2.3

Rinna led the way back to the Healer's work tent, with Emri and Aron in tow and Nathley trailing close behind. Emri could hear that Remal Haelson fellow well before they reached the door to that particular tent. He probably didn't think he was speaking very loudly, but his voice carried.

"No, that's from something else," he was saying to someone, "before the bear. Do you want to see it?"

A child's voice replied. "Ew, no, that's gross."

Upon entering the tent, Rinna went straight over and whispered to Faver, who was sitting next to a woman and apparently having dinner. Emri stood just inside the tent's door and Aron stayed by her, seeming as bemused as Emri was by the spectacle of Remal having a perfectly amiable conversation with a child who was playfully swatting at him with the wooden spoon she held in her hand as though it were a weapon.

"If you want to be a Hunter," Remal scoffed, "you shouldn't be so squeamish."

"I'm not squeamish!" the girl retorted with mock ferocity, "I've watched the butchers do their work and I've seen them slaughter sheep!" She jabbed at him with the spoon, which he blocked with a wooden bowl. More seriously, the little girl declared, "I didn't run away when I saw dead people, either. Blood doesn't scare me! It's just stuff like pus and infected wounds that's gross, and you always wait until things get all infected and inflamed before you let Pa see them!"

"Not always!" Remal acted aghast, as if he were deeply offended by the accusation – but ridiculously overplayed, which made the little girl laugh. "Regardless," Remal added with mock indignation, "your father already cleaned it up, so it's not infected."

"Anymore." Emri heard Aron say quietly aside, and she looked at him. What he said might have been judgmental, but his tone and the amused look on his face belied it. He smiled when he saw she looked at him, and not knowing if she should reply or what to say if she did, Emri quickly looked back at Remal and the child.

"So there." Remal said to the girl, and made as if to set the wooden bowl on the girl's head, but she ducked and bounced aside, and the bowl fell on the ground instead.

"I bet it's still all red and puffy!" the girl declared, then hopped to where she could swat at the back of his shoulder with her spoon. "So no. Thank. You." She punctuated her statement three times with a slapping sound as the spoon hit a bandage that Remal had there.

He winced like it hurt, but not enough to yell about it. "You," he said, turning his shoulder away and snatching the spoon out of the little girl's hand, "are picking up your father's bad habits."

He started to lean over to pick up the bowl from where it had fallen on the ground, but the child dove at it faster, triumphantly declaring, "I got it, Uncle Rem!" as she stood up with the bowl and presented it to him. He put the spoon in the bowl, leaving it in her hands instead of taking it from her.

The woman sitting by Faver spoke up. "Better if she picks up her father's habits, than yours." She sounded teasing, but also as if it was something of a serious judgement.

Remal wrinkled his nose at her, but Faver and Aron laughed, so then the child laughed, too. Paying more notice to the woman by Faver, Emri appraised that she looked like she might be somewhat taller and broader than the average woman in camp – not unlike Rinna, although there seemed to be no other resemblance between them. The woman and Faver appeared to have just finished eating from wooden bowls like the one Remal had now left to the girl. To that was added two more, as the woman stood up and took her own bowl and Faver's, stacking them all in the little girl's hands. The woman then picked up two more bowls from the work table, and Rinna picked one up as well.

Faver stood up, too, and addressed Emri: "This is my wife, Brylin, and my daughter Nina. Brylin, Nina, this is Miss Emri." The woman – Brylin – handed Emri and Aron each a bowl, which Emri now saw contained some sort of soup. Faver patted the little girl on the head, who bobbed about and offered a cheerful "Hello, Miss Emri!"

"Pleasure to meet you." Brylin said, with a nod. She patted little Nina on the shoulder and the girl spoke up, adding: "Nice to meet you."

The girl sounded quite genuinely friendly, and looked at Emri with curiosity. Her mother also looked at Emri with curiosity, though not as obviously and perhaps somewhat more appraisingly. That reminded Emri of Rinna, though Brylin's smile seemed more sincere. Emri wondered if the two women might be related, as Brylin made simple conversation – asking, as other people already had, if Emri were from this part of the country or somewhere farther off, saying she had heard that Emri was helping with some new medicines, and similar things. Emri answered all the same questions as she had answered before. On the surface, Brylin appeared to take the answers like Rinna had – but beneath that, she seemed less incredulous.

Meanwhile, Emri heard Faver send Nathley to fetch her dinner and then come back here to help, and then he whispered aside with Rinna and Aron a bit.

"So how far away are you from?" Nina asked excitedly. "Are you from really, really, really far away? Have you traveled farther than us? 'Cause we've traveled a looooong way so far."

