From Street Mouse to Striker

[Alatriel]

Bella lays a sleeping Rachel down in the small crib and looks over to Daniel  "Ken we talk, Dan?"

Daniel nods and motions to living room, craning his neck to see if Rachel is asleep before slipping out.

She follows him out and sits on the couch.  "Dan, I been thinkin' a lot since Rachel come... I don' think I'm gonna be a bounty hunter."

He furrows his brow.  "But I thought you were a blade and that is what you wished to pursue, Bella.  Why the change of goal?"

She shrugs and looks back at the door.  "I am a blade, Dan... but I don' want nobody hurtin' my kids neither."

The wrinkles on his forehead smooth out and he smiles.  "Commendable, so what do you wish to do with your training then?"

"I'm still gonna go out with you an' all and still work on my blades... but I ain' gonna go after bounties like I thought i wanted ta afore Rachel.  I'm gonna keep trainin' on my own, might look fer dif'ren' ways ta train, sometimes with you, sometimes with Charlie... but I ain' gonna be lookin' ta build up my name except fer as a trainer," she explains.

Daniel settles back into the couch, obviously still puzzled but listening.  "No reputation, no fame?"

"A reputation an' fame what brings my enemies ta my house ta kill my family?" she asks.  "I ken train up my kids so they ken fight back... but they ain' ready."

"Perhaps it would, but you seemed so set upon it, Bella.  I do not think you should give up your dream so quickly myself."   He pauses studying her face.  "Unless you are very certain that is your path."
 
Bella shrugs a bit, looking resigned.  "Mebbe it's jest puttin' it on hold fer a bit fer somethin' more important.  Children are meant to be taught."

" Aye," he agrees, "and I shall do my part in thier instruction.  What of Lana's girls, Bria and Katlyn?  Will you train them as well?"

Bella nods.

" Very well.  This was all that was troubling you?" he asks.

She nods again.  "Mouse is retirin... "  She looks at him for a moment, then away from him towards the fireplace.  "I'll jest be Bella here."

He hugs her closely and whispers in her ear.  "Whatever path you choose, know this Bella.  We are chosen by the Great Dragon for each other, I will stand beside you and you beside me as is his will," he kisses her forehead with a soft chuckle,  "whether you be a Mouse or a Bella, Beloved."

She wraps her arms tightly around him and smiles.  "Thanks Dan... I don't think I ken learn ta be a shiled, but I ken teach my kids ta be blades."
Daniel nods.  That will be my task: to teach them how to heal wounds and protect each other, Bella.  Fear not."

She nods again and settles into his embrace.  "Sit with me fer a bit then afore I go ta bed?  I know I gotta get some sleep while I ken with her sleepin'... but I like havin' ya home fer now."

Daniel tickles her playfully and whispers an alternate idea.  Bella grins a bit and the two retreat together towards their bedroom.

[Alatriel]

Once Bella and Steel arrive at the Tower Academy and find an empty room, Bella locks the door, and removes her helm after making sure there isn't anyone else at all around.

"Alright, so I need a better way to talk with my hands," she says.  "Too many people know my voice, so I don't wanna risk it."

"Makes sense...  ironic, really, given who you're speaking to," Steel informs her.  "My master once told me that before I could make a name for myself, I had to reinvent people's perception of me.  You realized this all on your own.  Or rather, you extracted this from our discussions of the Axioms, our discussions of what it is that you want, and how to get it.  For me, being what I am, sticking out the way I do, I had to not only travel far from my home, but had to completely cover myself, head to toe, paying to have a special mask made that would fit my unique skull...
"I fought with sword and shield and chainmail. But the most important change I made, what distinguished me from the rest, and made my transformation complete..." he pauses a moment to make his point, "... was the choice not to speak.
"Something about being mute, though, separated me while at the same time causing me to be questioned less.   My actions had more meaning, if I ever did choose to speak, people listened.  Of course, my vocal quality is recognizable even to those that don't know me personally."

She listens quietly to what he's saying, letting it all soak in.   "I didn' know you didn' speak fer a while."

"I think I must have gone ten years, maybe longer, without saying more than a hundred words," he says.  "At the end of that time, I was well known, respected, and when I finally did begin to show my true attributes, people were willing to accept that because I had already proven myself in ways they appreciated."

She nods.  "Makes sense.   I'm lettin' people believe that I cain' speak at all."  She shrugs a bit.  "Iffn they ask ya, tell em part o' why I got my name's cause a snake bit me inna throat."

Steel grins wickedly, his mask sitting silently to the side as well.  "I can help you add the two scars to your neck if you like."

"No, cause then Bella'd have em, an' that ain' all I'm doin'.  I'm changin' Bella's reputation too, an' Bella's gonna be inna public eye."

Bella goes on to explain parts of her plan to the more experienced Dread Blade.  After listening for a while Steel smirks.  "And where did a little mouse learn such cunning?"

"Ya ne'er watched a mouse much did ya?" she asks.

"I mostly ate them."

"Cats chase em, but they gotta be quick an' smart ta keep outta their claws," she explains.  "I said from the beginnin' Steel, I ain' dumb.  Ne'er was.  I spent a long time watchin' how things are. I know what I want now... an' now I'm gonna get it."

"Yes," Steel agrees.  "Yes you are."

They talk some more about things that are needed to carry out various parts of the plans.  Steel sniffs and tilts his head.  "I'll see that you get what you need. First, though... since you'd like to learn signs..."  He takes a set of jagged-edged cards, clearly well used, and offers them to her.  "This is the first set:  the basic alphabet of signs for the Common language."

Bella looks over the cards, eyebrows raised.  "This... I ken learn."  She looks up from the cards and looks at him.  "Ken I keep these fer a while?"

"The letters are on one side, a picture of the correct hand sign is on the other. At some point you'll need to actually watch somebody, but thse will get you started," he explains.  "And yes, though I want them back.  They were made for me, and I value them greatly."

Bella nods.  "Iffn ya'll practice with me, I'll get it."

"And that's most of what it takes," he agrees, "lots of practice.  Repetition."

She nods confidently.  "Practice I ken do."

Steel continues, "When you've got the alphabet down, we'll move onto basic words and concepts."

She nods again, looking through the cards carefully, then looks back at him questioningly. "So ya don't think my idea's too farfetched?"

"No, actually. Just, what you're leaning to become..."  He pauses, squinting one eye.  "Well, all in good time, hm? You learn your signs, and then as part of each new lesson, I will also teach you something that will interest you in light of your plans."

Bella raises an eyebrow.  "Fine," she says.  "I'll learn this alphabet by next week."  She pauses and looks at him a moment.  "The most importan' thing I gotta do, though... iffn this secret e'er gets out, then it's all fer nothing.  Yer holdin' my cards, Steel, an' I know better'n ta trust ya, but I'm hopin ya ain' gonna play that card against me les'n I really screw up big time."

Steel smiles a surprisingly genuine smile.  "If you screw up, make sure you meant to."

Bella grins crookedly and pulls her helm off the table, putting it back over her head.  "See ya next week..."  She tucks the cards safely in a hidden pocket in her pack, and leaves the room.

Steel nods once, picking up his own mask as well.

[Alatriel]

In a quiet room within the Tower Academy, Steel shows Bella how to form various hand signs, specifically reviewing the alphabet, showing her how to spell her different names.  Bella nods and repeats each sign.

"I got a problem, an' I don' know iffn yer gonna want to help me with it or not... but I think it needs ta be done," she says after a while.  

Steel looks at her, silently forming the sign for the letter "V."

Even while talking, she repeats the sign for "V" then continues to sign the letters for the rest of her name.  "You know I got a problem with mind magics affectin' me.  Iffn I'm protected, tha's one thing, but iffn I ain', I need ta make sure that even when I'm scared, I don' scream or make any sound.  Iffn I get hurt real bad, make sure I ken still not cry out."  She spells out the rest of the words: "I b-e-e-n s-t-u-d-y-i-n", making a mistake and signing a D instead of a B, but corrects herself quickly.

"What you ask for cannot be done without permanently removing your ability to speak or significant magic," Steel says.

"I ken train myself not to scream," she says.

"I suspect it's possible for an item to be made emanates a magic which either neutralizes the ability to speak or creates some manner of silencing effect in a small area," Steel continues as he considers the possibilities.

Bella shrugs, "I still think I jest need practice."

"Mm.  If such is the case, then why ask me about it?" he asks.

"Because I need ya ta scare me till I don' scream," she explains quietly.

"That would work right up until you're mind is overcome by magic. At that point, your training will matter little," Steel says.  "Magic always wins."

She sighs.  "I hate magic."

"You and most of the world," he states.  "There are items that can provide a permanent protection against all but the absolute most powerful attacks on the mind.... however, these items are rare indeed, and powerful in and of themselves."

Bella spell-signs slowly "i  c-a-n n-o-t a-f-f-o-r-b t-o f-a-i-t."  She then frowns and repeats the signs correcting her mistakes.

Steel watches her signs, and then responds, "Then be very careful what you get into until you know what you're up against.  Or learn to use the magic on scrolls, and carry a lot of mind blanking magic.   Often, especially if you're in a group, you can allow others to engage before you get involved, allowing an assessment of the situation.

She nods quietly.  "Iffn it weren' that Bella needs ta keep her voice, I'd let ya take mine away.

He looks at her oddly, squinting slightly and tilting his head, following that comment, but says nothing.  Instead, he starts at the top of the alphabet and go through all the signs again.

She doesn't respond verbally, but once again repeats all of the signs of the alphabet.  She repeats through the entire alphabet again and then once more to make sure she has it all correct, then puts her hands in her lap and looks at him.  "Last time ya started ta say somethin' to me but ya stopped.  What was it?"  She pauses a moment, then continues as if sure of a thought.  "An' I still think I wanna try ta get it so's I don' scream iffn I'm feared.  I don' think I ain' gonna be scared... I jest wanna not scream.  Ya know... change the way I react ta the fear.  Run, sure.  Freeze, whatever... I jest don' wanna make a sound I ain' s'poseda be able ta make.  I ain' tryin' ta make it so the magic don' work on me.  I'm tryin' ta be realistic.  I cain' change the magic, but I ken change me.  I done it afore, I think I ken do it again."

He nods a bit.  "You're right. You can at the very least alter how you respond to certain stimulus.   It requires changing the mental, emotional, and physical responses, as they are all linked.  Magic may force ytou into having the emotion of fear, but people aren't limited to feeling only one emotion at a time, and most magic isn't powerful enough to both instill an emotion and take away all the others.  That is, most of those who control magic aren't powerful enough. I'm certainly not."

"So ken ya help me do that then?" she asks.

Steel responds, "I've never attempted to teach such a thing, but I can certainly try.  I'll have to consider a few methods to try. I'm sure you have your own ideas on the matter as well."

She nods.  "None of them actually sound all that fun... but that's sorta the point.  Shefrowns gravely and seriously.  "I ain' even started talkin' bout trainin' myself so's I don' call out under torture... so... we'll leave that fer another time."

"Training against fear is in fact training against torture," Steel states, "because torture works solely off of fear, whether that be fear of pain, fear of death, or fear for the lives of those close to you."

She nods silently, then signs the letters "t-h-a-t-w-i-l-l-w-o-r-k."

"You've about got the alphabet down. Here's the next set of cards."  He hands her another well-worn deck from his pack.

Bella takes the cards and looks through them briefly, then nods quietly.

"They have words and signs for basic terms used in battle," Steel explains.  "I'll take the other deck back now, unless you wish to make your own copies first."

"I ain' so good at drawin' but iffn I need ta check I'll ask ya."  She hands him back the first set of cards, which Steel takes and tucks away safely.  Bella tucks the new set away carefully, then pulls her helm on again.  "See ya soon then.  I'll learn these."  

Bella opens the door, turns around and looks at Steel, then flashes the letters "s-t-a-r-t-w-i-t-h-c-o-n-t-r-o-l-s-o-o-n."

Steel nods.  "Soon."

[Alatriel]

Sometime over the course of another meeting in the Tower Academy, while reviewing hand signs, Steel says, "You need to pick out a name."

Bella looks at him quietly, her mask setting on the table again as per normal.

