A small beige Khatta comes slowly to consciousness in a dimly-lit room. She is snuggled comfortably beneath multiple layers of quilts and blankets, with cushions and pillows piled all around her. Her mind, not fully awake, tries to recollect her plans for the day. She wonders, did Mother want something this morning, or will she be free for history lessons?

The feline sits up and rubs her eyes. It seems to her she must have been terribly busy yesterday as her back and arms are sore. She reaches to rub at them, too, hoping her muscles might be better for the attention. Unfortunately the rubbing serves only to sting her and she remembers with a start that she had been burned. The how and why of it remain vague to her, and she struggles to recall what she had been doing and what she's supposed to do now.

Memory leeches back to her, jarring her all over again: the shock of being a slave, the horror of the events of the last Kyriaki, the surprise of the tyr's insistence that she remain in his private living quarters. She is still hazy on how much time has passed since the destruction of the Hearth. Can it have been more than one day? A little light, possibly from a false dawn, filters in through floor-to-ceiling gauzy white curtains.

After a moment of stunned consideration of her plight Rasheeka can only manage to utter a groan. "Laos," she whispers in dismay shortly after. "Of course. How can I forget." Her nose wrinkles and she decides she has been in bed long enough and would very much prefer not to give anyone else a reason to hate her. She climbs out of bed and searches for her glasses.

As Rasheeka stumbles around, managing to find her glasses on the writing table, a soft susurration breaks the quiet, as the door against the wall opposite the windows opens.

Rasheeka pushes her glasses up her muzzle with a finger and turns to face the door. She doubts anyone will care if she's still wearing her nightgown. They certainly didn't care the many times previous, and definitely not on the captain's ship when something similar was all she got. A lack of privacy comes hand and hand with being a slave, she has come to understand.

A vulpine woman, her muzzle graying, and one ear marked by a greenish-black entomo that contrasts badly with her russet fur, stands in the open doorway. She holds a bundle of cloth folded in her arms. As Rasheeka turns around, she offers a nod of greeting and enters the chamber. "I am Agueda," she says. "You are … Rasika?"

The feline girl reaches up and rubs the top of her muzzle with two fingers as she wrinkles her nose. "Yes," she answers wryly in Laosian, "I am Rasika."

"I am here to help you dress and prepare yourself," Agueda continues, with another nod. She pauses, then adds, "How are you feeling?" Her tone is considerate, even kindly.

The feline begins to open her mouth in what looks to be a reflexive answer of "fine" but pauses. Her wry expression falters, and she frowns a little. "Terrible," she admits instead, adding, "but Arcadia willing, I'll manage. I don't have any other choice."

Agueda's muzzle crinkles, as if perplexed by this response. After a moment, she bends slightly at the waist. "The least chooses not," she says. "I shall start a bath running for you. I have fresh bandages as well as clothing, if there is need." She turns to one of the side doors, sliding it open.

Rasheeka follows the vulpine to the sliding door but instead of entering waits just outside. "Am I to be on trial again?" she asks.

The room beyond is a very small private bathing chamber. The other slave turns her head to blink at Rasheeka several times, her hands starting taps running. Steaming water pours into the tub, which is smaller than the tubs Rasheeka was accustomed to in Tizhar, much less the great bathing pools she's become used to in Laos Enosi. Agueda answers, "No, you are not accused of anything. Steward Rasmus says you are to be considered an … echaristi." Agueda hesitates over the word, as if trying, unsuccessfully, to mask a distaste for it.

Rasheeka mirrors the woman's look of distaste. "That isn't good at all, is it?" she asks hesitantly.

The slave fox says, "I suppose that depends on your perspective. It is a good deal better than being accused of treason." The little tub is filling quickly. Agueda stands to separate out the folded clothing, shaking each item out. They look similar in cut to the clothes Rasheeka was outfitted with earlier, but they are of pure white, and adorned by ornamental embroidery.

"But, oh, what is it?" Rasheeka asks. She wraps her arms around her chest in a loose hug and twists at the waist to watch the vulpine work. "I may speak Laosian passably, but there are so many words that I haven't had a chance to learn yet," she adds.

