eing grown ...is nigh impossible, but a chance is better giving up entirely." the old woman replies, head low.

Gable lifts up Lukas to throw right into Grampa's arms. Then steps up to tap on the ground with his foot, and it feels as if the ground was a pond rippled by a rock. It sounds out, detecting everything and everyone in the vicinity. Satisfied with the level of privacy, he spells one last layer of a large barrier unseen to the naked eye.

"What happens here, will stay between us. Speak and you may forfeit your life before the consuming finally gets to you." Gable warns.

Oh hot damn, I'm already swooning. Yeah sure ground, take my fall. This level of Gable intensity is just too much for my delicate maiden senses.

Wait, Georgie? Why are you on the ground with me?!

Oh well, I guess we're both swooning that bad. That's fair. How can anyone resist? That or the earth literally shook. It might as well have with how magnificent Gable looked and sounded just now. Look even grampa is almost swooning for a man!

"Rosalia, will you come here please?" Gable calls out to me, specifically me. Oho ho ho!

Rolling myself off the ground I run off to his perfect outreached hand, beautiful background of dead and dying trees and all.

"Remember how we've worked on plants before?" he kneels down to tell me.

"Yes. I know how to control Lilyanne on that much." I recall to last year, all the tests and experiments that may have included exploding fruit.

"This one will be a little more intense, think of it more like the pillars underneath the main garrison. It will zap a lot out."

"That's why we haven't been charging anything lately right? To save up for this big one."

"...Smart girl. Don't push yourself. It won't be all fixed today. "

"Alright, I'll stop Lilyanne when it starts feeling risky or she gets tired."

"..."

"But can I ask one thing for now? What's kind of fruit is it?" I whisper this part.

Gable has this worried look on his face but a girl can't help it. I'm curious. What's the great big deal that we're trying to save a tree for?

He pats my head, sighing but relenting none the less. His voice smooth and low.

"What type doesn't really matter. It doesn't resemble much anything we know, but it has restorative properties. One fully matured fruit... has the potential to restore a person's life by 5 years. You know this isn't to be known anywhere else, right Rosalia?"

My mouth slightly hangs but I nod readily none the less.

Such a thing! People would go crazy to get their hands on the supply. It would cause an upheaval, a war even. Imagine being on the verge of death and just having a fruit that gave you another 5 years of life. What if you baked a few of them into a pie?

If I ate one right now I may even be unborn! No wait, mother took a bite when she was a kid and that caused her to poison? Maybe I'll just drop dead if I try it.

No wonder it's hidden do deeply. No one would go looking for such treasures in a leper colony. They would never imagine it.

Gable pats my head and closes my jaw, silently patting me to retrieve my sister and get to work. While I do so, he pulls up the barrier once again, either making sure it's still there or reinforcing it even further.

"Come on Lily, follow big sister. It's zap zap time! You can have a snack later." I clap and pull her up. My sister easily toddling along, looking back only to make sure our mother was still there in sight.

I can see as mother gulps, lightly sweating in her gown. Grampa reassuring her quietly with a wriggling Lukas tucked into his arms. The boy holds out a thumbs up when our eyes meet. How reassuring, whatever that means.

"Have we stooped to the lows of using such small children now your highness." the woman's voice carries in the wind, despite her stepping back even further away as my sister and I approach the tree.

"Healer Melitta, how about we know our places? I am but a humble hermit, with a personal history that means nothing. Best not to forget that." Gable says calmly, denoting her title to a mere health worker.

Well now. Before I overheat, let's get to work.

Snap snap and zap Lilyanne! Start strong and use discharge! Go crazy! Big sister is right here to cheer you on. Rawr rawr and spark, now use thunderbolt! Yaaaaay!

Cheering on the heroine is also very hard work. But Lilyanne does a lot better when I hold her hand and encourage her like this. So attention needy.

She's saved up a lot of energy the last couple of months, so even when the hungry tree and earth below initially feels like swallowing us up, it only comes as a temporary surprise. Plenty more where that came from.

Pushing down, I help direct the little power source, distributing it more evenly across the dry-packed land that starved the trees. That just feels a lot more reasonable than shock overfeeding an already starving magic tree.

