and winter air respectively. A barely stifled shout thundered in the caverns of his throat when he felt her cloth-covered hand placed on the one part which he had not expected it to go to. Despite her disturbing lack of care for their awkward situation, he had sincerely expected her to leave it undisturbed, for despite how they truly seemed to her, which would be creature and caretaker, he felt that it might be the start to what could be something more intimate, something more primitive and more natural. Something between a man and a woman. “Milady, I—“ he raised his voice in protest. It felt strong enough to deliver his message, but after waiting for a few dozen seconds for her to stop, she seemed to not have noticed, and continued to use the cloth in stroking his part. Despite the enormous amount of embarrassment he felt, it somewhat pleased him that he had not forgotten how to react normally to such a setting. His hands, which had raised wildly near her shoulders, dropped back quietly in submission, and it left him in a desperate attempt not to think too much about how intimate it truly was, for fear of making the problem grow bigger, all other meanings considered. He raised his eyes to the ceiling of the shadowy bath to shield them away from disturbing her in her task, which she was doing with amazing skill. It seemed to him as if there was a deeper meaning to her actions, though she hinted too little of it for him to be sure. He looked straight up and began focusing his eyes on darker areas, letting it slowly eat away at him, yet he strangely felt no trace of revolution on his other side’s behalf. Even more surprising, the darkness reminded him of many sad things: how many years he has lost to his personal battle, all the good things he could have had, the love and the woman he could have cherished in the century-like decades that had fleeted him by. As he reminisced on the folly of his life and the gifts he had lost, he found himself weeping again, though he quickly wiped them away as they began to trickle and mesh with the soap still on his face. A lighter voice began to break the convoluted feelings in his chest in a whim of a while, and he found himself momentarily looking down at Kavala with rapidly blinking eyes. Her face was straight and stern enough, but her hands placed on her waist in a matter-of-factly posture. An order for him to sit down and prop up a foot was calmly and casually done, and they both let out their versions of a laugh when she was nearly dragged down into the water by the weight of his size-20 heel. “Uhm. Nice catch.” He said with a small smile, not knowing if it came as a compliment to her or a bad joke, for the tone was flat and monotonous. She began to clean the in-betweens of his toes, which caused a tickling sensation he tried very hard to ignore, and they squiggled and squirmed as she picked them clean. He gave her his other foot in a slower manner, and within a few moments she was done with both. The air began to pervade with the quiet, and soon Kavala began to talk again about the other members of her family. Her sister and her brother, pictures of whom were drawn and imagined in his head according to what little he had seen of their clans and kind. “A warrior woman, a great Ankal, a strong father and three mothers.” He repeated in recall, his head nodding in his musings, which was broken suddenly when she thrust his head into the water and poured hot water on his hair. “Mrph—Wrph.“ he bubbled from the dirty water, some of which came into his mouth due to the suddenness of her attack, and he crossed his arms to his chest, giving out the playful impression that he was not at all pleased. Underneath the water however, he wore his simple smile He listened to the myriad of names dancing merrily on Kavala’s lips as they came one by one, names which she fondly spoke of, along with memories of many happier days in her formerly nomadic life living among her tribe. There was a sense of longing in her voice, the blue giant could tell this fact clearly, and as she left the last word on their fates and hers when they were still closely intertwined unsaid, he found himself wondering how much she was truly carrying within her. What happened? Why did she leave? Are they still alive? Will she ever see them again? So many questions