World Tree MUSH

    In the aftermath of charging through the manor, fending off the Twilight Messenger, and summoning Ramuh, the Eidolon of Wisdom... Rydia passed right out. The exhaustion and strain was bad enough that she curled right up next to the hearth, rolled over, and was out like a light. Judging from the distance put between her and said hearth by the next morning, she had recovered enough to curl up under several blankets and keep that distance for the next day.
    Rydia has, largely, done little moving in the time since, keeping herself bundled, shuffling around the suite and trying to keep warm, while mainly sticking to very light duties, if any at all, considering how pale she looks even several days after the fact. It must have been exhausting.

    Creaaaaaak. The door is now open. And Yumi's familiar cascade of cream-orange hair is peeking through. "Rydia?" Her voice is soft. "You awake?" Only once she sees the summoner's eyes does she break into a smile and speak more loudly. "Hey. We found a better room to camp out in. There's a library downstairs. It's not open to the outside, so it's a lot warmer and a lot less trashed. Cecil and I have already moved most of our stuff in there. Zelda's been going through books."

    She's up. The creak of the door is met with enough suspicion that the gleam of the Summoner's dagger can be glimpsed briefly before Rydia realizes that it is friend and not foe. The dagger goes away as the girl's slinder shoulders heave in a sigh under all the blankets wrapping her. She hasn't been a part of the expiditions deeper into the house; as far as she knows the place is still potentially dangerous.
    "Oh good. This room kind of sucked." She says plainly, voice still heavy and hoarse with fatigue.

    "Kinda, yeah," Yumi replies, with a glance up at the gaping hole in the ceiling. Sure, it's better than camping out in the open, but it still leaves a lot to be desired. She decides to step all the way into the room, withdrawing hands from her pockets. "You gonna be okay? You look worse off than Zelda does," she observes, with a mix of humor and concern. "I can carry you if you'd rather. Blankets and all. Great big Rydia roll."

    "I don't need to be carried." Rydia says. She's a big girl and she wants to be treated like a big girl, no matter how much of a wreck she is. She may not have sustained any injuries like Zelda did, but it's clear the girl is utterly *exhausted*. Though she's not quite wobbling on her feet, it's clear in how pale she is and how she's struggling to carry herself at all that she will need help to the new room. "Just... Help me out. I'll be fine, this happened the last time, too."

    Yumi takes one look at Rydia.

    Then she walks over to the pile of blankets, grabs one more, and carries it over to the summoner - where she whips it around the /both/ of them. One arm goes around Rydia's shoulder. "There, compromise. Lean on me as much as you need to." She'll carefully and slowly guide Rydia out, taking it at the smaller girl's pace. "You and Zelda both have a knack for really exhausting yourselves pulling out the fireworks," she observes, her tone playful.

    Rydia said she didn't need to be carried. She didn't say she wouldn't accept help, and when the extra blanket is thrown over, there's just the lightest weight against Yumi's side. Not for lack of leaning, Rydia is leaning, she's just that small.
    That's why the pace is slow and easygoing, though she obviously lets Yumi lead. Because Yumi knows where they're going. "I do not." The Summoner huffs. "I can use black magic and call monsters just fine." She defends. Before pausing. "It's the Eidolons that take a lot out of me."

    "Well, I've only got like a month and a half of experience, but that was still the single most spectacular thing I've ever seen," Yumi replies. "That was... he was so... vast. Powerful. I think if I ever saw an actual god, I would kind of expect them to look like that." She's very careful about taking Rydia down the stairs, step by slow step. "So... what exactly is an Eidolon, if you don't mind my asking?"

    There is a beat of hesitation at the steps, but Rydia starts making her way down. One at a time. Half leaning on Yumi, one hand resting against the wall. "Mn..."
    She only pauses half way down and it's for a few breaths. "He was Ramuh." She starts an explanation. "Keeper of Wisdom and lore, his lightning judges the evil and wicked." She says. "He's one of the Eidolons. They're um. Beings that live in the Feymarch. It's a world connected to mine but separate. Many of them are like... Like a greater embodiment of something. Like ice, water, wind... Fire."

    Yumi's patience is infinite. As slow as Rydia wants to take it, as many times as she needs to stop. "So he was lightning..." She considers. "...wisdom and lightning. I can see it. Patient enough to stand back, consider a matter from all sides, build a well-founded opinion - and then delivering a final judgment quickly and decisively." A small smile. If there's a way to meet them, she decides, she'd like to. However, one other thing didn't escape Yumi's notice. Something that she's pretty much continually noticed, in fact.