It's the first time Lilyanne is working with so in nature. I wonder if this would work well on general crops and farms too.

I feel like it should? She's forced flowers in gardens to bloom before? Or well, at least the original did.

Actively focusing myself, especially while directly holding on to Lilyanne, really does have a more immediate effect and direction. It's a little like playing co-op mode on a certain wacky game. She drives full throttle while I aim and shoot.

So I don't really notice the world around us as much, not when I'm focusing and feeling around where to best aim the Lilyanne magic water hose.

The newest discovery is how it's almost as if I can see what's receiving it underground. The soil, slowly drinking it in like rainwater deeper and around. Dry roots, flushing back to life in their complicated networks. Empty spots deep deep down below, like very old broken skeletons all eaten up by said roots.

Wait what?

"Um, I think we need a break soon." I raise, more questions suddenly under my tongue.

Hey uh not to be pretentious but I think I know another way to fix the hungry tree problem. Where do you people bury your dead? I'm just going to quietly ask later...yeah.

"Zap zap!" Lilyanne huffs, pushing in a last few heavy bursts. As if I had just made her sprint some laps and wove the finishing flag in a home run distance.

Good girl. Working so hard. Zap zap and finish strong Lilyanne!

At my cheering, the floodgates really rush. She must have had a lot of pent up magic saved up still. It's to the point that I have trouble regulating it far and deep enough. I finally give up as I get her to stop, letting a good amount rush straight into the seemingly dormant tree, awakening in a colorful flush.

Green and pink blossoms start growing, hyperspeed. It's as alien as it is beautiful.

"This is beyond a miracle." the strange old woman gasps, looking up in awe.

Lilyanne screams the moment the wind blows just right, misplacing the woman's hood and veil. My sister screams and cries as if she's seen a monster. A horribly frightening thing that she must immediately clutch and hide behind me.

And I don't blame her, the shock freezing me in place after I jumped back. Even as the unidentifiable woman quickly rights her veil, covering up. But it's too late to unsee.

Sunken gaping nose, misshapen bloodshot eyes, unnaturally uniform boils wrapping all around her skin as if it were replaced with bubble wrap. It would be more accurate to compare her to a half dead lizard than a human. Truly it was the kind of face that could make children cry.

"WAAAAAHH!!!!" Lilyanne wetly wails, shaking and running back to mother and the rest when I don't move. "WAAAAAAAHHHH SCARY MONSTER!! WAAAAH HELP!!! Mama! Mama! Grampapa! WAAAAAAAAHHH!"

Pinpricks uncomfortably itch up my skin. Fear. Shock. Shame. Guilt. All sorts of horrible feelings well up in me, much like Lilyanne's flood. My body not listening to what my reason wants it to do, and calm down.

The world is disgusting, and I am part of that. I am disgusting.

"My humblest apologies for frightening the little ones," she backs away, hunched and tightly gripping the veil.

"What monster? I don't sense any monsters?" Lukas tugs up at Gable.

"Lilyanne, there there don't cry so. It's alright. Oh I'm so sorry Multa Melitta. She doesn't mean it like that. She's just so young, and there there Lily." mother rocks the bawling toddler, trying to calm down her painful cries.

Pain.

I feel a pain I don't fully understand when Lilyanne cries. I feel it with weak limbs and hot eyes.

"Alright there Rosalia?" grampa stands right behind me, the shadow and presence solid despite never touching me.

He does not try to comfort me. Does not scoop me up or take me away. He stands there patiently, watching. Waiting for whatever it is I choose to do myself. It oddly feels like the most reassuring thing he could have done.

Pinpricks and acid still run through me. I'm scared. I'm sickened and scared. So ugly. I'm so-

"Sorry. I'm sorry." I choke, feeling that awful pressure in my nose. Tears finally beginning to edge and drip down my eyes.

It's beneath me but I feel myself drop messily on knees. I feel myself curl up, almost like a bow yet still hiding my ugliness from the world.

"I'm so so sorry. I'm sorry for being scared. I'm sorry for reacting like that. I'm sorry."

The woman's deformed appearance is truly repulsive.

