Ira nods and takes a sip again. She wear a contemplative look and doesn't say much for a moment before asking, "So, what were you doing when you came in? I was just coming back inside from checking on the chickens."

"I was on my way to find Hal and work on the translation tool. I think I figured out how to fix part of the grammar system."

"Oh, that's good! I hope your fix works out. What is the Nomai language like? Do you have any examples you could show me? I always want to think about languages when work on the settings for my stories but grandma doesn't know much about it and we don't have many books on it so it's hard to know what would make sense."

"I have a picture here." Sylvite hands over a printed photo about half a meter across. "You can see how it's written out in spirals. Each branch is a reply to what it branches off from. The start of each branch is usually the name of the person writing."

Ira takes the fact that she can read this unfamiliar text without effort in stride. "Ooh. That's a much more conversational way of writing than the books we have! I wonder if writing was a much more important way of communicating for them than it was for humans, compared to speech. And it's interesting how this writing ends up looking like plants. I wonder if that plays into plants being important to the Nomai, or if I'm only seeing it because I've started to think that."

What does this snippet of Nomai text say?

FILIX: Has anyone observed the phantom moon that sometimes greets us in the night sky? Your thoughts interest me.

    THATCH: I compliment your eyes! How do you imagine it disappears? Hypothesis: Could it be a shift in the light spectrum?

    PLUME: Suppose this moon is too shy to show us its face.

    PLUME: I’m interested in your playful moon. Is it much like its violent friend (Hollow’s Lantern)?

    THATCH: Imagine if there were two volcanic moons.

        PLUME: Then I imagine there’d be none of us left!

            FILIX: Hypothesis: There can exist too much lava.

            THATCH: I’d strongly prefer we test the null hypothesis.

    FILIX: This moon isn’t volcanic (to my unaided eyes). Sometimes it leaves its friend Hollow’s Lantern for nights at a time.

        PLUME: The nights the moon circles this planet appear random. It seems to travel as it likes.

"Huh! Do you know anything about this disappearing moon the Nomai are talking about? You mentioned the Nomai had teleportation technology, do you think it could be related?"

"We call it the quantum moon, it moves when you're not looking at it, there's areas on Brittle Hollow and Timber Hearth where other things behave the same way. It's a weird effect, entire trees, roots and all just aren't there anymore with unbroken dirt in their place. Look away again and they sometimes reappear as if they never left. We think it might have something to do with this one weird type of rock we haven't seen elsewhere. There's a bit of it in our museum and it behaves the same way despite not being in either of the areas."

"I wonder how the effect goes from being in rocks to being in trees? Given how different your trees are I shouldn't assume they work the same, so, how do you get more trees? You mentioned planting them but do they make seeds? Do you take cuttings? Do you get them some other way?"

"Our trees have seeds, and then they grow when planted in the dirt. How the rock makes trees and signs and such behave differently is a mystery. Gabbro seems to understand it better than anyone, they managed to make a signpost where the attached signs change order. They couldn't really explain how it worked when I asked though. It was a lot of trial and error."

Ira nods. "I imagine it could be tricky to work with something that can disappear as soon as you look away from it. I wonder what it's like, to be the tree? What does it seem like when to us it isn't there? Does it experience anything at all or does it just skip to the next time it exists? Actually, hm. Do you know if you do something to one of these quantum things, whether it stays that way after it disappears and then reappears again? Like if you carved into the trunk of one of the quantum trees, would the carving still be there when it reappeared? I guess it has to, if Gabbro was able to make a sign like this. I wonder if you made a clock that was quantum whether it'd count time while it was gone, and how much time. Oh! Do you know where this bit of Nomai text was found? Given how it has three different people and they all contribute to it more than once I get the feeling it must have been a place they visited frequently, or maybe stayed at for a while."

"Oh, we're pretty sure it doesn't really disappear, it just moves. Whenever you look at the rock in the museum it's always somewhere it just doesn't stay in the same place if you blink or look away. I think this particular text is from a wall at the north pole of Brittle Hollow. It's right above the biggest city of theirs we've found. Feldspar's reports said it looks like there used to be a pretty direct route down into the city but it's broken now."

"Huh! I wonder how the quantum things, uh...know where to go? Maybe they start as just a small difference and then over time they get separated more and more. Do you know if a quantum thing can have three or four or more different sort of places it can be? Or, hm, maybe they only have one sort of normal, consistent spot and when they disappear they go to a different other place every time. And, huh! I'm kind of surprised it's only the three of them if it's such a high traffic area, but maybe that's just part of the social rules for Nomai. These three don't seem like strangers, at least to me."

"The one in the museum switches between three tree stumps. Most of the other quantum obiects switch between more than that. The Quantum Moon can orbit in at least five places. As for high traffic, I don't think the Nomai went above the surface often. The vast majority of their structures are under the surface and the paths between them are too."

"Oh, huh. I suppose it may have been some special place for these ones then. Maybe they worked there, or it was a place for them to hang out." She takes another snip, before seemingly having some internal realization and putting on a somewhat chastised expression, if such is recognizable to Syl. "Sorry, I've hardly let you ask any questions yourself, or even sit down."

Syl takes the prompt to sit down. "It's alright, there's a lot of mysteries in our solar system and they're all so exciting. I can't wait to try to find the answers so it makes sense that you're interested in them too. Hmm, Bar can you recommend something I've never tried before but you think I'll like?"

A napkin appears on the bartop, bearing a short message in neat, feminine handwriting.

Certainly, says the napkin. 

Next to the it appears a large ceramic mug of something warm and fragrant, smelling of herbs and spices and light sweetness. It steams gently.

Syl picks it up and smells it, feels the warmth of the mug in their hands... "That doesn't smell like anything I've smelled before, this is great!" They take a sip... "Ooh, I don't know why we didn't think to try heating up things and drinking them, it's such an obvious idea in retrospect. This is really good." They drink some more.

Ira nods vigorously. "Hot drinks are the best! They change how all the ingredients taste so much, plus they always feel great when you come in from the cold." She takes another sip and really relishes it, consciously registering its tastes and aromas, its texture, its warmth. "Do you not cook things on Timber Hearth? Or are just hot drinks new to you?"

"Just hot drinks, we cook Marshmallows all the time and we make fish stew pretty often."

Ira nods. "Huh. I wonder if we could make marshmallows back home. Do you know how to make them? And, ooh, fish stew. I've heard about fish, and seafood, for so long. Maybe I should get some. Bar, would that be covered with books I traded earlier or should I go get something else to trade?"

The books will more than cover a seafood dish, yes, the words appear on the napkin with their suggestions as though an invisible person were writing them out, Do you have a specific one in mind?

"Hm..." Ira considers that for a moment, before glancing over to Syl. "Maybe something from Syl's world, if it's safe for me to eat? Other than that I more than trust your judgement." She takes another sip of eggnog.

Ira will receive a lovingly carved bowl full of gently steaming fish stew, then!

"Marshmallows are a lot of work, you need to refine sap to get sugar and fish to get gelatin and a lot of patience to get the consistency right."