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Cata'rina al'Joslyn: "Penance"

Rina al'Joslyn
Penance, Part I - I had a Bad Day Again
Tue Jun 17 2003 1:01:21 pm

Inkstains on her dress!

How in the Light could a simple lesson in weaving Earth cause inkstains on her newly pressed, newly washed skirts? The lesson had started easily enough, and without too much incident, with some very simple weaves, learning how they braided together, not even channeling. But one thing led to another, a Novice swished her way toward another male Novice to get his attention, he backed up away from her and in her huff to get away, her arm swung into a young Aiel’s stomach, which promptly led to a brawl between Domani and Aiel. Before the Aes Sedai had gotten proper control of the pair, some clumsy oaf, certainly not her, had careened into the desk to topple the newly filled inkwell straight into Cata’rina’s pristine skirts.

The ink had seeped through the light wool and to her legs as the Aes Sedai forced the Novices to order once more with a promise to speak to the two malcontents and refused Cata’rina’s request to change. Unfairly. She had another lesson to attend in only half an hour and she desperately wanted to get changed before arriving. It would be close; the stairs loomed before her to lead to the Novice Wing, and her short legs could only take two at a time for a short period. Between the gaping stares at the sable blossom on her skirts and the huffing she did to get back to her room, Cata’rina emerged fresh once more, but in a volatile, irritated mood for something that was just not her fault!

It was a race to the bottom of the Tower once more and a dashing sprint to the classroom that had been specified by the announcement. Swinging herself into the room with a grip on the doorframe, Cata’rina paused in utter shock. The classroom was empty and piece of paper was tacked to the door with Air. Lesson cancelled. Reschedule to be posted on Announcement Board tomorrow. A cat scattered from the screech of frustration and in uncharacteristic fashion, Cata’rina pounded her fists on the door, pummeling it until she felt slightly better. But only barely. If that fight hadn’t broken out and caused her skirts to be a mess, she wouldn’t have had to run to and fro throughout the White Tower like some absent-minded dolt on a fool’s errand and arrived at this lesson on time, out of breath and for no apparent good reason.

She stalked back toward her quarters, the lack of lesson for an hour offering her a blessing to fully take care of her disheveled appearance and see if the Browns minded her hand earlier than they would expect her. Probably, she thought sourly. A tall, stiff back came into sight and the vision of a russet haired Aiel filled her vision with the scuffle once more and the cold, wet feeling of ink drying to her legs. They had been arriving since a year ago according to the rumors of the Novices, and now there were approximately twenty women who used to be Apprentices to what they called “Wise Ones”. And the one that had been in her class previously had paused long enough for Cata’rina to catch up to.

“Hey, Novice Dhuinda!” Cata’rina called out, gaining the attention of the Aiel woman, who simply stared at her impassively, hands folded neatly on her chest as if a shawl rested there.

“What is it, small one?”

There are few things in Cata’rina that would snap at, but this was one of them. Her hand lashed out and was smacked aside while the much taller Novice shoved her in the chest, reeling her backwards a couple steps before she charged again, angered and wishing to vent. Each time she was brushed aside, there was a flash of a grin, amusement that lay beneath the veneer of aloof concentration. Once she got cuffed on the ear for an errant swing to the Aiel’s arm. Vowing that this time she would catch the Aiel with her hand, her arm came back, and began to whip forward—

She was nearly yanked backward from her reverse momentum by a strong hand on her wrist, holding her in place. The word spoken with force and command should have stopped her, if Cata’rina hadn’t already been wound up and frustrated for no outlet to vent. “Enough!” It didn’t register, although it should have. Using her momentum, Cata’rina whipped around and felt the satisfying sting of her palm to a smooth cheek and the resounding crack! that echoed in the corridor. She heard the Aiel Novice’s strangled gasp of shock a moment before her eyes raised to see a cool Aes Sedai face staring down at her, icy blue eyes a thunderstorm of displeasure. Smooth skin was marred by one angry red handprint across her cheekbone and Cata’rina could swear that she saw the Aes Sedai’s jaw pulsing with pure displeasure and reined in temper that might not last much longer.

Oh, Light. What a bad day. Cata’rina could not escape the glare of the Aes Sedai, nor could she move. Transfixed, she knew that she was staring into the hungry gaze of a mountaincat and she was a gazelle caught in it’s trap.

---

Kailin Dometrico Sedai, Green Ajah
And, It Just Got Worse
Tue Jun 17 2003 3:35:38 pm

A nice relaxing day, that’s what Kailin was looking forward to. She had no lessons to teach at either Tower, no meetings to attend to, and all of the paperwork that normally littered her desk had been seen to. The bond told her that Raaen was in the training yards, as usual, as she thought perhaps she would visit with him sometime during the day. Surprisingly, he’d gone easy this morning and his activity for once hadn’t woken her up.

