“Miss Rimba, where should I put these tulips?” the girl asked, her figure started to show fully to the front room. I can feel blood rushing to my face, especially my cheeks. It was Devony, goddammit!!
Devony seem to be quite surprised when she looked at me as well. She unconsciously dropped the tulips and realized as Miss Rimba warned her.
I think and act quickly, ~“Flowers, reach my hand!”~ I chanted spell in Lycanlinguid and the tulips quickly wrapped their roots around my arm. Miss Rimba handed me a pot so that I can put the tulips back, and they did automatically.

“Marvelous job, Havadr!” Miss Rimba squealed at me happily. “You just saved my flowers from devastation.”
“Nah, plants are my friends, I can communicate with them since I was a baby.” I replied stroking the tulips gently.
“And Devony, be careful next time.” she said to Devony. I’m glad she wasn’t a hot-head.
“It’s not really her fault.” I said, trying to defend her. “You see, Devony and I used to be in the same junior school. But, you know mages; I have to train my magic so we got separated.”

I noticed Miss Rimba looked at back and forth from me to Devony. She seemed to notice something that caught her interest or common sense. “You two wear an eye patch. Havadr, is she Sud?”
I knew that Devony was very startled about Miss Rimba knowing her identity, but I, recalling that all Solitaire members were protected by my dad, only nodded.
“So is that why you’re here?” she asked me. I blushed all of a sudden. Whoops, I talked too much.
“Y-yeah…sorta…” I answered, scratching the back of my head.

She thought of something that I was sure it had something to do with me. And, man, I was quite right. “Do you have a job already, dear?”

I shook my head saying, “No. I just came back yesterday.”
“Then why don’t you work in my shop, Devony is the only employee I have right now.”
I hesitated to think that I’m going to work with Devony, but at the same time, I heard voices in my secret ears, saying “Please, Havadr, stay with us…” well something like that. The plants wanted me to work and take care of them. Since the plants were so young and small, I have no heart to leave them.
“Alright, I take your offer.”

I dare not see Devony’s face. Was she upset? Was she happy? Or was she didn’t mind about it? But I’m happy that I didn’t need to be broke again, yay!
So I worked on that flower shop that minute but not on the front, but way on the back, taking care of the plants. Devony decorated the plants and Miss Rimba took care of the customers.
What do you know; working here was a lot of fun. I mean, I get to communicate with plants a lot and they love me. Plus, the plants were more varied than the plants at home. I met a group of orchids, dahlias, and other plants, even cacti. I was glad I did take the offer.

I noticed Devony entered the glass house, simply because I heard the door opened and then closed. I whirled my head to see her; I tried to look calm though I was incredibly nervous. She could’ve come to be mad at me, and I still remember how scary she was when she was upset.

“How did you found me here?” she asked me. Alright, she didn’t sound so upset.
I took a deep breath, making my mind clear of all the nonsense that was in my head, “My dad helped me. You know he’s the Cronus, even though he doesn’t own this future-reading eye, but he still can spot us. You know why?”
Devony shook her head.
“Because the eyes of the Cronus can see everyone’s life span—that was how he found you, even from kilometers away. He could see how many seconds our life has before we died. And…I once heard that the Heimdall’s Eyes were used to be Cronus’s eyes before he gave it to the two lycanthropies, Nord and Sud.”

After that short explanation, I noticed a smirk on her face. I was perplexed at that new expression she showed to me; I blinked my eyes quickly.
“For someone like you, you’re quite bright and informative.” she said.
I was, again, perplexed but shortly I got her meaning and grinned. “You’re insulting me, eh? I see, the way you comment harshly has changed now. You used to yell at me but now you insult softly. What had happened to you in five years?”
She giggled and I couldn’t help myself giggling as well. For me, this was a glorious reunion. She stepped closer to me while we were still giggling and said, “Speaking of changes, you too have changed a lot, especially in height. Now you’re one head above me.” She rose up her hand to compare our heights.

Suddenly, the giggle on her face disappeared and was replaced with neutral. “Oh, yeah, what’s your relation with Miss Rimba? How could she know that we’re the Watchers?”
I was startled of that question, but there was nothing to hide. “She’s one out of a million friends of my dad.”
She nodded thoughtfully. “So what did you do in your…training?” she started to ask a friendlier question.
“Well, basically, everything that a sorcerer must know. And since I’m a ‘True Managarm’, he taught me how to use magic to offend, defend, heal, and escape without relying too much on my ‘talk-with-the-plants’ power.”
“How about school?”
“I stayed a year or so in the capital of Dragon Kingdom then I moved to the farther part of Dragon Kingdom until Aconite Empire. The cool thing—also the astonishing thing—is that in every city we came to, there was always at least one of my Dad’s friend. And because of that, we ended up staying in their house for quite a long time.”
“It must be fun isn’t it?” she asked again. “I mean, to travel the whole Terra.”

I don’t know what or why, but I think I just caught a different impression of her. She was so much different than last time; not a hot-head anymore, kinder and more patient. Hey, why did I—
Why was my stomach felt really weird?