Ouroboros Spine takluak

After the datura and the women's circle, Tulukiri had been out-of-sorts.

To say she had been drained of feeling, or not herself, was an understatement; she had withdrawn beyond the usual work-focused, antisocial behavior that had plagued her initial inception to Moonglow - in the days and weeks to follow, as she sifted through the events and processed them, she was not seen by many. Certainly her duties went unfinished; if Kigipigak came calling for her she would not respond, and likewise she was resistant to the attention of any of the women who had witnessed the ritual.

The girl processed in her own time. She found herself thirsty for answers more than anything, but did not know who to speak to, or how to ask, or even if she wanted to delve so deeply in to her own spirit (the spirit being a concept all Tartok abhorred, and mocked, and otherwise found impossible to substantiate, and in this Tulukiri was on-brand).

When she did feel more like herself, she worked. Her patrol routes were stymied by drifting thoughts or sudden waves of intense emotion that Tulukiri was not accustomed to feeling; she was reminded on more than one occasion of a sense of dread, or a fleeting worry, and sometimes would cut her work short to wallow in something close to guilt; or she would fight against all of it and hide herself away.

Today was only slightly different. The sun was setting earlier and earlier, and only a couple hours after the midday mark, she could see bands of murky bruise-pink across the sky indicating the departure of the sun and its warmth. She climbed to a high point upon the spine and settled there to witness it, and drew a weighted breath, which pulsed back out of her as a fine cloud as visible as smoke.

Callyope had become a wisp of the heart of Moonglow.

She haunted woodlands and danced the spines. Her singing had become humming. When her own work was done, it was with a sway to her movements. The growing early darkness only served to gentle sever her from keeping track of time.

So she found Tulukiri upon the spine as well, wondering if the girl had become a night watcher.

Golden Warrior,

A name, hummed upon the wind for just their ears.

There had been a question. Her thoughts had been ordered and ready to interact. Now they danced, fizzled. She watched the wisps of Tulukiri's fur compliment the changing skies.

The smoke carried from her lungs and danced, dissipating at the edges; beyond it, she saw the coalesced form of someone striding close. Fine-boned, feminine. Neither the disgraced leader of Natgivik or the intimiating witch woman of Moonglow; the nearer Callyope got the easier it was to recognize her, and Tulukiri averted her gaze as she moved to settle and watch the sky.

One ear turned as the title was spoken aloud.

She did not feel much like a warrior right now. This was no warband, they held no marching orders and Tulukiri never attended any training sessions; she was meant to continue working with Kivaluk, but since the circle that was yet another thing she had put aside. The title, therefore, made her feel intimate guilt.

The light is dying too early, she finally answered, having let her thoughts wander and go dark, following the angle of the celestial body. The air was chilled enough already, yet in the coming hours it would only worsen, but at least there were no clouds in the sky - no hint of snow to come by morning.

Another sigh. I... she started, faltered, and silenced within moments.

The light was dying.

The light was dying. Somehow it inspired a pinprick of panic. A small inkling of worry that threatened to spill out slowly.

She tried to search for the sight of the nearby mountain. As she often did these days. It soothed in ways she could not describe verbally. Only that the sensation of height often comforted her these times.

The mountain. She jutted her chin towards the chain. Moonspear, but she knew not a proper name. Have you seen it?

The mountain?

She looked to where Callyope had indicated. There, she could barely make out the silhouette of something distant and tooth-like against a deepening sky. It held no significance to her; evidently, it was important to the other girl.

Tulukiri looked to her now, rather than the mountain, and shook her head.

She missed the shake, but the silence wrapped around her like the gold air.

I want to walk it. She spoke, soft and far away. She had not planned the idea. Not at all. She knew not when to go, when it might be safe to go.

Would you? With me?

She turned her gaze now upon Golden Warrior.

It seemed far to go. They had a mountain here underheel, but, maybe Callyope meant to visit the other place because it was different.

Sure, she answered. She felt sheepish, and didn't like it.

Her throat cleared. Maybe we could talk about... the circle.

Her mouth felt dry. The very thought of those visions unsettled her, and imagining all those women who had seen her drugged (and the moonwoman, who forced her to drink the water), all if it - it was stressful, and made Tulukiri want to shut down entirely.

Trauma. That's what it was. Drugged and manipulated by people she barely knew - and left to understand it after, as if any sense could be made.

Callyope did not know how to be spirit talker.

But perhaps, through lingering delirium, she had convinced herself she knew. That everything was fine. Mainly because if things were not it became an all encompassing rain cloud.

So she tried to become soft and light.

Perhaps that was why the earlier statement had planted a pin of panic.

I have ears for your words. She hummed, soft and warm. Let us talk.

Yet she did not speak of it first!

It felt wrong to speak about her feelings. It wasn't a Tartok-versus-Moonglow culture thing, either. It was a Tulukiri thing. These people weren't her family; she had left her family behind, chosen to abandon them for the pursuit of a dream half-realized, and those people she fell in with (Tulimaq especially) had no time for feelings. That was a time of work, of focus, of strength and obedience (even if it ended with disobedience).

