"Things in Common"

Log Date: 2/9/02
Intro: Later in the same day that Kephissa first met the Olbar, the sun is now 
setting and Kephissa returns to the Olbar camp.  Needing to understand if they 
have seen any of her crew, she brings some seafood that's she's collected in 
trade for the information, and the food they gave her earlier.

Cast:
Kephissa
Xhosa

The sun is setting as Kephissa makes her way back to the camp. For now she comes 
back alone, whether she met anybody else while she was gone is a mystery. She 
carries with her a rough net of several sea creatures, star fish, crabs, 
mussels. She raises a hand as she nears the camp in greeting and calls out the 
names she recently learned. "Xhosa? Shelbor?"

Xhosa looks over from her spot near the fire. "Kephissa?" She smiles, waving the 
other woman over. She's busy cooking herself. There's roasting rabbit, potatoes 
baking in the coals and a couple ears of corn cooking in their husks. There's 
also a pot of rather strong smelling tea nearby. "I hope you're hungry."

Kephissa holds up the net and hands it to Xhosa. '((Food in trade.))" She can 
hardly go eating other peoples food when she's perfectly cabable of gathering 
her own. She wrinkles her nose, although the rabbit smells good. After all this 
time eating just fish, land animals make a nice change for the pallet.

Xhosa oohs, looking at the net of critter. She pokes at the crabs curiously and 
nods. "Thank you." She motions for you to sit down, then moves to pour a cup of 
tea. "Do you want some?"
A few of those crabs may still be snapping. ;)

Kephissa inclines her head and takes a seat cross-legged on the ground. She 
takes the offered tea, sipping it gingerlly. Not bad. A little more bitter than 
some of the infusions of her homeland, but still nice.

Xhosa smiles, drinking her tea and eyeing you curiously. "Well. I suppose we 
should start with a language lesson..." She peers around, at a lose for where to 
start. Okay, start with the basics. She sips, then says "Tea."

Kephissa looks puzzled for a moment, not at the concept of a language lesson, 
but at whether the word refers to the action or the liquid. She taps the surface 
of the liquid with her finger. "Tea?" She pauses. "((or))" She mimes holding a 
cup up to her mouth and drinking. "Tea?"

Xhosa ahs. Okay. She can do that. She touches the liquid. "Tea." She sips, then 
looks at you. "Drink." See the difference?

Kephissa nods. Clearer now. "Tea." She holds the cup up. "Drink." She takes a 
drink. She pauses for a moment, unclear in whether the stranger wants to know 
the words in Kephissa's language like the other ones did.

Xhosa nods, waiting. She's here to learn, after all.

Kephissa taps the surface of the liquid again, this time repeating the word in 
her own langauge. "((Tea))" Then she takes a drink. "((Drink))" Seems an odd 
place to start the language exchange, but than she's never claimed to be a 
linguist.

Xhosa nods and tries that. Well, it's no more strange than the elven words she's 
picked up. She smiles, then frowns. What to try next? She's a witch and a 
hunter, not a language coach.

Kephissa smiles and than decides its her turn. It's a joint effort after all. 
She points at the fire. "((Fire.))"

Xhosa mmms and nods. "Fire..." She looks around, pointing to the tents. "Tent."

Kephissa repeats the word for fire and than looks at the tent. "((Tent.))" At 
this rate it will take forever before they get to the more than basic 
communication stage.

Xhosa nods and sighs. She looks lost, really. At least with the elves, she had 
Coral around and Coral was raised with them. Doh!

Kephissa sighs. This worked much better with the other strangers. But there were 
more visual aids around. What she really needed to know if these strangers have 
seen others like her. Although she's getting the feeling that they haven't. 
Things would have started differently if they had. She points at a nearby tree. 
"((Tree.))"

Xhosa nods. "Tree." Blah, this will take forever. She frowns, looking around. 
She stands up, calling her horse over to her absently. Spiritwind comes, 
nuzzling against her. Xhosa strokes the horses neck reflexively. It always calms 
her down to have her horse sister around.

Kephissa takes a moment while her host is distracted to mumble under her breath 
about never complaining that Arnos had a cushy job again. She looks at the 
horse, something she hadn't had a chance to really do earlier. Seems similar, if 
maybe a bit smaller than the ones of her people.

