Age: November 8, 206 -- presently 84, looks to be in her mid thirties
Race: Unknown -- mutt
Height: 6'0"
Build: Lean and muscled
Description
Not quite human is one of the first things someone would notice about Qamra. The second might be that she doesn't seem to know what humility is. Qamra doesn't walk, she stalks. She doesn't stand, she poses. She doesn't ask, she takes. Her movements are certain and full of her own confidence; she could be considered physically imposing to some. Added to this is Qamra's love of bright colors and attention-grabbing jewelry. Use of lipstain and colorful tattoos round out the mix, and with her array of clothing and different types of cloth she travels with, it can be assured that Qamra will make a statement wherever she goes. Words like 'tasteless' or 'gauche' mean nothing to her: Qamra loves standing out from the rest.
That can be both a good thing and a bad thing. Qamra doesn't give a shit about most people: how they feel, and how they feel about her are meaningless. Her love of control for her surroundings and her disregard for those around her means that she is at her best when others are acting how she wants them to. Manipulative in the way of the bully, Qamra is not a nice person. Nor does she aspire to be. In her opinion, it is the way everyone should be -- morals do not weigh at her and they especially don't make her conflicted about who she is and the way she acts. If you want something, you should get it however you have to. Betrayal? That's just part of the game. Stepping on someone to reach your goal? Not your problem if they don't get out of your way.
Qamra's upbringing was brutal and unforgiving, and rather than letting it become baggage she has embraced every aspect of her life, and come to honor it every day of her life. Live hard, laugh often, and treat each day as if someone plans to kill you. Competition and challenge exhilarate Qamra, and she does not feel right with herself unless she is struggling to survive. She revels in hard situations, and finds most insults and opposition to be just another arena in which she may compete. That doesn't mean that she is entirely impossible to ruffle, however.
The events of Qamra's life have made her intolerant of those who dismiss her or otherwise hassle her due to her magical ability. She has faced too much persecution to simply let it go when someone thinks to rattle her cage over the matter. While she doesn't give a shit if the same thing happens to another person, she will not sit complacent and idle when someone thinks to challenge her on a personal level. In that aspect, if someone does manage to insult or anger her, they will soon find that Qamra holds a grudge for a very long time.
Might makes right, and no one is going to convince her otherwise.
Still, there are a number of people in her life she feels responsibility towards, and even some twisted sort of love over. Her adopted sons, Tabnit and Vitor; her old trainer and longtime companion, Lucius; the woman who trained her sons in the sword and became a friend, Epria. There are many more she would name as allies, though it is only these four towards whom she regards as important as she considers herself.
Otherwise, the things she's likely to be soft over are the everyday objects that surround her. Due to childhood experiences, she believes everything to have a spirit. That which is flammable is mortal, and that which is inflammable is immortal. These things she views as being more intelligent and more wise than the people she tends to interact with, largely because the vast majority of her "conversations" with inanimate objects are really just delusions sprung from the warped reality in her mind. As time has worn on, her accompanying use of magic has only worsened her hallucinations. The result is that while most of the time Qamra functions as a normal (if irritating) person by southern low-class Eyropan standards, she has swings. She talks to inanimate objects and believes they talk back. She talks to smoke and believes she is doing flammable objects a favor by setting them on fire. That there are strange Plane creatures that sometimes talk back only serves to favor her impression.
Generally she is quite polite (in her own special way) to inanimate objects. This can be quite frustrating for those who don't know her, especially as it is entirely possible to mistake her quite sincere conversations with things for open mockery. Qamra treats the misunderstandings as yet more proof that the majority of the world just doesn't understand, and furthers her hubris and scorn towards those outside of her small family ring.
Possessions
A bullwhip.
A falchion.
A large amount of jewelry -- gold, silver, brass -- that comes and goes as Qamra purchases or pawns it.
A few changes of offensively bright linen shirts and pants.
Leather armor in more or less good repair, with a rather nice chainmail hauberk that fits as if Qamra wasn't its first owner. Not surprisingly, she wasn't.
Several pieces of flint & steel.
Nisani & Dagi: familiars Qamra has kept with her for several years.
2 familiars she has had for four months each.
3 familiars she has had under three months.
Strengths
Qamra is deadly with her smoke magic given the right type of smoke, though she is also very dangerous with her falchion (though against a swordmaster blade to blade she will always fail). She can do some damage with her whip, as well, though that's more of a party trick and less an actual threat. Her extensive array of acquaintances allow her to slip out of many tight spots, while her body's resilience comes in handy when she's not able to escape a bad situation.
- Unerring confidence & megalomania.
Qamra does not doubt herself or her goals. If things start going wrong, she adjusts. Her ability to gloss over any ignorant actions or assumptions on her part is second to none. Seriously, this woman has ego issues that could take out a ship. Ruffling her is nearly impossible (the notable exception being those who do manage, somehow, to hold steady relationships with her) and even should she be caught in a tight spot it's unlikely she'll waver. She'll be grinning right up 'till she dies.
Along with this, frequent use of magic has allowed her to sometimes make connections others might dismiss out of hand. Too, Qamra usually lacks the fear of failure for improbable situations that usually stops other people from doing dangerous stunts. Be it social gaffes or daredevil stunts, Qamra is willing to do what it takes. - For whatever it's worth, Qamra is an expert with a whip.
Not particularly the most useful skill in combat, it's nonetheless an ability that can break bones and stripe flesh from bone should she be using the right kind of whip. - Adept with the falchion.