    "Say, Rydia. If you don't want to talk about it, I don't mind, but... if I can ask... fire bothers you a lot, doesn't it?"

    It's a slow process. Rydia does have to pause and muster herself every few steps, but it's not forever before the two reach the bottom of the stairs. "Lightning, yes." She confirms Ramuh's element, nodding at Yumi's assessment of the wizened Eidolon. "It... I um. Technically a Summoner is supposed to defeat an Eidolon in combat and earn their service before we can call on them. I kind of hope I didn't make him mad." She murmurs, before Yumi's shift in the topic halts the girl.
    She nealry stumbles on her own foot, and stops to look up at- no, almost look through- Yumi at the question, and her haunted stare lasts for the span of several long beats.
    Rydia should have expected the question. Yumi's observant nature no doubt picked up how she shied away from the fires during the treacherously cold ascent up Snowpeak. How she chose blankets over tthe warmth of the hearth once inside the manor.
    "Ah..."
    That fear of fire. That urge to evade it whenever she can. Now it comes up once again.
    "It's. Why I travel with Cecil and the others. My village was burned down, I..."

    Yumi listens, quietly, not pressing; that distant expression speaks volumes before Rydia ever opens her mouth. "...oh, I... oh. Oh, Rydia, I'm sorry." It's not a show of pity; it's a genuine apology, for bringing up such a rough topic. "You don't have to say anymore." The arm around Rydia's shoulders gives a little squeeze, both for reassurance, and to urge the girl to keep moving. "Anyway, if Ramuh is an Eidolon of wisdom, I'm sure he'd understand. You called him in to save someone's life. If he's got a problem with something that selfless, I'll give him an earful," she adds, putting on a cheery smile.

  The library is a fairly large chamber, with custom shelving built floor to ceiling. That shelving is full of books, spines weathered and many of them bearing gilded Hylian glyphs. Most of the binding is leather. The room is warm, because there's a fire burning in the hearth, and it's by far more sheltered than their previous chamber.

  There are chairs beside the large white stone hearth. One of them is occupied by a Hylian princess.

  Zelda is leaned against the side of the comfortable, upholstered high-back chair. A pile of books are on her lap, and a few pieces of paper tucked onto an endtable. They seem to be ledgers, to go by the angular Hylian glyphs, probably belonging to the former proprieter.

  Currently she is very much asleep. Her hands are folded over her stomach, head tipped to one side. Both several blankets and her hooded robe are wrapped around her. No doubt she'll wake when they come in, but for now, the warmth of the fire is just too tempting. She's been almost as exhausted as Rydia, prone to sleeping when faced with nothing more pressing to do. Even the noise of the party coming and going hasn't woken her much.

    That's where Rydia stops talking, anyway. Briefly she tenses under the squeeze as the memories are dredged up, but then she's back on the move, even if shakey and addled. For the briefest of moments her eyes lose their focus, before Yumi returns to the topic of Ramuh.
    "Mn. It's not the first time I've summoned an Eidolon before I was ready." But any further talk is stalled as they arrive to find Zelda asleep by the library hearth. Rydia immediately quiets. It's probably for the best considering it keeps her from going on about what happened.

    There's a fire in the hearth; without a moment's pause, Yumi directs Rydia over to a spot where she'll be able to take advantage of the fire's warmth without being close. "Here, let me bring you a chair," she murmurs.

    Carefully, the older girl slides out of that blanket, leaving it to Rydia, and heads over to where the chairs have been dragged up. She plans to try and pick it up, very carefully carrying it over to where she's left the summoner.

  The princess shudders awake at the sound of voices. There's a glint of something bright -- she has one of Rydia's knives clutched in a reverse grip, blue eyes wide and unfocused for a brief instant and ready to fight for her life. Memory sets in.

  Zelda lowers the knife, but she does not apologise.

  It may be that she's still not quite awake. Politeness seems to be a cornerstone of her personality. The sidearm clatters softly as it's set down on the table. A beat or two of silence follow.

  "You may try simply dragging that," the princess says, blandly. "It would be much easier."

  ...Was that a deadpan sarcastic joke??

  The princess smiles. "I am glad to see you both."

    There is, yet again a hesitant moment of shying away from the fire. Though Rydia lets Yumi find a spot for her, she's eyeing the hearthe the whole time when the Ordinary Girl heads over to procure a seat.
    Rydia displays... Precisely zero surprise at Zelda stirs brandishing a blade. She had done it herself just not too long ago after all. But she is also aware of the princess' light sleeping nature. For reasons. Reasons she may just very well share with Zelda.
    "It's fine." Rydia says, letting herself plop to sit on the floor in all her bundled blankets, rather than force Yumi to struggle with the chair.

