Frostbitten Wayfarer

Zoe stood outside Liz’s shop wondering what she should do next. There was of course, a laundry list of things she needed to do. But there was also the entire rest of eternity to do them. It was a strange feeling, she’d come to learn.

At first when she realized her advantage she was excited. She knew it was big, of course. But it hadn’t clicked for her the whole scope of what it meant. Immortality didn’t just mean that she could spend more time getting achievements, stats, and feats. It meant she could spend more time sitting on a park bench doing nothing at all and not worry about whether it was a waste of time.

And that’s just what she decided to do.

When she got to the park, she saw Lynn sitting down at her favourite bench. Lynn was an older lady who came to the park almost as often as Zoe did. They’d spoken a few times, and Zoe found her company for the most part enjoyable.

Zoe stuffed her injured hand in her pant pocket and sat on the bench next to Lynn. The pair sat there in silence for a few hours, watching the birds flutter from tree to tree.

“I wish more people could appreciate this.” Lynn said, turning her head to look at Zoe.

“The birds, you mean?" Zoe asked.

Lynn gestured around her, “everything. Everybody’s always moving so quick, rushing through life. Nobody has the time to just relax and enjoy themselves.” She sighed.

“Well I think everybody’s got their own things to do, you know? Jobs, or family. Or maybe they just want to go train their skills or something.” Zoe said.

“I suppose you’re right. It’s just a shame. Life’s so beautiful.” Lynn said.

“It is. Especially in the winter, I love how bright everything is with the snow on the ground. All the tracks the animals leave through the snow. The smell of the snow, the noise of it crunching below people’s feet. It’s my favourite time of the year.” Zoe said.

Lynn laughed, “Yes, well it would be very unfortunate if somebody lived here and didn’t like the winter.”

They sat for a while longer, watching the snow fall on the park, listening to the birds chirping in the trees.

“Hey, look over there,” Lynn said, pointing at a nearby tree. “I think he fancies her!"

Zoe looked where she pointed and saw two birds on a large branch about halfway up. One of the birds was hopping in a circle around the other, its black wings spread above it in almost a crescent shape. The other bird stood still, its head swivelling around to watch the performance.

Every couple rotations, the flamboyant bird would try and approach, and the other would hop back away from it.

“I don’t think she’s into it yet, he’s gonna have to step up his game.” Lynn said, her eyes glued to the performance.

Lynn and Zoe watched for a couple minutes, the two birds hopping across the branch back and forth. Until one time the male bird leapt at the female bird, landing on her back. The two birds wings fluttered and the male was pushed aside while the female took off, flying to another tree nearby.

“Aww, too bad little guy. You’ll get her next time!” Lynn giggled.

“You like birds, huh?” Zoe asked her.

“Oh yes deary, I do. Love them. Those little ones were Nekhbets. Lovely little things. They mate for life but the females are quite picky. If we’re lucky, we’ll see him try again soon.” Lynn said.

“He’ll just hop right back into it and go for it again? Really?” Zoe asked, watching the male bird preen its feathers on the branch near her.

“Yes, yes. The males can be very persistent you see. It so rarely works out for them but they give it their best shot anyway. Once he’s done cleaning he’ll probably go find a gift to bring her and try again.” Lynn explained.

“A gift?” Zoe asked.

“He might find an interesting twig or stone. Maybe somebody’s hair.” Lynn giggled.

“Like would he just rip out somebody’s hair or find a clump of it on the ground?” Zoe asked.

Lynn giggled some more, “Either way, really. They can be little menaces sometimes. Oh look, here he goes!"

Zoe looked at the bird and he jumped off the branch, falling to the ground with his wings spread. He hopped around on the ground near the tree, picking up little twigs with his beak and tossing them to the side.

Eventually, the bird seemed to get excited over something, jumping in place flapping his wings around. He reached down with his beak and picked up another twig then took off to the tree the female bird flew to earlier.

“What a precious little thing, huh?” Lynn asked.

“Yeah that was cute. I wonder what he saw in that particular stick anyway?” Zoe chuckled.

“Maybe it was pointy in the right way? Who knows what they think. Hopefully that was the right one and she likes it.” Lynn giggled.

“Guess we’ll have to wait and see, huh?” Zoe asked.

“I wish I could but it’s about time I get back. If I let Hector cook dinner we’ll be having burnt venison with a side of poorly cut vegetables.” She shook her head, standing up with a groan.

“Hector’s your husband?” Zoe asked her.

“Have I not told you about him? Remind me next time we’re here. He’s a lovely man, just can’t cook if his life depended on it.” She smiled.

“I will, hope you make it home in time then.” Zoe said, looking back to the tree the birds flew to.

Lynn laughed, stretching her back. “I think I will dear, I think I will. Keep an eye on those little birds for me will you?”

“Sure thing, Lynn. I’ll tell you how it goes sometime.” Zoe said.

“Thanks, dear. Have a nice day now.” Lynn said, walking off down the path giggling to herself.

Zoe watched the male bird land on a branch next to the same female bird from earlier. He dropped his stick in front of her then hopped back and bowed his head. The female bird look at the stick and poked at it with her beak, then bowed to the male bird as well.

He jumped into action, his wings spreading out in the same crescent shape as he bounced in circles around her. She seemed less averse to his play this time, though she’d still hop back every so often.

Eventually, the male leapt at the female again, and their wings tussled as they tumbled around on the branch. But this time instead of the female taking off alone, the male followed along with her to a distant tree.

Zoe decided to stop watching then. The ritual was interesting to her, but she’d have to get up and walk around, try to find them again if she wanted to continue watching. And she wasn’t sure she wanted to see what was next anyway. Or maybe that was what the tussling was? She wasn’t really sure how birds worked.

