[Azura Rayume]

"Well, um, it's... strange, don't you think?" He points to the plant over her head, and it swells again even as he watches is. "Plants don't grow this quickly, ever, on their own. It might be harmful for them if it goes on much longer. And we don't know what else it might do to them."

Her expression falls, and that pains him, even though it means she's realizing he may be right. Rune never wants anything less than the best for this garden, and he knows that. She doesn't want to put the plants in danger any more than he does. "I suppose you're- Tristan, what is that?"

[16]

[Azura Rayume]

"What is-" Something wraps around his ankle, and he kicks at it, mildly panicked in confusion. A second later, he has the peace of mind to look down and realizes it is a vine from somewhere, much larger than anything should be, and it moves with some kind of intent toward him again. "See? That's not normal!"

"Okay, fine!" Rune fiddles with the device and whines loudly when it does nothing. "I don't know how to turn it off!"

[17]

[Azura Rayume]

"It turned on when we put the crystal in it." He kicks at the vine again, and that does very little to keep it from following him as he backs up. "Try that?"

"Right!" As soon as she starts to tug on the device, however, another vine reaches out from under the oversized leaves and wraps around her wrist. She cries out and tugs at it, but this one holds firm until the end of it winds around the device and pries it from her hand. She manages to yank away after that, and the vine coils around the thing until the crystal's glow is hidden from view.

[18]

[Azura Rayume]

Tristan blinks at that, stumbling toward her. "Well... That isn't good."

Rune clings onto his arm, clearly shaking. Plants don't do this. They don't move this much or take things. "What do we do now?"

"Uh..." He drags his attention away from the now very animate vines. They have to something, but the only thing he can think of is to get the device back. Clearly, they cannot just do that with their bare hands, and Rune's magic isn't built for something like this. "We should maybe, um, hide. In the shed."

[19]

[Azura Rayume]

As soon as he says it, he starts to move, pushing against her to get her to move, too. The vines shake aggressively behind them, and he can hear leaves rustling across the ground in a way he would describe as "threatening." They make it through the door quickly, and Tristan slams it behind him, pressing his back against it just in case.

Rune stares at him, then she raises one hand and snaps her fingers. A little orb of light blinks into being just above her hand and floats up toward the ceiling. "What do we do?" she asks, keeping her voice to just a whisper.

[20]

[Azura Rayume]

Tristan fumbles with the lock on the door, only relaxing when he gets it in place. There's no way plants can open locked doors. Then again, plants should be able to steal things either. "I don't think this is a usual gardening problem," he mutters, dragging his eyes over everything under her witchlight. Shears, chemicals, a weed whacker he hasn't touched in forever. "We need to get that thing back and shut it off. It's probably the only way to get our garden back in order. But there's things in here we can use."

[21]

[Azura Rayume]

He reaches for the shears, and Rune immediately makes a distressed noise. "You want to hurt them?" she whines, pulling back from him and, more importantly, the iron in his hand. "But they haven't done anything wrong!"

"One of them stole the thing we need," he argues back, keeping his voice level. He isn't mad at her, and he needs her to know that. "I won't hurt them any more than I have to, but I have a feeling we might need to protect ourselves a little more than we had before." He holds his empty hand out to her. "You'll stay close to me?"

[22]

[Azura Rayume]

Rune hesitates, but he waits for her to make her choice. Slowly, she reaches out to lay her fingers in his. "You promise not to hurt the plants more than you have to?"

"I promise." He guides her closer and behind him. "These are my plants, too, remember? It's not like I want to hurt them, but if they're dangerous, we don't exactly have much of a choice." He sets his hand on the doorknob and takes a steadying breath. All they have to do is get the device back. Chances are very good that same vine still has it. If they're lucky, the only thing they'll really have to handle is that vine.

[23]

[Azura Rayume]

Tristan unlatches the door and pushes it open. Whatever that gem has done to his garden, it works quickly. The grass is already taller than he's ever seen it, and massive leaves overhang everything like a great, overgrown jungle. The trees have grown together into a canopy, filtering the light soft and green down to the floor below. If it was supposed to be like this, he would say it was beautiful, like a little section of Tengel here in his backyard. The way the rustle, too, animated by the magic in some strange way, makes it feel like something is watching them. Maybe the plants are.

[24]

[Azura Rayume]

"Hold still," Rune whispers, and she presses her palms against his lower back. Right away, he can tell he feels lighter. She did something. "I can't really make you float, but it should help you move. I think."

"Thank you." She cannot see his face, but his smile is clear in his voice. He scans the plants near where he thought they had run from, but nothing looks even remotely the same. The vines seem to have moved quite a bit. "Do you have a way to tell where the thing is? You have a better chance of sensing the magic than I do."

[25]

[Azura Rayume]

"Hm... Let me see." She starts to murmur in a language he cannot understand, and the plants around them begin to glow. At first, it is everything, but it soon fades from most of the leaves except one small bundle not too far from them. "It should be over there. Um... Can you see it? I don't know if humans can see this spell or not."

"Yeah. Maybe I've just been around you enough." The leaves around the glowing point start to shake aggressively, and two vines start moving toward them more rapidly. "I don't think the plants like that!"

[26]

[Azura Rayume]

Rune's grip on the back of his shirt tightens, but she does not let go of the spell. "You said you can handle the plants, right? You do that, and I'll do this. If I drop it, you won't be able to find the crystal."

The closest vine surges forward like a snake, and Tristan brings the blunt outside of the shears down to smack it before planting his foot on it. It seems to calm, at least as much as plants can calm, and stills, while the other surges forward to wrap around his ankle and pull. He quickly turns the shears in his hand and hacks at it to free his leg, kicking all the while. The cut end of the vine recoils, spasming like a dying animal, before retreating into the undergrowth. "So they don't like being cut. That's good to know."

[27]

[Azura Rayume]

Rune whimpers from behind him but pushes her forward. In all likelihood, she can feel when the plants hurt. So much of her own magic has gone into growing them that they're connected to her. But she keeps her spell just as strong and moves with him, even though she flinches when he chops at another vine. The other thing she did, half of a floating charm of some kind, lets him balance on the overgrown leaves, even as they shake and tremble in frustration.

[28]

[Azura Rayume]

"Almost there," he assures her, and she nods against his back. From up on this leaf, he can see the spiraling vine with the glow at the middle that has to have the device. "There is a slight problem, though..."

"What?" She peeks around his side and looks around, then down. Around their target, several more vines point up toward them, coiled to strike, and what looks like the roots of a nearby tree have grown up and around like spikes. "Jumping down there doesn't really seem like an option, does it?"

[29]

[Azura Rayume]

Tristan shakes his head. "If the spiky branches don't get us, the vines will. Do you think you could float us down there?"

"One of us, maybe." She bites her lip. "But if I take the spell off one of us, the other will fall."

"Okay, well..." Not too far away, a branch from the tree juts up among the leaves, thick enough to be hundrends of years old even though he remembers planting that himself. "There! I'll go there and see if I can get the vines' attention. You float down there and get the device. Pull the crystal out or break it, whatever works."

[30]