I struggled with the weight of my things as I headed down the road. I hadn’t received so much as a donkey when I left, and the weight of my pack dragged down on me.

My family- my tribe? My people? We were nomads that lived in tent cities and we moved from place to place, buying, selling, bartering where we could.

‘Where we could’ was a euphemism for ‘mostly Azure territory’. When I was living on Earth, I never thought I’d be part of a ... people that lived like this.

And now I was an exile. None of the Traveling People would take me in. According to the Traveling People, I was doomed to wander as an exile until death claimed me, but there was nothing that really stopped me from trying to find work or living in a city.

There was a part of me that strongly resisted the idea, the part of me that insisted that I wasn’t reincarnated, the part of me that had grown and developed while I was still asleep somewhere in my own head, waiting for the time when my brain could accommodate my soul.

Part of me longed for a car, part of me longed for a horse or a donkey, part of me wished this whole thing a terrible nightmare.

No home. No tent. No bed. No family.

There was a city a few weeks away, but... could I make it that far?

I was an idiot; I should have headed for the city that my family was camped out next to. I might have been able to eke out a place to sleep and then found something to do for work. Stupidly, I’d headed in the wrong direction.

The sun was setting.

I needed to find a place to sleep.

I stepped off the road and pushed my way through the brush and into some fields covered by some belly-high tall grass.

I’d sleep here tonight, and then in the morning I’d turn around and head to the city.

I unpacked my bundle of clothes, looked over the food. There were meats and cheeses, a small jar of pickles and sheets of flatbread that reminded me of naan.

Tucked in my clothes was a small pouch with a handful of gold and silver, as well as a small spool of leather; my father had included my jeweler’s tools.

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I couldn’t stop crying, then.

I’d wrapped myself up in my extra clothes and sort of bundled the tall grasses together to form a shelter, and that’s how I spent the first night of my exile.

When I woke up the next morning, I remembered that the ...administrator... lady had promised me a guitar, so I concentrated on that, and the guitar appeared in my hands.

It came as a bit of a shock; I didn’t expect something like that to happen. One moment it wasn’t there and then suddenly, there it was, right in my hands.

I fumbled for a moment, fingers hesitating over the strings, wondering what I should play.

A memory came to me; I was hunched over a guitar, when I was ... as old as I am now, teaching myself by playing a cassette of a song, plucking the strings, rewinding, playing, plucking the strings, rewinding, over and over and over again.

Yeah. Let’s go.

I started playing and suddenly I could feel magic surging up in me as I played. My body suddenly felt stronger, healthier. Hy heart surged in my chest and I could feel my sense of balance correct itself subtly.

I stood up as I swung into the bridge, fingers working the frets as I pushed through into the chorus. My vision seemed clearer; I could spot things at a much further distance now.

I suddenly realized that my vision hadn’t been perfect when I was born; I remember having to concentrate over my work, straining my eyes as I agonized over some tiny detail.

I worked into the main melody, and then back to the bridge, strove for the crescendo, aggressively beating down on the strings as I worked through, and then slowed down as I resolved down to the outro.

“Fuck you, I’m out!” I shouted as the last note faded.

Holy shit that felt great. I hadn’t played like that in years.

Really, I hadn’t played like that ever, but thanks to my ability I could play it perfectly.

I armed a little sweat from my brow, and the guitar faded in my hands and was gone a moment later.

“Damn, that felt great.” I muttered to myself as I stuffed some food in my mouth.

I washed it down with a little wine, and then headed back the way I came- not to my people, but to the city that I had been forbidden from entering by my clan’s taboos.

I swung wide from the Traveling People’s encampment, entered the city gate, and got my first look at a real city instead of one that was made from tents.

The walls were high and thick and made from some robust stone, the streets were paved, and people walked or rode horses through the streets.

Their clothes were wildly different from mine; they didn’t wear the flowing robes of the Traveling People, they wore shirts and pants and dresses and all sorts of things.

I had to find a way of fitting in.

I summoned my guitar and headed towards the heart of the city; I assumed that was where the more well-to-do inns would be- maybe if I razzle-dazzled them with my guitar-playing they’d let me stay if I played for my room and board. After that- maybe I could find a gemsmith that’d be willing to take me on as an apprentice?