Vehicles are more easily repaired, but a creature with sense of its surroundings, and a friend while you travel? Even I might be persuaded to pick the goat.

( What's your home like? Alll-Mer, she's longed for home so desperately since she arrived in Prehevil. Mission or no mission, how could she not want to run away home? August asking her about her accent and homeland. )

Oldegård can be a shock to people who don't know it, I think. They have maybe seen photographs of our mountains and lakes, or they only go to cities on the coast with man-made canals weaving through. Then they go to the mountains, and hey think it will be all beautiful views and hot cocoa around a fire. They don't realise that part of it being so beautiful is it being harsh and extreme, too. We're further north than anywhere else in Europa, so sometimes in the summer the sun barely sets for an hour, and some days in winter you barely see it. There's dense forests and vast lakes and mountains so tall you can't catch your breath. People work hard to survive, and if they are kind and care for each other, it's because your community is the only thing you can count on. The cities still have people who are polite, but it's not the same as the small towns.

( Abella pauses, aware she's gone on a bit, and unable to feel apologetic when she just wants home so badly. )

I haven't been able to go so far from the cities for a while, though. What about yours?