Chapter 18 - Otherworld Cuisine

She'd just turned and begun walking towards Yarrow when a familiar twinge of pain slid through her, feeling as if it wanted to rip one of her ribs out of her body in its entirety. It couldn't and wouldn't even if it could, she knew, but the slight bit of pain meant more was to come. Her magic might be whole in the game but she was still connected to her real body and it wasn't doing well even in the dream-like hibernation that should have been healing her.

Grateful at least to not be plagued by either nightmares or nothingness that only ended when she woke for short periods, she forced herself to show no signs of discomfort, "Is there somewhere to eat near here?"

Yarrow's sharp wine-colored eyes watched her and it felt like he remained silent for just a little longer than he might have normally before answering, "Just over here," he gestured towards a building nearby, "They serve good food and have benefited from their proximity to the Star Ash since the Godsborn have begun appearing. Apparently such a tree is not a common occurrence where they are from, where you are from," he corrected.

She nodded agreement, waiting for the wave of pain to subside into a short lull before speaking, "They have normal bark, doesn't usually shimmer unless you find a magically infused species. Nothing like the Star Ash."

"Because they have the Starborn."

Ash was forced to shake her head at his observation, "Starborn were never terribly outgoing. Some of the less magical inhabitants of the world call them Calamity Unicorns," pain sliced through her in another sharp wave, though she forced out her next words in spite of it, "Heralds of death."

"They sound like fools," he said, "Nothing connected to Sidus as strongly as you are would be a herald of death," with a slight frown he admitted, "Though I suspect that being without magic also leaves one largely without the gods in their lives."

Ash kept silent as she kept up with his long-legged gait, uncertain of how much she was allowed to say about the world she lived in. The sharpening pain tightening around her rib cage wasn't helping to make her more chatty, either.

They settled at a table near the back of the building with Yarrow positioning himself so that he could keep a wary eye on most of the room with little trouble. A waitress came over to ask for their order and Ash managed to say that she'd have the same thing he did. The only words she'd fully known the meaning of were stew and juice. She wasn't sure what was going in the stew or what fruit or other item the juice was from.

The juice was absolutely marvelous, refreshing and sweet with just enough tartness to keep it from being cloying. She managed small sips in the lulls of pain that tore through her though normally she'd have likely downed the entire cup and asked for a refill immediately. She was grateful to be sitting as the pain moved indiscriminately across her body, targeting anything and everything as if she was being personally pulled apart by it.

In a way, she was. Her magic was fractured, broken into hundreds if not thousands of tiny pieces that she willed to continue behaving as a whole instead of falling apart. Sleeping let them patch themselves back together but it was not a painless process most of the time. Clearly her body was in a sleep state closer to waking at the moment which meant she'd just have to endure. She decided she'd keep her adventuring to a minimum in the first days as she got the hang of whether or not there was some sort of rhythm to when the pain would come.

Yarrow's wine-colored eyes continued to watch her as he savored his own juice, perhaps prompted to stop and enjoy it more by the reminder that to someone it was new and exotic. It seemed more likely that his observational skills had picked up on her pain. Conversation filled the air around them, somewhat masking the fact that their table remained completely silent until the waitress returned with the soup. Despite the small sips, Ash had managed to drain half the juice and the waitress gladly offered to bring more.

The soup was a meaty one by its scent, filled with root vegetables that were unfamiliar to Ash. It tasted good, though, warm and hearty with a bit of spice to it. A slight crunch when she bit down on a particular spoonful pointed towards something like green beans also having been tossed in. Likely, the soup was nothing special, just thrown together with whatever vegetables were left over from other dishes and whatever meat was most recently hunted. Ash savored it, the pain finally beginning to fade after the first four or five delicate and slow bites.

By the time she finished eating, the pain was gone even if the memory of it was still fresh enough to leave her uncertain of standing. Yarrow paid for the food, waving away Ash's attempt to do so and led the way back outside.

They passed closer to the tree than he'd seemed to plan to go when they'd first come into the square and he paused in its gentle shade to speak, "The Star Ash are magnificent and hearty trees. For each planted the leaves of them all slowly become more green, less colored by the magic they cleanse as they all share the burden," his wine-colored eyes moved to her once more, their gaze knowing, "I do not, perhaps, know Lord Sidus as personally as you do…But I believe he'd intend the same for you as these trees…But something has happened and you are alone. Judging by how happy you were to see him, cut off even from him. While I can do nothing in the world you reside in, so long as you are here I will be your ally. The Godsborn speak of their world all of the time and I am certain that Lord Sidus would stop you himself if there was something he didn't want said here, something he didn't want us to learn for some reason. You are in pain, Ashterra, and it troubles me to see someone hurting so much refusing to reach out, for comfort even if relief is impossible."

Ash sighed, hating the idea of explaining the state she was in more than she hated that she was in it at all, "The Starborn were all but hunted to extinction. Until enough power gathers for another to be born, something we aren't sure is even possible anymore, I am the only of my kind. I take on the job that all of the Star Ash trees of this world do for a world just as large," she'd gotten a feel for the state of the world and its size with the earlier questing pulse of magic, "My magic breaks more with each yearly journey and I spend more time sleeping to put it back together again. I sleep here because there is very little waking left for me there anymore. There is just nothingness or nightmares of agonizing pain, of hunters chasing me and ripping me to pieces for the money my parts are worth."

She turned back towards the temple but didn't bother to start walking yet, her voice quiet as she spoke again, "I have been told that I am here to live, to enjoy my life. I…am not sure I remember how to do that any longer. Until today it had been hundreds of long years since I'd last seen him, since I could rest against him. I am not here for money or for glory, just to live. That means I may not be very good company for a capable warrior like you."

He smiled, glad to have her confide in him even if just a bit, "As the head paladin, I am only a warrior when great threats trouble the city. I have the time to devote to show you how beautiful it is here in Redwood Stars."