The wee birdies sing and the wildflowers spring

Яemi

you're every song that fills my mind

The alchemist listened with rapt attention. The way Eliza was speaking it did initially sound as if the lichen had some sort of higher sentience than he'd originally given it credit for. Would Safrin truly ask him for such a thing? To burn something that had a mind of its own?

However as the girl—woman—put her description in more plain terms, Remi nodded feeling relief course through him. As a lion/hawk and a man, Remi had never objected to killing things if it was for survival or food. Did a quest from a goddess fall into the same sort of morally approved category? He honestly had no idea, and was glad that he wasn't about to find out.

"Mmm." Remi hummed with a grin. In his hands a long stick suddenly appeared, the combination of creation and earth magic being able to do wonderful things he'd recently learned. Dipping it into the water, indeed the lichen seemed to slip up the stick even as he swirled it around in the water. With a youthful look of surprise on his face, he flashed a smile towards Eliza as he pulled the stick back out, now bright red with lichen.

"I suppose that is why I was told to burn it." Remi mused, setting it down on the bank and indeed taking out flint and gathering some dry grasses to do just that.

"What did you mean before? When you said I would have to learn how to speak with the fae? It seems as though we are doing alright now? Or...am I missing something obvious?" He asked of the winged woman just as flames began to lick along the lichen, darkening the bright red to a more somber maroon.

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Eliza

When Remi flashed his smile at her with the lichen creeping up the stick, Eliza couldn’t help but return one of her own. Then he mentioned he was told to burn it, and that sparked a new curiosity in her mind. Who was telling him to burn the lichen? What purpose was there in that?

She flitted back to the shore, landing easily and folding her wings against her back easily. Her golden-toned eyes watched the flames darken the lichen, and she really couldn’t help the wonder that was capturing her mind.

Then came his question, and with it, a slightly mischievous glint to her gaze.

“Obvious perhaps to some, completely unknown to others,” she said with a grin, her gaze sparking and meeting his.

Once again, she opted to just help him out, rather than dance around it. It wouldn’t be easy to dance around the second part of his question anyway, so it wasn’t really worth the effort to try.

“Fae can’t lie,” she said, accompanied by a shrug. “Because of that, we are...good with words. Find loopholes where there shouldn’t be any, sometimes purposely mislead just because a statement or question wasn’t specific enough.” She bit the tip of her thumb with a shiny smile. “Watch. Ask me anything! Well, not anything. Preferably something that isn’t a yes or no answer.” An excited vibration lifted her wings again, awaiting his response.

Яemi

you're every song that fills my mind

"They can't—" He murmured almost dreamily with confusion, his eyebrows coming together as his nose crinkled with amusement. Listening, his mind tried to replay some of the things he'd asked her, now focusing intently on how she'd answered. What she'd said, what she hadn't said, and how he'd interpreted what he'd heard.

Or thought he heard.

"Alright..." He said, eyes narrowed playfully as he looked her up and down for a moment. "How old are you?" Head tilted in a decidedly avian fashion, he thought his question shouldn't be the type of thing she could easily evade.

But then again Remi wasn't good with language as it was.

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Eliza

Eliza grinned as she watched Remi backtrack through their conversation, and she wondered just how much and what he was picking up from it. The Fae took her lip between her teeth when the man agreed to the little display of her ability.

When he asked the question, she suddenly regretted not setting stricter guidelines. However, she refused to be bested. Was it pride? Maybe. Ego? Likely. Simple want to prove that she could do it? Perhaps. No, it was all three.

Drawing her lips into a tight line, Eliza let the corners turn upward. “Older than you are,” she said. “Younger than most of the forest. Likely older than half of your entire lifespan, if my memory of your people serves me correctly.” She quirked a brow with a slightly arrogant grin. “If you would like the technical answer, you could ask, ‘how old are you numerically?’ But then, I could tell you that I am  aged 18,805 days and…” She put her hand up to measure the sun’s position, before looking back at Remi. “...almost five hours. But if you wanted me to not be able to dance around the question or complicate the answer, you could ask, ‘how many years have you been alive?’ Then, I would tell you fifty-one.”

Finally satisfied with herself, Eliza’s wings relaxed again and she bit the tip of her tongue in a shining smile to see Remi’s reaction. “It’s all in the wording.”

Яemi

you're every song that fills my mind

As Eliza spoke, a befuddled but wildly impressed smile pressed out, causing his cheeks to round and his dimples to deepen. He couldn't help the almost chirpy-sort of bouyant laugh as she outlined all the different ways she could have answered his question. Eventually though, as she narrowed it all down and answered, he raised a brow and merely sat there with a pleasantly surprised expression on his face.

"I think that is one of the most impressive things I have ever seen." He said with a laugh finally, shaking his head with a bemused grin. "And might I say you look amazing for 51." Remi added with a wink. " Does that mean...do the fae live longer than we do?"

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Eliza

The Fae pressed her lips together and scrunched her nose slightly in a smile she tried and failed horribly to hide. To make matters worse (or maybe better?), he winked at her, drawing a hint of red to her cheeks.

“Yes,” she answered with a small nod of confirmation. “Well, I suppose so?” Her eyes narrowed at him, brows drawing closer together. “How old can your people live to be?”

It wasn’t exactly as though she was overly familiar with people like Remi, but she was pretty sure that the Fae were longest living people. At least that she knew of. They weren’t the most social race, so she didn’t have too much to base that assumption on.

Яemi

you're every song that fills my mind

With a smile meant to put Eliza at ease, Remi shrugged. "Well, to be around...80 or so?" He said, but didn't seem entirely convinced of this number himself. "But then again, where I come from there was constant fighting and so many died quite young. I could be off entirely. Though were you one of us, I think I would put you at around my age. By the time I am 50, should I live that long, I am sure I will have more wrinkles than the water has ripples." He added with a boyish laugh.

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Eliza

The Fae’s eyes went wide, and she leaned forward suddenly. “You people are so young!” She said in disbelief. If she only lived to eighty, that would mean she was already a decade past half of her life. What a disturbing thought that was…

Eliza giggled lightly when he commented about having wrinkles. It was hard to picture such a youthful face aging as he described. “Why did your people fight?” She asked him with a tilted of her head. It wasn’t like the Fae were strangers to violence, but was it for the same reasons that his people fought? She wondered just how alike her people were with his.

Яemi

you're every song that fills my mind

Remi snorted a laugh, unable to help it. "I suppose that makes me practically a baby to you, then." He said with a cheeky grin, laughter pulling at the corners of his lips until his face was alight with amusement.

Pulling his knees into a crossed-leg position, the alchemist conjured a feather between his fingers and twirled it gently. "A lot of reasons, actually. I never quite understood them. I was a commoner and so...ahh...not all that involved, in the fighting itself, or the deciding about what to fight over." He said with a shrug. "There was a war, between our people and another group I think...though for all the time that I was building weapons and heard of attacks, I never actually saw a single attacker..." Biting the inside of his lip, Remi gave a rueful sort of chuckle.

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