Author's Note: I am fascinated by the idea of Azar – particularly since we never get to see her as a character in her own right and especially since she's so obviously such a strong influence on Raven's character. And I found – when I decided to write Azar into Walk on Water – that I also felt this need to write her story.

This is not even close to canon (since there is none). This is merely my speculations based on what little we get in the comic, the cartoon, and my own fanon inserted into WoW. Sabe will also make an appearance ^_^

1The Venerable

Part I

By Kysra

She is born cradled in the mists of autumn, on the equinox, when the moon is at her zenith and the crickets are singing in tandem to her mother's euphoric cries. There is light and love in the little corner room of the tiny hut where her parents dwell, and the fire throws shadows all 'round so that her first view is of black ghosts that are multiplied with the twilight hour and the entrance of her grand-mother, aunts, and uncles. They all coo and awe over her wet, cold body as she screams and wrestles beneath the heavy, scratching birthing blanket till a hand not her mother's covers her face and weak, barely-there fingers skim into her mouth to caress her newly exposed gums.

"This one will be wise." She doesn't understand the words but immediately quiets to the sound, and her mother holds her just a little tighter, a little closer to bring warmth and a welcoming security.

"This one will be loved."

As is the custom, she is not named until her second season has passed and gone and the third is celebrated according to the Founder's direction. It is understood that she will take her grand-mother's name and mantle, though when has yet to be revealed by time. Her family is not troubled, nor is the society she will lead. She is a good child with a ready smile and calm demeanor even at this age usually so wrought with challenge in exploration and measured independence.

When the day dawns on the second day of her third season, she is bathed in milk and fed honey. Her bright eyes take in sights she has never seen, her ears are filled with sounds she has never heard for it is sacrilege to taint Temple with a child's unstudied and blank aura. She sees people and children and horses, dogs, cats; and her heart pounds with the excitement of it even as father's hand pats her knee to calm her.

She is naked when they lead her up the seemingly endless column of stairs, and her mother begins to cry when she is carried to a raised altar deep beneath the stone roof. There is a fire there that burns a cool blue. It paints the gray stone a similar color. She thinks it is pretty but refrains from saying so. Grand-mother is here, and grand-mother does not stand for such trivial critiques.

"Young one of the house of the Founder. Do you know who I am?"

It is on her learning, agile lips to respond that grand-mother is grand-mother because that she is and will always be, but there is something in the question, in the tone that stills her. She is not being asked of 'who' but, rather, 'what.' The answers are not the same and mutually exclusive.

Carefully, she forms the word without voice, trying it on for size and attempting to wrap her tongue about the syllables. There is a crowd of strangers behind, blocking the incoming sunlight; however, she does not wish to embarrass her family. She has never been bathed in milk and rarely fed honey; and she understands as well as a child her age can that something about this day is important to all present.

"F'unduh." She gurgles from lack of speech; but the response, she knows, is the correct and expected one. Grand-mother's milky eyes stare straight ahead and over her, but there is a smile beneath the crinkly skin and broad nose.

"Let it be witnessed that this girl child of my house shall henceforth be known as Azar and named for my honor, my student and heir, and granted all of the privileges and respect that such an identity and position warrants. May her soul be clean and whole and bright for eternity and beyond by the will of the Divine Universe."

She can feel the warmth of her mother and the solidity of her father as she is cradled between and within their arms. There is cheering and hands shaking like falling leaves in the deep of autumn, and she claps with a bubbling giggle and bouncing curls.

The heir despises lessons. This relationship is established from the first when she is seven seasons and three turns old. It is a prodigious time, says grand-mother, and all is in alignment for initiation of her training; but Azar, the second, does not understand the thieving of her time, cannot comprehend the usefulness of quiet reflection. It is all she can do sometimes to simply sit still and listen when all she wishes is to run and jump and play with the other children of the village or help her family cultivate the garden, water in the stream.

