Priscilla and Kavil were having a delightful time picking out flowers. Kavil knew the name of each and every one and Priscilla listened with rapt attention as she did her solemn duty of holding up her newest find for inspection so he could identify them. While flora wasn't nearly as interesting as magical monsters, Priscilla still filed away the information so she could pull out the knowledge at a later date to make Kavil smile.

After about ten minutes of laying out the flowers in neat piles so there'd be enough to go around for their matching potpourris (which Priscilla planned on making small, personalized sachets as soon as she found some thread and cloth), Priscilla saw that Holly and Nicky were determinedly walking towards them, with a few hesitant children trailing after them.

"Heya, Holly," Priscilla said, giving the girl an easy grin.

"Heya, Illnyea's sister," Holly said as she came to a halt. Priscilla distinctly remembered introducing herself to the tween, but, to be honest, being referred to as Illnyea's sister made her smile grow.

"Heya, Nicky," Priscilla said, and the boy straightened from where he had been peeking out from behind Holly's shoulder. He squeaked out a hello and Holly rolled her eyes at her brother before looking over her shoulder.

Holly sighed deeply when she saw they were walking slowly and said, "She's not going to bite us! I told you she fought the cannibal and helped save us, don't be such wimps!"

Kavil and Priscilla exchanged an amused glance as the children did a half-jog, half-speed walk to get closer. The four of them ranged from what looked to be about five to a little older than Holly, maybe thirteen? Priscilla could never be sure about children's ages with puberty hitting everyone differently, but they all were looking at the flowers in front of them with curiosity.

Holly turned back to Kavil and Priscilla with a determined expression.

"We want in," Holly said, stubbornly raising her chin.

"In on what?" Kavil asked.

Holly gestured towards the flowers. "The flower crowns."

Kavil and Priscilla both blinked in surprise, glancing at each other. Priscilla raised her eyebrows in question and Kavil nodded, giving the children his friendliest smile as he patted the ground next to him invitingly.

"What flower should be in my crown?" Kavil asked as the children hesitantly looked at their collection. The girl who seemed a bit older than Holly had a curtain of black hair and peeked one brown eye at Priscilla and Priscilla waggled her eyebrows at her.

"Purple bellflowers," she said quietly, as she glanced away from Priscilla, pointing at the flowers.

"Good choice, that's my favorite color," Kavil said, smiling as the girl ducked behind her hair.

Holly sighed again as she sat down abruptly.

"That's Primrose," Holly said, pointing at the girl with long hair, her tone of voice reminding Priscilla of Tabitha, "and that's Emory, Thomas, and Candace, and you know Nicky, so that's everyone. Now let's get started."

As Holly introduced them, each child sat down, forming a small circle. They began to pick out a few flowers for their crowns.

"Don't hate me," Priscilla said, making everyone pause in their flower gathering, "but I don't actually know how to make a flower crown."

The children's offended gasps were no match for Kavil's, whose eyes soon filled with mischief.

"Don't worry, Priscilla," Kavil said, scooting closer. "When I'm done with you, you'll be an expert at flower crafts."

Priscilla laughed, leaning in to bump their shoulders.

"I'm your willing and eager student," Priscilla said and Kavil's eyes sparkled.

Priscilla was able to make a decent flower crown that didn't fall apart when she finished tying it off, but the children had decided that her work was shoddy and unreliable, and they got a little competitive as they each tried to make a better crown for her. The local flower population was decimated by their efforts, but the children began to fully relax and laugh as they tossed grass at each other, each claiming their work was going to be the best. Priscilla was glad to bring some joy to them when the past few months of their lives had been so stressful.

Priscilla's creation had been snatched by Kavil as soon as it was declared not good enough by the children. He placed it crookedly on his head with a triumphant expression, the clumsily woven yellow and purple flowers resting upon his curls.

"It's my fee for teaching you," Kavil said with a toothy grin.

"You put your fee on crooked," Priscilla said, getting onto her knees in front of Kavil to readjust the crown so it sat straight, "hold still."

When Priscilla was satisfied with its new position, she paused in the middle of pulling back. Kavil's copper eyes were wide and mouth slightly parted before he started to smile up at her. His warm brown skin glowed in the sun's soft rays and the flowers adorning his hair made him look ethereal, like a nature spirit who had decided to grace them with his bright presence.

"Illnyea's sister, stop staring at Kavil and tell us which one is your favorite!"