Qamra has spent several decades mastering the blade, though since the broad majority of her focus and learning with it wasn't with the most quality of teachers, it could be said that up against a skilled soldier or a highly trained swordsman she will not have the advantage. Still, she is formidable with it up against your average mercenary or layabout. - Contacts.
While there are many people who don't like Qamra, there are also many she has met who tolerate or feel some small affection or responsibility for her. From Eyropa to Tian Xia, she has traveled widely and has any number of acquaintances she might be able to bum favors off of. The problem would be finding them. Her best contacts are her adoptive family and the charming, ruthless ex-gladiator-turned-entrepreneur Marcialis. - Resilience.
Due to the extended age granted to Qamra by dubious parentage, her body does not succumb to the slow breaking down of aging as quickly as other species. The result is that she can fight off longterm diseases or injuries better than humans could. Though her healing ability is not on par with a shapeshifters, this has helped her to stave off her magical breakdown and her chronic condition. Too, wounds received in battle will, over the course of years, tend to heal without too many lingering side effects (though her elbow still sometimes aches and hampers her ability to grip with her left hand). - Smoke magic:
control over aerosols; particle & droplet manipulation. Qamra's control over smoke is largely due to her belief, formed as a child, that smoke forms from the souls of whatever was burned to form it. She considers the soul-smoke to be her 'friends', and that if she asks nicely it will do what she bids of it. Considering that all magic varies depending on the belief and intuition of the user, her very ability hinges on her own certainty that she can communicate with all smoke and its desire to do what she asks of it.
So how does it work for her? In order to begin utilizing the smoke she must first have smoke. Certain materials she feels she has a rapport with over others (such as marijiuana, Corezan fir trees, the various varieties of Corezan oaks, and magnesium as well as magically altered magnesium). She believes the magic comes easier with those, and so it does. She vastly prefers to use her own materials, as with time and her own personal ritual (consisting of chanting, prayer, and a communion that in reality serves to open her up to the astral plane and imbues the material with magic) she feels she forms a bond with these materials. By purifying them with fire she is setting their souls free, and it is by this exchange they are more willing to work with her. She considers the bundles of material she keeps with her to be her familiars. She also might refer to them as bound spirits.
If she finds smoke not caused by her she is less likely to have control over it, as it was already freed and owes her no debt. She can make bargains or pleas, and as she believes she is dealing with intelligent, alien entities she is often refused by the wild ones and sometimes, though more rarely, by her own bonded material.
Is it really there? Yes and no. Her belief in her own materials as well as her rituals with them can sometimes draw barely-formed entities over from the Astral Planes and into her material. They become something like lesser nymphs, and her ritual burning of them releases these spirits either back into the Planes or into the physical world. However, this only occurs with the material she spends at least three months working with. As a result, it feeds into her certainty and results in smoke that is very potent. Due to her incapacity to form solid relationships with people, she does have a couple pieces she's worked into charms that she does not burn because they have become "friends" to her.
What can she do with the smoke? It must remain within her field of view or else she loses control of it (if she is turned around or her eyes somehow blocked she will lose it). She must remain focused. Each individual fire is a different spirit to her, and she can only work with one at a time. Her use of the smoke causes the fire to burn more intensely, shortening the amount of time she has with the smoke. She can somewhat sense when more fuel is added to a fire; if new material is added to the fire while she is controlling the smoke she has to renegotiate with the smoke and loses the majority of her control (she can keep it hanging out, but it won't react to her control).
- With already present smoke she can use it to obscure and to lightly smother (sting the eyes, cause coughing, nothing major unless there's a lot of smoke. If there is a lot of smoke she can use it to kill someone, but if there's that much smoke hanging out people are likely to be in danger anyways).
With her own material (due to the need to travel portably all of her own material lasts from 1 minute to 10 minutes. She usually uses wax to slow the burn. She carries 2-8 clusters of material at any given time -- counting the two she doesn't use):
**It should be noted that these times are loose and give or take a month either way.**
Under 3 Months: unconsciously pull other material into the smoke (she thinks it's the smoke building upon its soul to do her work). She could use it to damage someone's lungs (though they'd have to be breathing), temporarily blind someone, or for partial concealment.
3-11 Months: She can control the toxicity of the smoke. In addition to the above, she can cause mild corrosive burns with the smoke. She can also cause hallucinations or induce a dreamlike or inebriated state. At this stage she can more actively consult with the smoke and direct it to coalesce more solidly, resulting in more effective use as concealment. She can ask it to report to her what it "sees". At this stage she can use it to drug herself to help dampen the affects of her own magical use. Sadly, the long term effects of this only serve to further deteriorate her connection to reality. If she is successfully able to draw a nymph over from the astral plane, it might be able to coalesce past the point of burning, and might hang around her as a slightly intelligent second pair of eyes. Generally these will only stick with her for a few months, and they are mostly only useful as scouts or obfuscation.
1 Year or more: She is able to manifest the smoke into something of a creature in its own right. Though it will not solidify fully, it is capable of being felt by those it attacks. Its smoke is laced with magical energy, and capable of killing someone in minutes by excessive lung damage, or bodily trauma via corrosive burns. It is also capable of fully forming into a sort of nymph with its own small intelligence and ability to live as a physical creature. As a nymph, it would feel an urge protect its originating material (plant-based), and it would have some small powers in that regard. With Qamra's need to consume her own bundles as drugs, the only two to last this long are Nisani and Dagi.
