Welcoming the Newcomers (Lilu)

[StarFyre]

“He sounds like a handful,” Selesst spoke as they walked. “It must be interesting to keep track of him all the time.”

The hallway itself was relatively straight, curving slightly to the left, massive doorways along the hallway at even intervals, with the occasional, human-sized door interspersed among them. Not far from the room they had been in, another, slightly smaller hallway branched off on the right, more doorways – smaller than the ones in the main hallway – on either side of the hallway, alternating sides.

---

His fingers encountered different styles of book-binding – the smooth hardness of polished and carefully crafted wood; leather of different styles and thicknesses, some cracked and worn, others carefully oiled and cared for, some butter soft, others thick and rigid enough to be like stone; as well as cloth of various weaves, usually with an internal core of some sort around which the cloth was sewn. Many of the leather-bound books had titles embossed on them, in gold or silver leaf. The wood-bound books had their titles carved and stained into them, while the cloth-bound books were split between having their titles painted on or actually stitched into the weave itself.

The ones at Kalju’s level were relatively well taken care of, many with their titles still intact, though some were starting to show flaking and fading. Above his head, the books began looking more faded, more ragged and ancient looking. One or two at about his head height showed signs of fire damage, their covers blackened and damaged, streaks of soot marring the titles.

The titles themselves, or at least the ones in a language Kalju could read, covered a variety of topics. A handful had esoteric topics like Theory of the Layers, On Magic and Its Source, Telepathy and Teleportation: Overlap of Mind and Body, Alternate Universes and the Paths We Could Have Taken, and The Variance Between Knowledge and Belief: Energy VS Magic. Others were more normal, though some of the titles contained words that were obviously from other languages, or described races and people Kalju knew nothing about, such as An Introduction to the Migarials, An Extended Study of the A’vredon Lineage and History which consisted of three massive volumes, bound in black leather with bright silver leaf, Evolution in Parallel on Multiple Worlds: Mere Coincidence or a Sign?, The Blood Rose and the Celestial Covenant, Lighter Than Air: A Discussion on the Advances of Flight in History, Lyreleent: The Untouchable Country, and Politics and Persecutions: The How and Why Things Became Unacceptable on Rothkalia. Yet other books were mind-numbingly ordinary – a book proclaiming to be the only book on biology that a dabbler would ever need, several texts on physics and mechanical properties, several that looked to be nothing more than fantasy books, an annotated book on musical theory, and so on. One section was exclusively dedicated to historical conflicts, based on the titles of the books that were such things as Defense of the A’vredon Lands: Why Avreda and Lyreleent Never Fell, Riding the Dragon: When the Mother Betrayed Us, The War of the Ocean, and At War With the Gods: The Final Days of the Reign of Immortals.

[Guest]

"Mmm," he said noncomitally. "He usually leaves inadvertant hints - what he's reading, what he's working on... I always worry he's going to run across the wrong kinds of people." He paused to glance at Krethae. "Not all among my people would be so gracious when dealing with our young." He walked passed the smaller hallway, then stopped, and took a few steps back to stare up at it. Something different. "What's this hall?" he asked as he started walking down the new hall.

--

Kalju stared at the books for a long moment, then grabbed the titles that seemed immediately of interest. Variance Between Knowledge and Belief. Lyreleent: Untouchable Country, Politics and Persecutions for certain, things that sounded not like straight history, but things that were obviously necessary or inherantly interesting.

And then his eyes drifted upwards towards the more mangled books on the shelves above. Older texts were inherantly closer to the source and therefore often right.

He reached up with gentle, delicate hands and pulled one of the most pitiful-looking texts. His hands worked towards the binding, itching carefully, gently, as his knees wobbled out from beneath him, eyes drinking what words he could glean, breathing deeply, smelling the ancient pages and cover, breathing the cold, earthy scent of books. He closed his eyes for a moment, smiling quietly as he sank down to rest his back against the shelf.

He tried to determine the title in the dimness, the state of the binding, how gentle he needed to be with it before going anywhere near opening it.

[StarFyre]

Selverat doubled back when he realized that Spyridon had backtracked and begun heading into a side corridor. He glanced up at the symbols engraved on the wall above his eye level before replying to the question, “This would be a residence hall, housing quite of a few of the non-Myrsilkain residents.”

Krethae nodded, “Mixed quarters, here. The female wing is further that way,” she gestured in the direction they had been walking, then turned and pointed in the opposite direction, “And the male wing is back that way.”

Kerkael, for his part, settled to one side of the smaller hallway and contented himself to wait and watch.

---

The book showed signs of multiple mishaps in its lifetime. The cover and pages were slightly warped, signs of water damage visible in the discolorations that decorated it. The back cover was blackened and soot streaked, with small holes burned through it, possibly from someone actively attempting to destroy it. Despite all that, it looked well taken care of, the spine supple enough to open without cracking, and the pages preserved somehow to keep them from turning to dust at a breath.

The title was simple, Solemnity, it said, in graceful lettering. The word looked like it had been hand drawn on the cover, and there were no other markings visible. A journal, perhaps, or at least something of some definite value to someone at some point, based on the finely tanned leather that it was bound in, and the graceful, hand drawn lettering of the title.

[Guest]

"Hopefully he hasn't walked in on anyone and upset them," Spyridon mused, glancing between the doors as they walked, looking for one likely to be entered. Not a closed one. Absolutely not. It interrupted the kid's flow or something. Probably not one with the lights on, either. When he got to wandering, he usually knew better than to go somewhere where people would likely send him away.

Then his eyes fell on the darkened door, and he wanted to weep for the possibility of relief. He didn't. He drew a deep breath and swallowed it down. But he wanted to. He nodded towards it and forced his voice to work. "The dark one," he said. "I'd lay odds." He turned to Selverat. "May we go in and see? He won't come out even if we call him, especially if he's found something to interest him."

--

Kalju opened the book gently, despite the well-cared-for binding. Things obviously old and worn deserved to be handled with care and reverence. He opened the pages to somewhere near the early middle and found the nearest start of a paragraph and started reading.

[StarFyre]

((Sorry about that ^^;; I think I've finally gotten mostly on top of my classwork and the like again. Wee.))

Selverat glanced at where Spyridon had indicated, then sighed, stepping slightly to one side and gesturing for Krethae to go first. “Figures he’d find our resident Night Mage. Kreth, you get along with Lesara better…”

With a snort, Krethae moved forward, hesitated a moment at the doorway, then shrugged her wings and moved forward, speaking softly, “Lesara? We don’t mean to be a bother, but we believe the boy we’re searching for might be here in your rooms…”

Outside, Selesst crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against the wall to one side of the door. Anticipating the questions Spyridon would likely have, he began to explain when it was obvious that Selverat would say nothing more. “Lesara and I share the same world as our home… she could actually be considered one of my ancestors, if you want to be precise about it.”

