Date: February 27, 2000
Place: Forest Edge - Farmlands
Cast: Thornlance, Vinna
Scene: Two sisters are reunited, and find much to talk about.

Forest Edge - Farmlands:
      Here, the farmlands meet the forest. Ancient trees cast shadows down onto cultivated fields. Like two factions, the plant life stands in contrast. The foliage of the forest is wild and untamed -- weeds, trees, wildflowers and underbrush alike struggling for a chance to grow, while the crops in the field are carefully tended and manicured. It is much like the difference between the Sylvans that dwell in the forest and those that dwell in the city of Haven.
      The gravel road ends and only a path winds between the thick trunks, leading into the forest.

Sitting on a rock with her back towards the newcomer is a familiar outline, though much built up. The white hair leaves no trace of doubt, however, as to whom this might be. She leans over, using a knife to pick a rock out from the side of her shoe.

The great bowl of the sky is clear, the sun providing precious little warmth to filter down onto the forest below. It doesn't bother the huntress who slinks through the underbrush, though, spears in hand. She makes nary a sound as she pads through the foliage on pale, bare feet, eluding twigs and dry leaves lingering from autumn. The cool of the earth is reassuring to Thornlance, moreso than that dismaying silhouette perched atop yonder rock. Silhouette? Thorn diverts her attention back to the snowy-tressed figure. Vinna. It must be her! None else occupy that same figure. But it isn't that easy. Tawny brows draw together into one bushy line as she ponders the knife. Vinna never bore a knife. Concluding that this situation needs further inspection, the slender huntress continues to make her stealthy way through the bushes, edging ever closer.

With the slightest of movements, Vinna sits a bit straighter, listening to the sound the world makes around her. Shifting her gaze to the side, she lowers her foot slowly to the ground, pulling a knife twice the length of her boot from her hip. She does not turn around yet, waiting for the right moment to do so.

There's only one way to settle this, and Thornlance knows what that is. From the underbrush comes a series of precisely-spoken words -- words that only a born and bred Kana'ti would know. "Wa-mutawin?" 'My sister,' inflected in query at the end. Any others might simply take it for the oddities of an animal's cry.

Standing with a bit of a start, Vinna looks around with the quick motions of a trained huntress. Lifting her chin a bit, she answers the call with, "Ha-kiyanataya deiyana," which, of course, means 'I ask, who is there,' in the tongue of the Kana'ti. She takes a step back, towards the rock, making sure there's enough space around her should she have to fight.

A bright peal of laughter immediately gives away her position amid the forest foliage, yet the shaper cannot help but reply in the most formal tone of voice she's able to muster, "He-Shai Lokwani Toqewi Maona! Of course!" The more common words follow the naming of the hidden one as 'I am Shai Spear of Thorns.' Again, Thornlance laughs. "Vinna!" Finally, she emerges from the foliage, spears still in hand.

Astonished for just a moment, Vinna stands and stares back at her sister. Though much has changed with her sister, Thornlance looks just like Vinna has remembered her. Maybe not as she idolized her, but just as she remembered her. "Sister..." Vinna says, walking towards Thornlance, not quite sure whether to toss her arms around her or to be a bit more formal. The spear, of course, make it harder to hug the other.

Very little has changed about the whipcord-slender shaper of wood -- certainly not as much as her sister! The addition of the second, steel-tipped spear would, most likely, be the most drastic change. "What brings you back from the lands of the tribe?" Thornlance asks as she brushes a single hand through the thick, tawny mane whose only change is the addition of various new feather and bead ornaments. "I thought you wanted to stay?"

"I changed my mind." Vinna answers, with all the guff of a teenager who grew up rapidly. "Times were tough during the war, then they got better all too quickly. I had to get away from the mountains, the snow, the Tribe." She replaces the knife back in her calf-sheath.

Yes, Thornlance gives the knife due notice. No, she will not ask about it yet. She simply folds her bare arms over the chest of her well-worn deerskin tunic without once loosening her grip on the ever-present weapons and asks, "Hard times?" This does seem to interest her. "What happened? Was anyone hurt in the war? Did the fighting come onto the tribal lands?" A flurry of questions, quickly dammed in order to permit her sister sufficient time to answer.

Shaking her head and returning to the rock, Vinna sits. She takes the smaller knife and returns to the annoying rock in her shoe. While she stares at it, she says, "The Varati took to the mountains just over the tribe. When the war started to turn for the worse, we were squeezed between the Empyreans and the Varati. Men left to try and ward off the advancing forces. I went to try and get some food and clothing for the family. I ended up in the Varati front-line, along with the shudra." She finally tosses the rock out of her shoe and sighs, sitting up straight. "RunningWolf, HeartsBluff and Ivy, they all died from hunger by the time I got back. Then, three of the elders were dead from fighting. It was a tragedy. But, we got better. Time passes, you know, wounds heal, and food grows in the spring."

For all the gravity of the subject being discussed, Thornlance can't help but wrinkle her delicate little nose and inquire as to the health of, "Featherbrook? The little child-who bore-children? Did she survive?" Unspoken yet clearly readable within those vernal eyes of hers is a hope that she indeed did not.