- With already present smoke she can use it to obscure and to lightly smother (sting the eyes, cause coughing, nothing major unless there's a lot of smoke. If there is a lot of smoke she can use it to kill someone, but if there's that much smoke hanging out people are likely to be in danger anyways).
While Qamra is a sociable person, she is also selfish enough to not be very good at reading other people. She doesn't get that their opinions should matter. Add to that her need to be around other people and you have a recipe for disaster: Qamra isn't always the easiest person to be around. Too, her decades of magic use have made her a bit loopy, and as a result she is not the healthiest functioning person in the world.
As for the magic itself, it is limited by her own beliefs in it, and due to this system she cannot use any smoke for anything. She has a hard time of keeping materials in stock that will provide the best kind of smoke, making her ability a bit unreliable. Still, she does have her sword and her whip, but those are hampered by an old injury to her elbow as well as to the lung disease she suffers from. Her endurance is not what it used to be. Add to that her hallucinations and her magic-induced shakes (when she isn't sniffing smoke regularly), and she can be a bit of a mess.
- Familiar limitations
As Qamra's ability to use her own material requires certain rituals, it can be difficult for her to sustain more than her base two clusters when she is busy. In order for her new clusters to gain age and power, she must resist the urge to use them. - Extravert.
Qamra needs to spend time around people to feel happy. Though her personality sometimes drives them away, the death of her friends and her own lifestyle has made it difficult for her to maintain any close relationships. That, coupled with the violence that formed her personality means that it isn't terribly often that she has any meaningful interaction with others. Loneliness might drive her magically induced craziness towards a bad end faster than it otherwise would go. - Does not get subtlety or hints
The amount of stock she places in herself means she isn't really the kind of person who would be likely to get subtlety. Her self-love places her at strong risk for not getting hints or signs that others around her have their own opinions and aren't just going to sit back and let her have her way. - Emotionally stunted.
The rigorous training and contact with magic since a young age has done a number of Qamra's sympathetic and empathetic qualities. While she may not always care what other people think or how they react, this leads to her having a very difficult time reading social cues. Her ability to coerce others into doing what she want results in use by force oftentimes -- while she can be charming she usually can't tell whether or not it's working. What's worse, she doesn't always recognize that how others feel about her charisma (or lack of) does matter. Should negative results occur from her lack of ability to properly socialize, Qamra is unlikely to put two and two together. Even when these things happen frequently, she still does not learn. - Damaged elbow.
A long life spent as a gladiator, a personal guard and a sword for hire puts one in the way of danger many times. Qamra has received her share of injuries, but the worst was when she took a mace to the arm. The force of the blow was great enough to crush the joint. If it were not for a mage able to painstakingly put the pieces back into order, she would have been crippled -- if not dead. As is, the mage was not a specialized healer and despite his good intentions the joint was never quite the same. Though it has been a few decades since the injury, it remains injured and likely to never be fully healed. The injury causes her chronic pain (which she self-medicates with alcohol and smoke), as well as hampers her ability to lift and grip. She received the injury when she was 61. - Logically unsound.
Qamra is the type of person who is so utterly convinced she's right that most of the time she will not adhere to logic. If she thinks the sun is blue, she will argue it to her last breath. Should she quietly decide to change her mind about something, she'll shrug and claim she thought that way the whole time. If she doesn't change her mind, she'll use insults or possibly physical intimidation. Because of this, Qamra can be immensely frustrating to deal with. This is the cause of no few hard feelings, and the start of some relationships that turned very bad very fast. - Visual and auditory hallucinations.
Not only does Qamra believe things talk to her, but she sometimes also sees small things that aren't there. Sometimes there'll be the impression of movement out of the corner of her eyes, or a sound unconnected to the spirits she's striving to listen to. The result is that Qamra can sometimes be jittery or unable to focus. Her attention might split between things, leaving her distracted and vulnerable. - Addiction induced shakes.
Qamra is addicted to her use of magic and to the 'drugs' she takes. She feels that in communing with the spirits (inhaling certain smoke) she is able to cement her own spirit into her body. This started due to the hallucinations (which are due to her longterm magic use) but has turned into something of a magical and physical addiction. That there is damage to her brain is a given, but what else might be wrong with her remains a mystery. Her mixed heritage has saved her some of the bodily function failure that would have resulted in a human keeling over, but it's only a matter of time before something fails. - Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease caused by chronic bronchitis (caused by all the smoke she inhales on a regular basis). She coughs. She experiences shortness of breath. The only reason she hasn't keeled over is that her body's ability to stave it off hasn't allowed it to progress to the later stages. If you see her constantly coughing, hacking and then spitting that would be the excessive mucus from her lungs. She's not as mobile, shall we say, as she used to be. This condition started in her sixties.
- Enemies.
There is no shortage of people who wouldn't mind seeing Qamra dead. There's a good number who wouldn't mind being the cause of her death. Beyond that, there are a few actively seeking her death. While Marn is out of the way, it isn't so out of the way that she can completely escape her past and those who would do her harm. She has to watch her back. - Smoke and mirrors.
Her entire ability to do magic hinges on her own belief in it. The second she stops believing or doubts what is happening she will lose control. If she permanently loses belief, she permanently loses ability. Even if she tries to believe later that what she had was there, the utter certainty will never be restored, and therefore the permanence will be complete. She will still have the potential to use magic, but her own spark, the ability to use the potential, will have gone out. It is true that this would be a long and difficult task, but where the human mind exists also exists doubt. Qamra is not fully human, but she is also long-lived and twisted by her magical use. Someone skilled in the art of manipulation would be able to get in under her skin and into her head and deconstruct her from there. - Line of sight
If she is physically blinded her own belief will dictate she can no longer do magic. If her vision is somehow restored, so long as she still believes in her ability she will be able to resume her ability.