proliferated in his mind, yet he found no strength nor will to ask them, for fear of a dejecting answer. A pause in her stories quieted the place again, and the sound of running water again regained dominance over the tiny sounds within the premises. Bubbling sounds, windy sounds, streaming sounds, they all mixed and gave a more comical and lighthearted tone to their momentary escape from all the social constraints which would have otherwise prevented them from being this close to each other. They were all drowned out soon enough by Sorian’s deep, rich voice spoke out, wanting to share something about himself too. “I was a strong warrior in Riverfall, a hunter of sorts.” He began, letting Kavala settle on her embrace around his neck, the touching of their bare skins together no longer fazing him as much as before. They came and went in brief moments, but he leaned closer to her, as if telling her without words that he wanted her to remain locked to him. “I used to be so acclaimed in our home city, and… Truth be told, they, the women, all fell in droves at my feet. I used to be such a beautiful creature, and all the other men were jealous of me.” He paused, his eyes looking down on his left arm, which he had raised from the depths of the pool, wondering if the generous bath had returned some of that beauty back to his image. “But despite my popularity… I had eyes for only one woman. Her name was Karnelia.” A flush of pain entered his heart at the mention of his long-gone first love, whose name he had not uttered in many, many years. He had blocked the image of her in his mind, not wanting the darkness to consume his memories of her too, and he had kept them away in a tiny portion of his heart. To him, it was the only place in the world where she continues to exist. He continued on, his voice noticeably sadder. “She was the only precious thing in the world to me, and I loved her fiercely. For many moons I contemplated on how to approach her, but I was afraid. And for good reason. She was notorious for being very choosy in her suitors.” His head, which now smelled of rich oil and fragrant soap, leaned back even more, his right hand finding its way to Kavala’s. How and why he did this was beyond even him, but the feeling behind it was unmistakable: he was lonely. It was a crushing, heartbreaking loneliness of a century’s worth. “Eventually we found our fates intertwined, for I had not known that I was in her sights as well until I did try to tell her how I felt. I was so happy… We were so happy.” his voice trailed off, even more sadness brewing inside him as he prepared to tell her the details behind his epic fall. “On the night of our wedding, the darkness took over. It—no, I killed her in the darkness. She didn’t even have time to scream, or maybe she just didn’t. But I saw it clearly in her face, that she was happy despite the fate I was meting out for her. She was happy to die in my arms.” Sorian began to sob again, his head bowing away from her, his entangled hair falling to cover his face. He had harbored this fact for so long that he had grown fond of being hunted down by the few Akalaks and bounty hunters who still know of his existence. He wanted to die, he wanted to suffer. But the beast inside him won, and it shielded him from their blades, and dipping him longer and longer into the burning furnace of his pain. But for the time being, in some merciful twist of fate, it remained dormant as he told this perfect stranger everything. Kavala’s soothing croons and embraces did much to calm him down, and in the greatest surprise of his life yet, he felt the pain melt away little by little, much like the soot, dirt and mud that his body had harbored for decades. “But… Maybe, just maybe, there is still hope to be forgiven. Perhaps I simply have to accept that fate is cruel, and I must find some way to save myself.” He lifted his face, his eyes in all their clear, azure blue turning to face her own sapphire irises. He could barely believe what he was feeling, for he felt in that brief moment of clarity, a peace he had all but forgotten. His right hand, which had been gently pressed to her embracing arm, raised slowly until it touched Kavala’s cheek, a real smile now blossoming in his icy blue lips. “Will you be there for me, as I try to fight this away, milady?”

