Andy 3.13 - A Quick Rest (Patreon)

Sorry for the delay! Enjoy the chapter :)

-Plum

13 – A Quick Rest

Andy was surprised to find a two-by-four frame around his adobe-block foundation; apparently his little cottage had moved up the queue for the builders. There was even a large stack of adobe blocks nearby, ready to be built up around the frame. He looked around, but he was still alone. A lot of people in the settlement were still asleep, but the ones who weren’t were back near the gate and the central clearing, talking to Omar and Madi.

Andy had already been there to help share the bad news about Bree. Lydia had taken it poorly, bursting into tears and running off into the early morning shadows of the mesquite grove. Andy had chased after her at first, but she’d waved him off, wiping at her eyes and stomping away toward the spring. He liked Lydia, and he thought of her as a friend, but he didn’t feel close enough to recognize whether she really wanted to be alone or not. He erred on the side of not pissing her off by pushing it.

After she ran off, and he was left standing there, unsure what to do, he’d looked back to the others, but they’d all been huddled around Madi and Omar. Certain that the two were telling the tale of their harrowing night, Andy had decided that he could use some alone time. His night of fighting and the emotional rollercoaster they’d all been on were catching up to him, and he wanted nothing so much as to curl up in his sleeping bag and forget about all of his responsibilities for a few hours.

He wasn’t sure it would happen—someone was bound to come calling—but he was determined to give it a try. He summoned his sleeping bag and foam camping mattress from his magical ring, threw them down in the far corner of his foundation under the shadows of an overhanging mesquite, and then kicked off his boots. Feeling sleep calling even before he hit the ground, he stretched out and closed his eyes.

Maybe someone came by; maybe many people did, but if so, they didn’t bother Andy. He slept uninterrupted until nearly noon, and when he blinked his eyes awake, his body heavy with the aftereffects of deep sleep, he was amazed at how quiet his little corner of the mesa was. He knew he had a System award coming, so when he sat up, he looked around and wasn’t surprised to see a cloth-wrapped package—bright yellow, and about the size of a shoebox.

Sometimes Andy wondered about the wisdom of the System’s determination of a “safe resting place,” let alone its practice of dropping off prizes when the recipient was asleep. What if someone sneaky had come into his completely wide-open home and taken his reward? Did the System just know that wouldn’t happen? He didn’t think that was possible, even for the System. Maybe it was more up to the recipient to think things through and plan for the delivery. Andy had known he had a prize coming—the smart thing would have been to rest in a more secure location.

“Or have a friend watch over me,” he muttered, recognizing the fact that, so far, he’d been lucky. He picked up the package; it was soft and slightly heavy, but not terribly so. He began to wonder if his assessment of its size had been more accurate than expected—was he holding a new pair of shoes? When he unwrapped the cloth, he smelled oil and wax, and when he pulled the cloth away, he saw immediately that he’d been right. The System had granted him a pair of dark, supple leather boots.

Andy’s current footwear—the hiking boots he’d kicked off before falling asleep—had seen better days. They were stained, the soles were worn down, and worst of all, they weren’t a very good fit. He’d gotten them from one of the supply loads that had come in from Construction City, and they were an easy half-size too large. The boots in his hands, though, were a completely different beast.

They reminded him of cowboy boots in style—with uppers that would come halfway up his shins, made from smooth, oiled leather with no laces. The soles were some kind of layered material that, if he weren’t mistaken, might also be leather, but the bottom layer was hard. They smelled great and felt soft in his hands, and when he pulled them on to test their fit, he smiled at the luxurious feel.

Andy pulled his jeans down over the tops of the boots, and when he stood, he felt like his feet were wrapped in a perfectly sized glove. Better, when he walked, he hardly felt like was wearing them. He wondered how leather boots could be broken in before he’d ever even put them on, but they were. When he walked back to his sleeping bag, his eyes fell on a piece of cardstock inside the yellow wrapping cloth that he’d missed earlier. He bent to pick it up, then read the note:

Boots of Easy Stepping – crafted by the master artisan Jelioptrizaph Korad. These enchanted boots will make long journeys feel short and make your steps feel light, even when you stomp! Wondrously adaptable, they’ll fit a wide range of feet, and the leather is remarkably durable. Warning: these boots were treated with rendered fire-salamander tallow for heat resistance; do not, under any circumstances, treat them with cold-attuned oils.

Andy grinned and tested the validity of the statement, stomping around on his adobe floor. He felt the impacts, but they were, indeed, lighter than he expected. Moreover, he hardly heard the sound of his feet impacting the solid clay bricks. “Awesome!”

The novelty of the new boots and the simple pleasure of their perfect fit were enough to distract him to the point that Andy didn’t realize someone was there, standing at the open frame of his doorway, until she cleared her throat. When he looked up to see Lydia standing there, looking more than a little uncomfortable, Andy smiled and gestured to his feet. “New boots.”

“Oh? They’re pretty sharp. Comfortable?”

“Very—they’re enchanted.”

That piqued her interest more appropriately, and her eyes widened as she stepped into his “house.” “From the System?”

“Yep.” Andy sat down on the hard floor and tugged one of the boots off, holding it out to her. “Check it out.”

He was glad to see the interest in her eyes, and the faint smile on her lips as she took the boot and turned it in her hands, studying its every angle, its every stitch. While she distracted herself with it, she said, “I’m really sorry about earlier. I mean, when I ran from you. I think I might have said something rude, too…” She trailed off, her eyes studiously avoiding his as she feigned a closer inspection of the boot’s heel.

“Come on.” Andy waved a hand dismissively. “Nobody can blame you for that. We’re all tired of losing people.”

