Reaching for the Stars

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Andreas was laughing at me as I had practically dragged him out of the mess hall as soon as he finished eating, but what could I say, I was eager to go down to the city. "I don't know why you're so excited? It's not like anything has changed about the city since we attended the academy for the last few weeks." I roll my eyes at him, my wide smile not at all smothered by his words.

"Well the city might be boring to you, cause you grew up here, but this is all rather new to me. And I've been isolated in a forest for the previous few months, so I'm allowed to be excited to go somewhere I don't have to hunt for food, and worry about spiritual beasts attacking me." As soon as I said that he quieted down immediately, as if afraid he had offended me, but I wasn't offended at all, truly the Silver Woods weren't as bad as everyone thought they had been for me.

After all I had had Orpheus keeping all the larger more dangerous animals away from me, and he had brought me food, making sure I survived. I may complain about him a lot but I knew that I likely wouldn't have survived without him, if not being attacked and killed by the spiritual beasts in the Silver Woods, I likely would have starved, or gone mad from isolation. Unable to communicate verbally with him for months or not, his company had kept me sane, because while he couldn't respond verbally, I could still talk at him, and his eyes more than often gave away his response, usually annoyance.

Likely because of my eagerness, there were still carriages left to take us down to town, which I was immensely grateful for, I did not relish the idea of trekking down this practical mountain in order to get to the city. Andreas has little to say about my excitement now except to look at me with a smirk, his eyes glinting with amusement. Nonetheless once we reach the city, he is more than eager to show me his favorite places, though acquiescing easily enough when I tell him I want to go to an herb store.

He brings me to the largest one in the city, much to my delight, my eyes can't help but eagerly roam over everything in sight. "If what you're looking for isn't here, I doubt they have it anywhere else in the city." I would have loved to spend all day looking through the drawers at all the herbs they had, but this wasn't the only thing I wanted to do today, so I decided not to waste time, going directly to the desk where a worker was waiting to assist people, I decide to ask for what I want.

"How can I help you, miss?" I give him a wide smile, fully prepared for the bewildered look he'll give me when I give him my request.

"I'd like seeds please. Any that you have." Of course, he didn't disappoint me, he looked very surprised by my request this was an herb shop after all, most people asked for medicinal herbs.

"Seeds? We have quite a collection of preserved herbs, are you sure you only want seeds?" I nod my head firmly, remaining especially polite to the worker who would speed up my search a lot.

"I'd like to see any seeds you have, as well as I would love it if you have to have some Tea bush seeds." I was very intrigued by how an abundance of spiritual energy would affect the taste of tea, maybe even add additional benefits to it.

"Of course, miss. Um, we probably have a dozen seeds here, most of them from rather common herbs, are you sure I can't persuade you into getting any of the preserved leaves? It would be much easier than waiting for them to grow." I shake my head lightly, knowing he was only trying to be helpful, but I was firm with my decision.

"No thank you, only the seeds please." He dips his head and turns around, seeming to be thinking, before he abruptly realizes where they must be and heads into the backroom, before long he comes out with a little over a dozen small boxes stacked up on a tray.

Once he places it on the table, I quickly open the boxes, taking note of what the labels said was in each box, to my delight there is indeed a small box of tea bush seeds. "I'll take ten grams of each, please." This store indeed had exactly what I wanted, many of the common herbs that were used in numerous potions, even the advanced ones, as well as many pills were all here, it would ensure my stock would never run low.