She had spent a leisurely morning in her quarters, catching up on reading that she’d wanted to do. And, now, after a visit to the kitchens for something for her hunger, she’d thought maybe a stroll in the gardens would be pleasant. It had been some time since she’d actually been through the gardens, so she hadn’t yet had the opportunity to enjoy the new summer blooms.

Kailin couldn’t say what whim had taken her near the Novice quarters on her way to the gardens. But, the unmistakable sound of a scuffle brought her to a stop. Her head tilted and then she identified the location, and even caught the slight scent of violence as she resumed walking and approached from behind a corner.

A tall Aiel Novice, one that Kailin was sure had been around for some time, seemed to be holding off a spitfire of a girl. A newer Novice, if Kailin didn’t miss her guess, one with the look of a Cairheinin about her. Other than the fact that the small girl was trying her best to get a blow in, and the fact that she was trying to fight at all, what surprised Kailin the most was that the girl had picked the much larger Aiel to fight with. Certainly, the Novice knew that it was a losing battle, as did the grinning Aiel. Well, at least they hadn’t resorted to channeling like the last pair she’d caught fighting.

Kailin reached the two novices just as the smaller girl once more pulled a hand back to slap at the Aiel, and Kailin snatched onto that wrist. “Enough!” She would have thought that the girl would have given it up as hopeless by then.

The next bit came as such a surprise that the red handprint upon her cheek was already stinging and her ears were ringing before she realized that the little minx had slapped her. Kailin wasn’t sure which irritated her more, that the Novice had slapped her at all, or that she’d not seen it coming. Of course, why would she have? Novices just didn’t go around smacking the faces of Aes Sedai.

She was certain that her eyes were dripping frozen fire with the glare that she leveled at the Novice. Kailin snapped her head up to the Aiel’s face, who was trying to back away, certain she’d be caught within the punishment somehow. “Novice Dhuinda, you will report to the Triple Offices of the Mistress of Novices and let them know that you have been fighting. You may also tell them that I,” and Kailin punctuated that last word with a yank on the arm she was still holding, “will be seeing to this Novice’s punishment.” The only thing was, after the child’s offense, Madeline, Briar Rose, and Serafim, would probably also want a piece of her after Kailin was finished. If there was much left.

Kailin left the Aiel Novice hastily trying to curtsey, and turned towards the Training Yards, errant Novice still in tow. She wasn’t even sure that she trusted herself enough to ask what the girl’s name was, and she actually wasn’t sure she cared at that point. There went her pleasant day off.

Saidar had already sprang to her unbidden, as it usually did when her temper flared. Normally, she pushed it away, but this time she embraced and channeled her energy into slipping a shield between the Novice and the Source. As they approached one of the training circles, Kailin finally released the Novice’s wrist to hold both hands out. Two quarterstaffs whipped from their place at the side to slide into her grip. It was amazing what Kailin could do with saidar when she was angry, as Air usually wasn’t her strongest element.

She turned to the Novice, her eyes still blazing, “Strip to your shift.”

Kailin supposed the girl looked like a fish with her mouth gaping open as it did at Kailin’s words, but she shut it quickly. “You don’t want me to do it for you.”

The Aes Sedai waited as the girl did as she was told, and then began an Air weave. A whip fashioned from the weave and with a tweak of Spirit, Kailin set the weave so that it would give the child recurring lashes until she released it. Then, threw the second quarterstaff at the Novice’s feet. “You challenged me with that slap, and therefore I accept your challenge with a weapon of my choosing.”

---

Rina al'Joslyn
Punishment - Part II - You Get What You Deserve
Tue Jun 17 2003 4:13:01 pm

Bad days have a way of compounding and piling up until one wonders how, precisely, they ended up where they were. It had been a simple day until the ink stain. And then there was the cancelled lesson, and one would not like to forget about the burst of anger against another Novice and the shameful way she had kept on, even when the Novice could easily pin her to the ground with one hand. But slapping an Aes Sedai, intentionally or no, had been thought to be a topper to her day, not to mention the sheer anger that lay just in check behind that Aes Sedai façade. And it still came as no shock to feel that frustration and anger drain instantly, leaving only an empty void of utter and complete dread and fear. It didn’t take a Novice who had been in the White Tower a few scant months nor an Accepted who knew better to know that manhandling anyone in the Tower, let alone an Aes Sedai could result in dire consequences, if not an expulsion from the White Tower without so much as a second thought.

