Two Eyes Cenote Aimless direction bound through

Backdated a bit.

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Muat-riya's tunnels seemed to expand endlessly. Water dripped down into the floor below, and echoed into the maze of corridors that resided byond their own. Fellahin quietly made way through the palace and tidied up the grounds. No outsider would see filth, no. Not the blood spilled. Not even the bone scraps or fur shed.

Today, it was like a quiet breeze broke through the cenote. Pelts rustled away. The ground was disturbed with the most quiet pitters, and yet by the time eyes could look, they would find no cause. The vines would part and then sway into each other as they came to a still. Rocks would be just centimeters out of place, and a shadow would grow small in the distance.

Legend was quiet, and tried not to disturb the children. Or anyone, for that matter.

"..@Eset?"

Carrying a skin in her mouth, their Yaret stumbled lowly to the entrance of the woman's chambers. Head, slowly peaking inside and gaze averting with a quiet nervousness. Big, round and curious eyes crossing themselves to stare at the bag which dangled from her front teeth. She tried not to drop it. Fidgeting both front paws into the dirt by flexing her pads, Legend's voice searched for her friend. In need of help, and unsure what to do with herself. But who would help her? Legend didn't know. Legend didn't know at all. So, she came instead to the only name known that may not have turned her away or answered harshly and waited. Dumbly, she knew.

Alone in her quarters she hears the crunch of pawsteps and glances towards the door, formality dwindling to surprise when the raven’s face appears in her threshold.

“Legend,” she is on her paws before the woman has time to set in more than a couple steps, sweeping her chin gladly along the yaret’s narrow spine and wrapping a paw around her runner's arm. Her eyes squeeze shut and she breathes deeply, lips pressed together with the determination not to cry.

“I’ve missed you,” she whispers, pulling back to study the glaze of Legend’s huge gray eyes, only then to truly take notice of what she clutched preciously between her teeth and how the room had suffused with a floral scent; one that drops strangely in the hebsut's lungs like cold, heavy stones.

A shift abaft, she makes ample space for Legend to enter, eyes wide in unvoiced question.

Was it wrong to miss someone who had played such an insignificant role in your life?

The pouch hit the floor.

Eset had been there for most none of it, and yet all of it. It was strange, really. Strange how someone you found regular in your life, yet to never be given a day of thought, could leave such an empty feeling in your chest in their vanish. The memories that were there though, even with their meaningless nature with no weight to change the game of their world, somehow never left.

It must have been nice to be capable of making unforgettable memories with someone.

Eset could make many. Legend knew she made none. Their embrace was warm and held for many seconds, and tension fell away from every portion of the yaret's body. Her native tongue exposed itself.

"It is good to see You well, Eset." Even if every piece of Eset said she was not.

"The fellahin have whispered many tales, but she does not know which are..true and untrue. You will have to tell her. Akashingo has kept her busy and on doubled patrols." Though, luckily, she was more likely to go back and tattle on an intruder before going after one alone, it was still tiring.

Legend had the look of a bad dog for not coming with it sooner.

Eset backed away. "Ahm." Frowning, a lonely paw gently pried open the bag and revealed its contents, hidden away even from the door and only to Eset's eyes. "..She brings You this. She doesn't know what to do with it. It came from- from a stranger man at Muat-riya's borders." Ceremonious, in some ways, and.. Not always in others. "So, she brings it to You to- ahm, ask: Help?" Because Machiavelli would likely take it for himself, and Senmut? Why, he likely would not care per say, but he'd simply been busy. Perhaps she would find him after if he had free time. Toula was too young. "The stranger man said it is a gift."

“It is nothing I wish to discuss.” Not to relive it. Not here. Not now.

A burst of pain, like soreness coats her throat. She did not feel she had to veil that part of herself from Legend that pulsed with telltale cold; the little bud that had been her’s now buried in a thousand forgotten fragments far from this place. But the days had passed, decisions were made and acted upon, and when all was said and done the world had not much altered save for the hebsut’s own grief.

You were right, she thinks grievously. You had wanted to spare me from future anguish, and I did not listen.

Some inward shame touches the woman’s face, a guilty look that makes Eset want to pull her close and murmur words of comfort. “You look healthy,” her eyes are on the silken profile, taking in her new strength, “and a yaret now, I hear.” Her mouth stretches into a pleasing smile, wondering what new responsibilities charge Akashingo’s raven.

The sudden reveal is not so foul as it is overwhelming. Legend unbars the sachet and at once the coy is sent sputtering back with a cough. A gift from a strange man– immediately her mind jumps to Herod and poison and warily she leans in to inspect the patch of herbs, taking every care not to touch them.

“A gift for who?” Grave speculation is in her eyes as she tests the air.

ref tag!

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Grief cut through Eset's throat, and Legend listened. Blue stars speckled the ceiling and covered over whatever blood resided on the hebsut's hands. Many stories were whispered, and none of them could have been the truth when they did not expose the true vulnerability of the servant. 