“Don’t think too hard,” Selverat muttered, “Evidence of Timing it. Lesara’s not much older than twenty-five or so, much younger than the Armsmaster here.”

Selesst shot a glare at Selverat, then continued, “She’s a royal from a country that was destroyed several centuries before my country came into existence. They were known for their love of knowledge, their willingness to work with their subjects, and the mixed blessing and curse that would strike one member every generation. That member would be unable to face the day, the sun a curse that would burn their skin, blind their eyes… but in return, they could summon and control powers that others of their family couldn’t touch.”

“I’d more call it albinism with benefits,” Selverat chimed in, “They exhibit all the signs of it.”

---

The pages were thin and supple in Kalju’s fingers, the water damage minimal at this point in the book. The pages were filled with more of the delicate, graceful script, and dated in the upper outside corner.

In the tradition of my people, I have stepped down now that I am no longer eligible to hold the twin thrones, my own twin destroyed by my carelessness. My own life I owe to the very man I abhor, Emperor Yuvigon Ashatol of the Nakria Empire.

The thought leaves a sour taste in my mouth.

I do not know why, precisely, he tore me from the death-will I had entered to follow my twin..

Here a blotch covers the end of the line, as if the quill was left resting on the page for a long time.

No. For those who may follow, and for my own peace of mind, I must be honest. I do know why he did what he did, why he cursed me to this half-life I now live.

He loves me.

Let the reader acknowledge that the High Lord of Avreda and the Emperor of Nakria, leaders of countries that have been mortal enemies since their inception, have, in their journey together, fallen in love. Let the reader acknowledge that this was instigated by the bloodbond the gods forced upon us that I cannot, no, will not renege upon -- for to do so will kill him and leave me empty inside. Let the reader acknowledge that hate and love are separated by only a thin line. To hate is to care. To love is to care.

In the death-dreams I saw, before Yuvigon pulled me from Death’s claws, I saw the end of an era. Yuvigon stepping down, my cousins taking my place, Yuvigon’s cousin taking his, meeting in peace and good will. I saw the centuries long war ending, peace coming, our people mingling in ease and confidence.

As for myself, I have no more purpose here in Avreda. I am an oddity – a twin without his twin, a loose thread that no one can pull from the tapestry of life. The gazes of my family convey this, wary, waiting for me to go insane, to kill myself to follow my brother. I will go north, to the mountains we call World’s End. Vague legends of our past hint that Vredon came from those mountains, when every other nation in the world claims that no one lives there.

If I can no longer be High Lord, then I will follow my other passion and head north for research.

[Guest]

((That's alright! School always comes first. For my part, NaNoWriMo ate my soul, so you get posts only after I've finished my night's quota. XD))

"There are worse things," Spyridon admitted. "It could be porphyria instead." He furrowed his brow and glanced between Selesst and the darkened room, wondering why but not ready to voice the concern that everyone seemed to be walking on eggshells suddenly. "But I take it it's not a hereditary condition, if there's a possibility she's an ancestor?"

--

Kalju could read books for days on any given subject once he'd started ((and for that reason will accept and excuse if the pages do not have actual texts to be written out XD)), and this one was no less fascinating than any other. Indeed, written as a journalistic account of the ending of a regime (torrid love affairs were way down at the bottom for his reasons to pick up a book) and the beginning of scientific research in a culture he did not yet grasp nor understand, he turned the page and continued reading on, not hearing any of the words from outside, as he was too absorbed in his reading to hear any actual words spoken to him.

[StarFyre]

((^^ Same here, on the NaNo bit. Haven't been keeping my quota lately, need to catch up. Need to keep reminding myself that writing is good, and revision comes later, not right now, so long as I'm satisfied with the major points I'm hitting. And, uh... sorry about the reeeeaaaally long bit for Kalju, but, uh... that's actually part of the history of my world (though AU, because it's dealing with humans, instead of the Ashia and Andu as they actually are in my books), so I tend to ramble a bit when given the opportunity...))

“It’s been bred out of the line,” Selesst shrugged, “To an extent at least.” He lifted a lock of his hair and indicated the silver tips, “Odd as this may seem, this is part of the heritage that remains. My sister’s hair was silver from the moment she was born. We don’t suffer from the pale skin anymore, but other features show up on occasion.”

“Of course, you Lyrelians set out to destroy that heritage as swiftly as possible,” came a frosty voice from the room, as Krethae swiftly stepped aside to make way for the speaker. “After thirty thousand years of careful breeding, you mercenaries decide to make our shattered country your home, and destroyed what remained of our work. You lost more than the skin tone and eye color when you did that, and would probably not be in the straits you are in now if you had not.” She stopped several paces shy of the lighted hallway, her blue-violet eyes glowing with reflected light, skin a deathly, ice pale color, a book held in one hand. She ran her gaze across the small group, then focused solely on Spyridon.

“You must be the mentor of the child. You feel alike.” Her lips quirked upwards in slight amusement, eyes glittering with some hidden emotion. “A child after my own heart.”

---

The account continued, describing briefly first the trek the author took to reach the mountains he was heading for, then finally the arrival, the discovery of signs of life, the careful hunting down of the natives.

I have seen four distinct tribes living in this area, though I have yet to ascertain exactly where the fourth lives, for I only ever see them patrolling through the villages of the other three. I believe they live somewhere in the high reaches of the mountains that surround this valley I have taken refuge in, for while the other three tribes live on the slopes, they never travel past the snow line, nor do they enter the forest that covers this valley, though I believe that is from superstition more than anything.

The three tribes whose villages I have found are akin to one another – darker skin, brown or black hair, possessed of various skills that many I know would be shocked to find in ‘barbarian settlements.’ These men and women wear well woven cloth, fashion boots of leather that would shame any shoemaker, live in well built shelters, and cover near every surface with sophisticated carvings.

It appears that men and women share equally in the tasks, men doing as much of the craft work as women, and many times I have run across a hunting party of women, or a mixed gender party. This puts the stance my country took on gender roles in a new light. If we truly came from people like these, then our declaration that men and women were equal was nothing strange, despite the claims of other countries around us.

The members of the fourth tribe that I have seen about are different, though. While the patrols are also made of equal male and female members, these people are clad in cloth and leather and furs, with weapons at their side at all times, creating a truly barbaric appearance. Their hair is silver-white, like snow in the sun, and their skin pale. Truly, the only color upon them is their clothing, chosen, in my mind, to give them some camouflage in the forested lands they patrol.

It continues in the same vein for a time, as the author slowly works his way closer to the tribes. He carefully notes down every quirk he can find about their society and lives – one he makes a big deal about is their religion… or, rather, their apparent lack of it.

He notes that the four tribes seem to worship various animal totems, instead of acknowledging the collective gods that dominate and meddle in the affairs of everyone to the south of the mountains. He also notes that the four tribes seem… different because of it. Closer to the nature that surrounds them.

