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Harper's Tale 3 - Tuesday, October 01, 2002, 4:51 PM
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Hold Valley
You stand amid the whispering, waving grasses of the Ista Hold valley. The grassy plain is framed on the north and south by stands of tropical trees. Along the southern edge of the valley lies the Herdercraft's Istan establishment, surrounded by several fenced-off areas that serve as the hold's pastures. Below, as the valley slopes downward to the east and the sea, the Hold's gather grounds are a wider grassy area, usually unpopulated except during gathers. To the west, the valley ascends and narrows into the ridge trail leading into the mountains.
Gliding around is a bronze firelizard.
You see Dunking tank and Tin o' Numbweed here.
Kiriya and Caeran are here.
Obvious exits:
Gather Meadow     Forest     Grove     Upper Valley     Hold Pastures     Herder Crafthall

"Oh, goody. Well, for your information, I happen to live at the crafthall here," Kiriya explains. "Have for nearly six Turns... it's bloody well about time I became a journeyman, too." Fmf. She's got a bit of a problem with her embarrassingly long apprenticeship. Then again, her journeyman project is massive. "Zyphus is fine? Great. Whatcha doing here at the Hold, might I ask?"

Caeran says "I'm here looking around the different craft halls. I think that maybe it's time I decided what I wanted to do with my life."

"And then there was Molly, the next Bitran lass. / Her lips were right sweet, and so was her... Ehem. Hullo there, Kiriya." This mercifully interrupted tavern song brought to you by none other than Morallen, the Healer making his merry way down the valley trail with a pack on his shoulder and his sandals a-slapping. "Just on my way back form delivering a sharding great mountain of scrolls to Krysa over at Smith... what are you doing? Meeting a friend?" Caeran is given a friendly smirk.

"Yessir, 'Allen!" Kiriya chirps to her fellow healer. "Ooooh. Scrolls... disturbing, sometimes, the sheer amount of them." Making her way up the slope, she proceeds to meet Morallen up yonder... "That down there's brother to a good friend of mine over at Ista Weyr," she explains.

Caeran strides up the hill to meet the others. "And who is this beautiful lady?" he asks, offering a hand. He grins. It's sickening.

Morallen eyes Caeran for a long moment, then glances around to see if there are any beautiful ladies sneaking up behind the tall, lanky and most definitely male man that is him. Apparently he decides that Caeran is somewhat mentally challenged, because he just lets the misidentification pass with a nod to Kiriya and a turn back to the young lad. "Ista Weyr, eh? You a weyrbred then? I'm one myself, before I got my arse booted down to Healer Hall. Benden Weyr, in my case. Morallen, senior apprentice Healer."

After seeing that his joke has failed, Zelan says, "I'm Zelan. Pleased to meet you. Actually, I haven't actually lived in the weyr all that long. I grew up in Keroon." He glances at Kiriya and wonders if this is anybody his brother should know about.

Standing back, Kiriya decides to let the two exchange greetings, and leisurely begins to roll downward upon the slope. She doesn't quite mind if anything gets dirty, of course. Besides, it's fun. Yup.

Morallen gives a brief nod, and settles to a cross-legged seat on the turf. "Well met, then. What's Keroon Hold like, then? Never quite been there myself," he grants, before the young man's attention is quite stolen by the sight of a Kiriya rolling down a hillside. He pushes his forelock of waved and sandy hair out of his eyes, and calls over an amused "Am I going to have to practice my specialty and give you a massage later?"

Caeran kneels on the grass beside Morallen and watches Kiri's descent. She seems like she has done this many times before, though why she started is a complete mystery. "Keroon is nice. It's not quite as nice as Ista, though. There always seems to be more excitement here." Including healers rolling down hills.

