The Forgotten Zodiac

"Alright. Start picking up mushrooms," Bird showed him a few, then got to work.

"S-so..." Sylas felt his cheeks turning red again as they walked. "Everything okay with you? I mean...obviously you're fine, but...uh...how goes the search?"

Kendra smiled gently at Sylas, reaching quietly for his hand. "Well, you know the answer to that just as well as I," she said.

Sylas blushed again, shaking his head slightly. "I...I meant..." He sighed. "Nevermind." A smile crept onto his face, and he held up a handful of flowers. "I found Moonbloom. Do you see any Baby's Breath? It's a bush with a little white flower..."

Kendra grinned, finding Sylas' shyness charming. "I've been looking, but... oh!" she dropped her hold on his hand to rush over and inspect a small plant that looked as Sylas had described the flower. "Is this it?"

"Ah, perfect." Sylas hurried forward, collecting a whole bunch. "Sorry, friends...but you'll be put into something good, don't worry." He put them gently in his bag, then looked over the list again. "Let's see...we still need Honeydew, a flower that blooms near beehives, and Blacktooth. Such an ugly flower. It's hard not to notice it, it smells terrible, sticks out above the other plants, and talks like it just stubbed its toe. Only all the time."

"Certainly doesn't sound pleasent," Kendra concurred, looking around carefully for either of the two plants. "I'll listen for the buzzing of bees, you listen for that whining," she said, smiling slightly.

"Right." Sylas wandered away slightly, still smiling as he started to look.

"You sure we're not lost?" Verolen pushed aside another large bit of brush. "I feel like we've been going around in circles. I mean, I know you're the forest prince and all, but it's okay to admit you still get lost somtimes." He grinned.

"We're not lost," L'arc insisted for the fourteenth time. "We're just being thourogh in our search," he added after a pause, looking around at their surroundings.

"Ah yes...so thorough that we have to examine the same bushes three times." The demon prince chortled, starting to climb a tree. "I'll get our bearings. Maybe I'll see some mossy rocks."

"You know that's just a myth," L'arc harrumphed, leaning against the tree that Verolen climbed up. He gave their conversation some thought, before saying, "And, hey, I'm king now, remember?" He leaned back slightly to look into the branches of tree.

"Mossy rocks are a myth?" Verolen laughed, looking down at L'arc. "And yeah, you're the king. So what? We're still friends, right? Nothing's really changed in the end."

L'arc smiled slightly, then chuckled. "I can just ask the trees for directions, you know," he offered after another few minutes.

"Nope! I can see smoke from the lunch fires. The town is that way." Verolen pointed. "Did we get everything we needed, or were we too busy being lost?"

"I think we have everything, at least we did last time I checked," L'arc said, looking into his pack and running over their list mentally. "Yeah, I think we're good."

"Alright then. We should head back to Tinyville and see what the others have come up with." Verolen started off in the direction where he had seen the smoke coming from, smiling still. "You sure it was okay to pair Sylas up with Kendra? They might be too distracted to find much of anything."

"I'm sure he'll be quite content handing her flowers for a few hours," L'arc said, chuckling softly. "Besides, they deserve what time the have before... well, you know."

"Yeah." Verolen fell quiet again, though his smile didn't fade. He waited a few moments before talking again. "And Bird with Byrne? I think the Nymph would've been happier if you had gone with him. That being said, I don't blame you, not wanting to go back to that temple..."

L'arc nodded slightly, continuing towards town. "Yeah. And Byrne needs to talk to more people, too," he said.

Verolen chuckled. "And Bird needs to be around Dark Matter? I guess he needs to get used to it...I don't know if you've noticed, but he practically runs away from Manny. Not his fault, really. I just find it terribly amusing."

"Well, Byrne's not going to hurt him," L'arc said with a shrug. "I'm sure they're fine."