Emery

"Avuri, do the thing."

"Yes, ma'am." Avuri chuckled as her Domain spread out from her and toward the barn, encircling the whole building.

"Kids! Let's go inside and get something to eat, yeah?" I called. It got everyone's attention so fast that I was shocked when all six of them bolted upright at the call. I waved them toward us, and the whole group started moving. I sighed as they got closer, able to see just how badly they had ended up covered in mud. Briar aside, who had managed to stay mostly clean other than her rear end, the rest were coated in a decent shell of caked on dirt and mud.

"Alright, everyone, stand still, take a deep breath, and close your eyes." Avuri said. Cierra and Stena did as told immediately, but the others hesitated. Avuri smiled at them. "Right. You four can just watch first, alright?"

Avuri cycled her Qi and channeled it to condense water in the air. A huge sphere of clear water hovered over the girls' heads for a moment before Avuri directed it down over them. It didn't fall in a rush or splash everywhere; Avuri maintained a solid hold on the water as it flowed over Cierra and Stena. There was visible motion in the liquid, like a bubbling or vibration, as it passed over their heads to shake and scrub the dirt away.

The bubbling was most intense around their hair, trying to get the caked in grime out. It was mostly successful, leaving only the most stubborn dirt clinging to them that would require a real wash later on. Then the mass of water continued to flow downward until both girls' bodies were covered in it, but their heads popped out from the top of the massive bubble.

Cierra and Stena both took in deep breaths and grinned, the whole process only taking a couple seconds before they could breathe again.

"It's not so bad." Cierra said, directing her attention to her new siblings who still seemed a little hesitant. "You just have to hold your breath for a bit, then you're clean enough to go inside!"

"It kinda tickles though." Stena said, only to immediately lose a fight against a burst of laughter when Avuri made a sudden burst of bubbles appear by her sides, essentially tickling her with water.

It wasn't much longer until the massive bubble of water had turned murky with dirt and mud and Avuri let it drop to the ground, leaving both girls mostly clean - and even dry. They would still need a bath later, and their clothes would need a real wash, but they were at least clean enough to go inside and not shed dirt everywhere.

Avuri turned toward the other children. "What do you all think? Want to give it a try?"

"Yeah, okay." Enrik said.

"Me too." Karn agreed, and Kord stepped forward and nodded.

"Do I have to?" Briar asked. "I'm not that dirty."

I smiled and crouched down by Briar. "You don't have to. Come here, and I'll wipe you off so you don't have to get wet."

The little girl nodded and slowly walked over to me as I pulled a rag out from my storage ring.

"Avuri?"

"Yeah, I've got you." Avuri said. She began gathering a bigger bubble of water above the boys' heads to repeat the cleaning process with them, but split off a smaller bubble that floated over to me and hung in the air. As she lowered the bubble to clean the boys, I shoved my rag into the floating bubble to get it lightly damp, wrung it out, and began to wipe off whatever dirt I could from Briar''s clothing.

The whole process only took another two minutes. Briar wasn't all that dirty, so wiping off the loose dirt was easy, and Avuri's Qi-wash was a quick technique. When she dropped the dirty bubble of water, I patted Briar dry the best I could.

"Now, how about we go eat?"

We had to pull out a second table to fit everyone comfortably in our house. Thankfully, when we had first planned and built everything in our first pass over the Basin, Vale and I had made multiple sets of furniture to not only furnish the other homes, but also to keep backups in case of damage.

A second table pushed up against the first and a few more chairs was all it took to get all of us around a single table to eat. While Vale got that set up, Avuri and I started cooking and getting food placed on the table.

It had been a while since we had cooked together in our kitchen, but we had fallen right back into the normal dance. We had multiple woks cooking chicken and beef over fire Arrays in moments and were prepping rice while working on some quicker treats, like lightly fried veggies and bread.

Everything that was placed on the table was immediately dug into and separated among the kids and Vale.

"Hey, don't fill up on that stuff. We've still got the real dishes coming."

"Yes, Momri." Cierra said.

"Momri?" Karn asked.

"Emery was my mom first, before Avuri joined us. So, Mom and Momri." Cierra said by way of explanation.

"Oh."

"You can call me whatever you'd like, Karn." Avuri said. I couldn't help the smile spreading over my face as I stared into the fried rice I was working on.

"Momri."

"That works." Avuri chuckled as she moved back into the kitchen to keep working beside me.

I idly listened to the chatting at the table as we worked. It was mostly Cierra prompting the new arrivals with questions to get them to talk, or Stena responding to her sister to cover holes in the conversation. It was remarkably coherent for two children trying to get some other people to join them, but the topics were still favorite colors, foods, and that sort.

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

That was alright, though. Surface level stuff was important to know about family.

Vale, meanwhile, seemed happy to sit with them and just relax. He occasionally chimed in when the girls were having a hard time keeping everyone engaged, but they were doing well.

When Cierra suddenly got quiet and conspiratorial to ask what they thought of Avuri and I, I considered stopping my eavesdropping. While I kept listening, I felt a little guilty for it, but figured that if they were willing to share how they felt, it might be good information to have.

"I think they're both nice." Enrik said.

"They saved us." Briar said quietly.

Karn shrugged and said, "They're okay."

Kord didn't respond, but the conversation continued on topic, and suddenly the whole table, except for Vale, were swapping stories about Avuri and I. Cierran and Stenna had plenty to tell, but even the other kids had apparently remembered specific little things from during our trip home.

