So, Sefi never found any clay. Nowhere. Not at all. Horribly absent. In the lake – no, near the lake – no. River? Nothing at all. From her memory, clay is something like… blue, or a little viscous… probably. She doesn’t know for sure, so she tried to figure it out by taking soil from different places and trying to make bricks out of it. It didn’t end well, just wasted time. And all this took about two months: searching, experimenting, and so on.
— Maybe I should just make it out of wood?.. — she thought, looking at the canopy. Such an idea… ugh. Looks like it’s time to prepare the wood. The more failures, the more… she gets tired. Ugh, she needs to distract herself.
Her magic skills got better – very much so. She achieved high results: now the volume of her mana exceeds the previous one tenfold! No other way! Also, passive regeneration has increased. For this, she eats a lot, but it’s worth it. Since clay didn’t work out, at least it’s worth noting her successes.
First: her control over her own blood has improved. She learned to accelerate its flow even without hormonal stimulation. This gave an effect: Sefi became faster, smarter, and more resilient. But then she realized that this accelerates metabolism. That means the digestive system works faster, and therefore more energy is needed. So she has to eat more often. After turning off the ability, she gets the feeling as if she came back from drinking – a real hangover. Nausea, everything spinning in her head. Sefi understood: she cannot use it for long. The longer, the stronger the side effect. And also… lately she’s been craving blood, which pisses her off.
By the way, she also learned to speed up blood clotting – artificially “freezing” the flow in a wound to reduce blood loss. However, at the same time, the feeling is as if the limb goes numb. As for hormones – she could not control them properly. Difficult.
Second success: transformation of matter. Not finding clay, she seriously set about this task. However… no success. At all. Instead of creating new materials, she only learned to strengthen or soften already existing matter, but not to change its composition or create something completely new. A pity. But perhaps in the future it will work out.
Third success: she realized she could create materials out of mana, and this allows her to reduce dependence on real resources. These materials are still demanding in mana costs, but less than before. They are used mainly for attacks: swords, spears, and the like. And these can be transformed into other materials – apparently because they consist 100% of mana, which means control over them is complete too. Hmm… a theory. To test in the future. And also… every second of their existence costs her, so she can’t create millions of things. And the things that pass from her mana into “reality” place too much strain on her, not the most efficient way. She tried to create clay this way, a lot of clay, however… recovery after that takes a week. Horrible, the worst part is that each created material requires exactly 20% of her mana, regardless of its amount. What the hell!? AAAAA! And creating in kilograms is even worse… in general it’s nasty.
Fourth success: this is no longer magic, but language. She rewrote the entire text from that grimoire and learned the words – she knows how they are written, but not how they are pronounced. Probably, when she meets the first people she will be mute… but that’s nothing. At least she can write.
The alphabet of this language consists of 27 letters. Whether they are vowels or not, Sefi doesn’t understand. Perhaps there are more letters, but the woman rewrote everything that was in the book. The structure of sentences is very strange – perhaps the language is still developing. Some words are given as sets of syllables. For example, the verbs “to touch” or “to concentrate” are not written as whole, but separately. Maybe some letters are missing? Or necessary sounds? She doesn’t know. Studying a language from fragmentary phrases is hard, and she lacks education. Logically reasoning, the matter is probably also in the lack of knowledge about sounds. Difficult. However, she can confidently write all the letters, which means with proper training she will be able to fit into society.
The writings remained on wooden slips made of thin bark. Sefi carefully copied all the symbols from them – her hand had already grown used to these broken crooked lines. She could scratch out any sign even with her eyes closed. But still there was the feeling that she… was silent, even when writing. It pissed her off as a human, standing right in front of her, but unable to.
The words were before her eyes, but what did they mean? How were they pronounced? Some signs occurred more often – perhaps these are vowels? Or some kind of conjunction? Sefi didn’t know. She tried to analyze frequency: counted how many times symbols were repeated, compared which letters more often stood at the beginning or end of words.
Then a guess appeared. One symbol often stood separately, like a word. Probably it’s “and,” “in,” or “on.” Some short function words. Or just a pronoun. Possibly “I”? Although… why would a magical book have the word “I”? Hm. In question. There was no such thing, yes, she checked it with the monocle.
To understand the structure, she began to highlight identical endings – hoping that this was somehow connected with word forms. For example, if many words end in “-tar” or “-mish,” maybe those are verbs or something related to actions. Sefi simply piled up guesses. Sometimes she wrote out words in a column where the same part occurred. She stared at them for a long time. She imagined how she herself would name those actions if she were composing a language.
