The Etra Anthology

73rd of Nemulum, 336 EA

Ishikar, Athal

Cooking was an exercise in control, for Belmaia. She stirred, and tasted, and added salt. She blended the flavors just as she liked them, as she knew others would like them. When she did it, she did it for the others in the house. It made her feel good to nourish them.

“What are you making?” Livia hovered across the low counter separating the kitchen from the dining room.

“The empanadas are already in the oven.” Belmaia turned from the blaze that filled the stovetop to face her friend, never stopping her working movement as she spoke. “I’ve got squash, and rice on too.”

“That sounds good.” Livia had a sallow quality to her, the food would do her well. “That was always Shayleigh’s favorite of yours.”

Belmaia tensed at the name, but still she continued her movements. She couldn’t stop doing, it was on her to keep it all together.

“It’s a good dish.” She glanced past the conversation, “You know, I’ve been meaning to try some variations on them. My aunties would always be trying new fillings, and it would always bring the whole street over to try.”

“Would you want people to come over?” Livia’s voice tilted upwards into a cloying sort of hope.

“Oh,” Belmaia thought long and hard about her answer, pausing her preparations for the briefest of moments, “Of course I would. That’s what the temple is here for, right? As a waystation? To breathe life back into weary travelers, in the name of the Stria Intranscendent.”

“Sure enough!” Livia took on a glow to her, as though for a moment it was she that was the flame and Belmaia the moth.

“Still though,” Belmaia could feel the spirit shatter across from her as she began to equivocate, “There is so much to do around this place, things that need doing. I don’t have the time to go out, not just to bring people in. More people would be more things to do, and between my duties patrolling the aether and writings on the Stria I’ve barely got a handle on keeping things together here for just us.”

Livia sulked as Belmaia came around to her side of the counter to set the table. “It doesn’t all have to fall to you, you know. New people could help.”

“I know, but for right now it is on me.” Belmaia sighed through the words, “All I’m saying is that I don’t have the time or the vigor to be going out of my way for new folks.”

She could see that Livia was not satisfied with that answer, as she served plates, and so she conceded, “If they come, they come. I would not turn away a traveler. What sort of cleric would I be if I did?”

The spread of food that night was bountiful, beautifully cooked. Belmaia was proud of herself, for what she had made. It was a shame that she would be the only one to eat any of it.