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 Posted: Tue Feb 02, 2010 5:10 am
It didn't take long time for Skuld to get back to the place where she had hidden her divining bones and she made sure that no one was watching when she fished them out from under a thorny bush. She gathered them in her mouth and started plodding back to the Spirit-crippled male. Skuld hadn't used her bones for a reading since before the attack, but she was determined to at least try to help. With a clatter of bones she deposited her tools in a pile in front of Shibasa.
"There," she said, slightly winded from the walk, "We'll ask the spirits what they think about this."
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Posted: Wed Feb 03, 2010 5:41 am
"With... bones," Shibasa said, looking at the tools blankly. "You're asking them with bones." Yeah, he thought, this lady was crazy as hell.
But what did he have to lose?
"Okay," he said, laying down and watching the bones curiously. "Go for it. Let's see if your spirits can do me any good." Or at least keep him busy until night fell and it was safer to travel and find someone sane that could help him. If there was such a person, that was. Somehow he got the feeling he had long since left reality.
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Posted: Wed Feb 03, 2010 11:41 am
"Yes, with bones," Skuld said apologetically, "I'm not skilled in reading intestines and I don't think I could catch anything suitable in a hurry."
Or at all... Even smaller rodents and lizards were safe from her at the moment. Duma had kept her fed and she had regained some strength, but she still didn't count on getting home alive. Only the Spirits knew if she should ever see her home again. She tilted her head from side to side, stretching out the muscles in her neck and finding them quite sore. Throwing the bones would be... interesting. However, she was not about to let a stranger touch them if she could help it, so she had to try.
Concentrating on Shibasa and his missing piece of Spirit Skuld gathered the bones in her mouth and threw them high in the air with a forceful head movement. The flash of pain that followed nearly made her black out and while the bones clattered to the ground she thought she saw a Greater Spirit stand behind the other lion. Slightly dazed it took some time before she spoke or even looked at the scattered bones.
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Posted: Wed Feb 03, 2010 12:04 pm
"Oye," he said, seeing the dazed look in her eyes and not liking it. "You aren't gonna faint on me or anything, are you?" He had no clue what she was seeing, but it didn't really matter. The last thing he wanted to deal with was an unconscious lioness! "Water," he said. "You need water. Maybe some food, or--"
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Posted: Wed Feb 03, 2010 2:09 pm
The lion's frantic words did nothing to wake Skuld from her daze. In fact, they seemed to send her deeper, but he couldn't know that. Food... Water... Desperation... She hadn't asked to be showed these things, but there was nothing Skuld could do about it. Was it the Spirits, showing her these things? It was intense and slightly frightening to watch flashes of what must be Shibasa's encounter with the Greater Spirit. Finally able to break free she shook her head to clear the confusing visions. A sharp flash of pain told her that rapid movement was a bad idea. Oh, shoot... The headaches had almost started to disappear before she pulled this stunt.
"What a rotten thing to do," she said softly, and padded over to inspect the bone as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened, "Tricking you with the promise of food..."
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Posted: Wed Feb 03, 2010 4:21 pm
He jerked, shocked at what she knew. "How did you--I mean--she--" he stuttered. "How did you know that?" he finally demanded once he got control of his tongue. "Do you know her? Do you have something to do with what she did to me? Tell me!" he roared, feeling as inept as a child with impotent rage. He knew, somehow, that she couldn't possibly have something to do with Ubuge, but still--
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Posted: Thu Feb 04, 2010 2:12 pm
Skuld ignored the male in favour of the bones in front of her. The alignment of the bones and their overall pattern could tell a lot of things to those who were trained to read them, and this was an interesting read. The Spirits seemed to be arguing. She flicked her ears back in annoyance as Shibasa got louder and louder. Hmpf... Annoying cub!
"The Spirits," she said in an impatient tone that suggested he better shut up before she got really annoyed, "The Spirits showed me. Do you want to know what they say or not? Hmm?"
She turned back to the subtle patterns on the ground, noting the directions of cracks and tooth marks on her divining tools. To avoid further hissy fits from her blood red friend she started to read aloud.
"The spirits are conflicted," she said, "They either don't know where to find this Greater Spirit that stole part of your... err... soul. Or they don't want to say."
She read in silence once more, moving around the scattered bones. All that could be heard from her was the occasional huff and mumbled curse (was she cursing?) as she tried to make sense of what the Spirits had to say. They made little sense today, but they were communicating at least. Had she been completely healthy she would probably had tried tossing the bones again, asking the question in a different manner, but she couldn't afford to strain herself like that again. The young rogue would have to make do with this.
"Look," she said, motioning at a bone that must have some significance to her but that must look like any old gnawed bone to Shibasa, "This here suggests that what you search is in the North, and over here is something about a mountain. But what is this about going south? I wonder if your Greater Spirit is muddling my readings..."
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Posted: Thu Feb 04, 2010 3:00 pm
He went silent with her snapping, listening to her for a long moment before snorting. "So north to a mountain or south to something else. You know what?" he asked. "I'm going to the mountain. No clue which mountain, or if there's even a mountain at all, but I'm going to it. At least I'm not wandering through the middle of some pride war up north. But hell, with my luck I probably would be."
He paused, then shrugged it off. "Thanks, lady. And... try not to get yourself killed," he added before starting off in the general northward direction.
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Posted: Thu Feb 04, 2010 3:10 pm
"Good luck," Skuld called after him, "May the Spirits guide your steps."
She hoped she had really helped and not just helped lead him astray. Sometimes there was a fine line between the two, but she was sure the Spirits had their own plans for this young lion, whatever those plans might be. He had a strong spirit, that much was clear, and he would hopefully do fine despite the fact that part of it was stolen. With a bit of luck he would die with enough honour to compensate for that missing piece. She sighed and settled down to wait for the return of Dumanla. He would bring food, and a better chance of not getting killed.
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