Post by Men of Skye on Oct 26, 2009 15:12:44 GMT -6
An hour later, she was leading him out of the shop, basket in arm with a blanket folded into its depths. The same blue robes swayed as she moved, her hair, still left unbound in waves over her shoulder and back. The door to the shop was locked with the sign 'CLOSED' displayed just inside the window. There were a few people who knew were the few places she went to, it would not be difficult to find her if trouble arose, but for now she was treat the day as if it were her own. The key was slipped into the hidden pocket of her robes before she was turning and taking his hand into her own as she lead him towards the market street, a group of shops and carts, merchants calling, people bartering one product for another thing. It made her smile; this was another reminder of home. But she had purpose in coming into the market and as a merchant called of fresh fruits, her hand left his as she moved to the stall and lifted a peach to bring it up to her noise for a sniff. The pungent smell of tang and sweet met her nostrils before she was placing one and then two of them in the basket and along with it two apples and two pears.
When her hand left his, his eyes scanned the market… such a market in deed… though much different than markets of home, still it had its own similarities. Vendors hawking their wares, carts loaded to bear, people making choices based upon quality and price…
"Kam..." She called, turning her head to find him before pointing to the fruit and then turning to point at a stall of all ready prepared meat pies, kabobs and sandwich, though it was clear she wasn't going to walk that way as she added a bottle of apple cider to the basket of food. "For Lunch.." She explained. When he had chosen what he wanted, she paid and she wouldn't take any arguments from him. This was her 'adventure' for him.
“Yes?” he turned and looked at her, idly walking back to her. Then a smile crossed his face… “Lunch?” She could be a feast… he thought; and the smile morphed into a wicked smirk.
The market trip of course didn't stop there, it included a wet splash from a lobster as a merchant thrust it in her face and the animal kicked its tail throwing water at her and igniting a laugh from Briseis as well as a visit, or rather a passing of a stall of jewelry where Briseis paused looking at a necklace and earring set. Her mother’s jewelry, it still had not sold. She wanted to speak up and say the man was overpricing them but every day they remained there and she could see it, so she couldn't do it.
He too laughed at the lobster incident. Then he saw her pause at the jewelry…
"Come on, much more to see and do..." She chimed as she took Kam's hand into her own again as she lead him away from the market…
“Alright…” and they started to walk away, hand in hand… At the edge of the market, he stopped and made her halt with a slight tug of her hand. “Before we depart, I need to…um…” then he smiled, letting her know he needed to relieve himself. To a side-building, a he entered to use the loo. But… that was not his intention. Out a side door, he peeked around the corner, seeing her looking at a material, with her back toward his direction. Making his way stealthily back to the jewelry vendor, he reached deep into his jacket and withdrew a pouch. Tipping it, he palmed several coins… some Marinid, some of Skye… Counting out the right number, he handed the vendor all gryphons and informed the vendor to keep the change. Shuffling the jewelry into his pouch, he stuffed it deep into his jacket.
Making his way back the same route he came by, he returned to Briseis’ side. “There, I feel much better…” he offered with a smirk.
A journey into the country… No horses for this girl, they terrified her. No, it was simple walking and she was enjoying it, with the companion at her side, how could she not?
No stranger to walking Kam shortened his steps for her. Occasionally, he would stop, revere the countryside and then they would continue. Small talk filled the way… Their small talk consisted of similarities of the market, differences in flora, and the differences in weather, between his home and his visited land…
While they talked of mild things; weather and difference between home and visited lands, she did have one thing she needed to get out in the open. She had told him she was a slave, and she was sure he had known before she had ever said the words out loud but she felt the need to clarify a few things first. "You know..." She started "When I told you I was a slave, I was a house slave. An I didn't mind it, You've never... I mean… you didn't look at me like most people do when they find out what I used to be before I was a midwife. You didn't look at me with pity but I just, wanted you to know, it wasn't some... I am not sure of the English word, um skin and skin?" Her face twisted with trying to remember the English word of it. The truth was, English was not her first language, Latin was but she had adapted quite well in moving to Skye, still a few words escaped her. "I never hated being a slave, never wished something else for myself, never saw myself as anything but... what I was. I felt more fear in being freed then I ever had at my Master’s hand. Still do actually..." She stopped there, her eyes raising to their surroundings and she smiled.