Tulukiri therefore, did not know what to say. She sat in silence as the last of the color faded from the sky. She watched the air as if words might appear for Callyope without her involvement, or perhaps she could manifest something by sheer force of will - but no, there was only silence and the soft sounds of wind across the crown of the mountain.

I don't know where to start.

Her chest felt weighted. Have you... Do you, um, the women, drink that water a lot? Do that, a lot? She meant the ritual, but struggled to speak of it. Was this what made Moonglow so different from her own people?

It was my first.

A soft sound, gurgled in the back of her throat. Words dislodged by her throat.

Moonwoman sent me as talker but — There was that nagging, itching, static cloud. She thought she had buried it with the bone. With Mojag. With the camp in the north.

That sadness.

It buzzed in her brain for a long moment.

Moonwoman sent me as talker--

It was her first time grappling with the effects of the spirit-water, and yet she was meant to what, be a guide? To talk the other women through the effects? That was unfair.

Tulukiri could only remember bits and pieces of her visions by now, and had co-opted some of them, reordered some things, as she made sense of it. They were no longer fresh; so how was anyone to make sense of the mind of another?

I saw... It wasn't home. It wasn't a place, or even anyone I knew. But there were people. She grasped at the memory of the fragmented vision as best she could. I was trying to get them to listen to me. It was like... Something bad was going to happen, and I knew it, but they wouldn't stop. They were leaving for a -- a hunt, maybe. I dunno. She shakes her head as the explanation fades upon her tongue.

Do you remember what you saw?

Her ears turned, intent upon the words of Golden Warrior.

She spoke her visions into existence between them. Somehow that too sent a fracture of doubt through Callyope. Had she been meant to know these already? What if the spirits did not commune with her when she was meant to commune with them?

She felt dizzy and her mouth grew dry.

A soft smack of her lips as she grappled with her thoughts into words.

She did not remember details, only vague things and the feelings that came with it.

I was high above a village. Watching. But she had nothing more to say. She did not know how to convey it. What had there been to convey? Warmth tangled with her general sudden sense of dread.

Is this the first you have talked about the circle?

Maybe they had all been above the village. Maybe Tulukiri had travelled up there with Callyope and been unable to find her, but had looked down upon Moonglow, or Natigvik, or some other place full of faces she didn't know. It didn't make any sense either way.

Yes, she admitted. I was so tired after... And, I think, it was hard to remember a lot when I woke up.

The trees trembled. She couldn't see them, but the sound was like the ocean sighing. Tulukiri paused long enough to hear the sigh of the wind and listened too for Callyope, in case she had anything to say.

I am lost sometimes.

This confessed in a whisper. Uncertain if it should be spoken.

But women shared words. This she remembered always. Even more so now as the exchanged what had occurred. Each a different tale. Perhaps they fit into pieces of one another. Somehow they were all linked.

Maybe we...work together. More. Speak more. Her voice trembled off into silence, in cold wisps. Beginning a harder path towards her so badly wanted destination.

Me too, she added. It was detrimental to mention this - a weakening caused by the spirit-water, the haze of it and the disjointed nature of her life after waking from it. Tulukiri had felt physically weak in the days following, and now she felt closer to pathetic - unable to focus, as if the ritual had only destabilized her spirit rather than helped it.

She did not like being weak in any form. Weakness had no space in her life; it meant warriors might fail and die, or people would go hungry.

As for further talks, she was unsure, and went quiet.

I never want to do that again. The... water.

The water.

The plant. Callyope recalled the moments leading up to it in a haze. How she had prepared it alongside her mother. Dutifully. Devoutly.

Blood placed upon them.

Then you won't. She spoke softly, but her voice felt certain. As if she had some sort of say in this matter truly. That Tulukiri would never have to spirit walk again.

Maybe she wouldn't.

You did not know them in your visions, but do you feel the village was yours? That guiding them was your job?

She slowed to steal a glance at the nearing dark sky. Only slivers of the sun left.

I am not sure I was even in a village, which came out of her with some exasperation. And I was not leading them. They weren't listening to me, whatever I was saying.

Was it meant as a review of Moonglow? Tulukiri couldn't be certain of anything. She had forgotten what she had said upon waking from the vision by now, the pleading she had made in her plea to the faces around her.

She tried to think about the vision again, now, with Callyope there.

I felt very small. It was like everyone had their attention on some good thing in the future they could not see, and I knew somehow it was wrong, and that they had to listen to me. Like I held warnings - but none would listen. Now that she was speaking it aloud it felt very silly, and the flow of the words became like a torrent while her heartbeat rose to match; racing where it was housed.

Maybe I am not meant to be here. Maybe your spirits were telling me I did not belong? That was a sad thought.

It hurt her heart and perhaps that clouded her vision and her judgement.

I do not believe that to be the message. She declared in a hoarse whisper. Their voices now traveled in the dark, in cold wisps of air.

She turned her amber gaze in a multitude of ways. Down upon the shadowed village, up to the mountain slopes, back to the golden girl.

Maybe the spirits say you must find a path with the village, perhaps as the one to guard them. The village will listen if they know you.

Things to consider and discuss as they continued their mountainous trek. Callyope, silently, wished for Tulukiri to stay.