Having learned as a child that too little eye contact caused problems less often than too much eye contact, Caius preferred to look at other's faces as little as possible. Not as if he could really tell much from their expression. Posture and tone of voice were more reliable for him.

  Therefore he had to do some guesswork about what a normal, healthy Idunnir was supposed to look like. Still, "pale as a sheet" and "lips dark and blue looking" probably weren't healthy on anyone. And there was the trembling that might be shivering? Skin felt ice cold, but Caius' body temperature was apparently abnormal.

  Thoughts drifted slightly. Caius forced himself back on track. If this was the aftereffects of the tea, he had no idea how to treat that. Short of making more and kicking this can further down the road, which was not going to happen.

  What did he know for a fact? It was cold. That he could probably help with. Whatever benefit that bit of fruit had given him, helpful as it had been, was wearing off and he felt like his head was stuffed with cotton.

  Warmth helped with cold. Making a fire was one option, but he had the pretty rock. He'd thought the word "pretty" too often, it was starting to feel weird like words sometimes did when you used them too much.

  "Can't have Idunnir hold the rock, it's too hot and too small."

  Hot water? Caius would really love a hot bath. Actually, a hot bath might help Idunnir!

  Possibly a bad plan, wouldn't even be his first of the day. He had the waterproof cloak but no convenient way to make a hole. This place was where they tanned hides, they had to have a big tub or something.

  Sitting on the floor had his legs falling asleep, so making his way out the door and around the house was unpleasant.

  Caius sent up a prayer of utter gratitude when the first thing he spotted around the corner was a big wooden tub. Oval, sturdy and smelling absolutely vile. He asked it to shed all the filth. A golden glow. That glow was rapidly becoming his favorite color in the world.

  Moving the tub was a pain, but it had been designed to be moved and he just barely managed it. He flipped it over to get the filth off, then sort of rolled it to the door. Then realised there wasn't room for it inside and had to relocate half the furniture plus both sets of baggage and Idunnir, again, to get it inside.

  As for how to fill it, Caius had an idea. Combining what he had done to their supplies and to that bigger-than-it-looks bowl might solve the problem. Actually, that bowl was probably still lying back where he handed it to Idunnir earlier.

  His thoughts were clearer now, if perhaps a bit off. Cortisol, probably. He thought he read somewhere that was the reason you felt awake after staying up too long.

  The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  Only one bowl left in his basket. Good thing he'd originally packed two, in retrospect. Walking over to the stream near the house, he explained his needs to the bowl. "I need you to hold enough water to fill that tub, then make it light enough for me to carry. Please?"

  There was that glow again. And the bowl worked! Water poured into it as Caius held it submerged. And kept going. And going. He did need a lot of water and the bowl just wasn't that wide, volume aside.

  Eventually it stopped and he heaved it out of the water. Heaved, because the thing was heavy. It glowed brighter and brighter, becoming just light enough for him to get it to the tub. And the instant he had the bowl inside the tub, said bowl disappeared in a shower of golden sparks.

  Whatever the limits of the strange ability was, he had found one. Good to know. Was it asking for two different things? No, the cloak did two things. Two very different, unrelated things? Maybe. As he shut the door behind him, he asked it to keep any zombies or monsters out. It glowed.

  He dug the rock out. Judging by the fate of the bowl, it might not make it through this. Shame, it was extremely useful. Maybe he could make another one eventually.

  "Alright, rock. You've done an amazing job, but I need you to do one more thing for me. Can you heat all the water in this tub so it's nice and warm but not dangerous? Maybe keep it warm for as long as possible?"

  The rock had been glowing steadily ever since he originally made it magical. Now that glow shone much brighter. Caius dropped it into the tub, and it dissolved like an antacid tablet. That part caught him off guard.

  Now the water was faintly glowing. And warm, he found when he dipped a fingertip in it. Good enough. Just had to get Idunnir out of that armor and into the tub. Trying to work the unfamiliar buckles and straps and... why did some parts of it have laces!

  Asking the armor to come off did nothing. Unfortunately. But eventually he did get it off. Underneath, Idunnir wore clothing similar to Caius', if more close-fitting to fit under the armor. Outer, thick tunic and trousers over a thin linen shirt and trousers. Everything was substantially more dirty and stained than Caius' magical clothes.

  Turns out Idunnir was a woman. Probably another one of those things Caius had assumed and then ignored evidence to the contrary. Not that he had been paying close attention. He got her undressed and into the warm water.

  Calling what he had come up with earlier "a plan" was an insult to planning. But it had only extended this far. Might as well continue in a similar vein. Giving someone a bath, which Caius hadn't done that before, was probably kind of awkward even if they were awake and cooperative. Unconscious and limp were both very unhelpful.

  Actually, every step of the process was damn inconvenient. Caius honestly wasn't sure how he got through the whole thing without passing out or giving up. But he got it done. She was clean... ish... and so were her linen inner clothes, which he had ended up scrubbing while she was still in the tub.

  Must have been even colder than he thought, under her finger and toenails were also blue with cold. Lips too, hopefully he wasn't actively making anything worse. Kind of strange that helping a woman bathe had been the least sensual experience of his life.

  She was probably going to have a few bruises in the morning, but he actively decided not to care about that. Clean, warm, dressed in one of his spare sets of clothing and bundled up in his magically insulating blanket.

  Hopefully the slightly strange color of his magical light was the only reason she still looked concerningly blue. Regardless, Caius body was now actively giving up on him and he couldn't do anything more to help.

  Waking up the last few days had been remarkably pain free, despite his exertions. Maybe his ability to recover from strain had been improved? In an ideal world, he'd wake up refreshed the next morning to deal with this problem.

  Caius curled up in the fetal position and slipped into the sweet embrace of sleep.