"See, I told you he'd have food ready." Amelia ruffles Apricot's hair when they join us just after I got everything plated up.

"Hey, there. I missed you two." I pull them both in for hugs and kisses, not caring one whit for all the people watching. "How were your folks? Are you two hungry? I made chicken and there's chocolate mousse for dessert." Not the best pairing, but chocolate's chocolate.

"Talk later, food now." Apricot is clearly starving, so I set out some of the food I had saved for her and Amelia. "Mmm, what is the crust on this?" I just grin, she was so taken by the hummus crust on the 'chicken' that she didn't even notice what the meat really was.

"So, I see you got the spell to work." Amelia has a laugh for Fawne and Stan, who are both trying to eat with baby-sized hands. "Oh, this is good."

"Yeah, and the salamanders are all fine." I say for Apricot's benefit while trying to keep my expression under control. Not that anyone else is bothering to hide their smirks. "The crust is made from chickpeas, sesame seeds, oil, garlic, and lemon juice. It's called hummus." I materialize one of the many, many bowls I made after everyone ate my first batch.

"Okay, what's up with all the smiles?" Amelia looks around warily. "I thought they were just because of the kiss, but everyone is acting like they're in on a joke and are just waiting for us to find out."

"Really?" I take a bite of my 'chicken' to hide my smile. "I wonder why."

"What is it?" She glares at me.

"You tell me." I make a point out of cutting my tofu into bite-sized pieces. I pressed it into a chicken breast shape before cooking and even used a little plant shaping to make it feel that much more like the real thing.

"You didn't feed us salamander or something like that?" She inspects her meal carefully as several people start giggling.

"No." I start laughing too. "But, Granville was oddly interested in the kidney I removed from one of them."

"Nnh, poor little lizard." Apricot whimpers, but doesn't stop eating.

"I told you they're fine." I stretch my vine out to stroke her back. "I wasn't happy about hurting them either, but look what came out of it." Stan and Fawne wave their baby-hands at the pixie making her laugh.

"Then would you please tell me what everyone is so amused about?" Amelia's hand joins my vine on Apricot's back.

"This." I hold up a palmful of soybeans. "Is the 'meat' that you're eating right now. Turns out that Fawne doesn't like the fishy taste of the spirulina in the smoothies, so I had to get a bit creative. One thing led to the next, and well, this was the result."

"No way!" Apricot's eyes start glowing. "It's got your plant magic all over it. But... this is chicken."

"Heh. I guess not even a pixie's senses are infallible." I smirk over at her. "I used real chicken broth for the flavor, and a bit of plant-shaping to get the texture right." I recreate the process from scratch right in front of her eyes.

"Even without the added magic." Fawne interjects. "It's still close enough to meat that you might just think that it was something that you hadn't eaten before. And, just wait until you try the mousse he made for dessert."

...

After lunch, I went outside to soak up some sun while working out the enchantments needed for the elevator.

"Would you remind me later to go through the children's books in my head and copy out any that would be good for the daycare?" I ask Amelia as we pass through it to the south side of the building. "And, I seem to recall there being quite a few more plush toys in here yesterday."

"I have no idea what you mean." Apricot says with the worst poker face ever.

"Uh-huh." I just roll my eyes and start replacing the stolen stuffed animals, which Apricot immediately dives into. "So, how is your family doing?" I asked Amelia earlier, but she got distracted by lunch.

"Great. Business is booming, a little too booming actually, and all thanks to you." She laughs. "Word got around that we're together, so now my parents have more business than they can handle."

"Tch." I shake my head at the silliness of people. "Whatever. As long as they're happy." I put it out of my mind. "Mnh, I wish I had some coconuts, I really want to hang one of those hammocks up between a couple of palm trees." I don't let that lack stop me though, and just make some fake palms instead.

"I thought you were going to work." Amelia teases when I string up a hammock between the fake trees.

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"I am working." I retort and sit down on the hammock, using it like a swing. "I just need the proper environment to work in. That and the playground still needs to be built, so 'two birds, one stone'. Now, we need some nice, soft sand for them to play in." Amelia jumps when the ground starts rippling as I separate out everything that isn't pure silica from the top thirty centimeters.

"Hey, warn a girl first." She hops up next to me.

"Sorry." I kiss her on the cheek to apologize.

More silica is added to the expanding sandpit to replace the volume lost when I pull everything I don't want into storage. The seashell palace then forms in the middle with a ring of smaller buildings around it.

Two of those buildings are currently beset by giant octopodes. Their bodies are sunk mostly under the sand, and their heads look like wire-frame models to let the kids climb in and on them. Several of their limbs stick up out of the sand to form or hold playground staples like slides, swing-sets, and climbing ropes.

