As the blade bit into the wood, flake by flake, the form of a raven began to emerge. Shavings and splinters slowly accumulated across the tauren's lap. The needly pick put in the shapes of feathers on the wings, the scoop smoothed the beak, like the little knot of wood had been an egg and this bird were hatching from it as she carved.
"It is coming along well," said an approaching voice. It was one of the elders. The old bull settled himself down in front of Kalonaya on the grass. "You have a knack."
She huffed faintly. "I'd rather be out there, defending us against our enemies."
"Do you not give yourself over to the fight. You must make room in your life for peace. There must always be a balance."
"How? The quilboar seem to multiply overnight, and the centaur are always restless. They'll push us out as soon as given the chance."
"They are not here now," the elder said.
"They'll come here!"
The bull sighed patiently at her. "So are you going to leave immediately?" he asked.
She started to answer, then stopped, ears dropping. "Maybe," she finally said.
"I hope you can manage to stay a while after," was all he said. He stood once more, and left her to her thoughts.
How could there be room for peace in her life, when threats of war pressed in on them from all sides, when the lands to roam shrank as the centaur decimated what remained and the dwarves came to disturb the earth for the sake of old trinkets, and zealous quilboar sought to raze anything that touched their holy land, tainted with the blood of their fallen god? How could she sit down and do nothing when at any moment, any one of their enemies could seek out their tiny traveling tribe and stamp it out?
She couldn't. There was never a choice in her mind. There was no such thing as a balance of war and peace in one life; her life was for war, so that the others' could be for peace. They would be the ones who could relax around a campfire together and waste their time on games and feasts. She would be out there, ensuring that it was all possible.
But she had stopped in one place too long away from home, made a mistake she couldn't take back now, one she didn't realize she had made until she had long moved on. And now she was here, carving totems, cutting gems, doing what little she could to be productive somehow.
She hoped the Earthmother would spare them danger, yet also knew this was impossible, and that from now on, Kalonaya would have more reason than ever to protect her people.