It was a relaxing day for Zoe, which surprised her. She’d seen documentaries on birds before, watched their mating rituals on the internet or television, but never in person. It added so much, seeing it all in person. Watching the birds hop around herself, hear their chirping and cawing for herself.

She could get into it, she thought. Maybe not every day, or even every month. But she had plenty of time to sit and watch the birds sometimes, too. She sat back and relaxed, letting the sounds of nature wash over her as the evening drew on, until her stomach grumbled.

Dinner time, she thought.

Most restaurants were inaccessible to her she’d found over the last month. It made sense though. In such a cold environment most people wanted to be inside, surrounded by warmth and walls that kept the wind off them.

Unfortunately for Zoe, that was something she had to avoid. Her options were few and far between, the sandwich shop that Joe took her to was one. It had a roof, but Zoe didn’t think it was large enough to count as a shelter. Easy enough to get food and leave too, if she needed.

Then there was the food court that she found a while ago. It was decent enough food but greasy food was only tasty some of the time. The rest of the time it was bloating and made her feel gross.

And her final option was to pick a random restaurant and hope they did takeout. Usually, they didn’t, but she kept trying. Each new restaurant would get added to her ever growing list of weirdo accessible restaurants.

The list was rather short still, only two restaurants on it. One was a nice restaurant with plenty of rice dishes and another that served something reminiscent of pizza. It was more of a flat, tough bread with cheese melted on the top. But it was close enough.

For today, she felt like grabbing some greasy food. She’d had an exciting day yesterday and wanted to celebrate by gorging herself on garbage. Healthy? Maybe not, but she was a half vampire now. She had no idea what that really meant for her diet, but either way she lived a very active life these days.

She got up and walked down the road towards the food court. She kept an eye out for the disintegration mage who wandered around cleaning the streets just in case, but he was either not at work today or in another part of the city.

The food court was bustling with activity, people advertising their stalls and others sitting and munching on food. Zoe walked up to her favourite fried chicken stall. Fried ryz, really, but ryz were just chickens from what Zoe had heard. Very big chickens, with horns. That also produced milk. Zoe tried not to think about it too much, it was just tasty fried chicken.

She grabbed a box of fried ryz for twelve copper from that stall then waited in line at a bakery’s stall. They showed up every night to sell whatever they couldn’t sell that day at a discounted price, and Zoe often stopped by to pick up a late night snack.

They had a couple of sweet pastries for sale and a bunch of different buns of varying shades of brown with specks of different colours littered throughout them. Zoe picked out a light pastry with some kind of pink fruit slices laid on top of it for another ten copper and sat down at one of the empty tables.

The fried ryz was crispy and moist, the white meat inside tender and perfectly cooked. The batter they dipped the ryz in was seasoned well, too. Just the right amount of salt with a nice spicy kick mixed in. The stall had a sweet dipping sauce they offered too, but Zoe wasn’t a huge fan of it. Sweet and spicy was a good combination, but they took it too far with the sweet, she thought.

She finished her fried ryz and turned to the fruit pastry that had been staring at her the entire time. The pastry was square, about a centimeter thick, and rather brittle. The edges crumbled as she handled it, leaving dark crumbs of pastry on the napkin it was resting on.

Zoe bit into it. The pastry itself was buttery and light, each layer of it crunching between her teeth. The pink fruits on top were soft to the point of almost being spreadable, with a delightful sweetness.

Maybe she should take up cooking, she thought. There were so many new ingredients to work with here that all seemed so interesting to her. And besides, she needed more skills anyway. Cooking might be a good one.

She finished off her pastry and stretched. This was a nice day, Zoe felt. But being immortal was no excuse to not take advantage of opportunities she had. It was time to find the disintegration mage and hold his hand for a while. She chuckled to herself as she stood.

Flester at night in the dead of winter was an interesting sight. Most people stayed inside their homes or inns, and the town was quiet. Snow fell, covering the roads and alleys in a soft white blanket. Until the groups of snow clearers wandered nearby, at least. Most of the groups were near silent, at most a distant sizzling as the snow was destroyed through somebody’s magic.

But some of them were quite noisy. Rocks scraping along the ground, crushing the snow into oblivion. There was even the odd person just shovelling snow by hand into a giant bag they dragged along behind them.

And then they would pass, and the silence would return as though it were never broken to begin with.

Zoe wandered around looking for the disintegration mage again for a few streets before she gave up — there was no guarantee they’d be out right now anyway, and instead approached the first group she saw. They were another pair, one of the mages gathering the surrounding snow to a ball in front of them. The other would cast some spell and the ball would vanish with a dull whooshing sound.

[Mage - ??]

[Mage - ??]

“Excuse me?” Zoe asked them.

“Yes?” The second mage responded.

“I met a group a week ago, they were a water mage and disintegration mage combo. One of them gathered the snow and pushed it into a light disintegration barrier the other maintained around themselves. I’m just wondering if you happen to know them?" Zoe asked.

“Hmmm,” the mage tilted their head and thought for a moment. They looked to the other mage, “Do you think that was Ash and Lila?”

The other mage nodded their head, “Sounds like them to me, at least.”

“Ash and Lila?” Zoe asked.

“Mhm, nice couple. They could be doing a lot more for themselves, but they always help out every winter. Why do you need them?” The first mage asked.

“Oh I just wanted to maybe find them again if you knew where they worked or something?” Zoe asked.

“Normally they’re out in the early afternoon near the eastern wall. You could go check out there tomorrow maybe? I hope you don’t take offense but I’m not sure they’d want me telling a random stranger where they live, sorry.” The second mage said.

“No, no that’s already super helpful. I totally understand. Thanks a bunch! Sorry to keep you from your work.” Zoe said.

“No problem, good luck tomorrow.” They said, carrying on removing the snow as they walked down the road.