Catching up

When I woke on Thursday, my back and left shoulder were hurting. When I got into work, I slammed down on a DVD case to open it, like I usually do, and a bolt of pain shot right up my arm like a lightning bolt, and then back down again.

Well, I got to sit with an ice pack on it for a while, which numbed it down some, and my boss Sharon convinced me to stay the night. But I told her I was going to the chiropractor the next day, as I was convinced it was due to my back, which has been hurting anyway. I worked the rest of the night without opening any DVD cases, and went to the chiropractor the next day. Turns out I have really screwed up my back, presumably with all the bending, lifting and tugging I do on mom. My upper back was worked on, but my lower back was too stiff, sore and irritated to work on, so I will be going back this coming Monday for more work. My arm is better now, but my back still aches occasionally, and I worked Saturday as well.

Yesterday, we had carpet cleaners from Sears in to clean our carpet. As they were cleaning, they hit our etejaire amd two of the glass shelves fell, destroying everything underneath. Well, not quite everything, but my mother was livid at me for hiring them in the first place. I know she was upset (not that she hasn't taken out a shelf from the etejaire from when she fell and tried to use it to get up), but because so many of the things I gave her for birthdays and anniversaries were destroyed as well. A Lenox Bud Vase, a Vase from Hallmark I bought when we lived in New York State, two of her Chinese Ladies (One a goddess, the other a woman kneeling in a Kimono), a plate that belonged to my grandmother and her mother, A vase in Pastel Flowers she'd bought in Florida, a ginger jar with a lid, and probably other stuff as well, all reduced to pretty much shards.

The cleaners notified their boss, and today he came to look at the damage. He will fix the base of the ginger jar, and get us some new shelves from a glass cutter, and reimburse us $300 for the stuff we lost, which may cover the monetary value, but not the sentiments, of course.

We also had the Merry Maids in today, to finish cleaning up so everything is clean and sparkling (Well, as close to sparkling as it gets around here, which is not so much). In the time between, I have also been reading, including a non-fiction book about Herculaneum. Herculaneum has always fascinated me. At one point when I was younger, I wanted to be an archaeologist. I swiftly changed majors when I got to college, but I am still interested in Archaeology.

Back when I was growing up, when people talked about the eruption of Vesuvius in 79AD, it was assumed that the people of Herculaneum had gotten out of the city, while those in Pompeii had mostly died. Then, in the late 90's, they finally uncovered the seaport of Herculaneum, and the first of the bodies... The book I read was written by the female scientist who was brought in to look at the bodies, which had been found in bays where boats were stored over the winter. They had been suffocated by the gasses from the eruption, and then covered in ash and mud. One of the saddest skeletons found was a young and pretty slave girl, no more than a teenager, who had been forced to carry burdens too heavy for her and who had recently had a tooth pulled. She was found cradling what had probably been her master's child, who wore gold jewelry and who had died in her arms. The book also reconstructed the last days in Herculaneum, and included the "stories" of the other skeletons found nearby: a woman they called "The Ring Lady", a man called "The Soldier" and an old woman.

Another book I read was "More X Files" by Joe Nickell, a man who has investigated and debunked many supernatural hoaxes, scams and superstitions. This was 48 short cases or investigations he had taken part in, in many cases showing how it was done, although since many of them involved religion, people continue to believe in them, mainly because they want to.

I also finished two fiction books by Elizabeth Vaughn, "Warprize" and "Warsworn". These are the first two books of a trilogy, which I read out of order, reading the third book, "Warlord" some time ago. I enjoyed it greatly, even though I came to the story two-thirds of the way in.

"Warprize" is the story of Xylara of the House of Xy. A healer and princess, she has been disobeying her brother's order not to treat the enemy prisoners and has been going to the place he keeps them after she has finished with the wounded of her own side. This infuriates her brother Xymund, who has not much of a good opinion of her anyway. He is actually her half-brother, being the son of the King's first wife, while Xylara was born to the King's second wife. Xymund could have married her off, but he has refused all offers for her hand.

Xylara's kingdom is at war with the Firelanders, who are both hated and feared. They come from far away, and are usually known as raiders, but this time they have come to conquer Xyeria, a Warlord at their head, and an army backing him up.

When Xylara goes to heal the prisoners that night, there is a new captive with them named Simus. Xylara is able to save his life, and his leg, but discovers that he is an officer while doing so. Certain that if she turns him in to her brother that Simus will be tortured for information and killed, she hides his brooch of status and leaves to go back to the castle. She hopes to take the information to the General of the Armies, who is a decent man.

