There was a quiet standoff as Chess debated what to say. I should start with something safe.
“Why did you assume I'm a lady? Are all elves treated like nobility?” she asked careful to use the strange local language that had appeared in her head.
“What? No, I don't know. You're the first elf I've ever met. It’s just, you’re beautiful and refined and you sing like a goddess and you’re so tall. Normal girls don’t have time to learn music like that, we have chores to do." Ashley pouted. "Then, there’s your magic! I bet you need a rare Pyth to move plants like that. I've never seen anything like that. Well, except this one time. When Lady Underwood used a really rare healing ability to reattach farmer Frederick's leg. I thought you were a dryad, but then I saw your ear, and dryads are supposed to look like wood and you don't look like wood. You have very soft-looking skin,” she said in an earnest rush.
“Okay, slow down. So, the dress doesn’t make me look like a peasant?” Chess asked, looking down at herself. This seems like a good topic to keep her mind off her loss.
“Well yeah, a little." Ashley rolled her eyes. "But you don’t talk like a farmer, except for the swearing, and you have soft hands, besides, your scarf is silk. I wish I had a silk scarf," she finished with a wistful sigh.
Huh, that could be useful. Chess fingered the scarf. I’ll have to work on how I dress. I didn’t even think about it being silk.
Chess shifted in the sudden quiet as the conversation puttered out.
“So...tell me what you know about abilities? Is it normal for an ability not to have a significant limit on its use? My Shaped Growth ability only seems limited by how long I can sing or play for. That and some vague reference to soil depletion I haven’t run into yet,” Chess asked then flushed. She's just a kid. Probably thinks I'm an idiot for not knowing.
Ashley scowled, then slumped, muttering under her breath before she furrowed her brows. “I don’t know about any of that, but Dad’s Shield Wall ability would stop working if he got hurt badly. And Ma would get headaches from using some of her powers, I know because she would make me get her the peppermint oil.” Ashley nodded then bowed her head and slumped in on herself a little.
“So, it could be something I'm overlooking or maybe something that doesn’t apply in a forest.” Chess tapped her chin, continuing the thought despite Ashley's slump. Bad soil or stone could limit me. Hell, the type of plant and its proper environment is probably a factor. There also has to be a limit to magic I'm not seeing yet. Maybe Freya made it so I can handle a lot or maybe elves can naturally?
“What can you tell me about classes? I'm a Minstrel, but Freya didn’t tell me anything about how common or rare that might be. Although, it has a legendary synergy,” she said, deciding to open up about her situation. Ashley was young, 9 or 10, and had every reason to be grateful to Chess for saving her, and she had to trust someone if she was going to learn.
“Who's Freya?” Ashley murmured her question.
“Freya is a Goddess who sent me here to explore and spread her faith. To be her eyes and ears,” Chess explained.
Ashley’s eyes widened. “You're a priestess?”
“No, not exactly, more of a missionary. My skills lay elsewhere. She picked me because I was convenient and available,” Chess said. She told me nothing. What are her aspects? All that comes to mind are Sex, fertility, war, and death. Wasn’t there something about her collecting dead warriors, and something about cats?
“Did she send you here to save me?” Ashley asked with a hopeful lilt to her voice.
“I don’t think so. She has almost no power here yet and little remaining back home. Besides, I don’t think the Gods work like that. I think stuff like that only happens in stories. Freya gave me a choice: to come here and be her agent, or die, and I believe she did it out of boredom... Although, who can say with gods,” Chess said running her fingers through her hair. She wound up struggling to combat the growing knots.
Ashley nodded. “Yeah, Parson Heldon said Luminous only helps those that help themselves.”
Chess suppressed a giggle as she nodded in agreement. I guess some clichés are universal.
“I don’t know anything about Minstrels. It must be really rare,” Ashley said.
Chess kept the conversation on herself and what she’d been doing since arriving. She left out that she used to be a man. Instead, she told Ashley that she used to look very different.
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Chess made Ashley laugh a couple of times with her tale and felt good to see the humor even when the girl grew introspective right after. Ashley broke into giggles when she described her efforts to walk and her difficulties with her first moon blood. Ashley was surprised to learn she was a very young elf and relaxed more with the revelation.
When she got to the subject of her new staff and the tree she got it from, Ashley looked distracted and the conversation petered out again.
Chess gave her a long moment of silence before slapping her thighs and getting up.
“Sitting here is making me stiff, I need to move. What do you say we get out of here and feel the sun on our faces?" Chess prompted and Ashley gamely rose to follow her.
Outside the sun was bathing the clearing in a prismatic glow. The ox was chomping contently at the base of the flowering bramble bushes and the sweet smell of the flowers and berries worked to cover the sinister smells of ripening bodies.
