on Atheism, Skeptism and Shambhalalalalalala

I am an atheist.

This is something that I have taken a long time to come to terms with.  I was born and raised strongly Catholic.  I was an alter server.  Took CCD classes, got my first communion and was part of the CYO.  My dad saw to it that we attended mass every Sunday.  I used to leave my pretty ribbons from birthday presents at the foot of my bed, as a gift for the Virgin Mary.  When I was older, I had conversations with the priest and visiting brothers about the "call to priesthood" and how they could possibly know if I didn't have just that call (for non-catholics, females cannot become priests), or how could they know that what I felt wasn't the exact same thing that they felt when they went to seminary, and not an alternate feeling that was a call to nun-hood.

In 7th grade I kinda realized I was just playing around (I did continue to play around until mid high school it should be noted, having sort of a doublethink for awhile).  I have a long history of inventing characters, particularly fantasy characters, and keeping them mentally with me.  What would Efifi (My most main of guardian angel like characters I developed for myself in the vacuum of social ostracism) think of me doing this action?  Eventually, I acknowledged that these were aspects of myself, or of who I wanted to be, and thought of them less often.  I was growing up.  What other things was I just inventing to replace the lack of role models and friends I had?  Christmas Mass that year, it just kinda hit me, and I started tearing up: there is no rational reason to believe any of this - and thanks to their misogynistic outlook, there was plenty of reasons not to support it institutionally.

My dad spent a year not talking to me when I refused to get confirmed and stopped going to church.  This was in high school.  We have since gotten over that, but it is actually still a sore point to my dad who sees the actions of his four daughters and his wife (in either not attending church or not believing in the system at all), as an act of disloyalty.  Sometimes I try to delve deeper into this sentiment, and determine why his prime lesson to us - "Love the Truth" would not apply to religion, and that we should believe out of some perceived loyalty rather than empirical evidence - but this is very touchy to him and I have not been able to develop the topic in conversation without him getting angry.  (This, I should note, is uncharacteristic for him in any other topic.  He is mostly a rational engineer).

Rejecting a religion is not the same thing as atheism.  Though and from high school to college, I did not think in terms of what I am, so much as in terms of what I am not.  I dabbled with the label of "agnostic".  I thought Buddhism had some cool outlooks from time to time.

Coming to Mount Shasta has firmly put me in the camp of a skeptical, agnostic, atheist though.  The breadth of beliefs here, people thinking the mountain is hollow, or the earth as a whole is hollow, and hosts a population of 5th dimensional humans, or aliens, including Jesus, Buddha, and a whole host of people they call the "Ascended Masters" who live on a different vibrational level (whatever that means?)  There are people making bank on wild imaginations.  But then again, is what they believe terribly different from the idea that a sky man impregnated a woman without sex?  Or that a snake could talk?

I have a hard time taking and religion seriously, because I understand how seriously people can take their imaginations.  I think having a creative mind is great.  I form stories in my mind more often than they get written down.  I spend sleepless nights developing ancient societies and complex mythologies.  And this is fun.  At one point, I took these seriously.  I looked at my hard work in field hockey and thought, Efifi is demonstrating herself through me, strong, stoic, capable.  Or when I was feeling vunerable, it was Miranda coming though.  I did transition this supernatural imagination to understanding I was expressing parts of myself that exist and personifying them, but this was a slow transition from 6th grade to 9th.

There is of course something to ritual, and community identification, which are two things organized religion provides.  Becoming part of something greater than yourself is a great way to feel like you are cultivating yourself and moving towards a meaningful goal.  That is what I have Kyudo for though.  When I'm part of a D&D game, I feel the community part satisfied. 

This is a ramble, and I am going to close now.  I note, it is a ramble because half of it was written 3 months ago, in a different mindset, and now I just want to get it done enough to end it... so yeah.  blah.

Chapter 10 - Part II

How do they keep the ceiling so clean? he contemplated while he laid across a lightly padded stone slab.  They are so high up and so full of haphazard cracks.  It must take the Unseen ages to get this work done.  He took in a deep breath and though the air was stale, it was peppered with the smell of unfamiliar and sterile chemicals; a fragrance reminiscent of a combination of vinegar and formaldehyde.  This wasn't the room he had last closed his eyes in.

Ah, I'm naked. he realized as he felt the thin silk sheet that lay limp across his breast.  The fluid sheet of light red rested perfectly to reveal the outlines of his arms and legs, and perhaps other things that he'd have rather kept private.  He considered falling back asleep, but there was a smorgasbord of words and images in his mind that wouldn't leave him alone, and it was rising in crescendo. 