"That is, a sign which represents yourself," he explains.  "This is the sign for my name. It is made from the sign for 'coin' and the sign for 'sword.'"

She stays quiet and thinks, watching his hand motions, repeating them herself to sign his name, then setting her hands in her lap while she contemplates, still not verbally saying anything.  Finally she shrugs and shakes her head, signing "I don't know."

"I didn't expect you to have it figured out within a moment. When the time is right, you'll show me what it is."

She nods.  After quite a while, she finally speaks for the first time since she's arrived.  "You was gonna tell me somethin' bout what I'm becomin.  I wanna know what."

"In a round-about way, yes," he says.  "Perhaps it will help you understand what you are choosing for yourself... but the short of it is that I am going to tell you what my real work is.  At least, in pieces. Some groundwork will have to be laid for it all to make sense."

Bella nods and listens.

"But first, show me the signs you've practiced from the last set of cards I gave you, so that I can give you the next set of cards, and get those back."
Bella demonstrates several of the signs relating to battle, attack, directions, and commands.

"Alright," Steel says, "I'm going to give you a sign, make it with my hands, and you will tell me what it means."

Bella nods once and he runs through both the alphabet signs and the "battle" signs, hitting every single one in random order.  Bella answers most of them correct, and if she answers them correctly, Steel nods and moves to the next sign.  When she answers incorrectly, he shakes his head, tells her the correct meaning, and then has her make the sign and repeat the meaning to herself before he moves on to the next sign.  Bella corrects her mistakes without complaint, repeating them several times to herself before indicating that she is ready to move on.

After they finish the quizzes and drills she points to herself, then she taps her temple, makes the sign for battle, then signs "A" "B" "C".  opens her hands and looks at him questioningly, then holds her left hand out palm up, and taps the center with the index finger of her right hand.

"The city," he answers.  "That's next. A lot more words. Then I'll teach you how to form sentences... it's a little bit more complicated than speaking Common, at least in some ways, and in other ways it's easier.  Before I give you the next set of cards, though, what do you know about me and Big Red.   Steel and the Dragon."

Bella shrugs and nods.  "Ken I ask ya somethin?

"...or I can answer your question first.  Then you can answer mine."

"Ya ever wonder which one's the real disguise?  An' which one's the real face?"

"I did. Once," he replies.  "Now I know that neither is the real face."

"Oh."

" The real face no one can see unless I let them.  They can strip me down bare, peel my skin back, and still not see it."

She nods slowly, letting it soak in.  "I don' think my real name is Bella, an' I don' think it's even Viper... cause tha's jest another name ta hide ahind... but my sign name what I pick... should it be my real name, or should it be another name ta hide ahind?"  She pauses a moment.  "Cause... what iffn there ain' nothin' ta name?"  She sighs and starts repeating the signs she's working on over again.  "An' I don' really know much bout you an' the Dragon.  That ya seen 'im... that yer doin' this job fer 'im... tha's really it."

Steel smiles, the oddly genuine smile she's been allowed to see only in recent months.  "Oh, there's something to name. You have a strong spirit, and though it has many facets, it is one. Have no shame embracing all that you are, and don't fear that you are nothing."

Bella blushes a bit as she stops signing and lets her hands fall to her lap.

"Now... as to Big Red..."

Steel goes on to tell Bella of his relationship with Fisterion and how it all began.  Finally as he gets to a good stopping place in his story, he pauses, and finishes.  "And what I will further discuss with you in the future."

"Steel?" she asks, while also signing his name.  "Why're you tellin' me all this?"

"For the same reason I was once told things like this," he says.  "You have what it takes. You're not held back by right or wrong, yet you do not take advantage of that freedom."

Bella nods and tells him about her current plans and meetings.  They discuss the better approaches to certain things and the risks involved.  Finally, she sighs.  "I'll do what I ken then.  I should prolly get goin'."

"Right," he says.  He holds out one hand so Bella can give him back his "battle" cards, and with the other offers the next set of cards.  Bella looks at the new deck as Steel tucks away the previous set.  "A lot more cards in that deck," he says.

"What's this one again? The City ya said?"

"City terms," he affirms.  "Everything from trade to streets and structures."

Bella nods.  "This might take a lil bit more time... but I'll learn it."  She pulls on her mask and fastens it securely, tucking the cards away safely and heading out the door without another word.

[Alatriel]

Bella walks into the bedroom after tucking Charlie into bed, holding Rachel in her arms. She steps quietly, and walks in to see Daniel sniffing her clothing and looking through her things in her pack as if searching for something.  "Dan? What're you doin'? Ya lose somethin'?" she asks him with a confused tone.

Daniel turn and regards Bella quietly for a few moments before speaking.  "How was your most recent trip to Vehl, Bella?  Charlie told me you have been gone these last few days."

Bella sighs.  "I got a return letter from Arkolio, so I went in there, an' I waited.  I waited fer hours... finally I gave up.  He ne'er saw me.  I'll try again soon though."

Daniel turns and regards Bella quietly for a few moments before speaking as if judging the truth of her words, "I see."  He mumbles something to himself them moves closer to her.  "Was Lana taking care of Rachel or did you take her with you?"

"Lana had Rachel this time.  Mebbe iffn I bring her with me next time I'll have better luck ya think?"

"I do not know Mister Arkolio but my reputation.  Do you feel she will be safe?"

"From my understandin' he ain' physically dangerous, he's jest tricky."

"Hmm."   He nods a bit.  "Very well, I see no harm in it then."   Daniel gives her a perfunctory kiss then holds his arms out for Rachel.

She hands Rachel over.  "Dan?  what's wrong?"

Daniel cradles Rachel in his arms, but faces Bella squarely.  "I sense you are withholding something from me, Bella," he says quietly and evenly.

Bella raises an eyebrow and looks at him, saying nothing.

Daniel simply looks at her.  "You have no reply?

"Withholdin' what?" she asks.

"I am unsure to be honest, but I sense it," he states accusatorily.  "I have investigated several crimes in the course of my duties for the Temple, Beloved, and have learned to trust my instincts on where the truth lies.  You have nothing you wish to share with me?"

Bella frowns.  "Course I got stuff I wanna share with ya Dan, but how'm I gonna?  Last time I asked ya ta stay home with me fer jest a few days so's we ken spend time together, ya couldn' even do that, ya ran off ta Alindor."

"True," he admits, "I did return here after the few days promised ..and found you absent...strangely absent at that."

"Ya were gone more'n a few days Dan..."

Daniel sighs.  "I explained my need for materials before I left, Bella.  In any event, Lana was with me."

"I told ya I ain' gonna stay home an' sit here an' wait fer ya.  I told ya I ain' gonna do nothin' ta put the kids in danger no more, but Dan... I got stuff ta do, too!"

Daniel seems to weigh something in his mind then gives a sigh.  "Nor do I ask you too, we have help aplenty with Lana and Tod.  Perhaps I fret over nothing and should trust more.  Forgive me?"

"Dan," she urges, "talk ta me... wha's wrong?"

He shakes his head.  "Tis nothing of import, Bella.  Pray let it go for now."  Daniel busies himself with setting the room to rights, putting things away.

Bella frowns.  "Now yer keepin' somethin' from me."

He pauses after doing a one handed fold on a piece of clothing, Rachel held close to his body with the other arm.  "Perhaps I do, but I realize now my accusation will sound outlandish and I require more proof, "he says quietly, adjusting Rachel carefully.

She stands still where she is and waits.

Daniel shakes his head slowly and continues his work, humming to Rachel as he does so.  "I will speak no more of it until I am certain, Bella."

"Fine.  Well, I'm leavin' tomorrow anyhow.  I got stuff I gotta get in Hempstead," she says with a miffed tone.  "You leavin' again soon?  Which one's gonna make ya go this time:  The Dragon, er this Miss Daniella?"

Daniel seems a bit taken aback.  "I do not know, Lady Daniella has given us all a reprieve for an uncertain amount of time and the Temple has no specific orders.  I had planned on staying home for a time."

"Fine.  Then mebbe when -I- get home you'll actually be here still."  She frowns, seemingly hurt and angry.

Daniel looks to the ceiling then back to his wife, he moves to her side and tries to embrace her.  "Aye, I will be here."

Bella perfunctorily hugs Daniel, then turns and leaves him in the room alone with Rachel.  The front door can be heard slamming shut a few moments later.  With a glance toward the stairs down, Daniel moves to the food cabinet and takes out the fresh milk he gathered earlier.  He tucks Rachel closer to himself and prepares her a bottle mumbling, "Your mother is troubled, my angel, I hope she will tell me the truth of why soon."

Rachel coos as she looks at him, babbling and drooling.  "Da."

Daniel smiles wide, and hugs his daughter close, his trouble forgotten for the time being.

[Alatriel]

Bella disentangles her limbs from her husband quietly, trying not to disturb him.  So much fighting between them lately, and yet, always they seem to make up.  She sits silently for a time, listening to Daniel's snores softly drifting across the room, looking into a small basin of water, and quietly going through her new signs.  So many words... and yet, so important that she learn each and every one of them.  She watches the reflection of each sign, mentally saying the word silently in her head as she makes the motions with her hands, and sees the reflection in the water.  

Her hands still as she hears Daniel's breathing quiet for a moment and she looks back as she hears the bedcovers rustle.  "Bella?" Daniel calls softly, trying not to wake Rachel  "Are you here, Beloved?"

Bella splashes some of the water on her face.  "I'm here Dan," she says softly.  "Jest washin' my face.  Go on back ta sleep..."

"Come back to bed, dear... it's early yet," he says, sleep still on the edge of his voice.

Bella frowns slightly, looking back at the bowl of water and her reflection peering back at her as Daniel begins to snore softly once more.  She signs a few more quick words, then stands, replacing the bowl of water on the shelf, and making her way back over to the bed.

She climbs into bed and Daniel gently wraps his arms around her, pulling her close.  He kisses her hair and whispers something incoherently through his grogginess.  Bella closes her eyes, leaning back against him, and running through the signs in her head, her hands motionless as she holds his arms to her.  

"I love ya, Dan, but I'm gonna have ta get more trainin' in soon," she whispers very quietly.

"mmm?  It's raining?" he asks groggily. "Good..." His words once more drift off into soft snores.

[Alatriel]

Viper and Steel set out on a journey into the Thunder Peaks where magic ceases to work.  They fight through to find a safe location in the wilderness away from prying eyes both physical and magical to work on Bella's developing signing skills.  Steel picks a secluded ledge on a lower peak. The air is chilled and thin, yet charged enough to feel the prickling of energy across one's skin- a common feeling in the Thunder Peaks, as though the mountains themselves are simply just giant lightning rods. Bella sets out her things off to one side as they get the fire going, her armor and mask off to the side as she sits in a lighter tunic and pants and cooks a slab of meat from a recent hunt over the fire.  Bella's hair is loose instead of pulled back into her usual braid, and she remains quiet most of the time, either in deep contemplation, or trying to continue to use only her limited signing skills.

Steel in turn uses signs to communicate, speaking only to translate signs she doesn't know, or sentences she of which can't get the gist.  Despite his typically light clothing, he seems comfortable, and rests in front of the fire, watching Bella work on the meal.  His mask remains in place, though his pack is currently serving as a back-rest

Bella hands Steel a slab of meat, not anything special, but no longer raw.  He waits until they've eaten to begin any real lessons, eating with his usual method of tearing off bits and stuffing it beneath the mask

Bella signs, ::sorry, D-a-n cooks, not me.::

He shrugs and nods to her comment about cooking, seemingly not having given it any thought.

After they eat, sitting across from her, Steel goes over every card in each deck:  city, verbs, country, etc., three times with her, taking however long it takes to do so.  Bella doesn't complain as they go through the flash cards.  In fact, when she makes a mistake, repeats the sign several times more even after Steel seems satisfied, working to perfect each and every sign as they go.

Finally, Steel moves away from merely reviewing vocabulary to forming sentences, speaking even as he forms the signs.  He signs everything he speaks, hands moving quickly, though speaking a bit slower as if making sure to keep pace with his hands so that the signs and words align.  "Aside from the obvious difference between signing and verbal language, you'll find that certain conventions of a normal sentence structure are left out.  And signs can mean more than the just the words they're designed to represent.... signs can represent whole phrases within certain contexts."

