The next week starts off with a flurry of activity. I spend the day frantically working at the bar, trying as hard as I can to learn everything I need to know to help Matthew. Normally, kids start training for a job when they're ten years old, and training lasts a few years, until they become adults at fifteen years old. I only have a week. And at my age, there's only so much I can do... We go over cooking and cleaning that very first day, but it's hard because I can't reach the counters very well, so I need to stand on a box to work. Matthew seems like a nice person, but he's really strict when he's teaching me about how each thing should be cleaned, and how to set them all so they'll dry quickly and can be used again. Apparently all the plates and mugs patrons use need to be washed after each use, because it's a known fact that sharing them leads to illness. I've never heard anything like that before though. When I ask about it, he says he has no idea why, but that's how it is. But I take every word to heart, trying to get up to speed.
When customers start arriving for lunch, only a short time into my first day of training, I end up running around frantically, trying to get food to customers, clear away their mugs and plates, get dishes washed, and anything else I'm able to do. I make absolutely sure to check on Aria a few times throughout the day though. At least she only needs help using the chamber pot once.
With so much work, I end up making all sorts of mistakes, like taking food to the wrong tables, not cleaning things right, and tripping and spilling things in my haste. Each time, Matthew reprimands me sternly, and all I can do is stare at the floor and promise to do better. By the time the eleventh bell rings and I need to leave to make it home before curfew, I'm ready to fall over with exhaustion. I had no idea it would be this hard when I volunteered, but I have to keep doing everything I can. That's when a messenger arrives, apparently sent by Eryk, with food for Aria.
I didn't realize that would also be starting today, but it makes sense. She needs to eat and rest. I thank the messenger for the food and take it into the back. It's some sort of food I don't even recognize, with all of the stuff inside cut up into tiny little pieces. I sniff it a little and it smells... I don't even know. Kind of biting maybe? It isn't a scent I'm familiar with at all. Even so, I feed it to Aria, then make sure she is settled in for the night before leaving.
With the extra time that took up, I have to run home, flying up North Main Street as fast as my legs will carry me, to make it back just barely by the twelfth bell. I end up collapsing in the doorway, whispering, "Safe," to myself. It takes a while before I'm able to stand again. Once I do, I stagger to the dining room, shovel down the nasty dinner the orphanage serves, and fall into bed. As I drift off, I realize I didn't even see my friends today.
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The next day isn't that much better. More training, more work, and more checking in on Aria. Matthew lets me stop briefly to feed her whenever Eryk's messenger arrives with food, and around the middle of the day, I give her the next dose of medicine, despite her protests. Even the smell turns my stomach, so I continuously praise her for taking it. Not long after, Matthew lets me eat lunch again. I accept the wonderful food happily, but then it's right back to the brutal pace of work. He starts going over the different foods and how he prepares them every day so that everything will be ready for lunch and the late night dinner rushes. Keeping it all straight takes every bit of concentration I have, but I still end up messing things up when I try to do them myself.
I barely arrive home again before the twelfth bell, to an annoyed Mister Fredricson. I have to tell him I was busy with something today, and that's why I couldn't go to the forest.
I completely forgot, since I'm not bringing anything home, I don't get to eat dinner or breakfast, and end up going to bed hungry. I wake up at the first bell on Venaday. Two days in and I've already run into a problem. If I don't bring anything from the forest, I won't get food. I can't make it through this without any food. Even if I told him I got a job, I'm not making any money, so that's no good either. Besides, if I just stop going to the forest, he might get suspicious, and he can't know about Aria until she's healed enough to talk. There's only one solution I can think of, so I grab my thread and knife, and get going for the day. I head to the bar and desperately ask Matthew if I can leave a little earlier. Just half a bell should be enough.
When he asks why, I explain how I don't get any food at the orphanage if I don't bring anything home, and how Mister Fredricson will get suspicious. "Please, I'll even bring some of the hobins I catch!" I promise.
"Hobins?" Matthew blinks. "You can catch hobins?" I nod emphatically. "But how much could you really catch in a half-bell?" He asks skeptically.
