<IS-ST> The night air is cool as Kazumi finds a rather remote homestead of about 20 buildings.  There a hand full of trucks parked around, and a large padock of painted horses, each of them hobbled.  Probably wild horses or poached ones.  As she looks around, sitting on the eve of one of the buildings she can identify a radio tower, probably for the CB's that are almost indutably around
<IS-ST> here, a sweat lodge that seems well maintained, and the each of the buildings had a wooden carved wolf mask hanging over the door (http://sheetgen.dalines.net/sheet/51611)
<Kazumi> (( UH.... that's Minah's profile...
<IS-ST> http://prntscr.com/mz8n9b
<IS-ST> That's what I meant to psot
<IS-ST> post
<Kazumi> Hobbling the horses seems odd to her. Almost needlessly mean to an animal that loves to run. Then again, she knew squat about how to keep horses. Because of that, she decides to be cautious, but to also learn more, and will fly around from perch to perch checking out the buildings, or the sweat lodge, to try and make sure she's dealing with authent
<Kazumi> ic natives, and not poachers just using this area.
<IS-ST> As she moves around the buildings, she can hear the people, old men and women, younger people, and even children in the group, so poachers seem like a far issue, at least white man poachers.  When she gets to the Sweat lodge and lands on the fence that surrounds it she can immedatly feel the power of the place.  A little bit like being on the bawn.
<Kazumi> Sensing she's on a place of power makes her squawk a bit and back off, moving to land a bit further away. Because, you know, muscling into someone else's sacred space without so much as a by-your-leave is a good way to get a claw to the face. Kazumi's theory is that she will be noticed in due time, or already has been. That being the case, someone
<Kazumi> will see her, and choose to speak, or blow her off in a clear sign of GTFO.
<IS-ST> She lands on a house nearby, and there is an old man's laughter from the shadows under the eave.  "Ain't used to a Raven with Manners.  Lemme see what I got for you."  There is a creaking sound and the man stands up.  probably in his late 70's, body bent from a life time of hard work, one arm missing.  He moves to his door and slips inside.
* Kazumi canted her head to one side, almost afraid of what was going to happen. Bird seed? Would she have to eat bird seed? Or rock-hard kernels of corn. Ungh. She watched curiously, though, to see what was going to come of it. If the old man thought she was just a bird, might as well humor him before going.
<IS-ST> He actually comes out with a glass bottle and to mason jars, pouring a soild slug into each of them, dark, carmel colored whiskey filling them.  As a bird she can't reall smell it, but the bottle is old.  He sets the bottle and his glass down, leaving the other on the railing of the porch, as he starts to pack a pipe.  He's obvioulsy quite used to only having one arm with the
<IS-ST> ease at which he goes about it.
* Kazumi is going to assume he had no intention of giving a bird a big glass of whiskey, as that would be fatal past a few sips, and takes a gable he has some clue what's going on. Still, just to be sure, she flies out of his line of site, around the porch, and resumes her normal human form. "Why thank you," she says, approaching the porch.
<IS-ST> "Ain't much, but when Deerwoman comes to see you, you put out your best.  The hootch is rootgut, but the tobacco is homegrown and sweet, if you want."  He smiles to her as pops a match to life off a worn strip of sandpaper that seems glued there for that purpose.
<Kazumi> "I'll stick with just the drink for now, thank you. Deerwoman, hmmm? I suppose I do qualify in some respects." She took a sip of the drink, and moved to find a spot near the old man to relax against. "I've been around the reservation, waiting to see if any of you saw me... well, saw me, and wanted to speak." She looked over at the wolf-masks on the
<Kazumi>  houses. "Would I be wrong in guessing you're..... I don't know how you might say it, wolf-kin?"
<IS-ST> "Well, that's what the legends say, Deerwoman."  He gets the pipe going and smiles, letting out a cloud of the sweet smoke.  "I believe it, but I'd make poor medicine if I didn't.  Some of the other...well, they humor an old man.  That is until they need some help."
* Kazumi chuckled and nodded her head. "That's often the way. Are you...." She frowns. "I don't have the non-insulting English for this.... are you a medicine man?"
<IS-ST> He smiles at her, missing his fair share of teeth.  "No insult to call something what they are, Deerwoman.  Only when people go looking for insult does that happen."  He nods, sitting back.  "I figured that was why you came here.  Share a little hooch, maybe some smoke, maybe a vision."
* Kazumi pointed her finger at him. "A vision.... there was a homeless man in Holbrook. He saw me.... he saw what I was.... called me out from a prophecy given to me on the other side of the world." She paused to think how to phrase this. "The spirit of thunder told me I didn't have the eyes to see the grand design, no mortal did. But maybe if I le
* Kazumi arn to look from the perspective of others, I will find out more. I had a hunch that the wolves in the hills and plains around Newspaper Rock have been watching for some time."