Xhosa lays her head against Spiritwind's neck, looking at Kephissa. "I don't 
suppose you know what a horse is do you?" She pats Spirit's again, then says 
"Spiritwind. That's her name."

Kephissa smiles. Horses she knows, although not as well as ships. She points a 
finger at the horse. "((Horse.))" She can't pick up out of Xhosa's words what 
word actually refers to the animal.

Xhosa nods. "Right. Horse." She frowns. "I'm Xhosa and this is Spiritwind." She 
tries, hoping you get the distinction. She looks curious, then slips onto the 
horses back. She holds out her hand to Kephissa, offering to pull her up too. 
"Do you ride?"

Kephissa nods, and takes the hand, mounting gracefully behind Xhosa. Showing 
some skill in the area of getting on horses. Hopefully they're not going far. 
Valnek would kill her.

Xhosa laughs, vastly pleased. If you ride, you cannot be all bad. She grins over 
at you, then taps Spiritwind lightly with her knee. That's enough to send the 
horse off, jumping over the cooking fire and down the path toward the water.

Kephissa hangs on as the horse jumps, its been a while since she's been on the 
back of a horse, but she finds she's almost missed the experience. Oh well, 
nothing to do now but hold on and see where they're going.

Xhosa loves to run. She loves that more than probably anything else in the 
world, so she tends to forget things when she's doing it. Like maybe the person 
riding with her isn't as skilled at this as she is. She sends the horse 
galloping down toward the beach.

You never really forget how to ride a horse. So given a few moments to get her 
bearings, Kephissa has no problems at all. Well, except for the fact that she 
misses the various pieces of tack that made this a bit more comfortable.

Xhosa finally decides you've had enough and slows the horse, heading back to 
camp. She grins at you, nodding. "I like you."

Kephissa grins back, no clue what Xhosa just said. "((Thank you. That was 
fun.))" The ride was hopefully short enough she won't feel it in her legs later.

Xhosa slips off the horse when she gets back to the camp, offering you her hand 
if you need it. "I wish you understood me."

Kephissa dismounts rather easily. Okay maybe she stumbles a bit when she gets on 
the ground. It has been a while. "((Well, at least some connections can be made 
without talking. Wonder if she's ever been sailing.))"

Xhosa listens to your words, frowning. "Sailing?" She doesn't understand any of 
what you said, but it sounded important.

Kephissa nods as Xhosa repeats the word. "((Sailing.))" Hmmm, how to explain it. 
She moves her hand in a wave like motion. "((Travelling on the water.))"

Xhosa watchs your hand moving and mmms, shaking her head. "Wave? I don't 
understand."

Kephissa squats down and picks up a twig. She draws waves in dirt. They're close 
enough to the ocean that the other woman should know what those are. Than she 
sketches a basic boat shape with a sail. She points at the waves. "((Water.))" 
Than at the boat. "((Boat.))" She pauses. "((Sailing Boat on Water))".

Xhosa ooohs and takes the stick. She rubs out the sails on the boat and draws a 
pair of oars beside it instead. "Boat."

Kephissa grins. So they have some concept of water travel, if not wind driven. 
She nods. "Boat." repeating the Olbar word. Its enough for now, the concept of 
sails might require a demonstration.

Xhosa knows about boating. She grins, then takes the twig and draws out what 
looks like a long, winding river. "River." Then, she draws a little bridge 
across the water, "Bridge", then on one side of the river, a house. "House. My 
house."

Kephissa nods. Her house is across a bridge and river. Okay. Kephissa draws a 
ragged coastline. She marks an 'X'. Points at it and says "Xhosa." Than she 
draws a boat off the coast, and a few wave symbols. She points in the direction 
of the ocean. "((Ocean.))"

Xhosa nods. Okay. She gets that. There's a boat out there on the water 
somewhere. Hmmmm. She takes the stick and points to the X. "Xhosa and Kephissa." 
Then, she draws what looks to be a vast distance, filled with what looks like 
trees <Forest>, hills <Mountain>, lots of grasses <Plains>, and finally a bunch 
of little houses grouped together. "Home. My house is here." She points, looking 
at you to see if you understand. She's a loooong way from home, but at least she 
knows where it is.

