1Disclaimer: Kevin's my friend; the world is his, the characters are (mostly) mine. Phantasma and 'Granny' (AKA Toe Heret Kevin) are his, as is Briar Rose's mom.
Note the First: Briar Rose is a genie; that means, for all you HP fans, she's like a Metamorphmagus. I'm not sure if they can change genders, but genies in the Mystical Island universe sure can. Briar is her male name, Rose is her female name.
Note the Second: This is set in the future of the MI universe, the third generation or so. Therefore, none of the characters who get speaking roles here are mentioned in MI. I'm pretty sure they will be in any upcoming stories written by Kevin, eventually.
Note the Third: The point of view switches between Briar Rose and Tyler.
Note The Fourth: I have no idea why I chose the tastes/scents I did, besides rose, of course, matching her name. Don't try figuring out any symbolism!
Note the Fifth: Anyone read Sandry's Book by Tamora Pierce? :P
And now, on with the story!
I walked out of the castle to the practicing grounds - even though we had plenty of the room in the way of courtyards, we had a huge area of land set aside for practicing archery, swordfighting, thrown weapons, anything to do with combat. Phantasma almost managed to get her seductive skills classroom put there too, but Granny insisted that it wasn't actually combat. I heard that debate; I thought it was pretty funny, especially Phantasma's arguments.
So, where was I? Oh, right. I walked to the practicing grounds, intending to do some archery. When I got to that section, I noticed Tyler, her fiery hair for once down past her shoulders, cursing as she missed a target. I noticed several other arrows in the grass; none were in the target.
"Hey Tyler!"
She carefully put the bow down; I could tell she was trying hard not to throw it. "Hi Rose... Archery seems so hard!"
"It's not, really. Are you right- or left-handed?"
"Left."
I grinned. "That probably explains a lot. Here." I picked up the bow and gave it to her. "Hold it like this..."
I don't know what made me want to go try to teach myself archery, but thinking back it ended up being a pretty good idea.
So I went out there, grabbed a bow and a dozen or so arrows, picked a target and started shooting.
That part wasn't hard; I just couldn't hit the damn target! I got through about nine arrows before Rose showed up and showed me how to shoot properly.
I didn't figure what the feeling I got when Rose held her hands around mine and guided them to their proper positions on my bow was for a while, though I did notice that I noticed her looks more. She had cotton candy pink hair today, the same as when I had met her first, on I Don't Know City. She had spiky, light blue, anime-style bangs; again, the same color as when I had first seen her.
Her eyes were different today, though; it took me a moment or two to figure out why they were so familiar, until I realized that they were the exact same dark green, the exact same shape as my own. She was also closer to my height today; I could look straight into her eyes.
When I did realize what the tingling I felt was, I looked straight at her, surprised. It must have shown on my face, because she asked, "What?"
The bow dropped from my hands, unheeded, as I moved forward and kissed her.
Rose used blueberry chap stick; interesting, since blueberry was my favorite before strawberry.
The first thing I noticed when Tyler kissed me was that she used strawberry chap stick, my favorite before blueberry.
The second thing was that she was a surprising good kisser for the fact that she was only fourteen.
Then again, I'm a month old or so, so in normal circumstances she'd of course have more experience than I, but hey, I'm a genie...
The third thing I noticed was that she did use perfume, cinammon, but it was very faint.
I noticed that Rose used - surprisingly enough - rose perfume.
I heard someone tip-toeing toward us - I couldn't be bothered to break off the kiss to see who, though.
I heard the sound of a camera going off, and broke off the kiss to glare at a grinning Jordan with a magic camera in hand.
"Jeez, for a gay guy you certainly seem to like girls a lot!"
I felt Rose move; I realized my arms had wound around her neck while we were kissing, and I took them away to stand akimbo and scowl at Jordan, who hadn't answered for the simple reason that he was watching the moving picture he had taken. "Jordan!"
He looked up. "Who, me?"
"Yeah, you. Give me that camera."
Rose laughed. "No no no, here's how you do it."
Her form blurred, and she was a muscular guy with blonde hair. "Jordan, please give me the camera." Her voice was deeper; frankly, I prefered her as a girl.
Jordan nodded absently, his grip on the camera loosening. Briar blurred again, this time in motion, and grabbed the camera and picture, then turned back into Rose. "See? Easy as..." she paused, then grinned. "...as kissing a girl."
Jordan glared. "No fair!"
"Yes fair. I'm taking this picture." Rose grinned, then asked me, "You want a copy?"
I was busy watching; my arms wound around her neck, our hair hiding most of our face, mingling together, candy pink and carrot orange somehow not clashing but blending together perfectly. "Sure."
"There's a fee, though." Rose grinned.
I quirked an eyebrow. "And what's that?"
"Another kiss."
I'm pretty sure Jordan got two pictures out of this. We really couldn't care less.