Ash dabbed her last few remaining tears away with a corner of her tank top. "Well, at least that's something I can tell Rick and the others, how to know if I'm dangerous or not..." she said, grasping at the ghost of a silver lining. "I wonder what my eyes would do if I was really happy?"
Then she settled in for the requested explanation.
"I came because even the Blessing didn't fix whatever's wrong with me... I keep hoping my Gift is just something that'll kick in over time, but inside myself I'm not so optimistic. I *am* set in my ways, after all, and I've really blown it with people sometimes even without the damn crystal. And I hate it when people don't go along with me; I feel that they're questioning my competence, and I studied too hard to put up with that easily. And I guess I've been overcompensating since I came to Pandora, because my knowledge all by itself wouldn't have gotten me here, and I've always had to prove myself...even to myself. 'Napoleon syndrome', they call it back home--when someone who doesn't amount to much swaggers around acting all full of himself. Do you know I almost lectured Brenda? She's twice my age and has been here a lot longer than I have or likely ever will be, and there I am telling her she'd better be up front with me... Looking back now, I'm as shocked about that as I was about trying to shove Tiye around. Any wonder Tiye doesn't think I know my place?
"And then I got shot with that crystal fragment. 'Iheyu's convinced that that's most of the reason for my mood swings; I'd had that thing in my body since the day Vrrtep was released, and it got its tentacles in me pretty deep... And I think she's right about it perverting and twisting what was already there in me. I think, in time, it might have found a way to make a tool out of me after all, and that terrified me more than anything...
"Anyway, 'Iheyu suggested I come see you about going to the Heart again to be purged of it once and for all. I mean, yes, I've been there twice, but both times I was in my human body and I still had the shard in me. And I was human during the Blessing, too. So we thought maybe if I came with my Dreamwalker, my human body could rest and heal while the Heart addresses whatever's wrong in my spirit..." Her expression turned to anguish again. "But now it's affecting this body too...what the heck?? Just because I'm in it! And Enya doesn't understand, Brenda doesn't understand; but I've avoided 'sharing' with Sprout precisely because I didn't want to expose her to that! I didn't want to take the risk. So when everyone was pressuring me to link in, it was one more thing to be defensive about, and it was more than I could stand..."
Ali'ite took the Dreamwalker's hands into her own. "Child, a visit to the Heart of Eywa is above all an encounter of the spirit. If such a visit could have helped you in your Being, the body you presented yourself in would not have mattered at all."
Ash looked for a moment like she'd been dealt a blow, but then she squared herself and replied. "Actually, 'Iheyu thinks it might make a difference. This body was born on this world and is of this world; Brenda was pretty adamant about that, and she would know--she's actually Bonded to one of the sacred Trees. She said I shouldn't underestimate what Sprout's ancestry could do for my chances. And 'Iheyu thinks I might not even be able to experience the full effect of the Heart in any other form but this one. I mean, Enya's been there, and she didn't need a body at all except to come home to! And she heard, not just my and Brenda's prayers in the Heart, but Sprout's and Tall Brenda's too."
This provoked a round of raised brows and a short, murmured exchange between several of the shamans. Ali'ite, however, didn't look all that surprised; but then again, hers was the only Clan that included an Uniltiran-txen, a Dreamwalker-Awake, and if Enya had a soul, mustn't they all?
But her musings were interrupted by a question from Maru. "If you wish to return to the Heart, what's stopping you? You know where it is, you've been there twice as many times as anyone else here, and you hardly need our permission."
To everyone's surprise, Ash relaxed and smiled. "Ahh, this was the part that got spoiled by my rant... See, I think we've established that I haven't been able to do much of anything for either myself or Pandora on my own; so I was wondering if all of you could come too. Maybe with all of you there, your voices all raised in a mighty chant in that place of power, your strength would become Eywa's strength, and Hers could become again the strength of the world."
"And you don't mind sharing this burden?" Ali'ite smiled a little teasingly.
"It's about damn time I did, don't you think?" Ash replied, with just a hint of her usual sass.