Frostbitten Wayfarer

Emma sat in Zoe’s library — Emma’s library? She wasn’t sure where the line was drawn anymore, really. Didn’t really matter anyway, Zoe was barely around anymore. Always off doing whatever she felt like in the moment. She always liked saying she was exploring and discovering the world but after almost two decades, she’s finally leaving the only place she’d been?

Nah, Zoe was impulsive and anxious, but she’d never admit it. It was a little cute at times, hearing her grand explorations of places right around the corner like they were some distant unexplored land. Though, the cave below full of ice was interesting, and something only she and Joe knew about. The rest of the folk living in Foizo might not be so interested in sticking around if they knew what lurked just below them.

Fennel — the little void she’d adopted a few years back was sitting on her lap, nuzzling into her hand and talking about what must have been a very exciting day. Ollie was off somewhere, probably in the bedroom sleeping on the floor she imagined.

The two cats were her life now, and every morning she’d wake up and see the two of them and get excited because darn it, she had little kittens! The cutest little babies anybody’d ever seen.

Sometimes she’d have dreams where she never had a cat, had no memory of the cats. And then she’d wake up to fennel screaming at her and it was like a gracious, albeit somewhat annoying, gift was dropped on her by the gods themselves.

The library was quite nice, and filled with books from Zoe’s efforts before she left. Emma had continued the efforts a little, as had some others for their own libraries. But Kaira library was just frankly enormous. Like, who even knew that many books existed at all? It’s so many books. Has anybody ever read through every single one of the books? Is there, or was there any single person who actually knew every single book in that library?

Cause that’s insane. Even the little library Zoe made was so many books, the bookshelves were almost overflowing with them now and Emma had even started little piles up in the enchanting room. Peter and Lauren said they’d help out with making some more bookshelves at some point, but they had their own things going on anyway. They hadn’t told anybody yet, but Emma was pretty sure they had a baby coming along.

Lauren had a bit of a bump and had been turning down Emma’s invites to go hunting lately, which was unusual. What else could it be than a baby? The first one born in Foizo, which was exciting. That felt like the mark of a proper civilization, right? Like, they were set up enough that bringing new life wasn’t a horribly stupid idea anymore. They had food, they had shelters, and they even had a bit of a government now too.

Doris and Ingrid were joint mayors, while a small council helped manage some of the day to day issues and help advise them on larger problems. Joe and Kiara were both a part of it, along with a few others Emma didn’t know well. Eileen, Elliot and Ernest. Lots of ‘e’ names in town for some reason, Emma thought. Or maybe just on the council.

Their population had made it up into the hundreds a while ago, and the town only continued to grow. In time, Emma knew that the plan was to pay taxes to the Injellar kingdom and get some support. But while the help might be nice someday, for the time being what they needed was money to buy supplies and pay the population. Or something like that anyway, Emma never found the governing stuff very interesting.

She had a place to live, with people she liked. Her cats were safe, and even seemed to enjoy life. There was little more she really wanted. Maybe some windows on the cave, the fire gems were nice but they weren’t sunlight and Emma felt bad about keeping the cats inside so much.

They did have leashes, and Emma took them out for walks a few times every day which they seemed to enjoy sometimes. But some windows would be nice, so they could have somewhere to sit and stare out at the world.

Of course, Zoe never added windows when she built the place because it was supposed to be hidden. But that was hardly a concern these days with so many people seeing Emma come in and out with her two cats every day.

Peter and Lauren offered to build her a home outside, but Emma quite liked staying in Zoe’s little cave. Something about her eventually coming home, and Emma being there to give her a hug was a fun thought that helped pass the time now and then.

Not that she’d been home in almost a year now. The least she could do was send a letter, but that was too much to expect from Zoe. She’d send a letter if she had something to say, but just as a “Hello, how are you doing?” The thought would never cross her mind once she left. Around every turn would be something new and distracting that would take her mind off whatever she left behind.

She said she would send letters when she first left for Gafoda all those years ago, and then never once did. The damn girl was too impulsive for her own good. Maybe she’d be better in another few decades, or maybe she’d just continue on the strange path she’d already been taking towards whatever she was becoming.

Emma shrugged. Didn’t really matter, she loved Zoe either way. Their friendship had been an odd one, but a pleasant one. It started a little rough, and Emma often thought about how different her life would be now if Zoe hadn’t been okay with continuing their friendship after what her mom did.

The school would have been so boring, and Emma wasn’t sure she would have even continued it anyway. The guilt of what happened might have just pushed her to try again next time. She probably wouldn’t have moved out either.

Emma didn’t like what her mom did, but much of that annoyance was spawned because of her friendship with Zoe. She had a bit of an impulsive desire to get out right away, but it was seeing Zoe so often that made that feeling stick.

And without her moving out, her parents might have stayed together as well. She probably wouldn’t have adopted her two little babies, and when Flester was destroyed would probably have just ended up in Korna with her parents.

She wouldn’t have ever met Joe or his misfits as they hated being called these days, wouldn’t have met any of the other people living in Foizo.

They didn’t spend an awful lot of time together these days, but Zoe was an important part of Emma’s life for so many reasons. Maybe she would have been happy in Korna, dressing up in incredible clothing and feeling safe within the well guarded walls.

But she was happy here. There was no maybe, there was no possibility. It had happened, and Emma was enjoying life for what it was.

She looked at her stat sheet. Still stuck at one forty two, which more than confirmed that was her cap. She’d been there for a month now and wasn’t sure what to do. Normally, she’d just take whatever felt best at the time and be happy with it.

But this would probably be the last class she’d ever get, and Zoe’s incessant insistence on perfection for herself had leaked over a bit. What if Emma could get more feats, more skills, more achievements under her belt for her last class?

