Kosa and Helios looked at the tree goddess incredulously. Gardening? Really?? The closest thing their pride had to a Mea Hānai was Kipepeo, and neither of them were particularly close to her. Although, Bahari did teach Kosa the very small amount of gardening knowledge that she knew, but that didn't really cover much. And that was only for the plants in their world. She had no idea what the flora that lived here needed.
Helios was also none the wiser when it came to plant care. He was a Fire Mage. He didn't really like hanging around plants too much.
"Hey, Kosa, you go on if you want. I don't think-" He started.
"Nonsense, boy!" Helios turned his head in the direction of the voice. Staring back at him was a raggedy one-eyed older lion. "If our Great Goddess tells you to do somethin' you bust your butt in order to get it done, ya hear?"
"Yes sir," Helios sighed, turning back towards his mate. "Come on then, love. You heard him."
"Aww don't worry, I'm sure it won't be that bad," She said, trying to reassure him, "You can always ask for help, you know."
He snorted, "That's rich, coming from you," He said lovingly, wrapping their tails together.
"Keep movin'!" The old lion shouted, pushing the couple to move faster.
"Yeah, yeah, old man," Kosa mumbled, walking faster. He started yelling about how 'You young'uns are so ungrateful these days' or something like that. She didn't stick around to find out.
"I'll go find a spot for us, why don't you ask someone for some seeds or something?" Helios said, walking off into the gardens.
Kosa looked around, trying to find a cat who appeared to be in charge of what was going on. She felt a slight tap on her shoulder, and jumped in surprise. She turned and saw a dark blue cat with glowing eyes handing over a bunch of seeds. Thanking them, Kosa made her way through the crowd trying to find her mate. It didn't take long, and she found him in a fairly secluded area of dirt.
"What kind of seeds did you get?" Helios asked.
"Uh... not sure," She said, going to check the bag she was handed, "It says here that these are bleeding hearts? These are my favorite flowers, I may have to steal some of these for our garden."
"You should make a pouch," He said "You know, to keep them in. I'm sure I could find someone who would be willing to help. Maybe that tiny angry brown cat we saw on our first day here, she seemed pretty capable," He rambled.
"Let's just get these seeds planted, love," She said, fed up with her mates' nonsense.
"Right right, of course. But, uh, how exactly do we do that?" He asked.
"Uh, I don't know. But I mean it can't be that hard, right?" She said, moving to the center of the area. She scooped out a small bit of dirt to create a small hole and dropped one of the seeds in. "Hey, let's split up the seeds and get this done," She called, giving half of the remaining seeds to herself and half to her mate. "I'm thinking we should have them in a circular pattern following the stone, and maybe just the one I already planted in the middle, we can figure out how to water them when we're done, and I might go back to get some complimentary flowers to put in between them,"
"Sounds good," He said, walking towards the edge of the area. Kosa followed his lead and moved to her own side. She began making small holes around the edge. When she was done with her part, she retraced her route, only now placing seeds in the holes and burying them.
"Hey, Kosa, I'm done over here," Helios called over, "What do you want me to do now?"
"Hmmm let's work on watering them," she suggested.
"And how do you suppose we go about doing that?"
"I don't know, what do you think, Helios? I haven't really been asking your opinion today."
"O-oh? I uhhh... Maybe we-you could make an ice ceiling? Like something that covers the entire thing, really thin, too, and I could melt the ice and let it rain down onto everything. Sorry if that wasn't a good idea," He said, fiddling with his paws, embarrassed.
"Actually, Helios," she started, "that sounds like a really good idea,"
His head shot up and he looked at her with hopeful eyes. "Yeah? I mean... of course it is," He coughed.
Kosa rolled her eyes and made the odd ice structure Helios was talking about. It looked gorgeous when it was done, flashes of colors shone through, and it looked similar to a spiderweb covered in dewdrops in the morning sunlight. She was pulled out of her daze when the ice started to melt in the center. As much as she didn't really like the water, she must admit it felt amazing when it dripped over her back. She shook off the droplets, and looked around her. It wasn't as difficult as she thought it would be, but she was definitely glad that it was over.
Except for the fact that it wasn't.
She totally forgot that she needed to pick out accent flowers to alternate between the bleeding hearts. Sighing, she told Helios to wait for her and trudged back out to the main gardens. She had to admit she was slightly surprised when she saw the old one-eyed lion challenging a huge dark lion with almost draconic eyes. She did a double take when she saw them, her gaze lingering for a small moment, before she turned back to what she was doing.
Hmmm... what would look good with bleeding hearts... Wait, what color of bleeding hearts do we even have? I only know of four... let's just go with pink. They're my favorite. Actually, white flowers would look pretty good with all of them, so let's just work with that. She thought, looking around for that dark blue cat again. She quickly spotted her off to the side, staring at her. A little unnerved, she slowly walked over to them.
"Hi. I was just wondering if you had any white flower seeds?" She asked quietly.
The cat cocked her head slightly, "What kind do you want?"
"Umm, maybe some amaryllis, calla lilies, and uh, some hibiscus if you happen to have any," she said.
"Hm, yes I believe we can do that," The blue cat said, "wait here a moment," She said as she started walking away. Kosa watched as she padded over to a large pile of seeds, and started sorting through them. It didn't take her long to return with several small bags of seeds.
"Thank you, uhh," Kosa said, realizing she didn't know this cats' name.
"Nyx."
"Right, thank you, Nyx," she said, walking back to where Helios was waiting for her.
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