I cry for a long time. Deep, body-wracking, sobs. To the point I can't even make any more tears and just give in to painful coughing. All throughout it, though, I've had one anchor, one thing stopping this from spiraling out into a full-blown panic attack or something worse.

  Serafina.

  She never tries to overtalk me, or try to talk me down from these feelings. She just spends however long it takes with me holding me close. That bit of contact, that bit of of solidity, saves me from the worst of it and gives me the strength to make it through the other side.

  She does the thing that plenty of other people have promised to, but never actually done. She just stays with me through it. Garrick and Lan can never be around and I don't really know if I trust their opinions of me anymore. May and I grew apart as soon as things had friction.

  But Serafina has seen me now at my lowest point ever, and she didn't flinch or balk or try to explain why I shouldn't feel this way.

  She's just here. And I think that's all I've wanted and needed for a long time.

  I don't really know how I feel about her, if I'm being honest with myself. I can't say it's romantic, or lustful, or just platonic, but I don't really care one way or the other, I just don't want it to stop.

  After a long silence where the only sound in the room is my own raspy breathing and Serafina making gentle, supportive noises at me, she breaks the silence.

  "Coming down from the worst of it?" Her voice is soft and gentle. Not demanding I stop, not urging me to continue. Just giving me space to answer the question for myself. All I can manage is a stifled, ugly sob and nodding in response. "I'm glad. I want to ask, and you don't need to give me an answer now: What can I do to best support you in this, Nyssa? I could go on at length with support, but I want to make sure I give you what you need, not what most people need in these circumstances. I don't want to impose my views and thoughts on yours."

  She lets it hang in the air, not rushing anything, after a minute or so, I stabilize myself to answer, even if only in a broken, faltering, way. "I… I want to be stronger. I want to make this stop hurting, and I think more than anything, I just…" I hesitate, the last words, the ones I really need to say, are hard, "… I don't want to be alone anymore."

  She sits for a while, just kneeling next to me on the bed and holding my head against her chest with one hand on my shoulder and the other very gently running through my hair in meaningless circles atop my head. "Before you ran off from the keep, I told you that I would be here for you, Nyssa. I know you probably thought it was a political offer, but it wasn't. I see a kindred spirit in you, suffering from many things I have and do still on occasion. Anything I can do to help you achieve your goals, I will."

  "If that means you leaving the Vigil to find your own path, I'll help set you up for success. If it means the occasional hug and cry to decompress, I'll do it. If you need to vent, or need a break, I'll ensure you get it. If you need a firmer hand, and someone to lean on, I can do that too. I would like to say I've come to think of you as a friend — not just a colleague I'm worried about — and as such, I just want to see you better. Whatever that takes." Her words remain measured, maintaining a degree of confident calm that cracks periodically to reveal that she's feeling emotional over it all as well. I can hear that she actually cares.

  I listen carefully, though, before answering and respond with a bit more confidence. "I don't know which thing I'll need, or which group of them, but I'm going to try to not be evasive and just say "Yes, I will take your help"." After a delay, I add, not wanting it to go unaddressed, "I think I like the idea of being your friend, Serafina; I don't have many to lean on anymore."

  She just smiles the warmest smile I've ever seen her give. It radiates comfort and warmth like a hearth, even reflecting that vital warmth in her strange, void blacked, eyes. "Then all of those other people are just going to miss out on seeing the real you in time. You're going to show the world that you are good enough. In whatever form that takes. Live well, and nobody can say a thing to you anymore."

  I pull away to look up at her with a weak smile of my own, suddenly feeling lighter than I have in twenty years since I came here. "Thanks, Serafina. It means the world to me that you'd do this for me. I think I need to lie down, though. Between the doctors orders and…this, I'm just beyond exhausted and strung out."

  "By all means. You get the rest you deserve, not just the rest you need. I'll hang around here and read or write reports. If you need anything, you let me know and I'll see it taken care of."

  She clambers off the bed after a final tighter hug and then moves to the desk on the side of the room to begin sifting through her bags, leaving me to lean back into the satiny sheets feeling better than I have in a long time — especially considering how much worse I feel than I have in a long time in every other way.

  That thought giving me a smile, I roll onto my side. The position gives me a clean angle to look at Serafina, which buoys me a bit as I close my eyes and fall asleep quicker and more easily than I have in years.