Holly's voice cut through the moment and Priscilla turned with a wide smile, letting her move past the momentary hallucination.

"Present your offerings," Priscilla commanded regally, sitting back on the grass like she was empress upon her throne and the children her humble peasants.

Honestly, all the flower crowns were so good and Priscilla felt bad just picking one, so she declared them all glorious and precariously balanced them atop her head. Priscilla ended up with seven different flower crowns, one from each child and one from Kavil (an expertly weaved crown of purple asters and pink camellias). It was hard to move without jostling the stack but the children giggled and Kavil's eyes crinkled in amusement, so it was worth it.

They made two extra crowns and Kavil played tag with the children before they wandered back towards the forge. Kavil laughed at how still she had kept her upper body so her crowns didn't fall off while walking. Priscilla poked him viciously in the side and the crowns nearly toppled over, which only made him laugh harder and stick out his tongue while she stabilized them.

"You're such a fucking menace," Priscilla said, slowly bringing her hand back down.

"And you wouldn't want me any other way," Kavil said in a sing-song voice, dodging her next poke.

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Priscilla sighed because he was, unfortunately, correct.

Illnyea was free of her metal cage when they approached and practically bounced out of her skin in happiness. She didn't seem to be bothered that her arm was covered in corrosive burn scars, the flesh peeling backwards and quarter-sized patches that looked like they had been cut clean off her were oozing blood all the way down to her fingertips.

Priscilla's eyes widened in alarm but Illnyea's smile was dazzling as she asked, "Is one of those for me?"

"You may not have one from my hoard," Priscilla declared after deciding that if the supreme worrywart Sulaiman wasn't fussing over Illnyea, she wouldn't either. She held out a crown of daisies, "But you may have these daisies to adorn your brow."

Illnyea giggled as she ducked her head and Priscilla placed the flowers atop her braid. Sulaiman was staring at Priscilla like she was a toad that suddenly learned to tap dance, which left him open for Kavil to place the crown made from bluebells atop his head. Kavil murmured something too soft for Priscilla to catch but Sulaiman's cheeks flushed and he crossed his arms, pointedly turning up his nose away from Kavil's laughter.

Kavil then insisted they sit near the fountain, fixing Illnyea with a stern look when she opened her mouth, which she promptly closed when he pointed at the blood running down her arm. Kavil washed Illnyea's skin to get a clear look at everything beneath the blood before he began to heal. It was odd to watch the healing process – the bleeding was the first thing addressed as the skin reknit itself together, first forming a scab before smoothing out. The largest patches of burnt skin shifted as the magic poured into the arm, and then began to peel up like an old scab before it flaked off in large chunks. Illnyea watched it with fascination, Sulaiman with dry detachment, and Priscilla with mild revulsion as it was as disgusting as it was fascinating.

"I've healed up all the structural damage," Kavil said after roughly five minutes, turning Illnyea's forearm back and forth before releasing her, "but you should test it out just in case. I've done my best with the scar tissue, but with how long ago you got this wound, I'm afraid what's left is going to be permanent."

While the burn scars had faded greatly, they were still there, motley patches of skin that spread from Illnyea's wrist to elbow like small pink sunbursts.

"Eh, I don't care about the scars," Illnyea said, standing as she wiggled her fingers and bent her arm with clear glee. "It doesn't hurt anymore, and that's what really matters to me."

Illnyea clapped her hands, looking down at them with a wide smile.

"Olly said he had a pack of cards we could borrow for the evening," Illnyea said, her eyes gaining a competitive glint. "So, who's up for a few rounds of drake's hoard?"

They checked in with Tabitha to see if there was anything she needed from them, which she didn't, so they had some lunch before retiring back to the boys' room to play drake's hoard.

While Priscilla knew of the card game called drake's hoard from the story, the only thing that she really knew about it was that when it was played by Illnyea's party in TDE, it usually devolved into people throwing cards in the air and challenging each other to fights.

Luckily, Kavil didn't know how to play, so Priscilla was able to learn alongside him as Illnyea explained the rules.

"The goal of the game is to complete your hoard before anyone else," Illnyea said as she began to shuffle the deck in her hand.

The deck was thicker than the decks from Priscilla's old world, and she knew there were seventeen cards for each of the five suits, so it was a bit unwieldy, but Illnyea handled it like a pro.

"First we deal out cards in the center," Illnyea said as she placed four cards down. "One for each of the players and everyone takes one.