As the journal goes on, little clues from his writing hint that he, too, is beginning to mimic the tribesmen in their worship, unconscious of the change in himself, and even beginning to believe in it.

[Guest]

((Oh, I don't /mind/ the long bits. XD I just wanted to save you from writing them if you don't want to. If you do want to, go for it! <3 I am quite enjoying it. ! ... o_O except Kalju evidently will be coming back to that if he has any say. *FACEPALM* ))

Spyridon felt suddenly singled out in receiving the only smile out of the ... Night Mage, had she been called? He could see why, now, Selverat had remarked it was more albinism. Porphyria rarely gave that very distinct coloration. He waved his hand tightly to his body in a very uncertain manner.

"I take it he hasn't been troubling you?" he asked hopefully, not that Kalju usually bothered people in the very intentional way of many his age. Instead, he tended to stand in the middle of something important or wander off with a very necessary part of their research to better understand it in depth at a more appropriate location for him.

Spyridon knew well enough from his own experiance with the tetchy types that poured through the scholar's hall that, well, it was better to let her decide just what they were and weren't allowed to do. As in, do not invite yourself into her quarters at all to look for the kid. No wonder everyone seemed to be walking on eggshells when he picked this door.

--

Kalju was still blissfully unaware of the conversation outside. Religion was never something that fascinated him, being that theirs he took to be as a facade, obviously a portion of the ruling class best suited for control through fear. He assumed every religion to be as such, but the narrator of this journal seemed to be quite certain that these southern gods were meddlesome creatures that many may have seen, if he was reading this correctly, and the northern totems were not so much gods as forces seeking appeasement.

The social barriers broken, on the other hand, were fascinating for him. Women and men had been nigh-equals for a long time before the fog, but after, women were largely relegated to their child-bearing roles from what one text book commonly referred to as the dark ages.

It was strange to him, then, that either view was considered 'enlightened'. Obviously women had one advantage over men, and thus were not often slated to the dangerous jobs of surface work or digging, but that trait of childbearing alone ought not delegate them as a protected member of the society, either.

He furrowed his brow at the book, rereading the bits about the social equity, trying to figure out just where he stood on some of these issues. They were not available for debate back in the Mountain's Den System, and as such, he was not well-inclined to debate them, but this paragraph had challenged him, led him off on a tangent, and he left the book open to the page it was on, wandered it over to the nearest chair or table, and set it there so as not to damage it while he returned his attention to the bookshelf in search of a book on gender studies and equality. There seemed to be a bit of everything else here, why find it strange to expect some of that as well?

[StarFyre]

“Hardly.” Her lips quirked in a small smile again. “By the time I noticed him in the room, he was already settled against the bookcase, reading the journal of my ancestor. He knows quite well how to treat ancient books.” She swept her gaze over the four again, considering them for another few moments, saying nothing.

A few strained heartbeats later, she gave another of her small smiles, directed at no one specific this time, and stepped aside, gesturing for the four to enter if they wished. “Selverat, you are excused if you wish – I know you cannot see well in the light I prefer, and the room has been rearranged since you last ventured in.”

For a moment, Selverat wavered, obviously tempted by her offer. Eventually, though, he extended his hand with a sigh and a barely concealed shudder. “No, milady. If you would be so kind as to guide me…”

With no sign of mocking or ridicule, she accepted his hand and placed it on her arm gently, “You are a brave man. I promise you, we go no deeper than the sitting room.” At Selverat’s nod, she turned to look at Spyridon. “Your pupil seems to have no trouble with my choice of lighting. Yourself?”

---

Kalju’s search was rewarded quickly, with a slender, well kept volume named Gender Roles Through Time.

Opening to a random section, Kalju would find the following:

Evidence points to the idea that this male dominance that has spread across the southern plains-lands is not the true way of our people, or our ancestors. In the ruling classes of the different countries, females can often be seen in roles that are ‘traditionally’ male roles.

For example, in the Empire of Nakria, many leaders on the battlefield are actually females, covered head to toe in heavy plate armor like their male counterparts, indistinguishable from men themselves. Though a female may never become the Emperor of Nakria, it is not uncommon that the war leader and the strategist would be female instead.

In the country of Avreda, gender appears to mean nothing to them. Their rulers, always a pair, and always twins, are named High Lord and Knight Captain no matter their gender, and to see a female pair upon the twin thrones is no more uncommon than to see a male pair. The titles of royals also do not differentiate between male and female. Liyu, which translates to Young Lord (the plural being liya), is assigned to any royal under the age of sixteen, male and female. Upon reaching majority, the titles becomes liryu (pl. lirya), or Lord, for both. Even their commoners share this lack of distinction between the genders, and there are many female hunters, builders, and leaders to balance out their male counterparts.

Research into the past indicates that even this complete equality is not the true way of our people. More than one scrap of text, wall carving, and burial contradict both the male dominance and the co-dominance that the Avreda people share.

It appears, based on evidence, that our people began as a female-dominant society. All war leaders, all rulers, anyone in a position of wealth and power that we discovered was female, up until a specific point in history.

At this point, a disease seems to have ravaged the population, especially the female population, and, for a time, males became ascendant, protecting and caring for the females that had previously done so for them. From this point, we can postulate that, in areas less devastated by the disease, females rose to ascendance once more over their male subjects, while in areas nearly stripped of their females, they never regained the strength to dominate the males and became what their males used to be – protected, second class citizens.

[Guest]

Spyridon inclined his head at the compliment but offered no word of explanation, since the conversation continued on without it.

When pressed on the lighting issue, however, he inclined his head slightly to the side. "We live in darkness lit by phosphorescence and torchlight the majority of the time. We're used to the far dimmer conditions, and your quarters would likely seem a welcome refuge to the comparatively harsh lights we've seen since ... " He chose his words carefully here, biting back his own annoyance and continuing on in the more pleasant tone the others still shared "--we arrived." He was ready to follow her in when she was ready to lead and welcome them.

--

Kalju considered this account thoughtfully for a long moment. Yes, he could feasibly extrapolate a point back in a culture where the females would be more highly valued than the men. In theory. But he was still well anchored in his own set of references. He hadn't needed to delve beyond them ever. Magister Pallmern would likely chide him for even bothering when it was their own world, their own people that more required their attention.

But this was so fascinating. So utterly captivating. So completely enthralling that he still didn't hear the people outside in the hall. Instead, he considered the words of this passage and returned to the original text, closing it, then opening it far closer to the beginning, in search of reference to this fabled plague. His hopes were not set highly, but there was always the possibility, was there not?

[StarFyre]

((You know, this post has actually been finished since about Nov 14. Goes to show how dead I was soon after that.))

