![]() ![]() ![]() Had she really noticed something like that? The girl was as keen-eyed as her mother. ![]() “I–well,” Runaan balked, and felt his cheeks grow the slightest bit warm. “For all the scratches and bruises you get in training! They make him sad.” “You can dry their petals and grind them with oil to make a healing salve.” She tried to hide it, but Runaan could tell she nearly burst with pride at knowing the answers to his questions. ![]() “Rayla, you know to look deeper than ‘pretty.’ Remember your training: what is it that makes these flowers unique?” She was comparing their bland shape and washed-out colors to the lunabloom, of course. Ethari likes these? They’re not even very pretty.” Rayla frowned at the bush and the small flowers, unimpressed. A stubborn plant, he thought, but hearty. They took longer to find than Runaan would have liked: the summer heat had wilted their numbers, but eventually he pointed to a thorny cluster twisting its way out from underneath a log. Near the edge of the forest, where the trees thinned and the ground turned grey with the nearness of the Midnight Desert, great spiny bushes dappled with yellow and pink flowers grew in what little shade remained. She reached forward to clutch at his hands, deadly serious. He tilted his head at her and smirked, humoring the notion that his husband’s favorite things were subtle or secret in the slightest. “Runaan! You have to help me! You know all the secret things Ethari likes!” Little limbs flailing, she pushed herself up to sit and look at him. Rayla sniffled and blinked at him, a glimmer of realization in her eyes. “It’s just, they’re his favorite, and I wanted to bring him something he likes.” “I know,” Rayla pouted, stubbornly wiping at her eyes. The lunabloom flower likes cool nights and morning dew.” Runaan knelt gently beside her and shooed a displaced grasshopper away from her knee. “We’ve looked everywhere! We’re never going to find a lunabloom!” Tears glistened and began to slip down her sun-flushed cheeks, but she covered her eyes with an arm so he couldn’t see them. Rayla flopped backwards into the grass with a long, defeated groan. ![]()
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