Obviously, Kiriya hasn't chosen a very good path to roll down, as is evidenced by her meeting several little rock-ish protrusions on her way down which prod into her body and trigger a series of "Ow!"s. Standing up, she wearily remarks, "Mental note: Do not roll down a grassy slope without checking first for pointy, protruding objects. Yes, Morallen, I believe I'm going to likely be your victim, later." That said, she trudges over to the two and sits down in the grasses. "That huuuurt."

"It's the tropical climate," is Morallen's opnion on Istan liveliness. "Brings out the loons in otherwise sensible peo--" He trails off to watch the somewhat battered Healer-girl ascending the slope, wincing somewhat "Ooooh, Kiri, yes that would probably be a good idea. Anything feel pulled?"

Caeran rises and says, "Well, I should be going. I have to be home before dark." With that he heads for the road."
Caeran goes home.

"Pulled? Not sure. Bruised and in pain? Yes," is the terse reply from the senior apprentice as she ascends slowly, so as not to aggravate problems or slip. "Though I doubt it'd do much good for my bruises, I've gotten my share of knotty feelings in my spine, stiff necks, and general backache over the last sevenday or so that I figure a nice massage would do me some good for the whole lot of them." Kiriya winces just slightly as one or two of the bruises in her legs give her pain.

Morallen stands and quickly closes the gap between himself and Kiriya, offering an arm for support as unconsciously as one might stop to tie one's shoelace. "Tsk," he clucks, shaking his head. "Might help, but I think a soak in the hotsprings would probably do them a good bit better. And some arnica paste." Morallen's advising against himself giving a pretty girl a backrub? Yep, he's thinking in Healer Mode.

Kiriya rings one arm around Morallen's shoulders as firmly as she can. "I... believe I'm not going to be doing any hill-rolling for a while, now." With this kind of fun comes consequences. "Mmm... yes, there's benefit in that stuff... but it's summer, and the hot springs are the best in the winter, really," she quips with a grin to her pal, "even though they do wonders for issues pertaining to achy body parts."

Morallen has to stoop a little to permit Kiriya to put an arm around his shoulders comfortably, but he does so without any remark about it, turning to direct them towards the more hold-wards sections of the valley. "Mmm, probably a good idea that. Wouldn't do for the patients to see a Healer as one of them, eh?" he jokes. "Not to mention those begreen'd gowns... Well, a soak in a hot spring can help, regardless of the temperature out, and I could prove it to you, but if you'd rather a massage, I'm not arguing."

"Oh, I bet there'd be all sorts of talk if a healer turned up as an infirmary patient. If it keeps me out of the infirmary, I'll do either hot spring soak or massage, whichever you find more appealing," offers Kiriya, winking ever-so-slightly. The heat of the summer has probably gotten to her, and it's not quite helped by the amount of work she's been doing lately, coupled with a good brain-shaking from that rather nasty roll she took down the hill.

Morallen's ears pink briefly at the wink, but covers that with a smirk and a playful bow. "Then, m'lady of hill rolling, let's get you to the hot springs. If that doesn't work, I'll try a massage, both of which fall into the category of 'minor healings', no?" He'd offer her his arm to complete the picture of panache, but as the other Healer's already on it, the lanky young man settles for another bow before guiding them slowly towards the direction of the springs.

Kiriya stealthily and gracefully stalks down the valley towards the gather meadow.

You walk down the valley towards the gather meadow.
You go to the Gardens Entrance.
You go to the Flower Gardens.
You go to the Pebbled Path.
You go to the Hot Springs.

Hot Springs
Tall bamboo grasses gently fade away the rest of the world, leaving on this secluded nook; although carefully maintained, their length lends a wild, jungle-like feel. Branches arch overhead, shading out light but for at the height of the day and making the rest of the island all that more remote. The grasses screen a natural hot 'spring', surrounded by moss-carpeted rock. Bamboo cages hang at various intervals, filled with glows that cast a soft light in the night. Near the path, a small wooden clothes tree stands to hold clothing and towels. Although no flowers bloom, their gentle scents perfume the heavy air regardless.
It is a summer noon.
Kiriya is here.
Obvious exits:
Pebbled Path

Flattened boulders, natural in appearance, synthetic in perfection, form an asymmetrical ledge around the springs, spilling around to form a natural seeming stairway into the waters. Dark volcanic rock, scoured clean, lies revealed by waters that run clear enough to reveal them on the bottom. A tiny stream winds through a crevice in the rock, curving away toward the forest peeking through the wall of bamboo. Steam plays above the surface of the springs, especially on colder days, playing in the light shining through the canopy of leaves.