Good.  You are up.  The greeting flooded his head quite unwelcome and he turned his head over to its source.  A decrepit figure loomed over the prone man, head, arms and legs well concealed under a cover of tight olive green wrappings and a face mask of mesh black.  About its body the Silent Scholar wore an ornate emerald green robe that hosted a myriad of native birds etched in gold, reds and blacks.  Wide sleeves too long for its arms by double had been rolled up and tied back while it worked and the short robe was tied tightly about its hip bones.  A plain emerald green, twice pleated skirt stopped mid calf over black leggings and plain black shoes on its feet.  All that was exposed were a pair of intelligent, black almond eyes, two thin strips of hair that arched fluidly along the Silent Scholar's brow and the tips of wavy black tattoos, escaping in random patterns from the confines of the wrappings.   The figure was skinny and slightly hunched.

At its head it wore a black hat that followed the curvature of a skull from forehead to the back of the head, but flipped up at the back like the head of a bassinet.  This indicated that it was one of the Empress Coth Di's top level advisers, one of the Learned, only the second bei'thal to be considered such.  Of course, the Silent Scholar was not a mere bei'thal, trotting their bei from city to city at the behest of her wisdom.  It was not even merely the first of its order, although as the pnum'beithal, the one advancing the art of compromising of the spirit, it certainly held those responsibilities as well.  But a compromise of spirit was always required in the art of the bei, whether the target be of senses, matter, or even time.  This put the pnum'beithal at a particular level of knowledge that its peers could not compete with.  the rha'beithal and the fwoh'beithal might made advances in compromising for eye sight or weightlessness respectively, but none of it would be possible without the continued work of the pnum'beithal.  Consequently, it was the pnum'beithal, lone among all beithal, who had the ear, or rather, the mind, of the empress.

Nobody knew how old the Silent Scholar was, nor if it was male or female, though surely it was mortal human.  This only added to the trepidation people, even the bei, felt at its presence.  Being pnum'beithal was all the identity the Silent Scholar needed, any other qualifier was irrelevant.  Long before it stopped speaking, the bei had named it the Silent Scholar as a sort of dry humor, referring to the constant mental chatter from it that they were subjected to if they were merely in the neighboring room.  It was mostly unintelligible, but the man lying on the padded slab couldn't block it out.

...orange extracted from a carrot mimics... ...stars painted with toads...

 The only offer of relief to a bei came when the Silent Scholar mentally spoke to them, or anyone, directly. 

Cedric.  Welcome home.  I've missed you, my special pet project.

Cedric felt queerly proud, yet objectified by the Silent Scholar's description of himself, but if the Silent Scholar took any interest in his conflicting heart, he made no indication of it.

It is you, right?  Really you that is.  I don't have to pump you with anymore heartsong extract, do I?

Cedric could feel the Silent Scholar's laughter reverberate through his soul and shuddered at the thought of strange concoctions still flowing through his veins.  Still, it had to be done, even he understood that.  His shadow self, while not a strong personality, was proving to be quite a fighter concerning his own consciousness. 

So tell me, what was the last memory you have before waking up here. asked the Silent Scholar.

Cedric knew it could hear, and already wearied of speaking mentally.  "A firelight.  Thoughts of Gregor.  It gets fuzzy again there.  Coming and going in and out of consciousness.  Then, a bandaged woman was there.  She was in a defensive position.  I asked if she kidnapped me from the Eirdred City, and she responded "yes".  She was a threat.  I attacked her. But..." he stopped, a little bit embarrassed.

But what?

"This body is severely out of training.  How many tides has it been? 3? 4?  I lost.  Miserably." Cedric chuckled at his own powerlessness.


There will be time enough to get that back.  What memory do you have before then?

"That one is even more of a haze.  And more abrupt.  Suddenly I was aware of a large group fighting.  There were a great deal of Eirdred men, lightly armored but fit and able and a group of darker skinned men and boys.  They were wearing some crude leather jerkins and the like of mercenaries, but they too were pretty capable.  The mercenaries outnumbered the Eirdren, and looking more like the Eirdren, I assumed that nothing good could come from this.  I let my instincts guide me and ran before anyone could engage me and hid up a tree before I blacked out there.  I suspect the shadow took over at that point."

And before that?

"Well, here, at the University on High, in your office.  Just after you drew my blood and injected whatever it was, that purple goo."

Three tides and only two times you surfaced.  Both times while under duress.  This has been one of my better experiments.  

"You have all you need from the shadow?"


Yes, data which I am still going through.  When I speak with him about my findings, I want you to be there.  It laughed.  You were a cook you know.  For the Archne household.

