Out on the town was a big deal when Arthur was in the largest, most high-level-class filled city in the Demon World. That was especially true when Coldbrook was flush with cash, and had strapped the expo party down with more money than he could reasonably spend over the course of a couple of weeks. And it was especially, especially true when they also sent him with a firmly stated expectation that you at least try to spend it, disregarding the awkwardness-of-using-public-funds aspect of things if possible.


    They had already, at Lily’s guidance, been on a handful of terrifying rides and through a bunch of crazy, thrill-seeking experiences. Arthur had no idea how she had identified so many of them so fast, but it seemed like some adrenaline-filled amusement was behind every corner, powerless to stop Lily from becoming an instant customer. He had been twirled, dropped, hurtled down subterranean waterways, and generally jostled half to death by the time he called a stop to it. The rides were a good time, but he could only take so much.


    Now freed from the obligation to cover the scary-rides-of-the-capital base, they were cruising the city in the way people do when they look for new things, expecting the city to show them experiences and fun they hadn’t known about. And soon enough, it did.


    “Is he frying dough around fried dough?” Lily’s hand shot out and caught Arthur’s sleeve. “He is. Arthur, he’s layering dough. He’s making… Multi-floor doughnuts. Get the purse out.”


    Lily’s eyes filled with the purest greed Arthur had ever seen. When the stratified snacks turned out to be a carrier for various fillings, that look somehow intensified even more. There was something so primitive about the sheer growing-child-appetite aspect of it all that Arthur almost shuddered.


    “Fine, fine.” Arthur walked towards the stand, sharing a laughing glance with Mizu. “Hello, there. Can we have three of…”


    “Five,” Lily said, firmly. She unconsciously puffed to enormous owl proportions, by her standards. Arthur was surprised the seams on her clothes were holding up.


    “Five of… what are these called?”


    “Dolders,” the man said. “Dough boulders.”


    “We are friends now.” Lily looked up at the man in admiration. “Good friends.”


    “Good.” The man seemed accustomed to this kind of reaction, which Arthur took as a great sign.


    “What kinds of fillings do you have?” Arthur asked.


    “Oh, plenty. Frosting is popular. I have a full stock of jams, too. Just ask and I have it. But for you, my owl friend?” The man’s eyes lit up. “You don’t get a choice. You are getting meat fraggles.”


    “That’s made up,” Lily said. “There’s no way that’s a real thing.”


    “I’ll have you know a thing can be made up and a real thing at the same time.” The man pretended to be slightly offended. “I invented them. I can name them.”


    “Show me then.” Lily’s eyes narrowed. “Show me now.”


    The man reached for a large bowl on another counter behind his stand and brought it forward. “See? The problem with fried meat, for me, is that I’m showing up for the fried part. The crispy breaded parts, in particular. But when you fry a big hunk of meat…”


    “You only get the outside. So you diced the meat before you fried it.” Lily pulled on Arthur’s sleeve again, subconsciously. Arthur put a small stack of coins on the counter, and the man started assembling Lily’s sandwiches. “And then every part is crunchy. It’s genius. Except…”


    “What keeps them from falling out of the sandwich?” the man asked. “Good question. Let’s talk sauce.”


    “I would die for this,” Lily said. “If you ever need me, at any time, just call. Arthur, we have to protect this man.”


    Five minutes later, Lily was working her way through her third calorie-bomb in completely silent focus. Arthur watched with interest as she packed it away. Something about traveling and exploring a new city had taken just enough energy to push her over some kind of nutrient-need threshold, and there was not a moment he was around her in the last several days where she wasn’t trying to make up for it in some way or another.


    To the food-stand operator’s credit, the Dolders seemed to be the first meal that made a dent in Lily’s black-hole hunger.


    “That is much, much, better,” Lily said, patting her stomach. “Gods, where did those people come from?”


    “They’ve been here the whole time.” Arthur and Mizu continued watching the street performers in the square, as they had been. They were a troupe of dancers who appeared to work with whatever obstacles they had on hand, juggling, flipping, and climbing over fountains, benches, tables, and trees as they worked a complex, fully improvised routine into existence from nothing but talent and difficult terrain. “They are pretty good.”Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.


    “Good, but not high-leveled,” Mizu said. “You can see they are slowing down.”


    “Ah, yeah. They are, aren’t they?” Lily concentrated on the square for a moment, then nodded in satisfaction. “There, that should help.”


    Arthur saw a few of the performers give each other quizzical, almost startled glances as they began dancing a bit faster. Lily was juicing them with majicka, something that made them better at what they were doing, whether they knew where it was coming from or not.


    “Do you feel fine doing that?” Arthur patted Lily on the head. “It’s fine if you do. I just don’t want you to hurt yourself.”


    “It’s fine. It just feels like normal.” Lily looked at her last Dolder affectionately, then wrapped it up in the paper it came with for later. She had limits, after all. “I think the system really was just worried about me progressing too fast. It doesn’t seem like using my skills is any problem at all. Besides, I like the dance.”