He stopped, his hand urging her to… His chocolate brown eyes seem to sparkle. “Girl, I knew yu had been a slave from the very beginning when we met. But here, in this land, yu are free. Yu told me yu are a mid-wife… that is sufficient for me…” he paused. “Being a slave is no reason to offer pity… many have been slaves to one thing or another in their life, whether the master is a human or inanimate object…” he smiles, his free hand caressing her cheek in reassurance… “Whether a passion slave, or a house slave, or a Master’s pet… matters not to me… yu, to me, are a friend… and more…” he spoke the truth, regardless of their length of the relationship. He felt good around her.
She couldn't say anything to that, still there was nothing to say when her cheeks flamed as they did. And more? What did that mean? She didn't rightly know but it sounded so...well there was no good word to describe how such things coming from his lips sounded to her. For perhaps the first time in her life, her heart seemed to flutter in her chest, beating as fast as the wings of a hummingbird and she didn't understand why but it wasn't an unpleasant feeling, it was rather....nice.
"It's there... see it, the field of wildflowers... there is a lake just a stretch across the field..." She grinned as her fingers curled over his own. "Do you swim?"
At the edge of the field of wildflowers, he listened to her, observing where she pointed, then smiling. Bending over and picking a piece of heather, he smells it… then turns and places it in her hair over her ear. “There…beauty for the beautiful…”
She let out a laugh, shaking her head but not moving to take the heather from her hair. "You really are a charmer you know that. First spouting words of poetry of where I go you go and now heather for my hair...I am sorry I cannot be likewise. I never really understood how to charm men." she teased as she linked her free arm with his as they started their trek across the field.
He chuckled… “Do yu enjoy my charm? Does it make yu warm?” he winks… “then enjoy it… Besides, it was not yer place to charm men I presume… possibly yer former master deemed it unnecessary…” He paused once again along their walk. “Yu have, within yu, natural charm…use it if yu wish… if nay, then fear not… for it will be there when yu require it…” offering her a bit of insight. Then he began to walk once more.
“I never said I did not enjoy your charm. If you must know the truth, yes it does make me warm, it makes my heart flutter, beat faster then I ever thought possible and it makes me blush but I am just not used to such things, such sayings. My master used to say, that we should not expect happiness, that it is not something we deserve. When life suddenly goes well, it is a sudden gift, but it cannot last forever." She paused a moment, grinning at him before her eyes dropped to their feet as they began their trek again. "I was never able to see things for myself, imagine anything better but I suddenly find myself wondering what it would be like, to be in your land... with you. It is a strange and new thing, the same as my fluttering heart."
And then the question that stunned him… “Swim? Errr… yes I do, quite well in fact.” His mind reverting to the dream of the mermaid, that carried him from the depths of poverty, to the role of emissary… with a smile, his mind returned to her… “It is a bit cold to go swimming, yes?” But the though of them skinny-dipping and what could result made him smirk.
It was his stunned pause that had her stopping and turning to stare at him a moment as he stumbled a bit over his words. She grinned. It was cute. Did she look like this when she couldn't find words? How many times had she visited here? It was unclear but there was a patch of grass amongst the tall grass and wildflowers that seemed pushed down, sat upon and it was here she stopped, setting the basket down before she finally answered him. "Yes it's a bit cold for this time of year, but you're not chicken are you? Or are you going to let a former slave show up a great emissary? Just think about your mermaid hmm..."
Even in late autumn, the Middle Sea was warm… the heat of the mother desert would waif across the land for months. But here in Skye, far much northern than his homeland, the change in weather was finite… “I guess I could try…”
Her eyes seemed to sparkle with the silent tease; she wasn't teasing him because he believed in mermaids, quite the opposite. She had shown interest in knowing that story hadn't she?
Her hand loosened from his and without any warning or word, she took off through the rest of the brush of grass and clinging flowers towards the lake. Her robe was heaved up and off, dropping at the edge of the lake, a far spot away from the water before she ran into the water splashing into its depths gasping with the chill as she waded out from shallows into the deeper part of the lake and diving down to wet her hair before she surfaced again.
Attack from an ambush, in a period when the enemy least expects it… and she did… her teasing caught him unsuspectingly… and his mind did reflect back to the mermaid… the one that saved his life…in a sort. Now frozen, he watched her run off, disrobing, leaving it where it lay… He saw the bare form splash in the water, then disappear below… only to resurface again.
