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'Perfume!' Nephrite's eyes widened with surprise. 'Does that mean you can smell things?' She had always thought she was the only fiend with that ability.

"That does sound incredibly familiar," Amon chuckled. It was quite comforting to hear other guardians seemed to suffer the exact same kind of problems he had to deal with. Though he very much doubted he'd ever spot a frost pixie in his home. Not with him and all the salamanders around. "They are quite the pest. And that pixie dust gets everywhere. Worse than cat hair. It even ended up in my coffee."

He noticed Nephrite had already piled a number of items onto her arms, and quickly picked up a basket to collect them from her before any could be spirited away into those wide sleeves of hers.

"Putting some cookies and milk out for them helps keeping their mischief at bay," he said. "Athan's advice. It works. Mostly." He inspected the items Nephrite had dropped into the basket before she'd zipped off for more, and sneakily put some of them back on their displays.

Nephrite frowned a little at Nell's words. She'd always thought her sense of smell was something special amongst her kind. But! At least here sense of smell was better than Nell's?

'True,' she agreed. 'I know a shop which has very nice essential oils and incense—' She glanced back over her shoulder at her guardian, but he was already shaking his head. 'Tsk,' she made, and sent him the telepathic equivalent of a pout.

Amon looked at Triv's twitching ear with a slightly puzzled look, and then laughed. "I'm sorry, that was a poor choice of words—I meant no offense. See, I had a co-worker once who used to own two cats, and I swear, every time I visited her . . ." He rolled his eyes. White cats even, and it had been at a time when he'd still mostly worn black.

He quickly strode towards Nephrite, and removed the crystal goblet from her hands. "You already got one of these," he said sternly, and put the vessel back to where she had been taking it. "In the second bathroom. As a candle holder." He paled a little at the number on the price tag—had they carved that thing carved from a diamond, or what?

'Oh,' Nephrite said, and blinked. 'Okay.'

Nephrite tilted her head, a bit thrown off in her shopping spree by the innocent question. She didn't really do anything in particular. Not like her guardian, at least, who went to 'work'. When he wasn't busy getting almost killed yet again by nymphs-slash-mermaids-slash-demons-slash-fae creatures in general.

But what did she do? Not much really, she realized. 'I garden,' she said eventually. 'I have my own little greenhouse where I grow exotic plants. I know a lot about plants and their uses. For medicine . . . tea . . . incense . . . essential oils . . . I do make my own incense sticks.' She leaned closer to her new friend, directing her thoughts to her alone, so Amon wouldn't overhear. 'If you ever want to go out on your own, I know a tea which can send your guardian to sleep . . .' she said slyly.

'I also design my own clothes.' she pulled back a little, and draped Nell's "shawl" in a way that was more pleasing to her eyes. The fabric was too stiff, she thought, silk would be a far better choice. Still, it was pretty, and the color suited her.

"They do. Usually their items are worth the price though." Amon eyed the goblets once more. The price tag was hefty, but the craftsmanship was exquisite, so they might actually be worth it. However, they did definitely not belong into a child's hands, and they were looking too gaudy to suit his own taste.

"Same here. Plus, I used to have to move around a lot, so I tend to take a minimalistic approach." The parts of the house that were his still looked as if he'd moved in only recently. Only the extensive work done in the gardens betrayed how long he'd actually lived there—longer than in any other place before. But he still just couldn't shake the sense that—as soon as he'd decide to buy something nice, something to make it home—he'd jinx it and have to move out again.

Triv's comment interrupted his train of thoughts and he turned to gaze with a look of suspicion at he girls who were putting their heads together over something. "In Nephrite's case it tends to be, unfortunately, very very true . . ."

Nephrite tilted her head once more with a faint jingle of the delicate charms in her bun. Making her own cosmetics was something she'd never even considered. She just went and bought those. Or simply took then, when she'd ran out of her allowance and Amon wasn't around to pay for them.

'I don't know,' she said, glancing at Trivii over her shoulder. 'I guess I could make kohl for you? Or prepare some henna for'—she paused to draw an invisible pattern on the back of her hand, to indicate what it was she meant—'mehndi. It would suit you.'

Nephrite's eyes widened. Now there was finally some proper use for all that annoying pixie dust! 'Pigment was and is often made from gemstones,' the young fiend confirmed and nodded slowly. 'I think I may have something on the topic. It's just . . .' She paused to briefly rest her hand on her chest, where her soul-stone lay hidden underneath her silken garments. 'I don't really like the idea of crushing gems,' she admitted sheepishly. 'It's creepy in a way? And I like them much better as jewelry.' Maybe if she got some straight from Athan, just to make extra sure she wasn't going to grind up some imprisoned soul by accident . . .