Lydia sniffed, nodding, and when she looked at Andy, her eyes were pooling with tears. She handed him back his boot and said, “I really liked her, Andy. She and I got along so well, and I think, in my heart, she’d begun to fill the gaps left by other people I’d lost. You know?”

“Yeah.” Andy sighed and set his boot down, giving her his full attention. “Of course, I know what you mean. Every time I get a spare minute, I wonder where Lucy is. I wonder if she’s coming back or if I can add her to the list of people I’ve lost. For the record, I liked Bree too. She was always cheerful, and I…”

Lydia looked at him expectantly; she wasn’t going to bail him out.

For the first time, Andy felt himself really getting choked up about Bree’s loss, and he knew it was because he’d been refusing to look too deeply into his feelings, afraid of what he’d find. He forced himself to say the words that found the way to his tongue: “I think she’s dead because of me. I pushed for the attack on the goblin camp. I pushed Bree to get more involved in the fights—to use Cheechee more. When things started to go sideways, I charged after the boss instead of staying back to ensure she and the others would be okay.”

Lydia squatted down beside him and put her hand on his shoulder, gently squeezing. “Omar said he thought you felt guilty.”

“Only because I am.”

“Bree was a big girl, Andy. She knew what she was getting into when she volunteered to go out into the desert. You’re only human; you made the decisions that felt right in the moment…” She trailed off. Then, after a second, she jostled his shoulder. “Hey! Aren’t you tricky?”

Andy looked up at her sharply. “Huh?”

“Getting me to comfort you so I’ll feel better about my feelings?”

He shook his head. “I’m not trying—”

“Hush. It’s working.” She sat all the way down, folding her legs before her as she looked at Andy. They were quiet together for a long minute or two, and then she said, “I’m really happy Madi took Cheechee under her…wing.” She smiled at the pun. “She said Omar had a kind of ceremony for Bree.”

Andy nodded. “Yeah. It was beautiful, Lydia. It made me wonder if there really is more—I mean, after this life.”

She punched his shoulder lightly. “Of course there is.” Before he could respond, she said, “Speaking of Madi, have you seen what she’s doing?”

“Um, no. I kind of passed out.” He jerked his thumb toward his sleeping bag.

“Well, after things calmed down, and I talked to her for a while, she went over to the Garden Square, walked to the middle of the clearing, and knelt down. She said she had to complete a ritual for her new class, so I was curious. Actually, a few people were there, standing around watching her. She held out her hands, and then I felt a rush of mana—all warm and fuzzy—and then a green…well, a green nut appeared in her hands.”

“Her heartseed, I think.”

“So you knew about this?”

“Not really. She only mentioned it in passing. Kind of.” Andy shrugged.

Lydia nodded, licking her lips before continuing. “She pressed the nut, the heartseed, into the grass, and, like ten seconds later, a green shoot grew up from the spot. Madi had gone all quiet with her eyes closed, but I could still feel the mana. I’ve never felt anything like it. Of course, I haven’t seen the kinds of things you’ve seen, but—”

“Go on! What happened next?”

“Oh! Madi started to glow! Not brightly, just a faint kind of golden shimmer around her skin, and then the green shoot grew. It’s a tree! I mean, it’s small—barely as tall as me, and super thin and delicate, but it’s there, right in the middle of the clearing.”

“The Garden Square?” Andy tried to picture the old dog park with a tiny magical tree growing at the center. There were already a dozen log-lined planters in the space—hence the new name—but there was a perfect spot right at the center—grassy and clear.

“Yep. Smack in the middle. When I walked over here, she was still there, kneeling before the little tree, whispering to it.”

Andy tugged his boot back on. “Want to walk over there with me?” He sprang to his feet, then held out a hand. Lydia took it and he hauled her up. “Damn,” he said, chuckling.

“What?”

“Your hands! You’re half my size, but I feel like you could crush my bones in that grip of yours.”

She growled, her ginger eyebrows narrowing as she punched his shoulder. “Just what a lady likes to hear!”

Andy grinned, rubbing his shoulder as he feigned injury, and the two of them walked together down the quiet, shady lane toward the center of the settlement. As they went, he saw more and more activity. Tucker and his crew were working on someone’s home—he thought it might be Bernice’s—and they passed Keshawn and a couple of younger kids hauling a large wheelbarrow loaded down with fresh adobe bricks.

“What’s up, Keshawn?” Andy asked as they trundled past.

“Just helping out with the wall!”

“What’s your grandpa doing?”

Lydia answered before Keshawn could, “He’s working on the forge.”

Andy looked at her as the kids continued on their way. “Not you, though?”

“I got it started. He’s just following the plan—it’s just a big oven when you think about it.” She shrugged, looking down. “I wasn’t feeling like working.”

“Yeah, I get it.”

She put a hand on his shoulder as they walked, leaning some weight on him. “I’m glad we’ve got you, Andy. Don’t go and…” She trailed off, shaking her head.

“I don’t plan to.” They continued in silence, both of them thinking the same thing, he was sure: none of them planned to get killed. Bree hadn’t. Their friends, currently in a dungeon, maybe fighting for their lives at that very second, weren’t planning on dying. Lucy hadn’t been planning on it when she left. That’s where Andy’s mind got stuck—on Lucy, smiling and waving up at him as she slipped away into the desert. She’d already been gone longer than he’d expected. Was she okay? Would he know if something happened to her? He wanted to believe he would, but he knew better; he didn’t have any sort of magical sense for her.

“Cheer up,” Lydia said, squeezing his shoulder. “Wait until you see Madi’s tree. That’ll make you smile.”