Log Date:
	April 1994 (Approximately)

Log Cast:
	TallWalker, Mender, Shayilbey

Log Intro:
	This is an extremely old Mender log, dating from when Natil used to
play him. The scene here is Mender doing healing work on TallWalker's
memory, which leads him to have a confrontation with Shayilbey.

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Visiting room of Mender's house(#3986R)
With two small windows positioned to the east and to the west, this circular 
  chamber is airy at any time of the day with the breezes that wander through 
  and lightly rattle the strings of beads that hang there. The adobe walls are 
  lightly carved and tinted to give an overall impression of a forest glade, 
  albeit in dusty desert hues.
Contents:
Cushioned couch(#5631ae)
Obvious exits:
Stairs Out

TallWalker climbs up out of the sleeping pit.
TallWalker has arrived.
TallWalker nods a bit and rubs his eyes. "Um...hello..."
Mender smiles, looking up from drinking from a jar of water. "Good evening! 
  You've slept a while, friend."
TallWalker nods. "I haven't slept in quite some time, I guess. I was afraid 
  to sleep in the desert."
TallWalker shifts his weight from foot to foot.
TallWalker says "I want to thank you for letting me stay here..."
TallWalker blushes faintly and looks at his boots.
Mender grins to you, and clasps one of your shoulders in his lean brown hand. 
  "You did that last night, as you dozed off, and I'll say what I did then: 
  you're welcome. In the meantime, are you feeling better?"
TallWalker nods. "It's so safe and kind here."
TallWalker sighs and lets himself relax.
Mender beams. "Aye, Sorrow's End is that!" He offers the jar of water. "You 
  must still be thirsty, you looked parched as the sand itself when you 
  stumbled in here. Have some water."
TallWalker takes the jar and drinks steadily with a thirst he was afraid to 
  sate before for sake of his stomach, and looks up after swallowing. "Thank 
  you. Again." He smiles shyly.
Mender is a golden picture of cheerfulness as he tells you teasingly, "And 
  you're welcome. Again. Tending's what we healers are for, after all."
TallWalker grins and blushes again, looking at his boots. "Well. Um, yes, I 
  guess so. Um...what do you think I should do...next?"
You say "Well, if your thirst and hunger and your need for rest are 
  satisfied, it is quite up to you, friend... you can try to get your bearings 
  in our little village here, or, we can talk if you like. Nobody's called for 
  my magic today, so I've got time on my hands."
TallWalker smiles. "Well...I did enough talking last night, I suspect...but 
  I'm a bit afraid--leery that the other--she who argued with you--is still 
  there. I don't know."
Mender shrugs, airily. "If she's still in the village, we'll deal with that 
  as we need to; she certainly isn't coming into my house without asking!" He 
  smiles again, and adds, "Well, we can try to work on your problem, then, if 
  you wish it."
TallWalker nods. "I don't like being afraid and not knowing why...when you 
  want to...if you want to...I'm ready for at least that much."
Mender inclines his head. "I've been ready and waiting all day, friend...!" 
  He lowers his lean frame to the cushioned couch in the middle of the floor. 
  "Let's get comfortable, this might take a while."

Cushioned couch(#5631ae)
This is a wide, shallow depression in the floor of the hut, filled with soft, 
  light blankets and random pillows, of assorted dusty shades of purple, 
  green, and blue. The circular rim of the pit is worked in delicately carved 
  sandstone of a yellow-brown hue, smooth and wide enough to sit on. Here, 
  Mender often works healings, or simply lets guests sit and relax.
You climb down into the sleeping pit.

TallWalker climbs down into the sleeping pit.
TallWalker has arrived.
TallWalker settles in the pit and looks oddly nervous. "This seems familiar, 
  the way it's sunk into the floor, somehow."
Mender tilts his head, and hands you a few pillows, to recline upon. "Indeed? 
  Well, perhaps we can start with that... what does it make you think of?"
TallWalker looks up at the ceiling, leaning against some pillows. 
  "Um...well...it's just...similar...like i remember being somewhere like it 
  before, a long time ago, in some kind of haze."
