Clover breathed a sigh of relief as she spotted Aspen waiting for them at the edge of the mushroom mountain forest.
She didn’t consider herself ready to navigate the forest without a guide; she assumed Basil felt the same way.

The trip felt like a light stroll both ways; neither druid worked up even a drop of sweat, and yet Clover returned feeling exhausted.

“Welcome back,” Aspen greeted them both with a pleased smile.
“Have you taken care of your tasks successfully?”

Both junior druids nodded.
“Yes, we got through everything on the list,” she explained wearily. “We spoke to someone from the alchemists’ guild and had them ask around, but nobody seems to know anything about the chemicals.”

Aspen’s expression hardened nearly imperceptibly before he nodded.
“I see.”

For a moment he was silent before shaking his head.
“Good work, both of you,” he breathed.
“We’ll continue your training soon,” he explained, “but first, I think you both earned some rest.”

As Aspen escorted them back to the grange through the lush underbrush, he couldn’t help but notice the unusual silence.
The blotchy noise of flickering shade projected by the rustling canopy scrolled over them as they walked.

“Did you have any trouble in the town?” Aspen asked beneath the psithurism of the leaves above.

“Not really,” Clover shrugged off his concern.
“Clover was pretty persuasive,” Basil recalled, indirectly corroborating her utopic report.

Back at the henge, Clover slept like one of the rocks.
When Aspen brought her to the druids’ sparsely used sleeping area, she collapsed face-first onto the giant blooming flower.

As soon as she lay down, the flower sealed back up – which Clover knew better than to question – as she buried her face in the fluffy sea of yellow anthers.

After a long rest, Clover opened her eyes to the dim red glow of whittled light.
She could see the fractal roads and highways creeping through her xylem walls.

She began to stretch purely out of habit.
No matter what kind of gymnastics she attempted - short of trying to dislocate her arm – Clover couldn’t coax a single crock of pop from her overzealous meatsuit.

As the thought of having to figure a way out crossed Clover’s mind, the flower bloomed cooperatively.

The grange was as empty as Clover got used to it being, but some of the druids present were different.
It was like seeing different shifts taking breaks at different times.

She stood up carefully so as not to damage her surprisingly unfazed bedding before hopping down to the packed dirt below.

There was no sign of Basil or Aspen.
The flower beside her was still closed; she assumed it was Basil’s.

Clover took a deep breath and began to aimlessly peruse the moody hideout with the confidence of triplets in a trench coat.

“Hey! Clover! Over here!” Clover heard a familiar woman’s voice call out.
When she spun around, Clover saw Heather at the buffet.

“Hey,” Clover greeted the slightly older woman sheepishly.
“This is how elves must feel,” she thought beneath an awkward smile.
“I have no idea if I should talk to her like an old lady or a friend from the gui-… or like a friend from home…”

“How did you like the beds?” Heather asked, plucking the sweetest-looking berries from a bowl of mixed fruits like a picky bird.

“They’re nice,” she answered honestly. “I, uh… like how they close,” she added.

Heather laughed. “Oh, just you wait till you learn how to grow your own one anywhere you want,” she said tantalisingly.

Clover’s eyes widened in sudden interest. “I’ll be able to do that?” she asked incredulously. “That won’t upset some… order of stuff… or something in the kingdom of nature?”

Heather erupted into a second, louder fit of laughter.
When she reined in her outburst, the druid shook her head in preparation to once again form sentences out of more than just vowels.
“No, no, you’ll learn all about that soon, I’m sure.”

“What kind of things are you and Basil doing now anyway?” she casually asked.

“Um… He showed Basil how to stop being a fish, I think…” she answered under her breath.
“And then we went to town to talk to run some errands…”

“Oh?” Heather chirped curiously, “You’re new; I bet you liked being ‘back in civilisation’ for a bit.” She grinned.
It was an infectious expression.

“Well… same old but nothing new…” she sighed, confusing Heather’s brows into bumping head.

