Worries and Wondering

[Jirai]

It has been several weeks now, since Agnieszka Kaczmarek informed Rhaena Olwak that she would be teaching the Trader to fight. There had been some small protest from the slightly younger girl, but she did agree. The sessions were grueling for a girl not accustomed to so much physical activity - but if nothing else, it was time spent with her friend, and that was worth much to her.

After one such session, Rhaena had flopped down on the ground, staring up at the sky as she tried to catch her breath. Eventually, though, she turned her head towards Agnieszka, words coming suddenly.

"I had this dream the other night, Agnie."

[channe]

Agnieszka seems to get quite a kick from running the girl through a crazy series of drills; one of Ariane's mixed in with one from the Brotherhood, footwork and balance and response.

"This is important," she'd say, "just as important as knowing where to stick the pointy end --"

Perhaps Rhaena could take heart in the fact that Agnieszka remained relentlessly positive and encouraging through it all -- and then, perhaps be a little righteously annoyed at the fact that Agnieszka was breathing so much lighter at the end of all this than her friend.

But today, there's talk of dreams --

"Oh, yeah? What about?"

[Jirai]

She had been distracted today, as Agnieszka would certainly have noticed. It resulted in drills performed even more poorly than usual, and it was only the fact that this was Agnieszka that had kept her going.

"It.. was snowing. Lots of snow. Like..." That Other Place. Why was this so hard to talk about? "And Bryce was there." She draped an arm across her face. "And... when I woke up, my head hurt. Real bad."

[channe]

A moment passes, and Agnieszka looks like she's thinking of something, like she's searching a memory --

"Bryce? Damn," she says, chuckling slightly. "That's a name I ain't heard of in a while. But that makes sense. Bryce, snowing -- I bet he's freezing his arse off right now, and that he hasn't gotten laid in *six months*."

[Jirai]

"What makes you think he's even still -alive,- Agnie?" She sat up, knees drawn up to her chest as she gave her friend a long look. "He stole that child. And then he just.. left." And a place that cold was not the most forgiving of places to just wander off in. Not to mention that Bryce couldn't heal himself. "..He wanted me to go with him."

[channe]

"I dunno, I --"

killed him once and felt really bad about it later, when I discovered he wasn't actually dead.

Instead of saying that, she shrugs and is quiet, idly poking the grass with her index finger, and then the last bit draws her head up again. "You didn't tell me that. I'm glad you didn't go. That's cheek, t' steal a baby an' ask you to come with; not even bein' that kid's mama. Arse."

And then she looks back down at the grass.

[Jirai]

"I think about it sometimes. What would have happened..." She shakes her head, though, and does not pursue that any further. There is silence for a moment. "Glenn told me. Same night I had that dream, he had one, too. Someone on a snowy hill and all that." There's a question in there, somewhere, even if she does not phrase it as such. It's in her eyes, clear enough.

[channe]

"You'd be somewhere in Sinari or God knows where, freezing your ass off, playin' mama to a baby that ain't even yours, and not knowin' anyone but Bryce," she said, shrugging. "'Stead, you're in Myrken Wood goin' on tea-parties with the Guv. Simple as that."

But, well, that does it. That description --

"Y'know," she says, softly, "A couple nights ago I had that dream, too. Laranna, on a hill, in the snow. I was wearin' my pyjamas."

When she looks up at Rhaena, she's obviously worried.

[Jirai]

"Glenn said that Cinnabar and Cambree had similar dreams, too." She said quietly, chin resting on her knees. "And I told you about that... in the tavern, with Ariane and me. Seeing things that weren't there." Agnieszka wasn't the only worried one. "Last thing we need, huh?"

[channe]

"Rhaena," she says, quietly, looking at her friend. "Remember that voice? The one with no body, the one that came with the dream? Ariane an' I heard it again. We both were drunk, thought that we were hallucinatin' it, until we both started talkin' to it."

She takes a breath. "Shi-i-t, I don' wan' to deal with this again. What the hell is going on?"

[Kylerryth]

The wind picked up, but briefly -- like a final burst of strength before it dwindled to a breeze. The wind was cold, of that there was no doubt, but it was also sharp, cutting through their clothes, seeking out the gaps between raiment and flesh and gnawing upon the latter with invisible icy teeth.

And on the wind was a whisper of sound -- a sound that could have been the wind combing its unseen fingers through the withered grasses around them ... or a voice, a voice soft as silk, quiet as a blade drawn in the dark.

Remember, whispered the wind.

Remember.

[Jirai]

The girl shivered slightly in the wind - but it was just wind, right? "I remember," An unconscious answer to the voice that was not a voice - hearing things, she must be - an answer to Agnieska.

"I don't know what's going on, but I hate it. What can you do against a voice and some dreams? Glenn had the dream too, so even Lamai's shield didn't block that..."

[channe]

It was getting cold again. Too early; they'd spent half of their summer freezing in Sinari. She draws her coat tighter around her shoulders, and then -- and then there's something alien on the breeze, and when Rhaena mutters her remembrances, she straightens, and just looks at her.

"I told Ariane that -- well, I told her that I was gonna sit down an' shut the heck up. When I realize it's a dream. I have to wake up sometime, right? I --" really thought the last dream was kind of cathartic -- "I don't want to be used."

Almost word-for-word from what she told Ariane. "And you. You too. Don't respond. Don't give Koschei the benefit of the doubt."

[Jirai]

"Koschei?" Ah, but it was an idle question, that. She was quick to continue. "D'you think that would work? Just.. not doing anything?" Would it work? Could they do it? When you considered some of the things that happened in other dreams... well. Not responding did not seem like an option, in some of those instances.

[channe]

"Ariane named it," she says, absently, lost in thought. And then: "I don't know! I don't -- I don't want to kill Aeryn again, I don't want to kill Ariane, I know that sounds like a crazy thing to say, but that's what it felt like even though it was a dream. I mean, what's someone gonna do, just walk up and kill *me* if I'm sittin' there? Can he really make people do that?"