Bella watches his hands as she listens to him.  ::Talk something real,::  she signs, not speaking anything verbally as they converse.  ::Steel, what was the N-o-r-s-e-m-a-n like?::  She spells out words she either has no sign for, or can't remember.

Steel corrects each one she must spell out, showing her the sign and saying the word.

"He laughed a lot. Lots of scars. Most of the right side of his body was scarred from some childhood disease.  He had reddish brown hair..... and deceiving strength."

Bella shifts a bit, her tunic not hiding all of the various scars along her own back and neck.  ::Why did he choose to become a D-r-e-a-d Blade?::

Steel sniffs.  "He was the first Dread Blade. As far as I know, anyway. He wrote the Axioms sometime after he found me and my sister.   He mentioned that at one time he'd tried to put together an actual band of mercenaries, but discovered that he was a better teacher than commander."  He chuckles, "So he then considered becoming an armsmaster at Blackford... but the Soul Mother claimed him first."

::You have a sister?::

"Half sister. Daughter of my mother."

::Where?::

"She lives in Leringard. She's the headmistress at the Home for Delinquents.  A half elf."

Bella raises an eyebrow.  ::You do not look like an elf.::

"And what about you?  Siblings?"  He shows her the sign for "sibling."

Bella repeats the sign then shakes her head.  ::No.  My mother hated me.::

"How do you know?"

::She told me every day.::  She shifts slightly, but her facial expression remains neutral and unattached.

"Ah," he says without signing, then continues to speak, signing once more, "Verbal proof."  He pauses a moment before continuing.  "And what does that have to do with not having siblings?  Your mother simply did not like children as a rule?"

Bella shrugs slightly.  She pulls her tunic up higher on her shoulder self-consciously.  

"Why did you tell me you mother hated you? I asked about siblings, but you responded with that."  His signing has increased in speed, now keeping up with his normal speech pattern.

Bella looks at him a bit blankly for a moment, repeating the signs of what he just said before signing her response.  ::I said no, then gave you a reason.::

Steel chuckles.  "It's only that your reason is the oddest I've heard for not having siblings. The only correlation is potential rather than certain. Did your father also not want further children?"

She is still for a moment.  ::Who was your father?::

"A captain in Xandriel's army, as I was told, some sort of abomination.  Many were bred like him during the time of Xandriel and Bloodstone:  a mixing of Pit and Prime."

::Is he alive?::

"I don't know," Steel signs with one hand, using the other to relieve himself of his mask, even as the sky darkens, the heat leaving the earth.

Bella pulls a blanket up around her shoulders as the air cools more.  :: Do you think you are like your father?::

"I have some of the tainted blood, but otherwise, I don't know how much I am like him. I never knew him. I only know what my mother told me before she died."  He pauses a moment, then asks, "You're very interested in me today... makes good conversation for practicing signs, but still, why the sudden interest?"

Bella shrugs a bit.  ::I do not know you.::

Steel pulls his long hair back into a tail, tying it off with some twine.  "Yet you want to know me. Why?"  He stands and moves to pick up some of the extra wood gathered for the fire. He throws a few more branches on the open flame, and stirs the coals with another stick.

She watches him for a while, as if considering both her words and the signs that go with them**

::You::  She pauses for a while.  ::You care about T-y-r-a::  She spells the name Tyra, then signs a combination of the signs "loose" and "arrow."

"Yes."  He smiles and signs, "Loose arrow indeed.  I knew her as a child, and I knew her father back in his prime.  Her father looked up to the Norseman as a figure to be emulated."

::Was I that h-a-r-d-h-e-a-d-e-d?::   She struggles with the last words.

Steel knocks on the side of his head, chuckling at the sign for hard-headed  "Yes, you are just as stubborn. However, you have proven to be more teachable.  You have a willingness to learn, in great part because you do not consider anyone above or below another."

::She is not ready yet::

He squints one eye, sucks in a breath.  "Maybe not."

Bella raises an eyebrow and looks at him quizzically.  ::Was it hard to tell her" **her hands fumble and she repeats the signs again to correct them.  ::what you said?  When you made her go?::

He tilts his head to the side.  "I see this is a full fledged interrogation."  He looks down, smiling, shaking his head.  "I'm a hardened killer who has seen the worst and best the world has to offer. I'll let you decide if it was difficult for me."

She looks away from him.  ::Sorry::  She throws another stick on the fire and pulls her blanket back up over her shoulders.  :: Do you want me to not ask questions?::

The wind picks up as the temperature changes, charged dust and bits of snow flaking across their camp.  Bella clenches her jaw to keep her teeth from chattering and moves a bit closer to the fire.  Steel's loose hair strands catch in the swirls of wind, sending some over the front his shoulder.  After a pause, looking out over the foggy terrain, Steel signs,  "Ask all you want. I'll answer when and how I want."

Bella frowns, and after another pause, she asks again, not looking at him for a response.  ::Will I lose everything I am trying to protect?::

Steel leans back, sliding further down, so he's less sitting and more lounging against his pack.  "... hard to say... not something that can be predicted..."  He signs each word, a bit slower now.  "... I live my life as though everything is already lost."

::That would not be fair to my children.::  She pauses a moment, then continues, ::I a-l-r-e-a-d-y know that if D-a-n finds out before I am ready for him to know, he will not understand my actions.::

He looks over at her, the fire creating shadows that wriggle and flick across his cheeks.  "What does 'fair' have to do with it?"

::Maybe nothing.::  She pauses again, considering her signs and words.  ::But when D-a-n has to kill me for what I do, I do not want my daughter to have to watch.::

"Good thing you're bound to the stones."  Though there is the sound of amusement in his odd voice, his countenance is grim.

Bella doesn't respond for a while, watching the flames dance and flicker against the darkness, and the soft steam of her breath against the night air.  Finally after several minutes, she signs,  ::When Dan kills me, I should deserve it::  Another pause.  ::Or it will be by my own plan.::

Lightning cracks the sky open, searing it in two, but it's distant, and the thunder that follows is only a dull rumble.  Bella's eyes dart to the lightning and flinches ever so slightly as if caught unawares, jarring her out of her thoughts.

"Which means you'll deserve it."  He laughs a bit, the hint of danger in his eyes.  "We're all killers, aye?"

::Everyone kills::

"What drew you to him, to Daniel the Rofireinite?" He makes the sign of a dragon over the sign of law when saying "Rofireinite."

Bella raises an eyebrow again and looks at him questioningly.  ::What do you mean?::

"Was it his reliability? His sincerity? His mustache?"

Bella blushes slightly, visible in flashes as the light flickers over her features, her hair falling soft waves from her previous braid.  ::I don't know.  D-a-n is a rock.::  She looks distant as she thinks about her husband.  ::We were,:: she pauses once again, searching for the right words and signs.  ::d-r-a-w-n:: She makes a sign pulling both hands together, ::to each other.::

Steel nods a bit, seemingly satisfied with the answer.

::Why do you ask?::

"I figured you for many things. I never figured you to be the marrying type.... but then, to be with a Rofireinite means to do things properly, I suppose."

::In p-a-r-t why Viper was made.::  She looks at him, then looks back at the fire as she signs the rest.  ::So B-e-l-l-a can do what D-a-n wants, and I can do what I have to do.::

He nods again, turning and grabbing his bedroll from his pack, laying it out near the fire, then adding a few more branches before laying sideways across the mat, pulling a thin blanket over himself, tucking the rest of the pack under his head for a pillow.  Bella takes the hint and pulls out her own bedroll, piling more than a few blankets over herself to keep from shivering against the cold.

Steel closes his eyes, after a moment of looking across the fire at Bella; he only speaks, does not sign.  "Good night, Viper."

Bella whispers verbally as she turns away from him, "Night Steel."

[Alatriel]

The flashing electric lights from the night before are missing from the chilled morning air, a hazy yellow settled over the remnants of the night's campfire.  Bella wakes early in the morning, washes meticulously off by herself, and then silently goes through each of her signs that she knows, methodically, sitting alone and trying not to disturb Steel if he still sleeps.  

Steel rises sometime while she's away from the camp, and she returns to find him reading from the wood-bound tome he always carries.

::What are you reading?  Magic?:: she asks.

"Something like that."  Despite her signing, having not yet set down the book, he does not sign back.

Bella takes out one of her swords and sharpens it quietly.  She moves off to let him be for a while and moves through some exercises with her blades while he studies.  For most of an hour she works on her movements and skills with her paired short swords, her attacks focused on speed, agility, and mobility, and her strikes placed with precision and control at her imaginary targets.  She returns around noon looking refreshed and calmer after the practice.

Steel spends the better part of the morning studying the contents of the book, eating various dried bits of food from his pack.  At some point he puts the tome away, standing, he retrieves his own blades. He takes them and moves away from the camp, but still within eye-shot, to an open space, apparently following suit, stripping down to skivvies before launching into an hour of blade work.

Bella cleans her blades, puts them carefully away, then sits silently at the camp and eats a few pieces of dried meat from her pack, waiting and watching Steel finish his own practice routine, a style she's seen him use often, but no less impressive as he moves through techniques of an all out frontal assault, giving up defense for raw killing power.  His speed rivals the fastest fist-fighting monks, his whole body taking part in each swing.  Steel's hair, having been let loose to sleep, now whips and flails with each movement, eventually slinging droplets of sweat despite the freezing air.
Finishing, he searches for a patch of snow, or a not yet frozen stream to rinse, then he returns to the camp, dries off, and dresses, even placing the mask back on his head.  "So," he signs.  "What's for lunch?"

Bella smiles and opens her mouth to speak, then shuts it again before she utters a sound, then tosses him a piece of dried meat.

He snatches it up and devours it.  "We're going to need to find one of those mountain goats... can't always be living off this dried stuff."

She grins a bit, then signs. ::How are you not f-r-e-e-z-i-n-g?::

He shows her the sign for "freezing"- a combination of the sign for "cold" and a shiver.  "My body adapts to the elements much quicker than most, from what I've gathered. I suspect it has something to do with the blood of whatever Pit creature hides inside me.  Here... watch this..." Steel puts his hand into the open flame of the fire, letting searing heat flow over the skin, and he leaves it there for a solid minute.  When he pulls it out, the skin is blackened, but otherwise not injured.

Bella raises an eyebrow and watches intently.  "Tha..." she stops the word and signs instead.  ::That does not hurt?::

"A little, enough to know what's happening."

::No magic?  Just blood?::

"No magic in this case. At least, not from a spell or enchanted item."

She purses her lips a bit.  ::i-n-t-e-r-e-s-t-i-n-g::

"Even as this taint comes with certain heavy social disadvantages, it does give me certain physical advantages.  I can shrug off effects with which even the hardiest of dwarves struggle.

::no one seems to m-i-n-d that you are b-l-u-e::

"Not anymore, at least in the larger cities. Not now that I'm known.  Yet I'm still generally avoided, except by those few who require my services, or who have some affiliation to the Angels or the Arms."

:: Does that b-o-t-h-e-r you?::

"No. When I was younger it did. I long ago came to accept who I am and what all that comes with."  He pauses a moment.  "But here we are talking about me again. I think it's your turn.  Tell me about your father, since you've asked about mine."

Bella looks at him and considers for a while.  ::He is dead.::

"I bet you look like him."

She darts a glare at him briefly before she manages to catch herself.  With effort, she turns away from him and tries to appear casual as she looks through her pack for... something.

Any expression of Steel's  is hidden beneath the mask, and he continues, signing and speaking.  "I'll take that as a 'yes.'  Did you know your father? I know very little of mine, and never knew the creature personally."

She signs quickly.  ::I knew him.::

"Let's see... since you believe your mother hated you.... and your father allowed this, I'm guessing either he wasn't around much, was equally abusive, or spared you from your mother in some way," he continues.  "Feel free to leave that to my speculation rather than tell me which is correct if you feel the topic too personal."

Bella frowns as she listens, not watching his signs.  ::My father killed my mother when I was less than C-h-a-r-l-i-e.::

"Mm.... so he spared you, if by wicked means."

