By the time our rough breakfast is done, the streets - though not clear of sheep - are clearer, and the drovers are moving their flock in towards whatever paddocks the town could provide for them. In this early cold, Sekhmet, Ace and I make our way down the streets and walkways of the city, towards the central keep and then off a spur near the Juadipatos river.
The home of the Kosmas family is a large, if rustic farmhouse, flanked on either side by fencing and cool riverside land. One field has sheep in it, I notice; temporary guests busy tearing up a fallow field and fertilizing it for the planting of winter wheat, mushrooms, cabbage, onions, maybe even 'those odd sort of Yao turnips' we were glad to see in Viacruz. I see orchards with some olive trees, some almond trees, some quince; and vineyards beyond that.
The fields currently being harvested - by a middle-aged human man in a broad hat and a green jacket, two teenagers, and a gold-furred Vulpecian boy - are predominantly wheat, barley, and oats.
I take a deep breath and raise my hand to hail the man in the field. He looks up at me, squints at me over a fine and full black beard, without stopping his careful quick slashes with a hand scythe; his eyes dart to Sekhmet, he grunts, and returns his gaze to me. His kids glance at me but once before getting back to work.
"You're the godspeaker of the group that saved our Shadi, then," he says. "Deedee, was it?"
"I am she, ser Kosmas." I say. "I've brought a gift. "
"Mikhail," he insists, emphasizing the second syllable, beginning it with a guttural 'kh.' "I'm no ser, just a free man. Eleshiva will take your present when you step inside. We'll join you later - we've honest work to do."
"I can see that," Ace says, looking over the grain fields. "Let us know how we can help."
"Shiva will have ideas, I'm sure," he says, turning back to his work. "You'll want dinner when the siesta comes, and we can talk then."
"Thank you, Mikhail," I say, bowing sincerely, as I go to the door. "We'll waste as little of your time as possible."
He grunts amusement, but says little more, as Elishiva opens the door.
She's wearing a wonderful shawl of dark blue with embroidery in silver, cream and gold; her dress is a simple and ample cut to reflect the curves of a woman who's born many children, but in vivid blue and green patterning that evoked the sea, under a plainer rust-red smock. These were the kind of bright and beautiful clothes that Tayeb sold in the city at a great and well-deserved profit; this was the hand that taught his wife how, even now at the door stretching wool from a distaff leaning against her, pinching it off to a spinner in her offhand, leaving one hand free.
I bow to her. "Elishiva Kosmas," I say. "May we come in?"
"I suppose you'd better before the sun catches you out," she says, glancing at the three of us. "Friends of Sekhmet? And of Tayeb, then."
I hear the disdain in her voice, though I think that Sekhmet and Ace don't. I crouch under the unexpectedly short doorway and come into the front room.
It's mostly kitchen, with some bedroom and a second floor of more bedroom; plain table, plain crockery, a tall cabinet with a drip pan, and all sorts of herbs and pots hanging from the ceiling near a central firepit and chimney, with a row of beds along the wall and a table with chairs and benches. Eleshiva takes the second-largest chair, the largest being occupied by an old man with a white beard and a large white milia on his nose, wrinkled with age, half asleep.
Sitting at the table is an unexpected guest; a man in a heavy dark brown coat, a cane against his shoulder, with vulpine ears peeking from the brim of his hat; he is rubbing a great quantity of salt into the inside of what appears to be a whole, dead, skinned sheep with his bare hands, occasionally bidding Eleshiva to run water over those hands with a grunt. On one bed is a daughter in blue and brown, merrily spinning from a distaff with only slightly less speed than her mother - but also, on the bed with her, is an adult pixie no taller than the human girl, in a plain cream colored shirt, her boiled leather armor unlaced next to her, struggling mightily and merrily with a spinner in her left hand.
I place our gift on the table as I sit down. "We didn't realize you had other guests," I said. "If this isn't a good day -"
"Nonsense," Eleshiva insists. "We need more to dispose of senor Silphanii's generous gift anyway, and you've earned at least one meal from the mother of the girl you saved. We cannot thank your band enough for that. What, may I ask, have you brought?"
"Healing potion," I say. "Sekhmet brewed it herself."
"Adventurer grade," they say, nodding. "A spoonful for pain, a half cup for serious wounds and blood loss. Learned to brew my own with some help from Flamma rather than relying on the shops in Viacruz."
Elishiva eyes the bottle - one that used to carry half a gallon of olive oil. "That's a... very generous gift," she says. "A thoughtful one as well. Though what's it made of?"
I think - or guess - I know why she's asking. Ace answers as I would have. "I think it's herbs and certain roots."
"No animal components, unless it was sweetened with honey?" I ask Sekhmet.
"I used berry juices and some sugar syrup for that," they tell me. "Vegan-ass healing potion on sale at a place that sells yogurt and muesli today."
"Nothing our horses and kine and chickens will object to?" she asks.
Ace blinks, then laughs. "Adventurer tested, cow approved," she says.
"Maybe don't feed it to the dog, there's garlic in there," Sekhmet says. "Should be fine for livestock."
"It's a more practical gift than I expected," Elishiva admits, putting it among other potions and powders.
"Our sense of what's practical changed a lot once our job became fighting things with fangs and claws," Ace points out. "Being city girls before we were murder-hobos probably didn't help either."
The pixie adventurer snorts laughter. One of us, then - a Player.
"Murder-hobos?" Elishiva repeats, incredulously. "Gods, you probably would be more respectable with a good flock of sheep before you."
The drover, busy salting the blood out of our dinner, suddenly puts a hand to his mouth and shakes, in what may be suppressed laughter.
"I hear that they're a most honorable guild of royal drovers," I say, "from people who get rich off of wool sales. What everyone else calls you I won't repeat, of course."
"Of course," says the shepherd, chuckling.
"You didn't just come here to give us a gift," Elishiva says.
I sigh. "We have much more to discuss," I tell her.
"Spin while you talk," she says, handing me a spindle and wool.
I hesitate, while the others equip themselves.
"I never learned how," I admit.
"You never learned how to spin," Elishiva says, too shocked to be scandalized.
I take a deep breath. "Pretend I was raised a boy until I was twenty and teach me how?"
Sekhmet suppresses a choke and Ace just stares at me. Elishiva stares, too, for a while.
Then she picks up her distaff. "No time like now to learn, then," she says.
Dice rolls, decisions and administrativa to follow tonight or tomorrow.