  I sleep for the rest of the day, and dream happy dreams. They're still my normal hazy, indistinct, things. But I dream of things that give me positive feelings. Serafina's warm touch, her supportive words, the smile that makes it all feel a bit better and, most importantly, a promise that I actually believe for once.

  The dreams don't hark back to "better times" with May, nor do they trap me in the day my parents died. It's purely good.

  When I wake up, it's distinctly early morning, meaning that I probably slept close to sixteen hours. I feel fantastic.

  Mostly.

  Aside from feeling emotionally whole, I am beyond starving. I'm dehydrated, essentially fatigued, and the myriad other signs that come with your body doing its best to repair itself. While I've been passively pulling in essence while I've been resting, that doesn't fill my stomach even if it will technically sustain me. But there's more to life than merely sustaining your existence. Even for someone as practically minded as me despite what others might think.

  I slowly sit up, feeling Serafina's presence nearby and not wanting to disrupt her. The act of sitting up reminds me that I am still not quite fully healed though, with a more gentle spike of pain in my right leg from both wounds.

  Carefully, I swing my legs off the side of the bed to inspect the bandaging. And it looks…quite grim. The treated bandages have drawn what Venenum that remained out of my system and into the cloth, which tells the truth to the doctors claim of getting dangerously poisoned — the material is utterly soaked through with the liquid essence of poisons and decay.

  It smells utterly foul. Among the worst things I could ever imagine, really. It's rot, and decay, and mold, and acid and poison all at once. It's antithetical to at least a dozen essences that form the mortal body and soul — which is why it's so dangerous. Introducing it into your body will cause it to mutually destroy itself and take swathes of your body with it when it does. Imbalances lead to sickness, disease, and poor healing, so it's something that needs to be handled quickly and carefully.

  Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

  Serafina left a salve and some bandages on the table next to the bed, so I go through the slow process of rewrapping the wounds with newly salved bandages and dealing with disposing of the Venenum-soaked rags in a carryall that Paea left behind. Leaving . It takes me probably ten minutes, all told, but by the end, it feels loads better. Whatever is in the salve definitely has pain-relieving properties atop its use as a healing agent.

  That done, I rise to my feet and walk-hobble my way over to a note on the table in nearly machine-precise handwriting that I recognize as Serafina's . She has a very specific manner of writing that is unmistakable that I assume she does to maximize clarity. All of her letters are always capital letters with sharp lines, they just "capitalize" into larger versions of themselves. It makes her handwriting very blocky, but not at all unpleasant. It's just precise in the same way I might imagine a machine-printed document to be.

  Point of fact, if I hadn't seen her write this way, I might assume the things she writes are machine printed.

  How thoughtful the note is leaves me smiling as I unfold the clothes. They're far nicer than anything I'd buy for myself by a fair degree.

  The pile is comprised of a set of snug, blue, woolen pants, a black leather belt, wooly socks, and a matching long-sleeved shirt with a fine tartan pattern. They all fit perfectly, and the pants tuck neatly into my boots with no spare material hanging anywhere. It's a degree of fit that I would expect from an enchanted item designed to refit itself, but I guess Serafina just has a good eye for these things.

  The pants even have a tailored notch that holds together in the back for me to slide my tail through at the perfect height. It seals tightly enough that it isn't going to let any air leak through, but similarly isn't so tight that it's uncomfortable. My tail isn't terribly temperature sensitive anyways, so it being exposed is never an issue, but having a hole in my clothes to let chill air into my underwear is hardly pleasant, so the feature is greatly appreciated.

  Finally, a fully sized winter coat that pretty well matches what I know is the "in" style right now. It's a tall, long, thing that goes all the way down to my ankles, is made of a pleated material with each of the vertical pleats being a different color — primarily warm colors in the orange and yellow spectrum. The hood even has snap points to accommodate my horns!

  As I finish getting dressed, I feel snug and cozy and deeply appreciative. I would never buy myself anything like this. The only person who ever has in the past was May….

  I push that thought out of my head, trying to desperately avoid sabotaging my currently good mood.

  With that, I quietly open the door and head out into the inn proper. Once I arrive in the front room, I see the innkeeper look up from writing in a ledger with a beaming smile that manages to lift his drooping lapin ears up for a brief moment before they remember their age and settle back down. While the disposition of lapin ears varies person to person it is an almost universal truth that they will turn floppier as they age.

  "Aye, you made it. Was worried for a bit that I might have to call the coroner." He continues smiling warmly, and would definitely be showing a lot of teeth if there were many left — what few remain, notably, are his larger two front teeth.