Lucius - m, dwarf, Apthoni, +38 (old trainer)
Epria - f, shifter, -18
Tabnit - m, shifter, -36
Vitor m, shifter, -38
DECEASED:
Dagi - m, shifter, from semerkhet's province (-1)
Nisani - f, shifter, +21
Friends/Questionable Allies
Martialis - m, elf, quijas (+2)
DECEASED
Elissa - f, human, phoenician history (-9)
Verecundus - m, human, quijas (-2)
Enemies
Ayzebel - f, elf, from old carthage (+3)
DECEASED:
Himilco - m, human, from old carthage (+11)
Other
Trainers:
Salaco - m, half troll, old Tyre
Otho - m, shifter, Quijas (Corezo)
Ystradwel - f, human, Pretana (DECEASED)
History
Part I: Pursuit of Blood and Glory
The Kid
Qamra Kalara was born from the union of at least one whore, if not two. Given her mother's proclivities, it was impossible to say for sure. Qamra was cared for in the whorehouse for her first few years. As the whorehouse existed in the slums of a bustling trade city, she wasn't very well loved. Those men and women who lived in the wreckage of an otherwise prosperous city had long ago signed away their right to happiness by any other creature, intelligent or not. Though they might show affections or harbor some form of fondness for the children that were the inevitable get of people too poor to pay for proper charms or protection against conception, the rule by and large was that the children were best used as a means for money.
Slavery was an accepted part of the culture, a natural extension to too little money and too many mouths to feed. In tradition often found in those parts, the leftovers were sold to provide for those still making their (mostly) free way in the world. But don't mistake her! Some chance of birth isn't tragedy in disguise, nor is it something to be pitied. No matter how mean Qamra's birth, she had the same happy and sad memories as any other child. Just a bit dirtier, sure, and maybe with more roughness. But say what you will about her: she was a tough little bitch and that she remains.
She was a big baby, and sprouted quick for a girl. This, coupled with her easy smile and quick fingers soon earned her the name of "Bishani", since that was what she'd go for. Qamra's mother never really gave her a name, so the girl learned to respond to 'Bishani'. Thing was, her little toddler mouth couldn't handle the whole of the word, and so when asked for her name she'd respond with "Bishi", which no few of the whores found to be hilarious. More still were just flat out annoyed, but we can't account for them and in the long run they didn't really mean jack shit anyways. Yup, Qamra had a price tag on her since the day she was born, and not a whole lot has changed since. At the time though, all she knew was that when she was bad or had to stay in her momma's room where incense was nearly always there, she found a playmate in the smoke.
The smoke was nearly a constant in Qamra's early life. Incense was cheap, and the lamps that were lit were smoky. Qamra would watch it for hours at a time when she had nothing else to do, and imagined it making faces at her, or talking to her. To her, the smoke was free to leave, and so it made sense when the smoke told her that by being burned its spirit was allowed to go free. Qamra was excited about this find, naturally, and tried to tell someone but no one really had time for a three year old with an active imagination. They didn't even really have anything to call her by, so why would they try to form a bond with her?
Things were rough for the kid. There wasn't really anything that might be considered 'safe' or 'responsible' or 'supervised' 'round them times (and really things haven't changed much in that shithole since she's grown up). The things most parents teach their kids Qamra had to learn the hard way. Y'know, fire being hot, shattered glass being sharp, magic being something that tweaks your mind worse than any illegal substance. Which, well, probably wouldn't have been much of an issue except that Qamra developed magical potential early on. It was her imagination that was the problem, which probably could've been due to her dubious heritage, and suffice to say that magic influenced by a kid's mind is not precisely fun magic. When no one would talk to Qamra about the smoke, she decided she'd set it all free. She tipped one of the lamps and burned up a good bunch of her momma's stuff.
Normally this bunch in particular sold kids somewhere between ages six to eight depending on how they looked and their state of health, but not Qamra, oh no. She went at five, shortly after her stint with the fire and the resulting smoke "friends" that she insisted they not hurt by putting out the fires.
Now, understand that child slaves were useful for a whole lot. They were more pliable then, and could be used for a bunch of stuff. Mostly positions that required more learning, perhaps man-servants or companions to young ladies. House slaves, mostly. But sometimes, there were other things. The other thing that Qamra went for? Violence. Tall and well built (as such things are reckoned for five year olds), she was purchased as something of a novelty; while male fighters were preferred in the fighting pits, there were on the occasion games for women or for exotic weapons. So it was that at the tender age of five, Qamra was taken to one of the traditional Greek-style fighting schools, generally called the palestra, to begin training.
Let's just say that a five year old used to being left to her own devices and living in her own squalor did not do well with the rigor and discipline of a fighting school. Not only that, but there were hardly any children compared to where she'd been for the last few years of her life, and far too many bossy adults. Her stomach didn't do well with the food for the longest time, and she threw hellish tantrums. But none in that field were willing to throw away a purchased slave so easily, and the seal of her doom was stayed for the price of a year to see what regular food and discipline could get them.
