Brown Ajah Sharing Readings (open)

[Bree]

Rory and Makenna sat on either side of one of the small fireplaces in the main sitting room of the Brown Ajah Quarters. Makenna had come to visit Rory this evening and he was very pleased with her company. She was a refined young woman of distinguished and discriminating tastes. She had graced them all with a lovely rendition of her harp playing several weeks ago and twice before, she had traded brief oratory with Rory in the hearing of others in the sitting room. She was far from a performer but she was learning. Tonight, she had brought with her several trays of meats and fruits and vegetables all sliced just so and served with assorted sauces in the Domani fashion. Some of them were quite spicy and biting while others seemed to coat the tongue and linger on the pallette. She had embraced the Sursa with proficiency and she looked completely at ease and graceful using them.

She was sitting now with a lap desk and a small book writing in a delicate hand. As Rory watched her fondly, she sprinkled sand over her writing and a pleased expression transformed her stately face into a mask of beauty. "May I read this to you, Asha'man?" Rory nodded and Makenna lay the lapdesk at her feet and sat up straight on the edge of her seat. She took the orator's posture as he had instructed once and began.

"I once saw the Dragon devouring the World.
I slew him in the end, or perhaps the beginning.

"His eyes were pale green flecked with burning amber.
The world was blue and gold.

"He opened his mouth and scooped out furrows of the world;
He swallowed them whole.

"I began to cry to see the world die.
The furrows filled with my tears.

"They became oceans and sent out life.
The dragon seemed to think it was salt, a spice for his dish.

"So I strode up to him;
I held my pen in my hand.

"I wrote the rules and posted them;
The rules that fenced the Dragon in.

"But now the lives I have saved have become the Dragon too.
My tears all cried, my ink all dried; my pen is now a mere sword."

Rory had closed his eyes and envisioned it all as she told it. He held his pipe stem between his teeth and then tapped it on his lip. "Ah, My Lady. Your prose is haughty and blasphemous. Do you write from the perspective of the Creator or the Dark One?"

[Bree]

Makenna closed her book and smiled to hear Rory's appraisal. She had piqued his interest. This old gentleman. This seasoned and weathered font of refined and majestic intelligence. He was a fine and attractive man. She challenged him and he her. She was glad to have taken him by surprise. Now to get him to explore the concept she really wanted to talk about.

"If the Dark One is challenged by the Dragon, who challenges the Creator? I posit that the Dark One and the Creator are two incarnations of the same being. One is the decay of life making way for the recreation of life. You can not have one without the other and each gives way to and causes the other."

She was aware of others listening closely and hoped one of the lively debates that they had come to be known for would spark from her intentionally instigatory words.

[Bree]

Rory grinned on of those false grins that he put on when facing a challenge. It was a space-keeper, to hold at bay any intruders upon his thoughts while they mulled. slowly he pulled his pipe-stem from between his teeth and he pointed it at a space in the air between them. Drawing with it a circle and then halving the circle with a sinuous line, "The Light and the Shadow. I posit that the line between, what catches and reflects the light as well as casts the shadow, is the Creator." He spoke slowly and at the end, nodded once before going on.

"Rather than the Creator being Light and the Dark One being, ...er ...well ... dark." He gestured to show that his normal eloquence should have purchased for him a little leniency in his listeners, and Makenna inclined her head. She did not accept his posit, not that easily; merely extended that leniency. Rory continued, "Thusly, the Creator created the Wheel of Time all around Himself and He is the spokes and axle. No," Rory bobbled his pipe-stem again, "I believe we can find evidence to suggest that the Dragon is only the name we use for the force that champions the Light and the Dark One merely a name for the same in the Shadow. The forces of Light and Shadow are yet things apart and different, each embodied not in a single individual but rather in the masses of all of Creation. Thereby, it is not the Creator that is challenged in the conflicts between the Dark Once and the Dragon." He met her eyes once, briefly, then; having made his point and met hers though she had tried to disguise that is what she was saying.

Rory stuck his pipe back between his teeth and squinted, puffing contentedly. He knew this would not be the end of it. That variable and musical voice of the young woman who sat with him; well young by comparison to himself. He was nearly twice her age and now that they were both in the throws of the uses of channeling, those ages would soon mean even less. His mind began to wander down the path of Time and aging when that sweet voice called his attention back. He thought, Ah, Hana, you would not begrudge me this comfort, would you, My Love?

[Bree]

Makenna tilted her head to one side as Rory spoke. She had been trying to train herself out of the habit of making that turn to her head when she was concentrating on something but so far she had not been very successful. It did not really matter. Rory was the only person anymore that had noticed. At the moment she did not notice herself as she was concentrating on the confounding posit. "If the Creator is neither Light nor Shadow, then is He touched equally by both? If He created both and is both equally, then does it truly matter which side the individual walks under? What matter is there if one is a Darkfriend or not if both are equally esteemed by the Creator?"

Makenna reversed the tilt of her head, leaning it slightly to the left and forward. "Posit: The Wheel of Time is turned by the forces of Light and Shadow pushing against each other, churning out Time. Both must be equal in strength, force and speed or the Turning of the Wheel and Time itself is disturbed. Therefore, the Creator caused creatures of both to walk in both the Light and the Shadow. A creature of the Light that turns to the Shadow is then lending more power to the Shadow and taking it from the Light. Why then does this not skew the Turning of the Wheel and set ripples and hiccups in Time?"

She straightened her head and poured a glass of wine. Rory had closed his eyes and was tapping his pipe-stem on his lower lip. He would think a bit more before he spoke.

[Bree]

Rory reveled in the mind of this Accepted. She was seeing it clearly and saying it in a way that he had not been able to put so concisely himself. But this question; the lending of Light to Shadow and vice-versa... Could there be a vice-versa? But first, "I posit, the Wheel of Time in its spinning brings the Light and the Shadow into zenith each in their turn." He began drawing circles in the air with his pipe-stem again. "The Wheel is mostly even, equal in its distribution of Light and Shadow and in the majority of its turning, neither force is at the apex. However, there are those two great points of equal and completely opposite density. When either is approaching the apex of the turning of the Wheel, the power of that force is temporarily greater in order to push it up and past that apex. The crossing of individuals, one side to the other would be a reasonable and natural occurrence to facilitate that power build up."

He nodded and met her gaze. Puffing on his pipe, the mallow and the mint in the tabac giving a mild flavor, he held back his own question. Will it occur to her. Hana, My Love; if it does come to her on its own, I may be forced to pursue this woman as the third love of my life.