However, without a resident of this world, it would have been slow
Doesn’t matter. None of this matters. She now set about cutting trees. With magic, this became an order of magnitude faster and better, by the way. She used the “Wind Cutter” – also as a tool for polishing wood. She wrapped the log with wind, in her case a tornado, and spun it quickly: because of the speed, unnecessary pieces fell off. But… ehh, she couldn’t make square cubes. After all, a tornado is a spiral, and she needed a cube. Control over this, though it had grown, still didn’t let the maiden figure out how to express the shape correctly. Making planks is hard, but she can. It just takes time. And patience… of which, alas, there is not much, but the fact that she skillfully cools her head helps.
***
All the materials are made. But how to make a wall?.. Although… wait. If she doesn’t know how properly, then let it be however it comes out. She’ll make wooden bricks – not so strong, but they’ll do for a house. The main thing is that… ehh, they don’t cause a fire. But how to fasten them together? Or maybe better with beams? There were such houses before… um… ahh, how complicated this is.
— Hm… what if… — Now Sefi had a thought, so unethical that it would make any self-respecting builder burst into tears. Literally. Very, very improper. — What if I cast a house? Hm… maybe it would work.
Her head, surprisingly, managed to grasp: mana, released into matter, makes it possible to control it. The structure, the strength, and how it will move. With her abilities, she can make the material soft – like water or loose sand and pour it into a special frame, and then give it hardness. This should make quite a good wall. And very easily. However, she needs to run a couple of experiments:
First – the transition from liquid state to solid: will the material become a monolith or fall apart into pieces?
Second – how precisely can she control the shape and achieve tight fitting? Because holes in the walls are no good!
Third – can this be used like clay? If so, then the possibilities of sculpting various statues and things become practically unparalleled. She already knows how to work with bones, and makes quite decent things out of them. But small details, like carvings, are still inaccessible. Bone – it is strong, and the chance of a mistake is one. But clay… you can mold it again! Isn’t that a miracle?
— I need to try, — she said aloud and already began to build a wooden frame in her head. She’ll pour the goo into it, well, like concrete, only magical, and then give it hardness.
Smart she is! Ho-ho! That’s construction!
...
...
...
***
Not smart at all, she's stupid. Her frame shattered into splinters after she poured that stone goo into it – apparently, the wood couldn’t withstand the weight. Yeah… And as a result, all that liquid spilled everywhere. Simply horrible.
— Shame, — said Sefi, cleaning everything up with magic. She once again took control of the stone: all the dispersed mana gathered, and then she realized something. Now she wasn’t sure. — Either I’m stupid, or I still haven’t understood the full power of magic…
After all, she could have simply made the wall right away. Without all this fuss with planks, frames, and damned cleaning. She really is stupid. Instead of the obvious, she takes the hardest path. Simply horrible… is her thinking really that straightforward? Although, maybe it’s not stupidity, but loyalty to her own style? The only problem is that the style… is silly, she knows it but can’t change it. She lived like this before this life, and here she has lived this way for more than 5-6 months, she already stopped counting.
— If that’s the case… then I could have made the whole house out of stone, — she said without emotion, though inside she wanted to be disappointed. The body is different – that’s the problem. However, maybe that’s even for the better. After all, if she felt like before, she surely would have fallen into depression.
She pointed her hand – and the “miracle-goo-stone” mass became a wall, straightening out like by a ruler. The woman now made such things almost automatically, she was already used to it, and that pleased her. But the joy didn’t take away one thing, she needed to learn and learn again. To keep her eyes open. Repeating mistakes for experience is useful, but inefficient. Instead, she should be spending time practicing magic, decoding the text, or exploring the area.
Although… fat chance. Sefi builds, Sefi destroys. The cycle of nature.
Still… the foundation needs to be reinforced, the stones shake slightly. Perhaps it’s worth filling the whole bottom with small stones – this will make the soil stony and strong.
— Hm. Now there’s a house. Time to set it up, — she muttered, looking at her creation. It turned out like a real box: wooden pillars at the corners, stone walls, a flat ceiling. Rain, of course, is a problem, but she lacks the knowledge to build a triangular roof. Just a square… though no, a rectangle. — But first…
Her plans were interrupted. The entire house, the entire floor and foundation collapsed. More precisely, they fell apart from the weight, apparently. The loud crack of wood, mixed with the rumble of falling walls, raised dust tens of meters high. Sefi’s nerves evaporated. This was… well, a complete disaster.