Basket in hand, he strolled slowly thru the grass, finding a nice spot near the water’s edge. Removing his jacket, the white shirt opening, revealing a muscular chest, he sat down. “Yu girl, are a bit crazy… that water is cold yes?” though in his mind, he wished he was in the water with her; his bare form next to hers. Uh oh, there goes his heart again pounding in his chest like a gorilla beating a downed hollow tree. A repositioning of his trousers was required as he shifted from one buttock to the other… his imagination running rampant as he looked across the water.
Her fingers caressed the surface of the water, wading back and forth as her feet kicked beneath to keep her afloat as her eyes found his and she smiled as he called her crazy but it was when he removed his jacket and the white open shirt that revealed his chest that made her blush and push backward, kicking her feet and arms to push herself back in the water. "Yes it is a bit chilly, but I don't mind it." She stopped then for she dove again, her bottom raising up as her body arched inward to the water and then it disappeared followed by her legs as she kicked to swim beneath the surface before resurfacing again by a boulder which was poking out of the deep water. Was it part of the landscape or had someone pushed something so large into the lake?
Her arms folded over the stone, her chin dipped to rest against her arms as she watched him sit. "You're not joining me? Is it too cold for you?"
As she paddled backwards, he stood and watched her. Then - Oh hell fire !! Cold water and a fired heart… and a view of something not many had viewed before – her bottom. His heart now beat wildly at imagery that pressed upon his mind. Her words echoing in his ears… <"I was never able to see things for myself, imagine anything better but I suddenly find myself wondering what it would be like, to be in your land... with you. It is a strange and new thing, the same as my fluttering heart.">… And his imagination ran overtime with her… usually this calculated, conscious, studious leader of warriors, based decisions upon fact and instinct… but the instinct had turned to impulse… the inclination to wander aimlessly around the facts, never stopping and standing upon specifics… almost to the point of fantasy.
She leaned against the boulder, one hand pressing into the smooth stone while the other dipped into the water then pushed through hard, flicking water in his direction as she let out a laugh. "Join me or I keep throwing water on you until you do, or you can tell me a story, the one about your mermaid, your choice!" Again her hand moved through the water then flicked, tossing more water droplets his way.
The shock of cold droplets against warm skin caused the inner hairs of his neck, beneath the longer locks to stand. His eyes focused upon her. “I shall tell yu the story of the mermaid… in time…” as he began to remove his white shirt, and his now tight trousers. As the pants were removed, a sign of relief as he sprang forward from the material… even the chill of the air couldn’t dampen his spirits now. With grace and charm, as best as expected from a naked, excited man, he strolled to the water’s edge.
She looked like such a minx, or perhaps some mystical being there to tempt him with her golden curls now wet, nearly straight from the heavy water drenching her hair and pasting some of it to her face as her head leaned on her arm and she grinned at him. Yes, she looked like one of those sirens in a Grecian story only she was not singing to him, beckoning him to his death. She couldn't pout about not being told the story because she was at least getting one thing she wanted, him in the water but when he stripped, she blushed and averted her eyes, turning her head upon her arm away from him. Thank the lucky stars of night for she didn't see him 'spring' forth or else she would have fainted in the water and drowned.
Without even thinking about the consequences, he dove into the cold water. As he emerged from the depths, his chocolate eyes seem to darken, as did his skin. His long silky brown hair now matted against his head. His feet kicked, keeping his head afloat as he drifted toward her. Little or no words could describe how he felt… Cold, yet warmed… “I am not afraid to venture places unknown… nor shall a slave, present, nor former, shall best me…” as his skin lightened from the cold water.
It wasn't until he dove into the water that she allowed herself to look again, turning her head to find the spot where the water rippled and moved in his invasion of its stillness. She saw him under the clear water, treading beneath the frame of water towards her before surfacing, still trudging along towards her. With his eyes darkened along with his skin, she couldn't put to words what he looked like. A god really. Her mouth opened and then closed since she didn't know really what she wanted to say but he was speaking next and she grinned and let out a hum of a laugh as she rolled against the boulder to face him completely. "Oh, me thinks that a challenge. But I was the first one in the water hmm, that is one point for me, but we will see about the next venture."
She paused though and shrugged her shoulders out of the water, her head tilting with the movement. "Then you are brave enough for the both of us, I'd never have the courage to venture places unknown. I'd dream about them, darkest forests of the Amazon, the desert sands of the southern Middle Sea, the waterways of Venice, but it was never me doing these things, I was always watching someone else do it, but I never saw their faces."