"Probably just girl talk," Amon mused. "At least I hope so." Most of the fiends they'd come across had been male, he realized, and Nephrite didn't do so well with the 'boys'. To see her chat with little Carnelian like that almost made her appear . . . normal.

"I'd definitely love to take you up on it," Amon nodded. "Who knows, it might even temporarily get rid of your frost pixie pest," he smirked, but did not elaborate as to how and why. "And I'd like to return the invitation."

'Gem chips.' Nephrite nodded. 'That should be safe. There's plenty in Twilight Design's storage. The suppliers add them as freebies to their shipments all the time.' Why hadn't she thought of that?

She frowned when Nell discarded the vases she didn't want on a random shelf, and quickly put them back to where they belonged and—after a small pause—compulsively arranged them by color. She got done just in time before Nell could drag her her off to another part of the store. My, someone was being enthusiastic, wasn't she? She laughed, her colorful tail twirling and fluttering as she moved, like a silken banner in a breeze.

'How about one of those bowls?' she suggested and pointed.

Amon accepted the card and studied it carefully before he put it away in his wallet and produced one of his own cards—one of those with his private information, not the job one.

Eh, he thought. I shouldn't have brought this up. To talk about his element still was something that made him feel deeply uncomfortable.

"Because," he said slowly, "fire and ice are polar opposites." He looked about to make sure the shop staff was busy elsewhere and did not pay attention him before he reached out towards one of the many burning candles. He gently (and very very carefully) coaxed its flame to sit upon his dark palm. "And I happen to have— be a pretty strong fire elemental." He closed his hand over the flame to extinguish it. "Or so I am told. With the damage I've managed to do, I don't doubt it." He gave a nervous laugh. "Chance is, because I am bigger and stronger than them, those pixies will flee the house while I'm around." Or they might call to arms to force him out.

Nephrite shook her head. 'I don't think they will mind. Miranda takes stuff home all the time.' Never mind Miranda actually worked at Twilight Designs.

She ran her fingers along the rim of one of the bowls. 'I use them for small stuff. To collect earrings and the like, or single eye shadows. I actually like the wooden ones.' She pointed once more.

Amon's brows shot up. Never, not ever, had someone referred to his ability as being 'amazing'. "I don't have the slightest clue how it works," he admitted and glanced over his shoulder once more to ascertain the shop staff hadn't noticed anything—and also to make sure the other candle flames behaved and stayed where they were. The last thing he needed was to accidentally set yet another place on fire because he'd wanted to show off. "And I've only recently started to learn how to control it," he admitted.

He smirked a little when Trivii curiously examined his hand in a cat-like manner, even sniffed it. There was nothing out of the ordinary about his hand, except that his skin seemed warmer than an average human's, almost as if he was running a fever. "Please don't," he said with a chuckle, "this is one of the few shops Nephrite hasn't get us banned from and . . . my employer shops here. I'd rather not be the cause of anything that would piss her off. I really shouldn't have shown off like that, not inside." He shifted uneasily, before he glanced up at the lights above. "Something with electricity?" he guessed.

'I have one just like this one,' Nephrite said and lifted up the wooden bowl she had pointed out previously. 'I like it. It doesn't break when you drop it, and the things you toss in there wont scratch.' She looked at her guardian over her shoulder with a mischievous glint in her eyes and wondered if she should demonstrate. Eventually she decided against it. They had already gotten kicked out of one shop today, and she knew it was unwise to overdo it. Plus, this shop was actually one she liked to come back to.

'That tray is very nice,' she agreed. 'You could use it to carry things into the bathroom. Or put small bowls on it, or candles, if Trivii allows.' There'd been endless discussions about open fire in their household. 'Or you could use it to collect your bangles.' She looked about for something else to store those—she almost invariably wore long fluttering sleeves, so she owned only very few bangles and bracelets herself. Hair ornaments and earrings were her 'thing'.

"You and I both," Amon said with a roll of his eyes and offered his hand for a high-five. It was nice to meet someone with a set of problems so similar to his own. "I mean, I'm definitely no stranger to learning things late in life . . . But with practicing the alphabet at least there's no collateral damage.." He gave a chuckle, but his amusement lasted only for a moment before he grew serious again. People had gotten seriously, seriously hurt. Nephrite had the scars to show for what happened when his ability got out of control.