Mender unobtrusively settles you so that you lie comfortably on your back, 
  and sits cross-legged beside you, grey eyes going forthright and 
  business-like as he listens. "All things in life are interconnected," he 
  tells you, "like a web... perhaps that is how we can seek to return you what 
  you're missing. You've lost those connections in your memory."
TallWalker nods a bit, curiously.
TallWalker looks up at the ceiling from where he lies. "Um...what shall I 
  do...?"
Mender lays a hand on your forehead, and a pale golden glow, like a hint of a 
  sunrise, lights around his fingers. "Think about the familiarity of a sunken 
  place in the floor... let's see what connections we can get, to that."
TallWalker hmms softly to himself.
You locksend to TallWalker, Mender in sending offers you a hand, too; a sense 
  of invitation to explore something jointly, for him to observe while you 
  ponder...
From TallWalker's mind, unbidden by him, come a set of images that do not 
  amout to so much as a sending, for any conscious effort he makes to put them 
  forth is somehow immediately reined back joltingly by his own power, again, 
  unbidden. The dominant image is one of a safehold, a bed sunk into and 
  partially beneath the floor, and a sensation of childness, of being cared 
  for; it almost immediately turns over upon itself and becomes an image of 
  fear, huddling in the corner of that bed, waiting for something unpleasant 
  to happen. He shudders almost imperceptibly as the images pass.
Mender frowns thoughtfully, as the flow of your thoughts gives him a pointer 
  on how to direct his magic. He sends back to you, concrete images of safety 
  in the here-and-now, his own hut... that nothing here can harm, without 
  coming through _him_ first. ** Stick with the place, for now, and not what 
  happened there, ** he suggests quietly.
You locksend to TallWalker, Mender attempts to mute the 'fearfulness' that he 
  senses, gently trying to nudge the wisps of memory to focus only on the 
  recollected place... its shape, its color, any other physical details that a 
  mind's eye might catch.
TallWalker nods a bit, physically, and tries to set a few images out, but 
  again they are drawn back. Present within his mind they remain, however, for 
  the healer to see in sending. The bed is in a room filled with...cloths. 
  Cloths decorated with scenes in the concrete and abstract, colors sparkling 
  in a dim, phosphorescent light. A thin, delicate sword rests in a stand by a 
  door.
Mender's brown-blond eyebrows knit a bit, as his sending inquires: bright 
  colors? or soft ones? What makes the light...?
TallWalker nods a bit more as the scene clears. The colors vary...around the 
  bed they are muted, soft, but here and there and on the opposite walls, the 
  cloths...tapestries, really, obviously woven with a caring hand, are bright 
  and breathtaking to look upon. There are images of elves in repose, in fight 
  or craft, illustrated tales and abstract images meant to reflect this person 
  or that...there is a stand by the bed, covered in growing things, mosses and 
  fungi, and the light, soft and green, flows from them.
Mender blinkblinks - green growing things that make _light_? - but he pauses 
  for only a moment. Nodding to himself, he asks you gently, ** You know this 
  place, don't you? Restore that connection... ** The light around his 
  fingertips ripples a bit....
You locksend to Mender, Mender's magic ripples, too, in your thoughts, as he 
  looks for the place where a strand of memory can be reformed... and he shows 
  it to you, hanging back a bit, as he offers to let _you_ make the connection 
  while he supplies the power.
You sense in a locksend, Mender's magic ripples, too, in your thoughts, as he 
  looks for the place where a strand of memory can be reformed... and he shows 
  it to you, hanging back a bit, as he offers to let _you_ make the connection 
  while he supplies the power.
You locksend to TallWalker, Mender's magic ripples, too, in your thoughts, as 
  he looks for the place where a strand of memory can be reformed... and he 
  shows it to you, hanging back a bit, as he offers to let _you_ make the 
  connection while he supplies the power.
Mender murmurs softly to himself, "This will take some doing, indeed... " 
  Concentration creases his brow as he explores this, taking his time, at the 
  unfamiliar work... not wishing to have to undo something later should he err.
