"A Glimpse of Freedom"

Log Date:
	1/21/99

Log Cast:
	Faanshi, Kiera

Log Intro:
	For the first time, Faanshi has experienced -- for all that it
has been from within the protective shelter of the tent of her master
Hashim -- what it can mean to have a living god walking the face of the
world. She has felt the shaking of the land, and has breathed urgent
prayers with her heart-mother Ulima for the safety of those who have fled
the vengeance of the Divine Flame of Heaven, Khalid Atar.
	Now, with marvel after marvel feeding her hungry curiosity, the
shudra girl cannot resist begging Ulima to help her escape Hashim's tent
for another chance to simply _see_ the army with which they've been
travelling... and the world through which they've ridden. Only when she
is actually outside the tents of Clan Sarazen and seeing the awestruck faces
of the Varati hosts, hearing their rapturous whispers that tell of the power 
of the Amir-al, does she allow herself to hope that she'll get another 
glance of the winged halfbreed she'd met by chance at the dawn...

----------
Varati Camp - Somewhere in the Empyre(#2120RFJnh)
     After the fashion of many a war-camp, this one - the imperial one - 
  somehow fashions an organized and effective army out of hopeless frantic 
  clutter and activity. The Varati host is here hosted, and tents spread 
  legion across the rolling prairie - now trommled into hard-packed mud. The 
  tents themselves are surrounded by cookstoves and chairs, armour boxes and 
  racks upon which clothes dry and repaired or cleaned items are stored. Women 
  and men both hurry through the clutter, each to his own vital task. The air 
  is warmer here, thick with fire smoke and the fouler odors of many people in 
  close inhabitation with inadequate sewage and washing facilities. To the 
  south is located the tent-hospital, to the north, the Amir's encampment. 
  West are the wyvern pens and east, the corrals for the lesser creatures that 
  serve as food for men and mount.
Contents:
Kiera
Obvious exits:
Clan Sarazen Tents <CST>  Khalid-Atar's Tent <T>

_Khalida,_ Faanshi thinks to herself, clinging to the word like a talisman as 
  she steals on thinly shod feet through the mighty encampment, anxiously 
  studying the banners that oversee each Clan's territory she crosses, looking 
  for the sigils of the Atarvani caste. The winged imphada had said she was of 
  the Clan Khalida... could it be that the tents of the Atarvani might take 
  her close enough to see her? The young shudra had not quite comprehended the 
  vastness of the army with which Sarazen has ridden and camped for weeks now, 
  not until she has begged and won from Ulima this one brief taste of freedom. 
  Find the tents of the Atarvani, she has been instructed, and ask of them 
  this much of this herb, this much of that, to be brought back to her. As 
  long as she is free to do this errand, Faanshi seizes the opportunity to 
  surreptitiously peek at everyone and everything she passes.

It's snowing again. Weak and pale daylight matches, really, Kiera's spirit at 
  the moment. She is, as is her wont, outside of the Khalid's tent, under the 
  tarp stretched for her by the Agni-Haider, near where a fire crackles. Kiera 
  stands stock-still, in the precise center of the area beneath the tarp, and 
  no snow touches her here. It instead swirls to land anywhere outside the 
  tarp, though it shows no such preference elsewhere. Only here, the winds 
  seem to push the snow away from the ground. Only here, Kiera can stand on 
  bare and frozen ground with her cold - bitterly cold - feet. She is 
  different from when you saw her last, besides her seeming lack of presence 
  that almost suggests her soul has fled her body; Kiera is missing a few of 
  her larger, and many of her smaller feathers, as if she has begun a molt.

Faanshi had thought she had felt small the morning she'd arisen to see the 
  dawn... the morning she'd seen Kiera Khalida. Today, she feels just as small 
  as she edges into the heart of the mighty encampment, stricken mute by the 
  sheer immensity of _people_ everywhere she looks. The cold is almost a 
  secondary consideration, though Faanshi is indeed cold. She is far more 
  distracted by the _people_... by the soft white stuff drifting yet again 
  down out of the sky overehead... and by the mountain on the horizon that was 
  not there before. Everywhere she's walked this day, she's heard softly 
  breathed prayers, seen gestures of awe directed towards the new peak. And at 
  last, in the center of the massive array of tents, she pauses, overwhelmed, 
  lost.