However, she is not able to speak to him. That afternoon, while buying supplies, she meets a supposed mercenary named Keir who knows the ways of Firelanders and tells her that they drink Kavage, and where to find some. She thanks him and buys it, as well as a bowl for them to brew it in. Keir also asks her to pass on a message to Simus, but she refuses, not willing to be a traitor to her country. Her brother, Xymund, may be an incompetent King, but she is not willing to betray him, either.

The Firelanders are delighted to recieve the Kavage, and that night her brother summons her. The Warlord has sued for peace, and in return wants only one thing. Xylara, to be his Warprize, or, as her brother tells her, his slave. He has already agreed to save the Kingdom. He will swear fealty to the Warlord and have a Firelander overseer to see to the running of the Kingdom, but since he was already losing the war, this is better than the alternative of being completely overrun and the Kingdom destroyed. Xylara, wanting to save the Kingdom, and feeling she has no other choice, agrees.

The Warlord sends her a trunk and says that she may only wear what is in it to the ceremony. She is horrified to find it contains only a thin shift, but is determined to go through with the ceremony. In it, she agrees to be his Warprize, and a set of silver bracelets is locked on her wrists. As part of the ceremony, she agrees to take nothing except from his hands. She is also shocked to find that Keir is the Warlord. He takes her to his tent, and although she expects to be raped, he leaves her alone that night.

The next morning, she is awakened by a scarred man named Marcus, who finds her clothes, mostly a tunic and trousers, and feeds her from food the Warlord commanded him to have for her. She leaves the tent to explore and finds the tent with the wounded, who are lying in filth, untaken care of. As a healer, this angers her, and she berates the guard who is supposed to be watching over them. She cleans up the tent herself and sends the guard for clean water before treating the prisoner's wounds.

When Keir finds her, he and Marcus are angry at first, but when he sees the conditions in the tent, he agrees that he was at fault, and asks her if taking care of the wounded is what she wishes to do. She says yes, and he allows her to. Marcus berates her for not taking care of herself and working without eating, saying she has no sense. He feeds her, and she drops off to sleep, exhausted.

The next day, Keir calls a "senel", a meeting of his subordinates. One of his men, Iften, is scornful of her as a weak city-dweller, and believes that taking her as a Warprize will weaken not only Keir, but their people. He is already stirring up bad feeling for Keir in the Warlord's army. The rest of the meeting is about setting up someone to oversee the Kingdom when Keir returns to the Plains, where he and his men live. The next day, Keir and Xylara must return to Xymund's castle, and Marcus finds her a dress to wear, a bright red dress. Xylara squirms inside, for only whores wear that color, but seeing how she is a slave, she wears it. Much of the court is shocked to see her in that color, seeing her already giving into Keir, but Xylara tries to hold her head up, as Keir still hasn't forced himself on her.

One of the nobles, an ill-tempered, unlikeable man, calls Xylara a whore, an insult for which Keir runs him through with a sword. He will not allow anyone to insult Xylara. Everyone is shocked. Xymund most of all, although he isn't happy with Xylara. He has nearly destroyed her room, destroyed everything in her stillroom and burned the notes she made of her medicines and cures. He has called her a traitor to other members of his court, but she cannot concieve of why. Hasn't she done everything he has asked her to?

When she is back at camp, she befriends several of the people in the army, including Atirra, a horsewoman who falls and breaks her leg, and Gils, a cookslave who becomes her student at healing. The Firelanders have no concept of medicine. If someone is badly injured enough so that they can no longer fight, they are given mercy by their comrades. Otherwise, a Priest-healer looks after the wound, saying spells over it. But the Priest-healer with the army was killed, and that is why no one was looking after the wounded in the tent. Xylara tells them she does not know how to cure everything, but she is able to help the men.

This is not the only problem. Men with crossbows are making raids on the army at night, killing and wounding the sentries, then slipping away again. Keir sets men to watching for the killers, and asks Xymund to investigate, as the shafts left behind are Xyerian in make. Xymund promises to look into it, but the attacks continue.

As Xylara helps Atirra one afternoon, she asks her about Plains society. She finds out that a Warprize is dearly hoped for, and is the only one with the power to change the society. Feeling that she is missing something, Xylara asks Atirra about the Warprize. Atirra tells her she is not a slave, but an honored position. That by asking to be a Warprize, she is asking to be courted by the Warlord. The bracelets are not marks of slavery, but those of status. That night, Xylara, who has fallen in love with Keir, gives herself to him completely.

Shortly afterwards, Xylara is attacked by a group of Xyerian men who burst into her healing tent. The leader is the son of the nobleman Keir nearly slew, and he calls Xylara a whore and a traitor, choking her nearly to death. Keir comes to her rescue in a beserk rage, killing the men. He is about to start in on the guards who were supposed to be protecting Xylara, but she manages to talk him down from his rage, and he goes to look after her instead.