As it turned out, it could get them a lot. Enough? That wasn't so sure a thing. See, Qamra was a natural bully, and a sassy baby. The terrible twos and threes sorta never really stopped into age five and more recently age six, and the change of scenery -- while a game changer in her formative years -- still wasn't enough to completely overhaul her previous development. Which left the owner of the school in something of a bind when it came to her in particular (though to say she was the only outlier in this regard would be a lie; this man and his forebears had seen many unusual men and women come their way, and there were more troublemakers than Qamra herself in this particular year's batch). She showed promise in size and muscular development, in temperament and aggressiveness, but discipline was still something slow to come to her. What she had, on the table, was an unusual magical predilection towards smoke that, coupled with her stubborn beliefs, was something that could maybe be useful.
At the end, the owner was distracted from his survey of his slave lists, and thus distracted, gave her a pass. She was only six, anyways, and had made some progress. In the grand scheme of things, Qamra was not very important. So it was that she was formally accepted into the school, and was renamed from the rather plebeian "Bishi" to a much nicer name: Kalara. Ostensibly it was for her bright, shining fighting spirit, but really it was just one of a long list of traditional names for female slaves in that particular palestra, and since no other slaves presently bore the name it was a matter of convenience. So it was that she gained the second of her names.
The one thing they had on her was smoke. They gave her many different types of things to burn, and because she took to her own magical ability so easily the decision was made to encourage her in her beliefs with the thought that it would make her stronger still. In turn, they gained her trust. By age nine, she had been reformed for the most part (though she still sometimes had temper tantrums, in particular around an elf girl who shared some magical instruction with Qamra) and was able to participate in lessons with the other children without causing disruption or needing punishment.
The owner of the palestra primarily specialized in buying adults to train, the children tended to be a mixed lot of races and ages ranging from 4 to 12. A secondary aged training group, from 13 to 19, awaited those who passed the first round. She was nine, and had adjusted to the restriction and discipline. She had come to regard the trainers, Lucius, Ystradwel and Otho, as something like parental figures (though to say she regarded them with a child's love for mommy and daddy would be incorrect). Dagi was one of the first corporeal friends she had ever made, and Ayzebel was her first enemy in a child's reckoning. Kanmi became the first victim of her chipper bullying tactics, to which Verecundus and Martialis became her cohorts.
While strict observances about behavior were observed, it was expected and some bending of rules was allowed for the pecking of childhood to be established. The lanista of the palestra wanted controlled aggression out of his gladiators, and those too weak or passive to do anything about it wound up either getting killed in practice or sold off for some other venue. It was in this manner that Ayzebel became the first person in Qamra's life to test her.
Ayzebel, Verecundus and Kanmi were all magically inclined. They, along with Qamra, had special lessons with Ystradwel separate from the combative magical theory that all of them were required to learn. The lessons turned into their own power struggle within the group, as Ayzebel took it upon herself to protect Kanmi from Qamra and Verecundus' bullying. At first the incidents were relatively minor, but later that year when Ayzebel was about to take her trial to ascend into secondary the rivalry spun out of control. Jealousy and petty hates over two years of violent incidents had given Qamra and Verecundus reasons aplenty to want to permanently silence Kanmi.
While Veredundus distracted Ystradwel and Ayzebel during one of their training sessions, Qamra used a specially prepared bundle to quietly suffocate Kanmi to death. It was the first time she'd ever killed another person, and to say she was unaffected would have been lying. Still, her curiosity and her horror were forestalled by the need to explain to Ystradwel that it had been an accident. Though the explanation was accepted with no small measure of doubt, it was accepted. Everyone had known Kanmi was unlikely to pass the trials, and as he had not been formally considered for sale it was deemed to be a loss consistent with training.
Ayzebel took it personally. She was older than Qamra, and far more mean. She had become something like friends with Kanmi, and his death was devastating to her. Before her trial, she managed to maneuver Qamra alone. The two girls argued, and Ayzebel openly called Qamra's magic stupid and childish. Though Qamra denied her, Ayzebel was loud and overrode Qamra with belittlement. The result was that it caused Qamra's faith to waver, and that was all Ayzebel needed. Qamra's performance in their training suffered, and Qamra, in turn, got the brunt of the trainer's negative attention. Ayzebel, meanwhile, shone pure with her superior ability.
Were it not for Dagi, it's entirely possible Qamra might have lead an entirely different life, if she wasn't killed during training.
Ayzebel went on to secondary, and Qamra took a few days recovering from the damage Ayzebel had done. She was determined to grow stronger than Ayzebel, and began to train extra with Dagi. The fact that he was a shifter and, like her, awkward and rather inhuman looking, made them inseparable. The others had kept their distance after Kanmi's death, and Dagi was the only one willing to train with her.
Three years passed in that manner. Qamra passed her trial, and a year later Dagi joined her.
Secondary was much like primary had been, though the expectations were higher. Their trainers remained the same. The knowledge of the quiet feud between the girls allowed the trainers to keep them from each other's throats for the duration of secondary. Ayzebel passed into the palestra at age 16. Qamra followed at 17, likewise with Dagi. They were young upstarts compared to the main body of gladiators in the palestra, and they were treated as such by their seniors. Though the rivalries and camaraderie between the young gladiators did not go away, they were greatly lessened. The final test to becoming a true gladiator still lay ahead of them, for until they were ready to face their true gladiator brethren in combat, they were still little more than dirt in the eyes of the lanista.
When all was said and done, of the thirteen children Qamra had trained with only five made it as full gladiators.