Just so happens that your halt is within the line of sight of the hooded gaze 
  of the winged halfbreed. Slowly, she focuses on you. Within a moment, a 
  whirling light breeze kicks up snow around you into a brief and blinding 
  display - but none of it touches you, and the wind itself does not so much 
  as ruffle your veil. Then it's gone. Nothing more.

What...? Taken aback by the sudden bizarre behavior of the snow, Faanshi does 
  not immediately comprehend its cause -- a minor wonder, after all, now that 
  the Khalid Atar has drawn a mountain up out of the plains. Only when the 
  whirl of flakes around her subsides does the girl in her veils turn 
  startledly, peeking in all directions, wondering if anyone saw what she has 
  just witnessed.

If anyone else did see, they don't remark on it, or react to it. The snow must 
  be particularly unruly here, in this part of the encampment. Kiera still 
  watches you, though she hasn't moved to do so.

The shudra girl's gaze tracks slowly about the crossroads, resting at last 
  upon the tarp... and the fire... and the figure beside it. Faanshi stifles 
  her gasp, realizing that fortune is indeed with her... though for how long? 
  A glance left... a glance right... and then she begins to approach the fire, 
  drawn inexorably by its warmth.

And nothing moves. And no one moves. And the world seems to go completely 
  still, until the large form of an Agni-Haider presents itself between you 
  and Kiera. Then, and only then, Kiera blinks and she speaks, "That one will 
  not harm me. Please let her through." Very mild voice, quiet and one nearly 
  lost by the sound-subduing snowflakes.

Faanshi's heart nearly climbs into her throat, and she scurries back a step 
  from the black-clad guard, ready to go to her knees. That the Agni-Haidar 
  obeys the winged halfbreed, inclining his head and standing aside so that 
  the halfbreed without wings might advance is enough to keep her on her feet, 
  however. Still, she dares venture only a step or two nearer. "Please," she 
  whispers, "I seek the tents of the Atarvani, imphada... but I am lost.... 
  could you show me the way?"

Actually, Kiera has no clue where they are, but she can get directions and she 
  recognizes this ploy. Kiera need not even speak, but looks at the guard, and 
  he indiates with a curt nod, the correct tents. Kiera steps out from under 
  the tarp, gesturing with an arm that you should pace with her, and she 
  ignores the guard that follows.

The vicinity of her throat is apparently appealing to the heart of Faanshi, 
  for it feels to her again as though that organ has come right back up to 
  that overhigh place in her body. Not at all having expected Kiera Khalida to 
  guide her, unnerved by the guard, Faanshi hastily falls into step alongside 
  the smaller female. "Thank you, Lady," she whispers, very softly.

"You are welcome." Flat, those words sound, and Kiera struggles through the 
  snow, her footing insecure, her wings sometimes saving her balance by 
  shooting out unexpectedly and with a rustle of feathers. "I will speak to 
  the Khalid-Atar, and ask if you cannot come with us, back to Haven. Who is 
  it that you belong to?"

The taller, wingless girl stops dead with shock. "Speak... to... the Khalid?" 
  she echoes in a voice gone breathless and small.

Agreeably, Kiera also stops. The shadow of a guard, who trails some distance 
  behind, also stops. Kiera looks up at you. She does not repeat what she 
  says. You obviously heard it.

Apparently, the thought that the winged girl, the halfbreed with the surname 
  of Khalida, would be able to speak to the God-King himself has never crossed 
  Faanshi's thoughts. It takes her obvious effort, despite her expression 
  being veiled by protective scarves of silver-gray, to get a renewed grasp 
  upon her composure. Before the Warlord had brought her with him on this 
  journey, Faanshi had never quite thought of the Amir-al as... real. But then 
  the ground trembled, and a mountain arose where once there had been a 
  city... and now, the young shudra's mind shies away from the sharply 
  increased reality of her God-King. "A... kshatri... of Sarazen, Honored 
  One," she murmurs.

"Whose name is?" Kiera returns, without any preamble or title-tossing. Her 
  unblinking regard takes in your reaction. Light breezes wash snow over you, 
  but don't really allow any flakes to stick in their caressing playfulness.