Kailin Sedai’s grip was painfully firm as she towed Cata’rina out of the Tower, the shield slipped between her and the Source so fearfully unnecessary that Cata’rina nearly explained it to the Sister, except that something that boiled beneath the surface stilled her tongue from anything that might draw further notice. As it was, Kailin Sedai seemed lost in her own thoughts and her own world and was only aware of Cata’rina enough to maintain the uncomfortable vise on her arm. The warmth of the sun was minimal to the chill of the coming autumn season, the command given by Kailin Sedai dropping Cata’rina’s jaw until she looked like a fish straining for breath in the air. “Strip to your shift.” Words failed her, and she didn’t dare look around to see if anyone was near enough to see her stripping until Kailin Sedai’s voice cracked through her horror. “You don’t want me to do it for you.”

Thoughts of how the angry Aes Sedai might remove her shift swirled in her thoughts as her hands moved of their own panicked accord, removing the dress and tossing it to the side. She heard a shout of interest in the yards and Cata’rina spent a moment in dismay, realizing that the ink stains that covered her legs were very visible beneath the thin shift that did nothing to conceal most of what Cata’rina did have beneath her Whites. She felt Kailin Sedai channeling and looked up in time to see a weave of Air, but was uncertain of what the weave would do and not given much time to contemplate on that issue when the staff bounced once at her feet, sending up a puff of orange-brown dust before settling. “You challenged me with that slap, and therefore I accept your challenge with a weapon of my choosing.”

Challenge? She wants to duel me? With a bloody staff?! Cata’rina gaped once more only a moment before Kailin Sedai’s ice blue stare flattened with impatience and picked up the staff, the length of wood feeling foreign and uncomfortable in her tiny hands. It was heavy and although she wasn’t weak, it was cumbersome and too long for her slender, small body. Kailin Sedai did not appear to notice or care on Cata’rina’s predicament and swung the staff end toward her with startling swiftness. The instant Cata’rina tried to swing the staff up to block, she nearly dropped her weapon in shock when the first lashing lay across the back of her legs just as the staff descended on Cata’rina’s hands. The staff clattered to the ground, but the lashes did not stop, moving across her body, traveling at random to deliver uncomfortable, distracting lashes to her body that could not be warded off, could not be diverted. “That’s not fair, Aes Sedai!”

Kailin Sedai didn’t shrug, but neither did her expression soften. “Life isn’t fair, Novice. Now pick up the weapon and continue.”

Cata’rina could feel the tears of desperation and frustration well in her eyes as she attempted twice to retrieve her staff, each time a lash laying across her body in a manner that caused her to jump and lose concentration on what she was doing and lose the staff once more. The third time brought the staff in her grip by accident and the painful lash only contracted her hand into a firm grip of the wood that was steadied by the second hand. Standing as straight as she could, despite the lashes, she could feel the tears running down her face and she was fully aware that there was a small group standing around them, interested in what happened and what the outcome would be. There was no way she could win this, she thought between the lashes, but she had to make an effort before the Aes Sedai pummeled her before Gaidin in Training and Novices alike.

Thinking as logically as she could beyond the stinging of each lash, she began to detect a patter. Lash, lash, pause. Lash, pause. Lash, lash, pause. And during those blissful pauses that lasted but a moment, she swung the staff, unconcerned with the fact that Kailin Sedai merely brushed aside each attack and would crack her against her arm or her leg hard enough to bruise. Each time, Cata’rina would try to evade and twist from that blow, but a lash would come at that same moment and cause her to twitch right into the blow so that she took it on her back, on her arms, on her shins with a painful lesson each time.

Light, how much longer is she going to make me do this? Cata’rina felt a strange sense of accomplishment when she blocked one attack simply by accident and no skill, her staff raising just in time to deflect and turn the other weapon from her and avoid the first strike to her body in what felt like two hours and was no doubt closer to two minutes. She never touched Kailin Sedai, however. The Aes Sedai was good and trained well with a staff and Cata’rina had never picked one up before today. Even had the Air lashes not provided a successful distraction from what she was doing, Cata’rina didn’t doubt that Kailin Sedai still would easily be able to keep the staff from coming anywhere near her.

One lash caught her on a particularly tender area of her neck and she gave a cry out into the silence of their duel, falling forward and clapping hand to the slender column of her neck, unfortunately tumbling straight into an attack that Kailin Sedai didn’t turn in time. The pain of the blow against her shoulder sent fire down her arm and a shudder ran though Cata’rina as she lay on the ground, panting, no longer even twitching against the lashes that fell on her invisibly, crying into the dirt and uncaring that anyone watched a Novice in her shift sobbing on the ground. The lashes stopped with blessed relief, but Cata’rina wondered what was next. She couldn’t take anymore.

