Chapter 31 | Gelid

I observed how Sylvia took care of the mushroom and truffles. I kept smiling at her because she knows the value of these plants. The other cooks as well were very careful. We were about halfway through cleaning the mushrooms when Nix mindlinked me, "Where are you, Etheral?"

He had been mindlinking me every hour or so throughout the day, checking in to see how I was doing. His calmness indicated that he had not yet been informed of the two rogues that passed us by during our mushroom hunting – and I was not about to tell him.

"In the kitchen, helping clean the mushrooms," I replied via mindlink.

I could feel his relief that I was back in the pack house. "Did you find a lot of mushrooms and truffles?"

I sent my amusement along with the image of the two fighters walking carefully to avoid spilling their overloaded bags of mushrooms down the link. "Quite a haul, in fact. You should expect mushrooms for supper,” I heard him chuckle, “And we e