Frostina

I stretched beneath the coarse blankets and let out a low grumble. Disappointingly, I did not find a wonderful furnace pressed against me, it would seem she had left the bed early again. That's unusual… I pushed the sleep from my mind and looked around for Zet. I, again, did not find her in the room. In irritation at her repeated stunt I checked the party window and found her location arrow pointing in the direction of the rooms entrance, 5 meters, 4 meters, 3 meters… The door swung open and Zet clopped in with two steaming mugs and what looked like bread? tucked under her arm. “Morning love, I brought some coffee. I think, they claimed it was anyways. And some bread for breakfast, I was going to get some cheese but it all looked funky and-”

Noticing my scowl, she cutoff while handing me one of the mugs. “Again Zet? Yesterday I arrived moments before you die and you left again.”

“I just thought it would be nice to get some breakfast, have coffee. I didn’t mean to worry.” She sighed, “I’m sorry. I was careful…”

Poor addition to her apology… “Careful? Like how you were careful when you grabbed that scroll? Or insisted we join that dungeon run? Careful like...how you went to a shady bar and found a fight ring? That kind of careful?” She opened her mouth to speak but I steamrolled ahead, “Or did you mean careful like when we both hopped into some game leaving our kids behind with no idea how the fucking thing worked and have no way out so now we’re trapped and have both nearly died SEVERAL TIMES! That. Careful?”

I tossed the mug on the nearby end table and fell back to the bed already sobbing. I know that last part was cruel and unfair but who the fuck does she think she is to keep doing this? Just running in without concern? Without thinking about me or our children? Like with that damned alligator at the start! Did she go ‘oh hey frost, I’m a fucking dumbass who tried to look cool, can you please save me?’ No! She fucking rode the thing! What would have happened if it ate her? I’d be alone, or dead! This all flashed through my brain in an instant before my thoughts dissolved into formless fear and sadness.

I felt a warm hand pull me to my side where an equally warm chest awaited. I sobbed into Zet’s chest, her breasts making comforting pillows beneath me. Zet’s voice cut through my sobs as she whispered near my ear as she tickled my back, “You’re right. I’m sorry. I didn’t think about it, I just. I just went and didn’t consider the cities might be dangerous, that they may not be safe zones. I’ll stay with you, I promise. We’ll get home together and we’ll stay with the kids and be home and...we’ll be home…”

I pushed myself back up, tears still falling down my cheeks and looked at her. She was softly sobbing as tears fell from her eyes, she looked back seeming smaller and more vulnerable than she so often is. I sidled up next to her as tears sprang anew to my eyes, I hate making her like this. “Please don’t cry, I’m sorry. I shouldn't have said all that.”

“You sh-should have. You’re r-right to be mad.” She was intaking breaths at random times as she sobbed.

I shook my head vigorously and put a finger to her lips. “No. It’s not your fault we’re trapped. Just stop leaving me behind. Please. I’m so scared to lose you. Again!”

She stared at me, her eyes sunken and red, “You won’t. I’ll do better.”

I pulled her to my chest and shushed her as I rocked, “Promise?”

She nodded, “I love you.”

“I love you too.” I tilted her head up to me and kissed her. The salt remains of our tears flavoured our kiss, a mix of sorrow and passion with a heaping of need. Need to be whole, to be together. Breaking the kiss she laid her head back down and we rocked like that for a while as I ran my fingers over her scalp.

The fortunate thing of being in a climate that supports swamps is, by the time we got to it the coffee was still hot. Not like piping hot, but certainly more than just warm. We sat side by side and ate our bread. It was ok, certainly nothing to write home about. God I miss Publix’s bakery… I inspected Zet as we ate, she wore a simple undershirt and the rest of her armor. I sighed internally that she went around the city like that, other than looking completely stupid what would have happened if she had been attacked? But, we’d had enough this morning and if she really will stay with me and not go off alone then it's a moot point. Other than her clothing she looked pale. Well, paler than normal which for someone who would be described as having ‘Alabaster’ skin is really saying something. I’ll have to keep an eye on her, it was probably just the emotional morning.

We discussed where we should go next, we couldn’t trust that the arena host would give us information or even give us good information if he somehow did keep his word. After some discussion we determined we needed to get to a major city, if any information on how to beat the game has been determined it’s gonna be in a major city. Not that I’ve forgotten my need to cut Greg into tiny little pieces while healing him after each dismemberment to ensure he survives as long as possible… I pushed the rising anger back down, that’s for later. We determined one of the smaller major cities was best, Zet said Fògarrach-fala or something, I thought she was choking but apparently that’s the name. Some Elven city, actually the elves that my character would belong to. If cities are PVP enabled then being in the larger ones is just being stupid, plus information networks between cities would give us much of the same information on something as major as the main point to this game.

With our plans settled we got back into our armor and made our way down to the docks. As we left the inn, the innkeeper did a double take before shooting as pretty nasty look. I guess the springs mean something to him after all. Zet handled the dockmaster, figuring out which boat we needed to be on. Apparently, this part of the game was expanded upon too and instead of 3 boats with set paths we had to charter a boat. Fortunately, the boat was available for us to book. Zet handed over a coin purse and just like that we were boarding and on our way. I frowned in confusion, all of our gold went missing when we started this new expansion. I’d been out of it at the time because of the loss but it was a bit of a problem at the inn a few nights ago, I vaguely recall Zet arguing with the innkeeper for a room.

“Where did you get those coins? I thought we spent them all on the room.” I raised a questioning eyebrow at Zet.

She averted her eyes and scuffed her hoof behind her, “ We did… So. Yeah. This morning I found a bank and apparently the original owner of this body had some coins in there and I was able to take them out.”

I shook my head and smiled. I wasn’t mad, she probably meant to tell me and then I yelled at her causing her to forget in the moment. She’s great at getting shit done but shit at remembering the details. “So how much do we still have?”

She raised an eyebrow, “We? We are not French my dear…”

The ‘We, Oui’ joke? Le sigh. I fixed her with a flat stare and she chuckled, “Maybe 20 gold, we’re gonna need more but we have room and board to our destination at least.”

“So, do we at least have a room or is it a quick load like on the computer?”

“So, the captain said it’s about 3 weeks to get there. But we have a room!” Zet noticed my sigh and pulled me into a close hug, “I know love. I know. We’ll find a mage to port us to wherever this damned endgame is supposed to be once we find out. We’ll be back in only a few days to them.”

I felt hopeless again, that's at least 3 days in the real world plus its been what 3 or 4 days for us, so we’re getting close to a whole day already for them. “What if they need us? What if my mom didn’t hear them or can’t manage?”

“Shhh. It’s ok. She’s able to handle them and she has help. And the bills are paid and we just grocery shopped. I’m worried too, maybe it will instant load and the 3 weeks is video game make believe.” I looked at her with a disbelieving frown, “Ok, that’s a stretch. Let’s try to pretend its a vacation? We can’t go faster and worrying won’t help. Let’s pretend it’s a little vacation. I have an idea of how we can pass the time…”

She scooped me into her arms in a bridal carry and dipped below deck. I was worried and pretending wasn’t going to fix this. But maybe for a few minutes I could just enjoy the time alone…