Lunamor

I normally don’t eat breakfast at all, so technically no. TPBM can start a fire without a match or lighter.

Jenny knew that talking about Kylee made Edgar sad, and he had done a lot of that today. Perhaps splattering a dead rat could cheer him up again. Finding one could be difficult, though. She’d have to keep an eye out for one. ”What’s your favorite thing that you’ve made?”

“That all sounds very impressive! I like catapults. Launching rocks is fun. I’m not supposed to use the big one in the training grounds, though. I tried launching a dead rat to see how far it could get and it made a bit of a mess.” She smiled sheepishly. ”It made it pretty far. Impact was surprisingly splashy.”

They had something in common! Jenny didn’t typically share a lot of interests with people, so this was exciting. ”You’re probably much better at it than I am. What sort of stuff do you like to carve?” She peered at his Gift, wondering if it could turn into carving tools.

…you do realize that water is liquid, right? You can’t make a building block out of that. Locks help stop people from opening doors.

“I like painting. I’m not terribly great at it, but it’s fun. I’ve covered most of the walls inside of my cabin. I’ll have to show it to you sometime!” She added a final stroke to her carving, then sheathed her dagger. Jenny’s eyes had mostly returned to normal and her smile was now genuine.

Her grip on her dagger tightened until her knuckles were somehow even whiter. Jenny’s smile, however, didn’t falter. Her eyes, which had begun to gain life again, reverted back to being glassy. ”I don’t know a Johnathan. It does seem like a good animal name, though.”

Lead is perfectly light and rather upset by your rude claims about its weight. Penguins can’t fly.

Jenny nodded. ”Her name was Janice. She was sweet. Liked to be scratched behind her left ear. She died pretty young, though. Poor thing got hit by a car.” She shrugged. ”Sometimes that’s just how it goes.”

Ah. So the gift did understand language. Good thing she had thanked it! Jenny began adding a friend for the bird to her table carving. This one had parts of its ribcage exposed.

“Hmm.” Jenny held up her hands. Her skin looked pale and sickly as ever. Her nails were still painted black. She seemed to still have all ten fingers. ”No, I don’t think so. It’s just a cat. It didn’t bite me or anything.” She inspected her hands again. Yep, no bite marks.

Jenny stared at him, confused. ”What do you mean? It’s just a cat.” She thought for a moment. ”It’s ok if you’re scared of cats! They can scratch you up pretty badly.”

For a moment, Jenny said nothing. Jenny saw nothing. Jenny did nothing. Then Jenny quashed the begging voice. She opened her eyes and smiled widely. “It made a very cute cat!” Her eyes looked almost empty, as glassy as the dead bird’s. The tears still streaked down her face, but she wasn’t crying. Why would she cry? There was nothing sad for Jenny to remember.

Chuck Norris can unscramble an egg.

The Gift shifted into a small replica of a cat. It was a mangy thing, missing one eye and parts of its ears. The tail swooshed, all puffed up. She swore she could hear purring, although that might have been her imagination. ”Johnathan…” It had been forever since Jenny had last seen her beloved cat. He’d died of old age when she was young. She missed him so much. She’d tried to fix him, but… Remember, Jenny. You need to remember. Skeletal hands reached up from the dirt. Dragged her cat away. Her father told her no. Said he was old. Said she was going too far. The little girl cried. The little girl yelled. The little girl was angry. Remember her. A kind woman approached the little girl. She tried to speak. The little girl screamed. Remember. Jenny’s eyes opened wide and began to glisten with tears. “I didn’t- I-“ REMEMBER. Jenny shut her eyes tightly, sending the welled-up tears rolling down her cheeks.

Jenny carefully took the bird, then held it up in front of her face. She inspected the finer details, impressed. It was just as cute as she remembered. Ever so gently, she pet its head. The metal’s coolness felt exactly like that of a corpse. “It’s lovely! Thanks for showing me the bird again, Gift.” She wasn’t sure if it could understand language, but thanked it just in case.

Jenny gasped. Her face immediately brightened. ”That’s the bird I reanimated today!” With much difficulty, she restrained herself from trying to pet it. She didn’t want it to disappear again. “It’s so accurate…” She doubted that her carving was enough to allow for it to create such a spot-on replica. That meant it had to have read her mind. Either that, or Edgar had been spying on her.

Well shoot. That could explain some things. ”How do you know when someone appreciates it?” Jenny paused for a half second, then continued on. ”You don’t need to answer that. I’ve tried to read books that answer that question, but do a poor job of understanding them. People haven’t had much luck explaining it to me either, although they’re normally pretty angry when they do that.” She decided to attempt to change the subject. ”How’s being a Hephaestus kid?”

Antagonize him? ”What do you mean? He looked like he liked my bird art. And it’s rude not to wave at people. I think.” She tilted her head. ”Or is waving at people rude? Oh no. I’ve waved at so many people…”

Jenny didn’t jump when the Gift snapped at her. Instead, her fascination with it grew. Was it intelligent? It didn’t seem like that was an entirely wanted behavior. She barely registered Edgar’s next words. ”Hmm? Oh, ok.” Odd that Edgar was apologizing. She cheerfully waved at the guy anyways. She was pretty sure that it was rude to not wave at someone.

Eza made mental notes of the names Itsuki mentioned. Vinette, Itsuki’s girlfriend whom had apparently ditched him, and Chloris, the person sitting next to him. She crept forwards to stand next to Asylum, carefully avoiding the salt they had tossed onto the floor. Chloris’s eye covering thing looked even stranger up closer. ”It’s nice to meet you. How do you two know each other?” She echoed Chloris’s question back at the pair. Normally, she wouldn’t have asked. Eza didn’t particularly care about that sort of stuff and preferred to talk with strangers as little as possible. It would’ve felt weird to just stand there silently, though. Made her seem suspicious. @Stormlightsong @Koloss17 @Ravenclawjedi42

Jenny smiled at Edgars words, then smiled even more as his Gift morphed into a mesmerizing pattern. She wondered why that was what he apparently needed at the moment. Jenny carefully tapped it to see if that made it do anything interesting. Over Edgar’s shoulder, she noticed a kid at the other Hephaestus table looking at her, then down at the table’s new carving, then back at her. She must’ve appreciated her art! Jenny waved at her, grinning.

“Well… kind of.” She went back to carving the bird on the table. It was a decent rendition, although the head was backwards. A bit of bone stuck out of its neck. Jenny blew some wood dust off so she could see it better. ”I like my dad. He doesn’t talk to me that much, but he gave me a really nice gift. Necromancy is great too. It’s other people who don’t like him.” She scraped the dagger a little too hard against the wood, leaving a gash. ”Death makes most people uncomfortable. They know I’m the daughter of the god of the underworld, so I make them uncomfortable too.”

“You’re welcome! I’m not sure why you’re thanking me, though. You’ve been a nice person, and I like to sit with nice people.” Her smiling expression melted away, being replaced by a sad one. She set her dagger down and stared at her hands in her lap. ”There aren’t very many nice people here. Not nice to me, at least. I’m sure they’re kind to other people, though.” She watched a kid at the Athena table split his bread in half, handing it to his sister. Bad people didn’t share with others, so he probably wasn’t a cruel person. But he’d called Jenny a hag anyways.

ogidni, which cancelled out each