"Avuri was really cool. When we were in the hot jungle, she made a whole place really cold and nice. Then we ate lunch there, too. It was the only real break we got that day, but it was good." Karn said.

"I like Emery. She made us good food, even when there wasn't anything to cook with. And she made bowls and things from nothing. That was cool, too." Briar said. Her voice was notably softer than the others, but Avuri bumped me with her hip in response to the compliment and shot me a smile.

"Hey, they said you were cool, too." I whispered.

"I know. I guess our new kids like us too."

"I'd hope so. I don't want them to live with people they don't like."

"True…"

I gave the wok I was working with another solid flip and pushed the rice, vegetables, and chicken around in it to double check it all seemed done before I served it.

"How's the beef coming along?" I asked.

"It's looking good." Avuri said, mimicking my tossing with the wok. "Hopefully it tastes good. I made a pepper beef with way less pepper; it might be a little bland."

"Well, it's easier to add pepper than remove it. Vale will definitely want more, so bring the dried pepper to the table with you."

"I know." Avuri chuckled. "Ready?"

"Yup." I said, dumping the fried rice onto a large serving plate. "If anything, I hope there's enough."

"Em, we have a huge pile of fried rice, an entire second entree, plus extra rice, veggies, and the appetizers. If that's not enough we're going to go bankrupt trying to keep us all fed."

I snorted. "Maybe we make Vale pitch in more for food and the like."

"Love, he already pays more than half of our expenses, doesn't he?"

"He does. But I think you underestimate exactly how rich he is in mortal currency, Ri. He probably wouldn't ever do it, but I'm pretty sure he could buy a city the size of Flowing Dragon if he wanted to. Upfront, with hard money."

"You keep saying that, but I'm still not sure I believe you." Avuri said, concentrating mostly on plate the beef without dropping any.

I just shrugged. "Ask him yourself. You know as well as I do that he's never turned down paying for stuff for us."

"If that's the case, why did he open a tab at Lyn's instead of paying?" Avuri asked.

"That's…actually a good question. I should ask him." I said, picking up as many of the plates as I could carry, then floating the others with Qi. Avuri carried the remaining plate with her beef and another plate with broccoli.

"Food's ready." I said, leaving the kitchen. The conversation at the table died as everyone's attention turned to the food.

"That smells so good." Stena said. "Did you make -"

"Chicken fried rice, just for you Stena." I said, laying the platter closer to her on the table.

"That's…not all for you, is it?" Enrik asked, his mouth basically watering. I was about to respond, but Stena laughed.

"No! You can have some too, it's just my favorite. Well. Chicken is." She said, and I left her to answer while I served the food to various plates.

"Oh. Chicken is really good."

"It's my favorite meat." Stena said haughtily. "I think Cierra likes beef more."

"I think I like them about the same, but they aren't anything alike." Cierra said.

"I agree." Avuri said, "Beef and chicken are very different. And if you want one of them, the other isn't a good alternative."

"Pork is pretty close to chicken in some ways, though." I said. "But we didn't make any today."

"I guess pork is like chicken because it mostly tastes like whatever sauce you put on it. Chicken is good on its own, though. Pork isn't." Stena said.

"Hmm, I don't think I agree."

"I like this." Karn said, pointing at the beef on his plate.

"Ah, that's beef." Avuri said.

"I don't know if I've ever had it before." Karn said, staring at it. "At least, it doesn't look familiar."

"Well, there's lots of ways to make it. And they don't always look the same." Avuri responded and added another spoonful of the meat to Karn's plate. He thanked her for it awkwardly, but continued to eat heartily.

I looked around the table while picking at my food. I wasn't particularly hungry, still distracted by everything else bouncing around in my head. I could feel Avuri's comforting presence there, too, but my current worries weren't really ones that needed to be soothed.

There was just a lot to do.

"So…" I began, and the kids' attention only flickered over to me briefly. They were clearly more interested in the yummy food on their plates, at least until they knew what I was going to talk about. "Once we're all done eating, we'll need to sort out rooms upstairs for all of you."

That seemed to get their attention, but it was still short-lived as their excitement took over.

"Rooms?"

"Yes. You'll be living with us, so of course you get rooms." I said. "The only problem is that there are six of you, and only five rooms upstairs." And while I didn't say anything, I didn't think it was fair to ask Cierra and Stena to share after they had each had their own rooms for so long. Which left me debating one of two options.

First, of course, was a pair sharing a room. But there was also an available bedroom on the second floor, which could go to one of the kids if they all wanted to be separate. Perhaps Cierra, as the eldest.

"We can share." Kord said, pointing to himself and Briar. "I think Briar would have asked to stay with me anyway."

My eyes shifted to Briar who quietly nodded. She was already holding onto Kord's shirt hem, so I suspected she was about to ask him in whispers, too.

"What do you think?" I asked Avuri.

"I honestly don't know." Avuri sent back. "We know they aren't actually related, but that's about it. If they were older I might be more concerned about them sharing a room but as is, I think it's better for everyone if we let them."

I was glad Avuri agreed. I didn't particularly see an issue with them sharing a room, but I also knew some people would. "Okay. We'll set you too up to share, then. Once we're all done eating, we'll get beds out for everyone and see about setting up your rooms, alright?"

I couldn't help another smile as the kids cheered briefly before settling back in and shoveling the food into their mouths in an attempt to hurry.

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