A Trip to Gridania: Medicine, Chocobos, and the Search [Hipparion Tribe, Story]

[Torvhan]

K'mana stretched as she looked around her tent, examining this in that insuring that she had packed everything she needed. She sighed, K'luha was not happy when she had heard K'mana was leaving on another trip, but her older sister relented when K'mana had brought up her arguments. There were no adult chocobos of age in the camp for K'mana to call her own, so she intended to travel to Gridania and their chocobo ranches to seek one there.

 

She grabbed her pack and left her tent. Marching steadily out of camp, K'rei was out on a hunt, and she said spoken to the other women several days before she broached the subject with K'luha. She made her rounds earlier this morning and said her farewells and she had many malms left to travel.

 

As she walked she thought about the tribe and her last stay. It had been nice being home and seeing K'ailia return. Though it relaxing to be among her family once more the thought there was more she could do for her tribe elsewhere had weighed on her mind her entire stay.

 

She had learned many skills at Melvaan's Gate, and she had begun her search for the missing of members of her tribe right before she had left to return to her Tribe. She smiled remembering the many hours she had spent writing and rewriting the article and reviewing her notes on the tribe's history before finally submitting the article. She hoped she would receive at least a few clues on where to start her searches. When she arrived in Gridania she planned to send a message to Melvaan's Gate inquiring if they had received any replys to her article.

 

K'mana looked over the dunes of the desert, and wondered if K'ailia would be able to convince the tribe they needed move from now desolate sands of the Sagolii. She wished she good help the girl more, but also felt that K'ailia would pull through. Their meeting at the Sagolii Gate had shown her that K'ailia had that spark that would help rally her people behind her. It gave K'mana the comfort of mind, so that she could continue to help her tribe from behind the scenes and expand her circle of allies as she continued to search for those that had wandered away.

 

She continued to walk in silence, she would likely reach Ul'dah before nightfall the tribe was camped farther north than usual. When she reached Ul'dah she would likely need to find lodging before searching for a caravan heading north towards the Black Shroud.

[Torvhan]

K'mana wandered the streets of Ul'dah mulling over the problem of traveling to Gridania. Once she had arrived in the city, she had sought out information on the trip and realized that it would take her much longer to reach their by land than it normally took her when she traveled to Limsa Lominsa by ship.

 

She knew when she started that she would be in Gridania for awhile, but she hadn't realized how long it would merely take her to get there.

 

She cursed silently to her self as yet another city goer jumped as she walked by, they were so accursed loud they never noticed her until she passed by. The whole city was like this, the clank of armor or the clack of hard soles on the ground, the city bustled with a noise she was unaccustomed.

 

It was then she had the idea...normally she would have never considered actually doing it but with the issues her tribe was having she wished to minimize her time away if she could help it, and she told herself its not like it would hurt anyone. So she set off to prepare.

 

---

 

Later that evening, K'mana fell in to the harmony that was the hunt. Each guardsman and sultansworn were her prey. She watched from the shadows the setting sun cast upon the tall building of the grand city, noting their movements and paths. After an hour or so she over heard of an airship bound for Gridania. As the ship readied itself for departure and the guards busied themselves checking the passengers aboard, she silently slipped passed and on to the airship. She decended quickly into the innards of the ship, listening at each door for signs of movement. Opening several quietly as she searched, after several room she found what she sought, and slipped into the large room filled with luggage and other goods, she nimbly climbed one of the larger boxes and slid off and behind it hiding herself from view of the door.

 

---

 

The trip was uneventful K'mana hid herself throughout the trip using her traveling rations and sleeping lightly, the type of waking rest honed through years of camping in the desert, always weary that your prey could be hunting you. The airship pulled into Gridania, and K'mana slipped off the ship in the crowd of passengers. She marveled at the greenery as she skylarked and walked through the wide paths of the city.

 

It took her awhile to figure out where she should head, many of the people in Gridania seemed cold and surly. But she eventually learned of the Bentbranch stables from the proprietress of the Carline Canopy.

 

The trip to the stables was short and she spent most of her day at the stables speaking with the workers and the head wrangler Keitha, helping them with small mundane tasks, having been raised around the tribes chocobos she knew quite a bit about caring for them but its hard to trust a random outsider to more skilled tasks.

 

At the end of the day she headed back into Gridania and booked a room at the inn, and spent the night thinking of how she could prove to Keitha that she could be trusted with the care of one of her chocobos. She realized that in her time training under K'piru she had learned a great deal about herbs and caring for members of the tribe but very little on ails or injuries of their chocobos. She slept soundly that night deciding she would seek out an apothecary in the morning.

 

The next morning K'mana spoke with Miounne in the morning and was directed to a local apothecary by the name of Taijha.

 

So it was that she ended up standing on the steps of the small wooden building. She straightened her clothes once and took a deep breath, and then softly rapped her knuckles on the door.