::No::  She pauses, then signs, ::He was just too d-r-u-n-k and p-a-s-s-e-d out::  Her posture is stiff and uncomfortable as she tells him.  She puts the pack aside again, not retrieving anything from it, but finished trying to pretend she was looking.

Steel appears to be looking out toward the horizon, speaking and signing without directly looking at her.  "Ah. So your father was a drunk who killed your mother, and your mother was abusive. If you'd like to compare, my father was a captain in the most feared army this world has ever known, and my mother was a prostitute in one of the army's baggage trains."  He pauses briefly.  "My mother died giving birth to my sister... so I raised her instead."

She whispers, not signing, "My pa beat my ma and me every day as early as I ken remember.  My ma said it were my fault."  She still doesn't look at him as she whispers again, "I don' wanna talk bout it no more... it's inna past.  It's gone."

"Clearly not gone. But yes, I suppose it's my turn to answer questions."  He looks at her again.  "And don't stop signing."

Bella takes a deep breath and spends a moment centering herself once more.  She stands and walks off, taking her blades, leaving him, and goes to the clearing, once again going through her blade work, losing herself in the motions, starting with slow patterns and speeding up the process as she relaxes once more into the movements.  When she returns after a session taking up most of the rest of the afternoon, she notices Steel has gone, leaving her be while going to find firewood.  She rinses herself off with melted snow from a kettle and scrubs herself meticulously clean once more.  She then dresses in her armor, tightly braids her hair, and replaces her mask.  She sits a long time near the fire with her legs crossed, her back straight, her eyes either staring off or closed behind the mask.

Steel returns sometime after with an armful of branches which he sets near the fire to dry.  Seeing her sitting, silent, he mutters something arcane out of habit, frowning when his magical bow does not appear for him in the breach of the Al'noth.  He instead pulls a dagger out, and heads off into the woods to hunt something for dinner.

When Steel returns, Viper seems more her "normal" self, her mask still in place.  She looks over at what he managed to kill, and stokes up the fire, burning off one side of a flat stone to clean it.  ::You s-k-i-n-n-i-n-g it or me?::

Steel shrugs and hands her the carcass, which she sets to work skinning.  Her hands busy with the work of cutting the meat, she doesn't talk again until dinner is cooking and she's cleaned the blood once again from her hands.  ::I am not sure what to ask now,:: she asks, pausing a moment to consider.  ::Why do you think killing is evil?::

Steel shrugs a bit.  "Life is what we cling to, what we protect. Perceived control over our own souls, our own destinies. Robbing someone of that perception, of that smidgeon of time we have rule over a body is counter-intuitive. Why would anyone want to cease to exist?  Good and evil... concepts so very much subject to the eye of the beholder... yet I believe can more or less be related to giving and taking. Giving is good. Taking is evil."

::Sometimes taking is giving::

"Most people live in some sort of balance between giving and taking... those that take too much are nearly always labeled as evil, and those that give too much are generally labeled as good."  He signs each sentence, speaking casually, relaxing back down by the fire to watch the meat cook.

::I do not b-e-l-i-e-v-e in that r-e-a-s-o-n-i-n-g::

He shows her the signs she does not know, as he has been doing all along, before replying.  "You're not the only one."

Viper repeats the signs he shows her.  ::You hear like you mean something else by that?::

Steel corrects her word that she's misused then replies.  "I mean as I say. Many other people do not understand good and evil in the way I do, perhaps even most other people."

::Then maybe I don't understand.  Sometimes killing is good.:: **she pauses, then seems to correct herself**  ::It is right::  She pauses again.  ::Sometimes letting to live is wrong.::

"I would still say it's a matter of giving and taking... to explain, an action can have three aspects if we define it by giving and taking... an action can be giving, and action can be taking, or is can be both.  This lends to three outcomes: giving, taking, or neither.  That is, if you imagine a set of scales, a measure of weight... and you place what's been given on one side of the scale, and what's been taken on the other side, you will ultimately get a net value that tilts the scale toward one side or the other, or if you have balanced your giving and taking, the scale will sit at zero; it will be even, yes?

"So, an example..."  He sniffs, lacing his fingers together and placing them over his stomach.  "Killing is always taking... it immediately drops a lump some on the taking side of the scale.  However, the action of killing could also have a giving aspect to it... were we to kill a man bent on sinking ships, ultimately resulting in the deaths of hundreds, well, then even though we took his life, there is the thought, the acceptances, that we have given life to all those this man indicated he would kill. Further, and typically more substantial in the eyes of societies, we have given comfort to those who held fear due... to the actions of that man."

She listens quietly while he speaks.  ::So what you say is killing is evil, but the person who kills does not be evil maybe::

He shrugs and nods.  "I've never said the one who kills is evil by virtue of killing. Only that the act itself is evil by nature, as killing is inherently a taking action."

::Your way is more c-o-m-p-l-i-c-a-t-e-d than my way::

"And what is your way?"

::Sometimes killing is right.  Sometimes it is wrong.  Same thing maybe.  Mine is shorter.  Sometimes l-y-i-n-g is right, sometimes it is wrong.::  She pauses, turning the meat over and checking it, then signing once more.  ::Killing is not the only wrong or right.  More to it.  Just like blade or shield.  Sometimes to kill is to protect.  Sometimes to protect is to cause death::

"How do you know when, though?"

Viper pauses a moment, then laughs silently.  ::The balance.::

Steel tilts his head to the side.

She removes her mask to facilitate eating as she pulls the meat off the fire.
Steel does the same, setting the mask to the side.  Between bites he asks, "The balance of what?"

Blowing on her fingers, then sucking on them as she singes them on the hot meat, she looks at him, her eyes almost searching for something.  ::Not just life and death.  Q-u-a-l-i-t-y of life, of death::  She purses her lips a bit, thinking.  ::You ask me hard questions.  I answer.  I do not like to answer all the time.  But I gain something.  Training.::

Grins, no longer having the mask to hide his expressions.  "That sounds awfully subjective to me... 'quality of life and death.'"

::Questions you ask me some could say evil.  Some could say good.  Just a question.  Just an action.::

Steel chuckles a bit.  "If it wasn't hard, it wouldn't be worth it."
Bella points at him as if to indicate a point.  ::Exactly::  She cuts off a piece of meat and chews thoughtfully while signing.   ::Example::  She swallows.  ::Someone lives on a farm.  n-e-i-g-h-b-o-r lives on a farm.  Person has bad crop.  Other person has good crop.  Person wants food, other person not give person food.  Person steals food.  Who is evil?  Who is good?  Taking is evil.  but is keeping bad?::

"Simple," Steel says. "The farmer with the good crop takes from the earth. That is evil, it is taking. The farmer, in order to balance, must then give in some fashion."

She scrunches up her face and raises an eyebrow in an odd sort of quizzical, yet frustrated look.

"If the farmer keeps what he takes without giving," Steel continues, "then he has tilted to the evil side of the scale. That said, his giving does not have to include the man who stole from him."

::But farmers give to earth by working it.  Earth gives payment.  Payment not evil.::

"The earth does not need to be 'worked' in order to give.... but that is a different discussion.

She scrunches her face more.  ::I am not a farmer::

"What is relevant is that this farmer with the bounty could refuse the starving man, but then turn and give his bounty to a herd of cattle.  In this sense, he is still giving, he is tipping the scale, but yet the starving man still suffers. Should the man that gave his bounty to cattle instead of the starving human be considered evil?"

::Was my question.::

"The answer depends entirely on how much he has given and how much he has taken. It does not depend on whom or what receives the giving... This is assuming that the action is a purely giving action, which such a thing is very rare.  Almost all actions are both giving and taking, and we assume a net value on one side of the scale or the other.  So if the farmer with the bounty gives the crop to the army that is razing the countryside, the action is both giving and taking...  the chains are usually complicated, and each link weighted differently, but boiled down, evil takes, good gives."

::Right.  The balance.::  Bella frowns, wrinkling her nose again.   ::Happy I did not mention gods.::  She finishes eating her meat and looks over at the horizon as the sun dips low between the mountains.

Steel laughs.  "Gods are just pompous, narrow-minded, control-freaks, who unlike the rest of us similarly bent creatures managed to get their hands on a lot of power."

She looks back at him with a grin, and then laughs.  ::Let me learn to take on dragons before gods.::  She yawns.  ::Long day.  Early start tomorrow.  Going to sleep now if nothing else.::

He grins back, both rows of pointed teeth shining white against the red of his lips.  "I can barely kill dragons.... and aye, no rush."

She sets out her bedroll once more and curls up under her blankets against the encroaching cold of the night.  She speaks quietly.  "G'nite Steel."

Steel doesn't go to sleep immediately, choosing instead to read.  "Good Night, Viper."

[Alatriel]

The lacerations across her back burn and yet she does not cry out.  Roughly, the men shove her to the dirt floor, sweat dripping into her eyes, causing her visibility inside her mask to blur.

"We found the one you sent us to get, Protector.  She won't be no more trouble for you now,"  one of them says.

Viper pushes herself up with effort to see a pair of familiar boots standing before her briefly before the rough heel of a heavy boot hits her in the back again driving her back to the ground and sending stars of pain to her eyes.

"Stay down, you Snake, else you want me to break them arms of yours," the bounty hunter says gruffly.

"That's enough, sir," Daniel's voice says evenly over her.

"Well... what're we supposed to do with her now?" the men ask.

"You have done well, gentlemen.  Leave us and I will deal with this... problem," her husband's voice instructs.

The men shuffle out, mumbling about payment, and the door is heard shutting behind, and Daniel throws the bolt, locking them inside.  

"Well well... it seems you have found her after all, my brother," another familiar voice croons in an eerie, oily tone.  "Now what are you going to do with her?"

Daniel crouches down to Viper's still form, bleeding and broken, but still breathing.  "Can you hear me... Viper?" he whispers, a dangerous edge in his voice.  "I hope you can.  I want you to hear this, and know this."  He rolls her over so that he can look through her mask to the brown eyes hidden there.

"Your secret is out."

Daniel stands, turns to Aesthir, waiting in the corner of the room.  He looks once more at Viper, then back to his brother in faith.  

"Kill her."


Bella sits up in a cold sweat, soaked and shivering in the frigid night air of the Thunder Peaks.  She takes a moment to draw in her surroundings and once again remember where she is, and why.  She looks at the dying embers of the fire, and moves quietly to put another log or two on the fire, trying not to disturb Steel out of his sleep across from her.  They'd been here for several days now working on her skills with sign language.  Daniel didn't know.  She wasn't being hunted.  It was a dream.  She lays back down on her damp blankets and covers herself once more against the cold air, shivering uncontrollably as she stares at the fire, wrapped tight.  She tries to will away the images still running through her head to no avail.  Soon it would be daylight.  Soon the storms would pass.  It was just a dream.

[Alatriel]

Bella is slow to get up in the morning, her hair still somewhat plastered to her face from the night before.  She splashes cold water over her face and changes into some loose fitting clothes to start her morning blade routine.  Her movements are not as precise to begin with and it takes her a bit longer to get back into harmony with her blades, her mind and her body.

Steel doesn't stir during the night, laying on his side facing the fire, he stays that way until he sits up in the morning, a few minutes after Bella has left her bedroll.  Grabbing some dried fruit from his pack, he puts on his boots and wanders over to watch Bella train, a cloak wrapped around his shoulders, his breath fogging the air in front of him.  He silently watches for maybe five minutes before speaking, between bites.  "You know, you should eat something before practice."

Since her hands are occupied, she speaks quietly.  "I ain' hungry."

He squints one eye.  "Eat to live. Satisfying hunger or the lack thereof is a luxury.  Disagree with me all you want, but you're stuck with me out here for now, and if you want to last, you'll eat first.

She stops, glares at him a moment, then sheaths her blades and returns to camp, coming back momentarily with a piece of dried meat, ripping off a piece of it and chewing, then signing.  ::happy?::

He chuckles.  "Yes, actually. And give it a few minutes to settle before you start poking the air again."