[Kavala]

Sometimes it was easy to anticipate something happening - the end of a story, a dish being spilled from overfull hands, a meeting missed due to unexpected visitors dropping by. She even anticipated death sometimes, but only in the places where such things made sense, and those places only usually came along in stories and epic tales. They simply didn't happen, not so tragically, in the reality of life.

She should have felt sorrow for the woman she did not know. But instead Kavala's mind traveled back to that first night in captivity when the young girl had been dragged out of the wagon they were caged into and violated. The Konti had no way of knowing such things were routine for the men who partook of them, nor could she have predicted that moments later when the girls cries had angered something in her tormentor, he would so casually break her neck. It had shocked the Konti into a startled fog of shock that she decided much later had in many ways saved her during her own abuse. Had she not seen what she did, Kavala would have been more apt to fight back, and resistance was not tolerated. Her daze had earned her their scorn, for most of them had enjoyed the sport of what they did to the women far more than the act itself. And when the gentle Konti gave them no sport, they began to be quick about their business and leave her to herself. She thought perhaps it was the only way she'd survived.

His next words pulled her back abruptly to the present and she wondered if the woman was human or Konti or perhaps something else altogether. The Akalak race had no females and she knew it weighed heavy on their souls. Life was a hard enough burden without the added pressures and responsibility of keeping your race alive. Kavala knew that burden clearly, for there were no more Konti in the world than perhaps there were Akalak. But Sorians pain eclipsed that simple burden. His was guilt born of violence carried out through loss of control.

She thought about it for a long time, even as he continued to speak, wondering why the woman was happy as she died, betrayed by the one who had finally captured her heart. Love was like that... a bitter reality. Kavala's mother knew that well, and it was a lesson both her daughters understood. It was perhaps why Kavala had chosen such an isolated location and a profession that kept her in closer contact with the truly honest beasts, rather than in contact with the dishonest ones. Men tended to be in the later category.

"You say it's the darkness within you, but it sounds like its something altogether different. You started to say it killed her... before you assumed the responsibility completely. You already told me your people have a dual nature... Have you ever tried talking to him?" She started to say only to be interrupted by him twisting around to looki at her. She released him and raised her eyebrows a moment before looking thoughtful.

"It is never too late for forgiveness. It's never to late to try to retrieve the pieces of a broken life and put it back togeither. But you should not be asking me such questions... for if you would but look around, you'd know the answer. I brought you here to help you - to give you a place to take a break, think things through, and give yourself a moment in time to know things need doing. You should know the answer already. Yes. But I'm not sure anyone but you can really help yourself. You speak of terrifying things, Sorian. Things that are hard for an outsider to understand or accept. They are going to see blood on your hands. In some cases, that's all they will ever see." Kavala said gently, a tinge of worry crossing her features mixed with sadness.

And then she picked up her scissors, pushed his head back around and forward facing away from her, and began to trim. "First things first... clean and rested on the outside then you can start dealing with the inside. I will help you with what I can. But a war is a long drawn out thing. I have a feeling each day will bring battles... perhaps even each breath." She emphases the 'you' part too. But she wondered, in that instant, what the 'it' was. What happened sounded almost like a fit of jealous rage, not the blind evil and darkness Sorian kept speaking of. Why would Sorian himself be jealous of his new wife unless he was right about the Akalak being of two people. Truthfully Sorian wasn't the problem, in Kavala's mind... it was the other one, the one hiding in the darkness and harboring such strong feelings that caused such violence.

Eventually though, she'd have to talk to the darkness - an impossibly dangerous thing. But the only way to understand the darkness was to come face to face with it and determine its nature. It was a lot... a lot all at once. And so Kavala lost herself in the battle before her, trimming off the ends of Sorian's hair, neatening it up and making him look almost decent. Kavala sighed softly at the thought, preferring the imperfect to the beautiful.

[Sorian]

Sorian listened intently to everything Kavala was telling him, feeding her soothing words to the fire in his chest as if it were some source of life to him. He did not approve of everything she said, and the quick changing of his facial expressions hinted strongly at this. Thinking over her question on whether he had talked to his other side, he grit his teeth together and let out a growl of vehemence. He did not say anything, but it was clear that his reaction expounded more on it being a 'never' than it is a 'no.' His anger towards him--it--was just too strong. He shoved a great breath into his lungs and exhaled it slowly, letting his mind find peace once more. She was still there, serenading him with words of rationality, and indeed they were words that spoke veraciously of the facts of life. Nobody might be able to help him but himself. He has the blood of not merely one innocent, but those of many others, of all shapes, sizes and genders on his hands. Even Kavala's care and warmth can never erase that. During every split second that his eyes were able to lock with hers, he would try to search out something within her. Despite her pushing his gaze away, taking back to the chore of snipping and cutting his hair into something more appreciable, his eyes continued to search through the fresh image of it in his head. They were eyes that were whispering something deep to him, something like a wound that needs to be taken care of, yet is instead kept hidden away. There truly is more to her story than she is willing to share, and when she would speak of them he does not know. What he does know is that he needs to be patient, just as she had been with him. He listened to every snip and snap of her scissors, and calmly watched the thick locks of his mane fall piecemeal into the dark water. Perhaps there could be some sort of symbolism to this shedding of a very old look. Perhaps he could shed some of his own pain along with the hair, the mire and the grime of his years. His eyes trailed these as they drifted away to the distant end of the pool, and his head captured a very different picture within them. He pictured that he had put a small piece of his sorrows onto a small white boat, then pushing it into the grasp of the sea. He watched it drift away into the vast expanse of a great sea, never to come back. The wind carried it away slowly, until his eyes could see it no more. A slight pinch on his scalp shook him awake. He had fallen into a small nap, much to his amusement. He propped up his legs so they stick up from the waters, letting his arms rest on the cap of each knee as he waited for the Konti to finish. When Kavala had finished he felt like his head had lost more flesh than it had hair, for it was far lighter now. He quickly snapped his neck to the left, then to the right, letting the bones and muscles crackle with abnormal power, the tension releasing excellently. He then turned his face back to Kavala, a smile on his lips. "How do I look?" he asked, hoping the shedding had done to the original purpose.