But my own revulsion, my natural flimsy character, disgusts me even more. I'm no better than the ignorant masses of people I hate and judge. Though I thought myself to be above them. Like being born 'noble' or from another world means anything.

I just proved it. I'm not better than those who denounced me without knowing a thing. I'm no better than my baby sister who innocently ran screaming. Crying.

"I'm sorry. It hurts a lot right? Don't be sad. I'm sorry. You don't have to run away like that. You're not scary or bad. You didn't do anything wrong. I'm very sorry. Sorry."

I'm babbling. The stupid tears won't stop. It's not like me at all.

The woman bends low, also on her knees, as if to see eye level with the stupid little kid on crying her eyes out on the ground.

"I see. You're a kind one aren't you? Thank you." she says gently, the way you speak to upset babies.

My nose is so stuffed I can't even sniff, my throat stuck and impossible to breathe let alone speak. I can only shake my head no at her comforts.

We're the ones that hurt her. We don't need it. No one wants to be seen in that way, to be treated in that manner. It must have been hard. It must have been very painful, not just the treatment. It must have been a very long time she's been living here like this.

Strong arms that can only be grampa's finally pick me up, lightly bouncing me as if I were a real child. Sweet nothings pressed into my ear. It sounds like he said good job, and for some odd reason, I cry more.

It's pathetic how much it comforts me, though my tears and hiccups only increase. Curse this body, curse this too young overly weak and sensitive body.

"There you have it. My little monsters of grandaughters. Strong criers aren't they? Sorry for the noise." grampa laughs, holding me into the firm softness of his chest to cry in.

"Almost as bad as you were. They're very cute. So is your son." that mismatches voice chuckles back.

"Ahahaha! It's really time for their break, they did warn us. We'll be back to finish up the jobs, please take care of us then.

"Of course and no, thank you."

This short but painfully scary trip is not over. Far from it.

But on the tunnel ride back through the other side, Georgie strokes my hair, uncomfortably silent while mother checks up on when still trying to calm down Lilyanne. Her own emotions a complicated and frazzled mix.

Lukas could have gone with Gable for whatever they had planned for him but insisted he was tired and wanted a nap too. The kid crushes half my side along with my hand, just because he feels like it. They tuck us into a guest bed with cool sheets and I won't say anything more.

Not today.

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Lighter Road trip side story bonus. For those who need it. Still skippable.

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"It's a...spoon?"

Yuna tilts his head to the other side, trying to identify the item Amar questioningly held out of all the others at the stall, let alone the busy market.

It wasn't the nicest that they've seen, but it was something. Definitely a strange and new experience to everyone but Vincent. The borders between these two lands were friendly. Most importantly it was somewhere they could finally fix the damn wagon and get some spare tools.

"It's a spoon carved like out a chicken. I think?" Amar holds it up higher, inspecting and waiting for approval.

"For Lukas? Why a chicken?"

Yuna looks over to the specific stall, an array of seemingly decorative carved wooden spoons on display. Some were colorfully painted, some were varnished plain to showcase the natural wood, but there were all traditionally carved according to local traditions. Lots of decorative designs, though the most eye-catching to a child may be the animal-shaped handles.

"Chickens," Amar says as solemnly as a child that young possibly can. "They raise chickens. "

"...Yeah sure. Whatever you want to waste money on." Yuna waved off.

Despite his words, he not only helps the child select a few souvenir spoons but angrily haggles with the stall merchant to prevent the kid from being 'ripped off'.

"Are these eggs?" the boy inspects the painted wooden carvings that the seller gave and threw in for free, perhaps in a desperate big to get the kids away. "What do they do?"

"Look pretty," Yuna spat out but sighed and took the younger boy's hand for safety as they walk down the market, putting away the supposed gifts, "or some shit like that. People like pretty painted stuff."

"Oh. Okay." Amar nods, swinging their hands together as they walked.

He let the older boy handle the purchases and lead them down the sparse market alleyways. As they've often done in all the places before this. He knew how the teenager didn't express it very well to the adults, but he worries.

Amar doesn't think anyone would want to kidnap him, not this far from home, and certainly not any weaklings. But if it made Yuna feel better, he'll stick close and hold his hands.

