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Lostara Yil

Page history last edited by D'rek 13 years, 8 months ago

Lostara Yil

 

 

Name: Lostara Yil

Pseudonyms:

Age:

Race: human, Pardu

Appearance:

Warren:

Further Info: Officer of the Red Blades

 


 

"She was Pardu, a southern plains tribe; her companion had the look of a northerner - possibly Ehrlii. His dusky skin was a shade paler than the woman's and bare of any tribal tattooing."

DG, UK mmpb, p.168

 

'Her skin was dark and tattoed in Pardu style, her nose narrow and aquiline'

HoC, UK mmpb, p.285

 

"Born a daughter instead of the desired son in a Pardu family, as a child she had lived on the streets of Ehrlitan. It had been common practice - before the Malazans came with their laws for families - among many tribes to cast out their unwanted children once they reached the fifth year of life. Acolytes from numerous temples - followers of mystery cults - regularly rounded up such abandoned children. No-one knew what was done with them. THe hopeful among the rought circle of fellow urchins Lostara had known had believed that, among the cults, ther ecould be found a kind of salvation. Schooling, food, safety, all elading to eventually becoming an acolyte in turn. But the majority of children suspected otherwise. They'd heard tales of - or had themselves een - the occasional nightly foray of shrouded figures emerging from the backs of temples, wending down alleyways with a covered cart, on their way to the crab-infested tidal pools east of the city, pools not so deep that one could not see the glimmer of small picked bones at the bottom.

 

One thing all copuld agree on. The hunger of the tempes was instatiable.

 

Optimistc or pessimistic, the children of Ehrlitan's streets did al thye could to evade teh hunters with their nets and pole-ropes. A life could be eked out, a kind of frredom won, bitter thought it might be.

     

Midway through her seventh year, Lostara was dragged down to the greasy cobbles by an acolyte's net. Her shrieks went unheeded by the citizens who stepped aside as the silent priest dragged his prize back to the temple. Impassive eyes met hers every now and then on that horrible journey, and those eyes Lostara would never forget.

 

Rashan had proved less bloodthirsty than most of the other cults in the habit of hunting children. She had found herself among a hadnful of new arrivals, all tasked with maintenance of the temple grounds, destined, it seemed, for a lifetime of menial servitude. The drudgery continued until her ninth year, when for reasons unknown to Lostara she was selected for schooling in the Shadow Dance. She had caught rare and brief glimpses of the dancers - a hidden and secretive group of mend and women for whom worship was an elaborate, intricate dance. Their only audience were priests and preistesses - none of whom would watch the actual dancers, only their shadows.

 

You are nothing, child. Not a dancer. Your body is in service to Rashan, and Rashan is this realm's manifestation of Shadow, the drawing of darkness to light. When you dance, it is not you that is watched. It is the shadow your body paints. The shadow is the dancer, Lostara Yil. Not you.

 

Years of discipline, of limb-stretching training that loosened every joint, that drew out the spine, that would allow the Caster to flow with seamless movement - and all for naught.

 

The world had been changing outside the temple's high walls. Events unknown to Lostara were systematically crushing their entire civilization. The Malazan Empire had invaded. Cities were falling. Foreign ships had blockaded Ehrlitan's harbour.

 

The cult of Rashan was spared the purges of the new, harsh master of Seven Cities, for it was a recognized religion. Other temples did not fare as well. She recalled seeing smoke in the sky above Ehrlitan and wonder at its source, and she was awakwened at night by terrible sounds of chaos in the streets.

 

[more

"

HoC, UK mmpb, p.386-391

 

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