I know not what sort of response this post shall get, but I can quite certainly imagine what little standing my name might have to some people will now be gone. I am not a woman of words and letters, you can count the amount of posts I have ever written on one hand and the amount of writing of anything in my own Journal is likely less then the amount I write here and now.

Cyrene, I shall forever love you. I shall forever be home within you. I shall forever be proud of my attempts to defend you from the Tide, for which you saw to reward me with one of the first Hawk medallions. An honor I even now think was beyond appropriate recompense to what duties I felt necessary to my home, to my family. And I will always, as when the time came with the Tsol'teth, be amidst those who reclaim you from those who would take you from us.
But if my words now are deemed unfit by those I, like all the other citizens of the city, entrust with your stewardship, if my words are not worth for what I am meant to represent? I shall offer the medallion back freely and you may strike my name from the records if that shall ease any suffering.

But I thought you better than this.

No longer will my conscience let me sit by and say nothing of that which I wish to say now, what I wished to say many a time over recent years but have refrained for the sake of decency and decorum so we may instead work to healing the damage that was done. But I will not let the private fear of being berated and scorned by the opinion of the majority keep me kowtowed into silence and have me hold my tongue from what I feel is wrong.

I will say it plainly, and announce quite fully my decisions are of course biased because of personal opinions. As, from reading what has already been said here, has the posts before me and those who keep their replies and opinions to our City board alone.
Do I wish to forgive Shirszae? Yes. But that is an opinion coloured of personal reasons as I just mentioned, she was my mentor, and I a terrible terrible disappointing student. She was my friend. She is why I am anything like I am today, and honestly she is why I have restrained myself from comment for this long. I speak not on anything other then what is worth fighting for.

Do I think, in the end, driving the Tsol'teth away through conflict. Winning her back the way we did with sweat and blood, as opposed to negotiation, was the right choice?
Yes. I fought hardest against the Tide and it's twisted denizens then I have against anyone. I would do it again if the Tide returned tomorrow. I would fight until my sword be naught but red and my arms pain me till I could not use them. If it take me a century to learn it, I will better myself as a fighter till I can drive my Caomhnoir in the very hearts of those who would harm Cyrene.

But do I think that the opinion we should have sued the Tsol'teth for peace, or at least explore any path other then brutal bloody conflict, is a reason we should have attacked people? Not physically, I mean, but in the making of snide comments and remarks that they were, in their heart, Un-Cyrenian. That any who did not share the same fervor for the war to come were little better then the enemy who wished to see us broken, that they were unfaithful to our codes, or were cowards unwilling to do what must be done, and ultimately that they do not belong? The very same reasons any who may share even an inkling of the thoughts I do might not speak, for the fear of being politically and socially crucified by those we call friend.

I shall call no names out, I shall not drag any names through the mud as that is not my intention now, or ever. But it was done, and any who remember these comments know those I speak of. We are a hurt people, we are desperate find our way again and build something back up once more. But we can not reverse time and be the Cyrene from before this, and we cannot spend centuries leaving our wounds to fester as we cry 'Woe is us, for the knife runs deep'. We must build a new Cyrene, one we love just like any other.

Some of the things we did. It was not right, but it was war. But the war is over and Cyrene is centuries old. Although battered, she stands. It's time we act our age.

Ever in Service,
Silver Sentry Venmara

Penned by my hand on the 5th of Aeguary, in the year 822 AF.