The morning following the revelation of Tim’s indecisiveness, there came a storm that lingered over the mountain we kobolds called our home and poured rainwater through the opening to our city. The younger kobolds who had not seen rain were all amazed by the event while older folks simply trudged through the downpour with grim determination to reach their day jobs. My brothers were in a middle category being both intrigued by the change in atmosphere while also remaining some degree of maturity as they waited beside me for the cargo lift to return from down below. Perhaps it was the melancholy atmosphere following the weather or maybe the guilt over mistreating my beloved roly-poly pet, but for whatever reason I let my head hang low as I carried Tim in my arms as I rode the lift down to the scribe’s hall.
My arrival to the tunnel of the hall led to me facing down an entire horde of irate scribes shambling back up the tunnel towards the lift, which made me wonder what was going on. Raevu was there by the door reading a note posted on the wall just adjacent to the entrance, a look of confusion evident on her face. I approached and cocked an eyebrow at her, to which she replied silently with a finger pointed at the note. A single sheet of parchment written in the unmistakably elegant script for the Head Scribe himself.
“Due to the increased likelihood of harsh weather conditions, an inspection of the hall to ensure that there will be no leaks is currently underway. No entry will be permitted for the remainder of the day. Crutch pay in effect. Signed - Scribe Master Faerkurch”
Great, so I rode down the lift in the pouring rain only to find the door locked and a note telling me to go home: not the worst way I’ve ever found out that I had the day off, but also not the best either. Actually, there was a bit of water pooling just a few feet away down the tunnel despite this place being one of the deepest parts of the city, so maybe the elder in charge of the one place where our city’s knowledge and trade records had the right idea of having the hall given a thorough inspection. Regardless, it seems as though I have the day to myself, and since I wasn’t in the mood for moping about back home I decided it was best to go and visit the clinic and see how Vimna is doing. I adjusted my grip on my pet and moved back down the tunnel towards the elevators and noticed that Raevu was right behind me at just a tail’s length. Shooting her a questioning expression earned me an awkward explanation stammered by her.
“I…I have nothing to do now, so I wanted following you because we friends and you always do interesting things. I can follow you, right?”
Like you even need to ask! I jerked my head to the side in a way to signal her to follow me, then hastened back to the elevator caught in the downpour. Since the only person who had the authority to operate the lift was currently gone we had to settle for one of the automatic civilian lifts, which felt incredibly slick and dangerous to ride on due to the dusty water pouring over the edge of the mountain’s opening. Both of us held a white-knuckled grip on the barebones railing all the way up to the floor we were waiting on, and as soon as the ride was over we scrambled out of the rain’s reach and shook ourselves dry almost as a dog would shake off water. The two of us were both shivering as we jogged our way through two flights of wet stairs and the passage leading to Tuleni’s.
Not wanting to disturb the patients that were beyond the door, my friend and I silently slid into the room by only opening the door just wide enough for us to slip through. A blessed warmth filled the spicy-aired clinic, and an almost festive sort of feeling crept into my soul as something almost like cinnamon and nutmeg entered into my nostrils. There were half a dozen red kobolds sitting around the room in varying states of activity, a few other multi-colored individuals I identified as the other recent recipients of the draconic blessing, and one gargantuan doctor off to the side pruning one of the shrubs near the wall. Huh, wasn’t Tokols supposed to be here today?
My question was answered as I felt a handful of twig-like structures drift over my scalp and land on the floor, which prompted me to look up and see the brother in question hanging from one of the branch-like roots above me pruning at a withered section of Wilter’s canopy with a pair of small shears. Raevu’s gaze followed my own, leaving the two of us standing there watching as another cluster of sticks came clattering to the floor followed by the apprentice healer himself a moment later with a louder thud. He stuck the landing nicely, so both of us gave him a small round of applause much to his surprise. He swiftly changed from shock at our arrival to gleefully greeting us and welcoming us into the clinic.
“Kayrux and Raevu, welcome! I just finished the morning pruning of Wilter here while Tuleni took care of her herbs. Wait a minute…why are you two here and not at the scribe hall?”
