Chapter 3: Permission
Nobody can hurt me without my permission.
~Mahatma Gandhi
She paced like a caged Nexu. She wasn't quite sure why they were keeping her all but restricted to the healers ward, but she wanted out and soon. Oh they would let her go out with the man that she could have sworn was her father, but after the debacle about three weeks ago when she saw her reflection and noticed that she looked nothing like she remembered…well she realized that he was something to her, but definitely NOT her father.
They would let her out to stroll the grounds with him. They would discuss much, leaning heavily toward how she was handling the changes in her life and anything she could remember from before her time on Empress Teta.
She would shy away from the subject not wanting to have everyone chasing at ghosts. There were vague snippets of faces. Occasional whispers of almost remembered names but nothing concrete. The whole thing was beginning to frustrate her to no end. She needed out, needed action. She wasn't some youngster to be hemmed in the temple. She had always found that when meditation did not help her, its motionless quiet not aiding in her finding any piece of mind, that being able to move often times did. But she also considered that a very private thing, not to say that she didn't dance and dance well in front of others, it was the ones she conducted in private that were more a soothing balm, the focus necessary often allowed her to clear a path through the muddled thoughts and emotions that would cloud her next course of action. If only she could find a way to convince any of these healers that she just needed a little alone time.
She looked up to see the Master that was both her savior and bane. She focused on Yuan's face for to look anywhere else would give away the ache she had to see her apprentice again.
"You seem unsettled young one." The matronly woman said to her.
Tana remained silent for several moments, gauging whether or not this Councilor was here to reprimand her or actually help her. Then she just gave in, "What I could really use is a little bit of private space. I have some things to sort out and all the quiet meditation is not aiding me in my search for peace."
"I can see if I can arrange something for you." The old woman smiled as she made an almost imperceptible tilt of the head. Tana caught it though and dared to briefly flash her eyes in that direction. Sure enough, she caught the tail of a well remembered robe flipping out of sight around the corner of her suite door.
The knowing smirk on the elder's lips let Tana know that the microsecond that she had looked away had been noted and filed. She looked down quickly as she felt her face flush. She shouldn't feel embarrassed, she knew that. What they had shared, she was convinced was meant to be. But that one knowing look from this old Master and she felt like she were a youngling of thirteen again, all raging hormones and confused, she did manage to softly croak through her embarrassment. "That would be greatly appreciated, Master Yuan."
She felt a brief hand descend on her shoulder and felt something akin to sympathy or maybe it was pity, as the Master left.