Gray

Be in their flowing cups freshly rememb'red.
This story shall the good man teach his son.


Metal has a feel much the same as its color. I held the steel rings in my hand, looking not at them but the elder that had placed them there. Was there more than coincidence that the sound of the drums played background to every thought that went through my head? An announcement of change at the very pinnacle of our existence was being pounded into the air. Ba'atar would lead a crusade away from the Tribe, a group specialized by the very choosing of them. In his place another would hold the grays until his return.

The study of the minerals that make up this metal is a lesson that has importance. They come from the earth itself but are developed by fire, water and air. Its color is not as most would believe to be gray but instead white. The blend of all in light and the absence of them in pigment. It is shadow that creates the feel of something between when we turn it in our hands.

The new Ubar to sit upon the grays, Ayguili. I'd met him only a few times now though I admit that he has impressed me each time. I had given him the first bit that Enosh had placed in my hand to find the true owner of it. The blood opal or fire opal that struck its colors against the wagons and far out onto the mists was meant to be his from the moment that I had touched it. I had yet to begin my quest for what it took to be a great leader but those first firings deep in my synapse had already begun to form. If the sky predetermined our paths, she was paving the way in her own way and in her own time. Her wisdom touching the lives of our people in extraordinary ways.

This was to be a test not simply for me but for many now. I believed we were strong enough as a people, like the puzzle of rings I held. Their secret was not how they came apart.