    Oop.

    Yumi freezes in her tracks. The blade gives her only a second or two of alarm; realization as to what Zelda's doing quickly sets in, and a relaxed sigh is breathed-

    -only to be interrupted with a soft, sputtered laugh.

    It's as much from the unexpectedness of the jibe as it is from how amusing it is, though it's that too. "Well, sure, if I wanted to do it the easy way. This way builds character!" Yumi brings an arm up and 'flexes' - even if she has any muscle to show off, it's buried under something like three layers of winter clothing, the outermost of which is almost marshmallow-like in its fluffiness. Nevertheless, she decides to drag it the rest of the way, adding, "Sorry I woke you up. I was trying to be quiet. Here, Rydia. This should be a little more comfortable."

  The absolute nonchalance with which Zelda goes about brandishing and setting down her knife seems bizarrely incongruous with her otherwise quiet and gentle nature. Such violence of intent suggests there is trauma in her recent past, too.

  Blinking sleepily, the elf-like Hylian yawns, shaking her head. "I know some monsters I can point you at, if it's challenges you're looking for. You won't like them much." She rubs at her eyes as she continues. "Worry not. I have not slept deeply since fleeing my own castle. It is no secret to anyone. If there is any sound at all, I will wake. It has saved my life more than once."

  "Welcome to our new campsite," she adds, blandly, to Rydia. "I decided that not having holes in the roof was preferable, and took the liberty of assuming that opinion was shared among the others of our little party."

    Nevermind her spot on the floor then. As Yumi brings the chair over- able to drag it without waking Hylian royalty, Rydia picks herself up and climbs right into the seat with a tiny sigh of lingering exhaustion, and she proceeds to bundle up in all her blankets, taking the form of some form of green-haired Summoner loaf.
    "Thanks." Murmured to Yumi. She opts to not comment on Zelda's light sleeping, though. "I can see why." She replies to the princess. As she had said to Yumi before: "The other room sucked." She says before giving a more thoughtful pause. "The plan is to fix this place up, right? I really don't want it to fall apart around us now that we're here."

    "We'll have to work on fixing that," Yumi replies to Zelda. With the chair dragged over, and their camp more or less moved into the library, she can head back over to the pile of books she's been working her way through. They still have missing documents to find (or, at least, 'determine whether they're here or not').

    As she flips through books, though, the girl adds, "Remind me to bring you two some vitamins. And some calorie snacks. I don't know what it is you two burn when you're summoning elemental avatars or unleashing divine light, but we oughta see if we can replenish it. Maybe some sports drinks, too."

  "I intend to restore this garrison to its original condition. Aside from the fact that it would be much easier to defend, it would be much more liveable for us in the interim." Zelda drapes an arm over the side of her chair, tucking her chin into the crook of her elbow. "So. Yes."

  Her eyes flick to Yumi. She doesn't reply to the girl's comment, but her expression is somehow uneasy.

  She's still looking distantly at Yumi when the Perfectly Normal Girl cheerfully comments on bringing some extra nutriment, specifically in light of whatever they're burning when they're unleashing divine light.

  "Everything," she says, slowly, and the blandness of her tone is less from sarcasm and more from flat exhaustion. "I was coughing up blood, yes? Drawing so deeply of Her Grace's power -- the power of the Goddess was never meant for a mortal body. I can do it, yes? I can even use it to save the life of friends in a pinch. But I will always pay for it, afterward, and pay dearly."

  "Nothing in life is free." The princess' tone is light. "Every effort has a hidden cost."

  She shrugs, before huddling back into her blankets and robe. "I might say that I'm used to it, but I'm not. I have never been in a life-threatening situation before Hyrule's collapse. I avoided Zant's pet monsters; I led them in circles or I trapped them. Wisdom is my purview," she adds, flatly. "Outwitting those brutes is no challenge even for a dimwit."

  Her eyes close, serene once more. "It is my fervent hope this goddess-forsaken mountain is a little more tolerable by spring."

    "Vitamins? Calorie snacks? Sports drinks?"
    To Rydia, Yumi is speaking another language right now. The huddled bundle of Summoner is staring owlishly at the girl for a moment at the sundry list of things that Yumi intends for them to ingest at some point. "... I guess if it's anything like that Pocky..." She muses. It should be okay if it's like Pocky.
    How wrong she is, though.
    "That was dangerous." She then says to Zelda on the topic of coughing blood. "But..." But she trails clean off at the Hylian's philosophy of effort and cost. Rydia goes, perhaps startlingly silent. It doesn't matter to her if the manor or the mountain are more tolerable by spring. She has a painful, burning, question in the now, that bubbles to the surface. Someone she's grown to care about almost died. Her voice is a whisper so soft it's almost inaudible.
    "... Why is this world so sad and cold?"

