She stopped before the doors to the inner hall, and was greeted by a smile from Jerin Webdancer. She paused for a moment, checking to make sure that her blonde hair was straight and her leather armor spotless. At her nod, Jerin opened the doors before her.

"Ah, Karmic. We have been waiting for you."

Karmic looked around the inner hall. Several elder bards were seated around the hall. Various maps, books, and scrolls were stacked by each chair, but all the elders had eyes only for her. She felt a moment of nervousness, but let her stage training take over as she walked into the middle of the room.

"Karmic, do you have the final decision of the healers?"

"Yes Elder." She fought to hold her voice steady, even as she spoke the words that ended her time as a guild messanger. "The damage to my leg is as healed as it will ever be. I can walk, but not fast. I can not run anymore, even with the power of Bardsong."

"Karmic." A different elder spoke. "You have asked to be given the assignment of perminant assignment to Shar Vahl, to study that city's culture and history. Is that still your wish?"

"It is."

"Are you sure? You will be living in a land of strangers, strange cultures. You will work with them, work for them. You will lose your ties to this Kingdom, and have to swear loyalty to their King and Guilds. Are you really willing to do that, to become a member of Vah Shir society? Even then, knowing that you will never quite fit in to their shorter lives?"

"I am sure."

Several of the Elders whispered to each other for a moment. After they fell silent, the First Elder stood from his chair, and handed Karmic a scroll case.

"This contains your release from the athority of this Kingdom, signed by the King himself in recognition of your valiant acts that day at Mistmore. It also contains a message from our King, to the King of the Vah Shir, granting him all due athority over you. If they accept it, you will be a part of their Kingdom, and part of ours no longer. The thrid message it holds is for the leader of their Guild of Bards, though they have a different name for it. It explains to them that you are there to learn all you can about them, and to teach them about us. Remember, once you leave this hall, you will be one of us no more. You will be one of them, for good or for ill."

Karmic took the scroll case from the Elder. She took one last look around, bowing to each of the Elders in turn. Then, without another word, she turned and left them all behind.

(OOC: oops, this was supposed to be under Ryu Kamen's name. Oh well.)

[ 12-23-2001: Message edited by: Palador ChibiDragon ]

Karmic cowered in a small alcove of slime-covered rock, trying not to breathe. Before her, a slime covered not-quite repile creature paused to look around. Karmic could see the large muscles and sharp teeth of its jaw as the head moved side to side. For a moment, it looked into the alcove Karmic was in, but saw nothing. With a snort of hunger, it moved on deeper into the caverns.

Karmic slowly edged her way out of the alcove. Muttering a quiet prayer of thanks for invisibility potions, she continued to make her way through the caves.

Soon, she found a side cave leading off from the one she was in. Careful not to make any noise, she pulled out the map a fellow bard had made during his time in the caverns. She studied it for a moment, then crumpled it with a whispered curse.

"Damned map, it's useless! This area isn't even on here!"

After a moment's self debate, she started to make her way into the side cave. She walked slowly, hands on the rock walls to give herself more stability to replace the sword-cane she carried strapped to her side.

Just as she started to think that she should head back the way she came, the ground beneath her suddenly dropped away. Surprised, she was unable to keep her grip on the walls as her feet shot out from under her. She slamed into several outcroppings of rock before droping into the cold, dark waters of the cave.

Several minutes later, she at last made her way back to solid ground. Her backpack had been lost in the fall, and several large gashes in her armor spoke of the sharp rocks she had passed. Sobbing quietly to herself, she drug herself away from the water, her right leg a mass of burning pain from a hit to her damaged knee during her fall.

As she regained her calm, she performed a quick check of her supplies. The food in her belt pouches, and the scroll case had survived the fall, but the remaining bottles of invisibility potion had been smashed. Her waterskin and sword cane were still at her side, but a quick pull on the cane told her that water had gotten to the velium blade, jaming it in place with ice.

After carefully crawling to a quiet spot, Karmic laughed at herself. "Heh heh heh. Not much food. Not much water. No instruments. No map. No potions. And yet, it's still better than getting my leg chewed on by Mayong's wolves."

Quietly, hoping nothing would hear, she begain to humm a song of healing.

Karmic had long ago lost all sense of direction and time. Her food was nearly gone, and she was out of water. She was afraid to drink the water in the caves, too many things she had never seen before lived here to trust it. Her armor had fared poorly after the rocks and dunking in the water. Its rotting state made her sent match with everything else in the caverns, but was one more reason to misturst the water.

As she made her way carefully along a rock ledge, she heard a sound from ahead of her. She froze, unsure of what it might be. Realizing that she could no longer afford to be as careful as she had been, she readied her cane as a weapon and charged.

As she rounded the rock that kept her from seeing the source of the noise, her right leg gave out on her. With a cry of pain, she crashed headfirst into the floor right at the source of the noise.....

(OOC: This may look like a somewhat serious story at first glance, but it's really a semi-humorious SL. It is intended to give anyone that wants it a good way to get a Vah Shir character interacting with the rest of the EQ world, without them headed off to Norath with no idea what they are doing. (or to get a Norathian settled into Shar Vahl if you wish) Feel free to join in, but no high-level uberness please. The whole "lost in the caverns" bit would be boring as hell if someone had been able to just nuke the place and TP her out. )

"Vah Shir. Nothing but Vah Shir. Is there anything BUT catmen in this damned city?" mused Jahn Lee as he sat on a roof in his meditation pose, being interrupted as a Vah Shir tavern owner began to throw rocks at him. Being a monk, he deflected the improvised missiles, but he was beginning to be annoyed. "Quellious save me, this city is crazy." He hopped down from the roof and wandered away, his Lost Circle robe's ends becoming dirtied. "Ah well. Might as well find a Bard or two. Musicians are more likely to understand that a monk needs SERENITY. Not rocks thrown at them." he muttered. He broke into a run at the end of the street, wanting to find a decent music hall as soon as possible.