Kam just laughed… “Oh so yu see us as competitors, yes? I would prefer us as a team…” then he began to tread water toward her. “But yu cannot be afraid to venture into the unknown… even if it requires a sense of fear…” He neared her still… and yet, she moved again.
Pushing from the boulder, she began to swim around him, kicking her legs and using her arm to propel her in the direction she wanted to go. "So you've told me why you are here and all about your great Badis. Tell me more about you… It will keep your mind off the cold water."
When her hand left his, his eyes scanned the market… such a market in deed… though much different than markets of home, still it had its own similarities. Vendors hawking their wares, carts loaded to bear, people making choices based upon quality and price…
"Kam..." She called, turning her head to find him before pointing to the fruit and then turning to point at a stall of all ready prepared meat pies, kabobs and sandwich, though it was clear she wasn't going to walk that way as she added a bottle of apple cider to the basket of food. "For Lunch.." She explained. When he had chosen what he wanted, she paid and she wouldn't take any arguments from him. This was her 'adventure' for him.
“Yes?” he turned and looked at her, idly walking back to her. Then a smile crossed his face… “Lunch?” She could be a feast… he thought; and the smile morphed into a wicked smirk.
The market trip of course didn't stop there, it included a wet splash from a lobster as a merchant thrust it in her face and the animal kicked its tail throwing water at her and igniting a laugh from Briseis as well as a visit, or rather a passing of a stall of jewelry where Briseis paused looking at a necklace and earring set. Her mother’s jewelry, it still had not sold. She wanted to speak up and say the man was overpricing them but every day they remained there and she could see it, so she couldn't do it.
He too laughed at the lobster incident. Then he saw her pause at the jewelry…
"Come on, much more to see and do..." She chimed as she took Kam's hand into her own again as she lead him away from the market…
“Alright…” and they started to walk away, hand in hand… At the edge of the market, he stopped and made her halt with a slight tug of her hand. “Before we depart, I need to…um…” then he smiled, letting her know he needed to relieve himself. To a side-building, a he entered to use the loo. But… that was not his intention. Out a side door, he peeked around the corner, seeing her looking at a material, with her back toward his direction. Making his way stealthily back to the jewelry vendor, he reached deep into his jacket and withdrew a pouch. Tipping it, he palmed several coins… some Marinid, some of Skye… Counting out the right number, he handed the vendor all gryphons and informed the vendor to keep the change. Shuffling the jewelry into his pouch, he stuffed it deep into his jacket.
Making his way back the same route he came by, he returned to Briseis’ side. “There, I feel much better…” he offered with a smirk.
A journey into the country… No horses for this girl, they terrified her. No, it was simple walking and she was enjoying it, with the companion at her side, how could she not?
No stranger to walking Kam shortened his steps for her. Occasionally, he would stop, revere the countryside and then they would continue. Small talk filled the way… Their small talk consisted of similarities of the market, differences in flora, and the differences in weather, between his home and his visited land…
While they talked of mild things; weather and difference between home and visited lands, she did have one thing she needed to get out in the open. She had told him she was a slave, and she was sure he had known before she had ever said the words out loud but she felt the need to clarify a few things first. "You know..." She started "When I told you I was a slave, I was a house slave. An I didn't mind it, You've never... I mean… you didn't look at me like most people do when they find out what I used to be before I was a midwife. You didn't look at me with pity but I just, wanted you to know, it wasn't some... I am not sure of the English word, um skin and skin?" Her face twisted with trying to remember the English word of it. The truth was, English was not her first language, Latin was but she had adapted quite well in moving to Skye, still a few words escaped her. "I never hated being a slave, never wished something else for myself, never saw myself as anything but... what I was. I felt more fear in being freed then I ever had at my Master’s hand. Still do actually..." She stopped there, her eyes raising to their surroundings and she smiled.
He stopped, his hand urging her to… His chocolate brown eyes seem to sparkle. “Girl, I knew yu had been a slave from the very beginning when we met. But here, in this land, yu are free. Yu told me yu are a mid-wife… that is sufficient for me…” he paused. “Being a slave is no reason to offer pity… many have been slaves to one thing or another in their life, whether the master is a human or inanimate object…” he smiles, his free hand caressing her cheek in reassurance… “Whether a passion slave, or a house slave, or a Master’s pet… matters not to me… yu, to me, are a friend… and more…” he spoke the truth, regardless of their length of the relationship. He felt good around her.