    And here, Yumi realizes she is talking about more things the two girls here don't get. "Um... well, they're not /quite/ the same. Vitamins are... they're a way to get extra nutrition, so you don't start getting sick from not eating right. You can get them in a form like candy, though. Calorie snacks are... well, they're just really dense with the energy you get from food. Easy way to get extra, if you're really active, or don't have time for a full meal. A sports drink is a drink that works better for rehydrating than just water." And also has extra calories besides. But hey, at least she's thinking about ways to approach the problem.

    Then Rydia asks a question.

    Yumi goes silent for a moment, faltering, but recovers herself surprisingly fast. She stands herself up, walks right over to Rydia's chair, and sits herself down at the foot of it, where she can lean against it.

    "I... I don't think I have an answer for 'why'. But it is. A lot of worlds are... I think that's how life is in general. Good people do bad things, bad people do terrible things, and sometimes pure dumb luck just throws you a mean surprise. I think I hate it. But..." The girl closes her eyes. "...I think that's also why we're here. 'We', as in people. We've got the capacity to help each other, to make the world a little less random and cold, and make life a little easier for each other. 'The world sucks, so the least I can do is help people through it'. That's how I feel, I guess."

  The princess tilts her head a little as Rydia repeats the unfamiliar terms, and while she doesn't chip in verbally, her blank expression speaks volumes. Things are strange in those bizarre modern day worlds.

  Rydia's not far off the mark, though. That Pocky stuff was pretty good.

  Zelda's eyes flick back to the Summoner. "It was dangerous," she agrees, seriously. "I could have been killed if I had been forced to fight the beast's will for very much longer. The alternative was no better. It would have torn my throat out, and that was what it was still trying to do when I prayed to Her Grace to help me restrain it."

  "It was foolish, too, I know." She shakes her head. "But I do not act recklessly out of a desire to. I do so because I am compelled by the blood in my veins. Her Grace was once tasked with destroying such evil to save her people, in the time before Hyrule was Hyrule. So too are her descendants forced to suffer no evil, for it has never been anything but a threat to Hylia's chosen people. I was forced to destroy that creature because I cannot suffer it to live within my presence."

  She shrugs. "I can control myself, to a certain extent, but suppressing that instinct is ultimately a losing battle."

  "Still... it would have put you, my friends, into danger to ignore that beast. And its willingness to single me out suggests that Zant is afraid," Zelda muses, thoughtfully, "and motivated to instruct his lackeys to dispatch me instead of bring me back to him as a prisoner. That is good," she says, grimly. "It means he may grow impatient, and make foolish mistakes."

    Rydia's question is one a girl her age should never really have to ask. But it comes regardless, and once it's out, hanging in the air, she doesn't show much by way of remorse for asking it. She just looks so very tired as she stares at Yumi in haggard silence as the other girl tries to reason it out.
    "I hate it." She agrees, curling her knees to her chest and huddles in on herself.
    "And I hate how often my friends are put in a position where the only option is to do something stupidly dangerous and risk death, or die." She adds almost petulantly, before shaking her head and staring at Zelda for a long silent moment.
    "The burden of your blood isn't fair." It seems she decides to cut herself off there and just fall into a sullen, sulking, silence. It's not long before her exhaustion catches up with her, anyway, and she lets her head droop, dozing back off.

  The princess doesn't say anything in light of Rydia's accusations against her heritage. Her expression is terribly sad, though, and her gentle blue eyes turn away from the Summoner.

  "The burden of my blood is not fair," Zelda agrees. "But it is a burden that I bear willingly. I love my kingdom, Rydia, and I love my people. Who does not take risks for the things they love? Besides, the battle was inevitable. That beast knew I was there, and would not suffer me to live any more than I would it."

  In other words, the element of surprise had already been lost.

  Her eyes are beginning to droop, though, and the Hylian's head slowly leans to one side, chin still balanced in the crook of her elbow. A fleeting smile curls the corner of her mouth. "Anyway, I trust all of you... to keep me safe. The usurper's beasts are not immortal. You're all really quite something..."

  "Sorry... I think... I need a little more..."

  ...Sleep. Zelda never finishes her sentence, breathing evening into the slow rhythms of sleep. Ever since they'd taken out that Twilight Messenger, the princess seems to have had a few less nightmares. Despite her exhaustion, she's been looking just a little bit more peaceful. Rest is what she needs. She's looking better every day.