#rivervale_lodge

"Dunno. School is gonna be weird, being back..."

"Yeah. Got notes for Spanish. If you want."

"Oh, good! Thank you!"

"Anytime."

"There's sandwich fixings..."

Adam pauses.

"I'm good."

"...Oh." She hesitates, then closes the fridge. She doesn't make any food, but does down her water.

"Nah. it's cool. Look.... I get it."

"Get what?"

"You've got your .....stuff. So. Cool."

"We had to go...."

"And even enchanted, it wouldn't have been safe for you..."

"Yeah."

"If we quest outside of the Dreaming, though..."

"Yeah. Cool."

"...right."

----------

Later, Dagmar is washing dishes.

Kerri is drying and putting away.

"Thanks." She passes a plate.

"No, thank you." She smiles, taking the plate. "So, are you ready for Pennons?"

"I think so! It'll be different I think. Last year was pretty magical, I don't think that'll happen again..."

"But, well, I will be fighting with knights, Chief says. Other knights, more experienced ones."

"You fought very well last year...I'm sure you'll do perfectly well. You might not win, but you'll show well."

She nods. "I don't expect to win, yeah. But I want to do well enough."

"I figure last year, they didn't know what I could do and just figured I was a fledge."

"You and the rest of the wilders absolutely surprised everybody. This time...they've got a better idea. You have a reputation now. The Firebird Jouster."

"Yeah, no surprises. Plus... expectations."

"But the thanks was for earlier."

"Earlier? You mean...with Adam?"

"Yeah."

"He was in a real good mood after that."

"Well, that's good."

"Yeah." A pause. "He's hard."

"He's definitely giving you a challenge. But I do think I've never seen him smile quite so much before."

"Agreed."

"Now, you may need to keep an eye on him with the cantrips. He'll want to practice, which is fine, but he might wear himself out."

"Yeah, probably."

Pause. "Do you think he'd take it real bad if I broke up with him?"

She blinks. "I didn't realize you were going out. I thought it was just one date."

"I don't know?"

"Well...why are you thinking about breaking up with him?"

She frowns. "He's.... he's nice with me, usually."

"But, like..."

"Like he's... he's hard."

"I don't like it when he... he acts the way he does..."

"Hm." Kerri puts away the last of the dishes, thinking.

"I can't say I'm a fan of it either. You know, you'd still be responsible for training him, unless you asked the Chief to assign somebody else to the task."

She nods. "Yeah..." A frown.