"It'll be fine, I have a plan," I assure him.
"Fine, but no slacking off," he says pointedly.
"Yes, sir!" I respond, and we get back to work. When I check on Aria, I ask her for help. I can't do this all on my own. Even if she's completely out of it, Maven should still be able to help, right? She happily agrees. She'll have Maven catch hobins so I can collect them at the end of the day.
With that settled, it's back to the manic pace of learning and working, while also taking care of Aria. At least she can help too, even if it's not in person. When Eryk's messenger arrives with food, I ask them to pass on a message to deliver Aria's last meal earlier. I go on to feed her, and force her to take her medicine again. Even so, by the time my shift is ending a little after the tenth bell, I'm so tired I could fall over. The last meal of the day arrives for her, and I feed her before saying thanks to Matthew for everything and running out of the bar.
I only have about one and a half bells to get everything done, so I run as fast as I can toward the gate. When I arrive, the guards warn me that it's getting late, but I breathlessly tell them I won't be out that long. They don't look convinced, and more than a few seem worried, probably because I'm drenched in sweat and fighting for breath. Even so, I continue on to the forest. I go in the direction of Maven's burrow, though I don't know its exact location. But before I make it very far, he suddenly shows up in front of me.
Maven leads me over to a nearby tree where the unconscious hobins are waiting. He even caught eight of them today. I hardly have any time to pet him in thanks though. I'm on an incredibly strict time limit. Even as I'm thinking that, the eleventh bell rings. I rapidly dress the hobins, trying not to let my shaking hands trip me up. Then I tie them up to a small branch, and begin running back toward the city. When I show up at the gate again, holding a whole bunch of hobins, the guards look absolutely dumbfounded, but I don't have time to deal with that. By the time I'm at the central market, I'm staggering and my legs are burning from running so much.
I reach the table where the merchant buys hobins. He looks concerned, probably because I'm ready to fall over, but I tell him I'm fine. As for how many hobins to sell... I stare at them. After all the frantic running, I have no idea what to do. I ask him to wait a bit while I figure it out.
It's difficult to think.
Four hobins for the orphanage, so I should sell two of those. Four hobins for me, but I promised some to Matthew. How many does he want?
I try to think back to how much food he's making every day...
This is too much work, I'll just keep mine.
I sell two on behalf of the orphanage, and keep the rest. The stallkeeper looks very confused when I keep so many but doesn't question it. I thank him and quickly leave. As soon as I make it out of the central plaza, I keep running. I might have a little more than half a bell left to make it home, but now it's even harder while carrying the hobins. It's not that they're that heavy, I'm just so tired...
Despite my efforts, I can't keep up the same pace, my legs are just too tired. The twelfth bell rings, just before I make it into the house. I stumble through the front door, and just slide down to the floor. My head is swimming as I sit down, just trying to breathe and recover my energy. I can't keep this up, can I? No matter how hard I push myself, my body isn't going to be able to take it. At some point, Mister Fredricson walks past and sees me sitting on the floor in the entryway. He didn't see me come in late, so I'm safe for today. He raises an eyebrow at me, but keeps walking. Eventually, I wobble back to my feet, drop the hobins on the table, and give him his money while he's still standing in the dining room. He eyes the four hobins I still have and narrows his eyes. "You seem busy lately," he comments.
"I've just... been working hard..." I reply tiredly. When he doesn't say anything else, I go over to the dining room table. The food is already getting cold. Somehow, it actually gets even more disgusting than usual. I just shovel it into my mouth and swallow it all down. I need the energy. I grab the stick with hobins and carry them slowly upstairs before collapsing into bed again. The other girls look worried, but there's nothing I can say to reassure them. I can't let on anything about Aria until she's in a condition where she can actually talk to anyone. But will I last through the week? If I was bigger and stronger, like Andy, I probably could. But I'm not even ten yet, this much work might just be too much for me. I need more energy... As I'm half asleep, the answer presents itself, just as I'm beginning to drift away for the night. That should work, right?