"Do you think her suffering mother would ever let her go?" Vinna says with a smile. She flips her hair over her shoulder and shakes her head, "Our dear Featherbrook was warm in a hidden cave with her little ones for at least three of the coldest months. She's fatter than ever now."

Without thinking, Thornlance raises the hand currently unoccupied by the two spears to brush aside the tuft of hair that obscures the scar over her cheek in most cases. "Little she-cur. I don't see the reasoning of Rain's Fall, keeping her in the caverns all safe like that. If I were her mother -- Nokomis forbid! -- I would have given her to the Varati in exchange for leaving our lands alone. It'd teach that uppity healer some guts!" A sigh. "Well, if I am lucky, a mountain cat will have found her since you left." Vicious, this Thornlance! Onto another subject, though. "Did you feel the magic storm a while ago?"

Vinna tilts her head, gazing at her sister, watching her the way a student watches a teacher. Then, when she's asked a question, she answers, "No, I didn't. Was it while I was at war?"

"Perhaps they only happened here. Maybe it was because of that magical-tower-building in the city." Thornlance shrugs her narrow shoulders, giving the matter no further thought. "It happened after that. Maybe..." She pauses to think, lips pursing for a moment. "As many cycles of the moon as I have fingers." As if to display, she holds up one hand, five fingers splayed.

Shrugging, Vinna says, "There were many other things to think of than magic. I am no shaman, sister." She stretches her legs out in front of herself. "What magical tower?" This intrigues her.

Thornlance answers her pale sister's question with a question of her own. "Have you ever been to the stone city a little ways to the east?"

"Oh, the city, yes." Vinna says, smiling and nodding. "I met a few Sylvans there, as well. But I got lost very easily. Its not as easy to find your way around a place with so many sights and smells."

"Well," says Thornlance, a pragmatic edge to her voice, "if you were in the city, you certainly were able to see that white finger of a tower in the center of the city? That is the tower. Many go there to learn magic. I think it is still there. The storms might have destroyed it, though. I have not been there since."

"Why not, sister?" Vinna asks, leaning forward and gazing up at the new spear. "What's wrong with this city?"

The silvery tip of that new spear appears to be the selfsame spearpoint Thornlance found in the abandoned hut at the edge of Apisachi territory during the trip home two or so years ago. The burned quality of the metal would say so much. "It makes me nervous to be there. So much violence and so little green! There is a garden but that is the best that can be said of it." Self-righteous would be the best term to describe the shaper at this moment.

After staring at the spear for a moment and recognizing the head with a nod, Vinna looks back down at her sister and says, "There is violence in the forest, sister. Violence in the hills and mountains. I've seen it. There can't be as much in a place with so many different people."

"You're wrong, sister," the shaper asserts. "It's that that makes the city violent. Surely you saw in the war? The winged folk fight the strong folk because they're different. The fish-folk aren't as violent. That is good. But the others -- even our own folk -- are affected by the city. It makes them go crazy and hurt others just because they want to!"

"Those Varati, the strong ones, as you say, fought because they wanted land and power," Vinna says, gazing towards the northern lands. "They fought because they wanted what the others had, not because they were different. That, my sister, was just a convenient explanation." Someone told this to Vinna, it's obvious, and she takes much pride in being so knowledgeable.

The well-spoken rebuttal earns the pale teacher-turned-warrior a malcontent grumble from Thornlance, followed by a muttered admission of, "You were always smarter than me. Fine. They fought for land." Then, a thought strikes her. A bid for an impressive bit of reasoning is made. "Or did they start with a want for land but really fight the Empyreans," See? She knows the word, "because they were different?"

To this, Vinna simply laughs. "Sister, you have not changed and it is a joy to see." She stands, walking towards Thornlance. "I am quite glad that I came here. There is no more use for me in the Tribe. It was time to come here."

A smile forms upon Thornlance's features as her sister laughs. "It's been too long since you laughed, sister-Vinna. I hope this is a change for keeping?" The huntress herself laughs now. "It is good to have you in the Ettowealona lands. Will you stay long?"

"I hope I will be here as long as I can." Vinna says, smiling. "And I hope to laugh as much as I can as well. It feels good to smile."

A hand -- the one unoccupied by the spears, of course -- is clapped onto Vinna's shoulder, fingers resting lightly on the leather of Thornlance's sister's garment. "Good! I look forward to having you here!" A shift. The shaper's demeanor goes rather quickly from joy to concern. "Are you tired? Certainly you have traveled far today. Would you like to sleep?"

"Indeed, I have been on my feet for as long as I can remember," Vinna says with a smile and a chuckle. "I would enjoy a bit of rest, especially now that I have found my sister again."

"You can sleep on my branch if you'd like? Until a more permanent den can be created, of course. There's enough room for two of us." A sly grin crosses replaces Thornlance's smile. "It can't be any worse than the time when Father made us sleep on that little ledge high in the mountains 'to build character.'"

Vinna laughs, shaking her head and remembering the fiasco. "What was he thinking? I was so young back then! I couldn't have chased a mouse, let alone brave a night out on that ledge..." She smiles as she walks.

FIN  

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