TallWalker shrinks back a bit and physically curls up into the fetal position 
  in which he slept. Within his mind the image turns around dizzyingly and one 
  tapestry among the rest comes off the wall, disappearing. Its place is 
  covered by others immediately. TallWalker makes an effort to stabilize 
  himself and looks again, trying to push an image forth, and the pain of his 
  mind pulling simutaneously back seems to clear his head a bit, and the room 
  he sees restabilizes. Figures float, spiritlike, from the door, around the 
  room, toward the bed, and meet a dark figure there, who takes them into that 
  bed sometimes, and sometimes not...none of them stay.
The image starts to spin again, but in an organized manner. As the view of 
  the room winds from one side to the other, the focus fixes on the stand by 
  the door--where the thin sword no longer rests--to the door itself, and back 
  to the present wraithlike figure, whom TallWalker seems afraid to see.
Mender blinkblinks, rather startled as your mind's eye whirls... but, 
  gritting his teeth obstinately, he first meets the sensations of _pain_. 
  Again sending, ** Focus just on the place, now, friend, ** he strives to 
  fill your mind with quiet warmth. Cautiously, he seeks now to establish a 
  link on his own, but a partial one, one that will let you at least remember 
  this single without retreating in fear, if not the figures within in.
TallWalker nods within his curled form. The image stills again and the focus 
  remains from stand, empty, where the sword is no more, and turns again to 
  the door. The desire seems to be for the sword to be back, for its owner, 
  whom it represents, to be present, but its owner has not been seen. The 
  other desire present is escape of a kind, a hopeless kind of escape; running 
  from one that will catch you, but you have to run anyway, even knowing. 
  TallWalker in the here and now watches almost clinically, allowing the 
  images to settle alone in his mind, sensing that Mender can see them without 
  him pushing them...but the TallWalker in the vision, the mind's eye, is 
  desperate and hopless and afraid and...feels, in addition to all that, a 
  deep love, a pity--child's pity, born of no answers to "why."
Mender murmurs, "By my grandsire's whiskers...!" He changes tactics for a 
  moment, simply sending gentle golden support; one brown hand still touches 
  your forehead, the other clasps your shoulders. Aware of the division of 
  perspectives in your thoughts, he nevertheless tries to encompass both the 
  now-TallWalker and the then-TallWalker within his magic. ** There... good. 
  Just let that settle, for a bit... don't push it, friend... **
TallWalker nods and lets the images come into his mind. At last the 
  then-perspective gives up on the empty stand, the missing sword, and leaves 
  through the heavy door. Outside, the vision fogs again, memory failing...it 
  is a think, dark passage, a tunnel that winds and turns.
Mender's forehead sheens over slightly in sweat... this is a magic new to 
  him, this mind-healing. But he proceeds, keeping the physical touch as well 
  as the magical one steady, following the flow of your thoughts to see where 
  they settle next.
The images settle a bit. The tunnel is silent and cool, damp of air, and 
  there is the distinct impression of being uncomfortably alone there. There 
  is an entrance, marked by dim light, at one end...and at the end where 
  TallWalker stands, there are three doors, one from which he just came.
You sense in a locksend, Shayilbey is nearly hysterical. **You have touched 
  him. I know he fears me. That is wise. That is reaction to action. It is the 
  way of growing things. Help me. Let me help him. It is my way. It is my kind 
  of healing. Let me help...** Her sending is earnest and full of emotion, 
  without the least trace of amusement or smile.
Mender's eyes glitter sympathetically at the discomfort of bare, dark 
  stone... "I'd rather have trees, myself...!" you hear him murmur.... and 
  then, suddenly, he pauses.
The image turns about. One door has vines carved into its stone surface; from 
  that door, he has just come. Another is draped with a fur, and the third 
  almost slip[s out of his view...but he focuses obstinately on it. The 
  impression is one of safeness...if stark hatred and unpleasantness. The 
  third door has vines on it also; but they are carved of bone.
You locksend to Shayilbey, Mender frowns at the unexpected contact... there 
  is a small tiredness about him, as if you've just distracted him from 
  difficult work. He gives you an acknowledge of the sending, before briefly 
  swinging his attention away, again....