Agueda grimaces, but she offers the feline a sympathetic look. "It is a word for a Neyemen slave who has been … " She hesitates. "… trained in certain gentle arts, like singing and dancing, to please and entertain their masters. Some nobles own them. Dynatos tyr has never shown an interest in such before." Her voice lilts on the last sentence, as though she was glad of that fact.

Rasheeka covers her muzzle and only partially manages to cover an expression of unconcealed shock. "A courtisan?" she squeaks in disbelief. Her ears flatten and she blinks several times before she lets her head slide in to her hands. "I must have offended the gods, I must have, have … done something to deserve this. How can my life keep getting worse?"

The fox flicks her ears against her head, and makes no answer for a moment. She says, primly, "It is a great honor to serve dynatos tyr." She sounds offended. "The bath is ready."

"Yes, I'm sorry," offers Rasheeka somewhat lamely. "I just, well, I never expected my life to end up like this." She draws off her glasses and her nightgown before stepping in to the tub and sinking in to the water with a melancholy expression. At least she finds the water soothing to her wounds. A small comfort when the feline finds her life catapulted on to a spiral whirling like water down a Laos drain.

"The least chooses not," Agueda repeats. Once the Khatta is immersed, the older vulpine woman scrubs Rasheeka thoroughly, finally removing the remaining bits of dirt, soot, and dried blood that still cling to her after the Hearth nightmare. She makes a "tch" noise between teeth and tongue as she works the girl over, shaking her head. She shows a gentle consideration for Rasheeka's burns, peeling off the old dressings to reveal raw pink skin, the singed fur shaven off earlier by healers. She bathes the damaged tissue gently with fresh cool water, then helps Rasheeka out of the tub, wrapping her hair in one fresh towel and rubbing her dry with another.

"I'm not normally covered in blood and dirt," insists the feline with macabre humor in an attempt to smooth over any hard feelings she may have inadvertently caused. "But disaster has a taste for me."

If the vulpine woman appreciates Rasheeka's attempt at humor, she doesn't show it. Once the worst of the moisture is off, Agueda drops the tent-like night gown back over the feline, and leads her into the other room. She slides the outer door shut as she passes. After a glances at the curtains, and the pale dawn light beyond, she says, "We have some time yet. It is good that we started early; you will be able to dry a little more in the air." She gestures to the bed.

As bidden the girl walks over to the bed and settles herself down on the edge. "What will I need to do?" she asks carefully, afraid she already knows the answer.

Agueda lays Rasheeka back on the bed, taking the towel from her head. She drapes the towel over the bed, then spreads Rasheeka's hair out over it, separating it a little with her fingers. "You will be part of dynatos tyr's entourage," she says. "You are to look as pleasant as a neyemen may, and to comport yourself properly." A brief pause, then she clarifies that to, "Speak only when spoken to, and do not draw attention to yourself. Sit where you are bidden and follow when you are told. If dynatos tyr requires anything more of you, then one of his people … or he, will ask it." She hesitates before including "or he," as if it had only just sunk in that the tyr might consider Rasheeka worthy of his personal attention.

"I understand," says Rasheeka quietly. She opens her mouth to say something else, pauses as she looks up at the older woman's disapproving face, then seems to decide against further conversation in favor of quiet contemplation. Her eyes wander along the ceiling and walls and she thinks to herself about all that has happened. For as short a time as she has been in Laos Enosi it seems to her she has suffered a lifetime of troubles. It makes her wonder about all the histories she has read, all the tales. If the people within had as many difficulties when the world around them was changing.

The next hour or so passes quietly, as Agueda re-bandages the burned spots, and works on Rasheeka's hair, loosely combing it apart with her fingers. Her body fur dries first, and Agueda hands her one bristly brush, and uses another herself, to comb out the mats on the feline's body. Then she sits Rasheeka in a chair, brushing out her long hair. "I did not know neyemen could grow such long hair," she remarks at one point.