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Saraday comes. I drag myself out of bed at the first bell again. Matthew said that even in a lower class bar like his, I need to at least try to be somewhat cleaner than a low class peasant, so I change into my cleanest clothes. I have a plan for today, so I grab my basket and leave the orphanage. I head out through the North Gate, walking over to the spot where I found Aria the other day. I search through the grass in the area around that spot. It's been a few days, but I doubt anyone has even been past here, there's nothing but the northern border in this direction.
After some searching, I manage to find the metal ingots scattered all around. I can't find the glass though. She should have brought it with her, right? Most likely wrapped up in something, so it would be a lot harder to find than the larger ingots. I keep searching, finally managing to spot it. I sigh, relieved that it was here after all, but then the second bell rings. That took a lot longer than I expected, so I quickly hurry back to the orphanage to eat breakfast before I head out.
Today, I take the basket with me too, loaded with Aria's things, and the hobins. When I arrive at the bar, I give the hobins to Matthew. "I don't know how many you need, these are the ones I got to keep yesterday," I tell him. He looks surprised, but then starts praising me.
"Good job, Emily. I can make some good food with these!" He rubs my head and I can't help but smile. Even though he's strict, he's really nice.
"I'll get more again today," I say.
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"Sure," he replies with a smile.
Before getting to work, I go check on Aria, dropping the basket by her bed. "Hey, Aria," I wake her gently again. The color in her cheeks is already a lot better than when I picked her up outside the gate. All of her injuries are still bandaged so I can't really check her wounds. Matthew has been changing the bandages, it seems. The way they're wrapped looks a little bit more rough than when the doctor did it. While I help her use the chamber pot, I speak to her quietly.
"Aria, I got your stuff. Do you need more earth mana?"
"No, I kind of think it doesn't work like that now." What doesn't work like what? She grins at me sleepily though, so I drop it.
"Also... could you give me some fire mana?" She tilts her head to the side a little, so I tell her, "The work here has been really hard. It would give me more energy to make it through the days, right?"
"Yeah, sure!" she beams at me. Once she's done, I set her back in bed and grab the nuvrite and ignium from the basket. Holding the ignium close, I lightly touch the nuvrite to her skin while keeping a hand on her forehead. Without warning, my built up fatigue from the last few days suddenly lifts and I feel full of energy again. "It won't keep you going forever, but that much fire mana should help a lot. Just be careful about getting angry, ok?"
"Yeah, I'll be careful." I assure her while I'm putting all the metal back in the basket. "I'm going to work now, I'll be back to feed you later, ok?"
"Mm. Thanks a lot Emily."
"Thank you too. I can only keep this up because of the help with the hobins." She grins in response.
"I'll do my best today! Even Myra says she wants to help!"
"Myra...?" I mumble the unfamiliar name. I guess she did make more animals like Maven after all. But I have work to do, so I just pat her head for a bit until she goes to sleep again. Then I stand with renewed strength, ready to go.
Time flies as I work frantically. It isn't long until Eryk's messenger arrives with Aria's breakfast. Like all the other food, it's still stuff I can't even recognize by scent or taste when I touch a little to my tongue. It does taste really good at least. Of course Aria likes it, but she likes everything. And it's high class food, so it should be really good for her.
Then it's back to work. Matthew even has me draw a bunch of buckets of water from the well nearby, one after another. He says it's for a hobin stock. When I tell him I don't know what that is, he goes into a whole lesson on food bases and types of stock. I desperately try to remember it all for later. The main point seems to be that you can get much better food when you start with good stock.
He takes me through a number of new recipes and has me cut up a bunch of vegetables too, between runs out to the well and cleaning tables in the bar. Before I know it, the sixth bell rings and we stop for our lunch, earlier than most people in town, since there's always a crowd at the seventh bell when they eat lunch. Today, Matthew serves food that he explains was made with the hobin stock he's been making today. It's nothing like the food we made with hobins! Instead of everything just tasting a little better and there being a few chunks of meat here and there, it's like he got all of the flavor out of the meat to make the food even better than it already was.