She couldn't say anything to that, still there was nothing to say when her cheeks flamed as they did. And more? What did that mean? She didn't rightly know but it sounded so...well there was no good word to describe how such things coming from his lips sounded to her. For perhaps the first time in her life, her heart seemed to flutter in her chest, beating as fast as the wings of a hummingbird and she didn't understand why but it wasn't an unpleasant feeling, it was rather....nice.
"It's there... see it, the field of wildflowers... there is a lake just a stretch across the field..." She grinned as her fingers curled over his own. "Do you swim?"
At the edge of the field of wildflowers, he listened to her, observing where she pointed, then smiling. Bending over and picking a piece of heather, he smells it… then turns and places it in her hair over her ear. “There…beauty for the beautiful…”
She let out a laugh, shaking her head but not moving to take the heather from her hair. "You really are a charmer you know that. First spouting words of poetry of where I go you go and now heather for my hair...I am sorry I cannot be likewise. I never really understood how to charm men." she teased as she linked her free arm with his as they started their trek across the field.
He chuckled… “Do yu enjoy my charm? Does it make yu warm?” he winks… “then enjoy it… Besides, it was not yer place to charm men I presume… possibly yer former master deemed it unnecessary…” He paused once again along their walk. “Yu have, within yu, natural charm…use it if yu wish… if nay, then fear not… for it will be there when yu require it…” offering her a bit of insight. Then he began to walk once more.
“I never said I did not enjoy your charm. If you must know the truth, yes it does make me warm, it makes my heart flutter, beat faster then I ever thought possible and it makes me blush but I am just not used to such things, such sayings. My master used to say, that we should not expect happiness, that it is not something we deserve. When life suddenly goes well, it is a sudden gift, but it cannot last forever." She paused a moment, grinning at him before her eyes dropped to their feet as they began their trek again. "I was never able to see things for myself, imagine anything better but I suddenly find myself wondering what it would be like, to be in your land... with you. It is a strange and new thing, the same as my fluttering heart."
And then the question that stunned him… “Swim? Errr… yes I do, quite well in fact.” His mind reverting to the dream of the mermaid, that carried him from the depths of poverty, to the role of emissary… with a smile, his mind returned to her… “It is a bit cold to go swimming, yes?” But the though of them skinny-dipping and what could result made him smirk.
It was his stunned pause that had her stopping and turning to stare at him a moment as he stumbled a bit over his words. She grinned. It was cute. Did she look like this when she couldn't find words? How many times had she visited here? It was unclear but there was a patch of grass amongst the tall grass and wildflowers that seemed pushed down, sat upon and it was here she stopped, setting the basket down before she finally answered him. "Yes it's a bit cold for this time of year, but you're not chicken are you? Or are you going to let a former slave show up a great emissary? Just think about your mermaid hmm..."
Even in late autumn, the Middle Sea was warm… the heat of the mother desert would waif across the land for months. But here in Skye, far much northern than his homeland, the change in weather was finite… “I guess I could try…”
Her eyes seemed to sparkle with the silent tease; she wasn't teasing him because he believed in mermaids, quite the opposite. She had shown interest in knowing that story hadn't she?
Her hand loosened from his and without any warning or word, she took off through the rest of the brush of grass and clinging flowers towards the lake. Her robe was heaved up and off, dropping at the edge of the lake, a far spot away from the water before she ran into the water splashing into its depths gasping with the chill as she waded out from shallows into the deeper part of the lake and diving down to wet her hair before she surfaced again.
Attack from an ambush, in a period when the enemy least expects it… and she did… her teasing caught him unsuspectingly… and his mind did reflect back to the mermaid… the one that saved his life…in a sort. Now frozen, he watched her run off, disrobing, leaving it where it lay… He saw the bare form splash in the water, then disappear below… only to resurface again.
Basket in hand, he strolled slowly thru the grass, finding a nice spot near the water’s edge. Removing his jacket, the white shirt opening, revealing a muscular chest, he sat down. “Yu girl, are a bit crazy… that water is cold yes?” though in his mind, he wished he was in the water with her; his bare form next to hers. Uh oh, there goes his heart again pounding in his chest like a gorilla beating a downed hollow tree. A repositioning of his trousers was required as he shifted from one buttock to the other… his imagination running rampant as he looked across the water.