— A pity that all my work collapsed because of magic. Probably, I hurried too much, — she said without anger and sighed. She felt nothing. Just nothing. And that pissed her off.
Nevertheless, work must go on. Taking into account new possibilities and building a house… better. Perhaps, with her magic it will take a week.
With these thoughts, she began casting as usual. The entire clearing again began to take on some kind of shape. Not the one before, but at least not chaos. Even without Sefi’s disgusting canopy.
— And I should first make a plan for the house, not build as I go, — she muttered, looking at the wreckage, — otherwise it’s not construction, but a circus.
***
A lot of time had passed. Too much – so much that she’d stopped counting. So when she asked herself, she answered at random: “Three years.”
The winters here were cold, terrible, and oppressively heavy – both literally and figuratively. Snow piled up to her waist, sometimes higher. The air bit like shards of glass slicing the skin. It was a nightmare.
She hadn’t known how foolish it was to live in a stone house. At first, she was glad out of habit, proud of her work but it was a mistake. Because stone has no heart; it held the cold the same way ice does... and so, she nearly froze to death.
The worst part was that she began building her fireplace already in the middle of winter. Too late. Her body could endure low temperatures, but not endlessly. The fireplace was finished… but could it really warm her? It wasn’t very good, built in haste and out of desperation. With fire, it wasn’t fatal, but it was still cold enough at night to leave her shivering under every layer of fur she owned. She wore everything: pelts, self-stitched wolf hides, coarse fabrics. And sometimes, even that wasn’t enough.
That was her first winter – the one where she truly almost died.
She survived. Barely. And from that moment on, her chances of survival began to grow. But food was a problem. A big one. She couldn’t cure meat—not without salt. And without it, preserving it was impossible.
Salt. She needed salt. Meat carries moisture within it, and it must be drawn out, absorbed into salt, and then dried in the sun. But she had none. She searched, sifted through everything she could find, but nothing worked. Then she started creating salt with magic. She latched onto the idea – and found a loophole. Small, but real.
Simple salt: NaCl. She focused on it, imagined the atoms, proportions, structure… and with a pinch of precision, managed to create a kilogram. One. It almost cost her consciousness. After that, she couldn’t get up for a whole week. Her mana was burned dry. But the result was real.
Now she could make cured meat. Real cured meat. With salt, as it should be. Almost a dream. And besides – it was a spice.
Her cooking skills began to grow. Even just salt pushed her meals to another level. And then something odd – whether of her body or not – her craving for meat with traces of blood grew stronger. She’d noticed it from the start, when she first butchered carcasses: that urge not to roast it, but to simply taste it. Later, it only got worse. She never ate it raw – never. But she cooked steaks rare, so that her body wouldn’t writhe in hunger.
She now cooked on her own stone oven – the result of twelve failed attempts. But the last one was perfect. Large, warm, spacious. Dome-shaped, with two openings: the top for cooking, the bottom for feeding fuel and flame. The cooking surface was broad, and the stone held heat beautifully. She could prepare several pieces of meat at once – and lately, even a few plants.
Her first real success came when she noticed there were more berries in the area. She transplanted the bushes closer to her home. The cave beneath her shelter, just as she suspected, held a water source: an underground stream. The soil was fertile. She dug out a few beds and watered them. Though, truthfully, the ground itself gave more life than the water ever could.
The berries were the same kind she’d eaten in her first year. She also found stalks of something like wheat. Grains. There were only a few, but she began growing them, observing, selecting the best, and planting again. The harvest was tiny. A single stalk gave only a handful of seeds. Making flour would take forever. She understood: she needed to cultivate a stronger strain.
Magic couldn’t help here. She had to work with her hands. She picked the best plants, fertilized the earth with bone meal she made herself – crushing bones and ash. That alone boosted growth; harvests grew, and other plants thrived faster.
But it was still too little. So she began using magic sparingly, drop by drop, trying to grasp the very concept of growth, of agronomy, of life’s movement. It went poorly. Months passed – no progress. But even a little was something. If there was any way to influence it, she would. Preferably before the next winter. Because she had to.