"A cook?" Cedric shared the laugh with the Silent Scholar mentally.  As too many of his friends, and not a few of his past lovers could attest, his cooking was the surest way to an extended trip to the privy.

Chapter 10 - Part I

Today you have escaped the imposing walls of alabaster limestone and ivory marble for the only the third time since your arrival.  Your training has kept you busy but you have been afforded some freedom before the next task.  You knew how you wanted to spend that time and so for the day, you left the place you call home to face the masses in the streets.

                Your search is not difficult.  There are thousands who play this part, but you have a higher mind today.  You want only the best. 

                Among the beggars, the handless thieves and the castrated rapists, an old man, hair white as the walls of the university, exposed to the late morning sun, is wrapped in a velvet cloak of tired black.  He huddles, murmuring softly to himself.  His hands beat lightly against the tools of his trade in a rhythmic motion, ignoring your presence entirely as you kneel before the man and place a single cube of silver in the palm of his hand and another of copper in his waiting bowl.

                You know what happens next.  The method is the same for all fortune tellers.  He simply understands it better.  From a pile of black glass rocks, he will take one.  With his shaky might, he will break it upon the hard, straight edge of his iron anvil, steel if he is as good as his reputation.  The stone will fracture, producing a shiny edge on both of the resulting pieces. 

He will tell you that nothing is absolute, he will tell you that the gifts of the keepers can be both a blessing and a curse.  He will tell you that one piece of obsidian will reveal all the successes and gains to be had from your next actions.  He will tell you the other contains the secrets to all the failures to be had.  If you are lucky, the larger piece will be your good fortunes, and the smaller, will be forgettable.  If you are lucky, the half of your happy future will cleanly cut and each facet of the imperfect stone will tell the old soothsayer of glory and triumph.  If you are lucky, the other piece, the stone of disgrace, will be nothing more than a chip; irrelevant and meaningless. 

You have always been lucky, you tell yourself, you have nothing to fear.

But what, then, are you doing here?

His spotted hand runs over his holdings of black glass rocks, each individual, each unique to their fortune seeker.  His dull eyes then fix on you, and you feel yourself tremble.  The man’s once black irises are blanketed with a milk white fog and you know he cannot see.  Yet somehow his pupils focus on yours and bore into your soul.

Then, he selects the stone.  Your stone, your obsidian.  It had been waiting for you to come this day, and now it will reveal its secrets.

He raises his fist, fingers firmly holding it in place as his hand descends upon the anvil.  You hear the obsidian crack and you feel trepidation rush over you and you struggle to see the result.

The pieces have fallen upon the dirt road.  The old man’s right hand combs the dust and debris, searching for that smooth, cold stone.  He picks up one, and deposits it into his free hand.  He picks up the second soon after.  Then he picks up a third piece.

Even the fortune teller seems taken aback, unsure what so many pieces will reveal.  You know this when he mutters, “You walk east, and arrive west, young man.  Your roads are more than can be travelled by two feet”  His accent is hard to understand, he speaks an ancient dialect of the middle tongue, whether natively or by practice, you cannot say.  It is not your language but you understand enough.

He produces the largest of the three pieces, rubbing it in between his fingers several times before laying it gently upon the anvil.  It is long, and the thickness of you little finger.

“This is your good fortune.” Says he, and you let out an involuntary sigh of relief, “It is a nearly flawless cut; there is little to stand in your way.  If you do what is in your mind to do, you will become a great name in your field and respect will come from friends, enemies and superiors, all.

He then produces a medium piece of obsidian, once joined to the largest piece, it is no larger than the silver cube you paid.  He fits the two pieces together again, but they do not fit perfectly.  A sliver of black appears to have chipped away in the violence of the breaking.

“Your misfortunes will be few.  Your prestige, your alliances and promotions will remain intact without fail. But you will have other miseries; the piece of misfortune is clean and without abrasion.  Your failings will be unrelated to your success, too far removed from your gains.  You may recover easily.”

“And the last piece?” you speak up for the first time, knowing it is not done this way, but fearing to be left without the knowledge.

The old man ignores your thoughtlessness, and answers with his hand.  He produces the last, and smallest piece.  What the piece lacks in size, it makes up for in thickness, appearing more as an uncut stone than broken obsidian.  He places it on top of the other two pieces, and then pauses to consider the three.

He glares at the constructed tower, his blind eyes darting over each facet of each piece.  Finally he grunts, satisfied, but haughty.  “This is neither fortune nor misfortune,” he repeats slowly, first to himself, and then to you.