Mender pulls in a sigh... and, with as gentle a 'nudge' as he can manage, he 
  directs your attention to 'now'. ** TallWalker... friend... I must ask you 
  something. Listen to me...? **
You sense in a locksend, Shayilbey scrabbles, claws at the briefest contact, 
  desperately. **PLEASE! Let me help...let me help me...help me. Help him...** 
  she fades into incomprehension, hysterical.
TallWalker nods and slowly blinks a bit, opening his eyes. "I...yes?"
TallWalker blinks again, solidifying Now and the hut and the pillows and 
  Mender in his mind.
Mender flicks a stern grey glance outside, before looking at you levelly. ** 
  There's one outside who is begging to come in here, ** he informs you. ** 
  She's asking me to let her help me help _you_.**
Mender, still frowning, adds, ** It's that one you told me you were scared 
  of. I'm not letting her in here if you tell me not to. What do you want me 
  to tell her? **
TallWalker nods a bit, unsure. "Um...I don't know...I...could she 
  help...I...would she have to...touch me?"
Mender admits, ** I don't know... she says she's a healer, and all the 
  healers _I_ know usually need to touch you to do their work. Her thoughts 
  are frantic, though. She feels upset. **
TallWalker blushes and looks at his boots. "I'm sorry I'm so much 
  trouble..seems to be trouble follows everywhere I go. Maybe it would help 
  her...to be near you? You're calming..." He blushes a bit deeper.
Mender promises, ** I'll do what I can, to help you, if you get upset. But 
  it's up to you, friend... shall I allow her to enter? **
TallWalker nods, slowly, contemplating. "I...think maybe we should."
Mender nods levelly, then, and flicks a glance outside....
TallWalker sighs, trying to relax, and uncurls self-consciously.
You locksend ** TallWalker <the name emphasized says you may enter and 
  assist. ** to Shayilbey.
You sense in a locksend, Shayilbey struggles with herself, commanding her 
  mind and body to obey, trying to bring a tangle of emotions under control 
  and succeeding only partially.
Around the couch, Shayilbey slips through the beaded doorway from the path 
  outside.
Shayilbey climbs down into the sleeping pit.
Shayilbey has arrived.
Mender looks up at the new arrival, from where he kneels beside the prone 
  TallWalker. He glances up and down at Shayilbey speculatively, then at the 
  other elf.
Shayilbey settles, swayingly, on the opposite side from TallWalker, and 
  wrings her hands, eyes frantic behind her mask.
TallWalker looks up a bit and nods. "Um. Hello."
Shayilbey nods back and lifts her mask (OOCly actually having a desc for that 
  now...). "Greetings..." She cuts herself off as if she might say something 
  untoward and looks at her hand in her lap.
Mender gives a simple, level nod. "Lady," he greets.

Shayilbey
A tall, disturbingly lovely female returns your gaze, looking first at 
  you...and then through you. Shayilbey's shockingly pale green eyes almost 
  blend into her pale blue-tinted skin. Her straight white hair is cropped 
  short and wafts out from beneath her black hooded cloak, which is pulled 
  close about her and clasped at the neck with a light silvery chain. Beneath 
  her cloak, a pale green gown hides her feet. Her hands illustrate her words 
  as she speaks in subtle, shadowed motions, but her glinting eyes never leave 
  the mark of her interest.

TallWalker looks around a bit uncomfortably. "Um."
Mender clasps Tallwalker's shoulder, a quite amiable motion, and then says 
  simply, "We had begun some work when you sent" - this addressed to 
  Shayilbey. "Do you wish to assist in what we'd started setting up?"
Shayilbey nods. *I know...* She smiles wanly. "Can't speak properly." She 
  clears her throat. "Yes...if I can. Perhaps...if I watched...I could help 
  you...and I would not have to touch D...TallWalker...if you...want?"
TallWalker nods. "If that will work..."
Mender inclines his head. "Let us see, then... " He turns back to the elf 
  lying down, and asks, his tone gentling, "Ready to start again?"
TallWalker nods. "Yes."
Mender nods firmly, then. He returns his lean brown hand to your forehead; 
  again, the pale golden shimmer slowly flickers into being. He sends, 
  reminding you of the room which you have already half-remembered, and the 
  doorway that leads out into the bare stone corridor.... ** You were 
  remembering this... show me, again... **
TallWalker nods and closes his eyes. The images start to reform in his mind, 
  spinning and settling, not sending, but just present for the sender to see. 