Discipline
Twenty years old. Six feet tall. Lean and muscled, with more periods skipped than had. At that stage in her life, Qamra's body had been primed for the ending of lives rather than the creating of them; the majority of fat stores that are part of a healthy woman's body were absent. Make no mistake, Qamra was no female body builder of the real world; though she had her share of protein they lacked the nutritional understanding and creation of supplementation that allows a woman's body to bulk in such a manner. What was left was muscled but slender. Qamra relied on agility more than strength, as well as misdirection and magic.
Naturally gifted with showmanship, Qamra soon became a crowd favorite. She was often paired with Dagi in shifter-warrior duo-duels, and though they were not sent to the large-draw games they still brought glory and money to the palestra. They were doing well together, and they were noticed. It went to Qamra's head. She was at the top of her game (so she thought), and well on her way to being among the best in the palestra. With Dagi at her side they were guaranteed to destroy all competition. Dagi was the more practical of the two, though like most gladiators he was full of his own confidence. Besides that, though, he was also aware of how green they were compared to the other gladiators. He was not blinded by his own self-importance, and he tried to counsel Qamra against taunting their fellows, or grandstanding, or bragging.
Ayzebel had withdrawn from openly harassing Qamra, choosing to bide her time. She made herself useful to one of the older gladiators in the womens' section, Elissa, and waited for her opportunity. She found it when, in Elissa's company, she overheard Himilco (who was one of the premier gladiators in the palestra) complaining of Qamra's arrogance. It was a passing remark, but Ayzebel seized upon it. She suggested, offhand, that they teach Qamra a lesson. The two older gladiators declined, but things changed a few weeks later when, during training, Qamra openly challenged Himilco after he declined to face her sword to sword. Though the doctore redirected them before the taunting could turn to violence, it was something Himilco was not likely to forget any time soon.
Months passed without any major incidents. Himilco and his bunch would harass Qamra and Dagi whenever they could, and the two would do the same in kind whenever the opportunity presented itself. They were gladiators. They were expected to act with discipline, and when they weren't they were severely punished. Opportunities were few, and neither side was so wrapped up in rage that they were willing to risk lashes or worse.
At that point in her life, perhaps more than any other, Qamra was a simple creature. Life was clear cut to her; those who treated her well were her friends, and those who treated her or her friends poorly were her enemies. She lived for the cheer of the crowd and the trail of blood that extended behind and before her, and earning glory was the highest possible goal in life. The challenge of it made her feel alive, and the need for revenge was a natural extension of her adrenaline fueled mindset. Nothing was objective to Qamra then, and together with her smoke and her heavily biased opinions she had no need for fairness or objective truth.
It was Nisani who began to change the way Qamra thought. Then, Qamra was almost twenty-one years of age, and Nisani was five years her senior at twenty-six. The shifter reminded Qamra of Dagi in the quiet, thoughtful way Nisani had, though Nisani was not without her own arrogance. It was necessary for the ring, and though Nisani was a captured slave from a small tribe within Thar Shaddin's wise borders, born free and fierce, the capture had not dulled Nisani's fierce warrior spirit. The woman made an impression within the palestra. Among the gladiators she was favored for her easy manner and boundless confidence. Her skill was understood and admired with countless challenges and tests by her fellows, and she met them with skill and finesse. She'd been a fine take, a warrior in her prime whose tale was nothing so much as a stroke of bad luck and bad decisions.
Qamra did not understand Nisani, not at first. If it was not for Dagi, it was likely she and Nasani never would have become as close as they did, for Dagi formed the bridge that allowed Qamra to understand. Nasani's uncompromising world view was not easy for Qamra to understand, and in most cases not wanted. To Nasani, Qamra was at first nothing more than a kid molded by the unfortunate state of Corezo and, by extension, Eyropa. It was Dagi who convinced her otherwise. They shared stories with each other of their early lives, and Nasani gave them a taste of what life could be.
The months passed in that manner, and Qamra became distracted by thoughts of the outside world. Ayzebel, however, had not forgotten about their little feud. Kanmi's death was still keenly felt, and she intended to take vengeance for that and all the other numerous slights that had passed. There came an event where Qamra was slated for one of the smaller singles matches earlier in the day, and Dagi was to be in the group combat finale. It did not concern her, at first, that among the fifteen chosen for the match against the competing palestra he would fight alongside Ayzebel and Himilco and some of their fellows. It only occurred to her that there might be a problem when she, watching, saw them leave him open to one of the more experienced gladiators on the opposing team.
Qamra could only watch, horrified, as Dagi was nearly killed. Nearly. Not quite. It was that small fact of his life, hanging by a thread, that let her maintain some semblance of sanity. She could only stare as their palestra won, as their enemies were executed and Dagi was dragged off the sands with the other wounded and dead alike. It was Nasani's quiet words, her steady presence, that kept Qamra from attempting to kill Ayzebel within their holding pens under the coliseum. The other woman was bragging, and smiling, smiling, smiling as she snuck gloating glances Qamra's way.
That night was long and hellish for Qamra. Dagi's entire recovery was hellish. The second week of his required absence from the training ground, Ayzebel made a comment about it being a shame that Dagi wouldn't be permanently absent. It drove Qamra into a rage. All of her careful control, all of Nasani and Dagi's warnings to the contrary went out of her head. She caught Ayzebel off guard with use of smoke from lit torches, caused her to lose her focus for several precious seconds. The rest was a matter of blood.