<IS-ST> "Well, we have been here since the days of the Iron Horse.  Not that that did us a lot of good."  He gets up and grabs a stick that he uses to pull the wolf mask down from his door and then starts off the porch.  "Come on Deerwoman, and we'll share a vision.  Maybe it will easy your mind."
* Kazumi gets up and follows after him. "I don't know about setting it at ease, but I'm open to it. I'm not.... worried anymore, just restless. You've had visions.... you know how it feels when you do? When you can see more, when you are more.... try living like that day after day, non-stop, for two months...." She laughed. "And then try and be nor
* Kazumi mal again. It's not easy, at least not for me. I've learned to.... confine my misery to my diary, but..." She shrugs. "I'm babbling."
<IS-ST> He walks back to the sweat lodge and starts to build up the fire outside of it, with wet, green wood.  "what's normal?  Under the great father Sky?  There's just life, Deerwoman."  He doesn't say it to be mean, but just a simple fact of his life.  He pulls the tarp that is the opening back and slips the mask on.  Its in that moment that Kazumi truely feels the power of this place
<IS-ST> .  No Gnosis, not mana, but faith...simple quite, true faith.
<Kazumi> "There's a power to this place... I don't think I've felt anything like this before. Similar, but different, more... grounded. As for normal...." She looked at his missing arm, tempted to ask him how long he went after losing it in frustrated misery before he got used to it. That's what she felt like, missing a limb. Still, that would be a bit rude
<Kazumi> , she let his commentary slide. "The mask suits you. Malachi would approve." She chuckles.
<IS-ST> "A wise man, this Malachi?"  He slips inside and starts arrainging item in the already heating up lodge.  He pulls off his shirt, revealing what looks like a hasty amputation on his missing arm.  He waves her to sit across from him and the small fire he tends inside.  "This is the center of what power I have.  Which, in the great turning of the wolrd, isn't much."
* Kazumi chuckled and nodded as she took a seat. "Lately, the universe has reminded me time and time again how little power I have. Some days I'm amazed I haven't cried like a child about it." She sighed and looked down. "There are spirits we fight now... I haven't a prayer of making a dent in." She paused, rubbed at her eyes, and pushed her hands
* Kazumi back through her hair, sighing out. "But envy and jealousy can be gateways to fouler corruption. When you've the power to move spirit, you have a responsibility to guard your mind from thoughts that would send you down a spiraling path."
<IS-ST> "You are ill at ease with your power, Deerwoman.  It makes me sad to see that in you.  I am glad you came to see what I can share."
<Kazumi> "Do do what I do... you deny what is, and make what you want to be real. Until you reach the point where you can't.... and then you have to just.... live with it." She said, a bit glumly. "I used to be able to, then I shared time with the sun." She laughed and shook her head. "And he gave me everything I wanted...." She smirked at the old man, sure
<Kazumi>  he would know how that song ended from his own experiences.
<IS-ST> He nods, having heard that many times before, but passing no judgement on her for it.  As they sit there is a smokey environment, the walls around them grow dark and dim.  His form seems to melt away with it, leaving the mask, the wolf looking at her.  "Deerwoman and her broken heart.  Some would laugh at that, after how many are blamed on you, but I learned never to laugh at
<IS-ST> another's misforture.  The gods send bad medicine after that."  The heat climbs hotter and closer, pressing in on her and she can feel the earth following it.
<Kazumi> "Bad, or just bitter?" She asks. "I know I yearn for something I don't deserve and haven't earned. Can I really be upset when the answer is 'No'?"
<IS-ST> His voice deepens, calling back to his younger years.  "Of course you can, Deerwoman.  Everyone can be upset when denied what they wanted."  The lodge is deep and dark now, with only the mask hanging before her.  "And in the end times, we feel the most frightened of all, fogetting the greatest strength, the greatest power.  It makes us dance to other's tunes."
* Kazumi grumbled and nodded. "Fine, I AM upset, but it's the upset of a child not getting what she wants.... I'm supposed to be wise enough to move beyond that. You know what the real problem is? I know the way to get what I want.... I just don't know if I'm ever going to get the chance again. I hear prophecies, and don't know what to make of them
* Kazumi . I'm walking a path with blinders on."
<IS-ST> "Aren't we all?  No one knows the true ending until it has come and gone.  We see Echos from the past, and reflectings of the future, rarely taking the time to tend to the here and now.  I think that is where your upset comes from."
<Kazumi> "Some of it, sure.... some of it is a restlessness. I was transcendent once upon a time I must admit, I miss that a great deal. You could say I hunger for that. But yes... some of my upset is that. How is it some homeless bum in Holbrook looks up at me, and starts reciting prophecy?" She grunts out. "I'm impatient.... if I am to play some part, or.