“This is neither fortune nor misfortune… This is a die cast by GOD!” he cackles suddenly and with strength not expected in a man as brittle as he, the old man pushes the anvil over and all three pieces succumb to the violence and fall.  “This is another, you who are not you, and it will as easily break your fortunes as redeem your failures, but you will have no control over it.

You are frantic.  You know you should not believe in this nonsense.  The world had rational explanations for phenomenon; you learned that in the walls of the university.  But terror fills your heart.  The three pieces of obsidian had slid to the dirt before the anvil had finally crashed.  The weight of the steel easily crushed the large and medium pieces, breaking them into a million new futures.  But on top of the black rubble, the smallest, thickest piece remained intact, cushioned by the two pieces beneath it even as it dealt their shattering force.

“What does this mean?”  You say, but the man will not answer you again.  His sightless gaze does not return to you, for he is in his own world of magic and mystery.  He does not stop laughing and it is all you can do to run away before it infects your mind.

When you return to your dorm, you try to forget about it.  You try to rationalize that the ranting of an old and crazy man means nothing.  You do not speak of this to even your dear friend and bunkmate.

But you never forget, Cedric.  You are the fortunes of GOD, you are proof of the existences outside of the spectrums of man.

Chapter 9 - Part IX

"Stop."

The sedan, now wielded by 4 very tired but very stoic men, halted at the command.  The men laid their lady down gently while one of them draw back the thick, heavy lilac curtains.  Lady Kreihl dropped two tired feet to the well groomed dirt path that neatly wound through the clustered courtyard of cherry, plum and peach trees that populated the lower bailey of the Tsitul compound.   

Lady Tsitul dismissed her sedan while her head of house, an old maid by the name of Sejae greeted her with a padded robe.  The woman was bent over, old as she was, but she hardly let that get in the way of her duties as she helped her mistress into the robe.  "My lady is out late tonight." she uttered with a smile.

"Yes, mehra" Kreihl smiled back to her old confidant and one time wet-nurse.  "And it will be later still.  See that no one disturbs me.  The magnut are out tonight."

"Ah dear," the old woman sighed, "I do hate when those raccoon dogs get into our fruit stores.  Do take care." and she too departed.

Kreihl was sad to see Sejae go, but the magnut were skittish, and it was a strange notion to include servants in subterfuge.  In another world she would have treasured her old friend's input.

She was going to face this complication with her head held high, but it was never easy dealing with the servants of the empire.  Pho-Boteth wanted too much information and gave too little in return.

In the east the horizon was painted a subversive shade of purple and pink while the minor moon had made a stealth ascent since her visit to the Archne household.  Afterall, it was only once a tide or so that the night was completely devoid of any moon all night.

The lady walked past some of the cherry blossom blooms and was greeted with a satisfyingly sweet breeze.  The plums had all but finished their spectacular displays of pink, purple and white and had since lost their petals, but the cherries were in their full glory.  She rested her arm on a nearby branch and the path at her feet was littered with a rain of soft pink petals.

"Naming us magnut is hardly a new invention."

Lady Tsitul felt her heart stop as she spun around and saw the man she had been waiting for, Lord Vaughn.  She knew, of course, that he was no true lord.  It was likely the empire had bestowed upon the man some great and honored duty that could not be trusted to mere laypeople like herself. 

"It is childish of you people.  But Empress Coth Di understands that children need to be allowed to play from time to time." he condescended to her.

 "Perhaps if you did not growl and whine when you were unhappy we'd have less cause to make the comparison.  But you didn't come here to discuss the finer points of Eirdren slang now did we?  You and yours have put me in quite a bit of trouble now.  My son is to be wed to that husband-killing whore and take on the name Archne."

Vaughn was unable to determine what she was more upset about, the fact that her son's marriage would put him in potentially mortal danger or that a Tsitul son would walk the halls of a hated house. 

"She accepted?  Where is the box?  I told you, you must bring back the box!" though he was typically composed, as a son of Pho-Boteth, he was not immune to his upbringing and he uttered a guttural growl to indicate his displeasure.

"How was I to?  She accepted the gift.  If I had taken it from her then she'd be in her full right to claim betrayal and I might not have left her compound alive!  Are you daft?  Surely you might have expected this eventuality?  And now the Empire's ambition has caught the two of us." Lady Kreihl spit back with frustration.  Empire promises of autonomy were barely worth this relationship.
Vaughn did not hold back as he delivered a swift slap to Kreihl's face.  "Watch your tongue.  You border on treasonous."