If bad people wanted to kidnap someone for those bad things, he honestly thinks they'll grab the older boy first. Yuna was closer to the age the kidnapped slaves were sold the highest number in those parts of markets.

He remembers how all the mamas and mistresses laughed from their hidden balconies, pointing down to the new girls in the training houses of the outer harem. They would make lots of jokes and bets. All over who was rarer, lovelier, or more useful. Who costs more and why? If any were worth taking in as underlings or better off arranged to be married to an officer. If they were worth the trouble, the investment.

When his older sisters giggled, asking him to pick the prettiest ones, he couldn't really answer for his mama was best. How could anyone compare to his mama? It was like asking if a random pebble, even a polished one, could be compared to the moon. That's just silly.

While they were walking and pointing out any strange or funny things, Cass waved at them from the end of the market alley. She quickly maneuvered her way over to them, the chains and silver coins of her usual headdress jingling when not wearing her cloak. Not minding the dark eyes following how she just left a jeweler's the more high-end part of town.

Let them come. It's free money and stuff if they try mugging their unassuming party.

"Done and good riddance. " she flushed. Pocket purse more than a bit heavier in local currency after getting rid of some of those broken jewels and gems at the awful castle.

With the deft hands of a dealer, she counted out a reasonable portion and handed it to Yuna. The young teen still looked displeased though, pointing down to the boy.

"What about his cut?" Yuna defended.

"...It's all his, you're the one with a cut. " Cass made a shooing motion.

"That's cheating," Yuna hissed, arguing over the extra funds.

"Whatever he wants to buy, I'll get it for him."

"Kid needs his own money, not some-"

Amar felt his stomach rumble when sniffing something a passing traveler just bought. When he starts taking even half a step, the other's are on him in a flash. As if they were never arguing in the first place.

"Don't step so far out on your own. You think this is kiddy safe Ventrella lands? Pfft it's dangerous! Your skin is all baby soft and shit from the main house, easy for eating up."

"Don't teach him that! Little kahk, did you want some manti? Let's get some with your favorite yogurt sauce?"

"Shit, yogurt. There was this stall some ways back selling actual dehydrated yogurt balls. We gotta stock up."

"I still do not understand it Yuna. What do those people eat it the place of yogurt?"

"They don't! It's all vinegar or grape wine, and on fancy days we get half butter. I honestly think they're just figuring out butter. The cooks in the main Ventrella houses didn't even know how to clarify it until this year, when this brat here of all people told them."

"I believe it. I hear they think salt is a spice."

"Oh, it gets sadder to more north you go."

While the two older ones bantered and discussed the sudden shopping list, they pulled the boy along. Allowing him to carry the wood tray of steaming baked dumplings as they shopped and found a decent looking tea house to sit back and relax a bit.

That's how Vincent found them. Splitting manti dumplings and summer plums in a very public and ...' bohemian' part of town while either arguing or organizing.

But he supposes it's better than another bawdy tavern, like the kind Tamera often drags them too.

The others ignore him as he takes a tired seat, too busy figuring out translations and prices. They don't even bother asking him if the wagon is ready yet, because of course not. They already knew that.

"Did you eat yet? You look more tired than normal? Your breath smells like alcohol, did the repairmen make you drink with them? They drink really heavy stinky stuff around here. Good job. " Amar offers him medicinal tea and half a purple plum as he moves seats. The juices were sweet and refreshing.

Vincent plops down on the table in maybe tears. He thinks this trip will actually kill him if the brat wasn't here. It was a little pathetic but he has long accepted that.

"Did you have fun today?" Vincent tries to be a decent person because that's the right thing to do and not just because Tamera says that's how to get dates.

The other two were still arguing if something was a good deal or not.

"Uh huh. Yuna and I went and bought souvenir kinds of stuff. I tried to find stuff you're not supposed to find elsewhere. I think that's how it works."

"AH, yep yeah that's how it should work for normal people. That's how Tamera would do it. I hope she got that part right." the dark haired teen nods, weakly accepting everything Amar passed his way. From food in his mouth to souvenirs up for inspection.

"Tamera lost a lot of hair in that accident. So we got her this hat for laters because she gets cold easy." the boy pulled out from Yuna's shopping packs and piles.