After a while, she gave up on dissecting the nonsense remark and cocked her head to the side slightly.

“Is everything alright?” Heather asked more softly.

Clover blinked in surprise, caught off guard by the sudden question.
“Um, sure…” She nodded mechanically. “Just… I’ve been rolling with the punches so long my head’s starting to spin…”

Heather nodded with an understanding look and a compassionate smile.
“You just have to keep trying to make sense of it - keep asking questions.”
“Eventually, it will all click,” she said, plucking a wrinkled violet cluster of juicy cells from a dark blue vine.

All the food was served in hewn baskets or wooden bowls.

“Have a berry,” she said, tossing a small red orb her way.

Clover caught it with both hands but successfully refrained from crushing it.
She wasn’t hungry, but she felt like she should be by now, so she cautiously put the berry in her mouth.

As she bit into it, a strong, aromatic - almost perfumy – flavour erupted in her mouth.
The seeds were tiny, the insides pure sweetness, and the skin soft enough to chew without sticking to her teeth.
“That tasted amazing…!” Her eyes lit up as she reached for a smooth, shiny, translucent orange fruit the size and shape of a cherry tomato.

“I know. Every job has its perks, right?” She winked and eagerly watched Clover take a bite of the amber fruit.

As Clover’s teeth sank into the gelatinous flesh, she found the texture confusing - almost waxy - but distinctly gel-like even in how it sagged instead of spilling out.
It tasted warm, rooty, maybe red-orange. It didn’t taste like something that should be eaten on its own by anyone with a full set of adult teeth.

“I hate those,” Heather remarked, seeing Clover’s mouth and cheeks awkwardly negotiate around the oozing mass within.

Clover nodded dumbly and spent the next few seconds trying to swallow the thick mass.
Once her mouth was clear, she took a deep breath.
“Do we maybe have anything savoury?”

“Well, if you want meat, you can cull, buy, or catch some – but there isn’t usually any just lying around,” she explained patiently.
“But there’s usually some vegetables or mushrooms to pick from.”

Clover nodded understandingly and reached for a carrot.
As she took a bite, she found herself chewing an exceptionally carroty carrot.
It was sweeter and juicier than the kind Clover was used to, but it was still only a carrot, no matter what magic the druids used to acquire it.

Still, Clover chewed on it to clear her mouth of any lingering gel.
“Have you seen Aspen around anywhere?”

Heather nodded, her lips now stained red.
“He went out into the forest pretty much as soon as you fell asleep,” she explained. “He’ll be back to boss you and Basil around soon, don’t worry,” she smirked teasingly.

“He’s nice, but he definitely feels… old and wise… if you know what I mean?”

Heather smiled and nodded.
“Elves,” she shrugged. “They just can’t decide whether sagely wisdom comes in the form of manic eccentricity or stoic serenity,” she mused and took Clover by the hand.

“Come, I’ll show you around the place in more detail,” she explained. “Don’t hesitate to ask any question you might have, alright?”

“I won’t.” Clover smiled and hesitantly followed Heather outside.

Across the forest, the alchemist stirred a bright orange blend of hormones and nutrients with a glass stir rod.
Occasionally I gently clinked off the walls of the crusty beaker.

In the days since they rediscovered the cave, the warlock was made to mount half a dozen lanterns and furnish half the cave into a laboratory while converting the remainder into pens.

He swept the bare rock below their feet as the alchemist spilt his ready mixture into a bucket of minced offal.
Using his bare fist, the alchemist churned the mixture into a homogeneous slop before shaking the excess ooze dripping from his arm onto the stone below, much to the warlock’s quiet chagrin.

The crack of heavy steel chains being pulled taut reverberated through the cave, followed shortly by a shrill roar.

“One minute, you overfed crow!” Victor – the alchemist – shouted, only leading to a louder, angrier fit from the unlit pens.

He shoved the bucket into the warlock’s arms and turned to wash his hands.
“Go feed the damn beast…” he growled as he walked away.
“The sooner it grows, the better.”