Tepeh Sah Ainuktan

Tepeh Sah Ainuktan looked up into the cloudy haze above her. In the darkeness, the haze glowed a dim electric purple, and flashes of lightning could be seen in the haze from far above. She kept her footing on the rocky slopes as she moved up from the small valley nearer to the haze. Below, Aipah, her sister and cousin stood in her robe, compact and silent as she stared above and minded the rucksacks beside her.

"Tepeh," Aipah called out as her kin's ascent drew nearer to the haze. "Do you suppose..." She stopped, hesitant, eyes directed upwards and mouth agape. "Do you suppose that we should be here? The priests will be angry, and the gods—" Tepeh stopped and turned her head to the side to cut her off. "The gods are the priests and the priests are not here. Those eunuch lechers have no concern for anything outside of their whitewashed vault anyway."

Tepeh strode upward again, as always, with the strident confidence more worthy of a man than a woman. Aipah, thoughtful and curious, was not so easily deterred. After a short pause, her eyes still transfixed upon the haze and occasional flashes of lightning, let out a retort.

"Yes kin, but... there is strong energy here. The knowledge of the priests is ancient and my technical training within the temple clearly demonstrated that these forces can be leth—" Again, Aipah was cut off. Tepeh turned around and stood akimbo, her ponytail, hide tunic and the knife in her belt all giving her the appearance of an adolescent man rather than of a woman.

"What are you going to do about it? Throw your abacus beads at me?" Tepeh stood looking down at Aipah belligerently. Aipah looked down from the haze at Tepeh in discomposure. Tepeh's gaze bore into her and Aipah stood silently, bereft of a response.

Tepeh turned around, heading back up the slope as Aipah, resigned to the inevitability of the outcome, took a seat on the rucksacks, swaddling herself in her own robe for warmth as she looked at the ground, ruminating over the implications of the vague references made in her training. She was never certain whether she hadn't properly understood the implications of what she was being taught or whether those implications were being deliberately obscured. Or both.

As Aipeh turned to watch her kin climb nearer to the haze, she was startled as Tepeh seemed to dissolve with a flash of light before reaching the haze. No lightning struck, and she had not reached the haze. Aipeh blinked and stood up. She called out, but no response. Suddenly, Aipeh was struck with the panic of a child. She pulled an orb from her robe and shook it, and as the phosphorescent blue glow began to emanate from the orb, she began to run, ditching their rucksacks and picking up the skirt of her robe and chanting incomprehensible prayers as her sandals clacked down the trail down the side of the mount.

It was said that dangerous forces followed her ancestors from the exodus of Aloma, and as she fled, clacking in small steps and reciting in focused concentration, she couldn't be sure that something ghastly wasn't trying to overtake her from within. Had she not been taught better, she would have squealed or likely fainted.