Side A – Nia
A glance over at Marianne told Nia that her one-time crush had already arrived at the same conclusion as to who might be the best one to help the Roadies with the improperly…was it buried? Had they buried the broken drums in the mountain? From what they’d said, Nia was pretty sure it wasn’t anything as simple as that, but she couldn’t get a feel for what the final resting place of a drum might be.
“We can help you as drummers,” Margrada said and turned to gesture towards town’s center, “but Yasgrid might be able to. The original one.”
“She’s a drummer too,” Horgi said.
“Not anymore,” Nia said, feeling finally free to speak. “She’s got her own magic now.”
“What kind of magic?” Grash asked, the suspicion lacing his words greater than Nia would have expected and yet, on reflection, quite insufficient for what Yasgrid had become.
“She’s the one who worked the other side of the magic the drummers tied into which opened all the new portals,” Nia said. “We had, what, every Stoneling who’s currently alive? Over in the Darkwood it was just her.”
Not exactly true, Nia knew, but there was arguably a kernel of truth in it.
“Elf magic? I don’t know…” Horgi said.
“It’s not elf magic. It’s her magic,” Nia said, hoping she was hitting a reassuring tone. “There’s no elves who can do what she did. I’m not saying she can definitely help either, but she’ll be able to give you options you don’t have now.”
“And a perspective that knows to be respectful of your beliefs,” Marianne said.
“It can’t hurt to ask her and if you need to turn her away, she’ll understand more than anyone else,” Belhelen said, which drew a considering look from both Horgi and Grash. “C’mon. You know she’s a good gal. She’s been around the drums since before she could walk, and she’s always respected the hell out of them.”
“Wouldn’t hurt to ask, would it?” Grash asked, directing the question to Horgi, even though the mere act of vocalizing it meant they’d already decided on their answer.
“Wait though, is she like you?” Horgi asked.
“There’s no one like this one,” Marianne said, which Nia found to be an oddly comforting bit of support, even if Marianne hadn’t meant it as unalloyed praise.
“Yasgrid’s still herself, she just looks like I used to look,” Nia amended to counter Horgi and Grash’s frown.
Horgi and Grash shared another look.
“That’s just wild,” Grash said. “So she was an Elf all along?”
“It kinda fits doesn’t it?” Horgi said. “A mother like she has an she was always so quiet? Never would have guessed she was an Elf, but, yeah, I can see it.”
Nia felt a flurry of words to defend Yasgrid leap to her lips, but checked herself. What was there to defend Yasgrid from? Maybe the connotation that Yasgrid had been a defective sort of Stoneling? But that wasn’t what they were saying.
And if they ever did, well, they were Roadies, Nia was no stranger to punching Roadies in the face. Even her friends.
Side B – Yasgrid
Yasgrid didn’t wait to be asked to contact Nia. It was too simple and too natural for her to pop over to visit Nia for her to even think twice about it. That her timing was apparently near perfect however did come as a bit of an unexpected twist.
“Like I said, Yasgrid is Yasgrid, and she always has been. Elf, Stoneling, that’s not the part that matters. The part that matters is that she can help you,” Nia was in the middle of saying when Yasgrid arrived.
“I can?” she asked.
Nia turned to her, delight sparkling in her eyes.
“Yes, yes you can,” she said, not bothering to subvocalize it for a change.
“Uh, who is she talking to?” one of the Roadies, Horgi Yasgrid was pretty sure, asked.
“Take a guess,” Nia said and turned back to Yasgrid. “Would it be an imposition for us to drag you over here? Or come visit you? There’s a problem I think you might be the right one to fix.”
Yasgrid blinked.
“I’m sorry but, wait, what? You’re stealing my line,” she said, trying to work out what kind of problem the Stoneling’s might have that would need her help to resolve.
Looking around she saw building that looked like they were still in a Stoneling town and from the sound of the distance river it was more likely to be the Gray Rift than Gray Falls.
“Stealing your…we need to talk, don’t we?” Nia asked, again audibly to the others as well, which drew a number of puzzled glances.
“It would be helpful if you could manifest her here so the rest of us could join in on the conversation,” Marianne said.
Marianne who Yasgrid first though was looking right at her, but from how Marianne’s gaze was shifting it seemed to simply be a good guess based on Nia’s posture and sight lines.
Yasgrid looked around again, taking in exactly where they were. She wasn’t present in body, but Nia was and through their connection Yasgrid could feel the breeze which played through the air. The mid-morning shone warmed her as it warmed Nia. Scents of pine and cooking and people swirled around her. There was a pulse to the town, the breath of the people in it and the stamp of their feet. A buzz of conversation and the thrum of fresh excitement.
In short, there was magic all around her.
“I have a better idea,” she said to Nia, answering Marianne’s request with what felt like an even better idea.
It was simple.
The magic was right there and the connections between them were barely hidden.
She’d closed her eyes when she projected over to see Nia but as she drew in a joyous breath, she opened them and let both sights blend together.
Subtle threads blazed before her and with the merest sweep of her hand, she called Nia’s party to her.
The gasps of surprise when Osdora’s home became host to six new people came from everyone save Nia and Kyra, the two women who knew her best in all the world.