My hands were proccupied with Tim at the moment, so it fell upon Raevu to respond.
“The hall is closed now while Faerkurch looks for leaks. This rainfall dangerous for scrolls and book, and I hear there was leak year ago that made him lose months of records.”
Tokols nodded along in understanding as he scratched his chin with a single claw.
“Yeah, that makes sense. The clinic doesn’t have that problem thanks to Wilter’s roots drinking up all the water, and if you put your ear up to his trunk you can actually hear all that liquid moving inside of him instead of splashing the patients. Speaking of the patients, I take it you’re here to visit someone, right Kay? Well good news, she’s up and active right now if you want to talk to her. Come and follow me.”
All of the mopey feelings that had been bogging me down since this morning evaporated in an instant upon hearing this news. For the past few days I had been told that she was lingering on the edge of consciousness, but every time I asked if it were alright to see her Tuleni would relay through my brother that it was best if they were left alone. This left a bad taste in my mouth, as it was the same sort of half-lie she had used on Juaki in order to keep her distant from me when I was on the verge of dying. Thinking back a little further, wasn’t this also the same as when we were isolated following our own ritual, with the exception of Tokols who had received a head injury? If this was true, then the infant mortality rates of our kind left much to be desired.
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
Pushing that morbid line of thinking aside, I decided to instead focus on the positive aspect of what this news meant. Vimna was alive and well, waiting for me just a few paces ahead, and would undoubtedly come hurtling at me like a living missile the moment she laid eyes on me. My brother didn’t lead us to one of the cots or any of the other red kobolds around the room, but instead led us to the back room where Tuleni would make her potions. The aroma of spices grew stronger as we approached the threshold, and the minty smell of the tea that Tuleni would brew joined the mix as we entered. Sitting at the table with a book and a cup of tea was my beloved lab assistant, whose eyes told of weariness and pain despite her widening smile at my arrival.
“Kayroo, I’m so happy to see you!”
Before she could try and stand up I set Tim aside on the table and came over to her, wrapping my arms around her as she nuzzled into my collar bone as she usually did. All of that worrying I had pushed to the back of my mind was unleashed all at once which forced me to grimace in order to not cry or get too emotional on her. A deep breath as I pressed my cheek into the top of her head was enough to reassure me that things were alright now and that she was just fine. Well, almost fine that is.
Something about her felt…off. Before the ritual her source was small and simple like a little ball of tightly knit mana threads holding their shape in a firm sphere, but now it was like seeing that same structure had been unwoven and messily clumped together into a rough mess of tangled lines and knots. Was this what the dragon’s blood was made to do, to restructure one’s source in order to push it towards some kind of improved form? If so, the current state of her source was a clear indication that it either did a poor job or was taking its time in getting things organized. Gosh, I can only imagine how awful she must feel if her insides are all jumbled up like that.
I stepped back and held her at arms length as if to inspect her and see if my theory was correct, and sure enough there were plenty of signs that the poor girl was still in a rough patch. She had flaky scales, bags under her bloodshot eyes, an unusually high body temperature, and to top it all off she winced any time there came a loud noise from the other room. I remember how it felt like my head was coming apart at the seams for a week, and having a broken leg did little more than create inconveniences as the pain in my joints and mana lines dwarfed the fractures bones tenfold. Well, at least she had Tuleni here with a massive supply of pain medication on hand, which is a lot more than I had available to me.
I’m no medical expert, nor am I some wise sage capable of truly knowing what the magic tangles in her source meant, but as far as I could tell she was still good. That warm smile of her was more than enough to put even the uneasy feelings to rest, enough so that I was comfortable enough to take a seat next to her while keeping a hand on her shoulder. Her inquisitive eyes flicked from me to Raevu eagerly, and it was only then that I realized I hadn’t introduced the two. Lucky for me, my best friend was way ahead of me on the intro.
“Hello, I am Raevu, friend of Karyux. I not mean to interrupt your nice reunion, I just wanted follow along and keep her company.”
