our real estate is a great investment

[cross_and_bow]

"Welcome to Sunshine," says Juliet. "And to my front porch and whatever you do don't hit the light, it'll set Sherlock on fire."

Comments

[cross_and_bow]

"Long story," she says. "You can go on calling me Bella."

[pythbox]

"I am very happy to," Giles says dryly.

[cross_and_bow]

Juliet giggles and gets out her demonology homework.

[she_sells_seashells]

Shell Bell does not help her with the notetaking like Amariah did; she scans the bookshelves instead. "Magic from here sounds nasty," she comments. (This is clearly a reference to her previous conversations with Juliet; she's looking at a shelf of YA novels.)

[pythbox]

"Yes it does," he agrees.

[she_sells_seashells]

"Long term protections against any of that would probably require a pentagon or a hex or even a star, but if there's any straightforward, relatively simple things that could stop it from hurting Juliet, we might be able to work out a way to do it with squares. A square would make her hair grow out blue forever if she wanted it; maybe it can trip some other variable on that scale that'll help? Can you tell me how it works?"

[pythbox]

"How... what, precisely, works?"

[she_sells_seashells]

"The magic around here being nasty. If she doesn't run into me again, or Stella or Angela, or someone else who can mint her, then it only makes sense for her to pick up the local stuff. Bells are supposed to have magic, we work best when we've got it. But maybe it could be less nasty to her with something clever I could accomplish with squares."

[pythbox]

"...Nothing springs to mind," he says. "Unless you can make her luckier, or, or less appetizing to demons."

[she_sells_seashells]

"Less appetizing is a probably, although with only squares I might have to find out what kind of nutritional value they're looking for," says Shell Bell speculatively. "I think any kind of permanent luck charm would take a pentagon at the least... and I don't have my amulet with me, I stopped wearing it... and I have my fire wand and I could part with it now I'm a mint, but it takes a lot of practice to use safely and I don't know if that's the best use of Juliet's time."

[pythbox]

"It varies by the species," he says. "Handily, I have plenty of books on the subject."

[she_sells_seashells]

"I'll go read Juliet's old notes," says Shell Bell. She turns invisible and teleports and reads fast and comes back. "Okay, I don't think I can convincingly do anything to make it seem like she doesn't have, say, bone marrow, but Juliet, how would you feel about smelling like vanilla or something all the time?"

[cross_and_bow]

"Does it have to be all the time? Can I just turn that off and on at will?" Juliet asks. "I'm not sure I want to be that distinctive."

[she_sells_seashells]

"I don't think I can make it will-operated with a square. I might be able to do something complicated where it's based on the temperature or the phase of the moon and you wind up flipping through ten different smells effectively at random, but I might not."

[cross_and_bow]

"If you can do the complicated version let's go with that, if you can't let's skip it," says Juliet.

[she_sells_seashells]

Shell Bell tries.

"Can't," she sighs.

[pythbox]

"But you could have made her smell like vanilla?" says Giles.

[she_sells_seashells]

"Yes. Why, do you want to smell like vanilla?"

[pythbox]

"My interest is theoretical," he assures her.

[she_sells_seashells]

Shell Bell and Juliet giggle in identical unison.

[pythbox]

He laughs a little.

[she_sells_seashells]

Shell Bell returns to browsing. She gets through a noticeable fraction of the section, reading at superspeed.

[cross_and_bow]

Juliet takes notes on demons, then packs up to go to next period.

They're back after school.

[she_sells_seashells]

Shell Bell checks for supervising presences besides Mr. Giles before reappearing.

[cross_and_bow]

"All clear?" Juliet asks Shell Bell, and at the replying nod, she says, "So... Mr. Giles. I'm... the... Slayer. Thought you might want to know."