Lesara’s eyes lit up with fascination at Spyridon’s words, but she said nothing as she gestured for them to enter, leading Selverat into the room with a courtier’s grace. She let him settle into a chair near her own, then indicated that the others could seat themselves if they wished as she resumed her own seat, where the coat and belt with the twin swords hung, and picked up the book that was on the table before her.

Krethae pulled the stool out from under the table to one side and settled on it, while Selesst stood to one side, arms over his chest. Though his posture conveyed nothing but calm confidence, one could easily guess that the Armsmaster felt uncomfortable in the room and presence of Lesara, the way his eyes kept flickering briefly to the open door.

“The boy is over there, by my desk and the bookshelves,” Lesara indicated the area in the back of the room with a flick of her hand. “I was wondering why he had no trouble reading in this light. You say that you and he come from a place where this level of light is common?”

--

Kalju had to skim through the text in order to find the references he was looking for. A paragraph made oblique note of it here, a sentence said “legends from the time of the plague say…” there, but nothing concrete. It was as if the entire society remembered the plague intimately, even though all evidence in the text pointed to the plague happening millennia upon millennia before the book was written, and the author felt no need to clarify his statements.

Finally though, a paragraph made more than oblique reference.

The memory of the People is long, and there has never been a catastrophe large enough to completely shatter our ties to our origins. Pieces may be forgotten by individuals, but we as a race recall. It is our nature, and one of the greatest curses the Starborn ever placed upon us. We know where we have been, what has been done to us, but we do not recall the shapers of our destiny, the heroes and leaders that guided us and became the Godborn. To that we must turn to written histories, and examine the holes and silences within the texts, read what has not been written.

Relying upon such fallible evidence rubs many of us raw, for we recall with preternatural clarity the hate that drove us from our more powerful brethren, from the dens we’d carved within the Mother’s body and out into the burning light of the sun. We recall the terror, the pain, the frozen, wide open spaces taking the place of the Mother’s warm embrace. We recall the joy as snow melted and ice receded, as green took the place of white, as we adapted to an environment we’d never seen before.

We recall the millennia of power. Tribes roaming the land, warring, merging, growing, fading, allying, betraying. And each of us, every single one of us who wish to acknowledge what we carry in our hearts, knows the glorious freedom that we as a race achieved.

And we recall the death of that era, our first upon the land.

It started in the far south, as a fever that left the sufferer weakened and worn to a gossamer thread, to die by the hand of things no more deadly than the common cold. But unlike most fevers, this struck without mercy, destroying those in the prime of their life before jumping to the elders and children. Entire tribes were decimated in a season.

The refugees were mainly men and young boys, for our females - those who led us, defended us, guided us in our travails through life – were more vulnerable than the men. And these refugees, in turn, brought the fever with them to new lands. And so it spread, reducing our population below what many of us believe was a sustainable level in many areas. In many areas, the ratio between females and males was as low as one female per every twenty males, when previously they were nearly equal in number.

The places hit the least were, strangely, those in the mountain regions, and here we encounter a blank wall within our racial memories.

We recall that there were tribes living in the mountains, even the deadly mountains in the far north we call World’s End, but after the disaster… nothing. As if all within those areas died, severed from the tree as soon as the plague began. And there we left it, as we of the plains and forests and deserts and hills recovered, pulling the wreck of our society free of the disaster that had struck us.

But there it did not leave us. Several centuries after the plague, when we were reclaiming our places in the world, explorers of the mountains, where we expected to find no one, found flourishing cities, tribes… entire cultures that had nothing to do with us or what we had created. Where we were barely reclaiming our past, they were thriving, living as we had forgotten how to, settled in cities carved into the very stone of the mountains, fertile valleys growing crops.

Our racial memories of the plague itself are few, clouded by the pain and suffering that all endured. Thus, we were left with memories of earlier times, and even those clouded vaguely by the wall of the fever, dulled further by the generations between us. We would remember – ah! So vaguely would we remember – a product, a tool, a way of working… but we would not recall the process to make the product, or what the tool was used for, or why we had to do things this way, and not that way.

They had lost nothing of themselves, and remained as we had once been, though we found that females and males were valued equally in their society, instead of one above the other. We knew in our hearts that our women used to rule us, and at times we would still defer to a strong willed woman, but during the plague our mindset changed. Women were to be protected. We could not let carelessness finish us off as the plague had not. And even long, long after the numbers of women and men had equalized, we retained that mindset, as we still do to this day.

[Guest]

((I don't mind the delay, and I'm glad you're feeling better enough to play again. As for me... My silly computer did not pick up on there being a post here for me. ^^; And so, when I went to write a recap of the hatching from Pallmern's standpoint and went to check a name, I was happily surprised. Hooray!))

Spyridon followed them in, waited tentatively as they sat themselves, glancing here and there for some hint of his wayward pupil. When given his location, he started towards it, then paused mid-step at the continued observations.

"Ah, yes, um, we live underground," he said, glancing over Lesara's desk to see the shorn scalp of his charge. As entertaining as this potential conversation topic could prove to be, however, he had more pressing issues in repremanding his student. "What would Magister Caldwell say if he caught you in his library?" he asked, keeping the irritation at a very schooled level in his voice.

Guilt-ridden eyes looked up at him in the dimness. "But Magister, these books, I've never seen, and--"

A finger jutted out from Pallmern's robes and his congenial nature fell to pieces as he glared down his pupil. "Go apologize for disturbing the nice woman then ask nicely if you may be allowed to continue reading," he instructed firmly.

Shamed but not cowed, Kalju stood, hugging the book tightly to his chest before scurrying over in a swirl of scholars' robes to stand before Lesara. "Sorry," he said lamely, and Spyridon mentally facepalmed. For all the smarts that kid had, sometimes the conversation bits he chose to utelize gave Spyridon a headache. "If I'm quiet, may I stay?"

He kept that completely disconnected look to him, and Spyridon swore the only time the kid's eyes were completly focused were when he was reading. Spyridon awaited the ruling, arms crossed over his chest, hoping no one thought he was being a bit of a heel about this. Something like this back home tended to raise temper tantrums from the other scholars or the prestigious interlopers who graced their hall. No sense changing how he dealt with these things just because they were surrounded by relative strangers.

[StarFyre]

((I look forward to reading the recap =P I like reading things like that!))

“Hmmm.” Lesara rested her chin on her fist, other hand spread over the book on her lap, to keep the pages from turning on their own. Her eyes swept over Kalju, then focused on the book he held. “Gender Roles? Hardly the lightest of reading in my collection. The author relies too much on racial memory for most of what he is saying to be very clear. The book went over well for our people because he uses specific key phrases throughout the work to conjure the correct racial memories… I can’t imagine what it would be like to read it without those memories.”