Steel wanders back to the camp, melts some water in a tin kettle, and makes hot tea.  He enjoys a mag even as he prepares himself for his own morning workout routine, though unlike the day before, he does not draw his blades.
Instead, he spends a good while stretching, all very slow and controlled movements, each breath focused and deep.

She keeps her blades sheathed and does as he instructs, letting her head fall forward, stretching her neck as she stands still and breathes in and out in a deep and controlled rhythm.  She sits on the ground after a while and stretches her legs forward, reaching out and grabbing her feet, pulling her head down to her knees

His exercises are not hard, but each movement pulls and extends the muscle, staying about fifteen feet away allowing her to do her own thing while he continues with his training.

Bella does her own stretches, then almost reluctantly she resigns and begins to copy Steel's movements, mimicking him and moving a slight step behind him until she is able to almost anticipate the next part of the pattern.  

Eventually, Steel finishes the stretching and sets about performing various resistance exercises, from push-ups to leg-lifts, even reverse military presses in a carefully balanced hand-stand.  Bella does not attempt to copy the strength exercises, instead, simply stands off to the side, head tilted, and watches him, his skin still mostly exposed to the elements, some sweat droplets freezing in the icy wind of the morning, making them easy to see as they reflect the early light of the sun.

He pauses, seemingly finished, then looks to Bella.  "Well, you up for a climb?"  He gestures to a nearby cliff.

Bella looks up at the cliff, then nods.  ::Free climb or rope?::

"No rope. Don't fall."  He picks a steep cliff, putting on leather gloves first, and they spend the rest of the morning sheering the cliff side.  He helps her get started on a hand hold high above her reach, but then she seems to do, perhaps, surprisingly well, using her lightness and her natural agility to help her.  Although she does not have the strength that the larger man could boast, she makes it fairly easily, rubbing her arms once they reach the top from the exertion.  They both breathe heavily from the climb, which accelerated the heart rate of both.  Steel gestures to the ridge on which they stand at the top, a long stretch of rocky ledges.  "Let's run to the other end and back, climb down, then have lunch, aye?"

Bella nods almost as if defiantly willing away any signs of possible weakness.  After a moment to catch her breath just enough, she starts running lightly across the top towards the other end of the ridge, with nimble footing on slippery stretches in the ice and rock.  The run is long and the path is uneven, but Steel keeps a pressing stride.  He has no intention of jogging, taking full strides with his long legs.   He crunches through the ice and rock, nearly slipping now and again, but proves to be surprisingly nimble for a creature of his height and girth.  Bella increases her speed so that her shorter legs can match his, which is a bit closer to a sprint for her.  She is very soon breathing heavily, her face reddening from the effort, but unwilling to back down, even though Steel doesn't seem concerned with competing with her.  His eyes roam the clouds and crags of the upper reaches of the mountains.

When they eventually make it back to the ledge they climbed up previously, Steel comes to a stop, then lays out flat on his breath, catching his breath.  "I.... dunno about you... but I'm awake now," he says as he gasps for air.

Bella stops, bending over pulling in ragged and quick gasps for air, panting heavily.

"I may just jump all the way down," Steel says, still breathless.  "That climb down is going to be rough."

Bella signs weakly, ::your funeral.::

"Just... catch my breath for a few minutes... then go..," he says.

She finally lays back on the rocks and looks up at the sky, still trying to get her breathing under control.  She nods.  ::Climb down more c-h-a-l-l-e-n-g-e.::

"You got pretty worked up last night," he says between breaths.  "Your breathing was almost as ragged as it is now. See a ghost?"  He doesn't rise from his back, steam rising from the snow that touches his skin.

She stops breathing almost involuntarily for a moment, then pushes herself up, shaking her head.

::Time to climb back down.  ready?:: she signs.

"Already? Pits, I suppose. The fact that I'm starving should help," he replies.  He rolls to his feet and jogs to the edge of the cliff, swinging out over the ledge to begin the climb down.

::You should have eaten more than fruit,:: she taunts.  She hauls herself over the ledge, moving carefully and slowly down the side of the cliff once more.

He starts off slow, but then starts taking a few risks, letting himself drop a dozen feet and catching himself on the a ledge. He misses his handhold once, and falls another twenty feet before stopping his descent, but that didn't stop him from trying the drop one more time.  Bella falters a bit on the way down, pausing and wincing at the pain in her arms before continuing the rest of the way down.  She finally makes it down several minutes after Steel, her arms hanging limp at her sides as if she doesn't have the strength left to raise them as she walks back to the camp.  Steel swings his own limp arm at Bella, his gloved hand flailing harmlessly in her direction.  "Take that," he says lightly.  He stumbles over to the camp, managing to throw some near frozen meat from the day before onto the spit.

Bella manages a bit of a grin and shakes her head.  "My arms hurt too much ta sign."  She grabs hold of her canteen and manages to bring it to her lips for a long drink, then tosses the empty canteen away towards her things.  

"I bet you sleep better tonight, eh, after all that?" Steel asks her.

Bella frowns a bit and looks at him with a curiously questioning expression. "That why we jest did that?"

He chuckles.  "Would be humorous if that were the case, but I'd have done all that anyway, so, no... just an added benefit, I suppose.  I find that when my mind is overwhelmed, I can calm it down by overwhelming my body."

She shrugs a bit and winces, her shoulders tense.  "I ain' sure I'm gonna be able ta move tomorrow..."  She turns the meat over on the fire.  "iffn ya wanted me ta eat though, yer gonna get yer wish... cause ya might be fightin' me fer this here meat.  I'm starvin' now."  

After sitting in silence again for a while, she takes the meat off the fire, cuts it in two, and tosses Steel the larger half, not really looking to see if he's paying attention.

He gobbles up his portion, hardly chewing, then pours himself more hot tea and sits back to relax.  "Should be about time to continue sign lessons...  any subject in particular you'd like to review?  Or learn new?"

Bella tilts her head, thinking a bit.  Finally, she swallows the piece of meat she was chewing and signs, ::What are you afraid of?::

He sniffs, starts signing his answers, while still speaking.  "Many things... and nothing. To be more specific, I experience fearful emotions, but I would not consider myself afraid of any singular creature, object, or situation."

::Like what?::  She watches him carefully, slowly chewing pieces of the grilled meat.

He shrugs a bit.  "I experience fear when I believe I am near death. Like most, however, I also feel other things. But regardless of the feelings, I attempt to choose the most useful path, which on very rare occasions includes my death."

::So you climb mountains to get over them?::  she asks with a slight smile.

He smiles back, casual, and genuine.  "Nah. I climb mountains just because I can."

"Oh," she says.   ::Your question then::  She shrugs as she signs.

"I get a turn, eh? Are you sure you want to give me a turn?"  his smile twists to reveal that often hidden but ever present dangerous nature.

She shakes her head solemnly.  ::No, but it is how we play this game a-p-p-a-r-e-n-t-l-y::

He blinks once, looks into her eyes, still signing as he speaks.  "What will you do when someone threatens your family?"

Her eyes are dark and there is no hesitation to her signs.  ::I will kill them::

"Let me rephrase."  He bites his lower lip in thought.  "Most of the creatures with which you will deal threaten your family, whether directly or indirectly. Most of the time, by having any association with your enemies, whether amiable or combative, you place your family at risk. Moreover, the enemy will seldom warn you of an attack on your family.

"You will only learn later that they survived or didn't.

"Perhaps what I really question, is not how you will exact your revenge, but how you will handle the emotions that come along with such things."

She frowns as she considers.  ::I do not want to see D-a-n hurt, but he is tied to the stones.

::C-h-a-r-l-i-e and R-a-c-h-e-l...::  She stops signing a moment, hands in her lap as she looks down at the fire before her, shaking her head slightly.  ::I never wanted children.  Now that I have them, I do not want to lose them.  I do what I do u-l-t-i-m-a-t-e-l-y to protect them.  Not because I want to see them in danger.

::Not because I want to put them in danger::  It takes her a very long time to sign everything as she concentrates on getting the signs right to explain her thoughts, correcting her mistakes as she goes.

After another moment, she continues, ::Viper has no family.  Only Bella has family.::

"You won't be able to keep Viper and Bella separate forever, even as I was not able to hide my heritage forever."

She pulls her knees up to her chest and rests her chin on them.  ::I know,:: she signs.  ::I don't know how I will handle emotions that I have not e-x-p-e-r-i-e-n-c-e-d::

He shows her the sign for "experienced".  "Excellent insight. Knowledge is tantamount. In order to survive, you must know. You must experience that loss.

That's the first step.

::What?::  She asks, looking confused.

"Because you cannot accept the loss, unless you have already experienced it."

::I don't understand.  How?::

"Each comes to it on their own, or at least, I've not discovered a method that works for all. The result, however, is an acceptance that what you love dearest is already lost to you. You have already grieved, wept, and remembered all that is most precious about them, regardless of whether they yet breath, regardless of whether you will see them the next day...

"... or never again.

She swallows hard and doesn't look at him.

"Because you cannot protect them, you cannot save them, and no amount of revenge will ever bring them back."

She whispers softly after several moments of contemplation, as emotions run through her, some evident on her face, others not.  "So I lost them all the moment I chose to wear a mask."

Steel closes his eyes, the edge and strength in his voice faltering at her quiet realization.  He opens them again to reply.  "You can get them back. Walk away from all of this, and lay down your blades."

Bella looks at him for a moment, as if searching his eyes to find an answer that she hasn't thought of.   ::I can't.  If I do that then I have lost myself, and I have lost them that way.  Either way, it doesn't matter.  

::I was not meant to have a family::

The danger in Steel's eyes is replaced by soft sadness of one who understands loss on a deeper level than he lets anyone ever see.
No longer signing, he speaks very quietly.  "Nor was I..."

[Alatriel]

After the physical exertion of the previous day's climb, Bella sleeps soundly for most of the night, but before the early light begins to start its daily attempt to warm the air, Bella rises from her bedroll, and silently grabs a mix of hard bread, dried fruit, and dried meat, eating some, and putting some in one of her smaller packs and taking it with her.  She walks softly to the clearing and spends a good fifteen minutes stretching out her sore muscles from the day before.  After a while she pulls her pack onto her back and heads once more for the cliffside, pulling on her gloves and starting a slow and careful climb to the top.  Steel takes his sweet time waking up, and when he notices that Bella is gone, he puts some water on to heat, makes tea, sits back and enjoys several cups, blanket draped over his shoulders.

Bella slips once or twice on the climb up, but manages to finally pull herself to the top and looks down over the landscape below for a long time as she considers the day before's discussion, her realizations, and the deep and profound pain that now swells within her.  After several moments of silence she lets the emotions that she normally keeps bottled up, swell and explode out of her in a loud and long scream of anguish.

Steel startles at the echoing sound of her pain, looking in the directions of the various reports off the cliffs.  Then he settles back and mutters.  "... good morning to you, too..."

Bella looks out over the mountain tops around her listening to the reverberating echoes of her own voice.  She hugs her knees tightly and closes her eyes.  They were gone.  Each and every one of them.  Everyone she loved, everyone she cared for, those that made her life enjoyable, the children that she might yet still give birth to... the husband she had vowed to love and cherish on the steps to the altar of Rofirein... were all lost.  She closes her eyes tighter as she pictures Rachel's smile, Charlie's mischievous grin, and as she remembers Daniel's warm embrace and reassuring touch.  She lets the pain of their memory wash over her, wracking her body in silent sobs as she absorbed the knowledge that not only was her family lost to her, but it was her own decision that brought it about.  Taking a few deep breaths she lays back against the cold ice, letting the physical pain try to overcome the emotional.  She looks up at the sky as the rays of light streak across turning the expanse above to a soft orange scattered with grayish streaks of clouds.  

"If they are not dead when I return", she whispers quietly to herself, "then each passing day with them is a gift... something to cherish, to remember.  Each time I see them, if I ever see them again, it will be the last time I see them.  Each time I leave; each time I put on Viper's mask, I have taken on the acceptance that those I love are lost to me forever.  I cannot get them back if I am to do what I have to do.  Staying home and walking away from life as a killer may have worked once, but it will never work again.  It's already too late.  I cannot protect them.  If the last time I saw them was in fact the last time I will ever see them, nothing I do will ever bring them back, and nothing can stop what has already happened.

