"on Alzi, you do it. You just o hold on with yht hand and reach forward. Ioelena will make sure I catch you," Shimmer shouts up to me.

  How did they vince me to e up here? I fly why would I ever be hanging on for dear life? If I fall, I'm likely going down back first, so I 't even use my wings to save me. Stupid wives trying to get me hurt!

  "My Lady, you are safe. Ioelena is well practiced in helping evea fall from that height safely," Aurora says, joining my wives in ving me to do stupid things.

  "Would this height even hurt Geta!" I shout.

  "It could," Shimmer suggests.

  I reach out with my left hand to the bar. I grab it and find it a lot easier than I thought it would be. So, I start going through the rest, swinging around until I reach the end. I look nothing like the trolled mass of muscles Geta was, but I did it.

  "What do I do now?" I ask them.

  "You could just swing off and glide down," Ioelena says.

  "Here, Alzi, I heat up the air a an updraft for you to glide off," Shimmer offers. She brings a fme to life, and I give the idea a shot. My wings snap open, and the draft actually brings me up into the air a bit before I glide slowly to the ground again.

  "That was the stupidest thing ever," I tell them.

  "Oh, e on, it was a great show. I think we found something for Elora ao do," Ioelena says. "Maybe add in Shimmer to make it easier, but have those two carry you across, then swing to unch you into the air. You would o hold onto their legs or something, but I think it would be a great finish to a show. Watg your beautiful wings as you glide around. They do some jump to get off, and maybe you dive into their arms?"

  "Is this a circus show?" Shimmer says with a chuckle. "It would be fun for the wives but a little too much of a circus show for the rest of the nobles."

  "Maybe. Pixies like to do that kind of thing. But us nobles are a lot more serious than that bunch," Ioelena says.

  "Pixies?"

  "Yes, tiny things. Like fairies, but love to py tricks and such. I have a bit of their blood in me, giving me my pink strips," Ioelena says.

  "Tiny? How small, and how did that work out?" I ask her. I've heard about fairies, and I don't know how they would mate with anything other than fairies.

  "As small as you are thinking about. My great how ever many it was grandmambled with them and won. That is all they passed down, and I would rather not think about it," Ioelena says. "So, what are we going to do ?"

  "Hmm, none of us throw a sihing that Geta , so we will o stick to acrobatic stuff," Shimmer says, walking around the items. "Anything that catches your eye, Alzi?"

  "I don't know. We just try them all, I guess. Never dohem before," I say. Most of them have something to do with the upper body. Like pulling yourself over a wall or using a bar to climb up a wall with pegs. Things I could do by just fpping my wings, really.

  It is o be able to use them again.

  "My Lady, you really are not dressed for this activity," Aurora says. "The first one was not that bad, but some of these you really should have the proper outfit for."

  "The corset will be fine for the top and just put a pair of shorts on for the bottom and take the skirt off," Shimmer says.

  "Please hold still, Alzi. I am not as good at this as my daughter," Aurora says. "There we go."

  In a sed, my thighs were free for the sun to shine on. My tights were still on, but different shoes y before me—the normal fts that they let me wear in the field. I slipped out of the heels and into the fts.

  "Anything else?" I ask, hoping to get out of this stupid corset.

  "You want out, I guess. Ok, my Lady," Aurora says. "But you won't have anything to support your breasts."

  "That is fine," I tell her. She gives me a shirt and frees my chest from the terrible top.

  "Shy will have a project for tonight. Enjoy running around, my Lady," Aurora tells me, pig up the heels.

  ...

  "How did I only plete two of these?" I ask. I didn't think running up the side of a wall would be this hard. I'm as tall as Geta and I have plenty of reach with my arms. Yet even trying to fp my wings to cheat I 't reach the edge. I had to fly up to the damn thing to meet up with Shimmer. Ioelena is too short to even have a ce at achieving it.

  "Practid endurance, Alzi. I only did two more than you, and I know I 't do any more than this," Shimmer says with a defeated chuckle. "There is a reason these are part of a show feta. Not everyone do it, aainly not all right after each other. She even goes from easy to hard. Two is an amazing start, I would say, especially when you made it up here anyway."

  "Flight does make most of these useless," I mumble. "How do we get down?"

  "You just glide down silly."

  "I know. I guess I was asking about you."

  " my beautiful wife carry me?" Shimmer asks. "Please?"

  "I try," I sigh. It isn't too far down, and I'm just gliding.

  "Thank you, my love," Shimmer says. "How do you want to hold me?"

  "In my arms, I guess?" I say.

  "Well, it is nice you don't want me hanging by your toes, my dear," Shimmer chuckles.