Her gaze flicked away then, without waiting for a reply from the boy, landing square on Selesst. A mocking smile tugged at the corner of her lips as the Armsmaster merely narrowed his eyes and met her gaze for gaze. The two remained like that for a few moments, silence stretching between them, the only movement the slow darkening of Selesst’s expression. Finally, with a smirk, Lesara looked back to Kalju. “You may remain. Your presence is no distraction to me – you remind me of a cousin of mine, truthfully.”

[Guest]

((^^;; I hope it holds enough water, honestly <3 I always worry about things that other people write being interpreted correctly. XD;; ))

Kalju's eyes widened and he drew a deep breath to explain just why exactly he'd chosen this book, but a glance from Magister Pallmern was enough to seize the words in his throat. He waited on pins and needles before the pale woman allowed him to remain for a time reading her books, at which point he promptly exploded towards Magister Pallmern.

"Magister! Magister, this is fascinating!" he chimed, the very necessity of relaying this knowledge to his superior eating at the very seams of him and demanding an exit. "Magister, look, these people, they're like ours once were, and then they became as ours are, and they say that women were once highly valued as war chiefs, and I've had to cross-reference over here, but this has gone to explain that things don't have to be the way they are and--"

"Kalju," Magister Pallmern said sharply, and his eyes drifted up to the general position of his face. He was smiling. Just a little. Not enough to relate that he was pleased by any of this.

"You may read," he said quietly, "and you may consider, but you may not speak a word of this, do you understand?"

Kalju considered the menace that his tone had very discretely left out but his words had carried well. He remembered several accounts of overzealous scholars seeking to uproot and to change and to alter what had lasted them several centuries. And he remembered the fates of these scholars, these radicals, these alleged madmen.

Demon-touched. All of them. Fed to the fires.

He was aware that that threat was far more realistic for him than it was for Magister Pallmern, and he grew silent and sullen almost immediately. Then, a small smile bloomed on his face. "Magister, I may not speak, but may I write?"

"Words to air are oft forgotten and hard to prove, Kalju," Magister Pallmern told him firmly but not unkindly. "Words to paper are more difficult to make disappear."

Kalju blinked for a long moment. He stared down at his inch of scholar's ink and frowned at it for a long moment. "But you've made it disappear. You made disappear the tapestry words."

Magister Pallmern gave him a very stern look. "I said no, didn't I?"

Kalju nodded sadly, then opened the book, and the sorrow vanished almost immediately. Old words challenged him to find sadness stored within them. He invariably found none, and wandered towards the shelf, flipping a page with silence and reverence, captivated by the text once more.

[StarFyre]

((I take no offense at other people's interpretations of what I've written, so don't worry =P ))

Lesara’s blue-violet eyes were fixed unblinkingly on Spyridon, a hard, thoughtful look on her face, but it was Selesst who spoke.

“Are your people that restrictive, that even asking questions about the ‘way things are’ is enough to brand a person as dangerous?” The Armsmaster shifted in his seat enough to look at the Magister, silver eyes catching and reflecting the light from the hallway, looking eerily like a colorless version of Lesara’s eyes. “No healthy society exists like that.”

As Kalju turns a page, he finds a note tucked neatly against the binding. On it, in delicate script, is written, “Kalju – if you wish it, find a free moment and visit me without your keeper hunting you down. I will speak with you and answer what questions you ask. – Lesarakel”

[Guest]

((THE BOOKS! MAGIC BOOKS! XD *joy* Also relief at occasional mistranslation non-stressishness))

Spyridon averted his eyes and collapsed into a chair. "No one said it was a healthy society," he admitted quietly. "It is what it is, and it is what we have. I am not such a one to combat the fog, the beasts, the men who own us. I know our ways to be less than ideal, but what shepherd am I if I lead my charge to his death?" He turned his gaze from the floor to the boy behind him. "He's very bright, but he's very dim at the same time. On a given day, he is this close to being charged as demon-touched, and such a call would feed him as fuel to the fires." He turned his gaze to the armsmaster defiantly. "What is safe here, it is not safe at home. And he does not well recognize the difference."

--

Kalju stared at the note curiously, blinked, and held it up, his mouth open to speak, but heard Magister Pallmern's tones shift to the quiet certainty that sometimes accompanied a lecture.

Which meant he was working. Which meant he'd have to tell him that the book knew his name later.

Weird that the book name and the note name didn't match, though. He stared at it with a tilt to his head for a long moment, then went back to reading.

((clearly, subtlety is beyond him. XD ))

[StarFyre]

((Complete and total LOL at Kalju's reaction to what Lesara did there. ^^ And gigglefit at my silly ethical mercenary/armsmaster. He's had such a terrible life, and yet he still wants to save others... while at the same time acting all "pft! whatever. I don't care about you."))

Selesst shook his head, sighing softly as he did. “You have a right to keep him alive, even if it means keeping him oppressed. But, what happens when he grows too old to be oppressed further? I’ve seen children like him before… protecting him only works for so long.”

“Don’t agonize over it, Selesst,” Lesara spoke softly. “You cannot save everyone, nor every world.”

“I don’t need reminders from you, Night Mage.” He growled, tilting his chin up slightly, rebuffing Lesara’s words with that gesture and the coldness inherent in his voice.

Lesara only smiled faintly, though, and shrugged. As prickly as her many-greats grandson pretended to be, he truly cared for others. It would have been a blessing in an A’vredon (after all, they ruled by compassion), but in a mercenary it was only a liability.

---

As Kalju set the note aside, the writing on it vanished, leaving a simple, blank piece of paper.

[Guest]

((Awwu, but Selesst /should/ be able to save every world! ... ... Yes, brain. In four years, we'll elect /him/ president of EVERYTHING, and he'll start with ours. Wtf. e_e; ))

Spyridon closed his eyes. "He's eleven," he said fiercely. "According to the ink on his wrist, he is an adult, but there is still so much child in him that I can get away with sheltering him. In time, he'll be out from under my control. He'll have initiates of his own to train. He ought to have them now, but he's not ready. It is my sincere desire to see the day he won't need me hovering over his shoulder. If the time comes when he must lead and he yet falters, then there is nothing more I will be able to do for him. At such time, protecting him further will attract attention from the governors and the priests, and we will both be to the fires."

He shook his head slowly, shaking off every niggling reminder that anyone ever made to him that he should have chosen to be a governor. "It is not a fate to which I would like to see his talents wasted, but to the end, I can not well ascribe a more certain future. At least with an edge of discipline instilled within him he has a chance to make his own way."

--

Kalju held the paper firmly under his thumb as he read the opposite page. Only a cursory glimpse made him notice that the delicate handwriting was gone from it. He stopped reading, let the book fall gently to his lap, then began to puzzle out the paper. He knew there had been words on it before. The words were gone now. Was his brain being mistrustful, or was the paper?

Paper was not often mistrustful. Only deliberately misleading. But this paper had had a name, and now was only blankness. What Magister Pallmern had said was true. There was no easy way to separate the mating of paper and words, and yet...?