While I marvel at it, Matthew explains how he made it. He says it's a mixture of boiled hobin meat and bones, sholly, and a number of different vegetables, like carrots and fran to deepen the flavor. He points out that adding the bones into the stock with the meat is essential to bringing out the full flavor, but they need to be taken out later, and you want to add some sela to pull any of the scummy flavor out that the bones introduce. "But isn't sela really bitter?" I ask. It's normally only used for medicine because it tastes terrible.
"That's why it needs to be pulled out too, so it doesn't make the stock too bitter."
"Huh..." I stare at the food. There's so much that goes into good food that I never knew before. Then I give him a big nod, and he continues to explain while we eat. Soon after we're finished, Eryk's messenger arrives and I feed Aria before the lunch rush. I also give her the last of the three cups of medicine Beth prepared. Today she doesn't protest as much, but even her crazy amount of earth mana can't keep her from pouting when I open the medicine. So I make sure to praise her a lot when she drinks it, to get her to start smiling again.
"No fair, I can't help but be happy when you do that..." Aria complains, even while she giggles and blushes happily at the praise. I can't help but laugh with her while I pat her head. She's always been so sulky, it's nice to see her laughing, even if it's kind of forced like this. Once I put her back to bed, I head back to the front for the lunch rush.
It's another flurry of activity, serving, cleaning, trying to cut things to help with the food, and anything else Matthew asks me to do. Some of the customers laugh when they see me working so hard and pat my head. I'm not sure if they're being sincere or making fun of me though... Either way, I do everything I can, all the way through the end of my shift, when I feed Aria once more before thanking Matthew and running out of the bar. I carry the four hobin skins with me though, since he can't use them. I'll sell them with the hobins I collect today. Even with the fire mana Aria gave me, I'm still pretty tired. But at least I don't feel like I'm about to collapse this time. I run all the way out of the city and into the forest. By the time I make it there, my breathing is heavy.
This time, Maven meets me practically at the edge of the forest. It makes me worry about him being seen, but I'm sure he scouted the area first, like he started doing after we were followed that one time. But today... Maven stands with his front paws clasped together, bowing like Aria does, over and over again. He's... sorry? He lowers his head and leads me over to... What is this?!
My mouth falls open at the sight. Besides two dozen hobins, there are five rechits and... is that a goat?! Where did that even come from?!
Maven just keeps bowing apologetically. Didn't Aria say some animal of hers would be helping today? Just what sort of animal is it? "Aah fine! I'll just do it!" I shout to raise my spirits. Pulling out my knife, I rapidly tear down the animals one after another. Now that I've done rechit already, I dress them quickly as well. I go right into the goat too, even though I hardly have any idea what I'm doing. Though... doesn't this goat have big fang marks on its throat? Seriously, what sort of terrifying creature did Aria tame? But when I feel for a pulse, it's still barely alive, so at least it won't be spoiled...
As soon as I finish with the animals, I string up the hobins and rechit, but the goat is a whole different matter. The thing is almost as big as I am! Gritting my teeth, I tie it upside down on a long stick, two feet at each end, and lay it across my shoulders. Heaving it with all of the smaller animals, I struggle forward as fast as I can, back toward the gate. The eleventh bell already rang while I was dressing them. At my current pace, there's no way I'll make it back before curfew! Overcome with terror, I force my legs forward under the heavy load.
When I pass back through the gate, the guards are all staring at me. They start to mutter between themselves, saying things like 'didn't she just leave?' and 'where did she find that?' I just ignore them, keeping all my focus on the ground in front of me as I move as fast as my overburdened legs will carry me. When I reach the meat buying stall, my vision has started to go blurry, and I feel like I'm going to collapse under the load. Both the man and boy behind the counter just stare at me with their jaws on the ground. Actually, I think everyone around me has the same looks. All I can do is heave the animals up onto the counter though, falling to my knees as soon as the weight is lifted.
"A-are you alright?" the man stammers, waving his hands.