Finally, it is found out that Xymund has been behind the attacks all along. Keir goes to the castle to find him, but Xymund goes to Xylara. She is mostly unaware of his evil deeds, and instead takes him to task for allowing her to believe she was Keir's slave, to which Xymund says that her status is the same as a slave to him. He then calls her a traitor for the brooch of rank he found in her room. Keir comes, and is not able to defeat Xymund without killing him. Xylara goes into shock, especially when, since she is now the heir to the kingdom, Keir decides to leave her behind on the Throne and go back to the plains without her. It takes some doing, but she decides to go to him instead, as there is no one she could marry from the surrounding kingdoms, and her people need the trade the firelanders represent to survive.

She walks after Keir in only the shift he gave her, with bare feet, until she encounters his army making its way home. At first, he tries to tell her to go home, but she will not, and threatens to repeat her actions until he allows her to stay. Finally, he relents, and confesses he is glad she has come to stay.

In the second book, Keir's people find that one of the towns they took in Xyeria has barred its gates against them, and the people inside yell at them, throw stones and even fire arrows at them. Iften is enraged that people are rebelling against Keir and urges Keir to attack them, But Xylara determines what is really happening: the village has plague, and she must enter and determine what type so that it can be fought before it can spread to the rest of Xyeria... or worse, Keir's army.

She, Gils her apprentice, and two people assigned by Keir to guard her, a husband and wife team- Epor and Isdra, enter the city. They only find four people alive: an old female healer, the guard from the gate, a young child, and a man in a delirium who sees them as enemies and attacks them. Xylara attempts to save them, but fails, except for the child. It is a plague called the Sweat, but this time its effects are stronger and occur faster, and it is much more deadly. She has Keir send a message to the capitol telling them of the plague and having them warn the other healers of what to look for, and then Epor falls sick, only to die from the plague. And then Xylara herself falls ill...

She tells Isdra to fire the town and to bind her inside, take the baby and flee. Isdra does fire the town, but rescues Xylara and brings her to Keir, who nurses her through the plague with the help of Gils and Isdra. They manage to save her by dunking her into the cold waters of the nearby lake at the height of her fever, bringing it down. Just when she starts to recover, others in the camp begin falling ill. Xylara goes to help them, but without Epor, Isdra decides to join her bonded in death. Xylara, finding this out, stops her, saying she needs Isdra's help with the plague. Isdra is swayed by this reason, and agrees to help.

Later, Keir himself falls ill, but Xylara nurses him back to health. Just when it seems everyone is recovering, Gils falls ill, but with a difference. He starts to convulse, and Keir is forced to give him mercy. Xylara is shocked and enraged, but in the end, even she is forced to admit she would not have been able to save him.

Despite the help of everyone in camp, about 1 in 10 die of the plague, and Iften blames Xylara and her people for it, especially their filth and city-lander ways. He challenges Keir, and not for the first time, saying that so ill-fated an expedition can only be blamed on the man who led it. Xylara has taught Keir Chess to keep his mind occupied as he recovers, and the other warriors begin to learn it, too. There is a mania for chess in the camp, but Iften refuses to learn.

To celebrate the recovery, Keir sets up a celebration of one-on-one fighting matches, and chess matches, to be ended with a life-sized game of chess. Iften challenges Keir again, who manages to defeat him, but he breaks Iften's arm in the process. Xylara, knowing Iften despises her, offers to help him, but he rudely refuses her help, saying only that he will take the help of the priest healers, not her unhealthy city-lander ways. She warns him that without her help, he will lose the use of his arm, but he doesn't listen.

Shortly thereafter, she is surprised in her shower by a man in ratty furs. She dumps a pail of garbage on him and flees, only to find that he is a priest-healer. Keir has a great dislike of priest-healers, and the feeling is only too obviously returned. As they plan to return to the plains, Keir holds a ceremony for the dead, and during the ceremony, Isdra, freed of her obligations at last, goes to join her husband. Xylara weeps for her going, but is already perparing for the ordeal she will find on the plains, being confirmed as a Warprize, and with Keir to be a confirmed Warlord.

These two books were extremely enjoyable. Both cultures were distinct and fleshed-out. Although you had the feeling that asking questions would have cleared up a lot of the problems and misunderstandings a lot earlier on, at least in the first book, I can also see why Xylara, thinking herself a slave, didn't think to ask questions. And the Plains people, aka Firelanders, have their own way of asking and answering. I as a reader, of course, am far less forgiving about Xymund's telling Xylara that she was a slave than she was.

But this was still an excellent series. I felt like I was living in Xylara's world along with her, and seeing out of her eyes. If you are looking for a fantasy romance with no magic but great description and plot, this is one series you will want to pick up.