They made up the lost day by not lingering in the next town, and for the next two weeks, the last two weeks of their time with the Nykimopia Consortium's caravan, Cerise and her family threw themselves into learning everything they could.
For Cerise, the learning mostly focused on Animal Handling and weapons drills. For the first, she took to willing it to remain the general skill, despite how problematic that could be for prerequisites. Cerise wanted to be a [Tamer] and the [Beast Healer] was a good match for her skills. The more general her skill, the more applicable it would be to all the animals she might tame, or be called on to heal. For the fighting skills, Staves was advancing at a good enough rate that she had unlocked the variants of Heavy Blow, Quick Thrust, Sweeping Blow, and Counter Strike specific to Staves. The Natural Weapon Combat, on the other hand, only seemed to progress as she dreamed more fragmentary dreams of her prior life.
Whatever movements the memory fragments gave her felt odd when she tried them, and she felt too self-conscious to practice them in front of the guards. She was most comfortable with practicing punches when she had her brief moments of privacy.
Also, Cerise's attributes took some time to heal from her abuse during the marathon healing of the patrol, but she now had High Focus, Good Stamina and Mana Pools, and a Moderate Health Pool.
----------------------------------------
The caravan arrived, on time, at the Nykimopia Consortium Compound inside the city walls of Va'Treborant. The city seemed massive to Cerise, and the vast press of people made her breath catch in her throat. Her father looked just as intimidated in his own straight-backed way, his eyes scanning their surroundings as if he expected monsters to ambush them at any moment.
Mykhal and her mother, though, had bright-eyed looks of excitement plastered over their faces as they unashamedly tried to take in every new sight.
Cerise felt only a little better once they were safely inside the compound. Gohren took pity on them and had Jens show them where to wait while the caravan was dismantled, beasts led to stables, wagons to be unloaded and then inspected for any damages. The personnel seem to scatter to the ends of this small world.
Several times, harried looking people began in their direction only for Jens to wave them off. Then a man wearing a waist length jacket came over. He went from looking harried to angry as Jens tried to wave him away.
"Just what is going on here, boy?" the man demanded.
"Irregular circumstances, Good Mister. Caravan Master Sanyel is sorting the matter," Jens explained.
"That horse needs to be stabled and the goods unloaded. The cart is inferior --," the man began.
Jens held up his hand. "Beast, cart, and goods contained belong to these good folk. They are not your concern."
The man drew up, highly offended. "I am the Yard Master. Everything in this yard is my concern! And I see Nykimopian kit in that cart! Don't you lie to me, boy!"
Jens' jaw jutted forward, and he put a hand on his sheathed sword.
Cerise spotted Gohren heading their way, and stepped up to lay a hand over the one resting on Jens's pommel. "I see Guard Sergeant Gohren heading our way. Good Mister Yard Master, do you know him?"
The Yard Master turned his glare to Cerise. She felt the wash of an Identify type skill, and the fury in his glare pulled back to make room for curiosity.
Gohren reach them before anyone else spoke up. "Denal, you cranky bastard, stop abusing my guardsmen!" This was delivered in a good-natured tone of voice that turned the Yard Masters sharp tongue on the guard sergeant.
The two bickered good-naturedly for a few minutes, until the Yard Master was calm enough to be properly introduced to Cerise's family. Gohren gave Donal a much abbreviated explanation for their presence among Miss Sanyel's caravan, and departed with Mykhal to get the youth's pay sorted out.
A stupid fear that somehow Mykhal would not come back seized Cerise. She pulled out the grooming kit for Daisy and began brushing her, hoping that filling her hands would empty her fears. That didn't happen, but she at least had a familiar routine to cling to.
Mykhal and Gohren returned around Cerise's sixth pass with the brush. Her Cleansing Aura was great for road dust, but did nothing about shed hair. While Daisy enjoyed it when Cerise bathed her with some water and an active use of Greater Cleanse, she also loved being brushed. Even with the active use of her skill, the mare's mane and tail needed to be hand combed.
Mykhal looked from Daisy to Cerise, and the excitement on his face dimmed. Something more, a quieter, steadier more, took its place, leaving the corners of his lips upturned. He did not need to speak, just hugged her, and Cerise could feel him telling her they were safe. She took a moment to breathe in that unspoken assurance, then put away the grooming kit, to Daisy's dismay.
Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.
While she and Mykhal were having their moment, Gohren sent Jens off to sort out his pay, taking his place.
Not long after that, Miss Sanyel came out of one of the fancier doors on the only building in the compound that was not a stable. It was a measure of their trust that none of Cerise's family hesitated for a moment to leave the horse and cart with everything they owned -- including their coin box -- to Gohren's care when he volunteered.
Miss Sanyel led them into the building from which she had exited, past a receiving room similar to the Hosthelholm Free Lancers Guild, and up a flight of stairs to a room overlooking a larger room filled with trade goods, containers, and people bustling about.
An old man, old enough to be Cerise's grandfather's grandfather, sat behind a large desk. Miss Sanyel introduced him as Mister Mopia.
"Please pardon an old man for not rising." Mister Mopia had a steady voice and steady hands. Cerise's Triage Aura, however, told her of damage to his joints that would be debilitating at his age to fix.