"I am not a shield.  I am a Blade."

An hour or so later, Bella makes her way back down to the camp, not really saying anything, her arms hanging limp once more, and looking a bit scratched and bruised in places where she slipped on the way down.  Steel greets her with the sign for "hello," but doesn't actually say anything.  She returns the sign, not speaking, and sits down near the fire, looking around for something to eat as Steel munches on various vittles from his pack.  

Popping a few pieces of fruit in her mouth, she looks at him and signs ::What is the plan for today?::

Still without speaking, only signing, he replies, ::Rest from yesterday, maybe some easy stretching and blade work... mental work, today, I think. Yes. I'll teach you a new trick or two with a sword.::

::Fine.  But how is a new trick mental?::

::Maybe you can learn without mentally comprehending what you're doing, but I have to know the details. Not just the how, but the why and when and what for.::  He stands, dusts himself off, and gets dressed.  :: A neat trick .. ::  He signs between lacing boots and pulling on leggings, :: ... is just that until it's utilized at the right time... then it's a deadly skill.::

She finishes eating while he gets up, then takes a long drink of water.   ::Fair.:: she signs, then pulls her hair back, tying it with a leather thong.  ::Warning.  I killed my arms this morning::

::I suppose it will be footwork today. ::  His signing comes faster today than it has before, enough that she notices how he has been holding back, purposefully signing slower.

::Stop,:: she signs.  :: Do that again.  Missed it.  Hard to get some without hearing it.::

He pauses, looking mildly confused, then seems to comprehend and repeats the statement, slower this time, accenting the signs he knows she isn't as familiar with.

She nods.  ::Thank you, sorry.::

::I won't be translating with words anymore. The real training starts now.::  He picks up his blades and walks out towards the clearing.

She nods a bit, and picking up her own blades, and follows.  She straps her blades to her back and looks at them once they stop.  ::Going to be hard to sign with my hands full.::

He signs with one hand, ::I know.::

She waits quietly, watching him and waiting for instructions, as he steps out onto the open tundra, taking a blade in each hand.  He takes a stance and waits, looking at Bella.  She tilts her head a moment, then pulls out her own blades, one in each hand.  Steel stands straight again, then eases into the stance once more, his crimson ringed orbs steady on her.  Bella grins slightly, then copies his stance.

Steel winks back at her, then starts very slow and controlled movements, stretches really, but keeping the blades in hand.  She follows his movements as he gradually picks up speed, moving from stretches to actual bladework, thrusts and parries, slashing and rending, though still light movements and not overly strenuous.  They move together each motion fluid and familiar to each of them, Bella looking to him every so often just to make sure of the next move, but neither of them speak a word.

At length, Steel slows and stops, sticking a blade under each arm and signing, ::That's enough warming up.  Time to show you a thing or two.::

Bella holds her blades to her sides, nods, then raises them up again in a ready stance.  Steel steps over to her, sticking his blades into the earth along the way.  She tilts her head, eyeing him skeptically.  He signs again, ::Close your eyes.  Don't worry, I'm unarmed.::  He grins, only with the slightest mischievousness .

Bella mutters aloud, "Yer a man, you ain' ne'er unarmed."  She eyes him again with a slight smirk and a "warning" look, then closes her eyes.

He takes her left wrist with his right hand. With his left hand he lightly jabs at the bottom of her ribcage, then follows through by making the wrist he holds swing down toward the jab.  He does this several times before releasing her wrist. Only a brief moment passes before he sends a swift and pointed punch into the ribs below her left arm.  Bella blocks the motion just as before, then opens one eye and looks at him.

He shakes his head and signs, ::Eyes closed.::  

She takes a deep breath, then closes her eyes again, letting him once again direct her movements.  He takes her wrist again, moves up to place his hand over hers and the sword, then makes the downward swing again, guiding her arm and hand into the swing, using his other arm to tell the elbow when to bend, her experience telling her that the move indicated is not defensive, but retributive.

Again, he releases her arm, let's a moment pass, then silently jabs at her ribs.  Once more she completes the move even without him guiding her, but this time does not open her eyes to look at him afterwars, but resumes the previous position as waiting for him to strike again.  And strike again, he does.  He repeats the procedure, attacking each side randomly, and quickly dodging her attempts to slice off his wrists.  She blocks most of the moves, missing every so often and wincing slightly as his jab follows through into her ribs.

Steel pauses after a time, and steps back, clapping once.  She opens one eye and looks at him.  He signs, ::The goal is not to prevent the attack. The goal is to maim the assailant.  Today is easy, only attacks to the ribs.  Tomorrow is hard. Attacks everywhere.::

She puts her blades under her armpits so that she can sign as well.  :: Do you want me to slice off your arms?::   She looks at him with a mildly sarcastic expression.

His expressions is serious.  ::I want you to try...to slice off my arms.::

::Why eyes closed?:: she asks.

::Because you've been blinded, when you're in the depths of the darkest pit, you must still be able to kill,:: he explains.

She takes a deep breath, then nods.  ::Get used to having no hands then.::

::Take the hit, slice off my arms,:: he signs, ::and keep your eyes closed.::

Bella looks at him in the eyes for a long moment, then closes her eyes again and readies her stance once more.

He mutters something, then she hears a few footsteps before a fist finds its way to her ribs, taking out two daggers, holding the flats of the blades against his arms and the hilts in his hands towards her.

She slices down precisely at his arm as she takes the hit to the ribs, but follows through her strike, purposefully letting the hit go through**

She hits something solid, and hears a noise, the sound of metal against metal, and without warning a second strike comes at the same spot on her ribcage.  She is slightly caught off guard with the second attack, but as the hits keep coming, she recovers and strikes each time she is hit, not pulling back any blows, but aiming to harm her opponent, the invisible enemy that is attacking her.  The blows continue for at least another dozen shots, each side of her ribs just behind where her arms hang, strong snap-hooks designed to sting rather than to shove the body.  Her breathing picks up as her heart rate increases, but she does not open her eyes as she continues to counter-strike rather than defend.

Steel finally stops and steps back, clapping once.  Bella opens her eyes and looks at him.  Steel  stands before her, small cuts and nicks taken out of his arms where her blades were not caught completely by the metal of the daggers.  He signs, ::That's enough for now.  I've bruised you enough for today, I think.::  He chuckles.

Bella sheathes her blades and signs, ::I have bruises.  You are bleeding.  Fair trade.::

The two make their way back up to the camp in silence.  Bella turns to glance up at the top of the cliff momentarily, then turns her gaze back to the path in front of her.  It's dead, Viper, let it go, she thinks to herself.  Nothing you do now will change that.  Focus on what you have control over.  Learn.

As she eases herself in front of the fire, she winces as she rolls up the bottom of her shirt to reveal several new bruises forming around the base of her ribcage.  She slips her lighter tunic over her head and shrugs out of her tighter fitting silk armored shirt, trying to preserve what modesty she has left.  

As she lays down on her thin pad of bedding she focuses on the pain in her ribs, closing her eyes and letting out a deep breath.  This was pain she could hold on to.  This was pain she could deal with.  

Sleep takes her quickly, not even managing to stay awake to eat.

[Alatriel]

Months after Viper and Steel return from their trip of training in the Thunder Peaks and after the encounters of other things both evil and benign, Bella finds herself ill and under the effects of a bad luck curse that even the magic of the blessings of Rofirein can't seem to help.  So she withdraws from her home and faces the world, finding that no mask or disguise can hide her from the misfortune that follows her.  Inns seem to suddenly be full before she gets to where she is going, in the north, her canteens freeze or leak, offering her nothing to quench her thirst, wine casks and juices turn sour before her lips.  Boats become unstable and the weather seems to turn foul upon the high seas.  Forced between a decision of starvation or eating food which has gone bad, Bella turns to the latter and forces herself to eat the spoiled food when she can stomach it, not knowing that misfortune has struck her even deeper than she has expected.  As she fights the nausea of what she believes to be food poisoning, she makes her way to the encampment outside of Leringard, penning a letter and paying a falconer in Ft. Llast on the way... a falconer whose first attempted bird dies near instantly upon tying the message to it.  The Falconer then demands that Bella pay for the dead bird as well as double to send the message because of the apparent added risk.

Bella pays the exorbitant amount to the Falconer in hopes that the message will reach her daughter before her third birthday.

Dear Rachel,
Happy 3rd Birthday.  I hope that you have a good day today.  I'm sorry that I am not there with you, and I hope that one day you'll be able to understand why.  I know that the past years have been hard and that I have probably not been home as much as I should be.  I know that I am not a good mother to you.  I never said I would be.  But it is not your fault.  You are not to blame for your Da and me being gone a lot.  I know you're too little to even read this but I'm sure either your Da or Charlie or your cousins will read it to you.  I love you Rachel.  I hope you will remember that when you are bigger.

Your Ma,
-Bella Poetr

[Alatriel]

Bella trudges through the snow, aching and trying to recover from the death that shouldn't have happened.  The contractions had stopped for a while.  That should've meant that the baby was still fine.  That elf just had to keep going on about what risk it was...

She suddenly doubles over as a contraction hits her.  She looks down as the snow beneath her feet stains red.

"I'm sorry Dan..." she whispers as she collapses to the frozen ground.

[Alatriel]

Bella hesitates at the entrance of her home in Wayfare a moment before going inside.  She pushes open the door to the house and looks around with exhausted eyes.  "Dan..." she manages to whisper before collapsing in a heap and darkness taking her.

She opens her eyes and looks up at the very concerned face of her husband.

"You're awake, Beloved?"  He manages a concerned smile as she looks at him and nods a bit.  "You had me worried, dear, you've been asleep for four days."  He touches her arm gingerly where her skin is still marred by countless bruises and slowly healing wounds, his voice breaking slightly as he speaks.  "I don't know what happened... but I'm glad you're home..."  he swallows hard and blinks back the moisture in his eyes.

"You're sick, dear... I can't seem to make you better.  I don't know what it is that ails you, my love."

Bella reaches over and takes Daniel's hand and looks at him, her eyes still tired and worn.  "It'll be okay Dan.  I jest need ta rest some, then I'll figger out how ta get better."  She closes her eyes again, then winces as Daniel gently shakes her awake again.  

"Eat something, Bella... please... before you sleep again, please eat.  I can't stand to see you drift away like this."  He spoons broth for her carefully, and she obliges his need to hover and tend, managing a good bit before falling asleep once more.

[Alatriel]

Daniel  sits next to the bed holding Bella's hand, a look of concern seemingly never leaving his face as Charlie sneaks into the bedroom using his normal toe to heel method.  He looks over Daniel's shoulder with a worried expression he seemed to have learned from his adopted father.

"Ma?  Are ya home fer good this time?"

Bella looks over Daniel's shoulder at Charlie, then at Daniel, hesitating before saying anything.  "Dan... mebbe Charlie an' me better talk alone..."

Charlie shifts uncomfortably at the glance, then toes the ground.  "Pa?"  

Daniel gets up quietly with a final look at Bella, then fixes Charlie with a firm look before leaving the room, shutting the door quietly behind him.

Bella clears her throat a bit.  "We din' get along so good last time we saw each other, did we..."

Charlie edges closer, taking Daniel's seat.  "Ya look bad ma..I mean I'm glad ta see ya, but yer hurtin..I..I'm sorry I was mean ta you before. "

"Ya weren' mean ta me, Charlie, an' iffn ya were sayin' what ya thought then that's fine, but I'd rather ya think fer yerself then think fer yer pa."

Charlie blinks.  "But I was, ma..I guess I was mad..but after talkin ta Dan and thinkin..I'm thinkin I was more sad then angry."

"Why?"

Charlie's eyes are bright with tears as he responds, "Cuz I missed ya..and oh hells.."  He cusses.  "I had ta watch Rachel a lot and couldn't play as much..and ya made Dan cry a lot..ya know?  Now I know he don't show it much..but he was feeling sadder than I was many times, Ma..and..that ain't right..He's a good man, even iffn he's stiffer than week old rawhide."