Kephissa nods, Xhosa is as much a stranger to this piece of land as she is, just 
coming from across the land instead of the sea. Kephissa draws more water 
looking stuff, and then another coast line, where she draws a house. "My home." 
She says in the language of the humans of this land.

Xhosa's eyes widen. She didn't even know there was land across the water. She 
nods, looking at the makeshift map. That much water, it must have taken a very 
big boat to get across. She thinks for a moment, then draws little stick people. 
"Xhosa. Shelbor. Coralfire." She names each person in her party. Then she draws 
a little figure and says "Kephissa," handing the stick back to you. Hopefully, 
you'll figure out she wants to know how many people you have with you.

Kephissa draws one stick figure upright. "Valnek." Than she draws about 15 stick 
figures a distance away. And then still more stick figures lying down, and she 
puts x's through those. There are about 30 of those.

Xhosa ooohs. That's not good. Not all those x'ed out figures. She nods, laying a 
hand over the crossed-out souls and murmuring a quick prayer for them. Then, she 
taps the one you called Valnek. "Valnek. Is here?" She gestures toward the sea.

Kephissa waves vaguely back the way he came. "((Valnek back there. Searching.))" 
She puts a hand to her forehead and looks around. An action that worked before 
to get this point across.

Xhosa nods. She points to the little Valnek figure, then to the mark for where 
the two of you are. "Valnek come here?"

Kephissa shakes her head. "((Maybe tomorrow.))" She folds her arms and than 
raises the top one slowly in a circle mimicing the passage of the sun. Well, at 
least that's what shes attempting, whether it will come across as that, who 
knows.

Xhosa mmms and nods slowly. Okay, she didn't get that one, but she's been 
understanding you far, so she'll let that pass. Besides, she understood the 
shaking head. She considers, looking around. You're going to need a place to 
sleep and maybe some new cloths.

Kephissa nods in return, not sure if that got across or not. She sits back on 
her haunches a bit, it looks like drawing time is done. She looks around, 
wondering if she should try and make her way back to the camp she set up on the 
beach or stay here for the night.

Xhosa stands and motions you to follow her. "Come." She smiles, moving back to 
her tent. She ducks inside, then comes out with a blanket and her extra pair of 
pants and long shirt. She offers them to you. "You can stay here. With us."

Kephissa takes the blanket and the clothes, but she makes no attempt to wear 
them. Instead she appears to be examining their manufacture, how their stitched 
together and the material they're made out of.

Xhosa laughs. She shakes her head, motioning for you to put them on. They're 
really quite well made, heavy leather, tanned and dyed a deep brown. The shirt 
is dyed a pale red, almost maroon, and decorated with tiny feathers and beading. 
The blanket, now the blanket is a thing of beauty. It's handwoven, but the 
weaves are so small and so tight you can barely see them. It's a bright green, 
with a pattern of spirals in white and black.

Kephissa finishes her examination of the clothes and shakes her head setting 
them down again. Even though she knows that she won't be completely understood. 
"((No, thank you. I'd be more comfortable in my own clothes.))" The leather is a 
bit heavier and stiffer than what's she's used to wearing. She does run her 
hands over the blanket again, deciding to wait until the morning until examining 
it in more detail.

Xhosa mmms. You're cloths are all torn though. It can't be good for you, or 
warm. She sighs, taking the things back. She gestures toward her tent. "Sleep." 
She makes a motion of laying her head on her hands and closing her eyes. 
"Sleep."

Kephissa thinks sleep does sound like a good idea. Its been a long few days, she 
gathers up the blanket and crawls into the tent. It looks like its being offered 
to her. A tent is much better than sleeping under the sky, particularly in the 
fall.

Xhosa nods and looks pleased. She crawls in after you, making sure you're 
comfortable.
Kephissa is used to tight quarters on the ship, otherwise she'd make more of a 
fuss over sharing sleeping quarters with a stranger. The bear on the other 
hand...

The bear just opens it's eyes, yawns and goes back to sleep. Xhosa makes sure to 
put the bear behind her, so you won't be too worried about it.