Something akin to sympathy painted the shadow puppet's features. Soft eyes, and leaned ears, but a straight and still body that had been molded to not move even under the most violent of thunders. 

"Okay."

They did not have to speak of it. Legend had closed her ears to those many whispers. They were not from Eset's mouth, and so she would never truly know what had happened. Pennies of privacy for the hebsut from whatever heart that she could muster. 

Then, suddenly, the woman's bad dog look floated away and she perked up, even if only a bit. Healthy! Healthy and a yaret now.

"..Yes. Erpa-ha tells her that she has earned it. It is not the same as Shuyet was, no, but it is more familiar than being on the same floor as the mazoi. She does Legend things now and not as many," her paw did spinnies and her eyes squinted, "Warrioress..thingies. She can do this better. Besides, it's more fun!" And struck the many feral strings in Legend to a high. There was not much yet to do with the new title, though. They'd need to hurry up and make enemies!

Games were good. This game was called: Legend and Eset create a tree of new realities to forget of the pain that displayed. 

 Bad dog! She felt it again suddenly.

"Ahm! Not sure. He just said 'geeft' in a weird accent after motioning vaguely to the whole palace. Maybe to You? Or he meant it for Pharaoh Toula and the King? Or for everybody? Dunno. Safiya, Khu's little girl that's, like, this high," the Yaret threw up a paw haphazardly, "Answered the stranger mans call first. So, when I got there, I took it before Safiya did since it smelled funny!"

That was a half truth. Eset simply being her friend prompted out the rest of it. "..And because I wanted it!"

But then she felt bad enough to bring it to Eset. Also, Legend was incapable of just keeping it, anyways. "Didn't use any of it. Just looked at it and then closed it back." What else was important? "Oh. He did give a name, though. @Soto."

“I do not know the name,” her head shakes, stifling another cough as the air itself burns, “but I would not trust anything handed over freely at our borders. Thank you for bringing this to me.” She felt ill at even the thought of this potentially dangerous mix falling into Pharaoh's hands.

Nostrils flare over the potent air. The hebsut cants her nose, extracting what familiar scents she can from the fine powdery substance. “Saffron, chicory…I cannot make out the rest,” she recoils, a paw carefully closing the leaf back over its contents, “Tavina will know.”

“Does Akashingo have need for you to return soon? I would like to know more about this man,” her firm glance meets Legend over the wrappings.

Neither did she know the name. For a life lived bathed in the shadows and lurking in dark corners to serve the Pharaoh and the King, there were few names that went unheard. 

Soto had never fallen into the imp's leeching ears.

Sitting straight, the woman's neck stiffened and eyes firmed into that of duty. "Not that She knows of, no."

Eset was to do whatever needed with the pouch now that it was out of the yaret's own filthy jaws. "She can always ask, if need be. With your word, there would be trust to allow it." 

Job! Job! Job! Job! The imps mind was screeching through mazes of halls and beating back against her skull. Rattling bars. Rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle. She was so close! She was so close!

“I will write to the Erpa-ha to ask and explain the situation,” though Eset hesitates, wondering if the exchange would be perceived as yet another foundering on Muat-riya’s part. Though she would not ponder it too deeply now. She had vowed for there always to be trust between she and Senmut.

Legend held herself with a kind of mesmerized energy. She was often this way, and seeing it again nearly persuaded a true smile from the distant woman.

“In the meantime, please find out what you can, Legend, and report back.” If there was a threat to Muat-riya, then the palace must act swiftly to address it.

That well-postured sit broke into a lazy one. Neck aching, back burning. Used to it, yes, but there was a certain relief that came with not being so upright. Both eyes sat hesitantly on Eset when it happened, and when the bite of teeth did not come, a stare.

Breaking gaze, the imp's bottom lip pushed up while many thoughts seemed to take an electric course across her mind.

A smile then formed next and the idea grew on her! "Yes! She'll go out then and prod around. Maybe there'll be tall, dark and handsomes!" Spinning around a red petal on Eset's floor, thinking, thinking, thinking! Tall dark and handsomes to spoil her rotten! That was a much better outcome, anyways, then being riddled with teeth marks and blood; though, maybe that was not so bad, either. Tricky. 

Oh well! She'd figure it out! Then, the woman spun on both heels with a mischievious plastered on that inked maw, and glitter across both ghostly eyes. "Leave it to me!" 

It was in Legend’s exuberant nature to speak light of things. In the past year Eset had learned well enough of her to understand the yaret would navigate this given task with competence.

Tall, dark, handsome. She cast Akavir from her mind and returned a steady look to her friend.

“Tread safely.”

Vanished.

Until there was a distinct click of paws for the most keen of ears, and a shuffle of noise. Perhaps a minute later. Both big eyes appeared at the doorway and caught Eset's face. "...E-set?"


"I be back." The woman's lip twitched and moved unsurely of what she had meant to say. It didn't really communicate what was intended, or maybe what was needed, but it was what came out. It was all she could say. A moment was given, paused.

Before truly disappearing--

gone.