Bella looks away from him, avoiding eye contact, but her tone is gentle.  "Don' cry Charlie, yer a man now, ya gotta start actin' like one..."  She can't seem to help a smile.  "He's stiff a'righ'."

Charlie rubs his eyes.  "Maybe I don't wanna be a man yet, ma..what then?"

"Charlie ya got choices in a lotta stuff, but ya ain' got choices in a lot more.  Bein' a man ain' one o' them things ya got a choice about," Bella explains.

He blinks away his tears.  "Maybe so... but I wanna know... are ya staying fer good this time ma?" he asks hopefully.

She turns on her side and looks him in the eyes.  "Charlie, when we first brung ya here ya said ya wanted ta go adventurin' with us, remember?"

He nods a bit.  "Yeah..an I still do, but I thought ya were gonna teach me more..Dan's alright..but after I bandaged my fifth frog..what he teaches gets kinda old.  Always goin' on about what not ta do instead of what to do."

She nods a bit.  "That's the dif'rence 'tween yer Da an' me I reckon.  Dan's got a lot bout what you ain' supposeda do... but where ya are righ' now, I cain' teach ya what ya are supposeda do.  That make sense?"

Charlie gulps a little then nods.  "Alright..how bout we just play together some with Rachel then..I missed ya awful, I have."

Bella speaks quietly, "I ain' stayin' Charlie.  Iffn I stay, I'm gonna die."

Charlie responds in a small voice, "Oh..yer sick ain't ya?  I ken tell..Dan's been teachin me what ta look fer.  Can't the Dragon make ya better, ma?"

She shakes her head.  "The Dragon cain' cure everythin'.  I ken get better, but I cain' do it here."

He moves closer, sitting close to her on the bed.  " So yer leavin again; is that it? I hate this."  His eyes go bright again as tears threaten.

"Don' cry Charlie.  I mean it.  Don' cry.  Iffn ya cry, they'll know how ta get to ya."

"I DON'T CARE!" he shouts, drawing footsteps from the next room.  Daniel peeks his head in, frowns, then withdraws after seeing everything is pretty much the same.

Bella waits for Charlie to calm down.

"I'm sorry ma.  I jest feel like... like I've got a ball of pain in my chest... and I wanna blame you fer it, but Dan says that ain't right neither."

"So blame me fer it," Bella replies bluntly.  "Does it make it better?"

"No."  He angrily rubs his eyes again.  "It don't."

"So what're ya really mad at?" Bella asks her son.

"Stuff..." Charlie begins to respond inadequately.  "You not being around...  Sometimes Rachel fer bein so whiny... Missus Lana always tellin me ta look after my sister..."

"Tha's responsibility Charlie."

"I don't like responsibility much...  Is that why Dan is always so hard, ma?  Responsibility?"

"Prolly," she says simply.  "Dan takes on more responsibility then a person really needs to, but I reckon that's parta who he is."

Charlie nods.  "He looks after us...  He'd look after you too iffn ya'd let him, ma."

"I heard he got promoted..." Bella says, changing the subject.

"Huh?  What's that mean?"

"He got a new title.  Means he's more important in his church."

Charlie shrugs.  "He's me da... best job there is."  He offers a hesitant crooked grin.

"Charlie, you know anythin bout what's goin' on inna world except what goes on here in Wayfare?" Bella asks seriously.

He shakes his head a little then thinks,  "Well, something about Toran almost went away some... and umm..."  He shrugs.  "That's about it I reckon."

"You know what's the diff'rence 'tween good and bad, Charlie?"

"I think so, ma..leastwise, I know what Dan's told me bout it."

"What's bad?" she asks patiently.

"Hurtin folks, stealin, lyin... that sort of stuff...  Why ya askin me?" he asks curiously.

She closes her eyes while she listens.  "Cause it's important, Charlie... What's good?"

Charlie responds proudly as if by rote.  "Protecting people, healin thier hurts, and um..helpin em too."

She nods a bit, eyes still closed and looking worn out.  "I'm gonna tell ya somethin' that I don' know iffn yer gonna understand..."  She takes a deep breath.  "But ya need ta know in case I don' make it back here.

"There's a diffrence tween good an' bad, an' right an' wrong."

Charlie scratches his head.  "Ya mean all four are different?  but..."

Bella continues, "Sometimes it's the righ' thing to do a bad thing.  Sometimes it's the wrong thing ta do a good thing.  An' sometimes ya gotta do a bad thing so ya ken do more good.

Charlie looks confused.  "Yer not talkin sense, ma..Dan told me that..."  He mimics Daniel, sticking out his chest and lowering his voice.  "We are what we do, son."  Charlie smirks.  "Course I don't hold to that entirely."

Bella opens her eyes again and looks at Charlie.  "The world ain' black an' white, Charlie.  It ain' one thing or another.

"Okay ma... I believe ya..."  He regards her shrewdly for a few moments.  "Ya were doin bad things weren't ya ma?  Fer good?  Is that why yer sick?"

She looks at him and doesn't say anything.

Charlie waits, staring back at her like he's sure he's on to something.  "An ya can't tell Dan cuz... cuz he'd hafta arrest ya... is that it?"

"Whatever I tell ya is fer yer ears only... yer pa will know what I need 'im ta know when I tell 'im, not when you do, understand?" she admonishes him.

The boy nods.  "I ken keep a secret Ma... honest I ken."

Bella smiles a bit.  "I know ya ken.  But you ain' gotta worry none.  What got me sick, I'll take care of.  But just in case I don'..." she trails off and swallows a bit.

He leans closer to her with a worried look.  "Yeah ma?

"Charlie, ya gotta be a man.  An' yer smart.  Yer real smart.  There's a lot goin' on in this world that mos' people don' ever see cause they don' want to.  They think that so long's they do what the law says that bad things won' happen, but they still do."

Charlie frowns then scratches at a few hairs on his chin.  "What about it?"

"Ya ken try ta be like Dan an' protect people ya love, an' that's good, but iffn it comes right down to it that somebody wants ta hurt somebody ya love, there ain' much ya ken do ta stop em jest by protectin.  Sometimes ya gotta stop the problem afore it happens."

"Ya mean ya gotta do bad things, doncha ma?"

"Know yer enemy Charlie.  Always know yer enemy.  An' yeah, killin's a bad thing, but sometimes killin's the righ' thing.  Sometimes it needs doin'."

"But doin' bad things has..conse... "he struggles with the word.

"Consequences, Charlie."

"Consequences.  Got it.   Yes, ma... know yer enemy...but killin's wrong."

"Iffn ya knew somebody were gonna kill Rachel tomorrow, or tried to... and ya killed 'im, would you have done a right thing or a wrong thing?"
Charlie looks at his mother confused.  "Dan says iffn I went lookin fer a fella before he did anything... I'd be in the wrong, ma... and get arrested maybe even killed fer it."

She clears her throat again and nods slightly.  "A'righ'... how bout this then:  
"Ya been followin' a man what stole a man's little girl, same age as Rachel, but she ain' yer sister.  Ya found 'im an' he's standin' with the girl and a knife ta her throat.  He says iffn ya come any closer he's gonna kill her.  What do ya do Charlie?"

He furrows his brow thinking hard.  "That's different, but um... I dunno iffn I could stop a man like that, unless I could throw my knife at him maybe?"  He looks at his mother seriously.  "Take a lucky shot to hit him enough to stop him, though, that's what I'd do."

"Who is yer enemy Charlie?"

"The man holdin' the knife."

"Yes, he's yer enemy, but iffn ya try ta throw a knife at 'im ya might it the girl."

"That's what I meant, take a lucky shot.  What would you do?"

"Charlie, member what I told you?  Only kill when yer facin' yer enemy.  So yeah, he's yer enemy, but yer job is ta kill her enemy.  So you do what you gotta do to kill yer enemy, not jest stop 'im.  Iffn ya throw yer knife at 'im an' you ain' sure where it's goin' ya mighta jest gave him yer weapon, an' he'll still kill the girl.  Ya don' never count on luck cause it ain' somethin' ya ken control.  Ya count on skill, on knowledge.  Ya gotta know when that blade leaves yer hand that it's gonna hit exactly where ya want it to."

"Alright..but Dan wouldn't disagree with that much..."  He cusses.  "He'd probably blast the man with some prayer and not hurt the girl."

"So let me ask ya then.  Ya killed the man, but he killed the girl when ya stepped closer to 'im.  Whose fault is it?"

Charlie pours some water into a cup and hands it to his mother, frowning.  "His ma.  He did it."

Bella takes the cup and sips from it watching her son.  "So it wasn't yours for stepping closer?"

Charlie hesitates.  "Well... maybe a little."

"No, Charlie.  Ya were right the first time.  He killed the girl.  You ain' got no control over his actions jest yers.  You ain' guilty cause he done somethin' bad that was also somethin' wrong.  Iffn ya killed yer enemy, an' he were gonna hurt a child, and even iffn he did, ya done a bad thing what was the right thing.  A child ain' never yer enemy."  She coughs slightly and takes another sip of water.  "Well... a'most never," she mutters mostly to herself.

Charlie takes the cup and puts it on the table next to the bed.  "So why ya telling me all this, ma?"

"Because it's important.  Because it's stuff ya need ta know iffn yer gonna be a man.  Dan's a shield.  He protects.  He'd rather let both the enemy an' the girl live iffn it meant the girl lived over lettin' em both die."

Charlie smirks slightly.  "Don't that mean Dan get a chance to blast his enemy when the little girl ain't around, Ma?  I mean, when yer dead ya don't come back unless the Dragon lets ya."

"Things ain' always so simple, Charlie, an' magic ain' always around or on yer side.  Sometimes the only magics ya got are the ones aimin' at ya tryin' ta kill ya."  She pauses so that he can understand the weight of it.  "Sometimes, dead is jest dead."

Charlie shakes his head.  "Dan says his Dragon never leaves him... even when he can't feel his power.  Ya wanna know something ma?  I believe him."

"You got that same magic in ya Charlie?"

Charlie frowns.  "Nope..but Miss Jen says I don't need ta have it to believe... she's been teaching me how to fight with my fists... and..,"  his tone loses some of its enthusiasm, "how ta fish."

"Ya ken only count on what you got, not what others got," Bella tells him.  "That's why knowledge is so important.  Ya learn everythin' ya ken."

"Okay ma, I will."

Bella swallows again and closes her eyes.  Charlie looks at her a bit.  "Ya rest up ma.  Rachel will wanna see ya in a few hours.  She's sleeping now, but she calls ya Bella ma now.  She's real smart.  An' she's got a name fer Missus Lana.  She calls her Lana ma.

Bella whispers quietly.  "Mebbe it's better that way.  I ain' a good ma fer her."

Charlie frowns sadly.  "Not like that ma.  Rachel still loves ya.  She jest likes Missus Lana's singin'.  Me too."

"Go on Charlie... I'm tired...  don' tell Dan what I said, a'righ'?"

He nods.  "Okay ma.  Ya rest and when ya feel like it, we'll eat dinner.  You'll stay fer a good meal woncha? Dan's been workin' hard on one... roast with pie and all the trimmin's..." He grins a bit.  "He wants ta surprise ya with it."

She nods, drifting off to sleep as if she hasn't slept well in several months.  Charlie pulls the covers up to her chin and then tiptoes out of the room.

[Alatriel]

Bella walks slowly through Ft. Wayfare, her bulging stomach slowing her down more and more as the days go on.  She stops a moment to work through a mild contraction, rubbing the top of her stomach, but mostly ignoring as she has for most of the day.

"Ma?  You okay?" Charlie asks her.  "Ya look tired.  Maybe we oughta go home?"

Bella shakes her head.  "I'm fine Charlie.  Sides, we promised Rachel we'd take her ta pick them flowers she wan..." She suddenly gasps and doubles over.

Charlie rushes to her side to support her.  "Ma!  I don' care what ya say, we gotta get ya home now."  He looks around until he spots his little sister.  "C'mon Rach, time ta go home!"
Rachel looks over with a pout.  "But we didn't get my flowers yet!"

"Not now Rach..." he says with a serious and worried tone.  "Ma... ken ya make it home?  Do I need ta fetch Holly?"
Bella nods, her face flushed.  "Get Holly, Charlie.  It ain' time yet.  It's too early an'..." She lets out a groan as another strong contraction hits her suddenly.  "Get yer Da," she gasps.