"Well, I know where to look for Apricot if we ever lose her." Amelia laughs as I add several more hammocks and fake palm trees around the outside as a finishing touch. "It's just missing one thing." She mixes some salt into water and disperses it into a light mist, kept constantly flowing around the playground.

"Nice." I give her another kiss for the perfect addition and add a speaker playing some beach sounds from my [Ambiance] playlist. "Now, no coconut and no pineapple means no pina colada, and I would love to have some agave to make some tequila for margaritas, but that's also a no-go. So, mai tais? Enh, maybe just a daiquiri. I don't feel like brewing up anything right now, and I don't have any bitter oranges for the liqueur either."

"Should you start drinking if you're going to be enchanting?" She sounds a little worried, but only a little. I may not be able to put the drinks away like her friend, Lianna, but I'm no lightweight either.

"Probably not." I admit with a tired sigh. "But, people have been staring at me ever since I started re-growing limbs, so I'm going to say fuck it and have one anyway. Ooh, make some more of that carbon dioxide from last night and mix it into some water." I decide to make mojitos instead since I have my own seltzer producer sitting next to me.

"It's fizzy!" Amelia giggles as the bubbles start to escape from the water.

"Yes, it is." I laugh along with her and mix up a small pitcher of mojitos. "Sweetie, do you want one? The bubbles tickle your nose."

"Sure, but you have to fix up Myra and Willow's playground when we get home. Ooh, minty." She smiles after taking a sip. "And, make some room for me up there."

I lie back and my girls take up position on either side of me. The three of us just relax there for a moment, sipping on our fizzy drinks in the salty breeze.

"This is nice." I breathe out and finally let some of the tension from everyone's earlier gazes seep out of me. "And, since I have extra arms, I can hug you two and work at the same time."

"Just try not to blow us up." Amelia laughs softly and closes her eyes to rest against me while listening to the gentle lapping of waves on our little pretend beach.

...

"Uh, Sorrel?" Elise, her fellow healers, and the formerly maimed guards join us a while later. But, they just stop at the edge of the playground and stare.

"Over here." I wave a vine to draw her attention, my arms being occupied with holding Apricot and Amelia right now. "But, keep it down, the girls are napping." I'd like to be too, but there's still a lot of work to be done.

I took care of the enchantments for the elevator first and foremost. With almost no explosions. All it took was a bit of linear motion magic to move the lever, and several more spark generators to activate and deactivate it. I still need to install everything along with some call buttons and hire an operator. But, that's one thing off my list.

"Sorry for bothering you." She apologizes. "But, everyone's fingers and toes have finished growing, we were just hoping that you would give them a last check before we leave."

"Of course." I've been keeping a loose eye on all of our patients, but mostly just to make sure they have enough to eat. "...Everyone looks good. You'll all need to keep working the fingers to build up strength, but that shouldn't be too hard. Just listen to your healers, and don't try to do too much at once."

The guards all bow to me in time with each other and, even with a couple drinks in me, I still can't stand the looks they send my way. But, I just nod back, knowing that I need to get used to this crap sooner or later.

"Thank you, Sorrel." Elise packs a lot of meaning into those three words. "We'll leave you to your little seaside vacation now." She adds with a smirk.

"Heh. Too bad it's a working vacation." I chuff out a laugh and return to working on the rest of the building infrastructure.

This mostly just entails moving heat around and making more lights. A lot more lights. The place isn't that big as far as buildings go, but you never realize quite how many lights a building needs. Not until you're the one responsible for supplying them.

"I wish I could work like that." One of the guards comments under his breath.

"Same here." Another agrees. "But those extra arms are what really make me jealous." An odd glint fills his eye when he looks from his newly restored digit to my vines and back again.

"It wouldn't work." I tell him with an amused smile on my face. "Even if you found someone mad enough to actually try it, the limb would just hang there without a proper connection to the brain."

"..." He gulps at being caught out.

"If you really want another arm, you'd be better off trying to master the shapeshifting spell." I add with a soft laugh for his expression and the way his friends are grinning at him for getting caught out. "It's not easy, but that way creates a magical connection to the mind allowing you to control the extra limbs." Mini-me grows from the back of my wrist and waves to him.

"How?" Jana breathes out, and I sense all three healers start scanning me.

"It took a bit of practice." Mini-me smiles up at her. "Especially to divorce the movements from the rest of my body, but... well, let's just say that I was very motivated to have a pixie sized avatar." She blushes, but most of the guardsmen grin at my words.

"And, with that, we should take our leave." Martin shakes his head and begins to usher his apprentice away, only to stop after a single step. "Thank you, Sorrel. Not only for developing this spell but for sharing it with the three of us."

"Of course I shared it." I roll my eyes at him. "The last thing I need is more work; I'm just starting to make a dent in the mountain of stuff I need to do, as it is." The healer just shakes his head at me again and continues on his way.

***