[ It's strange, the way some things are both painful and... accustomed. This isn't a bleeding wound, but it hasn't scarred over either. It is hard to describe, difficult to compare, the kind of pain that comes from being hunted, always on the outside, with easy power of life and death and the emotions of others and no amount of not using it will ever make them forget that you could - and you always sense their fear, their distrust, always. Is that the worst part? Or is the worst part the constant fear for your life? Or actually being captured for it, that part had been pretty bad too.

So it's strange, for this constant, accustomed open wound to suddenly feel a balm of pure, unlooked for empathy. She actually takes a quiet breath in and has to regain her balance. She decides to let the whole of this subject go. ]

The Strahl - that's a good name. And are you telling me, truly, that you sailed the skies in the same way some ships sail the true sea?