Charlie glances down the road to their home, then looks back at his mother and helps ease her onto a nearby hay bale.  "Ma... stay here.  I'm gonna get Da.  He ken carry ya home."  He looks at his sister.  "Rachel, stay with Ma.  I'll be back.  Don' you leave her fer nothing, ya hear me?"
Rachel looks at Charlie a bit fearfully, but nods.  "I'll stay here, I promise..."

Charlie sprints off to find his father, and several minutes later the two run back, Charlie by far outrunning his older, slower father.  Daniel's face shows his deep concern for his wife as he carefully lifts her up in his arms.  "Charlie, go get Holly.  I've got Bella.  Run, boy." He looks at his daughter with a serious and authoritative tone, trying to mask his concern.  "Come along, Rachel, time to go home."

"Dan... it ain' time... it's too early by weeks..." Bella whispers to Daniel as he carries her with gentle but quick strides back to their house.
Daniel swallows and looks at his wife trying to hide his concerns as yet another contraction hits her in close and regular intervals.  "It will be alright, Beloved.  And I don't think you get a say on whether it's time or not... Dear one... your water's broken."

[Alatriel]

Daniel lays a cool rag on Bella's forehead and grasps her hand once more, "Almost there, Dear. One or two of more pushes and it will be done." He smiles encouragingly sharing a look with the midwife, the unflappable Holly clucking but nodding with a smile as she tends Bella.

"Push dear one, like the first time, tis a bit easier this go around eh lovie? You are doing fine, but on the next wave you push!" Holly keeps smiling as Bella bears down hard once more and the baby slides almost too easily into her careful steady hands. A few moments pass before a cry is heard, the wail of new life filling the room and Holly expertly wraps the child and hands her to Daniel then checks Bella's color and breathing. "It's a girl.  She's a small one, comin' this early, but she'll live.  She'll be a strong one once she gets a bit bigger.  She needs as name as well, High Protector, what is it going to be?"

Daniel holds the tiny baby girl close to his chest, his breathing slightly fast but steady and deep and it seems to calm the infant into a pseudo slumber. "Her name is Rebecca Lee Poetr." Daniel announces in calm voice after an affirming nod from Bella. "Third of my house and second of our union." He kisses the baby's forehead and begins to ease her next to Bella to suckle.

With a frown, Bella takes her small daughter and looks at her, but pulls her up closer to her face, closing her eyes and feeling the baby's skin against hers. "I ain't fer nursing her, Dan.  I jest cain' do it.  Call Charlie, I a'ready told 'im what ta do." She lays back against the pillows exhaustedly, holding her newborn to her chest.
"Charlie!" Daniel calls out and the slight footfalls of their adoptive son are heard crossing the living room.

"Yes, Da?" Charlie enters holding a lambskin milk bladder.

"Like I told ya, ya warmed it on the stove and tested it right?" Bella asks softly, not even opening her eyes.
"Yes, ma, jest like ya said."  He hands the bottle over to Daniel.  "Is it a boy or a girl?"
"You have another sister, Charlie.  Rebecca," Daniel tells him.  "Your mother and sister are both tired though, you'll be able to see them later.  Tell Rachel she is a big sister please, and inform Lana and the other girls as well."
Charlie grins upon hearing the news.  "Sure thing Da.  Oh... Hey ma?  Good job."  He grins crookedly and then runs back out the door to tell the others the news.

Daniel sighs and carefully takes Rebecca back from Bella to offer the baby the bottle.  Latching on firmly, Rebecca at first seems confused as she gets her first taste of lamb's milk. Instinct takes over then she begins to suck greedily, "Is this really necessary, Beloved?  Why won't you even feed our daughter?  She needs you.  I need you... Bella, we all need you.  You've already turned Charlie into a nursemaid to Rachel, will you do the same with Rebecca?  To be raised by her older brother?  You ask too much of him."
"Ya know why, Dan. We all got our part ta play.  Bein' their ma's only part o' mine.  I need them ta be able ta survive with or without me." She takes a deep breath and winces as the post labor contractions continue to trouble her and Holly fusses about like a mother hen.  

"I know I said it before Dan, but I need ya ta trust me.  I know what I'm doin'." Bella replies.
Daniel falls silent as Bella drifts off into an exhausted sleep and he regards his newest child.
"I'll do what I can to protect your mother, my daughter.  She loves you, as do I.  And the Gold help us all."

[Alatriel]

Viper listened to the reports coming in about more and more attacks of the Mist- a mist she knew full well would keep attacking until it was stopped. She had been there when they defended the tower of that creature.  She'd been there when the creature came down and said that it no longer had a set target... that it would attack anyone, and gain strength by consuming anyone's soul.

But this time, the reports made her blood run cold.

Wayfare.

The mist had attacked Fort Wayfare.  Many dead they said.  It was about all she could do to ask Steel to investigate.  She simply couldn't get up the courage to look for herself.  Her home.  Her family.  Were they safe?

She waited at the fire, staring, unable to sleep.  The seconds felt like hours, and the hours dragged on like weeks as she waited for Steel's return.  Even though he was gone for only a day by the magic of the portals and his abilities as a wizard, that day felt like the longest day of her life.

Finally he returned.  She looked at him as he took off his helm and ran his fingers through his hair.  Even as she spoke the words to ask if everyone was alright, the words became slow in her mind as if things were still unreal.  The only thing that would put her world back to being right again would be a few short words to tell her that her family was safe.

"Becca is alive, and physically, she's unharmed," Steel explained in as much of a caring tone as he ever seemed to be able to muster.  "Rachel was caught in the mist."

The words after seemed to melt away.  Steel attempted to comfort her for her loss as he moved closer to her and tried to put a hand on her shoulder, a hand that was summarily slapped away.  

There were words spoken, words that came unbidden as Steel told her to go home to her family, to be with them in their time of loss.  "How can I go home?  I killed my own daughter!"  

Did she mean the words?  Maybe.  Were they rational?  No.  But the tears never flowed, only the words to know that she had been a part of setting this mist free.  She protected the one that set it free for the sake of information, for a contract.  For a cure.  This contract that paid for her very life, to rid her own body of a poison she had willingly been injected with by an evil man that nearly cost the life of her second daughter as well as her own, had taken the life of her first.

It was all she could do to remove the guise of Viper and pull on a simple dress of the wife of a Rofireinite priest.  Steel told her to go home.  He'd preserved Rachel's body, what was left of it, so that she could see her one last time before burial, but the magic would only last a few days.

She left Viper behind in Miritrix as she stepped through the portal, and stepped out on the other side into Wayfare, into the harsh reality of seeing what her life had cost.

What it had taken.

[Alatriel]

The funeral was small.  Bella managed to find a priest of Rofirein to conduct the ceremony.  Rachel would have liked that.  Her faith was about as strong as her father's.  Daniel, however, was not present.  Whether he chose not to answer the falcon that told him his first-born daughter had died, or if he didn't get it in time, Bella didn't know.  But she stood there with Lana and Bria, and Katelyn, and Charlie.  With Ferrit and Kyle, and with the others that their family considered friends.  Friends of Daniel more than anything.

Little Becca clung to Charlie's neck looking over the grave with staring, unfocused eyes.  She hadn't spoken a word since it happened.  Not a smile, not a tear.  She ate and drank when she was coaxed, but even then very little.  Even as she clung to her brother, her knuckles clenched so tightly to him in fear for being out of doors that they turned white.  After the prayer, Charlie, mercifully, took the little four-year-old back to the house where she could sit by the fire and clutch Bella's old teddy bear, Harrison.

Words were said.  Condolences given.  No one knew how to deal with the loss of one so young.  Tears were shed, but not by the mother, and not by the daughter.  

They said that Becca was found clutching her older sister's lifeless, shredded body- that her own dress was soaked with her sister's blood, but she refused to let her go until she was pried from her and removed from the scene.

After the funeral, Bella and Lana and Charlie and Tod all sat around the table at the small, but always croweded home under the hill.  Everyone had different ideas on what should be done to help Becca.  Everyone wanted someone to stay with her at all times.  People wanted to protect her.

Bella remained silent through a lot of the talks, letting the others decide, and every now and then casting a glance towards the door of the home, hoping her husband would walk in and take charge of things, that he would come in to be the Protector, to save the day, to make things better.

He never did.

Finally, quietly, Bella got up from the table.  She simply said "I'll take care of her."  Then she walked across the room and picked up her now sleeping daughter and carried her upstairs to her own bedroom.

She laid Becca down on the bed and covered her with a blanket, then smoothed her light brown hair that resembled Bella's so much out of her face.

"I'm sorry, baby," she whispered quietly to her.  "I cain' bring Rachel back.  But I promise ya, I'll do what I ken ta make this righ'."

Bella then crossed the room and pulled out a recently re-filled flask of whiskey and sat down on the floor, head against the wall, and drank until she fell asleep.

[Alatriel]

Bella sat quietly talking to her young daughter in the room at the Leringard Arms.  As she spoke, she signed with her hands everything she said.  If Becca would no longer speak with her voice, perhaps, Bella thought, she could teach her to speak with her hands.

"I dunno what I were thinkin' when I started teachin' this kid.  Sorta weren' really thinkin' at all I reckon.  Jest some kid what I heard his stomach growlin'.  I been there ya know.  Not knowin' where ta go an' how I were gonna get my next bite ta eat.  Yer lucky, Bec.  You ain' ne'er had ta worry bout that.  Yer Da an' me... we done tried ta take care o' you best we could..."  she trailed off slightly, and her hands stalled.  

Becca looked up at her mother, growing used to this routine of them sitting together on the couch by the fire when Bella was home.  Bella would come in, dusty and tired, and often bruised from where ever it was she'd been, she'd shoo the nanny out and tell her she was dismissed until called, pay her her wages, and Melissa, the nanny, would leave, often times trying to explain to Bella anything that Becca had or had not done in the past several days that Melissa was with her.  Then for the next few days, Bella would spend time with her daughter.  The routine was not always the same number of days, but in spite of the location in bustling Leringard, it was quiet.  The only monster here was Steel, and Becca remembered him from before.  Da didn't like him.  Charlie said he was a monster that killed other monsters.  Ma... didn't talk about him much, she remembered.  Ma was never really home before.  Not like now.

"Ya want me ta keep talkin' Bec?"  Bella asked her daughter as their eyes met.  

Becca blinked.

"That mean yes?"  Bella asked, continuing to sign each word.

Becca blinked again.

Bella furrowed her brow slightly.  "Do ya like ta eat peas?"

Blink, blink.

Bella grinned crookedly.  "Well look a' that, Becca Poetr, yer talkin' again.  I'm real glad.  Now you an' me ken talk ta each other."  She continues to sign each word, Rebecca's eyes shifting every so often between Bella's mouth and Bella's hands.

"Yer Da don' know I ken talk like this, Bec... so fer now, we'll keep it a secret 'tween you an' me, a'righ'?"

Becca hesitated a moment, then blinked once.

Bella nodded silently for a moment, then started talking to her daughter once more.

"So, like I were sayin'... I don' know what I were thinkin' when I started teachin' this here kid.  Steel says he look more like a grown man, but he's real green, know?  But he's stubborn, Bec.  Sometimes, stubborn's a bad thing, when it means you ain' able ta get past somethin' an' ya let it hold ya back.  But sometimes bein' stubborn's a good thing, iffn yer smart bout it.  It means ya don' give up.  No matter when things get hard.  Iffn things get harder, it means ya jest gotta try harder ta beat it.

"I done give him somethin' ta do.  I told 'im ta train so hard that iffn he done what I said it means his arm would fall righ' off 'is shoulder.  Ain' no possible way he ken do what I told 'im ta do.  But what I'm waitin' ta see is what he does.  Iffn he shows up when I told 'im to, an' iffn he kep at it till he were broken an' won' be no good, or iffn he quit when it got too hard, or iffn he used 'is head an' figgered out 'is own way ta get done what needs doin'.

"I reckon we'll see what he come up with, huh, Bec?"

Becca blinked.