For the conversation that ensued, Cerise and Mykhal kept their mouth shut unless asked a direct question. In those instances, they answered truthfully and as sparsely as they could.
Mister Mopia would not have survived long in Trall Mining Village. Someone of his limited mobility would have been stung by blue wasps or simply have stayed in the snows for too long one winter day, missing until the Spring thaw. Still, the village children had been taught to respect their eldest of elders by speaking little and then loud enough to be heard.
There were nuances to the conversation Cerise could feel eluding her, and at the end of it, Mykhal and her parents put their mark to a contract page, which Mykhal read out for her father's benefit. It was, as far Cerise could discern, an after the happenings statement of the jobs her family performed for Miss Sanyel's caravan, and the terms they had agreed to with Miss Sanyel.
After the signing, Mister Mopia said, "Should you change your minds, and decide to join our consortium, speak with Miss Sanyel. And should our consortium one day reach the Velton Hirsellands, we would be happy to do business with you." He pushed over a modest sized coin box, a half hand tall, a hand deep, and half an arm long. The box had been stained with a simple resin oil and lacked hinges. It was still, for all its simplicity, a sign of wealth that no one in Trall had ever possessed.
Well, perhaps the mine manager or the village head had had a coin box. Everyone else had lived on barter and a fistful of small copper.
Miss Sanyel escorted them back to their cart. Gohren stood guard still, relaxed into his watchful aura.
"Goh," Miss Sanyel said. "May I trouble you to continue your escort just a little bit longer today? There's still the Hirsel's receipts for our friends to claim, and I was thinking of introducing them to the Tradesman's Rest."
Gohren perked up. "You buying?"
Miss Sanyel laughed. "I'll stand the first round."
"Lead on, O Master mine!" Gohren declared with an outrageous flare.
Outside the consortium's compound, and without the whole body of the caravan surrounding them, the mass of people around her became overwhelming to Cerise. Lung infection, worn joints, bruising on bones, malnutrition, dehydration, overworked hearts, glandular imbalances, and a host more of people's problems tugged at Cerise's attention, demanding she heal, and now. Resisting the barrage of injuries and the ill health surrounding her required all of Cerise's focus.
And then a child bounced into her. The boy had a cracked rib, bruises all over, and rot in his newly grown adult teeth. Her hands moved to the will of her skills, and her Heal Wounds skill poured out of her to fix the broken bone, then Heal Diseases burnt out the rot in his teeth, and Heal Toxins forced out the bad food in his belly. Another wave of Heal Wounds restored the bits of tooth lost to the rot, and her Greater Cleanse pulled the water from the air to pull the small "bacteria" that grew diseases from his skin and clothes.
She had taken Slumber and Paralyze for her last two class skill slots. Paralyze held patients still for her delicate surgeries, and Slumber enforced needed rest on the newly healed, who often mistook lack of pain for recovery. Paralyze now kept the boy from running away while she worked. Stabilize fired off to aid his recovery from vomiting, and Block Pain prevented him from feeling the worst of this sped up healing.
When the boy was healed, Cerise's aura pointed her at another hurt soul. Gohren and Mykhal stopped her, held her back from plunging into the crowd. Vaguely, she knew her mother had swept up the boy, and her father had his staff out, looking intimidating as he guarded their cart. Miss Sanyel held onto Daisy's halter. None of them needed healing, but there was so much need on the other side of Mykhal and Gohren.
"Let me through! They're hurting!" She snapped.
Whenever they said didn't matter; they had to let her heal! She didn't even think, which was the problem. She had to heal; they were preventing her. She pushed Slumber at them.
Gohren collapsed.
Mykhal did not. On the contrary, he slapped her. The absolute shock of it, of Mykhal hurting her, blanked her mind, and she could finally hear him.
"Turn off your aura!" He demanded, his voice strong and carrying while not actually yelling.
She started to sputter, but he cut her off with the repetition of his order.
Cerise struggled to pull up her profile, to focus enough on her skill to deactivate her Triage Aura, but when she managed it, the urgency of the demands her skills laid upon her faded. The press to act was still there, but it was more a recognition of need than a ringing alarm spurring her to do anything to quiet it.
"I-ah-eh. It's done," she sputtered out, dazed, but returning to her senses. She looked around herself with confusion, until she spotted Gohren on the ground, Miss Sanyel trying to wake him. Horror at what she had done to her friend soured her guts, and she twisted out of Mykhal's grasp to inspect and heal Gohren, pulling back the Slumber she had pushed on him.
[Dispel] learned. Comprehension assessed at Beginner-0.
Gohren went from unconsciousness to thrusting them out of his way and drawing his dagger as he leapt to his feet. Mykhal pulled Cerise back. After a heartbeat or three spent assessing the situation, Gohren re-sheathed his dagger and scowled as he rounded on Cerise. "What the Abyss was that?" He asked, a roar strangled in his tone.
"I am so sorry!" Cerise said, already crying with her remorse. "I didn't know--! And I had to help--! But you were there--! And I couldn't help--! And I hurt you! I'm so sorry! I am. So. Sorry!" She broke down into unintelligible sobbing.
Gohren's anger faded to irritation. "Rough lesson learned," he grumbled. "You're buying me a round when we get to the Rest."
Cerise nodded, still crying.