[Kavala]

She actually thought he looked decent. Kavala hadn't taken any length off his hair, but instead had artfully removed the snarls, tangles, and shaggy ends so that it fell nicely in the thick full way an Akalak's hair could grow. And it was actually longer than she suspected, once thoroughly clean. The scissors were relaxing to her, though she was no hair dresser. The Konti was well aware of his piercing eyes catching her gaze occasionally, and the slight raise of his eyebrows ( which she'd thinned out a bit as well) that showed he didn't completely agree with her on everything. He was also intuitive. She could tell immediately, for meeting his gaze was like having him ask questions she wasn't prepared to answer. Not yet. That he was focusing on her... questioning her... thinking about what she said and whether or not he agreed... to Kavala that was an excellent sign. An argumentative curious male was a thinking reasoning creature... which was the whole point, was it not? A defeated soul questioned and cared about nothing.

She laid the scissors aside, pulled the plug on the tub to let it drain out through pipping that lead the compost pile, and then turned on the tap so that she could refill the pitcher and rinse both of them once the dirty water was completely drained from the tub. She was careful to wash all the clippings off of him. He was handed a fluffy towel as the Konti exited the tub, toweled herself off, and slipped on the tunic again.

"I need to get you some linens so you don't have to simply sleep on the mattress tonight... but will you join me at the table in the courtyard for something to eat in a few minutes? I have a warm rabbit stew and there should be fresh bread left so we can dine. There's cider in the flask on the table and water in the pump. You can find a wooden mug in the small sideboard off the back door of the clinic." The Konti said, then moved to a wardrobe off to the side - the same one where she'd retrieved the towels - and pulled out a large unadorned tunic. It looked very much like the one she wore. "Before this place is what it is now, it was a workshop. They left clothing here, though I had to clean and mend it. It's worn but clean." She said, handing him the tunic after he got out. It looked about his size, though it was designed more for summer than winter. "There's a horse blanket you can borrow if your cold while we eat. There's really no other place to break fast here yet." She said gently. "I... I am... used to just snatching bites as I've been working." The Konti said gently.

She left him then, letting him dress and regather himself, while she delivered linens to his bed and made it up. Then she returned, dishing up bowls of rabbit stew that she'd left heating over her hearth in the clinic. She brought them out to a simple wooden table along with bread to create a meal for them. It wasn't much of a kitchen, the one upstairs was a bit better, but she wasn't sure she was ready to invite him into her own quarters, even if it was just over a meal.

The bowl she placed before him was overly large, and while the stew hadn't had time to get steaming hot, it was warm and nourishing filled with a lot of vegetables and chunks of rabbit. It was only after they'd settled, each done with their own little chores, did she speak again. Kavala was miserably inept at dealing with people. Animals were easier, and though she knew she should have said something to him about the murder he'd preformed, the loss of his life's love, and being lost since... she knew nothing she'd say would change things for him or ease his pain. How could it? The past was the past, but it was a tangible thing. And she had a feeling it would never quite leave either of them.