She pushed the thought aside. This wasn’t the first time she’d fallen down that line of thinking, it’d been an almost daily occurrence since she noticed her level stagnating again. And every time, Emma would ponder it for a while and then decide that she’d take a class when Zoe got back. It’d be fun to have a little class up party again.

But she’d probably have the same thought again tomorrow, and the next day, and the next. Having all that power sitting at her fingertips and not grabbing it was difficult. With just a thought she could take an upgraded version of her Magic Archer class. Or maybe a cat servant class.

Emma put the book she was skimming through down, some story about a powerful dragon to fit in to normal human society but failing at almost every turn. Joe should be coming over to visit soon and Emma wanted to make sure the cats were ready for their walk.

A few minutes of wrestling with the cats to get their harnesses on later, and Emma dragged them out through the front door. The cats prowled around the grass outside looking for bugs and other such vermin, and Joe showed up not long after. Emma handed him Fennel’s leash and they started walking away from the direction of Foizo.

“I’m pretty sure Lauren’s pregnant,” Emma said.

“Oh yeah? She has been seeming a little strange lately.” Joe questioned.

“Mhm. I think so. She’s got a bit of a bump and hasn’t been coming hunting lately.” Emma said.

“Well, don’t say anything about it yet. She might just be sick and putting on weight, too.” Joe said.

“I know, I know. How are the sisters?” Emma asked.

Joe waved his head back and forth uncertainly. “Better, definitely better. They were both already pretty messed up when they got to my inn back in Flester and what happened definitely didn’t help.”

Emma nodded. “Yeah, I can’t blame them. Hopefully they can feel like it’s okay to be happy and safe someday.”

“I hope so. I’m doing my best but I never intended to be a therapist, you know? I had great dreams of wanting to help people who were down on their luck, to be a bit of a springboard for people. But I didn’t realize just how bad things were sometimes. You know what happened with Peter?" Joe asked.

Emma nodded. “More or less. Something with a noble in Korna who hired Peter to train his kid for something, but it just ended up with Peter being a punching bag for both the kid and the parent right?"

“Something like that. I thought when I made The Risen Cask that it would be people like Zoe coming in. Something happened, they needed a place to bounce off of and I could be that place. But it ended up being a home for some people, and it was just a lot more than I thought it was.” Joe said.

Emma looked up at Joe. “Do you regret it?”

“No, not at all. It’s incredible. Things are worse than I thought they were, but that just makes it that much more important for people like me to be around and helping out. I don’t regret it for a second.” Joe paused. “I just regret not recognizing the importance of it earlier, I guess.”

“Can’t go back and change things now. You’re doing good, Joe.” Emma said as they paused for Fennel to investigate a particularly important tree.

“Yeah I know. I’m not really stressed about it, anyway. Life’s good here in Foizo. As good as it can be, anyway. You know we’re thinking of paying the Injellar kingdom soon?" Joe asked.

“I’ve heard about it, but it’s still a ways out I thought?” Emma asked.

“Don’t talk about it much but no it sounds like it’s right around the corner. Businesses are booming, population has skyrocketed, and funds are looking pretty good. We’re thinking we can increase taxes on the wealthier businesses a little and use that to join the Injellar kingdom properly, maybe in the next few months.” Joe said.

“Wow, that’s a lot quicker than I thought. We’ll be a proper town soon then, huh?” Emma asked.

“Seems like it, if things go well.” Joe nodded.

The two continued walking as Fennel and Oliver started pulling them deeper into the forest.

“Do you think Zoe will notice?" Emma asked.

“The town? Be hard not to.” Joe said. “Even for her. Lots of new buildings since she was here, maybe we’ll even have a wall when she gets back.”

“The name.” Emma rolled her eyes. "Of course she’s going to notice the town’s changed.“

Joe laughed. “Ahhh. No, I doubt it. I don’t think most people would, let alone her. You think we should tell her?”

Emma grinned. “We totally should. But first we should get her to say she likes it. Make her say it’s a nice name and then tell her it’s named after her. She’ll be so mad.” She laughed.

“Oh she’ll hate it. But without her, none of this would have been possible so it was only right.” Joe nodded.

“When do you plan to tell her about your latest class?” Emma asked.

“Hmm, I don’t know. I meant to tell her as soon as I saw her, I know she’d be ecstatic about it. But then everything happened and I just forgot to tell her, and then she was gone. I’ll probably tell her when she gets back. When do you plan to take your next class? Your level’s been stagnated for a while now.” Joe questioned.

“I think I’m gonna do it when Zoe comes back. You tell her you’re immortal, I get a new class and who knows, maybe I get to be immortal too. Probably not, none of the ones I have now really stand out as being endless or timeless or something.” Emma said.

“How long do you think it’ll take her to come back this time? I’m betting another couple years, personally.” Joe said.

“I think she’ll be back next year. She pretends she doesn’t mind but you’re old Joe. Look at all that white hair.” Emma laughed.

“You’re not looking so young yourself miss wrinkles.” Joe said.

“Yeah. And she worries about us both too much. She’ll be back next winter at the latest, with her fancy new class as an excuse to make sure we pathetic mortals aren’t dead yet.” Emma said.

“Maybe, but I think she’s going to enjoy Korna a lot.” Joe said.

“The clothes?” Emma asked.

“The clothes.” Joe said.

“Think she’ll get into it?” Emma asked.

“Maybe. Actually, you know what. I change my mind, I’m gonna agree with you. Next winter at the latest, and she’s gonna have some absolutely insane outfits for us to try on.” Joe said.

Emma groaned. “Yeah, probably. I didn’t even think about that.”

Joe laughed.