  "No, sir. I'm a bit harder to put down than that. Just needed some rest." I return the smile as I make my way across the room.

  The front of the inn technically has two couches, but they are utterly coated in cats of every variety I'm aware of and quite a few that I'm not. As I enter the room properly, most of the awake ones prowl over and start various tones of purrs and grumbles while rubbing against my legs. I crouch, and try my best to give each some attention, but with two dozen cats and some of them looking somewhat similar, I can't be sure. Hopefully they'll understand.

  "They seem to like you. They're all friendly, but they don't normally crowd people like that. You must be good people. Animals know, you know."

  "I've always had animals be drawn to me, I've stopped assuming it's any sort of character judgement and instead think that I just smell nice or something." I deflect with practiced ease, but he doesn't let me drop it.

  "Mmm, maybe random animals. We take our kith here," He gestures to the flock of cats, "very seriously. I don't know if you know much about Burrowvale, but our little friends are very important representatives of the Rootmother, and it just wouldn't do to turn down their recommendations." The small lecture leaves me smiling, so I relent.

  "Fair enough, maybe I'm selling myself short. I don't think there's any bad folks in the Vigil, most people have their hearts in the right place. I'm just not that unique in that." I finish lavishing the cats with attention, and when I stand up a chorus of meows, mrows, merows, and mews ring out to decry my slight against their kind by daring to stop. "Is there anywhere around you would suggest eating? Any places that serve essence-enriched foods, maybe?"

  "You might like the shrine's eatery. It's where most of the essence concentration in the region is. Food there is always good because of it. Just turn right out the front and walk till you find stairs and just make your way up."

  "Thanks, I'll go take a look. Was hoping to see the shrine anyways. I'll be back later, if my…friend," I hesitate, unsure how Serafina would have been referring to me to people. I don't want to be presumptuous and say the wrong thing, she is still nobility, after all. But she did say she considers me a friend, so maybe that's okay? "—wakes up and is looking for me, let her know I'll back in a couple hours. Though I'm sure she could find me if she wanted in this town."

  That settled, I carefully push the door open to try to avoid letting the cavalcade of cats out into the street, but I realize the futility the moment I open the door and three quarters of them rush out the opening and form a semicircle around the door, and looking at me expectantly. It seems I'm to have an escort.

  I step out and look at the arrayed felines, "Can you show me where the shrine is?" I ask. Miraculously, one, a very very fat tabby, grumbles a meow that sounds like it regularly gargles charcoal and gravel, and turns to amble down the street while casting occasional glances back at me to ensure I'm following.

  I follow it, and the remaining cats follow me. Behind the cats eventually grows a small tide of other little critters: rabbits, some weasels, a raccoon, birds fluttering forward and landing ahead of me repeatedly to call at me.

  One particularly bold raven lands on my shoulder. It's pretty large for what I expect of a raven. Maybe it's a crow? I was never any good at identifying birds. It has a white streak on one wing that looks almost like a runic sigil, but it keeps flapping its wings to stay steady on my shoulder, so I never get a good look at it and hit the stairs shortly after.

  My guide continues to grumble back at me — with greater urgency and occasional breaks to flop onto stairs to rest. On the third break on the first flight of stairs, I experimentally reach down to scoop it — him, I realize on looking closer — up into my arms and he goes limp in my arms like a particularly pliant sack of potatoes. An act that offends the raven such that it squawks and indignantly flies away.

  He continues to purr out instructions at me, even when I have to take my own breaks to rest my leg — just slightly less often than he did. But each break gives me a nice opportunity to look around the town in daylight and not under the effects of…everything.

  It's a fair-sized town of maybe a thousand people built atop and around a huge hill mound. Each "layer" going up the hill has more ornate structures — not opulent like the homes of nobility — that seem dedicated to various forms of worship and catering to different animal's required care, each with dozens of seemingly hand-carved statues occupying each. The last two tiers have exclusively locations of worship until I make it up to the final flat plateaued top tier.

  Most of my journey has been free of people, but making it to the shrine atop the highest point of the town explains that lack of a bustle of people, all of whom turn to look since I'm announced by the cries of a veritable zoo.

  And, to their credit, much like the innkeep, not one person looks up at my horns. Not one. Everyone instead looks at the, admittedly, much more interesting fact that I seem to have collected a not-insignificant number of the towns critters to follow me.

  I smile back at everyone, embarrassed and scratching the back of my head. "Didn't mean to interrupt, sorry."