[Road to Najmi]

[mr_gaeta]

Once they're out on a road not pockmarked with stones and potholes -- or, at least, dotted with fewer of them -- the constant jostle of the cart settles into an easy, rolling rock from side to side.

Given his usual lack of sleep the night before, it isn't terribly surprising that that's enough for Gaeta to slip into a light doze, leaning against the back wall with his bag bunched up like a pillow.

Comments

[mr_gaeta]

Caught by surprise, Gaeta almost tunes into Azimar's voice and follows him up before he catches himself. He's expected to hold his own here; he does, giving more strength to final line as it swells and fades like a rolling tide.

For a moment, it's completely quiet save the squeak of the cart wheels.

Gaeta finds that he's smiling.

[road2najmi_npcs]

So's the bard.

"And you don't sing often?" he says, in some disbelief.

[mr_gaeta]

He shakes his head. "I've only done it a few times before now. And I didn't even start until about six months ago."

[road2najmi_npcs]

Azimar shakes his head, still smiling. "I've no idea whether to call that a tragedy or a gift of the gods. Friend Felix, your voice is a wonder. And consider, if you will," he adds, raising a finger, "who tells you so."

[mr_gaeta]

"I'm honored, sir," he says, dryly amused. "Even if..."

Another small shift, this time to draw his metal leg a few inches closer.

"I wouldn't call it a tragedy or a gift."

[road2najmi_npcs]

"Then what would you call it?" he asks with ready curiosity.

(Kaya's gone completely quiet, still watching but hoping they'll forget she's there.)

[mr_gaeta]

"Happenstance."

Gaeta tips his head back, resting it against the cart wall.

Softer, "Or healing, maybe."

[road2najmi_npcs]

"I'm no great believer in happenstance," Azimar says thoughtfully. "But that music can heal ... well. No true bard could ever doubt that."

[mr_gaeta]

He's watching the sway of the canvas ceiling now, lost in thought.

(Gaeta has indeed, for an instant, forgotten that Kaya's there.)

"It's how I got through losing my leg," he murmurs. "I'd..." And then he lifts his head, curious. "Have you met anyone else who had this happen to them, too? Did they tell you about it?"

[road2najmi_npcs]

"I knew a sailor, once, who lost his arm." But he's shaking his head. "He'd never talk about it. Oh, the tale of how he came to lose it, that he would tell over and over ... but never anything about how it healed."

[mr_gaeta]

Gaeta huffs out a near-soundless -- and nearly humorless -- laugh, leaning his head against the wall once more. "Wish how I'd lost mine was glamorous enough to turn into a story."

More often, of course, he wishes that he'd never lost it at all. But.

He takes a small breath. "After you go through an amputation, sometimes it feels like the limb's still there." A far more faint and rueful smile twitches his lips. "And most of the time it hurts like a motherfrakker. It's all psychological, though, it's -- just in your head; so when it happens, there isn't any medicine you can take to make the pain stop."

A sidelong glance to Azimar.

"So I'd sing, to get my mind off of it. It made the phantom pains hurt less."

[road2najmi_npcs]

He's listening. His eyebrows twitch upward at the unfamiliar word psychological, and lower again when it's explained.

"Phantom pains," he repeats softly, in appreciation of the phrase. "Pain's ghost, dead but lingering. And singing ... banished the ghosts? At least for a while?"

[mr_gaeta]

Speaking of Gaeta's reality being far less glamorous. He mirrors Azimar's earlier expression, more or less unconsciously, as his eyebrows rise a fraction.

"A little bit," he answers. "And...yes. For a little while."

[road2najmi_npcs]

Again he gives that slow exhalation, like a silent whistle.

"And that was how you came to begin to sing?"

[mr_gaeta]

He nods; a silent beat passes.

"So if you wanted to call it a gift," he murmurs as he thinks it over, "I guess you could. But it's more like the scales being balanced out. You lose one thing, you gain something else."

And by and large, that's better than most of the last four years, which saw far more loss without a balancing gain.

[road2najmi_npcs]

"Oh, but a fair balancing of the scales is the rarest gift of all," says Azimar, with a quirk of melancholy smile.

[mr_gaeta]

Gaeta can understand that. Quite well, in fact.

Enough so that he's giving Azimar a curious look, unsure if the other man will elaborate.

[road2najmi_npcs]

Azimar looks back at him, and raises his eyebrows again.

"Surely you've noticed, friend Felix."

[mr_gaeta]

"From my own experience, sure."

It's neutral enough that it could easily be left at that.

[road2najmi_npcs]

"As have I," he answers easily, "my own experience, and all I have ever heard or observed of the world and its workings. Once in a very great while, the scales tip unevenly in one's own favor; and when that happens, most men call it justice."

There's a thread of merry cynicism in his voice, and a matching tilt to his smile.

[mr_gaeta]

"What would you call it?"

[road2najmi_npcs]

"Fortune," he says, and his smile goes a touch more sober, "or a gift of the gods."

[mr_gaeta]

Maybe they're on the same page after all. To automatically think of any favorable outcome as such a blessing that it's a gift from the gods, though --

Gaeta knows what he's gone through to reach that point.

And it's not his place to pry an answer out of Azimar on the topic.

"I suppose," is all he says instead, quiet, and with a slight nod to accompany it.

[road2najmi_npcs]

"In the meantime," he says, still evidently cheerful, "you've done me the great honor of teaching me a song; shall I teach you one now?"

[mr_gaeta]

He exhales another breath of near-laughter; this time, though, it's genuine.

"What did you have in mind?" he asks.