Tarwantrad walked through her dungeon with heavy steps, trying to keep her face as impassive as possible. A girl the size of a hand zipped around her face, a set of transparent butterfly wings propelling her about. She giggled as she flew up to Tarwantrad and tried to poke her cheek.
“Aw, why the long face, Tarwy? Smile, today’s a great day!”
Tarwantrad waved her away.
“That would depend entirely on you behaving, Princess Finnakynne.”
Princess Finnakynne rolled her eyes.
“Come on, Tarwy, why so formal? We’re friends, aren’t we?”
Tarwantrad allowed herself a small smirk.
“Because you dislike it.”
The pixie cross her arms and huffed. But then, she began to smirk once more.
Finnakynne was zipping around the bee army at this point though. Her eyes lit up as she approached one of the bumblebee soldiers and dove towards her, landing on her back.
The bumblebee buzzed her wings and the nearby soldiers moved to assist at first, but stopped as they realized Finnakynne wasn’t attacking. The bumblebee soldier just swayed about as Finnakynne rolled around on her back.
Belissar wasn’t sure how to respond. He glanced at Tarwantrad. The elf just shook her head.
“Don’t let your guard down.”
Finnakynne popped her head up out of the bumblebee’s hair.
“How rude! Can’t a girl just enjoy some fluff? I mean, just look at her! Isn’t she just the goodest, fluffiest bumblebee! Yes she is!”
The bumblebee soldier grew increasingly perplexed as the pixie played with her hair, but her mana wasn’t indicating distress or discomfort so Belissar let them be. He did make sure to extend his mana towards the bumblebee and asked her to let him know if she wanted help. The bumblebee just began zipping happy circles about, causing Finnakynne to laugh as she gripped onto the soldier’s hair.
Eventually, Finnakynne patted the side of the bumblebee and then pointed to Belissar. The bumblebee soldier flew up to him and Finnakynne stood up, patted her dress, and placed her fists on her hips.
“Now then, let’s get to business. You have bees, honeybees if I’m not mistaken, right Belly? Or should I say Beely? So, Beely…”
She took off from the bumblebee and flew up as close to Belissar’s face as she could get before Niobee began buzzying, leaned forward, and grinned.
“That means you have honey, right?”
Somehow, Belissar did not find that grin as friendly as her first. Fortunately, he had prepared for this situation, so he reached into a pouch on his belt and pulled out a small chunk of honeycomb.
“I do. Would you like a taste of this chunk here?”
Finnakynne immediately dove towards it.
She swiped her hand across the chunk and put it directly into her mouth. Her eyes immediately went wide and she dropped from the air. She began groaning even as she fell to the ground. Belissar’s eyes went wide.
He glanced over at Tarwantrad.
“Is she ok?! I thought you said she liked honey!”
He found Tarwantrad blinking with wide eyes and a light flush.
“She’s…fine. I think.”
Belissar glanced down at the groaning pixie and frowned. Tarwantrad had said to give her the sweetest honey he had…but maybe using swirled honey had been a mistake? He wasn’t completely sure exactly what it could do, after all.
As for the pixie, Finnakynne…didn’t look fine to him, but if Tarwantrad said so then what else could he do. He asked the Second of the Sixth to bring up some medicinal workers just in case. Fortunately, though, Finnakynne stopped groaning before Belissar felt the need to send in the workers. She zipped back up to right in front of his face and glared at him.
“What in all that is fair and foul was that?!”
Finnakynne puffed her cheeks and growled.
“That…that wasn’t honey! That was like…a deadly, concentrated bomb of sweetness! How did you make the mana sweet?! How did you make me taste sugar in my toes? What did you even do to make something that delicious?!”
Belissar took a step back.
“It was swirled honey? It’s…new.”
Finnakynne flew forward to stay in his face.
“Explain. You can’t mean you just stirred it a bit!”
Belissar glanced at Tarwantrad. She just made a helpless smile.
“She won’t let this go, Belissar. I must admit, I’m curious as well. I knew your honey was good but I didn’t expect a reaction like...that.”
Belissar instead sent a message to the First of the Fifth, asking if it would be ok to explain what she does. She, of course, said “whatever King chooses!”
“If I understand correctly, the bees swirl the mana, which allows for greater mana density? I…think that also helps spread the taste around when you eat it?”
Finnakynne held her chin and nodded.
“I see, yes, I can see that now. They’ve crystallized mana formations within the honey itself, improving its capacity for sweetness and amplifying the sweetness when you absorb the mana from it…especially if you’re really good at absorbing mana like us. Brilliant, absolutely brilliant! With this, your plan to bribe mommy dearest might actually have a chance!”
She glanced over her shoulder and smirked at Tarwantrad while the elf winced.
“Oh, don’t look so surprised, Tarwy. We pixies love gossip, you know, so you didn’t think we would miss old Uhgy tossing out his own son and going on big rants on the danger of humans, did you? And then, immediately afterwards, you come to me, offering to introduce me to your own personal pet human, when previously you were gushing about him to every master in the Circle but me? Come on, Tarwy, you and Neny couldn’t have made it any more obvious if you had tried to. And what exactly would a bee dungeon master use to try and lure the pixies, hm? To sweeten the deal? Oh, what a mystery, just what could it…bee?”