"Whatever card you pick up decides what suit you're trying to get for your hoard," Illnyea continued as everyone picked up a card. "It's either wizards, dragons, knights, gryphons or pixies. Make sure to keep your suit a secret before putting your card face down in front of you so others can't screw you over."

Priscilla's card had three pixies smiling cheerily up at her.

"Then you get four more cards," Illnyea said, dealing out the cards before placing four more cards in the center, "and then we get into the meat of the game. Your goal is to get seven cards of your chosen suit in one hand – on your turn you can either draw from the deck, the middle, or challenge an opponent for up to three cards. At the end of your turn, you have to discard cards until you only hold seven cards."

Priscilla schooled her expression into her best poker face as she realized that none of the cards she had drawn were pixies and silently despaired.

"How do you challenge people?" Kavil asked, staring at his cards with a thoughtful expression.

"Like this," Illnyea said with a wide grin before pointing at Sulaiman. "I challenge you! I bet three cards the next suit is a pixie."

Sulaiman rolled his eyes. "Be prepared to lose because the next suit is going to be a knight."

"I'm prepared to steal your cards!"

Sulaiman flipped the card and it was a dragon. He sighed and flipped another card, and the stern face of a knight stared at them.

Illnyea wilted as she held up her four cards and Sulaiman took his time pulling three and adding them to his own hand. The cards they had flipped went to the discard pile.

"And then the person to your left has their turn," Illnyea said, shaking off the loss like a duck does water. "If we run out of cards, we shuffle the discard pile. You play until everyone has their full suit or until it's impossible for someone to complete their hand. Some people stop playing after the first person puts down their cards, but it's so much more fun when it's a race to see who the biggest loser is."

"What if we all get the same suit?" Kavil asked, eyebrows furrowed as the gears in his brain whirred.

Illnyea's smile turned predatory.

"Then you challenge your opponent until they have nothing left and admit defeat."

The game began slowly, as most of them chose to draw a card for their first few turns. Every card Priscilla drew was either a drake or a wizard, so when it came to her fourth turn, she had to make a desperate gamble.

Priscilla turned to Sulaiman, the only person she hadn't seen discard a pixie yet, so he might have some in his hand.

"I challenge you and I bet three cards it'll be a wizard," Priscilla said, all false confidence and competitiveness.

Sulaiman narrowed his eyes before smirking. "I bet it's a pixie."

And, of fucking course, the next card flipped was a stupid-ass pixie with a wide grin.

Priscilla groaned and held up her cards sullenly, glaring under her lashes at Sulaiman's smug glance and mumbling curses that the fates decided to align with him.

Her bad luck held as for the rest of the game, Priscilla only drew one pixie, one stupid pixie out of the possible fourteen in the deck. But with her hoard of crowns upon her head, Priscilla couldn't even indulge in wild movements and lamentations that the world was hellbent on screwing her over in particular, so she silently fumed as her friends discarded pixie after pixie.

Kavil won seven rounds in with drakes (beginner's luck picking favorites but she still celebrated when he turned to her with delight), Illnyea laid down two after that with wizards (which was okay because she only rubbed it in Sulaiman's face, who had sniped earlier that he'd beat her), and Sulaiman smugly challenged Priscilla for his last round and stole the last two knights he needed (which was totally unfair and Priscilla cursed the god of cowards to hell and back for letting the bastard humiliate her like that).

Priscilla leaned over to snatch what remained of the deck, one hand keeping her crowns in place until she sat back up straight.

"You guys discarded all the fucking pixies," Priscilla muttered angrily as she searched for the deck to see how far away she was from getting her hoard finished. All she saw were drakes, gryphons, basically everything she didn't need except for exactly one (1) pixie.

"Sorry," Illnyea said with a sympathetic wince, "sometimes you just get screwed over by the draw. And Sulaiman. I can't tell you how many times he's pulled the same trick on me – he can be sooo annoying to play with, sorry, I should have warned you."

Sulaiman still doing his best impression of a smug cat, eyes glittering with satisfaction as Illnyea scrunched up her nose at him, shaking her head, and Kavil doing his best to keep a straight face and failing to keep his lips from twitching upwards, almost laughing when Priscilla squinted at him. He was totally laughing at how hard she had been trounced.

Priscilla eyed the two unrepentant gremlins, determination to defeat them burning within her.

"I demand a rematch!"

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