Kiriya wobbles towards the springs, helped by Morallen. "Shards. Last time I was down here, I think Jathen was giving an herbalry class... nearly grazed my head with one of his knives, he did. The man scares me. Though I may consider myself an excellent prankster, I don't stand up to /him/." Easily, gently, she begins to let go of her colleague and slowly make her way over to the moss-covered rocks, where she sits down and takes off her boots, then plops in. Fully clothed, at that. "Well, I'm not going to hop in stark naked, am I? Now that'd be some news if it ever reached the Hall." Snerk.

Morallen shrugs, and eases off his sandals, rolling up the cuffs of his pants and sticking his legs in the pool with a friendly smirk. "Well, I wouldn't stop you if you wanted to..." he drawls amusedly, before giving a more serious comment of "But really, I wouldn't care one way or the other. Weyrbred and all. Now, let me know when you start to feel nicely boiled, and then your muscles should be good and loosened," he decrees, before muffling a grin. "Jathen...? I could just imagine. Anyone who was wierd enough to by my sister's mentor has to be a fairly interesting fellow to have teaching."

"Boilin' already. Just not there yet. I'll have been in here long enough when my hands start getting wrinkled like the faces of the old aunties n' uncles." Kiriya dips her head back to wet her hair, as well- it's been getting unruly as of late because of the inevitable Istan humidity, what with the wet, hot rainforests surrounding the Hold. "And I do suspect it would have been easier had I disrobed. It's too late though." She shrugs and leans back against a rock. "Besides, it'll make something for the apprentices and rankers to stare at if I come dripping through the hall, anyway... shards, man, your sister got stuck with Jathen? Oh, I do pity her. Hope she didn't constantly have to face the business end of a knife. The Butcher is... probably not the most stereotypical healer in the hall, one has to admit."

Morallen chuckles. "Stuck with him? To hear /her/ tell it, she /asked/ him." he reveals, his smirk coloured with a tolerant amusement of his younger sister's foibles. "But, she's always been a bit of an odd wherry, Wyn has. And at least it's warm enough that we don't have to see about cadging cold-fighters off the herbalists when we get you back, if you're going to come in dripping."

"She never occurred to me as odd... more of a sane presence in the dormitories, if you ask me. Though it was certainly odd of her to ask Jathen. I fear him." Eyes looking skyward in thought, Kiriya recounts Wyn's tenure at the Istan Healer Hall pre-Search. "Then again, most of the apprentices I had for friends were fairly nutty, if you ask me." Herself included.

"Fear him? Phllllbt. The guy's a nutter, but he's not as insane as he'd like you to believe," sums up Morallen, edging around to sit behind Kiriya and place his hands on her shoulders, touch deft as he does a little preliminary examination of her lower neck muscles. "But /were/ nutty? Have they all gone sane now?"

"Some of 'em are journeymen and have started on that path. But most of them are still like they used to be." Kiriya has to giggle- not only because of that thought, but because of Morallen's laying of hands on her shoulders. She didn't see that coming, no. Her neck is thankfully unhurt, because of her hunching her shoulders to protect it while she rolled, but as a result of that squished state, her neck muscles are taut and less relaxed than they should be. "Well, then again, I think Jathen's that crazy because of my experiences with him... I remember once during a sleepover we had with the apprentices, he threw an open jar full of trundlebugs in the room. OPEN. I will tell you that trundlebugs scare me to death." Why they do is completely unknown to her; perhaps it's just a simple phobia.