Her fingers caressed the surface of the water, wading back and forth as her feet kicked beneath to keep her afloat as her eyes found his and she smiled as he called her crazy but it was when he removed his jacket and the white open shirt that revealed his chest that made her blush and push backward, kicking her feet and arms to push herself back in the water. "Yes it is a bit chilly, but I don't mind it." She stopped then for she dove again, her bottom raising up as her body arched inward to the water and then it disappeared followed by her legs as she kicked to swim beneath the surface before resurfacing again by a boulder which was poking out of the deep water. Was it part of the landscape or had someone pushed something so large into the lake?
Her arms folded over the stone, her chin dipped to rest against her arms as she watched him sit. "You're not joining me? Is it too cold for you?"
As she paddled backwards, he stood and watched her. Then - Oh hell fire !! Cold water and a fired heart… and a view of something not many had viewed before – her bottom. His heart now beat wildly at imagery that pressed upon his mind. Her words echoing in his ears… <"I was never able to see things for myself, imagine anything better but I suddenly find myself wondering what it would be like, to be in your land... with you. It is a strange and new thing, the same as my fluttering heart.">… And his imagination ran overtime with her… usually this calculated, conscious, studious leader of warriors, based decisions upon fact and instinct… but the instinct had turned to impulse… the inclination to wander aimlessly around the facts, never stopping and standing upon specifics… almost to the point of fantasy.
She leaned against the boulder, one hand pressing into the smooth stone while the other dipped into the water then pushed through hard, flicking water in his direction as she let out a laugh. "Join me or I keep throwing water on you until you do, or you can tell me a story, the one about your mermaid, your choice!" Again her hand moved through the water then flicked, tossing more water droplets his way.
The shock of cold droplets against warm skin caused the inner hairs of his neck, beneath the longer locks to stand. His eyes focused upon her. “I shall tell yu the story of the mermaid… in time…” as he began to remove his white shirt, and his now tight trousers. As the pants were removed, a sign of relief as he sprang forward from the material… even the chill of the air couldn’t dampen his spirits now. With grace and charm, as best as expected from a naked, excited man, he strolled to the water’s edge.
She looked like such a minx, or perhaps some mystical being there to tempt him with her golden curls now wet, nearly straight from the heavy water drenching her hair and pasting some of it to her face as her head leaned on her arm and she grinned at him. Yes, she looked like one of those sirens in a Grecian story only she was not singing to him, beckoning him to his death. She couldn't pout about not being told the story because she was at least getting one thing she wanted, him in the water but when he stripped, she blushed and averted her eyes, turning her head upon her arm away from him. Thank the lucky stars of night for she didn't see him 'spring' forth or else she would have fainted in the water and drowned.
Without even thinking about the consequences, he dove into the cold water. As he emerged from the depths, his chocolate eyes seem to darken, as did his skin. His long silky brown hair now matted against his head. His feet kicked, keeping his head afloat as he drifted toward her. Little or no words could describe how he felt… Cold, yet warmed… “I am not afraid to venture places unknown… nor shall a slave, present, nor former, shall best me…” as his skin lightened from the cold water.
It wasn't until he dove into the water that she allowed herself to look again, turning her head to find the spot where the water rippled and moved in his invasion of its stillness. She saw him under the clear water, treading beneath the frame of water towards her before surfacing, still trudging along towards her. With his eyes darkened along with his skin, she couldn't put to words what he looked like. A god really. Her mouth opened and then closed since she didn't know really what she wanted to say but he was speaking next and she grinned and let out a hum of a laugh as she rolled against the boulder to face him completely. "Oh, me thinks that a challenge. But I was the first one in the water hmm, that is one point for me, but we will see about the next venture."
She paused though and shrugged her shoulders out of the water, her head tilting with the movement. "Then you are brave enough for the both of us, I'd never have the courage to venture places unknown. I'd dream about them, darkest forests of the Amazon, the desert sands of the southern Middle Sea, the waterways of Venice, but it was never me doing these things, I was always watching someone else do it, but I never saw their faces."
Kam just laughed… “Oh so yu see us as competitors, yes? I would prefer us as a team…” then he began to tread water toward her. “But yu cannot be afraid to venture into the unknown… even if it requires a sense of fear…” He neared her still… and yet, she moved again.
Pushing from the boulder, she began to swim around him, kicking her legs and using her arm to propel her in the direction she wanted to go. "So you've told me why you are here and all about your great Badis. Tell me more about you… It will keep your mind off the cold water."