Vi recognized as well what Renna was trying to do for Ellene. The kitchens were large, but Renna had been in ear-shot since the moment they’d sat down. Moreover, there wasn’t much activity at this time of night, so there hadn’t been much noise to drown out their words.
“I’d like that as well. I don’t think you’ve told us stories since we were kids, sneaking in for whatever cookies or cakes you had baked for the day.”
“Well, speaking of…” Renna glanced over her shoulder. “We made a whole batch of candied nut rolls for the festival that no one has touched thanks to all this madness. If you finish your dinners, I could cut you each a hefty slice and I’ll tell you one story before bed.” She looked right to Ellene. “Would you like that?”
Ellene gave a small sniff and, for a brief second, Vi was afraid she would protest that she was far too old for sweets and fireside stories before bed. They all were. But for one night, retreating into the comforting ignorance of childhood wouldn’t harm any of them.
“I think I would,” Ellene said finally.
“Then finish your meals and I’ll have warm sticky sweets ready when you’re done.”
“Sticky sweets for finishing a meal; I feel like a child again,” Andru murmured.
“There are worse feelings,” Vi said quickly, with a small nod toward Ellene. Understanding dawned on Andru’s face, and something like gratitude. Vi was starting to understand how this shy, awkward man’s mind worked—and how often it missed what seemed like obvious social cues. Renna was just trying to help, and one slice of nut roll would not turn any of them into a toddler again. And, if Vi was honest with herself, her mouth was already watering at the thought.
Renna was good to her word. The wiry woman had a plate waiting for each of them when they arranged themselves around the giant stone hearth of the kitchen. In proper fashion, they each sat on the floor, the woman easing herself into a stool she’d pulled over.
“When was the last time we did this?” Vi asked with a small laugh and nudge to Ellene’s shoulder. “Seven? Ten?”
“It’s been so long I can’t remember.” She stared at her nut roll and inhaled through her nose. “It smells just like I remember, though.”
“Sounds like you had a nice childhood,” Jayme said softly.
Vi resisted the debate that would follow any kind of correction. Her childhood hadn’t been bad… but nice? Nice was living with your family, knowing your sibling, and not growing up as the Empire’s trading chip.
But there were layers to Jayme’s statement, ones Vi may not have considered before Andru revealed her clandestine meeting in the Crossroads. What had her childhood been like? She knew Jayme had become the official courier almost immediately after enlisting. How did a fourteen-year-old manage that? It was something Vi hadn’t really considered, but the older she got, the more she wondered at the logistics that had lined up to make such a prestigious honor of delivering Imperial letters fall on a young girl’s shoulders.
Just how well did she really know her friend?
“What story would you like to hear?” Renna asked.
“I have no preference,” Jayme said, louder, as if to speak over the echo of the words she’d uttered under her breath. “They’ll all be new to me.”
“Something romantic,” Ellene eagerly chirped. Vi didn’t know if returning her mind to romance was the best course.
“Something happy,” Vi suggested hastily.
“Something romantic and happy…” Renna leaned back in her chair. “How about the creation of the reservoir?”
The reservoir was a large freshwater lake to the south east of Soricium. It was said that its underground tunnels fed most of the springs throughout the jungles. And, if that were true, it made it not only the largest source of freshwater on the continent, but also the primary water source for the people of Shaldan.
“The one with Dia and Holin?” Ellene asked eagerly. “Yes, that one, tell that one!”
Renna chuckled. “Very well, if my little chieftain-to-be commands it…
“Long ago, as Shaldan and its people grew under the care of Dia, so too did their needs. No longer could they collect water from when the skies opened, or rely on small trickles through the jungles. Something far more substantial was needed.
“‘Cut a layer beneath the earth,’ a young man suggest—”
“Holin!” Ellene said through a particularly large bite of her sweet roll.
“Yes, Holin.” Renna smiled brightly at Ellene’s ever improving mood. “He suggested such to Dia—that if she could use her axe to cut not just the earth above the ground as trees, and plants, but the earth below, that water would gather there in a mighty basin for all to utilize…”
Vi hadn’t heard the tale in some time, and she found herself as entranced as her friends by Renna’s storytelling. Andru seemed to be getting particularly into the way the weathered woman spun the tale as he inched forward, hanging on every word, nut roll forgotten.
It was a story of love being enough of a reason to master a power none had seen before, a story of triumph, full of such fantastical embellishments that even though Renna presented it all as fact, Vi was certain very little was actually true.
“… and while it was aptly called the reservoir, even then, a new name was eventually given—Lake Io, named after Dia and Holin’s first daughter. Some even still call it that name, in honor of our first chieftain.”
