Arrow Lake sturm und drang

a tale of a curious boy, listened to by a curious woman. Tahani grinned with delight at his recollection, knowing all too well the attitudes of some seasoned healers. boys too rough for healing, she responded, lifting her shoulders. so many think. not you. different. but they think you are like others. . .so they chase.

she let herself laugh and then fall into nostalgia when he questioned her. my mother, she admitted, missing the Ateneq matriarch for the first time in a very long time. the emotion was potent, fierce. it took her unawares and she felt tears shimmer in her vision, hastily blinking them away before continuing. her mother. mothers heal. . .i want nothing else.

care and plants and love were all she really knew. Tahani could hunt, sure, and fight, and scout, and run, but healing was her passion. it was a cruel irony that perhaps the only one fit to heal the woman (if she could even be treated at all, which was unlikely) was herself.

and she had already accepted her fate, so it was a moot point.