She loves to swim and laugh. There is even pleasure in crying when sadness or anger overtakes (which is rare but happens occasionally when she least expects), and she is only a child . . . . who wants to explore her surroundings not cloister herself in some dark cave of self-actualization.

Grand-mother admonishes her frequently. Mother begs her to focus and father just smiles in an apologetic and understanding way. She was born in the autumn on the equinox under a harvest moon and it is only natural that she be active and energetic and expressive. Theyador, whose title was 'The Author' as Azarath's only historian, her master teacher and current High Priest, often chides her for her passively rebellious nature, but also seems to allow her the space she needs to thrive.

"Little one, you are too cheeky." He would say. And she would smile from her seat in the field or near the river and answer,

"And charming."

He would laugh then, a great rumbling sound that echoed her heartbeat. "That too."

In her mind, she knows that she has been baptized as 'Azar,' but her family and Master Theyador call her Leeba; and she likes that name better as it marks her in a way she finds more suitable and attractive for it is foreseen that she is the last of her line and is as the preferred name implies, 'beloved.'

'Azar' is her grand-mother, the Founder, the Savior, and Chief Magistrate; and 'Azar' has died.

The old woman passes in the midst of tea with mother just as a raven dives into the garden to snatch up a turnip; and Leeba feels the chill of something brushing her cheek at that moment. She picks up her basket of vegetables and runs as if Scath's imps are at her heels to kneel at her grand-mother's still-warm side and brush two fingers along the center of a frail and limp palm. There is no response save the weeping sounds of mother's grief and the yelling shouts of her uncle running into the village with the news.

Leeba merely sits and waits as that great aura, golden and piercing with intensity, dims to nothing and watches the wizened face as if expecting life to return as mysteriously as it left.

Master Theyador collects her after the sun has lowered into the bosom of the horizon and stoops at her side where she is stooped at grand-mother's side. "Come away, Leeba. We must prepare the Founder for her Lighting."

Leeba does not understand the concept of death and the necessity of accepting it. Grand-mother is the first person she has ever lost, and indeed, that is as it feels - as if she has misplaced something indefinable and internally vital. There is already a void where this woman once was, and as she reaches a hand to caress the still-strong jaw and trace the numerous wrinkles that are soft rather than leathery, Leeba knows she will never experience such an aura again. With the knowledge, her face is wet and her heart full to bursting with an earthy weightiness.

A large, strong hand falls upon her shoulder as she begins to rise onto her knees to hug her grand-mother's body, and soon enough she is pulled into a living embrace, her ear pressed against a beating heart that drums through her head and sings into her chest as she experiences grief for the first time.

She wakes one night to the sound of whispers and the light of a single lantern. There is the smell of smoke and crushed grass, wild flowers and ash; but she is not alarmed because there are giggles and purring chuckles interspersed amid the low voices. Her mouth wreathes in a smile that carries her feet to the source, and at the edge of the family hut, she finds her parents huddled and happy beneath blankets against the crisp mid-winter chill. They beckon her when they notice her shadow hovering and she moves to join them, centering herself between them as their arms encase her and their cheeks press against her crown.

There is a sense of impermanence as she is now well into her eleventh season and will have to make her own hearth soon. She cuddles closer to block the raging fear of loneliness the thought floods into her hands, behind her eyes; and she turns to the study of her parents and their contrasts as it has fascinated her since she still toddled about their ankles.

Her mother is small and dark with olive toned skin that seems to absorb all light only to glow with it beneath shelter. Her hair is long, curly and sable . . . though riddled with reed-thin streaks of gray, and her eyes are hazel with a hint of gold about the iris. Leeba is nearly as tall now, a hair's breadth from reaching four and a half heads, but mother is raw-boned and skinny with lean muscle and prominent joints.

Father is wholly different, large and rotund with fair skin beneath perpetual sunburn and smattered with freckles that fade and darken with the passage of seasons. His head is bald by choice but his eyebrows hint at ginger and his eyelashes are bleached to a lovely wheat blond. They shade his pale blue eyes that seem to change hue according to his emotions. His frame is thick and solid and strong, and he is easily the tallest of men in the village.

