Chapter 44.
Galine lived outside the west gate, where the city had begun growing beyond the main wall. The revelation that she did not, in fact, live in the outpost was both as mind-blowing and as stupidly obvious as bumping into my elementary teacher in the grocery store and realizing that she did, in fact, go home at the end of the day like the rest of us.
Obviously Galine didn’t live at the fucking outpost. But I had not quite considered it enough to come to that conclusion.
I kept that embarrassing fact very much a secret.
Galine lived in a small house with a thatched roof. It has a curtain drawn across the doorway with no windows. The outpost was swanky compared to this.
Then again, this was on the ground. I assumed Galine had to give up luxury in favour of functionality.
A few of those bustling about said hi to Galine, but fortunately none of them engaged her in conversation beyond that, so I didn’t have to stand there awkwardly.
“I know it’s not much.” Galine smiled apologetically. “But it fits my needs.”
I nodded. “That’s what’s important.” I shrugged.
With a smile, she led me inside.
The floor was dirt, given her hooves that made sense. It was far more open than I initially thought, the middle of the space simply open. Another large doorway led to another room, but the one we were in seemed to be a pretty general living space. The lack of windows left it rather dark, but several laps sat on shelves too high for me to easily access.
“So… yeah,” Galine sighed nervously.
“It’s very you,” I smiled. The space had clearly been designed with her in mind, as it should be; it was her home.
“Are you hungry?” She asked. “Mrs Wenton, my neighbour, makes extra stew for me since I’m not around all day to monitor a fire. I could go see if it’s ready?”
I wasn’t really hungry. “Sure,” I smiled. I wasn’t going to turn her down, especially not when my presence was clearly making her nervous. I didn’t want to make her nervous.
“Okay,” she nodded. “I’ll be right back,” she told me before she ducked under the flap and left me alone.
I looked around. Okay, but… how could I not snoop?
I walked around the space. Large ornate shawls and fabrics in the next room. I poked my head through the doorway and was met with the biggest pile of blankets I had ever seen. It was Galine’s bed, or… a giant cozy nest.
On a low table was a large spool of wool and a blanket clearly being knitted. That explained the loom in the other room. Galine was crafty.
Well… everyone was probably pretty crafty in a medieval-ish world, but Galine liked to knit. It made me smile stupidly.
I retreated as I heard the thump of hooves. Galine returned carrying a small cast iron pot. I took an intentional step away from the doorway I had been peeping through. Galine set the pot down and gave me an amused look.
“It’s very cozy,” I said to distract from my twinge of guilt.
“Thanks.” She smiled. “Here,” she added, looking around before removing several jars of what seemed to be some kind of preserves from a small wooden chair. She pulled it free from the corner where it was tucked in and set it in the middle of the space. “You can probably guess I don’t have many bipedals by,” she added.
“That’s okay,” I chuckled. “I like your space. I’m glad you have somewhere that’s made for you.”
Galine grinned. “It took a lot of work. I had been saving every penny I earned. The family I had been staying with helped build it. Lord Grosswin wasn’t happy about the huts going up outside the wall, but by that point there were already a handful of us.”
“He wasn’t?” I frowned, curious.
“It was the first thing you’d encounter arriving from the east, so anyone of importance visiting sees our little neighbourhood before the grand ornate castle,” she chuckled.
I raised my eyebrow. “And he didn’t… kick you all out?”
“He threatened to,” She smirked. “But it was good for the farmers. If you lived just outside the city, then you didn’t have to travel all the way to the market. So it ended up sticking,” she explained. “And here we are.”
I smiled. “Nice.”
“Stew?” Galine offered, fetching bowls for us.
“Please.” I nodded. “What kind is it?”
“Goat,” Galine answered. “With herbs and egg.”
I graciously took my bowl of chunky brown stew. I wasn’t sure I had even eaten goat before; I was eager to try. Though the monocolour of the mixture wasn’t the most appetizing.
It tasted… different; that was for sure. Not amazing but hardly bad either. It was mostly just very, very dense, a little too meaty. It would have benefited from a more… diverse set of ingredients. Then again, it was hardly bad by any means; I probably shouldn’t be comparing what people ate daily to whatever fancy things I bought from the market. I was trying not to be a grump.
“So,” Galine said, clearing her throat, “How are things going with joining the Academy?”
I grimaced. “I haven’t quite gotten to it yet. I’m actually not even sure where it is,” I snorted.
“Oh,” Galine hummed. “Well, it's up by the castle. I’d be happy to show you around some time.”
I smiled. “I’ll have to take you up on that sometime.”
“Good,” she nodded. “Good,” she smirked.
She was such a sap. I wanted to eat her up.
I finished my stew, frantically searching for an easy topic of conversation. “You like knitting?” I asked awkwardly.
Galine nodded. “I love it. I don’t so much make clothes because well…”
“You don’t wear pants?” I supplied, with a chuckle.
Galine rolled her eyes. “I need form-fitting, durable clothes for fighting. So I mostly make blankets, sometimes a rug or such. I’m not so good with the machines, but give me two knitting needles and a ball of yarn, and I’ll be busy forever.”
I smiled, charmed by her enthusiasm. “What's the coolest thing you've ever made?”
“Hmm,” Galine hummed, “Maybe it's not the coolest but… I made a small stuffed manticore, which I filled with clumps of wool. It was young and really upset about… I don’t even remember what. Anyway, my older brother set me up with a sack of wool so I could knit while we all stayed on the move. In hindsight, it looked terrible, but I was so proud of it,” she sighed fondly.
“That's very cool,” I assured. “I’ve never been super crafty, though I did make a sock puppet once by gluing googly eyes onto a sock and then sewing some hair on with felt.”
“What are googly eyes?” Galine asked, amused.
“Oh… they were like… little white plastic things with a black bit in the middle that would move about. So they looked like a cartoon eye, but then the pupil would move around,” I frowned. What an absurd product. Were there factories dedicated to creating googly eyes? How was a little plastic eyeball such a renowned thing?
“Strange,’ she hummed, scraping her bowl clean.
“Yeah,” I agreed, "I was just thinking that.”
There was a tension in the air all evening, a nervousness which I was fairly sure hadn’t existed before. Galine seemed almost skittish. Maybe it was my presence in her space. Maybe it was the two of us getting to know each other better. Sure, we had shared far more vulnerable things than our hobbies and families, but something was different.
I knew why I was nervous; it was because I cared. Because now that we were… friends, or something, I didn’t want her to be disappointed by me. Not that I wanted any of this to be transactional, but I really didn’t have much to offer.
So far, I had been fluttering about thanks to people’s hospitality and kindness. I couldn’t help but be a tad embarrassed. I needed to build something for myself, to prove that despite everything, I was capable. I hoped the Academy would provide that and some more dungeon meddling.
And yet, as self-conscious as I was, it wasn't quite so dominant with Galine. One thing we certainly shared were struggles, maybe not exactly, but we both knew the difficulties that came with unusual bodies and the alienation of suddenly living somewhere totally different.
I felt like we really did get each other. And that made me irrationally nervous about this all blowing up in my face.
“It’s late,” Galine noted, leaning over to look towards the doorway. It wasn’t particularly late. “Do you… Would you like to… stay the night?” she asked nervously.
“Yeah,” I laughed with relief. “I’d really like that.”