"Wonder how he managed to catch so many of them..." wonders Morallen aloud, head canted and staring off towards the trees in thought as his hands continues their massage. Legs cramping from being sat upon, he switching to placing one knee to either side of Kiriya and sitting seiza. "Er, not that I'm /planning/ anything with 'em," he adds hastily.

"Urf... unh... ooooooooh." Kiriya winces slightly as Morallen's hands get at a knot, then sighs with relief as it's quickly undone. "Hm, don't think I know anybody better at massaging than you." Morallen's the /only/ person who Kiriya knows is good at massaging, but she won't tell him that, hee hee. "Good choice of specialty for one with so gentle a touch when it comes to therapeutic massage." Yeah, Kir even keeps her healer mind even when she's not doing healer things.

"Ahhh..." is Morallen's sound of mild triumph as he wins his battle with the knot, smirk vanishing into a mouth formed into a slight moue of concentration, 'though hazel eyes retain their air of general affability. "Hmm. Well I /am/ the only specialist on the island in it," he allows. "There's a Master up at Fort with the best hands I've ever seen, though. You just want to curl up and go to sleep if she's working on you."

"Mmmm... I bet if you were a Master in your specialty, you'd relax folks so quickly that you'd swear they were dropping dead before your very eyes." Obviously, Kiriya thinks rather highly of Morallen's talent. "Goodness, I could go to sleep right here if I wanted," she comments with a gentle smile that shows the massage is evidently working.

"Better not get too deft, then." quips Morallen, letting his fingers trace gently up and around the vertebrae of her neck. "Since I'd keep on disappointing poor Al when his corpses kept waking up and going about their business 'fore he could get to 'em." he banters, not exactly comfortable with compliments and hiding that behind a patois of quips and banter.

"Ohno. Don't want to have to have people carrying out sleeping patients. Too much sedation isn't very good." Kiriya shakes her head ever-so-slightly, so as not to interfere with any of 'Rallen's work. "Whether by fellis... or massaging..." Awwwww, she's just enjoying this. "Shards. S'too bad there's nobody else I know who massages so well... I could have these more frequently."

"Wyn's pretty decent at 'em," allows Morallen, running out of areas he can massage while Kiriya's sitting in the water, and taking two fingers from each hand and massaging little circles along the edges of her hairline, hopefully chasing down the last few lingering pockets of tense muscles as he leans forwards to do so. "Runs in the family, I guess. She's more interested in poking at folks' brains, though. Well, if I manage to get my Journeyman's knot soon, I can start teaching others, I guess. Although there's lots more to PT than just massages."

"I know... people getting hurt and such need rehabilitation to get back on their feet 'cause muscles can atrophy and such," replies Kiriya. Gently, she touches the thin (not too thin, though) brownish-red Threadscar, or rather the two of them, running down from the left side of her forehead down to her cheek to see if they've perhaps opened. Relieved to find the eleven-Turn-old wound that's become a distinguishing mark still closed, she proceeds to rest her newly-unknotted neck and head back on the rock, Morallen, or whatever happens to be closer. "Tell me, what do you suppose you would do if somebody had broken their legs badly enough to become bedridden for a while, got better, and needed to walk again?" she ponders, thinking of one of the more particularly complicated PT problems that comes to her mind.

That would be Morallen, being closer, since he's sitting right behind her and leaning forwards after all. He's in full Healer Mode, though, so scarecely notices, except to make sure she's comfortable. "What to do there...? Well it depends on a lot of things. Age, length of time they were bedridden, their condition before the accident... If a kid had broken their legs, I'd emphasize therapy that would seem the most like play to them. Swimming's good for that. Adults, they often respond better to excercises they can do while working, like ankle weights and the like. You want to make sure they've got the muscle there, before you try to make 'em use it, after all..." Gently, his fingers trace the outline of the 'score and he whistles softly, before returning to massage and conversation. "Once they've got the muscle mass they need, I'll start 'em on things like the parallel bars, moving from crutches to a cane to their own two feet... that sort of thing. Takes a while, though. Not like herbalry, where it's just 'take two and message me in the morning.'" he chuckles.