“Feel like going through all this stuff with me?” she asked Ashley, indicating the pile of gear she had stripped from the bandits and their camp.
Ashley shook her head with determination. “No. We need to deal with the bodies first.”
“Huh, you’re a tough thing, aren't you? I thought you would want to put that off as long as possible," Chess observed. "Well, I dragged the assholes outside the bramble while you slept. I figure I can grow some bushes through them if undead is a thing here. Your parents are in the wagon. I left them alone since I’m not sure what kind of rites people do here.”
“I’m not a little Kid. I’m 11!” Ashley stamped her foot, tail whooshing back and forth.
“Your parents?” Chess prompted, ignoring her outburst. Did she just move onto anger?
Ashley let out a deep ragged breath before responding.
“We buried Gran but the Parson had to use an ability on the ground before we put her in. Ma said it was to prevent her from raising as a zombie. Then there were prayers for her soul but I don’t remember any of the words. Sorry." She sounded embarrassed.
“Well, sh... Well, I don’t have any way to consecrate a grave but I may have another idea. Please tell me if you think I’m wrong but Dryads are magical nature spirits, right? Yhyslimron liked my singing. So, I think we could convince her to help your parents rest in peace if we sang for her,” Chess suggested.
“You’ll have to offer her something more than a song. I don’t know what a tree spirit would like,” Ashley said.
“Right, your right." Chess nodded. "Sh...oot! I’m an idiot. We can solve two issues, and I know just the thing.”
Striding over to the wagon she studied the gear used to hook up the ox and frowned. Shit, get real, Chesty you have no idea what any of this is, let alone how it’s hooked up.
She looked back at Ashley. “Do you know how to hook all this up?” She asked hopefully.
“Of course, I’m not a baby.” Ashley rolled her eyes and approached.
Together with Ashley’s guidance they got the ox, Rufus, hooked up and ready.
Chess summoned her guitar and played an opening into the bramble hedge near the bodies by making the brambles thin and lay down.
While Ashley pulled the wagon up close Chess hopped down and looked at the bodies, then at the back of the wagon. We need a ramp.
She played bringing a ramp of vines to life. The mess groaned as she made the weave tight to reinforce it.
With much cursing and gagging, she and Ashley dragged the bodies into the back in a loose pile.
They’d removed all the household items, putting them, the stuff she looted the night before, and her pack in a pile before growing a large bramble bush around it to hide it from view. If I can’t see them, others shouldn’t either. I can’t see anyone climbing in there with all the thorns.
Chess kept the only bow from the pile and tested its pull. Finding she could draw it comfortably, she grabbed a quiver of arrows and set them on the bench before hopping up.
The wagon groaned in protest at the added weight and she cringed.
“Guess I’ll just walk,” she told Ashley with a laugh while hopping back off.
She played her cloak to flow around her and stuck her new staff on the bench beside Ashley. “You look after her,” she said patting the staff.
Ashley nodded seriously drawing a smile from Chess.
“Alright, let's do this.”
The trip back to the road and the Dryad tree was uneventful. The sun shone through the boughs and the birds were loud and cheerful. The light breeze seemed to favor them by blowing into their faces taking the smell of the dead off with its whims.
Neither spoke a word on the trip, each lost in her own thoughts.
They pulled the wagon alongside the dryad's tree and Chess grew them a new ramp to roll the bodies off.
Once they had the bandits out, they pulled around behind the tree and unloaded Ashley’s parents, spending the time to move and arranged their bodies respectfully. Ashley purposely avoided touching her parents' heads and Chess followed suit. After the fifth time, a pyth loot window opened and she dismissed it thinking 'just go away' and it stopped appearing.
When they were done they took a big step back.
Ashley cried quietly and Chess gave her time; unsure if she should offer comfort or not.
Ashley bent to lay a palm on her father's forehead, then her other on her mother's with streams of tears flowing down her dirt-stained face. A blue glow swirled about her hands for a moment before encompassing her whole form.
The hair on Chess’s neck stood on end as the light started to thrum, making her teeth ache, before popping her ears. All at once the light and sound sucked into Ashley and disappeared.
“Wh...” Chess started but restrained herself. I can ask later.
Ashley stood and returned to stand with Chess. They simply stood there for a long time as Ashley cried quietly. Chess shed a few tears in empathy for the girl's loss.
“Okay, I’m ready,” Ashley said softly while wiping at her face with her palms.
Chess started playing but stopped after a few bars. That doesn’t feel right. Shit, it's been years, but you can still play it—Gran would approve.
Chess steeled herself.
Gently, then with more confidence as she remembered the song. She started playing Stairway to Heaven, for the first time since her grandmother's wake.
The tears flowed freely.