Dear Risa,

  I think, in like a year or so, I need to go back to Clover and see what it’s like all rebuilt.

  Because right now, it’s pretty depressing.

  Not horrifying. Not as bad as my nightmares said it would be. But still bad.

  Everyone was running around, frantically doing things. Trying to put the world back together. I don’t think I saw anyone just… chatting. At all. Not many people were talking, and if they were, it was important.

  We left this morning, taking building supplies and a Mage to a town with the wonderfully imaginative name of Chicken. There isn’t an inn any more, so we’re sleeping around our wagon as usual.

  Oh, the Mage was theeee most boring person to have ever existed. He wasn’t shy, or introverted, no, that would have been better. He was like… Remember Professor Brass? How he’d get that glazed look and say “which reminds me of an anecdote”, and then spend the rest of class just talking about how he spent a day staring at a pebble once or something? Yeah, this guy was like that, but worse.

  After lunch we insisted he sit up front with Cali. She’s amazing at acting like she’s listening when she’s mentally somewhere in the Void. I’m sure the Mage thinks she’s his best friend, because she looked like she was paying attention for the five-hour monologue during which he paused to inhale once. Goddess bless her. I would have set him on fire.

  Stolen novel; please report.

  I am so glad we don’t have to keep traveling with him tomorrow. We’re gonna get up before dawn and be well on our way to Eaton before he wakes up. Sure, it’ll take us two days to get there, but we’re excited to be moving! Yeah!

  …Is it “eat-on”, or “ea-ton”? I think it’s “eat-on”, but then… eat on what?

  Eh, I should just be happy it isn’t called “Plate” or something.

  Anyhow, there have been a few mini-quakes since the big one. They scare me, but I don’t panic like I thought I would. Sure, I tense up, but I can still breathe. So that’s good. I’m not as scared as I thought I'd be.

  Out of all of us, Maki is having the hardest time. He feels like he has to check out surroundings for danger, and then when it’s over he has to make sure we’re all ok. In Clover he almost objected to sleeping indoors, but realized that was paranoia.

  I wish there was something I could say to make him feel better, but… Well, I’m not the one with charm magic. And it'd have to be way worse to resort to that in any case.

  I wonder if any governments are going to resort to that. Put a blanket charm spell on all their citizens to make them not traumatized. It’s an incredibly bad idea because then it sets the precedent that charming all citizens is ok, but for this specific case it makes sense.

  …Hopefully Cali never reads this book and gets ideas. I mean, hopefully she never reads it for a number of reasons, buuut yeah. I don't want to be semi-responsible for thousands of people being charmed. Because I am a responsible person, who would never do that.

  Responsible Regards,

  Maeve Zee