Ashes

Last week in Dark Sun, we played some of Zarnian's guards, trying to defend the House against an attack by the Tunnel Boys. We were mostly successful in this, but not completely. At the very end of the session, after the game was offically over, our characters came back to find the smoky ruins. I know this is an important transition for my character, especially with all she lost. I am also starting to take her on a slight side step of the path she has been on, so it is story time. This story takes place right after the Tunnel Boys' attack on Tyr.

Ashes

                Her hands were covered in black, the smell of smoke burning her nose. With a trembling hand, she reached out to touch a single one of the charred leaves with the tip of her finger. It shattered, raining down black ash, disappearing on the bleak carpet of destruction. She wanted to cry, scream, to rage, but all she felt at the moment was cold, her heart in her throat. The plant that Malik gave her, the child she saved and sprouted from its seeds and raised for years was defiled and consumed. The glossy dark green leaves and small red flowers that brought her so much joy and comfort was dead, as was the plant which housed Tzitch, the nature spirit she’d taken care of for Trakas. Tzitch had gone insane from the violation and pain, and while she didn’t know how to end his suffering, she would have to ask Trakas to do so. All her plants, her babies, whom she’d given her water, touched, and loved – all dead. Part of her wanted to join them.

                There was some comfort to be taken in the fact her father’s whip had been spared. It smelled of smoke, the leather darker, but it could still be used. She’d left it behind and taken her new bow, instead, but now that choice seemed foolish. She had only two things left of the man she considered her father – the whip and her chest armor. Somewhere, that whip had some of her own blood on it still. She rolled it up, and held it to her chest, trying to smell some of Nibenay on it. All of that was gone, including her corset and skirt, made of kills from Itaruk, the one she had made to wear for Trakas. The one that, due to all the drama with Cael and the way Trakas had come back to her, she’d never worn it. Now, it smelled so badly of smoke, it could never be worn.

                Worse than possessions, Ennis was dead. The sword wound in his back told her all she needed to know. G’tol was a traitor. Looking back, she should have slit his throat when Jax was killed. Both Ennis and Jax, dead because she allowed a coward into their midst. Tightening her grip on the whip, she didn’t feel the spines of cactus draw blood as they bit into her flesh. Bay couldn’t contact G’tol, so either the Tunnel Boys saved her the trouble of tracking him down and killing him, or he was avoiding all contact. The smallest corner of her soul still had some pity for the weak-willed drunk, only because Astinicus had likely threatened his family. That tiny corner hoped that G’tol was already dead. If she found him, he would pay for her dead friends before he went to the Grey. It would not be an easy passing.

                Closing her eyes, she could feel the despair of it all coming, creeping up her back with lurid, arachnid steps. If she allowed it to take root in her heart and mind, there would be nothing left of her. The disappointments would keep replaying until they were all that she was. Pain would compound pain so that when they found her, she would be curled up in a ball, her mind gone. She’d be no good to anyone like that, including Ennis and Jax. There would be no justice for them.

                Looking again at her plants, her heart started to break. They were sweet and innocent and needed her. Then, with a twist of her stomach, she realized that Timmuth was sweet and innocent still that moment that she threw him over her shoulder in Nibenay. She missed her home town, but he was a part she could still connect with. Yes, hate burned in his soul, and those flames had been fanned into an inferno with Bay’s coaching. But Timmuth was young, undeserving of all that happened to him and continued to happen to him in House Esticles.

                Gently attaching the whip to her belt, she walked over to her pots. One by one, she lifted out their inner linings to take out the metal and coin she still possessed. She would go to the brothel and buy Esticle’s favorite, trading her for the boy. Once she had him back, she would not allow him to go again. Pushing him away when he was six, traumatized, and afraid was one of the worst things she had ever done in her life, a life where she had committed many atrocities.

                After Timmuth was back, she would help C’aro rebuild. The House was her home, in Tyr or in the village. Yes, she hated this damned city, but her work here was not done. The Oracle was still not retrieved. She would be saved; she owed the House that. After that, she’d find other ways to help them rise from the ashes.

                First, though, came Timmuth. With a breath to calm her nerves, she slung her satchel of money over her broad shoulder and stepped out to meet C’aro. Today was the first day of rebuilding herself and the House.