“Can you just heal him harder?” Addie asked with a roll of her eyes.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Nettal shot back with poorly concealed frustration in her tone. “I’m already trying everything I can.”
Lotty took that opportunity to boop his snoot against the man’s forehead. It didn’t seem to help.
“Ugh!” Nettal let out a frustrated groan. “My magic seems to think there’s nothing wrong with him, even though his heart isn’t beating! It’s so weird!” She complained.
“Maybe your magic just doesn’t work on dead people?” Addie asked.
“No, if he were dead, then my magic wouldn’t activate at all. I can clearly feel him with my diagnostics, so my magic is working, at least. He can’t be dead,” Nettal explained, but it sounded like she was explaining more for herself than for Addie.
“Okay, whatever. Maybe while you poke him with magic, I can go explore some more?”
“No!” Nettal turned around, panic across her face, “No splitting up! That’s like, rule number one!”
“Okayyy...” Addie scuffed her foot against the floor, bored. “So, what should I do?”
“Just be patient for a second. I wanna check one more thing,” Nettal said as she pulled one of the man’s eyelids back.
Hunched over and staring into the man’s eye like that, Nettal reminded Addie of her own experiences with healers and how they overbearingly prodded her this way and that. Addie had to look away and suppress a shiver from those traumatic memories; at least there weren’t any needles.
Nettal sighed in frustration, “I give up!” She threw her hands up in the sky before dropping them to her thighs with a clap.
“Maybe it doesn’t matter?” Addie shrugged. “I mean, none of the ensyoclyops helped us anyway. This guy probably can’t either.”
Nettal stared at Addie, face scrunched and utterly confused, "Do you mean encyclopedias?
“That thing. Whatever. But still, maybe he won’t know more, either? This is his home and his library, after all.”
“Hmm.” Nettal thought for a moment before responding, “Yeah, that makes sense.” The thought seemed to make her whole body deflate. “But I still want to help him. Healers take an oath, Addie. We heal those that we can reach— no exceptions.”
“You aren’t even a proper healer yet, though?” Addie didn’t want to sound combative necessarily, but she knew her cousin hadn’t taken any oaths yet.
She sighed in exasperation, “I still want to live like one! I think we can still help him, don’t you?”
In response to her words, Addie just pointed down at the singled-out blue crystal.
“This is going to mean more adventures, isn’t it?” Nettal dropped her head.
“Yep!” Addie smiled brightly. “We just have to turn these other three red crystals blue, just like the one in front is.”
“So you want us to fight more monsters like the ape?” Nettal asked semi-accusingly.
“They might not be apes?” Addie provided, but even she didn’t fully believe her own words.
“Some kind of monster, I bet. Well, fine.” Nettal stood up straighter, her shoulders squaring off with newfound determination. “There’s no food around here anyway, and it’s going to be a long walk to the next ruin site, according to your book. We better get going.”
Addie tried not to look too happy since she knew Nettal would be grumpy if she did. However, that didn’t stop Addie from being excited. The thought of exploring more ruin sites and possibly learning new ways to shape her flames enticed Addie to no end. She’d always loved magic, so of course the idea of learning new spells appealed to her. What were a few more ape fights if she got to learn more magic as a result?
“Do not forget, I will be there as well, my lady.” As always, Squishy’s twinkling eyes were full of affection.
“Adventure! Magic!” Addie couldn’t help herself; she pumped one fist in the air in celebration.
Nettal slapped her palm into her face for some reason.
Addie looked behind and over her shoulder at those impossibly high walls as they walked toward the eastern ruins. It had taken them nine days to reach the city after they had left the Furrian ruins in the north. Because all of the ruins looked to be about the same distance away from the big city, Addie also expected it to take another nine days of walking to reach the eastern ruins.
She nearly had to spit out a piece of the head-high grass when she turned to face forward. They’d already made it past the eastern gate, with the Binary getting close to setting and plunging the area into twilight.
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“Squishy, can you and Ember go find us some food?” Addie asked. “We need to camp soon.” At least they’d found another stream to follow and didn’t have to worry about water.
With a slight nod of his cat-like head, Squishy ran off into the distance. Ember’s streaking flame trail followed close behind him.
“Here?” Nettal said, pointing to a slightly less grassy spot.
“Sure,” Addie easily agreed.
Before long, they were all sitting around a campfire powered purely by magic, cooking meat filling the air with tantalizing smells. Despite smelling amazing, Addie knew she’d still be slightly disappointed when it wasn’t salty enough...
With the Binary fully set, the stars shone in full force. Addie wasn’t sure which was more satisfying to look at, the campfire or the stars above. Her pure white flames flickered to a nonexistent breeze, warming them in body and spirit.
“If we travel more in Realmspace, we can probably make the trip shorter.” Addie broke the silence with something she’d been considering.
“Hmm. What if you use up too much magic traveling, and we don’t have enough in an emergency?”
“That’s true, I guess,” Addie replied. “But, one step in Realmspace is, like, three steps in reality; I still think it’s worth it.”
“I didn’t know it was that much,” Nettal said, narrowing her eyes at Addie.