A large, tiger striped, white Vah Shir in leather armor moved to block Jahn's run down the street.

"Excuse me, Barbarian. I'm looking for another newcomer to our city, but I find that I need some help. Have you seen a 'Wood Elf' around here?"

The large Vah Shir glanced around for a moment. "She was supposed to be in this city a few days ago, but has not shown up. I've been sent to track her down, but I don't know what a 'Wood Elf' looks like."

IC:
Kiu walked slowly down the street and not watching were she was going and ran right into some one. Kiu fell backwards.

"oh.. excuse me, im sorry i was not watching where i was going." Kiu said looking up to see a man with a tiger.

The Vah Shir scratched the back of his neck nerviously.

"If you are willing to help me find her, I would be most .... errrr..... most ..... I'm sorry, I forgot the word. I would like it.

"I can show you the path she should have taken, but it's dangerous. If I go to look for her, I can't make it alone. I just know that I can't spend more time waiting for her to come to me."

Just as the Tiger said that, a person bumped into him. He retained his balance, and the person fell to the street.

Zaile turned back to Jahn Lee. "I will need a few moments to get some items together, if you don't mind. Is there anything you will need before we go looking for her? If she's wandered too far, it could take several days."

"Nothing? There's nothing here?" She rose to her feet, mindful of her knee. "I could have sworn there was something here. I heard it!"

As she looked around, she noticed something odd on the stalk of the mushroom. When she bent down to take a closer look, she found what appeared to be two eyes staring back at her.

"Errrr..... no. This is not good." She put a hand to her forehead, feeling her own tempature. "I must have a fever, and hit my head. I'm seeing things. I've... I've got to get out of here."

"Good luck.", said the mushroom.

Injured knee or not, Karmic ran.

Zaile glances down at Kiu again.

"We'll need more bandages though. Tell you what, if you speak to her", Zaile pointed to a female merchant down the street, "she can sell you food, water, and other basics for travel. I'll get a bunch of bandages and my gear. We can meet at the South Gate in about 15 mintues and be ready to go. Is that good?"

Kiu was confused. was that an order.
" alright south gate got it" Kiu said turning and walking to the south gate.

"Hey, Japolo! You awake yet?", he called as he walked into his small living area. On the single bed, a small tiger yawned and opened its eyes. It watched Zaile grab a backpack, waterskin, and various other items from the corners of the room.

"Come on, we're headed out. I've got someone to help me, so we're headed out to look for that Oldworlder that never showed up. I need you to come with us to keep an eye on one of the people coming with us. I have the feeling that she's going to need keeping an eye on."

Zaile strode to the door, all of his items packed and stowed in the backpack and various pouches on his belt. He stopped, and turned to look at the still resting tiger.

"Ok, ok. I'll get you some mint before we leave the city. We're going out the South Gate, it's on the way. Comeon, Japolo."

The small tiger jumped off of the bed, and followe Zaile through the door. One quick run to a vendor later, they were at the South Gate, with little time to spare and mint in both their mouths.

(IC)
"This is Japolo. He's my partner. Japolo, this is ... hummm. Excuse me, but I just realized that I don't know your names. Mine's Zaile."

Kiu held a large walking stick in one hand and a pack on her back.

"There was a Wood Elf on the way to this city, but she appears to have not made it. We were going to look for her. It may be very dangerous." Zaile's ears twiched as he tried to keep a straight face. "So, we wanted to take you along to help. Are you familiar with the term 'Stalking Horse'?"

"I'm sorry, but we thought you were wanting to go with us. I guess we were mistaken. Just remember to watch your manners and what you say, and enjoy your stay in Shar Vahl."

Zaile rose to his feet, and looked over to Jahn. "Shall we go? I'll explain what a stalking horse is as we go."

"I've been to the upper levels of the caves before, but never to the lower chambers. There are creatrues down there that are much stronger than I, and they will attack on sight. That's why I was hoping that she was lost somewhere in the city, so I wouldn't have to go down there."

[ 01-05-2002: Message edited by: Palador ChibiDragon ]

"Don't mind them too much. That's a Loda Kai. They tend to leave people alone as long as they are left alone in return."

Zaile stops as the path comes to a junction.

"Ok. The path through the Loda Kai tunnels is 'left, left, right, right'. You might want to remember that in case we get seperated. Everyone follow me. No Japolo, this way!"

"We're just using them to get to the Paludal caverns. Those caves are very deep. The Nexus itself is in them, but the people of Shadowhaven have done alot of work on that part of the caves. My mother used to say that the Nexus was in the exact middle of Luclin, but I don't know if that's really true or not."

With a small sob of exhaustion and fustration, she collapsed to the floor of the cavern. Too tired to continue on, she curled up as best she could, and drifted off to sleep.

later...

In her restless sleep, she could hear voices coming, echoing around the cavern. To her fevered mind, they were the voices of the people, that day in Mistmore. Once again, she heard the voices turn to screams. The sick, wet sounds as the unnatural wolves ripped apart anyone they could catch. Knowing what was coming, knowing that they would soon reach her. Knowing what they would do to her.

She whimpered and cowered against the wall, trying to hide.