:...That's true. Not normally what you want - and dry lightning would be really bad, here - but a rainstorm would be convenient: 

:So we'd only maybe have more weather to do:

:I guess it might not even be that bad. Our Gate here didn't seem to mess things up too much and that was a lot further. - I wonder if the more efficient kind we had to learn, to be able to do it this far at all, is less bad for weather?: 

:Ooh, maybe. We should get permission from the weather rota to do experiments with it:

:That's a good idea!: 

The sun is getting low in the sky, now. The children are playing some sort of game with each other, that involves throwing pebbles and trying to whack them in midair with sticks. Occasionally Ta'ana yells at them. 

Ma'ar's smile fades. His expression turns serious, then eventually sort of sad. 

:I - thought it would feel like coming home: he says eventually. :It doesn't. Maybe it was just stupid of me, to think it would: 

:It's been a while since you were here and it's not clear how much you can explain to them about what you've been up to and have them understand:

:I don't know that they ever understood before, either: 

:Understood what?:

:...Why I wanted to leave and learn magic - why I didn't think living on the Plains forever was good enough...: It feels like he should know how to explain and yet he doesn't at all. 

:Do... they like it here?:

:I don't know. Probably they haven't really thought about it: 

:It's... boring. And rude, though I guess they could fix that if they wanted to popularly enough:

:I mean, rudeness is contextual, right - there're parts of the world where, I don't know, where it's rude to eat with your left hand, or whatnot. I don't think anyone thinks their own people's customs are rude: 

:I think hitting people with sticks is not as much a matter of convention as eating with your left hand:

:Why not?: 

:Well, in the one case, if somebody's expectations are mismatched, they are hit with a stick, and in the other case, they have to look at or perhaps pointedly not look at somebody eating with their left hand:

Shrug. Ma'ar still isn't sure that he follows her point. 

She doesn't pursue it.

The sun eventually starts to set; just before it does, another young woman with two preteen girls gets back as well, leading a herd of a dozen thin, dusty and unhappy-looking cows, which are penned in with a rope strung between stakes. 

Ta'ana gets up and, in the same gruff manner as ever, asks Azabel and Ma'ar if they need space in a tent. 

"We brought our own." 

Ta'ana raises her eyebrows, then gives Azabel a knowing look. 

...All right, whatever, he is not going to bother trying to explain to his grandmother / clan elder that he's not sleeping with Azabel. 

Aza rolls her eyes but just a little.