Shocked at the physical abuse, the lady kept her composure and glared back at him.  "As ever the House Tsitul serves the Scholar Empress.  I speak only of the short-sightedness of her magnut."
Vaughn thought for a moment.  Nobody was supposed to accept the box.  It was plain and ordinary.  It had been compromised - a fact the Lady Tsitul knew nothing about - but the nature of the compromise was such that whoever opened the box would see an object of secrecy and shame.  It should have elicited rejection.  That was the weakness of the compromise.

"What was the color of the box when you gave it to the Lady Archne?" he demanded.

"What?  I don't know.  It was an oak box right?  Then brown.  I didn't see anything unusual." she replied unsure of what information he was trying to extract.

"Then it did not change" he muttered under his breath, careful to keep his rhetorical question from reaching the ears of the Lady Tsitul herself.

"What did you say?" she huffed impatiently.

"I don't think the Lady Archne is our quarry.  I will have to obtain another box for you to present to the Nogrem Household tomorrow."

"And about him?" Lady Tsitul asked.

Vaughn had nearly forgotten the initial demands Lady Tsitul made when they had first approached her.  "He's resting comfortably at the edge of the city.  Tomorrow he will begin the journey to the University on High and his new life."

Kreihl looked satisfied.  "Then I leave you to your nightly wanderings, magnut.  Good night."
Vaughn bowed and took his leave of her but continued to walk through the fruit gardens of the Tsitul compound contemplating the situation.  The box was supposed to change color at the presence of a nearby gegleth; alive or otherwise.  But rather than a simple hue of blue, it remained the same, and he felt this left him at square one.  Lady Archne had drawn a great deal of attention to herself in the previous tide, with the death of her husband and her reportedly reclusive nature.  She was his best guess as to who might have kidnapped the creature, and now that there was no evidence to incriminate her, he felt at a loss.

"Damn." he sighed, but no sooner had he let out a grunt of unhappiness than he felt a trembling quake at his feet.  The rapidly reddening sky, blushing at the onset of dawn, was now assisted with the tips of huge flames licking at the horizon.  In moments the Lady Tsitul had run back to the fruit garden and found Vaughn, grunting audibly.

"What happened?" she yelled.

"I don't think you have anything to worry about your son.  Go back to bed and prepare yourself an alibi for your peers.  After the flames die down, I am sure your fellow lords might wonder if you had anything to do with the death of Lady Archne."

Chapter 9 - Part VIII

It was all Reiba could do to not sprint back to her quarters in the Wing of the Major Moon.  In the east the Minor Moon began to rise.  It was only once a tide or so, afterall, that a night was truly devoid of it.  In the east the blackness of the night had begun to succumb to a sickly yellow-blue.  The brightest of stars still shone but the others in that part of the sky had been overcome with the mere suggestion of the sun.  Dawn was fast approaching and she'd have to make her decisions quickly.

While she walked, she pawed at the little compromised pill in her pocket; each time flesh hit its smooth surface she had an instant feeling of being somewhere else.  On the roof.  Hidden in an alley way.  Sulking behind lone stands of cosmopolitan oak and ceder.  It was in one of the parks of the Eirdred.

As she approached her wing, she could feel that already the creature was out of the city.  Fast, she marveled.  She clutched the pill a little harder in her fist and let more information seep into her skin.

West.  He travels due west.  This surprised Reiba, who expected her quarry to make its way south, as it had when she first caught him.  She realized then she had always connected those two things in her mind, the art of the b'hei and the creature, as being from the same catalyst and as all the knowledge she held of compromising lay written in the Sandoran tongue, she had always assumed that it was Sandoran in origin.  If she ever saw Laenuc again, she felt confident that compromising crafter would know what the creature was.

I wish I had more time to study this further she thought mournfully as she motioned her servants to open the huge door to her quarters.  Sadly, she had more immediate concerns.  Whatever form of guilt the two nobles were looking for when they visited her, they must have found it when Zaexyl accepted the Tsitul proposal, but she could not help but recollect the look of surprise the Lady Kreihl herself had at the gift.  She seemed as clueless as Reiba had been before she recognized the earring she held.

It had been far too many years since she had tried that first experiment.  As the door servants closed the bulky oak door that separated her wing from the rest of the world, she made haste to her study. She blew out each of the candles that provided her with the light to study and explore the unknown, and slid the paper doors shut.  Every candle save one, that is, so she could see what she was doing.

With no small measure of hesitation, Reiba opened the the Tsitul gift box again and extracted the earring once more.  It was nothing a cube of bronze couldn't buy.  The stones of jade and turquoise that hung lazily from the hook seemed real enough, but highly flawed, sporting cracks and strange cuts.  She recalled from her childhood, youths who would search the midden piles of gemmers for such unpolished scraps.  For her, the couple of meals one could get out of a weeks worth of rock discoveries wasn't worth wading in the combination of food waste, broken pottery and animal feces that often built up in back alleys in between street cleanings.

