Day 82,

Morning though: Beds are great.  Especially after an extended period of going without.

Cass and her parents stopped by shortly after I got up (so, around noon, beds are great) and offered me a ride back with them.  I accepted, but, in a moment of paranoia that I still struggle to pin down the source of, I asked them if they didn’t mind waiting a few minutes for me to wrap up some archival work.  They obliged while I hastily split the documents from Priscilla’s study between the hidden archive room and my backpack.  The metal case I carried home with me.  For some reason it just didn’t seem like a good idea to leave those materials lying out in the main area of the archive.  Perhaps it was Theo’s advice against looking for answers that got to me.

On the ride back I finally remembered to ask James if anyone had ever found anything in regards to that animal or whatever it was that seemed to be stalking me on the way home from their house a few weeks (more like a bit over a month ago now that I think of it).  Turns out that nothing was ever found.  No tracks, no missing livestock, no other sightings.  They were surprised no one updated me on it since I had asked the guards to look into the matter.  Best guess is since nothing was found someone figured there was nothing to report?  Looks like it was just the nature sprite messing with me again afterall.

After they dropped me off and I got back to the house, the first thing I did was start heating water for a bath.  While I waited for that, I did a round of checking for any surprises the nature sprite might have left for me.  In this case the biggest surprise turned out to be none at all.  Strange, I was almost certain that after weeks without having me alone to itself it would have outdone itself to make up for lost time.  Makes me worried I missed something.

Well, almost worried.  Bath relaxing, bed great.  There’s a particular type of pleasant exhaustion associated with returning home after time away that makes other cares seem distant.  I know I ought to do laundry and such, but I think for now I might just flop on the bed and take a nap for a while.

Nap was good.  Spent the rest of the afternoon and into the evening taking things down to the stream to wash.  Maybe-magical-artifact or not, even that blanket gets kind of gross after nearly two weeks of use without bathing.  

Still no sign of the nature sprite.  Where is it hiding?  What is it planning?  Surely it hasn’t finally gotten bored with me and left?  Why does that prospect seem kind of sad?