---

Rina al'Joslyn
Punishment - Part III - Until You're Reformed
Wed Jun 18 2003 11:40:41 am

“Novice, get up.” The voice had icy sympathy in it, the silence thundering in Cata’rina’s ears as she stood, shaking off the hand on her arm to assist her. It wasn’t fair, this punishment for such an accidental act against the Aes Sedai. There had been no opportunity to explain herself, no time to give an apology that Cata’rina felt from the very instant her hand connected with the Aes Sedai’s face, was immediately due. Just a challenge and a staff had been her punishment, along with lashes across her entire body that left invisible welts and immense pain in its wake that was no match for the red welts and bruises already forming along her arms and legs and the one across her shoulder, delivered by one very irritated Kailin Sedai. As she stood shivering in her shift, Cata’rina was aware that nearly all of her impromptu audience had left, only a few Aethan’Tar too young and curious for their own good remained, ribbing each other and jabbing their ribs in entertainment. She wasn’t cold, no, she was in pain, in shock and most of all, remorseful for her actions that were being punished so severely. It was enough punishment to ensure that she would never lose her temper again.

Kailin Sedai turned without another word, leading her past two sniggering Aethan’Tar who stopped dead by the icy calm on Cata’rina’s face, the pure lack of emotion that displayed when her eyes rested upon them a moment. Even as old as they were, they scurried away from the quelling, icy gaze of a Novice who had just been beaten before their eyes by an Aes Sedai in a purely unfair and weighted fight. The scent of stables wafted to her nose minutes before it came in sight, the chill breeze of autumn cutting around the corner and slicing through her thin shift. Goosebumps raised her porcelain skin, a texture so alien to her appearance as her public state of undress. Standing barefoot in the stables, her toes curling into the soft earth under her torn soles, Cata’rina wrapped slender arms about her frail and quaking body, taking care to avoid the tender areas battered by the staff. A shovel landed at her feet while Kailin Sedai’s gaze froze Cata’rina where she stood. “You will shovel this manure into the wheelbarrows and take them to that bin over there.” A slim appendage pointed to a large wooden bin used for storing the manure. “I’ll be back to check up on you to see how you’re progressing, Novice.”

In silence, Kailin Sedai swept from the stables, a queen’s composure in sharp contrast to the shivering form of Cata’rina. Already, her hands were bearing the beginning of blisters at the base of her fingers, painful sores that made gripping the pitchfork a chore. She’d never mucked stables, never been present when manure had been removed from her family’s stables. With her initial stab into the manure, the spade of the implement dug deep and sank nearly to the wooden shaft. With a grunt, she attempted to lift the shovel and, with surprise, it stuck and wouldn’t budge. Tilting her head, she threw her entire weight into it and the simple physics of a lever loosened the slightly damp manure, sending the slightly pungent heap into the air with a spray and a hiss as it landed to the ground all about Cata’rina. Small flecks of brownish yellow manure covered her shift from shoulder to knee and with a shaky hand, removed what had fallen to her face and hair. Light, this is not fair!

Her mouth formed a grim line of determination and her hands twisted on shaft of the shovel, her palms squeaking slightly in friction. Burying half the shovel into the manure once more, she lifted, more than a little surprised to find the weight of the shovel had doubled before Cata’rina awkwardly dumped the contents into the wheelbarrow with a satisfying twang. She only winced slightly when the edge of the shovel scraped across the metal of the bucket with a squealing screech and dropped on the ground with a meaty thunk before she lifted the implement once more to repeat the process.

After a time, her shoulders began to ache with a dull pain, the sharp discomfort of her welts and bruises forgotten in the throb of her shoulders and legs. The blisters that had begun to form on her hands were now raised and ready to break open and in an effort to avoid further tenderness, kept shifting her grip on the shovel time and time again until the wheelbarrow was filled and ready to transport its first load of manure. Rina gave a soft grunt of surprise when she straightened her legs and bent her arms, placing her in an uncomfortable and strange position. Ducking her head, her bare feet dug into the ground and she began moving slowly, the wheelbarrow tilting precariously on its single wheel, the handles trying to twist in her hand. Each time she adjusted her grip, righting the barrow, but Cata’rina grew careless and within two steps of the bin the entire wheelbarrow toppled over, manure spilling out across the ground, a mess, untidy and frustrating.