"I know!" Emri exclaimed, crouching down to address the girl more directly. "You've all traveled really far. You've been very brave, haven't you?"

Nina smiled and nodded, and Emri went on to say: "I did travel really far, too, but from way off away in the opposite direction. I've been studying what herbs grow in this part of the world for a while, now, though."

"So do you know people who live around here? Do you know what they're like?"

"Well, not much. Around here I've mostly been out away from where the people live. I haven't really met anyone from this local area yet. I've talked to people who live a ways beyond over that way, though. I suppose you could say… they're in the towns north of the towns that are north of where you and your family and everyone in camp came from."

"Really?" Nina said. She had such an open, unguarded air about her, that Emri found her refreshing to talk to, even more than Faver or Hin. "People say the towns are really big there!" Nina's eyes were wide. "Are they really, really big?"

"Well… maybe bigger than any you might have seen so far in your travels. Bigger, I think, than the ones nearest here. I wouldn't call them really, really big, though. There are some places in the world where the towns are soooooo much bigger."

"How big?"

"Hm… like as big as several of the biggest towns in this part of the world, all jumbled together."

"Is that where you're from? A really big town like that?"

"Oh, no. The place I came from isn't like that. There are a lot of people there, but it's arranged more like a lot of smaller towns all spread out over a much larger area, instead of big towns with a lot of people all living close to each other."

"That sounds like the Downs we used to live in!" Nina exclaimed, sounding pleased.

"Maybe it is like that, in some ways. There's lots of other ways it's different, though."

"Like how?"

"Oh, well… so many kinds of different that I couldn't list them all. One thing, though is that there's different plants. There's some kinds of trees there that you'd never see anywhere near here."

"Really? What else?"

"Oh, there's all kinds of different plants. Sometimes you can see the same ones as you could find here – or ones very similar – but there's some flowers there that no one could find anywhere else at all in the whole world. There's more different types of flowers, too."

"That sounds nice."

"Do you like flowers?"

"Yes! Do you?"

"Absolutely."

"What else is different there?"

"Oh, lots of things…" Emri hesitated to go into greater detail. She hadn't thought about it before, but perhaps she could sort out which details she could describe without touching on the things she shouldn't talk about. She would want some time to think it over, though. She looked around, suddenly realizing that no one else in the tent was talking anymore, and though some seemed to be trying to be inconspicuous about it, all the adults present were watching her. Emri thought Nina was going to repeat her question or say something else, but Brylin put a hand on the girl's shoulder just as she was opening her mouth.

"How about we let Miss Emri eat her dinner. There's still more work to be done here tonight. She's helping your Pa make medicine for all the sick people, and we have things to do, too."

"Oh. Yeah." Nina sounded reluctant to leave off the novelty of talking to someone new, but nodded to her mother in agreement.

Brylin took two of the empty bowls Nina had been holding, and said, "I hope you like the soup. We'll see you later, Miss Emri."

"Thank you." Emri said. "Goodbye."

"Bye, Miss Emri." Nina said, with a wave.

"Bye, Miss Nina."

"Here, take this one, too." Rinna said, drinking the rest of her broth and passing her bowl to Nina.

"Bye, Everyone." Nina took the bowl and spoon, added them to the other one she held, and ran to follow her mother out the other door.

Everyone else variously waved or said goodbye. Emri glanced over at Remal, surprised at how cheerful he sounded. Aside from having a bandaged shoulder, he looked a bit bruised and battered. She was fairly certain he hadn't looked that way earlier. When he turned from having watched Nina leave, he saw Emri looking at him. His eyes narrowed. Emri thought it was a look as if to say, 'how dare you, you have no right to look at me'. Emri hadn't thought him to be very friendly when she'd first met him, but he seemed more and more disagreeable every time she saw him after that.

Aron pulled up a bench for them to share, drawing her attention to it and inviting her to sit and eat. Perhaps the bench had been under the work table? There seemed to be only a few stools and small chairs in the tent, otherwise most of the space around the sides was taken up by the work table and a few assorted other things like cabinets, a smaller table, and what appeared to be a cot for sleeping, currently occupied by Remal.

Emri turned her attention to her soup. It wasn't bad at all. Vastly different from most soups she'd had, though similar in some ways to the flavor of some food she'd tried in the city she'd been to before, closer to the middle of this quadrant of the world. She supposed they used some of the same seasonings in similar proportions.

Meanwhile, Rinna could be heard talking quietly to Faver nearby. "So, was it really you that people saw fighting with Remal? He looks like he got the worst of it."

"I did dodge quite a lot." Faver sounded… was that tone apologetic or sheepish? "Don't you think I could beat him, though?"