  The tunnel reappears and the bone-carved door; the tunnel winding to a speck 
  of relative less-dark far away.
Mender's eyes narrow in concentration; he follows the mental gaze as it 
  drifts about, again awaiting a particular point on which it settles. There 
  is a faint 'sense' of the young healer settling himself back into the flow 
  of his work, and then, his 'presence' is re-established.
TallWalker nods thankfully for the healer's presence and looks again at the 
  bone-carved door, a sense of need to hide, a personal place.
Mender glances briefly at Shayilbey... and, with a flicker of a speculative 
  look in his eyes, he extends what he's 'seeing' to her.
Shayilbey gasps a bit. **My...chambers.**
TallWalker shivers a slight bit, and with the other healer's sending, his 
  vision's view whips back to the door with the stone vine carving, and then 
  around to the door with the fur hung on it.
Mender crooks an eyebrow, and says sidelong to Shayilbey, "Let _him_ 
  remember... " To TallWalker, he continues to send, hand still faintly 
  glimmering against his forehead. ** Look for another place to connect, 
  friend, ** he gently urges. ** Remember, all things are bound together, like 
  a web... **
Shayilbey nods and puts her head down. She opens her mind a bit, as if 
  something needs to be drawn from it.
TallWalker nods. In the vision, (OOC: Mender sees it, Shayilbey has it 
  relayed(?) through Mender) his eyes return to the bone door. It looms closer 
  and his hand reaches out into his view to lay upon its carvings...and it 
  swings open to reveal an empty room with a few shadowy fuzzy memories 
  floating in it.
Shayilbey's head remains bowed, her hands in her lap.
Mender, lean brown hand on TallWalker's forehead glimmering palely golden, 
  sends softly, ** Only the place, friend, only the place... remember that 
  first. **
In TallWalker's mind, a pile of blankets forms in one corner of the 
  room...no, not blankets, but cloths, colored and woven like those in the 
  first room. The walls are stark and pale of stone, dotted here and there 
  with glowing funguses.
Mender's young face flickers with concentration, now, as he takes in the 
  details of the scene, feeding them to the other healer... to TallWalker, he 
  again extends the 'hand' of magic to make enough of a connection to restore 
  the place in memory.
TallWalker shivers a bit. There is nothing else here in the vision...just the 
  cold walls and damp air.
You sense in a locksend, Shayilbey observes. *Remembering the places will not 
  harm him, if you so separate them from event. Is that your intent?*
You locksend ** First things first, lady... all things are connected, and 
  this will give him something to build on later. ** to Shayilbey.
You sense in a locksend, Shayilbey nods quietly. *It will not build good 
  things. There is not much good to build.*
Shayilbey sighs and bows her head further.
Mender nods, quietly, to TallWalker, now. He gives enough of a golden glow to 
  make the link... to make the web of fragile new memory grow a little... and 
  he asks, softly, ** Do you want to try to remember anything else here, or 
  move out...? **
Mender's brow sheens a little again, in small beads of sweat.
In the vision, the plain inside of the door looms close.
You locksend to Shayilbey, Mender's send is tinged with effort as he spares 
  enough attention to answer you, ** Is why... I am trying simple things, 
  first. To give him strength, for later. **
Mender brings his other hand to touch TallWalker's shoulder lightly, his send 
  asking, ** Do you want to look at the door...? **
You sense in a locksend, Shayilbey quietly assents, submissively.
TallWalker shakes a bit physically. In the memory, the door swings wide at a 
  touch and he stands in the winding tunnel once more. There is a sense of 
  aloneness, of no-one here.
Mender continues to provide a 'presence', a sense of a supportive 'hand' 
  looking for places to reshape severed strands of memory. ** Lead on as you 
  will... **
TallWalker sighs quietly and looks about within the memory. The walls, the 
  tunnel itself, seems smaller now, as if the watcher has grown. A glance is 
  cast toward the door of fur...and then the glance backs away from it, the 
  door shrinking...and turning red in the darkness, red with rebellion and 
  anger. Suddenly the tunnel whips around and the light, or less-dark, at one 
  end is seen hurtling near, and then the exit is made into a huge cavern of 
  muddy light--so light, compared to the tunnel, but yet so dark compared to 
  Mender's own hut.
