Organization: University of Maine System
Date: Friday, 21 Aug 1992 10:49:28 EDT
From: <BANNON@MAINE.MAINE.EDU>
Newsgroups: alt.pub.dragons-inn
Subject: [R] Hazy sees a bit of Rameshan

Hazy exchanged a few polite words with Radan on board ship
until Pashar was sighted.  Members of the crew went to their
stations and the passengers went to their respective cabins
to ready their belongings for disembarking.

Arrival in Rameshan was exciting.  It was a city like Hazy
had never seen before.  Her first impression was of sand,
silk and sun.  The cityline was spiked with minarets and
Byzantine onion domes.  Torquoise blue mosaic patterns and
the vivid gold, rose, and blues of swirling silk added
color to the scene.   Of course, there were the donkeys
and dromedaries creating minor havoc for some comic relief.
The sun was so intense everything seemed to be haloed with
its light.  That thought made her smile.  Haloed donkeys,
God bless'em.

They were met with relatively little ceremony and shown
to their rooms.  Karl had plans for a nice siesta and
retired immediately.  The others in the group went off
to their respective rooms to settle in.  Hazy was at
a bit of a loss.  She had no belongings to be arranged
in her room.  She looked it over once and then went
to the balcony to look out over the city once more.
A very dry city.  Not especially comfortable for a
cloud-like being like herself.  She would have to be
sure not to stray too far from the waterfront.  Later
she would probably even make a short flight out over
the water.

A little restless, she decided to do some exploring around
the city.  The decision that faced her was whether to do
it in her transparent form or in some other phase.  She
walked over to a full-length mirror and adjusted it so
that she had a comprehensive view of herself.  She'd been
experimenting lately with her ability to turn specific
parts of her body to mist while keeping the others in
perfect focus.  She had been making real progress
lately, -- perhaps this was a time to put the skill to
the test.

She stood before the mirror and concentrated.  The torso
was fairly easy, she'd been misting that for a couple of
years already.  It wasn't too hard to make it appear as
though she were swathed in layers of billowing, shapeless
silk, -- just a matter of lengthening the body haze, letting
it swirl a bit.  The hemline was a bit of a challenge, it
kept drifting upwards.  "Rats," she thought, "No decent
slave girl would be caught with a hem like this!  I've
got to get it under control."  She finally got the effect
she wanted and held it there.  She felt like a ballet dancer,
straining the muscles into place and maintaining the pose.

She inspected the results in the mirror.  Not bad.  Next,
the veil.  Of course, this involved dissolving the lower
half of her face and fuzzing the edges of her hair a bit.
Very delicate.  She took a step closer to the mirror, her
own flat gray eyes looked back at her intently.  She decided
just then that a darker shade would be less conspicuous and
darkened the appearance of her skin to a charcoal black.
She kept the "silks" of her apparel a light gray.  "Now, for
the veil," she thought.

It was awful.  When she concentrated on the veil her hemline
wandered.  When she turned her attention to the hemline
her veil became a moustache.  When she managed the hemline and
the veil for a bit her color began to fade and when she
adjusted the color, --AAKKK!  She looked like she was
frothing at the mouth!!

She gave up.  Rather than subject the denizens of Rameshan to
the sight of an apparently rabid slave girl, she would just
travel about in her transparent form.  She faded into
insubstantiality and drifted over toward the balcony.  She
made a promise to herself to keep working on that trick and
then sailed out into the air over Rameshan.  Such a lovely
feeling of freedom.  This was really her favorite form anyways.
So easy, so light.  She didn't plan to be long, but, even if
she was delayed or they did leave earlier than planned, she
could always catch up with them in this form anyways.  She
snuggled the particles of her being into a friendly air
current and did a playful loop around a minaret.  Life was
good.  As wretched as her service to the vile magician had
been, in a queer way, she was begrudgingly grateful to him
for having created her.  She glided on.

Hazy

-------------------------
Disclaimer:
These are not really opinions and things that are not opinions
do not represent anyone's opinions, so everything is fine.