At first Rasheeka doesn't react to the comment suggesting she may not have heard it but after a moment she turns her head slightly to explain, "I'm not properly a neyemen. That is, I'm not of the hunter-gatherer tribes known collectively as the Neyemen. I'm not Yemenos either. I'm really from quite far way."

Agueda pauses in brushing. "Oh. Yes, of course you wouldn't be." Her voice sounds strange, but not hostile. "You look so like them otherwise, save that your legs are human-shaped." She gets Rasheeka dressed in the white clothing she brought with her. The fabric feels soft and flowing over her skin. Then the fox slave returns to playing with her hair, apparently considering how to style it.

"This clothing is very comfortable," remarks the feline in an effort to sound positive. "Laos Enosi might find a market for some of these finer garments. And their swords – and I say this as someone only moderately familiar with modern metalworking trends – seem to be of very high quality. The lamp oil is ingenious. Especially its overall resistance to spontaneous combustion common to some other flammables."

The fox seems about to say something, then stops herself. A moment later, she says, "What sorts of things … do they have where you come from? Do you people live in little tents and hunt wild animals for food, like the Neyemen?"

The question causes Rasheeka to giggle a little at the thought. "Oh no," she answers energetically as she warms up to the subject. "Commoner housing varies from wooden shacks to single-story small homes. Usually with a single room, or a few small rooms. Typically with many generations living together. Our homes are more open than Laosian homes but the weather is also much warmer. My home, my estate, had several stories and it was very nicely furnished. We," she blinks, " … oh, well 'nicely furnished' is a bit vague isn't it? Our home adopted a distinctly Khattan, as in the Khattan Emirate, flair as was my mother's wont. But we are, or, well were traditional believers in the Pantheon. And as such of course we also had some Olympian and old Olympian Empire influences. Father especially favored the old empire style."

Agueda finally settles on a style, braiding the hair directly behind Rasheeka's ears into two long braids, close to her head, that connect back to another long, thick braid drawn from the hair at the top of her head. The rest of her hair is left loose and flowing. The braiding technique Agueda uses is unfamiliar to Rasheeka, producing a braid that looks a little like the teeth of two different combs coming together in the middle. It's a pretty effect. She listens to Rasheeka speak of her homeland with a kind of subdued curiosity, as if she liked hearing about it, but wasn't sure she should be enjoying it.

Finally having a chance to tell someone about where she's from makes the young feline homesick; this spurs her to go on about her home, as if stopping would cause the memory of it to slip from her mind forever. "Both Olympia and the Khattan Emirate have significant populations of felines. Olympians are more of the stance you would attribute to the Neyemen however while those from the Khattan Emirate tend towards my leg stance. The city I'm from is Tizban, located in the area of Tizhar which is northeast of Olympia and north of the Khattan Emirate. Oh, and far to the northwest of Apagorevo peninsula," she further explains.

Agueda shakes her head. "So very strange!" she says. She finally seems satisfied with Rasheeka's appearance. By this time, first bell has long since rung. Rasheeka would guess that it's perhaps a quarter way to the second bell. Her stomach grumbles; she hasn't had any thing to eat since she was in the infirmary.

Her stomach is insistent enough to distract her from her talk of home. "Will I have a chance to eat?" she inquires. "And, oh, Laosian cuisine is very different from Tizhar cooking."

"You'll eat when the tyr does, today," Agueda answers. "Come." She leads her out of the room. Steward Rasmus, and a few others the feline doesn't recognize, along with ten armored humans and ten armored vulpines, are standing in the large chamber beyond, which Rasheeka recognizes as the front room of the tyr's quarters.

Rasmus gives a pleased look to them both. "Well done, Agueda," he says, moving to them. The vulpine pivots her ears back and ducks her head, giving an abashed bow to him.

Likewise Rasheeka bows to Steward Rasmus. She isn't quite certain what to think of his hand in her new position but she doesn't question the deference he's owed.

