10 I Am Thirty-One

With Macha's newfound knowledge of the language, she also gained freedom. She made her way down to the mess hall after her studies. She was happy that she had some time to herself and a little independence.

This week Luna was celebrating her birthday and went back home. Although she offered to have Macha come with her, Macha preferred to study with her tutor, Isabella. She wanted to learn this language as quickly as possible so she could understand more about this world.

The mess hall, which was located on the first floor by the stairs, echoed with the voices of the crowd. Many people filled the hall and Macha picked up a tray and got in line. She peeked around the line and recognized the usual free slop offered to all members of the guild. The workers filled her silver tray, which became heavy after they loaded it up with food.

Today they served gruel, tasteless meat, and bread. The gruel had a few corn kernels in it and overall it resembled a greyish color. She made her way to a seat in the corner where no one else was sitting.

When she sat down, she spotted a group of females giggling while looking at her. The leader of the group was a voluptuous woman who wore a bikini like armor and a fur coat. Tribal-like tattoos decorated her torso and legs and lent a wild air to her. This woman made her way over to Macha and commented about how small she appeared.

Macha could sense that this woman did not approach with friendly intentions. Despite her apprehensions, she replied, "Yes, Macha small."

The woman laughed and mentioned something to her friends about Macha. The group of women laughed. They referred to the voluptuous woman as Constanza and pointed to their boots. Constanza then turned to Macha and mentioned something about guild rank and put one of her boots up on the table.

Macha was unsure what this woman was talking about. She ate another spoon full of gruel and replied, "Sorry, Macha do not understand."

Constanza, who she did not like at this point, shoved Macha's head a few times. The woman replied with a scowl on her face.

She had never been bullied before and grew worried. This woman was at least half a meter taller than her and had friends. Considering her options, she opted to cut her dinner short and leave. As she got out of her chair, Constanza tripped her. This caused Macha to stumble onto the floor. The gruel splattered across her chest and the tray slid across the floor.

Everyone in the mess hall looked at Macha. She heard people laughing at her. The embarrassment caused her to turn red and her eyes to water. Constanza called her a baby and said something about crying.

Macha picked herself up, dashed to put away the tray, and ran to the stairs. The hike up to her room was tiresome, slow, and embarrassing. Everyone she passed looked at her filthy top and a few even snickered. She had never been so embarrassed in her life.

Macha always hated bullies. She would go out of her way to help people who were being bullied while growing up. She slammed her hand on the railing, frustrated at her inability to communicate and defend herself. It amazed her that a grown woman would act like some high school bully.

From that day on, she decided to only go to the mess hall late at night since it never closed. Almost no one ate late at night, so she could eat in peace. Some nights she even took a few rolls of bread back up to her room so she wouldn't have to go down for a day.

****

A week passed since Luna's return. She filled a large wooden box with food and talked with Macha about the orphanage they were going to. Tyr set up this orphanage to help the children whose parents had died while working in the guild.

"When the children are big, where they go?" Macha asked. She was curious about what happened to children who come from an orphanage. She never went to an orphanage before, so this was a new experience for her.

Correcting her friend, Luna said, "Where do they go? When the children become adults, they can work for the guild or going off on their own." She always tried to correct Macha's speech. Luna was impressed that Macha had learned the language quickly.

"Do the children go school?" Macha wondered what the education system was like in this world.

"Do the children go to school? Yes. We have hired a tutor to oversee their education." Luna and Tyr both agreed that education was important.

Macha nodded. She thought it was compassionate of Tyr to help the orphaned kids. She did not understand all of the words Luna said, but she could get the gist of it. Macha then wondered if other guilds put similar institutions in place to help the families of fallen guildmates.

****

The orphanage was a brick building that stood three stories high. Many windows surrounded the building and two heavy wooden doors were centered in the front. In the front yard, Macha could see nine children tending a garden. They smiled as they showed a man some vegetables they picked.

The housefather looked like a dangerous man with medium length dark blond hair. He wore a large gold belt buckle shaped like an 'X' and an indigo leather jacket stitched with a web pattern on it. He tucked his black suede pants into his boots.

Macha thought this was a joke. She found it hard to believe this man took care of the orphans. He looked more like one of the men Tyr would bring along to go on a mission. Macha looked with skepticism at Luna as they approached and said, "He is leader?"

"Yes. Talon used to be an adventurer before, but when his wife died on a mission, he retired to help Tyr start up an orphanage," Luna said in a hushed tone as they drew nearer. "Talon! How are you?"

"Doing well. The children have been healthy and behaved. Right now Gabin has Longum Auris, so he's sick in bed." Talon looked at Macha, who held a box in front of her. "Is this a new..." he said hesitantly. Talon worried that another child had become an orphan.

"No," Luna denied shaking her head. "She is Tyr's new...companion."

"Oh?" Talon raised his eyebrows. "A bit young looking," he said with a look of disapproval on his face. The woman did not look like someone Tyr would have gone for based off of Fenrir's appearance.

"She isn't a child. She just hasn't gotten Longum Auris yet. That is part of the reason why I brought her here." Luna wanted to clear up any confusion that could hurt her brother's reputation. The fact that Macha looked like a child bothered her. She felt Macha contracting Longum Auris as soon as possible was imperative. One of the last things she wanted was for her brother to seem like a pedophile.

Macha realized they were talking about her age and said, "I am not a child. I am thirty-one. I am Macha nice to meet you."

Talon laughed at this. "Thirty-one eh? All right, not a kid, but not that old either! Nice to meet you, Macha. I'm Talon. Come in and I'll send you to hang out with Gabin."

****

Macha entered a room filled with nautical decor that decorated the walls and ceiling. In a corner, she spotted a stuffed animal collection of various sea creatures that created a mound that came up to her shoulders. Her favorite animal in the pile was a purple sea serpent with big goofy glass eyes.

The child on the bed moaned in pain. The boy breathed with heavy labored breaths. She approached and saw the boy was crying and clutching his ears.

"Gabin?" Macha called his name.

The boy responded with loud sobs. "It hurts! Make it stop! I'm hot!" he cried. Tears streaked down his face and snot dripped from his nose.

Macha understood that the boy was hot. She moved to wet a towel in a bowl of water that lay on his nightstand. She wrung it out and wiped him down, trying to cool his body. His ears looked as red as a tomato so she tried to cool them off with the towel. Gabin winced in pain when the towel lightly touched his ears.

Macha sang the boy children's songs in her language to comfort him. This seemed to relax Gabin and he drifted to sleep while she stayed up to watch over him.

Throughout the night the boy would wake up in fits of pain. Macha would repeat her method of cooling him down and singing him to sleep. Eventually, Talon came in to give her some food and a sleeping bag. "How is he doing?" Talon inquired.

"Ears red and cries," Macha replied. She pointed to his ears and asked, "Why?" She wondered if the boy had some sort of ear infection.

Talon patted the boy's head and fixed his blankets. "He has Longum Auris. It is a disease that children get when they are young. It is what makes our ears long and slows our aging down."

Macha did not quite understand everything he said. "He will be fine?" she questioned.

"Most likely. Sometimes kids die from it, but he is still young, so it isn't that bad. Symptoms are worse if you don't get it until you're older." Talon paused and thought about Luna's plan.

Feeling like she stayed up late enough, he cast a sleeping spell on Gabin. "Why don't you get some sleep? I put a spell on Gabin so he won't wake up so easily," He said as he motioned towards the sleeping bag.

Macha nodded and finished up her food before crawling into the sleeping bag. She reached out to pet the stuffed purple sea serpent and drifted to sleep.