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  [colpse]Chapter One Hundred and Twenty-Seven - A Poet, and Also a Dragon

  “We should go visit Booksie together!” I decred. The grenoil exploration team looked fused for a moment, so I hasteo fill them in. “She’s a friend of ours, a really nice bun that needed a bit of help. She should be in the East side of Port Royal.”

  “Ah, yes,” Emeric said. “I suppose we could follow you zere. By ze way... I noticed ze ears earlier... zey weren’t zere when we saw you st, right?”

  I reached up and squeezed both ears at the base, the part that had a bunch of white fluff. “Nah, these are brand new. I got them when my first css evolved.”

  “Zat’s unusual,” Arianne said. “irely unheard of, but unusual. I suppose you’re lucky zat ze evolution was towards somezing so i. Buns are generally well-liked.”

  “I guess so!” I said. I tugged my ears down, thehem go so that they sprang back up. “Anyway! Do you guys want to do lunch? We could go see Booksie, then find a nice pce to eat and catch up.”

  “I have some letters to send,” Amaryllis said.

  “And we give Amaryllis time to send her letters.”

  Emeric looked to his friends. Valerie was nodding quite seriously, Arianne shrugged while leaning against her staff and Pierre’s tummy growled. Donat was the only ohat really didn’t seem certain. “You know what? Why not.”

  “Brilliant!” I cheered. “We should go che Booksie first, and then maybe she point us to a nice pce for dinner.”

  “A bit of a walk won’t do any harm,” Emeric said.

  We took off, heading downhill towards the main streets of the city, then off towards the East end. I walked o Emerid listened with all four ears to him talking about their st adventure and how tricky it was to survive in the snow.

  I kinda knew all about that, but he was eager to talk, so I didn’t interrupt or anything.

  I did notice Amaryllis walkio a quiet Pierre, keeping to herself, and a bit further back, Awen was making a piece of gss float above her hao Arianne who seemed to be giving her some advice.

  “Hey, Emeric,” I asked when there was a bit of a lull in the versation. We were making good time. People had a habit of getting out of our path. I guess a group of armed and armoured people in adventuring gear made most pedestrians move, which was okay I guess. “Your team is pretty strong, right?”

  “Well, all of us are at least in our sed tier, except for Donat. Arianne and I are just about to hit our sed css evolution aher of us are more zay-five years old. We’re a bit ahead of ze curve.”

  “That’s cool! I was w, maybe after lunch you could teach us some things?”

  The grenoil looked at me quizzically. “What sorts of zings?” he asked.

  “Ah, well...” I tapped the tips of my fiogether. “We tend to get into some trouble sometimes, and while we’ve won every fight that ted, some of them were really close. And I guess I’m sort of our party’s leader? Kinda? We never voted on it or anything, but Awen and Amaryllis and e all tend to follow along with my ideas. And I don’t want them to get hurt because I wao try something dumb.”

  “You already sound like you’d make a good party leader,” Emeric said.

  I beamed up at him. “Thanks!”

  “As for training, we probably won’t stay in Port Royal past ze night and maybe into ze m, but I give you a few tips, I’m sure. Maybe a bit of sparring wiz Pierre? He’s quite good at fighting wizout injuring anyone. Don’t tell him, but Donat has been improving by leaps and bounds under Pierre’s tutege.”

  “That would be really nice,” I said. “Maybe after lunch ick out an inn or something with a big yard and you could give us tips? Oh, we’ll pay, of course, it wouldn’t be herwise.”

  “Maybe you pay for Valerie’s portion of lund we’ll call it a fair deal,” he said. The glimmer of a smile in his eyes suggested that it was a bit of a trap, but I doubted Valerie could eat that much.

  “Deal!”

  We crossed the gate into the Easterion without the guards doing anything more than gng at all of our Exploration Guild pins. Awen didn’t have one, but maybe they thought it was uhe pel of her jacket.

  There weren’t that many guards by the gate, and the reason why became obvious a few blocks down where we ran into a cordon of guards blog off the road leading down to Booksie’s shop.

  “Sorry folks, ’t go zat way,” one of the uards said.

  “Ah, but my friends are over there,” I said.

  “Zere’s a dragooo,” the guard replied.

  “Yeah, he’s one of my friends.”

  The guard didn’t seem to believe me, but fortunately Emeric stepped in. “Ah, five me, sir, zis is Exploration Guild business. We o scout ze area and e it is safe. Maybe you would like to go spy on ze dragon yourself?”

  “Oh, I see,” the guard said. “In zat case you’re free to go ahead.”

  “Thank you!” I said before hopping over the little wooden barrier they put up, then I pulled it aside for the rest of my friends who might not be so good at jumping.

  We moved along until, finally, we reached the street with Booksie’s shop. I looked around, taking in the quaint homes and little shops, and most importantly, the plete ck ons in the area. “I’m going to go cheside,” I told the others while pointing to the bookstore.

  “Do be careful,” Awen said.

  “No problem!” I gave her a thumbs-up and tried the front door. It was unlocked.