A little chuckle slipped through the massive grin on Vimna’s face as she set her book to the side.
“Kayroo tells me lot about her good friend Raevu, and I glad finally meeting you! You not interrupt anything since I was going to ask if you want to share tea drink with me. Miss Tuleni is very nice healer and has good drink and she even let me stay in here where it is quiet. Is okay if you sit too, we can all talk together and be good friends!”
Raevu fidget awkwardly for a moment before acknowledging her request by taking a seat across from her and pouring herself a cup of the minty tea. Meanwhile, I was trying my best not to openly clutch at my chest at the absolute adorableness of this sweet little girl’s kindness. Seriously, where did she get all of this kindness? Dobo was an alright guy to an extent and as far as I could tell Gyloa was a very reserved woman despite her apparent kindness, so where did this overabundance of cheer and charm come from? Whatever the source, I was just glad that she was happy being herself.
Vimna and Raevu surprised me, as the two of them seemed to have some underlying appreciation for the other about what they meant to me. My effort to teach Vimna to read despite my inability to speak resounded with Raevu, and the retelling of how my determination to show my sympathy for the loss of a sibling to Raevu in her darkest hour almost drove Vimna to tears. From there the topic drifted away from me and switched to things the two of them wished to know about the other, which worked as the perfect smokescreen for me to give them some privacy. I don’t know why, but hearing them talk about me in such a good light was such an off-putting thing, as if my brain refused to acknowledge that it was me being talked about there. Even if there was something I wished to say, it wasn’t anything my slate was going to convey easily.
Maybe my old habit of baking could come into play right about now, since it seemed that Tuleni kept a lot of the necessary ingredients on hand in her backroom kitchen and apothecary lab. My hands went into autopilot and began making something as my mind wandered into the emotions I was currently struggling to process. They appreciated me, I appreciated them, and I didn’t know how to explain it any better than to exhume one of my skills lying dormant from my Earth life. I didn’t ever bake for anyone else back then as it was more of just something that one of my foster parents had taught me to do, but something about those words about conveying emotions through art stuck around even after all these years and drove me to just make something for them. It didn’t really matter then, but it was only now that her name came back to me. Thank you Sharon, for both the years you put up with me and for the emotional outlet you gave me.
My mind finally returned to the physical world once I had finished making some kind of dough, which upon tasting was vaguely like a sweet spongy bread. My hands were fiddling around with what looked to be Tuleni’s big copper drum that was supposed to be an oven, and it was only after regaining my senses that I realized that it was a magic powered device of some kind that had a silver lined handle for powering it. I placed my hands on the lever and let some of my mana flow into it through a limiter rune, but my eyes locked on the current as it flowed into a rune I hadn’t seen before that was somehow making heat by causing some kind of friction on the baking sheet itself. Neat, but I’m not in the mood for magic-science right now, so I will only take a mental snapshot of the rune and just let it do its work.
My mind started slipping back into some of my human memories when a sniffing sound drew my attention to the oven. Some of Vimna’s siblings, Tokols, and two of the other patients had crept into the room around the conversation beside me and were eyeing the stove with gluttonous curiosity. The gaggle of kobolds looked up at me with puppy eyes in order to beg for whatever it was that I had made, and giving in to their demands I had my brother take over as the power supply for the oven while I made a second batch. The first batch had just come out of the oven and were devoured by the pack of scavengers when more scaly heads peered around the corner, which meant a third batch was in demand. Batch two were gone just the same when Tuleni strode into the room and lent me her aid, only for a majority of batches four and five to go to her alone.
Somehow I had lost track of the situation and now everyone in the main clinic room was instead piled up in here as Vimna read a tale from her book aloud while I took a much deserved rest on one of Wilter’s roots coiled in the corner. Raevu sat beside me and held my drink for me as I tossed my head back in exhaustion. Despite the soreness in my limbs, this wasn’t entirely bad, and had actually been kinda fun to make happen. Faerkurch should cancel work more often, that or I should open up a bakery of my own. What a rainy day this had turned out to be.