Along the way, she discovered one main rule: if something doesn’t work – boil it, burn it, dry it, and if that doesn’t help – do it all together, several times. It didn’t always work, but it helped her figure out which direction to dig in. Leather was the first example. She boiled it, slow-roasted it, dried it. The material was ruined, but the rule was born: leather must be kept moist.
After that, she worked with hides differently – salt water, oiling, brushing, and if needed, treating with magic. Over and over. Slowly, step by step, she uncovered the methods of preservation and improvement. In the end, she made a proper leather, and from it – her first fine pair of boots.
Her clothing also changed. With wool, she could make warm fabric, spin threads, weave patterns. Bone needles weren’t ideal, but workable. She had long since dismantled her first dress; now she wore a leather jacket with wooden buttons, pants, and those boots. A wool shirt, a knitted hat. Not luxury, but reliable. Everything needed to survive the cold.
Her bonecrafting skills also advanced. She could make tiny details, carve miniature elements. Sometimes, she even shaped little figures of people… and realized she felt no longing, no sorrow. Nothing. Emptiness. She lived without society, and did not suffer. That was good… but a little frightening.
To that, she added stonecraft. She sculpted simple statues, carved stone into tools nearly identical to iron ones: in shape, strength, balance. With magic, she reinforced their structure creating durable, lasting items. Stone was heavy, but beautiful. She painted on it, too.
Pigments she made from flowers. She brewed them, fixed the color, dried them. It became paint. Not perfect, but vivid. Her brushes were made of bristles and wool. On stone slabs, she traced lines – sketches of trees, beasts, forms. Simply to draw. Simply because… it gave her something.
Sometimes she wrote down formulas, calculations, long columns of multiplication and fractions. Not because she had to, but to keep from getting rusty. Once, she had been responsible for large sums of money. Numbers had been her responsibility back then.
Now it was just a habit
But it didn’t matter; she was distracting herself from a small grievance, strange as that was. All words were just food for thought while she clenched her fists, sitting in her house and watching the winter buried under snow. How many had there been already? She didn’t remember, and didn’t even want to.
Winter was bad, she hated the cold
And yet, she thought about plants. Because she had managed it – barely, but still managed... Joy from the new magic, from the possibility of life… there had been many such moments. It was pleasant.
After months of toil, trials, failures, and quiet nights by the garden beds – she had succeeded. One of the grains suddenly yielded twice as much as usual. The stalk was thicker, the grains heavier, more golden, with a silky husk. She checked, compared, counted, as if afraid she had made a mistake. But no – this was a success. She wrote notes in numbers, dozens of times, comparing the grains among themselves, granulating them as much as she could, and sighing with relief.
Sefi herself didn’t immediately understand how it happened. Perhaps a lucky mixture of magic and ash, or maybe a stray nighttime thought about the “pressure of the sprout” gave it a push… It didn’t matter. What mattered was that she had finally created something of her own. She thought about plants, about how they grew, breaking through the earth and now she had done it.
A variety. A real one. The first step toward bread.
But the joy was bitter. While she had been fussing over those garden beds, the land had begun to freeze again.
Winter had come
Not with a sharp blow, but with a creeping breath – the cold seeped under her clothes even during the day; it was too much, far too cold. In the mornings, a thin frost lay on the leaves, like cobwebs. At night the wind howled, and she pulled on everything again: the wolf-skin coat, the hand-stitched mittens, the fur hood she almost never took off.
All autumn she had thought: “I’ll make it, if the snow doesn’t come early.” But it fell, too suddenly. And the grain was not yet harvested. She ran through the snow, scooping them into sacks, pouring ash over the ground as if begging the frost not to touch what had cost her so dearly... she tried to use magic, but it became too hard.
The cold hindered her – she hated it
She managed to save only part. The rest perished. Snow fell – heavy, wet, and everything that wasn’t sheltered rotted into a cold mush. The girl sat by her stone stove, watching steam rise from her wet clothes. Her fingers trembled, not from cold, but from fatigue and resentment. And still… even that was more than last year.
She had salt. She had a stove. She had some grain, dried berries, cured meat, and most importantly – knowledge. All this was not just survival. This was life. Her life. Made anew. Torn from ice, hunger, and silence.
Winter would be harsh. As always. But now Sefi knew how to endure it. And she knew that in spring she would return to the garden beds. Because now, for the first time, she truly could grow something.
***
Spring came – the time when winter retreats... Everywhere water, mud, and more mud. Along with it came the awakening of nature from beneath the white shroud of snow. Not the best season, but better than the last.