Leeba sighs contentedly as her parents fall into slumber on either side and she lifts up a hand to inspect it. She has only ever seen half of herself reflected in the river water, and she looks nothing like her mother or father as other children do. She, instead, resembles her grand-mother . . . or so the Elders of the Council constantly say. Her skin is pale despite her days spent beneath the suns' light and heat, and her long hair falls like a pressed golden veil about her shoulders; but it is her eyes, a startlingly uniform and pure silver, that garners the attention of the people she meets.

Her father often says her stare reminds him of the owls he sometimes spies in the dark forest, glowing with concentrated mystery and bright with palpable knowledge.

"Understanding eludes me." She says in a small voice, visibly upset at her inability to grasp the concept of oneness with the universe. Master Theyador had prefaced the lesson with the dire warning that as she has completed her general arithmatic, theology, reading, and writing, things would only become more difficult. Leeba held no talent for the abstract, her mind too focused on the corporeal.

Master Theyador looks down on her with his intense golden eyes. She often thinks that if her eyes resemble those of an owl, his brings visions of wolves and bobcats. "Of course it does. You seek to understand that which is not meant to be understood."

Her face is a mirror of her emotions, scrunched and tense and ugly. "To seek knowledge only to know you will fail is nonsensical!"

He laughs and it is music as beautiful as bird song or the roar of a bear successful at the hunt. "Tis not failure one finds at the end of such a journey, Leeba. Tis understanding."

"You speak in circles, Teacher. How can one find understanding regarding knowledge that is not meant to be understood?" Her mouth is a pursed little frown as her cheeks redden with frustration. Hands grasp at loose hair and fingers pull at her limp skirt. She is a kinetic force, her knees trembling with the need to run down the sloping hill or jump into the rushing nearby stream to relieve the pressure of her mind.

Theyador is a man only some fifteen years older than herself, but he has already mastered patience and so he sits quietly in a perfect lotus and breathes into a small, secretive smile. "You have a tendency to over think. The answer is simple and infinite. Focus too long on what is before your eyes and touching your skin, and you will find that you have forgotten that which is most precious."

She stills for a moment, startled that his eyes are looking into her own with an expression so bright it hurts, as if he is willing her to pry comprehension from the depths of her knowledge. There is the fluffy-sharp tickle of static against her skin and the tugging of wind-tails rushing through her hair, molding her clothes. Her nose twitches with the smell of freshly shucked corn and the metallic sting of blood and the clean scent of her mother's embrace.

Leeba fumbles gracelessly to stand, wavering just a moment before thrusting a finger toward her teacher, High Priest, and friend, her entire body shaking with an understanding that has nothing to do with their lesson for the day. "You are . . . "

He stands as well and flinches slightly when she retreats a step. "I am all and nothing. I am a grain of sand just as I am the entire beach. It is the same with you, young one."

Shaking her head frantically, tears jump to her eyes and somehow, it feels the same as when grand-mother died and yet so much worse because her best friend is causing such pain and he yet stands before her, alive and well and aching with her. "I am . . . afraid."

And suddenly she is in his arms and holding tight as the wind tears at them, a sudden and horrible storm that rips and claws at their skin, blinding their eyes, pushing her into a dark space within her mind. She is still afraid but grounded, supported by his near strength and quietude. "Be afraid, Leeba; but never let the fear consume you. We must work through the fear until we understand ourselves."

"I . . . I think . . I understand."

He tightened his hold, and suddenly she could breathe again. "We must understand when we cannot understand. We must come to know that we are not gods and do not rule the world or the many plants and creatures upon it. We can only begin to understand and know ourselves."

And then there is the relieved sound of his sigh against her ear, the heat of his breath fanning her forehead, the touch of his lips . . . "This is only the beginning of the lesson. We must accept our smallness within the vast expanse of several worlds."

He never needed to say the words. She had never felt smaller in her life.