Even in the midst of the dread that has struck her, Faanshi doesn't miss the 
  odd attention of those little breezes, and after a moment she remembers that 
  Kiera Khalida had named herself, in addition to halfbreed and shapeshifter, 
  wind-mage. _She has... magic, too?_ Beginning to feel as though she walks in 
  a waking dream, Faanshi swallows hard. _If I tell her, the Warlord will 
  learn I got out and... that Ulima let me go out, and... perhaps he will beat 
  -her-, and..._ _That_ thought slices through her, driving all else from her 
  mind and making her blurt, "Oh, Imphada... I musn't tell you, please, if he 
  discovers I got out of the tent..." And she starts to back away, her voice 
  gaining sudden volume, a golden hand flailing a bit at the breezes keeping 
  snowflakes away from her thin garb.

*sigh* "Do you run again, Faanshi? I do not know who abuses you, but if you 
  name him or her, then I can see if the Khalid will have you removed. Then 
  you need not fear. And perhaps the Khalid will allow you to accompnay us to 
  Haven." Look. We're offering divine intervention here, if Kiera can get a 
  few moments with the busy god.

Faanshi's one hand curls about the other, and both press to her breast in a 
  gesture that might be one half supplication, one half terror. Her mind stops 
  functioning again for a moment at the mere idea that the God-King would 
  actually turn His attentions to her -- and then, conscience demands that she 
  speak not on her behalf, but on that of her heart-mother. "It is not for me 
  I fear," she blurts all at once, her voice still small, but clear with 
  conviction and pleading. "My heart-mother, he will beat my heart-mother if 
  he discovers she let me out even on this small task...!"

He will not beat anyone, if he is dead or... If he cannot reach her. "What is 
  her name, and his? I do not know if the Khalid-Atar will have time to listen 
  to me, so I may not be able to ask him about you until we have returned. But 
  eventually, he will speak with me again. Tell me your heart-mother's name, 
  and your clan, Faanshi." Kiera, in constrast to your shows of emotion, seems 
  sedate, dulled.

Her knees are trembling; indeed, her entire body trembles, and after a moment 
  Faanshi drops to her knees, her joined hands still clasped to her breast. 
  "Ulima," she whispers. "Clan Sarazen... you... can help, imphada? Truly?"

This groveling business is really getting to Kiera. "Would you /please/ stand 
  up. And do not fall down again, Faanshi. I am a halfbreed. I know how it is, 
  to grow up and be hated and hidden. The Khalid-Atar is a just god, and he 
  judges on what is within, rather than what is without. I will speak to him; 
  indeed, I must, for if he finds out about you, he will likely be angry with 
  me for not having told him." See? You have to tell her. So there.

Hesitantly at first, and then with more surety, Faanshi once more rises. 
  Flushed with embarrassment and dread and joy intermingled altogether, and 
  grateful beyond words that her face is behind her veils -- for surely her 
  face must be afire -- the taller girl pauses, then. That the god who has 
  raised the smoking mountain might get angry at this, her unexpected 
  benefactor, suddenly troubles her deeply. "I would not wish the Khalid to be 
  angry with you," she says in stark, straightforward earnestness, and once 
  more her soft voice is strengthened by a tone of conviction.

"You /should/," Kiera does remember to mention, "kneel before the Khalid-Atar, 
  and do not look at him until he allows it." She speaks this as if she's 
  heard it far too many times, herself. Kiera was not raised Varati. "And I do 
  not wish the Khaid-Atar to be angry with me either. The tent you wish is 
  there, Faanshi. I will leave you, so you are not seen with me. Keep hope. I 
  will speak to the Khalid when I can, of you." Then Kiera smiles, ever so 
  briefly, before she turns to trudge back through the miserable snow and 
  sleet, mud and ice, to her small haven under the tarp.

Faanshi turns to watch the winged one go, breathing a small but heartfelt 
  "thank you," though she does not know if her words are heard. Hope, indeed, 
  begins to kindle within her, and it is with seemingly sudden wings of her 
  own that her feet carry her to the tent of the Atarvani... to request the 
  herbs that her heart-mother requires... and to hasten back to the Sarazen 
  encampment. With each of her steps, the little flame of hope burns all the 
  brighter.

[End log.]