13th Saun, 721
Location: Home
Rei'sari yawned, and stretched as she woke up. She hadn't slept well the night before due to the heat of Saun. Going to bed with a headache hadn't helped either. The combination had caused her to have uneasy dreams of fire falling from the sky and chasing her. In the dream, it had been far more of an annoyance that something that had frightened her, so Rei'sari didn't consider it to be a nightmare, but it had been a very weird dream. The image of fire falling from the sky felt very familiar to her for some reason, but she couldn't place how or why it would be. After a while, she simply gave up trying.
As she was getting dressed, Rei'sari realized why the image of fire falling from the sky was a familiar one. It wasn't that she had ever seen or experienced it, but she had "remembered" another segment of Ari'sora's memories. In them, Ari'sora had responded to a call for help from Baron Smooglenuff in Faldrass. During which, she had failed to be of any help, a volcano had erupted, Ari'sora had nearly died and had only been saved by being brought to Karem's realm, and the Baron had died when his mansion had collapsed.
Well. No one can say that you led a boring life, Ari'sora. Rei'sari thought with more than a little irony.
Ari'sora had blamed herself for being useless, of course. And there had been rumors afterwards that suggested that Ari'sora might have been responsible for the Baron's death due to an argument that she had had with someone else. Over tarps of all things. Rei'sari wondered if it was possible for Ari'sora to be more pathetic than she was. She rather doubted it. How could an argument with someone who wasn't the Baron somehow have caused the Baron's death? Without knowing what the rumors were, Rei'sari had no way of knowing if there was any truth to them or not based on the fuzzy memories she had now "remembered."
Either way, Ari'sora had been very disturbed by those memories. She had tried very hard not to think about them too closely because if she ever decided that they were true, and that she was a murderer...she never would have been able to recover from the trauma that that would have caused. Rei'sari thought it was completely and utterly ridiculous that someone could think themselves a murderer just because a stupid argument they had had with someone else might have somehow caused someone else to die. It wasn't like Ari'sora had actually killed the man...
If I ever start acting as ridiculous as Ari'sora did, I hope someone gives me a good whack in the head to set me straight. she grumbled to herself.
Rei'sari paused at that. Was Ari'sora acting ridiculously? Rumor was a very powerful thing. It would awfully easy for someone who was as weak...as vulnerable as Ari'sora had been to put more stock in rumor than she should. And for someone who had no sense of self worth, and only saw themselves as useful...as worthy of existing when she was helping others, rumors like that could be beyond devastating. When Rei'sari thought about it in that light, she had to question whether Ari'sora was really pathetic at all. She was weak, yes. There was no denying that. A strong person would have sought out help when they needed it. Rei'sari was very firm on that belief. Ari'sora was very vulnerable too. There was no denying that either. And yet...there was almost a different kind of strength about her. She didn't believe in herself enough to understand that she was as worthy of getting help when she needed it as anyone else was. But...she didn't complain about the bad things that happened to her. She didn't simply give up at the first sign of trouble. She still lived her life as best she could until she broke so completely that she couldn't function anymore. And...at least she tried.
When Rei'sari thought about it like that, she realized that she couldn't really say that Ari'sora was pathetic. Weak, yes. Vulnerable, yes. But not pathetic. Not someone she should feel nothing but contempt and disgust for. And as Rei'sari thought about that, she started to feel kind of protective of Ari'sora. Rei'sari would not exist if Ari'sora had not given herself away to the fresh start that Vega had offered her. All that remained of Ari'sora existed deep within her. Whether Ari'sora was truly dead, or just sleeping deep within her, Rei'sari wasn't sure. She wasn't sure that it mattered either. What did matter was that Rei'sari was almost like a guardian of sorts. A guardian of Ari'sora's memories? Her lingering essence? Something. Maybe that was why Rei'sari felt so compelled to rewrite Ari'sora's life and give her a better one than the one she had had. Perhaps that was why she felt that in doing so, she was giving Ari'sora some peace.
Rei'sari set those thoughts aside for now as well. The new set of "memories" did come with another question. Ari'sora had been saved by one of Karem's wolves. Ari'sora was dead now, so she couldn't pay back the debt she owed to the Immortal. And Rei'sari wasn't certain how much of that debt, if any was now her responsibility. Rei'sari didn't want to risk angering an Immortal if Karem thought that she owed her a debt in Ari'sora's place. On the other hand...Rei'sari was not Ari'sora. They were two different people, and technically, she had not been the one that had been saved by one of Karem's wolves because she hadn't existed yet. Even so, to be on the safe side, Rei'sari decided that she would look for things she could do that might be considered payment for Ari'sora's debt. It was better to be safe than sorry where an Immortal was concerned.