A/N: Is it bad that I'm updating this faster than Crow Legends? :D I'll have that one out soon, hopefully. I've finally gotten over (mostly) my ACF writer's block, so now I have to work through my CL:N one :D Thank you to everyone who reviewed! You guys are really great! Special thanks to Kate of Carlay, my beta and subliminal message giver :D Briar still wins, I don't care! :D

Disclaimer: Not TP.

Chapter 3

"Do you like him?" Glaki asked. She and Tris were helping their cook, Kendre, to set out the plates for the meal.

"Him who?" Tris asked absently. She wasn't really paying attention to anyone, let alone this little girl she'd adopted in Tharios. Her thoughts were filled with Hunter and the gloxinia, not to mention the encounter that afternoon, so she didn't seem to notice that everyone was glancing at her and then smiling, amused at her dreamlike state.

"Hunter!" Glaki exclaimed. "Do you like him?"

Tris just stared at her for a minute. "What gave you that idea?" she asked when she could speak again.

"Ever since you came inside this afternoon, you haven't acted like yourself. All the older girls in school do that when they like a boy," she commented, shrugging.

Tris didn't say anything for a minute. "I don't like him at all," she said decidedly. "He likes me, though. I think."

Glaki smiled. "What's not to like about you, Tris?"

"Yeah, Coppercurls. You're the kindest, nicest person I've ever met," Briar said, tongue in cheek, and laughed when Tris made a rude gesture at him behind Glaki's back.

xXx

They ate dinner in their usual way, loudly and without many manners. When dinner was over, Tris and Glaki went to bathe, and when they came back, Tris put Glaki to bed in the room they had once intended for Sandry's use.

She went downstairs and found Daja getting ready to go to her room. She cleared her throat slightly. "Daja?"

"Yes, saati?" she asked.

"I have a question. I feel like I should already know, but for some reason, it never occurred to me before."

"Okay. Do we need to be in the hallway for this, or do you want to come in?" Tris walked by her sister into her room and then sat on a chair. "What's your question, Tris?"

"Does my lightning hurt you?"

"Sure."

"Really? Even my little braids?"

Daja frowned. "You know, I don't know. Let's find out."

Tris unbraided one of the braids that waved in front of her face and gathered the lightning out of it, making it into a long strand in her hand. Daja reached out with the hand that wasn't covered in living metal and touched it, pulling back when it had barely brushed her skin.

"Okay, never mind. That stung, badly." She held out her hand. A welt was already rising on it.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Tris said, frowning in frustration. She forced the lightning back into her hair and braided it up.

"Don't worry about it. Why did you ask, though?"

"Well, Hunter touched the lightning, and it didn't look like it bothered him. You're the strongest smith mage I know. If it hurt you, it should have hurt him."

"Logically," Daja agreed. "Unless he was so focused on you that he didn't notice."

"But he'd have a big welt like you do?"

"Probably. Most likely."

"Oh. Okay. Thanks, Daja."

"Any time, Tris."

Tris left the room, frowning, and didn't notice Daja leave her room and go downstairs. Daja knocked on a door in the hallway near the kitchen.

"Who is it?" Briar called back.

"Daja."

"Come in," Talia said. As Daja opened the door, she heard her brother's wife say, "Why ask who it was? The only people who live here are us and your sisters. And Glaki now."

Briar didn't answer for a second. "Are you not speaking to Tris?" Talia asked incredulously.

"I'm not 'not talking' to her," Briar muttered under his breath, and Talia rolled her eyes.

She turned to Daja. "Hello, Daja. How are you?"

"Fine, thanks. But I need a healing salve."

"What for?"

"She works in a forge all day," Briar reminded Talia.

"But when has she ever gotten burned?"

Briar's frown grew blacker. "Oh. What's it for, Daj'?"

"I touched Tris's lightning."

"Well, that was stupid. What'd you do that for?" Talia elbowed Briar in the ribs to make him shut up.

"She wanted to see if it would hurt me."

Briar and Talia both had shocked expressions on their faces. Talia recovered first. Her eyes were shaded as she stood up and left to get the salve. "Not because she wanted to hurt me," Daja said when Talia came back. "She just wanted to know if it did."

"Because of Hunter?" Talia asked, smoothing the salve onto Daja's skin.

"She said he touched the lightning but it didn't affect him. Or, it didn't look like it affected him."

"And what happened?"

"I don't really know. She's trying to figure everything out. I don't think she's used to being so confused."

"Love's confusing," Talia remarked, laying a hand on Briar's shoulder lightly.

"Well, it shouldn't be that confusing," Briar muttered. "Kaq likes girl, girl is enough of an idiot to like the kaq back."

Talia and Daja exchanged a glance. "It's confusing when you've never dealt with it before," Daja said. "And Tris has never dealt with it before. Let her be, Briar. Not talking to her because she likes someone who you don't happen to approve of is stupid."

Briar glared in his sister's direction, but under her calm gaze, he finally sighed and relented. "I just don't see what's in it for him."

"He has to be getting something in return for liking Tris?" Daja asked, raising her eyebrows.

"No. That's not what I meant."

"What did you mean, then? No one can like Tris?"

"I didn't mean that either. I just meant, it seems a little strange that he's met her once and then decided he was in love with her."

Talia coughed, and it sounded like she said the word 'hypocrite.' Briar scowled at her, and she smiled sweetly at him. "You and I were different."

"At least he met her in person before deciding he loved her," Talia murmured.

Daja started backing out of the room, sensing a fight about to start. She loved her brother, and she loved Talia, but they had intense arguments every once in a while. She went back up to her room and sat at her desk. She looked at the living metal flower on her desk. Frostpine had sent it over earlier that day after meeting with Hunter.

The young mage wanted to know if it was possible to create living metal bushes and trees without using Daja's living metal, just by magic. The flower she was holding made it seem like it was possible.

He'd infused a normal copper flower with his magic and forced it to grow like a regular flower would. Daja had only had this one for a couple of hours and the bud it had been when it was delivered to her had now blossomed into a pretty Lucerne, meaning life.

He was creative in what flowers he chose, Daja thought. She had to give him that. But she wondered if he knew what he was getting into with Tris. It was food for thought.

xXx

Tris was doing some thinking of her own in her room. One of her small braids was in her mouth and she was chewing on it thoughtfully, not noticing the sparks that were coming off of it.

She twirled the gloxinia in the other hand, watching the light catch the subtle glints in the copper as she spun it.

Hunter was a mystery to her. She'd never met anyone like him before, and didn't quite know what to make of him. Despite the fact that she'd told Glaki she didn't like him, she knew she did. It was hard not to like him, even though he was arrogant and could stand to be taken down a few pegs.

Then she smiled. Who better to take him down a few pegs than the girl he was trying so hard to impress?

A/N: Liked it? Hated it? Wished I would stop writing forever? Let me know in a review! Please and thank you! :D Love to all! --Sarah