But the cheapness of the earring also made it a suitable first attempt at using the art of the b'hei.  She blew out the remaining candle which left the room glowing only very softly as a consequence of the lit candles on the other side of the paper walls.  It was dark enough, however.

And the earring performed accordingly.  The glow of the earring looked more like the light of the moon than a candle or the sun itself.  It seemed to reflect luminescence rather than create it.  But there was no doubting that this was her earring.  It had to be.

Reiba had not worn those earrings since she experimented on them.  A quick flick of her wrist brought a match against a sandstone paperweight on her desk and in no time the study was again relit. She sighed, knowing invariably what she had to do next, but first wanting to know how this happened.  Her fist clenched around the earring angrily as she started flipping over the books on her desk.  Papers went flying in an almost celebratory fashion.

She then began tearing apart her study, ejecting books from their shelves, ripping out the drawers of her desk.  She moved to a closet she had kept locked since moving into the Archne compound.  Heri had, of course, asked her what she kept in it, the insatiably curious fellow he was.  She had told him that it was her garments of the night that she would use to surprise him from time to time.  This made him want to see the contents even more but somehow she had convinced him that the allure of seduction is as much the province of what you can't see, as what you can.

She supposed that she wasn't wholly lying.  A corset was among the items in it, along with a necklace, a hair piece, and some older articles of clothing.  Rats had tried to chew at the closet to get closer to the corset, the necklace constricted at the mere touch of her finger and she knew if she wore the hair piece she'd suddenly have bowel movements that mirrored those of the nearest person.  The butterfly affixed on the hairpiece not only looked real though, it acted real.  Its antennae seemed to probe the air for the scent of a mate.  Reiba kept very clear from the hairpiece. 

And of the earrings, both lay silently in a small box, same as the day she had forged their compromise.  There might be half a million of these types of earrings in Eirdred alone, but only hers glowed, as they both did now in the dimmed light of the closet. And now it was hers and this other, one earring.  She opened her left hand but was shocked to see that all she carried now was a lifeless granite rock.

No.  There is no such thing as magic, this is compromised!  But how?  What does it show? Her assault on her study left the Tsitul box unfazed and Reiba replaced the rock within the box.  She pulled a silk cord and had to wait only a few minutes before Vergaihl placed a soft but firm rap on her door.  She met him in the social room.


"Enter." she beckoned and the doors opened for the house master.





"My Lady, the boys are not yet..." he began but was quickly cut off by an impatient mistress.


She passed him the box.  "Do you recognize this?" she asked.


"Yes My Lady, this is the gift box from House Tsitul."


"Open it." she commanded.

Vergaihl did so, but with great hesitation.  It was not the lot of a servant to deal with noble gifts.  He kept glancing back at her then the box, expecting her reproach at any moment.  When he finally looked at what was in the box, he gasped and dropped it like it was a pox laden child.


"What did you see?!" Reiba demanded impatiently.

"I am so sorry," Vergaihl collapsed to his knees, "Please, it was only in fun.  It was only between my family and I.  I am ever your loyal servant..." he cried but Zaexyl was in no mood to hear his protestations. 

"Never mind that.  What is the object in the box?"


The poor man, who was not slight by any means but who nonetheless cowered now, had a look of fear and confusion on his face.

"Tell me exactly what it is.  Spare no details.  Give me context."

"Uh...", he began, lips quivering, "It is a letter to my family.  I've not seen them in so long.  They live in the country and.."

"Stop babbling.  Why are you so afraid of it?"

Every fiber in the elder man's being told him that to repeat the words he had written down was treason.  Yet to not answer a direct command could also be seen as treason.  He looked like a rabbit cornered by the wolf.

"In this letter," he tried, being as delicate as possible, "I explain to my wife that your Ladyship is a very ambitious woman.  That you, my lady, might have had," he searched for the words, "a strained relationship with your husband." he could not make himself confess further.

"You think I killed Heri?  That is what you wrote?" she interrogated the man.  His silence confirmed her suspicions.  "I see.  Now pick up the object in the box and show it to me."

Sure enough at this point it was a letter; its waxy seal of the house master of Archne broken and its pages slightly crumpled.