  "Just stand there, and I'll do it," I huff out. One hand under Shimmer's knees and the other on her bad pick her up. My wings unfurl, and I jump off the side. Her hands around my neck, pushing the cainst my skin.

  We hit the ground a bit harder than I'm used to, but my knees hold, and I set the tall woman down.

  "Do you want to do a short dinner after the bath or the real dinner right now?" Shimmer asks, looking towards the su over the horizon.

  "Now is fine," I say. "I'm not used to feeling hungry."

  "Alright. Ioelena, do you want to join us?" Shimmer asks. "We switch up the room and do it in mine. I'm still on the sed floor, so there are fewer steps for everyone."

  "I'll go let the kit know," Shimmer's maid says, bowing out of our little group.

  "I'll lead the way then," Shimmer says.

  "Should we bathe with magic first?" Ioelena asks. "I think dinner would be better if we didn't smell all our sweat. We may not be looking like we took a dip in a pond like Geta, but we did do some work."

  "Yay, that would be nice," I say.

  "I help you, my Ladies," Aurora says. A wave of mana, and she s us up.

  "Ready now?" Shimmer asks us.

  "Yes," Ioelena says. I give Shimmer a nod, and we head back to the house.

  The group follows Shimmer up through the massive yard and through the halls. She takes us to a differe of stairs than I normally take and we head up to the sed floor and then her room.

  Shimmer's walls were painted e, like she told me before. A small bookshelf and chair in the er were the only real differeween her room and miside of the color. Shimmer quickly found a seat at her table, letting Ioelena a down and begin the wait for the food.

  Shimmer's maid es up soon with the standard cart and passes out the food. ce the useless napkins in our ps, though Ioelena is smaller in the chest, so maybe the napkin could catch a few scraps for her. But with how careful we are forced to eat with all the rules, the odds of us dropping anything are low.

  The food is standard. The big differeween each meal seems to be where they get the meat from and the seasoning for all the food. It does well keeping it fresh despite the simir look eaight.

  Shimmer takes a bite as us begin the dinner.

  "Ioelena, did you have a lot of pixies on your family's nd?" Shimmer asks Ioelena. Ioelena gives her a pause before looking at me and starting. I guess Shimmer already knows this?

  "Yes, our family rules over a rge part of the forest that doesn't have all the monsters in it. Instead, pixies and fairies and a small group of dryads live. We have a few small towns and the city we live in. But most of it is keeping the forest free from bloodshed. The pixies are obsessed with pying tricks oher groups and themselves really. Always stirring up trouble but rarely drawing blood. The worst was when they made the fairies think the left was right and the right was left. They couldn't fly straight for a week. Had one fly at me after spending the week trying to get out of the forest and to my family. Saw a bit of my pink hair and just started screaming," Ioelena says. "Pixies are great with magic but terrible neighbors. I don't know how their society is still standing with all the crap they do to each other. No matter what happens they just ugh it off and promise to do worse back. I didn't get to talk with the fairies much; they really didn't like my pink hair. My sisters would hahem normally. Dryads would hahe pixies themselves and didn't reauch."

  "What is the differeween a fairy and a pixie?" I ask Ioelena.

  "The normal joke is to check if you still have your underwear. If you do, you're talking to a fairy; otherwise, it is a pixie," Ioelena says. "Really is just a small differen wings and the type of affinity they normally get. Fairy magic is generally based on miracles. Pixies tricks. We would always guess based on their hair color. Fairies are normally golden, while pixies are pink. Fairies aren't happy with the small differences, always doing their best to separate themselves from their trickster cousins. So be careful with them. It is an easy way to make them mad at you. Pixies don't care; they'll just tease you about the mistake for a bit, then try to get you to trip or something."

  "Seems a bit tiring to work with that stantly," I say. I wonder if I tired Mommy out with all my little tricks? I wasn't very good at it. She normally found out about it quickly, I think, but just let it happen to make me ugh.

  "You get used to it. Eventually, you start to expect what the pixies will do, and the fairies are easy to hahey just have a lot of issues to deal with. But both provide a lot of materials for potions and if you get oo talk about magic, you learn a lot. They are happy we keep a good border for them so they don't have to fight monsters as much," Ioelena expins. "We get knowledge and materials, they get safety. A good trade, we both think."

  "Don't they o fight to get strong?"

  "No, they are magical beings, so they grow stronger naturally. Most believe it is the Goddess of Nature that is helping them grow, but they refuse to tell us."

  "Are there ical beings?" I ask them.

  "True dragons, monsters, true phoenixes, and likely some sea creatures and the suot many that are willing to i with us," Shimmer says. "Dragons and phoenixes don't like to work with us. We all used to hunt them too much, I guess. Fluvis would know more about the sea creatures. But pixies and fairies are the few that actually i with non-magical beings in a friendly manner."