"You are excused until third bell, Agueda, thank you," Rasmus tells the fox slave, and the older woman bows again before departing. Rasmus takes Rasheeka's elbow. "You'll wait upon dynatos tyr with us, Rasika. Your position will be just behind me – that is, behind and to the left of the tyr. Keep to that position – unless a wall or something prevents you. Don't sit down unless bidden to, and don't sit in a chair. If you're to sit, there'll be a mat or a cushion for you. Am I understood?" he asks, guiding her to the center of the room.

Rasheeka's breathing picks up a bit at all this instruction. Flashes of previous moments before the tyr run through her mind as she tries to absorb the instruction without forgetting a bit of it. With all that has happened she knows her life is hanging on a fine thread and that she mustn't make a mistake. Not now. But that doesn't help at all to calm the fear that rises in her throat. "Yes, Steward Rasmus, I – I'll do my best," she answers in a whisper.

"Just keep behind me and stay standing, unless I point to where you're supposed to sit," the steward repeats. You'll be fine." He positions her behind him in the room, with the guards all around them. The armored individuals do not give Rasheeka a second look, but there are two well-dressed humans, and another fox, that all seem to eye her disparagingly.

Rasheeka is rather used to disparaging glances by now, though they certainly don't make her feel any more comfortable about a role she is already sorely scared of. She tries to remind herself to just think about what she has to do and stick to it, that pride is just going to get her killed.

The feline has a few minutes to stand in the chamber, memorizing the short instructions, and contemplating the various things that might get her killed. Then a servant emerges from a side chamber at the windowed end of the room, and everyone straightens noticeably. Rasmus reaches back to pat Rasheeka's arm, once, perhaps to reassure her, or maybe just to be sure she's where she's supposed to be.

Rasheeka follows the example of the others and straightens too. She tries to assure herself it won't be so hard, that she'll get used to this and it'll be like second nature. Just like a book she has read a thousand times. And she tries to think Steward Rasmus patted her arm to reassure her. That not every Laosian is sour. That hyperventilating now would be a very bad idea.

Then Tyr Sychi emerges from the side room. The golden fox mask is once more upon him, its featureless eyes of black glass glinting in the morning light. His white-gold hair, as the night before, is drawn into a warrior's braid. He is magnificently dressed in embroidered gikeko and legging, with the gold bracers and white leather boots that Rasheeka remembers from the first time she saw him. He also wears two swords, one long and one short, in sheaths at his left side. She can't remember seeing him carry such weapons before.

Everyone in the room, except for Rasheeka, suddenly drops to one knee before the tyr.

Although it's impossible for Rasheeka to match the speed at which the rest of the entourage responds, Rasheeka does her best to at least try and kneel quickly enough where she won't be accused of being insolent. The burns hurt her from all the bending but it's a better fate than she'd earn if she failed to kneel.

The tyr moves into the rows of kneeling people. He comes to a stop, rather close to Rasheeka. No one else is moving. "Diabiano," he says. As one, the Laosians rise, Rasheeka again scrambling to match what seems to come instinctively to them. The tyr walks towards the big double doors at the far end, and the procession falls in around him. Rasheeka has yet another uncomfortable moment: since they were facing the tyr when he entered at one end, and he's now walking to the opposite end, she's in the wrong spot – in front of Rasmus instead of behind him.

Hoping she isn't making a mistake and assuming too much Rasheeka glances behind herself to make sure a guard isn't about to step on her and then slows her pace so that she can come to stand where she was bidden to: behind Steward Rasmus just as he explained.

Rasmus pats her shoulder lightly as he walks past her – the gesture seems reassuring, though again, he may just be encouraging her to be where she belongs. In a moment, the lines of the entourage are straightened out, and she finds herself swept to the doors, and to whatever lies beyond.

Encouraging or merely correcting, the gesture brings comfort to Rasheeka. It's something she has done right and she takes comfort in that. Perhaps, she thinks, she is learning. And that maybe it will all get easier in time. With this idea in mind she steels herself for whatever waits. Slave, or courtesan to a prince, at least she's still alive. Maybe, just maybe, it will get easier. At least she can hope so.