"Interesting." Lady Archne observed to herself, uncaring if Vergaihl heard her at this point. "What amazing things the b'hei does.  I wonder what weakness this carries."  She paused deep in her thoughts before she remembered that her servant was still there, surely awaiting the wrath and potentially lethal punishment from his mistress.  "You may go now Vergaihl.  Actually, return to your home.  Clearly you have been over worked.  You need a rest.  Return to your home.  Go ahead, collect your wages for the next month.  Do not delay.  And regardless of what you hear, do not come back tonight."

"Thank you, My Lady," was all the man could offer, so confused by the recent turn of events.  He bowed quickly and exited the room, afraid that this was all a trick and the sooner he was on his way, the less time she had to put him in a noose.

It was only a matter of time before whoever was really looking for Reiba would find out who and where she was.  And who looked for her was more than the petty lords who deigned to offer her their second sons.  They understood the art of the b'hei, and they knew of the creature.  Now more than ever, she felt trapped.  The Secondsword would be returning soon enough, and likely with him his cronies.  She'd be painting the walls of the Augur red all over again with the blood she could expect to lose from the impending torture.

 I won't give them the satisfaction, she thought angrily to herself. 

Chapter 9 - Part VII

Lord Shik smiled again, bowed and put the box to his side.  Without a word, Vergaihl came out of his hidden obscurity, knelt to collect the box, rose and walked over to his lady.  At her side, he knelt again, his toes flat as his knees fell to the relatively soft flax woven mat.  He placed the box in front of Lady Zaexyl and awaited her response in this uncomfortable position.  It wasn't rare that his feet would go numb.

The moment she took it out of the box she knew with the surety of her entire being that these two were not here to offer their sons after all.  What they hoped to accomplish, she was unsure, but she was in far more precarious a position than she had previously thought.

"A tad simple," she smiled most generously at Lord Shik, "but I understand the sentiments of your son nonetheless.  I would be pleased to meet him."  Vergaihl returned the box to its owner before disappearing beyond the thick paper walls of the Receiving Room once again.

If Lord Shik were surprised at her willingness to open her home to their family, he did not show it.  Nor did he seem to take offense at her derision.  It was the way of the intended to downplay their gifts, that a suitor might try harder.  A noble wedding would not usually occur until five or six rejections.  By that time, a lord or lady could expect to have their likeness cast in gold.   More would be puzzle had she accepted his offer immediately. Whatever he was thinking, he merely smiled and bowed.

"I suspect my son Gaihgrem offers much the same." intoned Lady Tsitul.  "Although he requested that I not peek into his offering.  It is a son's embarrassment to let his mother know he thinks like a man." she chuckled.  A servant girl waiting by the door quickly placed the unopened box at Lady Tsitul's side and within moments, Vergaihl had it at his own lady's side.

Lady Archne lifted the box and opened it slowly.  What she saw perplexed her, which gave her cause to worry even more than the collar had.  Lord Shik seemed unable to contain himself when she did not immediately respond.  "What is it?  Come now, what has the lad offered you?"

Lady Archne made quick note that even though she had remained silent, Lady Tsitul also bore a glimmer of curiosity in her eyes.  She was not lying.  She did not know its contents.

Carefully, with two fingers, she extracted an extremely common looking, single, long earring made of turquoise and jade, suspended from a hook by small silver chain.  "Is this your son's idea of a joke?" Reiba asked incredulously.   "Does he take me for a merchant?" she accused, referencing the trend for particularly wealthy business men and women to mimic noble ear tattoos by holding their own traditions with single earrings. 

"Ah, my lady, my apologies, I do not know what he meant by this." Kreihl stammered, her age finally beginning to show as lines of worry.  "I am sorry to cause offense, please let me return this and we formally retract our offer."

The two waited for Lady Archne's reply, expecting to be tersely dismissed as tales of the ungracious behavior of House Tsitul reverberated throughout the Dance of Roses for the next couple of months.  It left them more astonished when she did finally speak.

"No.  I accept.  I shall wed your son on the night the Major Moon returns to the skies.  I thank you for your visit this night.  The morning fast approaches.  I believe your families await you."

Lady Zaexyl did not move a muscle, as it was poor form for a host to leave before the guests, but her bewildered peers understood the message.  They bowed slightly from their mats before getting up and exiting the room, each of their retainers close behind.

"Vergaihl!" she called and he appeared to her from the other side of the paper walls.

"My lady."

"Send two boys to follow those two home from a distance.  They are not to return until the see them to their compounds.  I want to know everything they witness before that happens." she ordered.

"Yes my lady."

"I will retire now, see that I am not disturbed until those boys return."