    Revitalized with Lily-power, the dance went on another ten minutes or so. Once they were done, other performers moved in to fill the vacuum. There were musicians, storytellers, and other entertainers doing things Arthur didn’t have great names for coming out of the woodwork and displaying their creative goods in an unending stream of fun.


    And somehow, even that had its limits.


    “It’s odd,” Mizu said. “Any one of those acts would make a whole evening worth living through, back home. But here, with dozens of them.”


    “You get tired,” Lily said. “I don’t think I could watch another act.”


    Arthur thought about that for a bit as they strolled along.


    “I think it’s like food. Lily, you have a Dolder in your pocket, right? And if you were hungry, you’d destroy it.”


    “Absolutely.” Lily patted her pocket affectionately. “I’m going to sometimes tonight.”


    “But not right now. It’s like… there’s a need. And once it’s filled, it’s filled. There’s only so much the fun-bucket will hold.”


    “Don’t say fun-bucket anymore.” Mizu squeezed Arthur’s hand as they walked. “It sounds gross and —”


    Mizu suddenly jolted to a halt, stopping in her tracks so suddenly that Arthur barely avoided yanking on her arm as he continued walking forward. He went through his normal checklist of sudden-stop-in-conversation things, ruling out danger almost immediately by looking around at the calm street, then her being angry or upset about something by looking at her face.


    When he actually tracked her gaze to whatever had caused the reaction, everything came into focus. It was a flower shop. There were plenty of those in town, but this one was visibly different. There was less order to what it carried. The plants were displayed in an almost random manner, like they couldn’t get enough variety to cover an acceptably smooth sweep of colors that pleased the eye. A sign above the shop reading Rare Petals and Stems shed some light on why. These were weird plants, mostly varieties he hadn’t seen before. This shop dealt in the unusual for people who wanted it, rather than normal-florist-popular varieties of things.


    And deep in the window display, at the very center of Mizu’s gaze, was the eventual explanation that put all the confusion to rest. In small individual pots, growing happily and healthily, were a dozen Blue Stars.


    “Ooooh,” Arthur said. “Let''s go. I’ll buy them for you.”


    “That’s silly. Where am I going to even keep one?”


    “In the pots, by a window. Or wherever the shopkeeper says, for when we get them home.”


    “They’ll break,” Mizu said, not breaking her stare on the plants for a single second. “On the way home. I can’t keep them safe.”


    Arthur put Mizu’s cheeks between his palms, squished her face a bit, and turned her towards him. “Talca will pack them for you. Or I’ll hire someone to do it. Or I’ll carry them home myself in my hands. But we are going to get them back to Coldbrook and plant them. You will have these, Mizu.”


    They stood there and stared at each other for a few seconds, until Mizu suddenly flushed with color and she shook loose of Arthur’s grip. From the side, Lily coughed conspicuously.


    “I’m going home now,” Lily said. “Before things get worse.”


    “But what about the rides?” Arthur said. “You wanted to go on more rides.”


    “I wanted, Arthur, to distract you from your troubles. And it looks like that’s going to happen now. I’m getting out of here before it does.”


    “I have no idea what you mean.”


    “You will. I’m leaving.” Lily started walking and waved over her shoulder. “Have fun.”


    Arthur watched her walk away, confused. Especially as Mizu flushed into every more intense shades of blue, like a slowly deepening ocean.


    “So…” Arthur said. “Can I buy you flowers?”


    “Our people controlled the inlets and outlets of our nation for a generation, limiting the flow of those unlike us as we too-slowly progressed towards trust.”


    “What?”


    “Sorry, sorry,” Mizu said. “Reflex. Yes. Please buy me flowers.”


    The purchase of the flowers was easy enough. The shopkeeper gave them some simple explanations on how to keep the Blue Stars alive in the pots, which turned out to be a very particular blend of nutrients and a limited amount of light within a certain range. Better, she was more than willing to have the flowers delivered to the hotel and seemed to have a special service just for that purpose that would ensure they got there safely.


    After making the buy and giving Mizu a few minutes to gaze at her very favorite plant, they walked again. Arthur very slowly became aware that Mizu’s heart wasn’t in the act of strolling in the way it was before. Something was up, and he wasn’t sure exactly what yet.


    “Are you okay?” Arthur said. “You seem distracted.”


    “I am.” Mizu half-smiled. “I’m just waiting for you to figure out why.”


    The conversation lulled for a bit. Arthur did some hard thinking, working over the last several minutes in his head. It wasn’t just a buying-her-flowers thing. The difference had definitely kicked in when Lily had mentioned she was leaving, or even a bit before. It had intensified since then, but the idea of why was still eluding him.


    And then, slowly, deep in the recesses of his understanding of Mizu, something started to click into place. He looked around at where she had slowly led him and found they were in a quiet corner of the park, away from prying eyes. Lily was gone. The night was quiet and comfortably warm.


    “Oh, gods,” Arthur said. “It’s kissing times, isn’t it?”


    “You just figured it out?”


    “I really did.”


    “Well, you got there, at least,” Mizu said. “Only a half-hour after Lily.”


    “To be fair, she has a whole skill for having good ideas.”


    “So this is a good idea?”


    “I’d say so,” Arthur said. Within a few minutes, he was proven very thoroughly right.