He stared at it, half frightened, half horrified, and totally confused. Perhaps, he reasoned, it was secret paper. Their own ancients had such a thing long ago, paper that pretended it was not marked while certain actions would reveal its secret. Often, he recalled, heat would have some effect.

He held the paper in his cupped hands, and he breathed on it with as warm a breath as he could muster. Failing that, he'd rub it vigorously between his palms. This was something which he must puzzle out.

[StarFyre]

((Lesara should not be let near gullible, easily puzzled youngsters. There's more than one reason she's mostly left to herself...))

“Make enough excuses and you’ll eventually believe them yourself,” Selesst’s voice was flat, emotionless, “Deny responsibility enough and it eventually becomes not your own. So long as you can live with yourself, do as you will.” He rose, flicked his gaze over the rest of the group, then inclined his head slightly. “If you’ll excuse me, Chandye just reminded me that it’s nearly time for my session with Flikk and Vikktor.” Selesst gave a humorless smile, “Selverat, I expect to see you in the salle tonight. Perhaps by then I’ll be tired enough that you won’t seem so out of shape.”

Selverat groaned as Selesst strode from the room, “The man is old enough to be my father! How does he do it?”

“Selesst, just like every other person in his country, male and female alike, has been training with bladed weapons since the age of four. Lyrelians have made a science of the… darker specialties. He also,” Lesara chided Selverat, “has never stopped training.” She turned her attention to Spyridon then, “They may have mostly destroyed the A’vredon heritage that we left behind, but we left our mark on them. There are three ‘holy’ professions within their country – everyone has at least some training in one of those three – Mercenary, Thief, and Assassin. Believe it or not,” She smirked, “But they’re all horribly ethical. Even the assassins.”

---

As Kalju blew on the paper, a handful of letters appeared on one side… not the ones he’d seen there previously though!

“It’s magic.” Proclaimed the letters, centered in the middle of the paper, in clear, block print.

[Guest]

((*stare at them* god, they're /both/ in that ranty internal-monologue-type mood. x_x sorry there.))

But it's not our doing, Spyridon thought vehemently as Selesst turned on him. Thankfully, that lasted briefly enough that he didn't give in to the very strong desire to defend himself from weaker ground. He wasn't stupid. He'd read how things once were. Maybe in a thousand years when it was safe to walk the surface again, they would be in a position to argue that what they had done for the last fifteen hundred was wrong.

But right now, it worked. Right now, it kept people safe. Mostly. It was easy to defend the moral superiority of the ancients. They hadn't been forced underground by demonic livestock. In the extremes of duress, it was very easy to take power. And you could only garner power from those willing to give it up.

Even if he'd wanted to change something, the rest of their people would never allow it. They had been trained and bred to think certain ways about certain things, to allow those who wanted the power over them to take it. The scholars and the priests and the governors were probably the only ones who even noticed there was something inherrantly wrong with the system, and two thirds of that group found things too much in their own interest to change for the supposedly-better.

He sighed, then blinked, noticing that he was being talked to again. He blinked, mentally rewinding what he'd been told, then turned his attentive face back on. "I've read about those, I believe, in texts. They're usually murderers, aren't they?"

--

Kalju stared at the paper and waved it lightly in the air for a moment. Magic was something he steadfastly did not believe in. Often these were sleight-of-hand tricks and foolery that could easily be puzzled out by paying enough attention to hands and physics.

Any and all insistances that things were controlled by magic were likely easily explained, therefore, by science. Just because he didn't understand the science didn't mean it wasn't science. It was just a higher science than he had previously encountered.

It was an addage often alluded to in the ficticious futures written by the visionaries of their past: Any technology that is advanced enough will seem like magic. The corollary was put forth that the opposite was also true, and therefore they were indistinguishable to a society as backwards as theirs appeared to have slid, but for the most part, Kalju did not believe in magic.

He didn't believe in lots of things. Religion. Gods. All of these things that fell into the tableau from which these nebulous experiances arrived.

So he held the paper up to the light, expecting to see something akin to circuitry like they had recovered from machines of old, machines too antiquated to be of use to them now. But machines that had been studied and dissected and replicated, until it was almost determined how they worked and the few solid theories they held mostly conjoined with the explanations of the ancient peoples.

[StarFyre]

((^^ It's alright. ALSO! Kalju's actually right... it IS science... to the Rothkalians at least. Lesara can do this trick, as can her brother Tirval... as can, interestingly enough, Selesst, though such a thing is "beneath" a Common Man like himself. It boils down to this: it's the manipulation of energy via the mind to affect the world about them.

So, a traditional Fireball boils down to this: the mind grasps the atoms in the air at the point the "caster" has decided will be the origin of the fireball. Then, all the oxygen atoms are compressed and all the contaminants are shoved away, more oxygen atoms from nearby are grabbed and fed into this expanding ball of pure oxygen... as this is going on, the atoms are being vibrated against each other so fast that they catch alight. Tada! Floating fireball. To throw said fireball, a path of pure oxygen is created milliseconds in front of the ball, aimed towards whatever is to be hit.

Of course, very, very few are away of the pure technicalities behind WHY it works, they just know it works.))

“Murderers for hire.” Lesara nodded, “They start out small – maybe approach a noble of little means with a grudge, offer their services. Each successful hit boosts their reputation, until they no longer have to approach others, but are instead approached by others. A good enough reputation, and they can pick and choose their hits.”

Lyreleent confused her, though she’d never actively admit it. Such a ragtag bunch of people should never have had enough cohesiveness to survive a great migration such as the stories told of, nor been able to forge a country from themselves and the shattered remnants of Avreda that remained in the mountain ranges: tiny, insular villages where A’vredon blood and A’vredon ideals still lurked after thousands of years. Mercenaries usually despised assassins and thieves, thieves usually looked down on mercenaries and had a hatred/respect relationship with assassins, assassins usually set themselves apart from everyone, including each other.

But yet they had. They had survived, prospered, and formed a country that grew strong enough to survive millennia. They held forth the ideals of equality, honesty, and integrity… and then had the gall to live by them! The darkest, vilest, most despised (at least openly) professions on the face of any planet she’d read about, managed to uphold ideals that many countries preached but struggled in vain to follow.

A mercenary from that country had even managed to convince her great-ancestor, the Wildlands God, to involve himself in the world again. And A’vredons of his era traditionally hated mercenaries!

It boggled the mind.

---

The light shined down through the paper, revealing… nothing. No circuitry, no tiny wires, no patterns hidden in the mesh of the paper. It was, to all appearances, a completely ordinary piece of paper. A bit thin, perhaps, but tough enough to take abuse, with a soft texture, almost like cloth, but not quite.

The words changed before his eyes. Fading and reappearing in yet another pattern, “Looking for something?”

