We were out of food I could eat, but our water was full. I filled our keg with water from the stream upriver from where we bathed, and made sure to dry out all our stuff the following day. I was limited on what I could eat. Did I eat the paste my armor had? Do I chance local flora and fauna from the ground? Nope, I was lucky and caught a fish in the stream that I roasted and ate while the others grazed further away.
The scent of cooked meat turned their stomachs, somewhat. Heart was willing to lay under the cart while I ate, but she wasn’t coming close to me while the smell was there.
We rested the day away and the next morning took to the path again. I set Heart in the cart and the rest of us took a good trot pace for a few hours and when I needed a rest I’d climb into the cart. Another hundred and sixty pounds wasn’t that much, what with the loss of our food, it was an increase of only a couple dozen pounds of when we’d left.
The next three days we made up a lot of lost time and entered a tree line of a light forest. The path had vegetation growing along it and over it, to the equine delight, and that meant birds and things for me to eat, if I could catch any. I decided to try my luck at a trick I learned in survival camp back on earth.
My arm cannon, if you can call it that, was removable from my armor, all I had to do was load my rounds ahead of time. I chose mostly blanks and a couple live rounds. Strapping it to my forearm I went to a large tree where I saw a couple critters and birds hiding. I raised my weapon up and squeezed the hand trigger.
A loud boom resounded through the area as the blank was expended. My ears rang slightly but I’d angled my arm so the sound wave passed over me, not through me. Six birds fell to the earth. Heart attacks. Easy way to eat meat in the wild.
Also, the mules panicked and bolted from the area, Heart was terrified and screamed all the way to me as full gallop and Lom took a steady trot to see what I made the noise for.
Easy peasy fix. “Heart I have a thunder spell I can cast but I’ll explain it later. I used it to scare away a monster that killed all the birds here, but I have to eat them because I can’t eat grass, you understand, right, sweetie?”
She nodded and held me tight, looking to my forearm that had a weapon strapped to it. I passed Heart to Lom and picked up the birds, when Lom had gotten a fair distance away I’d taken the birds and made sure they were dead before I collected them and returned to our day camp, started a fire, roasted them all up and ate two of the five birds that were for sure dead, saving the remainders for traveling snack.
Yeah, meat can be good for a few hours after it’s been cooked. So, I snacked until they were gone. I heard the others retch while I was cooking them, but I told them I had to or I’d starve. They understood, but didn’t want to be near me when I did anything with meat.
So, that held me over for the next two days. I rested in the cart the last four days of our journey and ate berries when I could. We came by a few streams which we used to refill our water supply, wash up, and take a cool rest when the sun beat on us too hard.
“Two more days and we should be there. Two more days until I can eat a full meal again. Two more days until- Lom, is that another traveler?” I asked hopeful. There was a wagon being pulled in toward us by something. I got really excited and started digging through my stuff until I found my gem pouch.
A few gold coins were in there that I dug out in anticipation to buy even an apple to satiate my hunger. The void inside me roared at the opportunity for a salad. Which meant a lot since I wasn’t big on those things. ‘Rabbit food’ we called it, back on earth.
As the wagon approached I saw it was being pulled by a blue unicorn and she wasn’t looking too friendly. I waved at her and stood in the path to ask her if she’d sell me some food. Instead she blasted me with a spell that burnt my chest and sent me flying two lengths into the grass and onto my back.
She entered into a full gallop as Lom and Heart came to my aid. The mules did their job and stopped hauling the cart and began to graze again.
At first I thought she thumped me with a telekinetic punch, but then I tried to sit up and it hurt. A lot. I saw my girls over me and asking what to do to help. I looked to my chest and saw a first degree spherical blister forming and I did what people did when they got attacked.
I got pissed.