Shayilbey looks up as if she expects to see the scene in front of her and 
  gasps a bit, then bows her head again.
Mender nods, musingly, eyes narrowed a bit more with effort and 
  concentration. Both eyebrows raise at the vision of the wide cavern... but 
  he pauses only momentarily, keeping up the steady flow of sending. The gleam 
  around his hand brightens...
The image begins to steady. A familiar pillar of stone...a ripple of 
  water...passages in all directions...and only shadows from whence he came. 
  The feeling is one of lost-ness...of freedom, too, but fear of being 
  followed and found, always followed and found.
Shayilbey shudders deep within her cloak.
Mender sends openly ** <approvingly Yes... you know that place... make the 
  link. <He feeds TallWalker a strand of golden light, just enough to remember 
  the location... the visceral impressions, too, if TallWalker himself wishes 
  it. **
Mender's lean pointed jaw sets; his mouth is closed, but there's the definite 
  impression that he's clenched his teeth as he continues the healing.
TallWalker sighs relaxedly. The image solidifies further and the sensation of 
  exploration begins. The river comes nearer, and images flicker uncertainly 
  past: a cavern of gems sparkling in the glow of the growing lights, a hall 
  of cloths woven so differently than those in the rooms below, a waterfall 
  and everywhere, glowing growing things that make him...nervous? That call up 
  more memories...and as thos memories are called up, the figure from the room 
  with the bed in the floor floats near, here, there, inescapable, dark, 
  laughing, smiling, following and finding.
Shayilbey shudders again.
You sense in a locksend, Shayilbey pleads. *This is going to hurt him--I 
  don't want to hurt him--I--*
The image swirls and turns on itself, over and down, and reforms in the 
  tunnel again, by the door covered in fur. There is a loudness in the mind--a 
  forcing, a turning. A thin white hand becomes solid in the image and grasps 
  his shoulder, dragging him through the furred door.
Mender frowns softly, flicking a sidelong glance to the other healer, and 
  then back to the reclining TallWalker. His jaw still set, he sends to the 
  latter, doing his best to steady the flow of random images... to meet any 
  nervousness or pain with the glow of his own magic, to assure. But as the 
  young healer works, and the images grow stronger, the light round his 
  fingertips flickers.
This room flickers as suredly as Mender's light, and carries on on some power 
  of its own, pulling from somewhere outside, almost. There is a scraping of 
  stone and laughter, another scraping of stone, and the image clears: now 
  there is a quiet stream rippling by, and moss on the ground...there is a 
  sense of something within wrenching upon itself at the hands of something 
  without. Time passes...as it does, laughter comes and laughter goes in a 
  black hooded, pale faced form, green eyed like himself, bending his mind to 
  her will, turning him into her dream, keeping him...and experiment. Time 
  passes...at some point, there is a cry...his own cry, in the cold and dark, 
  for love? And only laughter in return.
Shayilbey gasps. **No. No!** She closes her mind again. **You are foolish to 
  want to remember! You have not learned! You are a foolish boy to think you 
  can learn from my pain! End it now!**
Shayilbey rises and casts a hand toward Mender. **End it!**
TallWalker looks up. "I?"
Mender breathes, "Timmorn's Blood....!" And watches TallWalker's face for the 
  slightest sign of pain... and, abruptly, as Shayilbey sends, he withdraws 
  the healing light, looking up.
TallWalker looks to Mender, the image shattered with...the closing of the 
  other healer's mind. "I...I can't see it!"
Shayilbey shakes her head firmly. **You are a fool to want to. It is my work, 
  let *me* remember it and its ache, fool! I gave you one gift worth having in 
  all your cursed life!** Her tone turns hysterical and her eyes start to 
  tear. **WHY WON'T YOU TAKE IT?**
TallWalker wiinces and recoils in the force of the sending. "I--"
Mender, his angular face now sheened completely in sweat, frowns at the other 
  healer.