"Very, very good... you seem to know your stuff." Kiriya appraises his answer on a senior apprentice's level and thinks it satisfying enough. "In my journeyman's project.. I'm stuck with a bit of a dilemma. I've pored through about three-quarters of the total midwifery scrolls in the hall and found plenty of information, yet with the particular condition I'm studying, I can't seem to find an all-encompassing name to use in reference to it. It's quite confusing, though from the records I've pored through, the symptoms of what I'm studying are usually quite uniform. Estimate it'll probably take another half-Turn or so before I even /think/ of earning my journeyman knot." Tsk tsk. Either she's swamped with extensive work, or she's just going lazy, lately.

Morallen chuckles, and pats Kiri on the shoulder before replacing his hands in his lap, having massaged all accessable massageable bits in the current position. "I'd better... I've been an apprentice for what, 7 turns now?" he hazards rhetorically, before falling silent to contemplate Kiriya's quandary. "Well... why not take bits and pieces from the symptom names and kind of... smoosh 'em all together?" the lanky young man offers.

"If I did that, it'd be insanely long... like seizuresandhighbloodpressureandkidneyproblemsandgenerallyhorridpregnancy and... uh... noseizuresblahblahblah. This thing's so complex I don't know what to make of it, when it comes to that. Right now, I don't even know how to refer to it in my papers." If Kiriya ever needs to do a mastery project, she will make sure that she can easily /name/ what she's studying that time, because she's been having one heck of a time with what she's doing now. "I've been doing this thing for three bloody Turns. At least. That's /half/ of my apprenticeship, almost. More than half, probably." She screws up her eyes as she gripes and then simply sighs in resignation. "You finding it any easier?"

Morallen's lips twitch as he attempts to remain serious at the recitation of the prospective malady's title, but eventually he gives up and settles back into his standard amused smirk. "Heh, yeah, there /is/ something to be said for brevity." he agrees. "But me? Yeah, I'm pretty much done. Just... need to figure out how I'm going to present the sharding thing. I've a book, and a case history, and you to vouch for me knowing my massages," he winks. "But it's organizing a presentation that's killing me."

"Well, I suppose you were smart to pick something easier... but then again, someone's got to forge ahead in their area and make discoveries. Like me in midwifery n' you in physical therapy... hmm. Presentation, you say. Make up a couple of diagrams, bribe an appy into letting you do demonstrations on them, and you're probably set," Kiriya muses. "Doesn't occur to me as being too hard... perhaps if I'm not so bombarded by work around that time, I'll bother being your victim." This gets a bit of a chuckle out of her... not much, as she's too relaxed to laugh much more.

Morallen chuckles. "There's another apprentice focusing solely on massage therapy," he notes, flopping onto his side on the stone and propping his head with an elbow as he chats. "You getting wrinkled in there yet? But yeah, unless you were willing to break your legs for my demonstration, I think I'll take a pass on the offer,"

*Pose lost here. Basically, Kiri hauls herself out of the spring, and thanks him for the massage.*

"It is, after all," notes Morallen with a smile in his eyes. "My specialty. Easing pain that is. Not breaking legs. Although I scared a brownrider with a threat of it the other day," he smirks in remembered amusement. "Apparently the pretty boy didn't realize we swear oaths about that stuff. N'something-or-other."

"Well, I figure from this point I can get myself back to the hall and smear some arnica on these bruises before the pain flares up again," decides Kiriya, pulling herself to her feet a bit awkwardly, but making it without too much struggle. "Though I will likely drip all over the floor and have to clean it up later, the dip was worth it. Thanks, hon." And Kiriya's so appreciative of this service given her that she crouches down and moves to give him a swift peck on the cheek, though it looks like it's more headed for his ear, before she goes.