And how had that slipped my mind until now? Sure, a lot was going on here, but I was a missing person to my friends. I’d just disappeared right there on the trail. Had any of them seen me step into the ring? Were they even able to get help since they couldn’t explain where I’d gone?
“Because you fell through the ring?” Delyse asked.
“Yeah. I was hiking with friends. We’d stopped on the trail, so I’m guessing it looked like I just vanished right in front of them.”
“And they didn’t follow you?”
I shrugged before making myself be still again. “I was the only one who came through to here, so I don’t think so. I can’t imagine what’s it been like for them with trying to explain where I went.”
She peered around the canvas at me. “Do you have family and work to miss you as well?”
“No family. That’s part of what drew the four of us together in the first place. We were all foster kids.”
“What does that mean?”
“Oh, um… Orphans?”
“Ah. My condolences.” She returned to sketching.
“Thanks. We were each other’s family, really. Andwork, well, I lost my job to a robot just before our trip, so I don’t have anyone to miss me there.”
Delyse frowned at me. “A what took your job?”
“Uh…” How to explain AI to a fairy? “It’s like a metal person that someone, um, used magic on to make it do a job. It doesn’t always do it correctly and often requires more supervision than the human it replaced, so a lot of people don’t think it’s an improvement.”
“That sounds both idiotic and dangerous.”
I smiled. “Pretty much, yeah.”
“Relax your face.” She returned to sketching.
I relaxed.
Until I got itchy.
Turned out that when rich guys wanted to get fancy for portraits, they wore skintight pants with a bejeweled codpiece tied over their dicks. I hadn’t tried undoing it to take a piss yet, but it did have a matching ribbon in a bow on top. And some part of it was starting to make me want to scratch. I tried to discreetly roll my hips a bit for some relief.
“Milo?”
“Yeah?”
“Just scratch it.”
I blushed but reached down and took care of the itch. It wasn’t the first time. Probably wouldn’t be the last.
But of course this was the time that Flurry walked in and caught me digging at my crotch.
“Uh, it’s itchy,” I explained as my blush burned hotter. I stopped touching myself and put my hand back on my hip.
“I see,” he said as he sauntered over to look at the canvas.
Delyse was trying not to laugh and snorted instead. The two of them disappeared behind the canvas for a moment. Then Delyse set her tools down, took off her apron, and shot me a wink and a grin before she left the room.
I looked to Flurry, confused. “What just happened?”
“We’re taking a break.” Flurry came around the canvas to eye me with the same critical expression Delyse had been giving me for the last hour.
“Oh, good. I need to move. By the way,” I said, “was this you making a statement of some kind?”