“Yeah, it’s kind of annoying when I want to teleport us inside of small spaces. It’s easy to go too far or too little.”
Nettal’s eyes went wide in realization. “Ohhhh, that actually does sound right. I always thought we took less steps forward than what made sense in my head,” Nettal said. “I still think you should have told me that sooner.”
“It’s not like I was hiding it or anything,” Addie defended herself, “I guess it just never came up.”
Nettal hummed tonelessly, considering. She tilted her head up to look at the stars, and Addie found herself doing the same thing a moment later.
“Okay, I want the same thing I’ve wanted since we got here. I want to go home. If using Realmspace means we can speed things up to heal that man, then let’s do it.”
Addie looked back down at Nettal’s face.
Nettal continued, “But let’s only use Realmspace half the time, so you still have a lot of magic when we need it.” She tilted her head back down until their eyes met, “And if we hear any more ape shouts in the distance, we immediately stop using magic and recharge a bit before going forward, okay?” Nettal said with a fierceness that had Addie nodding along right away.
“Good. As long as we do that, I think we’ll be safe.”
“What if we find more Furrians?” Addie brought up. “Do you want to heal them, too?”
Nettal considered Addie’s question, then answered, “If someone in front of me is hurt, I can’t just abandon them. But, we are definitely not staying in any more Furrian villages. Last time was more than enough.”
“Yeah, I think so too.”
Addie hated grass. If she ever became an Area Lord, she would never ever ever let any grass grow anywhere in her domain. A total grass ban— that would be Addie’s motto. The stupid stalks liked to flick against her face, and each time it did so, Addie thought it might be a bug crawling on her. Addie didn’t mind bugs – she actually liked them – but that didn’t mean the grass constantly brushing against her face like tiny, prodding ant feet made her feel any better. If Nettal hadn’t been so against it, Addie would have just set everything in front of her on fire so she could walk without so much grass bothering her.
It wasn’t just the way the long stalks brushed against her skin; it was also the way the grass made it hard to see. If it weren’t for her book constantly floating just overhead, she would be entirely lost. Everything in front of her was a pure sea of green.
When she wasn’t using her arms to part the grass in front of her, the grass liked to ‘accidentally’ explore her nostrils. Well, to be fair to the grass, that had only happened twice— when Addie turned her head suddenly. But that didn’t make it any better! She had to sneeze five times after that— five times! She didn’t have anything to rub the snot on, either.
At least the poncho protected her arms— she couldn’t say the same for her legs. If only her arms were a bit stronger, then she could just brush the grass away, but her arms were still sore since she did that all day yesterday.
Addie didn’t remember the grass being this annoying last time, but back then she had been so focused on the towering walls overhead that maybe she didn’t notice the grass much. Now, it was literally impossible to focus on anything except for grass.
Nettal looked to be about as happy with the grass as Addie was— but that actually gave Addie an idea.
Addie stopped in her tracks and called out to her cousin, “Nettal! Let’s walk in a line.”
“No! Then I’ll be the only one walking into the grass.”
Addie huffed, “If you go first, I promise I’ll take a turn later.”
Narrowing her eyes at Addie, Nettal nonetheless tentatively agreed, “You better keep your promise!”
With a big smile, Addie nodded her head in agreement.
When it was Addie’s turn, she just sent them into Realmspace instead. Nettal complained about Addie being a ‘cheater,’ but she just ignored the taunts.
“Tomorrow, you are so leading the way first.”
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They caught their first sight of the eastern ruins on the evening of the sixth day. They had made such good progress that it’d only taken them six days instead of nine! But, since they were doing more travel through Realmspace this time, she thought that made sense.
The book showed the girls’ markers right near the edge of a cave symbol on the map. Addie still couldn’t actually see the cave, what with all the grass continuing to be in her way, but the knowledge made her feel better anyway.
They hadn’t heard any ape shouting or anything like that, but on the morning of the fourth day, Addie thought she saw billowing fog in the distance, making her narrow her eyes in suspicion. However, the fog had cleared up by the time they started moving. Still, Addie kept watch for any more of it, regardless. Squishy was particularly motivated to keep watch, his constant vigil setting Addie at ease.
“Can we sleep here for the night?” Addie asked. “The Binary is close to setting anyway.”
“Yeah, good idea. Tomorrow, we’ll reach the ruins, huh?” Nettal looked up at their markers on the book’s map.
“I hope so. I hate grass, so I’ll be happy to be somewhere else.”
“What if there’s more grass in the ruins?” Nettal asked with a smirk.
“Then I’ll burn it all.” Addie threatened.
“No burning everything. What if we choke on smoke?”
Grumbling, Addie replied, “I can make smokeless fire...”
“No burning everything,” Nettal repeated a bit more firmly.
Addie blew a raspberry, “Fine.” She knew Nettal was right, anyway— even if she didn’t like it.
The girls set up a small camp as they had been the last few nights, mostly some beds made out of the grass all around, as well as a dugout spot for a carefully smokeless fire, per Nettal’s demands. They ate some more food from Squishy and Ember’s hunting before heading to bed.
Addie stared up at the stars, wondering what tomorrow in the ruins might bring.