<Kazumi> .. become something...." She waves a hand. "Just bring it on, you know?" She eyed the old man. "I am not a patient spirit."
<IS-ST> "That is the deer in you.  You wish to be hunted and slain, or escape and live.  It is the tense moment of hearing the wolf, smelling the hunter, that makes you like this. "  As he speaks of it, Kuzumi can feel just that, her, in the snow, something just beyond her senses that is dangerous, something that is just beyound her senses that is coming for her.  Her heart starts to
<IS-ST> beat faster and faster, the sweat, smelling of fear, running down her fur.
<Kazumi> "Well, this is a very inverted feeling...." Being of the wolf and compared to a deer is a bit, well.... asking much, and yet here she is, in some inner vision, feeling that primal fear, just wanting it OVER, one way or another. "I'm not sure.... I like this feeling at all. I like being the hunter better...."
<IS-ST> "And yet...how many times have you complained of not being a hunter, of seeing them and knowing you would never match them."  Did she hear something to the left?  Or was that scent from the right, the need to run is almost overpowering now, but something keeps her still, maybe its just fear, or maybe she knows she has no place to run...yet.
* Kazumi snarled and stood up, though looking nervously around. "I AM a hunter, damn it! I'm just not good enough, I'm not strong enough, and I'm sick of it! I have the talent and the will and the discipline, and my damn fucking worthless mortal body just can't hold anything more!" She flicks the dagger Strength gave her into her hand, as if it wou
* Kazumi ld do any fucking good, since there's probably some Utkena out there whose ancestor her ancestors had fucked over in some tragically typically Garou way.
* Kazumi goes still at the feelings, trying to get ahead of the emotions she is feeling, and the emotions being pushed into her by the old man, which is really freaking her out.
<IS-ST> She cannot find the knife, as much as she wants to draw it.  The mask hangs there, the cold forest under her feet.  "Illusion.  All illusion you believe becuase someone told you.  You must be this, you must do that.  Once you are free of that, then you will be what you are meant to be deerwoman."  She hears the rustle of winter-dead, leaves, followed by the sudden onrush of the
<IS-ST> rest of the wolves, running just over the hill from her, having found different prey.  One of them stops, a powerful black wolf with tall pointed ears and a fur pectorial across its chest.  It looks at her and nods his head before turning to the rest of the wolves and running down off the ridge.
* Kazumi sighed out. "There's.... limits. There's just limits to what a mortal can do. There's limits to what humans can do...." She sat down and looked at the mask. "I cannot just WILL myself to be stronger. I can let go of what someone told me to be... but I cannot force the universe to let me be more than I am. I don't even...." She sighed again
* Kazumi . "Sometimes I ache for some greater power to come down, to elevate me.... and at the same time, have I earned it, or will I always just be someone who borrowed power." She rubbed at her eyes again. "I don't know the difference between my desires to help our Nation, and desires that are just a selfish little girl who wants power. I feel li
* Kazumi ke I am begging to be told what to do... I know that's not how it works, but I still wish it did."
* Kazumi shakes her head. "The sad lament of kin through all of history, I think. This part of my story is so very common.... I'm sorry."
<IS-ST> "You are not common, Deerwoman.  Never think that.  They only way to be worthy of the power you seek is...to be worthy.  Put weakness aside, embrace strength, embrace life.  There is no greater power to be had."
<Kazumi> "Is this you way of saying that as long as I mope, I'm guaranteeing that I am unworthy? Why would greater power be given to someone who couldn't find contentment with what she had?"
<IS-ST> A whiteman might say that, Deerwoman.
<Kazumi> "Wise men are equally annoying of any race, especially when they are right." She sighed, and pushed her hands through her hair. "You're wise, sir. That, or I am very foolish. Or maybe I just needed someone to talk to. But that is not the way of my people."
<IS-ST> "We all get trapped in our sights, isn't that why you agreed to share a vision?"  The walls start to fade back, the mask moving like it is being worn and not speaking to her.  "I am always honored to speak with the Deerwoman."
<Kazumi> "The honor is distinctly mine. I don't think I can repay you in kind, but, if there's something I could do, a favor, aid for the people here, something... I can do that. Your wolves, the ones from around her, they would be welcome to come by, you know."
<IS-ST> We are a small people, Deerwoman.  Many of them very seperate from the old ways.  Thank you for that offer, but we have a home here, and we don't go hungry.  Mother Earth and Father Sky provide.  I'm too old to leave this place.
* Kazumi nods her head. "I didn't mean moving per se.... just want to be hospitable, good neighbors. I know the record of that here has not been very good in the past."
<IS-ST> Well, thank you to that, Deerwoman.  The past is gone and its best to leave it there, I think.  You have been wonderful to speak with, and I enjoyed the vision we shared.  Not many ask that.