Chapter 9 - Part VI

Lady Kreihl Tsitul was well into her middle years, but age merely seemed to be another ornament in her jewelry box.  Unlike many of her age she did not use strange dyes and spa treatments to keep the color of her hair so white, grey and light blonde intermingled upon her scalp and through her loose bun. Today she was fairly demure, with short gold and onyx earrings and a lightly padded, high necked and long sleeved butter cream tunic, tied high underneath the breast with a stiff sash of brown and a wide flowing gown that reached the floor.  On her chest, just under the collar of the shirt she had pinned a small brooch with her house sigil, the rose, emblazoned.

Lord Hekbel Shik on the other hand could have been making the marriage proposal himself, had Lady Archne not already known himself to be reportedly happily wed with twin youths not yet 15 tides and another on the way.  His close cut brown goatee gave him the appearance of a perpetual smile and shallow dimples did not help in this regard.  He too wore a high necked collar of ocean blue satin edged with a thin gold trim.  His tunic was tied just above the waist with a thin grey belt after which it continued down to his knees.  Underneath the long shirt was a pair of black satin pants.  Like his counterpart, Lady Tsitul, he had since removed his shoes to enter the Receiving Room.

They were both left-eared nobles, leaders of their houses, and both of them lacked a residual right-ear tattoo, indicating that they were in power of their own birthright.  Tsitul, meaning rose had a monochromatic blue outline of petals, a stem and thorns gracing her ear while Shik had a simple outline following the path of his outer ear, making a point at his lobe.  Before they were a house, before the peoples of the Outer Crest took over the labor intensive work on the seas, the Shiks were the kingdom that relied more on the sea and her produce than any other.  A fish hook might seem mundane in this era, but there was a time when people lived or died by it.

They were guests in this house now, so they waited for leave to speak from its ruling Lady, while they kneeled comfortably on amble floor pads.   Zaexyl surveyed the pair.  "Tea and a honey stick" she ordered, "for my brother and sister.  Under the Red, our bonds are never broken."

The house staff were well prepared to receive a fellow Eirdren Lord and had placed an elevated tray of the required comforts before the guests barely after their lady ordered them.  "Under the Red, we are stronger together." they both intoned while all three held up their cups of tea while bending their backs slightly to each other in a bow.  The three drank. and set the cups down.

"How can I help you Lady Tsitul and Lord Shik?  Surely you come with urgent business to have rousted yourselves so late into the night." the Lady Archne asked.

"Ah but now is the best time to speak," smiled Lord Shik, "for both moons abandon us this night.  That is the best time to plan for life's intimate choices."

"My Lady Archne, forgive our boldness, we do not come bearing secrets," Lady Tsitul chided her companion for the night, "We only wish for you to take special consideration of our offers.  Surely you have met with many now who would like to keep your bed a little less lonely and provide you with an heir, but our proposals should be of great interest to you."

"Yes," Lord Shik had regained a more serious visage, "My son is young, but so are you my lady, and he will be a man soon.  He will be a great asset to you, and if you but say the word, he is yours as soon a you wish him.  Johlen is a smart boy and while he is a second son, he has been raised side by side with his twin brother, my heir, and will quickly learn the business of the Archne household."

Zaexyl Archne felt herself relax a little bit.  Tedious though marriage proposals are, they are not dangerous until you turn them down.  Nothing she said tonight would kill her.  It might only kill her in a month, or a tide. Yet it still struck her odd that the two would come tonight rather than tomorrow.  They must really want ties to House Archne, unless... she let that thought drift away not knowing where it led.

"He is eager to be your groom as well.  He was impressed with your ladyship's confident and powerful demeanor at the eulogy of your late husband.  Indeed, he offers a token of his affections should you wish to pursue my offer." Lord Shik called to his groom who knelt silently by the door with the Lady Tsitul's lady-in-waiting.  The servant stood up, and brought over a small box.  He knelt again side by side with his lord, placing the box at Shik's knees before bowing slightly, standing up, and walking backwards, silently, to his prior station.

Lord Shik opened the box and lifted out a thin silver choker necklace that gleamed in the candle light.  Lady Archne held her breath but kept her face as solid as stone.  That was no mere offering of jewelry to a betrothed, she was sure of it.  She had seen a collar that looked too similar to this one on the creature before, as it lay injured, trying to hide in the woods.

But Reiba refused to let herself panic.  If it was nothing more than a necklace, then asking about the trinket could pose no harm, but if it was more than a coincidence, then her very response could damn her to whatever blackmail they were trying to boil her in.

"Many thank to you and your son Lord Shik.  You do him great credit and I will have to think seriously on this matter." Lady Archne forced herself to not even mention the object he offered to her now.  "But as Lady Tsitul too has made the journey, it is only fair to hear her offer as well."