[Guest]

((SCIENCE!!! XD I love magic that can also be science, and vice-verse. If these two were /anything/ but scholars, Kalju'd probably be screaming curses against the demons and throwing the paper as far away from him as possible. XD As it is ... ))

Spyridon furrowed his brow, trying to follow the reasonable extrapolations here. You were a murderer. You killed people. And you got away with it because someone else asked you to do it? He shook his head after a moment and tried this a little more reasonably, but reason refused to enter the equation.

They had murders in the Mountain's Den System. As far as he knew, anywhere where there was enough people (read: more than one), murder was a viable option, and crimes of passion were very quick to be believed. They didn't tolerate murder. They didn't accept it. And these assassins were a thing of their distant, sun-loving past.

Still, he couldn't quite understand the basic reasoning behind all of this. "Why?" he asked. "Why want to kill someone enough that you hire someone else to do it but not do it yourself? And why make a living at doing this? And why didn't anyone stop things like this?"

--

Kalju was beginning to get frustrated by this piece of paper. He licked his thumb and pressed it into the ink. If it was ink and not some other device, then in theory it should dampen and smear. If their ink was anything like this ink, that was.

[StarFyre]

((Boy Spyridon doesn't ask simple questions, does he? =P Lesara got a bit frustrated here, trying to explain the concept of "assassin" to a sheltered scholar.))

Lesara rubbed at her forehead. How to explain to someone as… sheltered as this scholar about something so integral to many societies that the only definition was, ‘one who murders by surprise attack, usually for fanatical or monetary reasons.’ She took a breath, resolved to answer the questions one at a time as best she could, and began.

“Imagine – you are a youth, or perhaps an elder. Either way, you have no skills in killing, or your skills are no match for the one you hate. So, you approach someone else, someone will the skills you lack, and say to them, ‘I will pay you to kill this person’. It is a business contract, just as if I, who have no skill in woodwork, were to approach a woodworker and ask them to build a desk for me.” Lesara rubbed at her forehead again, puzzling over his next question.

“Why make a living at it? Some people are… good at it. Some people enjoy the money, the thrill… some people are just so twisted that they enjoy the killing. The assassins who have a tendency to survive the longest are the ones who are good at it, who do it for the money, who rarely let their emotions get in the way of a job.” She frowned in thought, staring off into the distance, “It’s just another service… might as well ask why make a living at being a scholar.

“People tried to put a stop to it, of course. Many, many times over. In fact, if I recall correctly, it was exactly such at attempted purge that drove the Assassins Guild, along with the Thieves Guild and Mercenary Guild, to their mass exodus that eventually created Lyreleent.” Lesara smiled crookedly, “Of course, forcefully putting an end to such things doesn’t work well – it’s like ordering an entire population to cease creating art or music or written works, including your rulers. Too, if the assassin was good enough, they could make the death look like an accident. There are more ways to kill someone than a knife through the chest, slitting the throat, or breaking the neck. Poison to induce a heart attack, or to cause fall asleep and never wake again. Induce slow paranoia, or cause an animal to throw a rider. Any death you can imagine, can be faked to greater or lesser degrees by an assassin good enough.”

---

The ink didn’t smear. In fact, it didn’t change its appearance at all, beyond the paper becoming slightly damp.

[Guest]

((Why ask the simple questions? XD Those are easy to figure out. No sense wasting peoples' time with /those/. ))

Spyridon blinked for several long moments as he processed this, then released a very candid smile. "I believe," he said carefully, "this is one of those moments wherein I am made to be grateful that our economy is no longer one based on precious metals but fair barter." He shook his head slowly. "Our priests, upon hearing what you have described, would look to this and declare it yet another reason the fogs have come to chase back the sun." He paused a moment in thought. "I doubt heavily such practice was common before the fog among our ancients, but I am glad it is not an option any longer."

It would be treasonous to say what followed of that thought, and he suppressed it immediately. As he had told Kalju, what could be said in free company could not be said in suspicious, and it was difficult to rein in those words once they had become so used to being spoken.

"But too much the darkness of this topic," he said cautiously, trying to shake it from his head like cobwebs from his office. "Mistress Lesara, I am under the impression you are a renowned and important member of your people. Why, then, have you chosen to leave them and live here?"

That, THAT seemed like a perfectly innocent train of thought that wouldn't get him in trouble with anyone.

--

Kalju glared at the paper and returned it to the book and his eyes to the text with it. He flipped it over so he could not see the inked side and presumably escape its absurdity. It was distracting him from his self-appointed duty, and that was not something which he wanted.

He groped for a moment to remember what it was he was reading about. Quite unable to determine this on his own, he started reading again, certain it would come back to him as soon as that trecherous paper was gone from his mind and the words had again begun to suck him back in to their world.

[StarFyre]

((=P Well, I suppose...))

With a tilt of her head, Lesara noted the change of topic, along with the cautious edge to Spyridon’s voice, but permitted the subject to be dropped. It was always best to let concepts nibble at the edge of the mind, rather than force things upon others, she had always found.

“Please, if you must use a title, the one my people use, Liryu, is preferable. Otherwise, we A’vredons very rarely stand on ceremony, so calling me Lesara is fine.” Lesara leaned back, relaxing as she did. “Liryu, if you’re curious, is a gender-neutral title that would roughly translate to ‘Lord or Lady’ in your tongue. We A’vredons have never seen the need to differentiate gender in our titles, especially since, man or woman, any of us can lead.

“As for ‘renowned’… well, I suppose I might be,” She brought a gloved hand to her mouth for a moment, eyes sparkling as she remembered the adventures that she and her brother had, “Renowned for mischief, that is. I’m just the Knight Captain’s Heir. My brother is the High Lord’s Heir, he’s the one that will control the country when our father retires. Myself, I’ll just control the Knights when our uncle retires with father.”

Selverat snorted, “I asked around at one point. What our dear little Lesara is not telling you is that the Knights are an autonomous group inside the country, answering to no one but the Knight Captain and the laws that the Knight Captain has created. They act as a check upon the High Lord just as the High Lord acts as a check upon the Knight Captain. It’s a situation of dual leadership that very few countries have ever managed to pull off.”

With a flick of her hand, Lesara dismissed Selverat’s words, choosing to continue without commenting on them. “I’m here because my people believe in education. That, and my father and uncle will remain on the Twin Thrones for another two to three decades at least.”

---

The treacherous paper remained… inert.

The book itself was back into a discussion of how gender roles affected the relationships between different countries through the ages and how the internal politics varied. After Lesara had mentioned that the author used specific phrases to trigger memory recall, the meaning of certain phrases -- the stilted, short ones that seemed strange compared to the verbose, well written sentences of the major portions of the book – was clearer. Though she was right; without the ability to call up the required memories on cue, certain things were left a bit hazy and unclear.

[Guest]

((It's true. And official. My computer continues to hate on this thread. e_e; Sorry about that. ))

Spyridon did some very simple arithmatic based on generalized observation. "Your people age longer," he said, jumping to the very obvious conclusion.

