Last night had been interesting..very interesting. It had surprised Kaeli that Sef had taken things spoke of casually at the fires and used them in the way he had last night. The night before several of the women had just chuckled and made wagers based on the talk, and were not the least suspicious when he had asked them more about it. They had answered from what they had seen and shrugged it off as a warriors interest in a woman. None of them had thought anymore about it and had moved on to talking of things that were specific to them, having no idea that what they had said would cause such a furor. So, when the ubar and commander brought the woman to the fires, Kaeli had no clue what was going to happen. It had shocked her as it shocked the others. And she secretly wondered if Sef had drank some spoiled paga, or been out on patrol too long. It wasn't until She started to watch his body language and really listened to what he was saying, that his intentions started to become clear to her. She knew from experience with Sef, that when he was serious about something, his demeanor changed from the easy going warrior, to a rigid one, who focused exclusively on the matter at hand and nothing else. He was not acting that way this night and it was this lack of seriousness that had alerted her that something was just not right. She had to think back on her talk with him and that brought her the answer. When he had inquired into why Sorrel was chained, Kaeli had told him. She had explained the event with as much detail as she could, honing in on what the Ubar had said and how others in the camp had acted. Sef had been less upset at what the Ubar had done, accepting it for what it was. He had however been more upset that mere prospects had been allowed to sling accusations about her daughter around the fire, like a bitter dweller women at a collaring. No one had even tried to still their tongues so that those actually involved could talk. It was something that never would have been allowed to happen in the past, and showed a serious lack of decorum in the women involved. Kaeli had brushed it off as some sort of jealousy and told her daughter not to mind it, but it apparently had bothered Sef. So much so that he had devised a way to made his displeasure of the affair known, leaving Kaeli in the dark about it. When the chaos started, she could only sit back and watch, unaware of what he was doing. It took her a long time to see through it all to the real reason he had chosen to take the path he had. It was not to have the woman chained at all. It was to teach her a lesson that she was not likely to forget. Words said without regard to truth can kill. The prospect had been the one with the biggest mouth that night, letting her accusations spill forth in a spiteful fashion, and she had done it just to see an innocent woman suffer. Kaeli had passed her words off as the rantings of an ignorant woman, one who had not learned to speak wisely and only of things she actually knew about. But Sef on the other hand was less willing to let it pass and obviously chose to teach her a lesson - and Kaeli had to admit, it was most effective. She wasn't amused that she had been drug into it unwittingly, nor was she happy that Yamka had either. Neither one of them had said anything that came close to an accusation, nor had anything they said been gossip. What they said was truth, and they were actually debating whether it was something that they could use to wager on. But Sef had taken their casual talk and twisted it around - just as the woman had taken things spoke of at the fires and twisted them around to use as a means of inflicting injury, and possibly preventing her daughter from being allowed to prospect. Kaeli had always prescribed to the idea that it was better to stay silent and listen, than it was to chatter constantly and have people wonder at your intelligence. The night the ubar met her daughter, the woman had thrown out these untruths to anyone that had half a mind to listen, and she cared nothing at all about how they would affect Sorrel. Well last night Sef had given her a taste of her own medicine. A very well orchestrated taste of her own medicine. Kaeli had to wonder if the woman would see the messege behind it and learn something from it. Kaeli kind of doubted it, but there was always a glimmer of hope that she may take it and think on it, and perhaps remember it and learn the lessons that she could from it.

Kaeli had been proud of her daughter Sorrel ,who took her place at the wheel to be chained, with her back straight, and her resolve strong - she hadn't cried, or wimpered. Sorrel had not begged to know why she was being punished, she had accepted it and sat beside her mother without letting anyone know what fears she might have in her heart. She had shown her mother that she had listened, and she had learned all those times when Kaeli had told her that a Plains woman takes what comes with strength. They were proud, they were strong, and they do not crumple, wimper or cry, they do not complain, they do not show weakness at the first sign of adversity. They are as strong as the grasses that fed the bosk, they bend when they have to, but they do not break under the strain of the many feet that will walk over them. Yes she was proud, and even prouder when her daughter found her tongue and spoke the words the Ubar wanted her to speak. During her time as Ubarra of the Kataii, she had found herself a bridge between two camps and two peoples. She had always fought hard to bring them together because she was a part of both and shared the blood of each. She was proud of her people. She had wanted her children to take their place with pride, but it had never been something she forced on them. She had allowed them to travel to different places, to meet different people, and to learn different things..not because she thought her own people were backwards or ignorant. Only because she felt that if they saw those things and still chose to return to the plains - they would return with the conviction that this was the place they wanted to be..and that they would stay here and take their place among the tribe without any hesitation, and not because it was what their mother wanted. In sending them away, Kaeli had made no concessions...she had ordered that they live in wagons, outside the walls of cities, and that their exposure to the dwellers behind the walls be very short and only for the purpose of educating them. Kaeli wasn't stupid. She knew that the draw of the cities took many from the plains, and in letting her children see these things while they were growing, she felt sure they would take from it what they could and still want to come home to the land of their birth. It was a calculated risk, but one she had been willing to make. And, they had both proved her right. After seeing it all, they both had come back to the land of they felt the most at home on. And what made her the proudest was that they had come home on their own. The only thing she herself had done was tell her daughter to wait until the tribe had finally made it to the south camp before she make her own journey to meet up with them. If there ever was a proud mother, it had to be Kaeli. She had her family together again and her two first born were following the path their father would have wanted, and she herself had prayed they would want as well..Now, she finally felt it was home....