It had taken hours, but Xander got the fire going. At least by that time, she could wrap her hands around things and hold them. However, she couldn’t hold the knife with any sort of accuracy and Xander had been forced to hack up the Boar meat. The best she could manage was huge hunks of meat speared on sticks and set over the fire. And Xander now had a mutilated carcass that probably could’ve been better utilized in his Inventory. Fat dripped off the meat, sizzling on the rocks below.

Xander had brought the blankets and rugs over, folded up so they had somewhere soft to sit, but Astra ignored it in favor of sitting on the rocks. She knew she was just wallowing and punishing herself, but she honestly didn’t feel like she deserved better. Maybe her whole life on Earth had been as bad as it was because she deserved to be punished? The familiar ache in her heart brought tears to her eyes, but she didn’t want to cry in front of Xander. She didn’t want his pity.

Now without her Menu, she was nearly useless. Sure, she could use her combat Skills, but her crafting Skills were out of reach. She needed her Menu to access recipes.

“Keep the fire going,” Xander said and stood.

She gazed after him as he headed towards the water’s edge and started slogging in, swimming towards the drift of logs some five or six hundred feet away. What was he doing?

Astra looked towards the fire. It was steady and did not need any tending. The Boar meat was burning on one side. She turned them, then went back to stacking rocks. Her motor control was getting better. Probably by evening, she would be moving normally. She didn’t care. Why hadn’t he left her? He had every right to be angry. Now she knew he was feeling sorry for her and that was the last thing she wanted.

I could get up and walk off, she considered. But he would be able to track her down. I have to make him leave me then.

Taking a breath, she let it out, finding a spark of fire. She looked out at the water. What was he even doing? That water didn’t look pleasant to swim in.

Something rippled in the water as he got to the log flow and threw an arm over one of the logs to take a rest. He was pulled under from below.

Astra stood and went to the edge of the water but knew that she wouldn’t be able to do anything. His HP was still full. He bobbed back up some distance from where he’d gone under, wiped his hair out of his face, then dove.

Was he taking revenge on the lake monsters that had tried to eat her?

She shook her head and decided to leave him to it. Turning to go back to the fire, she yelped as she found someone crouching beside it, eating one of the sticks of meat.

Astra stayed still. The kid, a Lycanth child with mostly Human features, laid his ears back, eyes growing wide. He stuck the stick of meat in his mouth and darted off down the beach.

If there was a child here... there had to be more people.

She followed at a slower jog, keeping the boy in view, but not closing the distance.

The child panicked, running along the beach to where the mountains practically dipped into the lake. The forest covered the side of the mountain, but as she got closer, Astra could tell there were structures between the trees. For that matter, to her left were the remains of a sizeable city. She’d been too in her feelings to notice earlier. Now, she perked her ears. She could hear people and smelled cooking fires. There was a village here.

The familiar tinkling of bells on the wind tickled her senses.

There was a Soul Stone here!

Leaving off chasing the boy, Astra changed her path towards the mountain and entered the trees.

People, a mix of Lycanth, Felis, and Human, stopped to stare at her as she passed them. The people wore rustic clothes of furs and leather, their buildings were stone with wooden shingle roofs and roads were mostly mud with the occasional cobblestone. Astra followed the most used route to the central square where a Soul Stone of a different design than those in Aesir, Vanaheim, and Nifelheim stood. Reaching out towards it, she connected and attuned, changing her respawn point.

* * *

Slogging out of the water, his mission unsuccessful, Xander wiped his wet hair from his face and looked towards the unattended fire.

It hadn’t gone out, but Astra was not there.

He sighed. Had she run off again? His Directional Sense told him she wasn’t that far away and in good health still. She was a little to the south, just around the shore of the lake, towards the mountains. Approaching the fire, he found one stick of meat left. It was charred.

Tossing some more wood onto the fire to keep it going, he started after Astra. Did she really think she could just hide from him or something?

He found her sitting on a log on the beach, whittling a stick with his knife, which he had left with her so she could cut meat. Xander stopped beside her, hands on his hips as he looked down at her. “I asked you to tend the fire.”

“You didn’t ask. You told,” Astra said and looked up at him. Standing, she held the knife out, hilt first. “Here’s your knife back. You can go back to Aesir now.”

He made no move to take the knife.

“There’s a Soul Stone here,” Astra said. “If I die, I’ll respawn here,” she said. “You won’t have to see me ever again.”

“That won’t stop the others from coming after me,” Xander said. “I will stay with you a while longer.” He stared down at her. She still had Death’s touch in her eyes. He did decide to take the knife from her. He was kind of glad he hadn’t been able to find her Menu. With it, she could forcibly send him back to Aesir. “So, there is a Soul Stone here,” he said.

“And a village,” Astra said, gesturing up the slope.

He turned to look, finding what looked like village hunters crouched among the trees, watching.

“Did you not introduce yourself?” Xander asked.

“I attuned to their Soul Stone and came out to the beach to show them I meant their village no harm.” Astra turned away, looking out across the lake. “Did you have fun with the monsters out there?”

Deciding that acting aggressively towards her, no matter how irritated she was making him, would do little good, Xander sheathed the knife and put it into his Inventory. “You could have gone back to our camp,” he said.

“I didn’t want to.”

“You’re being incredibly stubborn,” Xander said.

Astra looked up at him with a toothy grin. “Glad you noticed. Go home, Xander.”

“I will not,” he said. “Respect should go both ways. If I am not allowed to order you to tend the fire, you may not order me to leave.”

Her tail flicked in irritation.

Xander placed his hand on her shoulder. “Jessica,” he said gently, “you are not well. I cannot leave you.”

She shrugged his hand off. “I’m fine!” She moved away. “I’ve got all my fingers and toes. I’m breathing.”

“You got too close to death, and it still calls you,” Xander stated bluntly.

“What does that even matter to you?” she demanded, stepping back and facing him, her ears flat. “You don’t want Immortals around anyway.”

Refusing to raise his voice in return, Xander kept silent.

Her tail lashed in anger as she glared up at him. “Ugh!” She turned away, folding her arms, everything about her posture angry.

Xander left her to that and instead headed up the rocky beach towards the waiting hunters. “Greetings,” he said. He suspected that the ones he could see were a fraction of the ones he couldn’t. “I am Xander, my companion is Astra.”