Tears were now coursing down her cheeks leaving wet trails in her dusty and tattered face, clean rivers against the sweat and dirt covering her entire body. She jogged back to grab the shovel and began the process all over, stab, lift, twist, dump. Each time the spade of her shovel scraped on the dirt and grabbed as much manure as she could and dumped it into the bin. After a time, she just began scraping the manure into the bin, sweeping with the shovel spade until there was no manure left on the ground and she began the process over again.

Hair plastered to her head from the sweat of exertion when Kailin Sedai stopped by to check her progress in the waning afternoon sun. By now her shift stuck to her body in strange and shocking places, but she didn’t care. No longer did Cata’rina look like the Cairhienin Novice of the White Tower, instead she looked a dirty ragged child of the streets of the Foregate, dirty, unkempt, distasteful. Her hands had stopped bleeding an hour previous, the blisters long ago burst and raw, her shift was now gray-brown with dust, sweat and dirt. Large blue eyes looked up at the Aes Sedai from a dirty, dingy face impassively and she dipped a curtsey before going back to her shoveling, a task nearly completed after a full day’s work.

Twice she had dumped the barrow after the first time, once she had nearly bit her tongue off when her shovel hit ground and gravel, jarring her teeth against each other. Her arms were numb with fatigue, her back flaming and throbbing, her legs made of rubber and only upright through sheer force of will to complete the penance given to her by Kailin Sedai. After a few minutes of observing Cata’rina’s labor, Kailin Sedai left once more, leaving the Novice to solitude and silence, the only sounds remaining in the stable being her panting and sniffing and the soft whuffing of horses as they lived quietly in their stalls.

The sun was beginning to touch the horizon, throwing long shadows across the stables and a cool evening breeze through her thin shift when Cata’rina placed the last wheelbarrow before the bin and began the last, arduous transfer of manure. An hour past her beginning, she had stopped inhaling the soft aroma of horse manure, two hours she began to stop caring that it had dried enough to throw up small clouds each time she dumped a shovelful into the waiting bucket. The last amount of manure was dumped directly from wheelbarrow to bin and she trudged across the small path created with her passage, the soft soles of her feet now cracked and bleeding and leaving small spots of blood when enough had welled up on her foot to drop and stain the ground.

Kailin Sedai stood leaned up against a pole, watching Cata’rina’s slow progress back to the stable where the shovel was placed carefully on the wall with the rest of the stable implements, the wheelbarrow brushed out and cleaned of all traces of manure and settled into a small niche just big enough for the unwieldy object. Her hair lay in thick, sweaty strands about her head, her face dripped with the exertion of her job, and if she were told she could go to sleep at that very moment, Cata’rina didn’t doubt she could fall asleep standing up, so exhausted and spent she was. Dipping into a curtsey, it was a touch and go moment that determined if she could rise from that curtsey. Will won out, however and in a panting, hoarse voice, “I have finished, Aes Sedai, what will you have me do next?”

Light send that she accept an apology from me for my behavior.

---

Kailin Sedai
Did it work?
Thu Jun 19 2003 8:23:24 am

Her day had turned out almost pleasant after all. After beating some sense, literally, into the infuriating child that had had the gall to smack an Aes Sedai, she’d set the girl to mucking out the stables. The stable boys had certainly been pleased about that. Not only did they have precious little to do, but they also got to watch a fairly attractive girl do their job in her shift. It certainly was embarrassment enough for the Novice.

She’d checked on the child only a few times during the day, and had spent the remainder of her time in the gardens or in the Training Yards watching her bondmate and some of the other trainees practice. Near dusk, however, she returned to the stables. Kailin could see the child in the distance, dumping the last load of manure, so Kailin leaned against one of the barn poles to wait for her.

At the girl’s approach, the Aes Sedai was almost dumbfounded at the amount of dirt and manure the child had managed to get on her. Certainly, it hadn’t been an easy job, but Kailin wondered if the girl had ever done a days work in her life up until that day. She kept her thoughts hidden by her mask of coolness as she watched the girl dip into a curtsy that seemed debatable on if she’d come out of it.

It was in a panting, hoarse voice, then, that the Novice spoke, “I have finished, Aes Sedai, what will you have me do next?”

Kailin gazed at the girl, icy eyes no longer touched with anger, but she yet wondered if the girl had learned her lesson. She almost detected a touch of defiance in that tone, just in the way it was phrased. But, Kailin still leaned into the pole, arms crossed across her chest, one ankle looped around the other. For a moment she considered dumping water over the girl to clean her off, but then realized that she felt more sorry for the Novice than anything. But, all would depend upon the child’s next answer.

“What have you learned today, Novice?”

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