"Just tired. Have to get home before curfew," I answer stupidly. It's hard to think.
"R-right..." he responds. I take a few breaths, willing my energy to return. I'm sure it's thanks to the fire mana, but it quickly surges back as soon as I rest for a bit. Pulling myself back up to my feet as soon as I can stand, I look at the pile of animals. I have to do this fast.
"Twelve of the hobins are mine..." I frown. Can I do this much math? It's even harder than usual, now that I'm tired. I pull half of the hobins to one side, then pull two out of that pile. "Two for the orphanage, ten to sell. I guess I'll bring half of mine to the bar, so that's six of mine I'm selling..." Looking over all of the animals, I realize that without Aria, I won't be able to add up and divide out all the money properly. "Could I sell these ten first?" I ask while pushing the pile forward.
"Sure," the man nods, and sets twenty copper coins down on the counter.
"Then these six?" He collects them, placing down more coins, which I push into a separate pile. After selling them, I realize I still have the furs from the first four, and sell those two. At one copper each, they are worth four total.
"I'll sell all of the rechits, so... Two and two?" I push them forward in separate piles. He places down two piles of eight coppers each. The last rechit gets split, two coppers into each pile. If it's like this, even I can do it! "Last is, uhh... a goat? How much is this worth?"
"Uhh..." the merchant just stares at it briefly. "I guess..." Does he not know? "How about we say..." It looks like he's sizing up the goat with his eyes. "Are these fang marks?" he suddenly asks.
"I..." I gulp a little. "It looks like it. I guess it was attacked by something before I got it?" I tell myself I'm not lying.
"Ahh..." I silently thank him for not asking where it came from. "I guess I can do... two irons. An iron for the hides, five coppers for all the meat, and five more for the horns and everything else." I just nod tiredly. Some part of my mind screams at the insane amount of money, but I'm too tired to really act on it. I put one iron in each pile. That looks like everything... I count up the coins in each stack. Twenty six coppers and one iron in my pile, and thirty coppers, one iron for the orphanage. Since it's so many coins, I exchange the coppers for the orphanage with irons, ending up with four iron coins. I swap twenty of mine, for six coppers and three irons. That makes it much easier to wrap the money up.
"Thanks a lot!" I call to the animal buyer.
"No, thank you," he responds earnestly, with a smile. Holding the eight remaining hobins, I begin to run home. Even selling everything took longer than I intended. How am I going to make it home?! With a fire powered second wind, I run home, hobins slung over my shoulder. I pant in and out with raspy breaths, feeling like my lungs are going to explode. Aria said fire mana doesn't help with that, didn't she? Despite my frantic pace, the last bell rings long before I make it home. By the time I run in the door, Mister Fredricson is standing right there, frowning with disapproval.
Immediately, I slide down to my hands and knees, unable to keep myself upright in front of him. All I can do is apologize and pray he spares me... "I'm sorry for being late, Mister Fredricson," I say with my face pressed to the floor. I know it won't help, but I can't keep myself from trying to explain. "I've been working really hard! I'm late because it took a lot longer than I expected to carry everything back." I pull his share out and hand him the coins. "I caught two dozen hobins, five rechits, and a goat today."
"Hmm!" He suddenly clears his throat. "You have been working hard." He just states it, like a fact. When he doesn't say anything else for a while, I sneak a peek up from the floor. But he doesn't say anything else and just walks away. I'm... not in trouble? He isn't going to punish me? Maybe because I brought home so much money? For today at least, I'm safe...
As I stagger, lightheaded toward the dining room, it really starts to sink in. I brought home a lot of money today. I used to earn about five coppers each week, gathering. I just brought home about four irons, which would be... I don't know, math is hard. But it's definitely a lot!
Of course, it's not like I could bring home that much every day. It only worked out like this because some animal Aria tamed must be really good at hunting. It's thanks to her, this isn't something I would be able to do all on my own. I'll have to thank her tomorrow. But... maybe ask her not to go so overboard again...
The same as the last few days, I shovel down the cold, nasty stew before falling into bed, and I'm out immediately.