  The inside of Booksie’s shop looked a bit rough. Some of the dispys had been broken, and there was a fine yer of dust over everything that had my nose sg up until I let loose with my ing aura. That cleared up the dust around me, and also made the air smell a little fresher. I should have left it up the eime.

  My ears perked as I heard a deep rumbly voice from the back of the shop. It was a bit rude, but I decided to ast all the shelves and into the area at the back of the store. There was a little kitette there, with a ruove and a tiny table with one one chair o it. A door led to the backyard where the voices were ing from.

  I poked my head out, then spped a hand over my mouth to hold in an ‘aww.’

  Rhawrexdee was sitting coiled up in as small a ball as he could, and even then he ushing up against the fences all around him. His forearms were folded up before him and under his . Booksie was sitting there, a big book held up on her p so that the dragon’s eye could read the text on it from between her ears. Ears that were bobbing from side to side as if they were happy.

  The little bit of a flush on her face spoke volumes.

  “Ah, yes, the word mean that, but see, in that text it’s jugated in the past tehat means it’s airely different word,” Rhawrexdee was saying.

  “Oh, it’s a homonym, two words that are spelled the same?”

  “That’s right. That’s what had you fused, I think.”

  Booksie nodded hard, her ears smacked Rhawrexdee. “I see, I see. Did you want to tinue? Please?”

  “Certainly.” The dragon cleared his throat. “My only love sprung from my greatest adversary, my teeth shone, and my heart was at the ready. A her gaze melted my reservations, oh, to be free of these expectations! To have a heart which beats steady, uhe regard of a beauty that evokes such--”

  The dragon looked up, a single eye locked onto me.

  I froze like a rabbit meeting a wolf, then I remembered that these were my friends. “Ah, hi guys, sorry for interrupting.”

  Booksie jumped to her feet, patted down her pants, and smmed her book shut with a thump. “It was nothing,” she said.

  “Of course not,” I agreed.

  “So, you’re back,” Rhawrexdee said. “Is my sister with you?” His eyes narrowed.

  “Nope! She’s decided to take over the local mob, so now you shouldn’t have any more problems with them, Booksie! Ah, but we discovered this great big spiracy that might lead to a big war, so we’re going to stick our noses into that and see what we do,” I said.

  “Are the others with you?” Booksie asked.

  “Uh-huh. And I found some old friends too! They’re a grenoil party from the Exploration Guild. They’re nice.”

  “Well, let’s go meet with them, then,” Booksie said.

  Rhawrexdee sighed and got to his feet, his tail swiping through the fence behind him and the clothes line behind that, but he didn’t seem to care much. “I’ll leap over your little shop,” he said a moment before taking to the air.

  When the dust settled, I turo Booksie with a big smile. “So, reading romances while sitting on your friend?” I asked.

  “Oh, shush you,” she said past her flush. “Rhawrexdee was just helpih some of the transtions. I agreed to teach him the uages I know in exge.”

  “Won’t that take a long time?” I asked.

  The bun smiled a small, knowing sort of smile. “Yes, yes I think it will.”

  I giggled as I followed her into the shop. “Yoing to start the store up again?”

  “I think so. As much as I... enjoy Rhawrexdee’s pany, I am an indepe woman. I’m not going to move into my... my maybe-boyfriend’s mom’s cave just like that. I’ll see about buying some of the lots out back so he has a pce to nd and sit around in, and then, ah, I suppose I’ll have to look for a loan to get everything started again.”

  “Do you think people will e if there’s a dragon around?” I hoped that the people around here weren’t so speciest as to boycott a shop just because the owner was friends with a few dragons.

  “It might actually help. It’ll at least make food deal of advertising,” she said. “What was that about a war?”

  “ht. Amaryllis give you the importaails, but we think someone is trying to start a big war between all the big tries around here. It sounds really nasty, so we’ll see what we do to stop that from happening.”

  “I wish you the best, truly.”

  I stepped out onto the street to find the Exploration Guild party staring up at Rhawrexdee as if he was going to eat them at any moment. Which reminded me...

  “Hey, Rhawrexdee, we’re going out for lunch, did you want to e?”

  “Lunch? Certainly. I’m quite hungry. And also a dragon.”

  I grinned. “Awesome! So, do any of you know of a good pce to eat? The only pce I know is the Ron and Roll Inn. They do have a nice courtyard, so that might work.”

  “Sounds good enough,” Amaryllis said. “I need a pce to write some things, any pce with tables would do.”

  “Likewise.” Booksie said. “Let me just lock things up.”

  Emeric moved over to me while Booksie was off closing up the shop. “Ah, when you said zat you were friends wiz ze dragon, I, ah, didn’t zink you were being zat literal.”

  “Well, we’re not super-best friends or anything, not yet, but Rhawrexdee is a nice guy under all the arrogand the desire to eat people and take their gold. I think there’s a good ce that him and Booksie will work out!”

  The renoil looked at me for a long moment. “You are orange person, Broccoli Bunch.”

  “Thank you!”

  ***

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