The Power of Accusations

I made my way to the First Fires .. looking for Sef. In fact that is an understatement .. I was hunting him. He was there all right .. sitting on his wagon and flipping a silver coin and talking to a warrior. I offered to help clear up some confusion for him ... he invited me to a cup of blackwine and to join in the fun.

huh

I told him I wanted to clear some things up first. Mostly at this point I was relieved to find that Lei was no where around. The walk from the kaiila pens had done a lot to get me back into "commander mode" and not "pissed off guardian" .. this all punctuated nicely by finding that I did not immediately need to kill anyone for harm to that little girl.

He said "If you insist. Im sure it can be cleared up easy enough. I need tospeak with this prospect. seems she is spending a lot of time in your wagons."

"Impossible."

"It was brought to me by no less than 4 tribe members brother"

"Are we speaking of Asria .. just so there is no misunderstandings? Which ones?"

"Yes that would be her. Yamka would be one. Does it matter?"

"Of course it matters. She is a Tuchuk free woman who stands accused of slave like behavior. As her guardian I have a right to know who stands in accusation of such."

"It would matter if their where accusations against you."

"It matters because I am her guardian Sef. And I have a right to know or I will not take it seriously."

"But as her guardian then yes it matters she is accused."

Fucking A right.

I demanded to know the other names. Sef avoided my direct questions and tried to dance around them ... finally he said .. "I accuse her".

Ah .. now we were getting somewhere. Someone who could answer my questions. So I asked him if he saw Asria in my wagons. Once again he danced around the words .. but could not tell me anyone had actually seen Asria going inside or coming from the inside of my wagons. No one. He said he was not finished with his investigation. I said .. you stand in accusation without even knowing what it is you are accusing her of? He seemed confused by the word accusation .. when he had just told me he himself stood in "accusation". But with further very simple speaking ... I got from Sef ... finally .... that not he or anyone else had seen Asria going inside my wagon or coming from inside my wagon. That all anyone could say of her was that she came from that direction and went to ... that direction.

He has to be drunk .. or strung out on kanda. There is no way a rational Commander could be acting like this. Was he mad? Driven insane by a large fall resulting in serious head injury? Dehydration? Had he pissed Tarra or Silken off resulting in some mind altering herbs added to his paga? There had to be more of an explanation for this than was presented on the surface.

At this point I was disgusted with him and the entire series of unfortunate events that he had set into motion .. some all ready having occurred and several more I could see looming in the near future. I told him .. chain Asria to the Ubar's wagon. This was all assumptions and should be cleared up soon enough. I told Sef he had no proof. No one could even tell me they "saw" anything at all. It was all based on someone seeing Asria walking in the direction of my wagon. Good Sky .. seriously? It was ludicrous.

Sef said he would question Yamka and the others to find out exactly what they saw. About fucking time. That information was rather vital here .. should have been known before anyone started this little adventure. I told him I would take no one's word that was not willing to be known and step forward. At this point the only people I would take into evidence in this was Sef .. or Yamka. He tried to assure me this was not about me.

I pointed out to Sef this was indeed about me .. my name was mentioned ... my wagons ... and Asria was in my responsibility. How was this not about me? He said it might be she was meeting some other man there. I told him that unless someone killed my sleen it never happened ... but I was more than willing to hear the evidence .... if anyone actually had any.

Sef asked me if I would take the word of those of the First Fires over a prospect. That pissed me off. Of course I would .. but someone better have some fucking evidence or this was all boskshit. If it turned out to be boskshit there would be no punishment of Asria.

Sef said .. "Of course not, if they tell me they have not seen her enter thewagon i myself will punish them for false accusations."

Excellent. I was going to remember Sef giving me his word on that. And I meant to see it done or I would make my recommendation for Sef to lose his command for lying to an Oralu. Someone .. was going to answer for this.

The rest of the conversation involved Kaeli and Sef and was about Sorrel and Sef and Kaeli were upset that some prospects .. I gathered Mezoo and Asria had spoken some word of Sorrel being a dweller. And Ayguili had used their words against Sorrel. I did my best to clear that up.

Ayguili was the one that called her a dweller and chained her up for his own reasons. Mostly about how she answered his questions. Ayguili is not led around by the nose .. certainly not by a woman. Ayguili had no doubts in his own mind about what he thought of the situation and if anyone had a problem with it ... the only way they were going to fix it was either to die .. or leave. Sef reminded me there was another way ... go challenge the grays. I told him it was certainly a choice he could make. He responded he would not do so over a prospect. Best thing I had heard out of Sef's mouth yet.

I told them both .. I saw no reason to worry about a prospect's words of another prospect because .. by their own words prospects did not matter .. at all. The only thing they might have to complain about is someone taking their words seriously and using it against someone .. which had not happened whether Kaeli thought it had or not. I was there .. Ayguili had a mind of his own and what he did he did out of wanting to do it himself and anyone who was there ... should have understood no one ... was going to change his mind.

Bottom line .. even if Ayguili sucked kaiila ass and had a nose ring that every prospect with a pretty set of lips could lead him around with ... what really are you going to do about it?

Be careful .. answering that. You never know who it is that is listening and just what kind of skills they wield for said Ubar.

Kaeli said that she did not mind being chained but that chaining Sorrel was an "insult". How was chaining a prospect an insult? Ah .. was I supposed to be insulted Sef intended to chain Asria? Interesting.

I told Kaeli I saw no insult to Sorrel ... Sorrel was actually handling it well. Much better than those who were standing around trying to defend her. They were starting to make her look worse and worse. At this point .. if I were Sorrel ... I would have disavowed any connection to them at all and asked the Ubar to adopt me as a prospect to the First Fires. Neither one of them were making a salt lick's bit of sense.

Soon enough they were bantering back and forth and I left. Irritated by the entire thing .. so many words and so much accusation with no evidence presented. Where was the maturity of a Commander? Where was the care taken to know what you were speaking of before you spoke it? What had crawled up Yamka's ass so far as to get all this started? Why would she do such a thing? So much damage all ready done .. for what? Some personal vendetta against the Ubar? Why involve Asria .. and me.

I could do without it ... thank you.