Annddd.... That was actually all he had to say on that topic. o_x

--

Kalju, meanwhile, had a great feeling of 'hey....wait... what?' descend upon him. This was not the book he had hoped he'd been reading. He glared mutinously at the paper before closing the book gently and casting about for the journal. That was the one he wanted.

It was an insufferable void in him until such time as he could locate it, then gently settled it down on his lap, his back against the bookshelves, and started reading again. But as he read the words, he couldn't remember why he was reading the words, and he grew frustrated, which was something very few books had done in his life.

He closed the journal, shelved it, and returned all but the book on gender studies to their specific places in the shelves, working by memory which he trusted more than any attempt to puzzle out a shelving system. Then, furious still, he took the book and hovered by his master's chair, glaring down wrathfully until such time as Magister Pallmern looked up at him with a confusion in his face.

Kalju thrust the book forward and rested his hand on the inert paper. "What is this?" he demanded, completely unable to shake the anger at it for disrupting him so thoroughly.

[StarFyre]

((Hey, you can't help it if your computer ignores this thread =P I guess just make a habit of scrolling down the index page to see if I've posted? Unno. And Lesara got a bit introspect-y here ^^;; ))


Lesara nodded and said simply, “We live about three hundred of your years, on average. I’ve just recently become a young adult, by our thinking.”

Kalju’s demand distracted her then, and she craned her neck to see what he was complaining about. When she finally saw, she nibbled on her lower lip slightly – she hadn’t realized exactly how much her little tricks would disturb the child… most people she played that trick on were fascinated, curious, maybe a bit exasperated, but never furious.

All except her cousin. He’d never found her tricks amusing.

How to go about this? The boy and the scholar were, from what she could tell, from a place where abilities like hers weren’t common – perhaps were not even there at all in even the lesser forms. How could she say, ‘I use my mind to make words appear’ without sounding like a loony? How could she say, ‘I use magic’ without being labeled as a fraud?

And then she had it. Or, rather, Selesst had it. The man had been part of this Nexus community for longer than she had, had more experience with the world in general even beyond that. In one of the few times he had deigned to speak with her (not because she was barely an adult, she had discovered – Lyrelians considered children ‘adults’ as soon as they could wield a weapon – but because he saw things in her and her brother that he wanted to deny in himself) he had said that, in his opinion, the ‘magic’ of their own world was comparable to the science in others.

And he’d proceeded to point things out to her. Made her focus on what she was doing when she made things happen. And then made her read atom theory and other such science literature.

That was how she’d explain it. In science terms, not the vague terms of power flows and will that was a staple of how her people learned it.

“It’s a Sending Note, my people call it,” She indicated the piece of paper in Kalju’s hand, “We use it to communicate over vast distances with each other. You can’t see it too well in this light, but the paper is more of a grayish color than a pure white – that’s because the paper is treated with an ink mixture that flows freely through and around the paper molecules. We focus upon the paper, grab hold of the ink molecules with our minds, and arrange them in patterns we’re taught in order to form letters and words.”

The blank paper suddenly formed words. “Like this,” it said.

[Guest]

Spyridon recoiled sharply from the paper when the ink moved on it. It was as if he'd been burned. There was no actual pain involved, and the reasoning had sounded reasonable enough, but actually seeing it in action caused his brain to protest in a preprogrammed loop he had hoped he'd rendered inoperable. After all, was he not sitting in the company of others who had so far been indistinguishable in form of the monsters that plagued them? Why, then, would this simple alleged-parlor-trick seem so unwanted, unnecessary, unfathomably wrong to him?

Kalju stared at him, obviously gauging his reaction, and for the sake of the boy he gathered his wits as quickly as he could. "I'm sorry," he said, feeling his breathing labor at the memory of the action as he passed the paper to Lesara. "This is terrible, marvelous strange. It's... there is..." He stopped, shook his head quietly, then took his glasses off and fidgeted at cleaning the lenses. "There is nothing akin to that skill where we come from. There are no records of it, and there are no accounts of it, and... It took me by shock, I suppose."

Kalju stared at him, and Spyridon fidgeted more in the boy's unwavering gaze. This was going to be unpleasant to explain to him in retrospect, to say the least.

[StarFyre]

Lesara accepted the paper from Spyridon, folded it neatly, and stuck it in her book against the spine, just as Kalju had found it in the other book. She ran her fingers over the edge of the paper, simultaneously giving the scholar time to compose himself and herself time to figure out her next words.

“Where I come from,” She finally spoke, “such a thing is expected of us. Our entire culture is based upon the concept of the will manipulating the world about us.” Lesara finally looked up at Spyridon, a faint, self-mocking smile on her face, “You know, our culture skipped the entire gunpowder revolution. We never created it, or experimented with the things you and your people know as science. Instead, we honed our mentalist abilities, built a civilization off of harnessing a power that you and yours never even knew existed.”

“When we came here, everything was… strange.” A gloved finger tapped lightly against the open page, a thoughtful look on her face, “Computers… those are magic to us. We can’t comprehend how they work, or why. Mechanical things, gears… even such a tiny thing as a ‘pen’. We still use quills dipped in ink to write with. There is no ‘printing press’… only people with such a high skill that they can read, memorize, and then recreate the original book with their mind and special paper. A truly skilled Copier can do an entire three hundred page book in under two minutes, with no flaws.”

Lesara paused, looking down at the book in her hands again. It was strange to admit to weakness, went counter to everything she had been taught as a ruler. But she felt the two scholars needed to know that there were indeed others who had gone through the same (or nearly so) disorientation at such a new environment. Perhaps knowing would ease their discomfort a bit.

[Guest]

"Such skills as yours are not ones easily lost," Spyridon told her gently. "Or so I would assume."

He lowered his eyes a moment, knowing the darkness in which their people lived was not merely literal. All those revolutions that Lesara had mentioned were ones his people had had, but ones also that they had lost. Lost, not necessarily because they wanted to, but because they had to. The fog had found them more swiftly with the aid of high technology, or so the ledgers said. And the upkeep on generators alone would have killed them.

No, it was, in a way, better this way. But then he was back to the acquiescence that had caused Selesst to take their ways so badly. It was a fine line to walk - self-preservation and doing what was right.

He lifted his eyes and resolved not to think on it again. Not here. Not today.

But he grasped for things with which to redirect his thoughts. He struggled and fought. And silently thanked the boy when Kalju started wandering the room again, ostensibly forgetting anyone was there. At least he could hide his momentary lapse in cohesion by watching the boy like a hawk. Let them think him a bit authoritarian, if they wanted. It was a familiar task, and it settled his heart, which was thundering in a panic as it was suddenly realizing the depth to which he had swam here, and how far distant any shore that could be marked as friendly lay.