#velothi

Kassur shooed Jerky off the bed and stood. He lit the fire in the center of the yurt with a quick spell. It often wasn’t until he did this that he remembered precisely where he was. He’d stolen this yurt, disassembled, from the Ahemmusa camp before he left in the middle of the night, sneaking away right under the night sentinels’ noses. It took several trips to carry everything, and he still had to find some of his own materials (mostly to patch up holes in the rarely-used guarskin canvas), but it was worth it to start out fresh with a sheltered place to sleep. 

Kassur’s stomach rumbled. He reached into the sack of ashyams by the bed - no luck, all empty. Damn. He’d taken that sack when it was taut full with them. He couldn’t risk going back; even though they’d abandoned the old camp north of Vos, they’d no doubt have people coming by periodically to make sure the supplies they left behind were unmolested. They’d have his hands for sure if he was caught. 

Kassur sighed and opened his basket of wickwheat flatbreads and threw one on the grill over the fire. He also dropped a trama nub into the pot of water he’d gathered last night and hung it over the flames. 

Kassur sat on the floor of the yurt and soaked in the heat. He leaned his head back on the bed and started to doze…

He snatched his hand away before Jerky could bite it again. He quickly grabbed the hot flatbread from the grill before it burned, but the grill marks were very dark. He sighed and poured himself a cup of over-steeped trama tea as he took a bite of the bland bread. He took a sip and relished the warmth and lifting feeling of the drink, seeming to elevate his mind and wake him up. 

Once he finished eating and drinking, he grabbed his shirt and pulled it on. It was a terribly itchy garment, of House mer make, and he hated wearing it. But he needed to make an effort to blend in, and what he’d rather wear would make him stand out more than he already does. 

Kassur glanced at the shoes in the corner. He shook his head and walked out of the yurt without them. The soft Grazelands earth was soft beneath his bare feet. 

Kassur had set up his yurt very close to Vos, just around a small hill. He could look northwest and see Tel Vos towering in the distance. He spat in its direction and made for Vos.

Vos was a tangle of squat adobe buildings and giant fungal roots. It reminded Kassur of a trama shrub deprived of its thorns. 

The thorns are the people, Kassur thought cynically. But he cleared his mind of the idea as he stepped through the gate, a ring of fungal mass attached to the rest of the tendrils. There was a saccharine kind of pleasantness the House mer put on constantly, and he tried to emulate it. It seemed pointless to him, to wear a disguise like that. But he needed to get used to their ways. He was stuck with them, now. 

He tried to cheer himself up by pretending he was Mephala wearing one of her many masks. That made sense to him; keep a hand behind your back when near your enemies. But these House mer didn’t even worship Mephala, so he didn’t understand where they got it from. 

Kassur approached the Chapel’s doors and hesitated, as he always did. Was he really ready for such a leap? To abandon his ancestors and throw in his lot with the three impostors?

He shook his head pointedly, although no one saw him. He didn’t have to make that decision yet; he was just learning Dunmeris right now. He opened the door and strode in confidently. 

Yakin Bael was sitting across the room, holding a small prayerbook in one hand and studying it. At Kassur’s entrance he looked up past his small spectacles. 

(Spectacles. What a strange invention of the House mer and outlanders! Magic could just as easily repair poor eyesight. Why rely on thin circles of glass to do the same, such easily shattered things?)

Yakin was an old mer - almost preternaturally so, given that he was probably Telvanni. Despite this, his hair was dark reddish-brown, with scarcely a gray hair in sight. His longevity, he would say, was owed not to any magical prolonging, but to simple good health. Kassur knew, however, that he was a master of the art of Restoration, and was likely lying.

“Welcome, Kassur,” Yakin said, in Dunmeris, putting down his prayerbook. “Shall we get straight to your lessons?”

Kassur knew enough Dunmeris to be slightly dangerous. So long as someone spoke slowly - as Yakin did by his very nature - he could make out the gist of what they were saying. He struggled, however, with producing some of the strange sounds the language relied on. He was also being taught to read and write, and while he could almost reliably do the former, his hand shook too much for the latter; he could never get the grip on the pen or brush right.

Thankfully, Yakin was not only a patient teacher, but a native speaker of Velothi, too. This helped immensely to help translate certain nigh-untranslatable things, as well as in giving Kassur an out when he was too tired to speak Dunmeris. 

As he was now. He needed to save his energy for later today. “Can we keep this lesson short, kena?” Kassur asked in Velothi. “I am expected in…Mushroom Forest later today.”

“Sadrith Mora,” Yakin corrected, still speaking Dunmeris. “And yes, that is amenable.” He gestured towards one of the walls, upon which was a mural of the three impostors. 

“Azura’s starry tits,” whispered Kassur before raising his voice to reply, “Not there.”

Apparently Yakin heard the expletive. “You should say something like, ‘Seht’s shiny beard’ instead. Or even ‘b’Vehk.’” He seemed to blush as he caught himself. “But I shouldn’t be encouraging you to say profanities.”

“Sorry, kena,” said Kassur, emphasizing by speaking polite Dunmeris. “Can we study over there, please?” He pointed at the wall of the chapel with the mural of Veloth leading his people to Morrowind.