Rinna snorted. "Between the two of you? Normally I'd expect the opposite, but honestly it is better if you come out of it… less damaged."

Remal started to say something, but Faver cut him off. "You are supposed to be resting, so no talking! Do I need to give you a sedative?" Remal muttered something quiet and indistinct, laying down and turning his back to everyone. He sounded rather annoyed.

Aron, however, was chuckling into his soup, but when he happened to look at Emri, his expression went more serious and concerned-looking. She realized she had been looking at them all with her mouth slightly open.

Honestly, was it no very serious thing if they'd been fighting? She had thought this was a peaceable camp of people, but perhaps they were all a more violent people than she'd believed. Did they truly deserve to find a genuinely peaceful place to settle in?

Emri closed her mouth and whispered to Aron. "Is this… a normal thing?"

"For them to fight? No, they usually just argue with words." Aron patted her arm in a comforting way. "It's not uncommon for people in the camp to practice at fighting, but actual fighting is rare."

Emri sighed. She could understand that a group of people in the kind of situation these people were in, might naturally feel a need to know how to fight, to protect themselves and their families, but… it was disconcerting all the same.

Faver leaned closer to Emri and Aron. "I needed to evaluate his reaction time and responsiveness. Sparring works well for that." He glanced at Rinna again. "You are right, though, normally Remal would do better."

At something of a scoffing sound from Remal over in his corner, Faver spoke louder, saying, "But he's overtired and desperately needs some rest!" Speaking quieter again, he added in an aside to Emri and Aron: "And of course, a bit of exercise before resting can be quite beneficial."

Emri wasn't entirely reassured, but Faver's explanation did sound at least somewhat reasonable. She nodded slightly.

Changing topics, Faver said: "Rinna tells me you were thinking about making a treatment for fevers. I'll go get my apprentice, and you can teach it to us both at the same time. Also, we can have him help us make more of the other medicine."

Faver got up, and Rinna followed suit, saying: "I'll go with you."

Emri started towards the work table, but Aron put a hand on her arm and said: "You can finish eating."

"There's a lot of work-" she began to protest, but Faver interrupted.

"It can wait long enough for you to eat. It's not only our job to look after the sick, but ourselves as well." It sounded like something her mentor might say.

Emri nodded, and Faver declared that he would be back soon. Rinna exchanged glances with Aron before following Faver out – Emri was not sure what to make of the look, but it certainly seemed more serious than friendly.

Emri occupied herself with eating her soup. It wouldn't take much longer to finish, but Aron was finished eating before she was. Meanwhile, Nathley returned. Aron quickly admonished Nathley to speak as quiet as she could, since Faver wanted Remal to get some rest. She did try – mostly – to keep quiet, though sometimes her speech got louder. Aron was quick to remind her to speak quietly every time, though.

Aron asked if she had eaten, and Nathley explained that she had, finishing her food while chatting with the people who had been serving dinner. When Brylin got back there, she had reminded Nathley to finish up quickly and get back to work, though she also spent time chatting with everyone.

"That's Brylin for you." Aron commented with a smile.

"Sure is." Nathley agreed, then said: "So Faver wants Remal to rest here?"

"He's under strict orders to stay here where Faver can keep track of him."

"I suppose if he's going to take orders from anyone, it'd be Faver."

"Not without complaint, though." Aron laughed quietly, and Nathley joined in.

"Excuse me," Emri interjected, "is that because Faver is the Healer, or… is Faver his older brother?" Emri nodded in Remal's direction. "That girl Nina called him 'uncle', and Faver introduced her as his daughter."

"Ah, " Aron said, still smiling, "they are brothers, but by marriage. Faver's wife Brylin is Remal's older sister."

"Though sometimes children may call a close family friend 'uncle' or 'aunt' anyway." Nathley added.

"Sure, but in this case it's a fact and not just a form of address."

"Oh." Emri said, thinking this was more indication that forms of address in this part of the world seemed unnecessarily complicated to her. "I had thought Brylin seemed more like she might be Rinna's sister."

Nathley laughed, and Aron said: "There's no relation there, but they do have some interests in common." Nathley thought that was funny too, for some reason.

There was a sound like a derisive snort from Remal. He might be pretending to sleep at this point. How difficult might it be for him to actually sleep in a tent where other people were still talking, even if they might whisper? She wasn't sure if she should feel bad for him, though, because she had serious doubts about whether he even wanted to sleep.

Whispering, Emri suggested that they ought to get to work – quietly. Aron checked that she was finished eating, politely took her bowl to set aside with his own, and Nathley followed Emri to the work table.