Mender pants a bit as he says raggedly, "It would seem.... that he is not... 
  the only one in need of a healing!" His grey eyes have darkened.
Shayilbey glares, sweating and panting, back. **I told you it was folly. No 
  one listens to sense!**
TallWalker looks back and forth from one to the other, obviously entirely 
  confused.
Mender gives a derisive little snort, shoving a hand through sweat-dampened 
  hair. "Sense?" he echoes. "Forgive me, lady, but I fail to see the sense in 
  keeping him from himself!"
Shayilbey pants a bit more. **I will SHOW you the sense!**
You sense in a locksend, Shayilbey swirls images around you: the 
  'experiment,' the stillness and deadness below, the need for something to 
  grow and live again, the unwillingness of the one she made to go out, to 
  learn outside, to hear, to LISTEN! The punishment, the anger...the anger. 
  The anger spins back on itself and the image of the boy is forgotten as 
  Shayilbey becomes lost in her own ache...her own loneliness. A mother and a 
  father, fighting...killing...and then, a child, alone, trapped.
Mender lets out an animal growl, and reels backwards, lifting a hand to his 
  head.
Shayilbey curls over and falls, sitting, kind of.
TallWalker looks up. "Mender? Mender! Are you...?"
TallWalker stands and sways a bit. "Mender...?"
Mender, stunned, breathless, very nearly collapses... then snaps his gaze up 
  again. Two very clear instincts war in his face: there's a snarl to his 
  clenched teeth, the look of a wolf responding to an attack... but there's 
  also a sudden *knowing* in his eyes.
You say "I... I was... right! You _are_... like her...! You need... a 
  healing....!"
Shayilbey gasps a bit. *Get away from me. You loose me and you hurt him. And 
  it will kill him to know.*
Shayilbey pulls herself up, hair in her face, hood around her shoulders, 
  trying to stand and tripping a bit on her gown. **I won't have it.**
TallWalker watches wide-eyed.
Mender stares at Shayilbey, pulling himself to his feet with an effort. He 
  flicks a glance at the baffled, confused TallWalker, and answers, "It's 
  been... tormenting him _not_ to know...!"
Shayilbey nods. **I know. He knows some now. Let him learn the best. Let him 
  learn what won't hurt him.** She gasps for breath. **But I won't have him 
  hurt again. No!**
TallWalker stays quiet.
Mender's face slowly calms; he shakes with the visible effort to avoid 
  growling. "Then... you ask him... not to live." He adds, pointedly, "And I 
  still... think he's not the only one who needs a healing."
Shayilbey shakes her head firmly and puts her hands on her hips, not at all 
  gracefully and rather uncharacteristically. **It's not your fight, Mender. 
  It's not your cause.**
Mender takes a step forward.... unthreateningly now, though. His breath 
  returning, he says quietly, "The greatest healer I know taught me that... a 
  healer's cause is to give aid, wherever it is needed."
Mender looks between you both. "And I think you both need it."
Shayilbey frowns and nods. **You are foolish. I will not let you kill him. 
  You will have to experiment on me before I let you learn on him!** She 
  laughs a bit, hysterically. **And I will not let you, because it would free 
  him from me. Which would harm him. It shall not be done.**
Shayilbey takes a step back.
Shayilbey laughs. **Of course it is...and what have I done, but help him? I 
  have set him free to live his own life...to have his freedom...to live a 
  life without my pain. What greater gift could I give?**
Mender scowls at the notion of 'experiment' - and he says frankly, "Lady, 
  that is the way of the Black Snake... _not_ me. You don't heal pain by 
  hiding it."
Shayilbey laughs again. **The beautiful flyer spoke of her as such. But I 
  have no way to rid his memories of pain...nor do you. I will not have him 
  hurt!**
TallWalker huddles a bit and just watches.
Mender takes another step forward, still unthreateningly, and he offers a 
  hand. ** _Life_ is not _life_ without pain... but it's not life, not truly, 
  unless you have the chance to face the pain and conquer it! You care for 
  him... well, let me help you, and then let's help him together, to live and 
  be whole! **
Shayilbey steps back. **It will kill him. It will kill him, can't you see 
  that? What do I have to do to prove it to you? Show you?**
TallWalker chokes a bit and starts to cry for no evident reason.