Qamra was whipped for her troubles. Salaco did not hold back. Her rank was dropped, but she was spitting mad. The glory that had been so consuming not two years prior was suddenly tarnished by the threat of loss. If Ayzebel was allowed to exist, Qamra reasoned, then the honor of the palestra was tainted by comparison. So long as Dagi's life hung in the balance, she showed contempt in her matches.
Dagi's return to the sands brought her back to her senses, aided by both his and Nasani's justifiable anger at her lame excuses. She was given the slots typically reserved for throwaways: games against beasts and dumb brutes. It was Nasani who insisted Qamra learn how to use her smoke in a new way, to try for showmanship to recover her standing. It was by accident that Qamra did just that, though it was by Ayzebel's chance interference that the mistake occurred. Ayzebel made sure to switch Qamra's prepared bundle with one of her prized possessions with the thought that its destruction would only lead Qamra to making further mistakes.
Suffice to say Qamra wiped the floor with her opponent.
The discovery saved Qamra's career as a gladiator, and gave her ample power. Though it took them a bit of time to work out how it worked, the end result was the formation of Qamra's rituals alongside Salaco's strict observation of Qamra's methods. In return for the power, Qamra was not allowed to own any major or dear objects. Her clothing and bedding was regularly changed, and no opportunity was given for her to form the attachment to objects besides what was given; even those were only given to her in supervised circumstances.
Years passed with an uncomfortable stalemate between Qamra and Ayzebel. Gladiators came and went, lived and died, yet for Qamra things did not much change. She was respected among her peers, and even formed several companionships that were comfortable and fierce in nature. Though she was often described as simple, by age twenty-eight she was no longer as naive as she had once been. Himilco had been retired. Some of their human peers were starting to lose steam. So, too, was Nisani, though for different reasons. Hers was a soul meant for the endless land of the Thar, as she would often tell Qamra and Dagi. The compressed, ordered life of the palestra, of a slave, was not something that suited her as she aged. She wanted her children. She wanted her husband. Though she had come into the palestra with the fierce optimism of the warrior, the endless, pointless death weighed heavy on her. Qamra and Dagi remained as they had been, watching things turn around them. Get older, weaker. They watched the hope in Nisani slowly dry up.
The emperor's death twisted everything. Not in any drastic way, but for the gladiators within Corezo it meant games the likes of which they had never before seen in their lifetimes. They were transported to another province where the traditional games of death and life for the funeral of the old emperor and the crowning of the new, together with other events presented by the other provinces.
Nisani was injured in the games of death. Nothing a shifter could not recover from in time for the games of life, she assured everyone. Something niggled in Qamra, told her something was wrong, but she had never been good with intuition. The games of life dealt Nisani death. It was a slow death for Nisani, one by a silver wound to the heart. It was only by her high status in the palestra that allowed her the prestige of a death in the palestra and not execution on the sands. Before she died, she told Dagi and Qamra to win their freedom and go to her home tribe to tell them what had become of her. Nisani, herself, had been close to freedom -- five more years, likely, to win the price necessary. Five years too many.
Dagi killed Nisani, with honor, on the training grounds of the palestra. All were present. All honored the woman.
Dagi and Qamra, at that point, had more years left to winning their own freedom. Nisani had been bought. They had been trained and raised at the palestra, and had far more to repay. But with her blood still fresh they made a pact together to do as Nisani had asked them.
It was into this turmoil that Elissa entered their lives.
Rudiarius
It was only in the name of Nisani that Qamra turned away from all of her relationships -- for good or ill -- except for what she had with Dagi. He had likewise done the same, until a new batch of slaves arrived. It was reasonable, then, that Qamra was quite furious with him when he developed moon eyes for a female gladiator purchased strictly for the womens' games. She was small compared to the majority of the gladiators, and slender. She was feminine, with laughing eyes and a flirtatious manner that belied her skills. She was, to Qamra's eyes, everything that Nisani hadn't been, and it made no sense to her that Dagi would so easily capitulate to feminine wiles when Nisani hadn't even been dead for a year.
Still, for all Qamra's whining and complaints, Dagi pursued a quiet relationship with Elissa. He trained well, performed well, and kept to himself generally -- except where Elissa was concerned. Though Qamra never quite warmed up to the girl, as the months passed and Dagi's fixation did not lessen, she learned to cope. There was an uneasy truce between the two women, though it became strained when Dagi began to insist that Qamra further train Elissa as the time of her final trial approached. Qamra did not want to waste time with a person she'd deemed weakling; she was larger, stronger, and faster than Elissa. She had nothing to gain from the other woman, or so she thought.
Elissa passed her trial, and soon became a fixed part of Qamra's life. She was a deeply religious woman, proscribing to the Theortos way of thinking, and it was through their conversations that Qamra began to consider her own strange relationship with her smoke and the spirits in the world to be her own religion. Though Qamra never became easy with Elissa, the way Elissa looked at the world made Qamra consider her own life. It could be that Qamra's decades long use of magic had already begun to affect her mind, or maybe it was Elissa's youth combined with the grief of Nisani's death: whatever the cause, Qamra's view of the world dramatically shifted.
She'd always believed smoke to be a friendly thing, but it had always been other. Their long and grueling progress towards becoming Rudiarius -- freed gladiators -- coupled with Qamra's self imposed exile from establishing more friendships affected her deeply. She began to consider everything around her to be alive and, because of that, equal to her and everyone else around her. Everything had in it some presence of life belonging to a greater spirit. It was something Qamra could not fully explain, and given her crude grasp of language she had no words for it. But it was something she felt, and it was something she believed.