— I don’t like winter. — She whispered, stepping outside onto the snow that hadn’t melted yet. By the calendar it was spring already, but it hadn’t fully arrived. No matter – the important thing was that the snow was beginning to thaw. And how did Sefi know spring had come? Simple. Sensitivity. She had lived here for many years and grown accustomed. With the onset of this dreadful season, a countdown always began deep inside her, a tally of when it would finally end. It had always been this way. It would always be this way. And she trusted that feeling.
— I need to prepare the soil, — She told herself, building plans in her head – many plans. Sefi wanted to get everything done.
With those words, she left the house. The door wasn’t flimsy – on the contrary, it was thick, sturdy, wooden, covered with nailed-on hides for warmth. A kind of protection. Other structures had appeared nearby as well. First of all – a shed, also of stone. It wasn’t as big as the house, but spacious enough to hold all kinds of junk: tools, hides, leather, and other necessary things. The second was a small shelter with that large dome-shaped stove inside.
Instead of a refrigerator, she used a cave – its structure preserved both warmth and cold. In winter she had brought in blocks of ice, and now they still hadn’t melted, keeping with them several kilograms of frozen meat. She had also managed to dry berries, so there had been some sweetness in winter – albeit limited. She planned to get other berries or fruits; she wanted to try making something like jam, even without sugar.
Sefi entered the shed, took a hoe in her left hand, a shovel in her right, and stepped out, gripping the tools tightly. She walked slowly toward the area near the cave. Snow still lay there. It hadn’t completely melted, but she wasn’t going to retreat. Better to start now, otherwise… otherwise she might not make it, and she didn’t want another winter like the last one.
First, she worked the area with magic – in the right places, fire flared up, melting the snow. Steam rose, thick hot clouds filled the air, and the flames roared without pause. The treated area covered about twenty square meters. Not bad for a first try. In the future, she hoped to expand it.
— Let’s get to work. — She said, setting aside the hoe and gripping the shovel firmly.
The earth was still steaming; digging was hard. Some spots were too soft, turned into mush. But she dried them with magic too. That was the strength of magic. Thanks to it, everything was done faster, easier. It was satisfying. Very satisfying.
She hated winter. Not for the cold. Not for the snow. For the helplessness. For the feeling that everything froze, died, and that she herself did too, along with the world. Winter suffocated her. It brought an animal restlessness. Like a trap snapping shut again and again on her life. Spring wasn’t happiness – it was deliverance. Real happiness was summer.
And that was why she couldn’t delay
The shovel struck the ground with a dull sound. The soil, heavy and waterlogged, yielded reluctantly. It was like porridge, dragging other clumps with it, weighing down the work.
Each time Sefi drove the blade in, her hands felt the resistance. The earth didn’t want to be touched – as if nature itself were testing her, checking if she had the stubbornness to finish what she had started.
— Resist. — She murmured, plunging the shovel again. — You still submit in the end. — Perhaps long solitude had done its work – speaking to the earth… awkward as it was.
Sweat beaded on her temples. Though the air was cool, the work quickly warmed her body. Ice crusts in the soil sometimes rang against the blade, cracked, yielding to the first layer of loose, but not yet fully alive earth. Sefi knew: she needed to go deeper. To break through the winter still clinging to this soil. Magic might have melted the snow and dried the field, but not entirely.
— Deeper… — She whispered, as if it were not an instruction to the shovel, but to herself.
She mentally divided each patch of land – plot by plot, like pages of a book that had to be rewritten. She wasn’t aiming for speed. Her rhythm was stubborn and heavy. Speaking of books, now she had to try and find some civilization after a few weeks – by then she would likely finish many tasks, giving herself a kind of respite.
Sometimes she stopped and ran her hand over the soil, assessing its state. In some spots she added fire – gently, sparingly, just to dry or warm it. Then she drove a sharp stick into the ground, marking the borders of the beds. She did everything thoroughly. No haste. Only confidence.
Her fingers were caked with dirt, black streaks under her nails. She smelled it: damp, heavy, with a tang of rotting leaves and old snow. But that smell reminded her that winter was leaving. She felt it deeper than just her skin. A joy at the event or perhaps relief?
And again. A swing. Loosening. Leveling. Sometimes she used stone rakes to spread the soil more evenly. She had kept some leftover seeds; they needed planting.