Mender very nearly smiles, but gently. ** I'm not so proud that I won't take 
  him to Leetah, if I can't do it myself...! ** He glances sidewise at 
  TallWalker, and his thoughts ring with admiration at the name 'Leetah'... ** 
  I won't harm him willingly or knowingly. It'll take time. Let's try it? **
Mender again glances to TallWalker, and offers his other hand.
Shayilbey looks to Mender. **See? It is foolish. It will kill him just for 
  you tto try to work with me! Don't you see? I stay below so that he may 
  live! It was the only gift I had left!** She too begins to cry, wide-eyed, 
  unaware. She takes another stepback and trips against the edge of the dip in 
  the floor and slips, falling backwards onto the stone.
Mender answers simply, ** Then let's heal you, first, then him. ** He strides 
  the last step to Shayilbey, offering a hand that begins to softly glow.....
Shayilbey falls onto the sandstone rim/carpetstuff past that, then, actually.
Shayilbey picks herself up and scrambles away (and OOCly doesn't leave the 
  pit for the sake of simplicity.).
TallWalker gasps a bit through dim tears.
Shayilbey smiles madly. **You wouldn't heal one who didn't want it, would you 
  Mender..**
Shayilbey edges around the pit and around behind TallWalker. **Let him see 
  what won't hurt him. Let him remember the good...** She lays her hands on 
  the air just over his head. **Let him go on! He already has friends and 
  hopes and ideas...he doesn't need those cruel memories!**
Mender's expression falters a bit, his grey eyes flickering. He turns as 
  Shayilbey moves, watching her, disappointed.... but, he sighs. Resolutely, 
  he looks back to TallWalker. And asks him simply, "She thinks you shouldn't 
  be healed, friend. I say it's up to you."
TallWalker shrinks away a bit, confused.
Shayilbey looks oddly at Mender...and then looks down at TallWalker, tearily.
TallWalker looks at Mender. "I..." He looks, slowly, carefully, up at the 
  womand behind him.
Mender, exhaustion beginning to show in his face, simply stands, waiting.
TallWalker appears to think on it. "I...would not want to hurt 
  anyone...but..." He looks back at Mender. "I need to know. Maybe it will 
  help her. If it hurts her, it's not my right to say. But I want it."
Shayilbey nods exhaustedly. **You are a foolish childe.** She looks up at 
  Mender. **When we are all rested, then. It is up to you. Let him be peaceful 
  for now.**
TallWalker nods. "If that's all right with you...Mender?" He looks concerned 
  for one he would consider friend.
Mender inclines his fair-haired head in acknowledgement, to both of you. 
  "Rest, then. TallWalker, you're still welcome to sleep here." To Shayilbey, 
  he adds, "You should decide, lady, if you would prefer to sleep elsewhere."
Shayilbey nods. **You would not want me here. That is a shame. And I would 
  not force my presence upon...TallWalker.** She shakes her head bemusedly. 
  **I will return to the garden.**
Mender nods again at that, simply.
Shayilbey edges away from the side of the pit and pulls her mask down. **Good 
  rest, then.** She sighs a bit.
Shayilbey climbs up out of the sleeping pit.
Shayilbey has left.
Around the couch, Shayilbey steps outside through the beaded doorway.
TallWalker nods and looks at Mender. "Is she...all right?" The question is 
  pretty hopeless.
TallWalker shakes his head and is entirely messed up now. Um, ICly..."Do you 
  think she'll be all right?"
Mender IC says quietly, "I... wish I could tell. That she'll be alright, that 
  is. I think she needs some healing, but if she won't accept it... " He 
  sighs, and goes on, "I'm tired, friend... I think you and I should rest, 
  now, hey?"
TallWalker nods wearily. "I thank you for all you're doing...and for letting 
  me stay here."
TallWalker smiles a bit and curls up into the pillows.
Mender smiles groggily, and gives you an approving nod as you settle down to 
  relax. He, too, lies down, ungracefully, his long lean frame simply flopping 
  down. Wolf-like, he is asleep within moments, if lightly.........

[End log.]