It was her interaction with the smoke and the world, rather than people, that sustained her through the long years that followed. She spoke to neither Dagi nor Elissa of her changing beliefs, nor of her evolving faith, but all could mark the change and the periods of introspection that afflicted the previously loudmouthed and simple girl. Many put it to Nisani's death, for that was when the changes had first begun. While Dagi was concerned for his friend, his own evolving relationship with Elissa (and fear for her life and safety) lead him to primarily leave Qamra to her own internal struggles. He was there for her if she needed him, though none of them were very good with inner demons. They were the product of violence. The majority of their coping methods involved physical exertion, not deep conversations and philosophical soliloquies.
The years passed. Elissa got older and more cemented in her skill and position by Dagi's side. Qamra grudgingly learned to accept her, and turned her attention towards the freedom of herself and Dagi. Things were not always smooth for them. Being a gladiator results in death for the majority, and there was more than one time that either received an injury or faced down death. Dagi was more skilled than Qamra, and while she had no small amount of seniority it was obvious to anyone with a brain that if it were not for her skill with magic she would have been so much blood on the sand. She could put on a show, but when it came to the dance of weaponry she was second class at best, and it showed in the amount of prestige she was afforded.
She was thirty-four when she and Dagi were slated to fight each other. He in animal shape and she with her magic: it was a tribute to the new emperor's first child. Considering the rumors of his or his wife's infertility, it was a grand gesture of their lanista to put his own gladiators up for fighting together. It was also a political statement, for he claimed with some pride that the only way he could honor the emperor was to fight his own men and women against each other; in this way he derided his rivals.
The fight was long and brutal. Life was not guaranteed in their match together, but still they knew and respected what it meant to be a gladiator. They both put in their all, strove to win over the other. They had spent over two decades together training and watching the other fight. They had fought together, conquered their enemies together, survived the rivalries and dangerous enemies within their own palestra, and they had suffered the death of a close friend together.
They were so close to freedom. Qamra had only two more years, and Dagi three. That they might be forced to kill the other was bitter knowledge, but it only deepened their resolve to win freedom, whether it was alone or together as they had planned.
The result was something neither of them could have predicted. They fought to a draw, to the massive entertainment of the crowd. They were both bloody and exhausted; Dagi with lungs poisoned by Qamra's smoke, and Qamra with deep wounds to legs and sides. They both were in a bad way when the editor of the fight called the draw and rallied the crowd. They had outdone themselves, winning praise and glory for their owner. So much so that, in honor of the life of the emperor's first child, the editor declared their freedom then and there.
Presenting them each with a rudus, he cemented their fame by reminding the crowd that they were the first in a long time to receive such an honor jointly on a drawn match. They were both stunned. They were both half dead. Their former lanista volunteered to have them heal up for one last time within his palestra before they were let out to pursue their own lives. They were honored by their fellows, and treated with respect and deference by the house slaves. The owner treated them as freed men. It was disconcerting, and neither could quite believe how far they had come. The journey had seemed endless and, at times, pointless.
But, a week later, the gates opened before them and, suitably fitted for travels with their riches procured from years of games, they were free to leave. Qamra did not miss Dagi's long and speculative looks towards Elissa, nor Elissa's staunch confidence. It did not come as a surprise when, a week from the palestra, Elissa was purchased from their former owner and freed by Dagi's love of her. Qamra shook her head, but at that point she had accepted the younger woman as part of her life.
The two spent the first two months of their freedom acquainting themselves with the outside world. It was foreign to them. So long tied to the rigor of life as gladiators and slaves, there was much about it to dislike. Qamra, in particular, found it disconcerting. Still, the adulation and fame was welcomed. People bought them drinks. Women and men alike offered themselves up for a night of pleasures, and Qamra allowed the pleasant distractions to carry her away from what was a genuine desire to return to life in the palestra.
But that life could not and would not continue. They had made promises to a friend, and once Dagi and Elissa had been married and their understanding of the greater world suitable enough for travel, they set off for Thar Shaddin and Nisani's people. It was not as easy as they'd expected. Her tribe had always been small, and by her own stories they frequently moved. None of them knew the languages of the area, and though they were strong enough to protect themselves from brigands, there were other ways people could screw them over. Their fame was strong in south-western Eyropa, but they were traveling east where such things were not so popular. Soon enough they were viewed as ruffians or mercenaries themselves traveling for unknown purposes and viewed with suspicion and distrust.
It was quite the cold wake up call. It surprised Qamra that she should miss the life of the palestra so fiercely, but the world outside the walls she'd grown up in was cold and strange. Nisani's memory, alone, kept her moving forward. Not even Dagi or Elissa's companionship was warmth to the shock of the wider world. It took them months to find Nisani's tribe, and when they finally did find them they soon realized that not one of Nisani's family was left. They were treated politely and with hospitality, but the welcome they had expected, the final hurrah of sharing memories with Nisani's closest and dearest was lost to them. They spent a few days with the group, but found that there was nothing for them there.
It was a bitter realization. While Nisani had been struggling for her freedom, her parents had died, her siblings been killed or captured. Her husband had died of a disease, and her children had scattered to the wind like so much chaff. She was truly lost to them. She was dead.
It was then that Qamra chose her final name. Qamra, the shadow of the sun -- Nisani's shadow. Qamra named herself in honor of the woman who had, for better or worse, completely altered her life. Only then did she truly put her foot down the path that would lead to the ruin of everything she held dear.