With every swing of the hoe, with every heap of earth, images came to her mind — future rows of plants, modest yet strong. Greens she would grow herself. Food she would obtain not by hunting, but by patience.
She wasn’t just digging. She was building herself a future and burying winter, deep under layers of soil and toil. And besides, there was another reason she avoided people. Instead, she focused on herself. Perhaps they wouldn’t welcome her appearance? Who knew how she looked to them – maybe frightening? Or even like a thing, fit for sale, as a commodity or slave. Magic? What if her abilities were taken as a witch’s trick, something unclean – a reason for the stake. She didn’t want such a fate.
To live – that was her goal. Simply to live, not to become dead, sold, or broken.
That was why living apart, deep in the forest, seemed reasonable. She had learned to provide for herself: food, clothing, tools – everything could be made alone. For now, she lacked goods for trade. Bone figurines, carved items – they existed, but in small numbers. Sefi was saving them, to sell all at once if the opportunity came. The same with stone items. And since she had mastered leatherworking, she had begun making clothing too.
Not perfect, of course. But practice brought skill. She had found sewing methods that made the seams almost invisible, and the stitches strong. For boot soles she used several layers of thick leather, and for boots themselves she used wood as well, so they held their shape and didn’t cave in. It wasn’t craftsmanship, but it was reliable, solid work. Especially considering she lived in something like the Middle Ages… probably.
— Is it evening already?.. — Sefi raised her eyes to the sky. No relief, just dry realization. Sometimes time slipped through her fingers like water. It felt like the day had just begun… she had been distracted, lost in thought, and now the sun was already near the horizon. Surprisingly so.
She had managed to plow the field – that was a step forward. But she would have liked to practice magic more… and tonight wasn’t the time. She needed another task.
— I suppose it’s time to work on the big spinning wheel. — She murmured. Making thread by hand was long and tedious. So far she had used only a spindle, twisting wool with her fingers, and it had taken hours. But if she built something like a wheel...
She didn’t know mechanisms. Never cared. But she understood the basics. A bicycle – that was her example. In her youth it had been her only transport. Pedals. An axle. A chain. The wheel turned from pressing, which meant motion could be transformed. And if the spindle were linked to the wheel through a simple system, it would all go much faster. She imagined how the structure would spin, how the wool would stretch out in a thin line into the spool.
It’s worth a try
With these thoughts, she turned and walked toward the house. Mud squelched under her feet. A nasty, sticky sound. The sloshing and splattering irritated her. Her face remained calm, but inside her chest a wave of dull anger was rising – the winter had left too many traces. She would fix it all someday. Definitely. One cannot defeat winter, of course… but if she could, she would crush it without hesitation. For now, all that remained was to repair the consequences of that damned weather.
Sefi walked home slowly, head lowered, lost in thought. As she drew closer, she suddenly noticed: the front door… ajar? She remembered clearly that she had closed it. Could the hinge have come loose? Or maybe the lock no longer held? But even if so – why was the door open right now?
— Someone is in the house… — Sefi whispered, on alert. A blade formed in her hand without delay, without wasting mana, instinctively. Whoever it was, it was no accident. The open door was a challenge. A deliberate one.
She slowly reached for the door. It didn’t creak – it never did. And yet, in that silence there was a threat. Sefi took a step forward… and then caught movement inside.
And what she saw made her freeze for a moment
A stranger was sitting on her chair. Not hiding, not concealing herself – on the contrary, she was waiting. She sat like a mistress, like a judge, like the law itself. A grin spread across her face – not mockery, no, something greater. Authoritative, predatory. As if she already knew how it all would end.
She wore short beige shorts, a strangely cut vest, and over it a red cloak trimmed with white fur, decorated with jewels. Bracelets glittered on her wrists and ankles. Her locks – golden, well-groomed. Her ears – pointed and long, like those of fairytale creatures.
She looked young, almost adolescent, but… there was something more about her. She was short, frail in build. And yet her presence filled the room like smoke or poison. Sefi felt she had not entered her own home, but this stranger’s waiting hall, where the mistress had finally deigned to meet her guest.
She said something – the language was unfamiliar, it sounded like the chime of glass and the rustling of scrolls. Sefi did not understand the meaning, but she felt danger in those words – as if they carried a command.
And in that moment she was seized by complete, ringing incomprehension. Who is this? What’s with the ears? Why is she here? How to speak? Friend or foe? Nothing, not a single shred of information.
She didn’t know. At all.