The One

SIXTEEN

Morten cursed,
he had just taken one zip from the tea Agnus had given him.

The redheaded banshee seemed about as annoyed as he felt.
She knew all too well that based on their observations Morten and Agnus were supposed to be vastly asleep,
yet here they were,
awake.

Zipping tea.

" You're expected!" She snapped.

They found themselves sitting at a table 30 minutes later, with flowers on it.
Agnus was actually squinting at a flower he had grabbed. Morten understood, these were wildly different from anything both of them had probably ever seen.
They were apparently supposed to put together a nice collection of flowers to give to the girl who gave them a gift.

Which immediately turned into confusion,
struck down by the red screamer.

They could only receive a gift from one girl.

Morten was surprised at worry on Kur's face. He seemed to actually like the girl, three.
But she had received gifts from several men and had all the choice.

The next issue came forth, as there was nothing to keep the flowers together with.
Morten was sure this might be a bit of a problem solving test.
Kur, being decked out with decorations of a true wealthy Sand,
just clicked one of his bracelets around his collection.

Teddy, who truthfully managed a very nice collection,
chewed a piece of string from his braided shirt.

Morten was still trying to decide what color flowers to go with,
assuming the expressive girl would reply with a gift.

He looked to his left, to see Agnus's solution.

He shouldn't have done that.
He almost choked trying to keep his laughter in.

Agnus had simply stuck his flowers in his beard and hair.
He had actually unbraided it to do so, as he'd been sticking with the braids for a but now.

Agnus looked around at Morten for a moment, who was snorting a wheezing, mock offended.

"You don't get the smarts of this! I'm making myself part of the set so they have to take me!"
He said with a super serious expression on his flowery face.

Morten hastily looked the other way, snickering.
Agnus did however make him realize something, Agnus was picking flowers in the color the dress the girl he had gifted the dagger had been wearing earlier.

How the hell was Agnus so good at this, because that must have been a hint.

Also, Agnus's hair flowers reminded Morten of the spring flower tradition Morten's clan had,
where they'd made flower crowns by peeling holes in stems and sticking stems from other flowers through it.

That might be a good solution for the binding issue.

~

The men were all stuck in a line,
three arm lengths apart in a beautiful green clearing,
with some kind of building, a circle of pillars with a fancy dome top.

They had a lot of damn buildings with no other purpose than being a pretty building.

All the man had stared at Agnus's flowered head and responded in an variety of ways.
But especially his region mate had looked daggers at him.
Morten wondered whether he was pissed at Agnus misrepresenting the plains,
or the fact it was probably going to attract a lot of attention from the five.

Morten frowned, what would that man do anyway, once he realized he was out?
Because Agnus had apparently made some kind of pact with this one girl?
He didn't seem like the kind of guy to let that go.