"....Is that something's tail?" Vincent feels the dumpling drip from his mouth.

"Hat. Feel?"

"Oookay then. It...can be a hat, when turned inside out. I think she'll actually like that. "

Vincent doesn't actually know, but when Amar beams, he forces himself to sit through the burning sunlight of that smile. Practice being decent people, he told himself. This is what normal people do for kids right? Amar was practicing normal kid stuff finally, right?

Ah, they were the worse kind of people for this.

"And I wanna buy jams too but I got these-" the kid pulled out next, "oh and Yuna got these wood eggs for free. I don't know. "

At this point everyone at the table looked over. Cass and Vincent turning their head various angles to figure the hell out what it was.

"It's a...monster bird thing?" Vincent tries

"A fish! That one is a fish." Cass exclaims, figuring it out.

"Uh huh, the chicken spoon is for Lukas. Because of chickens."

They all play along. 'Oh yes', 'of course', 'that made perfect sense'. No, the fuck it didn't but they would stab anyone who ruined this. Kids were strange creatures. Lukas would probably like a funny shaped rock, why not a chicken spoon?

"And the fishy spoon is for Rosa. Because she's really scary around raw salmon."

Oooooh of course. Wait what?

"You got princess strawberry, grumpy money rolling cries a lot when she's hungry or mad Rosalia, a fish-shaped spoon?" Yuna says out.

"Uh huh." Amar nods.

"Do you want to be whacked with the spoon and get cried on. Again?" the blond just goes straight to the point.

"Oh. I don't think so? No?" Amar drops a little.

He thought a fish spoon was funny. Not as good as a chicken spoon but still good. Should get two chicken spoons? Or three? Would Gable like a chicken spoon? Or the scary chicken mama? He's pretty sure the stinky baby chick would like a random chunk of cheese so that was fine.

"Eerrr um I think it will be fine." Vincent tries.

"Cass," Yuna calls out, popping another dumpling, " you were a little girl once. What would happen if someone got you out of all things, a fish-shaped spoon?"

"I would gratefully thank them. Of course." Cass responded well and fine.

"Okay, but what would you actually want to do. Not what you should for face or shit. Besides cuss them out in your head," the younger countered

"...hit them with the fish." she admits.

"Aha! Yes. See. That's Rosa, but worse. " Yuna points, more than ready to spill his worst babysitting stories.

The young teen has no idea how he gets saddled with so many brats. Especially the young lady of the Ventrellas. What part of him screamed appropriate baby sitter material?! Lukas was included first because he followed along after Amar like a turtleduckling, but where the hell did the Lord Commander's spoiled little granddaughters come in?

"So....I should make it another chicken spoon?" Amar tilts his head in questioning.

"Tamera would lose her shit over a chicken carved spoon no lie," Vincent thinks about it. But ultimately shakes his head, because that does not sound like a normal sane answer.

"Typically don't little girls like playing with dolls?" Cass leans back, remarking casually.

She was the one with the least time and experience with the person in question. How was she to know just how wrong, cursed even, this statement would be?

"That sounds...right?" Vincent agrees.

"Maybe if it was made of gold." Yuna snorts. "A cloth sack ain't gonna do it. That one likes hard cold cash. Coins. Precious gems. Money. I swore I have never seen a three-year-old try to pry and steal off the stupid decorative gems embedded into walls, but that's what I caught her doing once. But that's nothing on how crazy feral the younger one is."

They get distracted, pouring cups of tea, and just not being tired out on the road for a while. The matter of spoons and souvenirs put away for the time being.

The problem came the next day. At the very same market.

"It's a doll? A nicer one? The face is ceramic and not cloth? The eyes kinda look like gems?" Amar it held up, getting the thing at the very low price of "AHHHH! IT'S BACK?! TAKE IT! PLEASE FREE ME!" free from the shop keeper.

He doesn't think Rosa will like it very much but it sounded like all the qualifications were met. That and it might be funny. It could be like Kitti all over again. He's sorry it got burned up like that.

Yuna was on the floor laughing, choking on his own tears at the terror this would cause. He was getting another babysitting story for the books.

"Oh, it's perfect."

-Road Trip Days till destination (7/49)