[h3]I am Learning[/h3]
The cooking fire had become something comforting to Anifaire. For all the time she had spent wallowing in her own uselessness, since leaving the Alik’r, she had learned that her time could be put to better use. Instead of wasting her time, she spent it learning around the cooking fire. She had slow success, but by now, she was able to handle herself.

So, while others were gathering more provisions, she spent the time alone by the fire, a pot propped up and filled with heating water. The Altmer sat on the hard ground next to it, something she might once have seen as unspeakable, but there was something enjoyable about it. The scent of campfire smoke was comfortable, and she smiled as she prepared a heap of leeks - there was little else left for her to cook at the time, but she hoped the others would bring something good. Perhaps some venison, she wished. 

Anifaire glanced around the camp - [i]where had Alim gone off to?[/i]. The thought of her... she paused at the question of what to call him and brushed forwards, allowing the warmth he made her feel to fill her mind instead. She hoped he would join her by the fire. 

She shifted her attention back the the leeks, slicing and washing them individually before setting them in a pile. She knew she was slower than the others, but still, each time the group left her by herself to deal with the cooking, she felt the glow of pride in her chest. 

Much of the situation at hand felt surreal to Anifaire: a journey to end the entire Dwemer threat. It was like something she would have read in a novel, in a life that felt increasingly distant with each day and each step. Except, it wasn’t - looking around the camp, it was all the ways that this [i]wasn’t[/i] like an adventure in a story book were highlighted for her. 

The danger was far more real, she thought, imagining how her companions - and herself, in a way - had sliced through dwemer guards leaving Gilane. 

Yet at the same time, it was slower. The heroes in a story didn’t spend a month trekking through the mountains, or at least, you wouldn’t read about it; the healed and re-opened - reapeatedly - blisters on her feet told another tale. 

[i]She[/i] was here. She didn’t fit in a story. There was no way she could conceive of herself as a character a child might read about and root for. Daro’Vasora, Latro, they fit. But there was her, underwhelming and unabl-- 

The water bubbled, coming to a boil. She cut off her thoughts, instead focusing on something she tried to hold forefront in her mind as they traveled:  [i]I am learning[/i]. She reached out an arm to begin piling the leeks into the pot, but caught herself mid-action and sat back down. Instead, she raised an arm and focused, using telekinesis to lift and drop the leeks into the pot. 

Practicing two skills at once: magic and cooking. At first she’d felt embarrassed using it, but there was a practical aspect to it as well; sometimes she moved things faster than she would have without magic, and she thought it might make up for some of her slowness. 

She glanced around camp, Alim occupying her thoughts, but she didn’t spot him. The time she’d been able to spend with him brightened her moods; he seemed proud of how proud she was about learning to cook. A smile crept onto her face and she pushed a loose strand of hair behind her ear, idly remembering the borrowed hairpin she was using, and how she would have to return it to Aries once she’d found something else to use instead. 

The last of the leeks dumped into the pot, she stood to mind them as they cooked, a large wooden spoon clutched in her hand. Truthfully, as the smell began to drift above the pot, she didn’t think she could stand one more leek, let alone a leek soup. Hopefully, she thought, those sent out for provisions would return soon.