"Does... it get any better? Over time I mean.. The past feels like it could haunt a person forever." She admitted, saying what she was thinking for once, without realizing she'd spoke aloud. Dipping her spoon and taking a bite of the stew, the konti grimaced a bit. Kavala was hungry, far hungrier than she'd anticipated, so the stew was a welcome addition to her stomach, though truthfully she was not much of a cook. The bread would be better. She ate quietly, breaking off some of the bread she'd brought along with the stew, and chewed it carefully. Swallowing, she glanced at him across the simple wooden table. She'd put on a cloak when she'd been in the clinic to keep warm outside.

Sorian would realize something immediately, the moment he tried the stew in fact, if he decided to join her... she was no cook. There was a good reason she was a small little thing. While it was nourishing, it lacked the touch of someone trained in the kitchen. And while she frowned down at her own bowl, she looked up and met his gaze, a rueful smile playing across her lips. "I'm sorry. I know its not the best..."

The silence stretched on after that... for a few heartbeats then well into chimes. Kavala felt his questions, even though he'd not asked, and because he'd shared so much of himself with her, he had a right in her mind to know whom he was taking shelter with.

"My mother died abruptly. It happens, sometimes, on the Grass. It was a fall from a horse that broke her neck. It was a shaming thing for the Denusk, for it means the spirit of the horse chose not to guard her, even after all she'd done to bring an end to the illnesses there." Kavala said. "It was hard, living on the Grass then, a constant reminded to have a pale face when all your other relatives have bronze skin. I went back to Mura to study at the Opal Temple for a while... I decided to come back this Fall. I missed my family and life among horses. Mura is an island, and Wind was terribly unhappy there." The Konti said softly, pushing stew around her bowl now.

"I was on my way back when I took Wind down a dry gully, a good trail from the looks of it, and there was a tripwire halfway down. They normally break horses legs and are used to trip up the lead mare on wild herds so the herd looses its leader and gets confused and thus easier to catch. Wind went down and I was flung from his back. I woke up in a cage, thinking he was laying out on the grass with a broken leg. They were slavers... headed to the Zith to sell women. I learned later that they always trapped the area around their camps just in case they had visitors unexpectedly." Kavala said softly, looking thoughtful. She managed one more bite of her stew before she picked the story back up.

"I was scared, but I didn't really understand how bad it would be until I was fully awake and they noticed. It could have been worse, I suppose, because they had already used me while I was still unconscious. I just thought the pain and all the bruises were from the fall. I didn't realize the blood on me was from different things. I was with them for two weeks. It was... brutal. I learned all the ways men take their pleasure and how to give it. I knew every inch of all seven of them, and they knew every intimate detail of me. They gave us almost no food, only a little water and bread, and stopped as often as their urges struck. There wasn't a single inch of me that wasn't tainted by them, twisted, used, and repeatedly discarded. Ruined." She said softly, pushing more stew around her wooden bowl until she swallowed another bite.

"An Akalak raiding party found us, but not before many of the women were dead. They had Wind with them. I was still alive, if you could call it that. I think they went easier on me a bit because I was Konti... so they didn't give in to their urges of strangling. One of them loved to do that." Kavala said softly, then looked up at Sorian, meeting his gaze with haunted eyes.

"I can't ever go home now. Not with mother's death and not with what happened. The shame would be too much for my family. So I'm going to stay here and repay my debt to the Akalak... a life debt. One will eventually come ask me to bear a child for them, even though every single male in the city knows how I came to be here and the circumstances surrounding my arrival. One or two have already dropped by curious, but so far none have asked. It's only a matter of time. I think they want to make sure I'm not crazy or have picked up a disease from the slavers that would harm a child. They are waiting to see if my waist thickens from my time with the slavers so they can be sure my body is still available for use. I understand that. I'd worry myself in their place. I know it is the way things are done here. And I will agree to it because its owed them. A child is a very low price for a life, right?" Kavala said softly, her eyes overly bright. She never cried though, not ever, so no tears slipped down her cheeks. But Sorian could feel her pain.

"There has been many times I have thought death would be a kindness. Do you see, Navis, why I am not so afraid of you?" She said, finally meeting his gaze boldly.