Growing in the Goddess - Rendia remembers

[Gia as Rendia]

Samheen 19th, Eveningtide

Rendia knelt and lit the precious candle that was always replaced in her room. It wasn't such a shock any longer, but she still felt grateful every evening that she was allowed a candle and allowed to light it when the sun had set over the isle in a wash of beautiful light, right outside her pretty little window.

She had just finished her sort of ritual, calming praying. She enjoyed praying to Anasis as the sun went down. It reminded her to thank Anasis for what she had done that day and to also pay homage to Uphuron. She did not do it every day at this time, however. It wasn't unusual for her to spend her time studying late into eveningtide, or maybe helping at the infirmaries. It was strange, she thought, how easy it was now to think of herself helping in places of healing.

Since she had spent time praying in preparation, she was ready to allow herself this time of guided meditation and thought while she knelt and stared at a speck on the wall that she always focused on in order to center her mind. This was becoming her routine for the evening, before she was too tired, she would light a candle and stare at the wall. This helped her. She remembered the curiosity with which she regarded the many glimpses of holy people and students staring at nothing. Naomi had told her this was meditating, focusing your mind and body to be still so that your spirit could be stronger. Some, she said, meditated on a certain topic or point of theology. The concentration appealed to Rendia. She had seen a few priests doing something like this in Amun Ra, but she had never bothered to try it herself. She had been a little discouraged despite herself the first night she'd tried to clear her mind. But she found she enjoyed looking at nothing and doing nothing so much that she tried it again. During this time she did allow herself to think, since she couldn't imagine how people got their mind still at this point, but she tried to keep her thoughts to constructive and analytical paths. She would think about her day carefully and try to remember exactly what she had been taught. That was taking less and less time to review. Now she turned her mind to a broader look at herself that day, and began to compare with great wonder, the Rendia who was meditating at this moment and the Rendia who was washed up on the island's shore what seemed like yahren ago.

The girl who had washed up on the shore of the sacred Oracle's Isle was terrified, timid, malnourished, a cowed ex-slave to her core. When Rendia considered the way she lived, the exhausting torrent of events that made her life, she had to admit that she had lived by fear. Fear had kept her alive. Fear had been the protective scab over her many wounds. Fear had haunted her, tired her, driven her to finally break away, and then clung to her when she had reached her new home. "My new home...? It is. I do think of the Isle as my home now," Rendia thought, bowing her head away from the speck on the wall briefly as her eyes misted. She had been welcomed here.

She remembered her first day on the Isle, when she still wasn't even certain what an island was. She had approached the main temple with such fear at first, and then eagerness. It had truly been the beginning of new life for her. She had been so overwhelmed by entering the temple of the Oracle, and then so very startled and thrown back into her old self when Callen had appeared to welcome her. She remembered just how scared she still was of men then. But the fact that he wore white had been the only thing that gave her hope, which kept her from running away. Memories swirled through Rendia's mind in intermingled sweetness. She remembered when she had entered the fountain, removing her clothes of course, to keep them dry and safe, and because she didn't think they would be allowed in the holy water. Only Rendia and her many scars had entered the water. Only Rendia and her inner scars had exited, she even more overwhelmed, but ready to serve Anasis with her whole heart. So many things had happened that first day.

She had been whisked into a brand new world. A world where there was fresh fruit, there were more words to learn, just like a scholar, and where she would be accepted into this place without question. It was a new world of a room all to herself, filled with cheerful kindness showered onto her by Mya and patient understanding from Naomi; a world where everything was strange, new, and clean or at least easy to clean. A room of cold as well as heat, a world of her own desk and chair and bed and blankets and cuboard. A world of whole baths of fresh, sweet water, pleasant scents, and beautiful, strong clothes. In this foreign place, she had thrived, Rendia realized. She had been so busy trying to soak up her new world of beauty and safety that she had grown without even realizing it. Every person had only been supportive of Rendia's fragile exploration. From the first, Anasis had suddenly embraced her in a way she had never known and followed up by never letting Rendia down once.

She no longer started every time she saw a man. She no longer lived on emergency energy, never knowing when the next crisis would arrive, or when the almost constant abuse would ease. She was little more then a child... she had lived in an exhausted state in the midst of a cruel life. Here, here she was safe. She had embraced the island with all her heart. And her heart, in turn, had begun to become soft and able to trust again.

Rendia shook her head to clear it and looked towards the candle, her eyes taking a moment to refocus. It was dark outside now. She had used her mark for the meditation and felt rested now, focused, even though her mind was definitely exercised by the practice. It was time for her prayers before going to sleep.

Rendia rose, blew out the candle, and lowered herself to one knee. Her pointed ears quietly listened to the nighttime sounds as she felt her blood flow through her legs again after being sat on for so long. She thought about how her dress was no broken in, slightly worn, and a tiny bit more yellow then when she had first obtained it. It also fit her differently. In the time that she had been here she had gotten used to eating three times a day, and the abundance of food had soon caused her to gain weight, although she had tried to limit her food intake to only what she needed when she noticed she was growing in size. She was almost chubby, after being a skeleton all her life. But if she had been heart-breakingly beautiful, only in the saddest of ways, she glowed with a radiant beauty now, her added weight softening her, her eyes filled with peace that grew daily instead of a wild alertness and fear. She combed her long hair every day, and it looked much healthier even though it was not trimmed evenly and sometimes formed unruly waves and curls. Now, head bowed, the transformed slave quieted her mind and humbled herself before her goddess.

"Merciful Anasis, goddess of everything radiant and good, I praise you for this day of learning. I praise you for all the blessings you have poured out upon me today, for my morning bath, for my faithful teachers and companions who I am learning to call my friends, for the sweet fruit and good food, for the labor which I have accomplished in your name today, for the ability to serve you, and for your blessing upon my mind, that it may process all the new things I am learning every moment. Anasis, thank you for bringing me here. Thank you for everything you have done for me. Thank you for the ways that I see you changing me. Thank you for helping me to practice walking straight everyday. Please be with Travis on his journeys. Guide me always; help me to constantly surrender my life to you. This I pray to you, Anasis. Adun ama! Thank you, I love you!"

OOC: After she goes to sleep, I plan to continue this thread from the morning, after she wakes up from dreaming of Ezrulzat. She will also contemplate more of her changes since being on the isle, and hopefully go through a day. I gave her a book to draw in instead of a journal, and someone taught her to practice her name. Maybe she will run into the friend who did this? Or old friends she is now more comfortable with (either already mentioned or new)? Thank you so much for your time. ^_^ ~Gia

[Gia as Rendia]

I must have dreamed that I mentioned to someone that I am on hiatus as a player at Tazlure. No time, you see. I still love you all, I refuse to leave!

Sincerely, Gia