“It’s for me.” Bumping her gently, aware I’m thicker and taller than her, I grinned as she ooped, slid, but quickly righted herself. “So maybe let me do as I please, as I have for so longI’ve done as I liked right into nothing, then smack dab into the middle of a Yeti village.”
“They’ll correct you the second you say that,” Dace cautioned me. In a mock deep voice, she grumbled, “Not Yet-tea, Lo denaii.”
We laughed for a minute over her sad impression of Berkr.
She wasn’t wrong— one peek out the window told me it was too dark to do much of anything.
“I should probably get going back to where I’m staying,” I muttered, though I didn’t really want to.
“Do you have an enormous sack of potatoes, like Vurhg was saying?”
Dace’s question caught me off guard. “A pillowcase full.”
Dace’s hands slapped to her chest and she squeezed the material of the thick winter wear she was donning. “Don’t get me wrong, the tubers here are pretty great, a nice substitute for the real thing in a pinch, but they don’t whip up like home made Earth mashed potatoes.” She was practically drooling at the thought.
It was then I realized that I may have lucked out in the mate lottery, but I’d just found my twin soul in friendship.
“I could spare a few, say, in exchange for lessons making tebbimenk wear,” I ventured quietly.
“Yes!!” Dace did a little dance in place and then squeaked, “And I’m done,” to stop victory dancing altogether.
Eyeing her, I tried to hold it in, push it down, but just started laughing.
“What?” Dace smiled but looked unsure. Blushing, she blurted, “Was it my boogie down?” Doing a little boogie in place again, she grinned, shrugged, and laughed along with me when that insane little jig in place set me off again.
She looked like an arthritic elf trying to attempt a touchdown dance.
“Don’t knock it,” Dace laughingly chortled. “It’s the only move I have!”
“Thank you.” It was the first thing I said when I got ahold of myself.
“For what?” Dace was all smiles despite the confused frown.
“For being my friend,” I said simply.
One moment Dace was standing next to me, the next she was latched to me like a barnacle. “Hi hould hay huh hame hoo hou! Hank hou!” she chirped happily from the material she was mashed up against, smashed up into my side.
Despite how dark it was getting, Dorothy’s warning of bad beasts on the peripherals, I sat down at Dace’s table and we chatted for a bit longer.
Feeling daring, I even gave Loretta an experimental pet.
Luckily for me, I quickly learned that Loretta is bitey but I am not affected by the dreaded tebbimenk allergy. Score one for me.
By the time I did drag my butt to my hut, Dace kept trying to talk me into staying the night, offering up her bed and insisting she was fine sleeping on the floor.
Wanting a bit of time to myself and privacy to wash up, I bid her good-bye with a tentative meet up tomorrow morning bright and early to check out the state of the other huts.
I was halfway home when I spotted him. Kehlor paced back and forth in front of Bia’s hut.
My steps slowed as I drew near. I was tempted to turn around and make my way back to Dace’s and take her up on her offer, but I wasn’t a complete and total wuss.
“Looking for something?”
Kehlor’s gaze whipped towards me as I spoke.
“Where go?”
Perhaps he didn’t mean to sound as angry as he did, or come off so controlling or bossy.
