After a while, Lloyd's voice drifted faintly from behind the bathroom door.
"Come, Sugar, training your ability in water doubles the efficiency. Try to condense a wind sphere in your palm. Pay attention to the rhythm of the wind."
"Young Master, is this speed acceptable?"
"Not bad. Keep it there."
Sugar's voice shifted, growing inexplicably breathless, a thread of excitement woven beneath the effort of suppressing it.
"Heh heh! Does that feel good, Young Master?"
Lloyd did not answer with words that time. He only let out a low sound, twice.
After an indeterminate stretch of time, the bathroom door swung open, and through a veil of warm mist, Lloyd and the others stepped out.
Monet looked down at Sugar, who had gone entirely boneless in her arms, and let out a helpless breath.
"Sugar, you were far too bold in there. How could you possibly..."
The scene from the bathroom surfaced in her mind uninvited, and Monet's words dried up as color rose steadily in her cheeks. She could not bring herself to finish the sentence.
Sugar pouted with supreme indifference. She raised one fair, delicate hand, stuck out the tip of her small pink tongue, and gave her own palm a slow, deliberate lick. Monet's eyelid twitched.
Sugar turned her gaze up to Lloyd, eyes gone soft and languid, and said in a thoroughly unrepentant tone,
"Silly sister, how could that possibly count as bold? Young Master, were you satisfied with Sugar's service?"
Lloyd pressed one finger to the smooth center of Sugar's forehead and smiled down at her.
"Very satisfied. Now tell me, where did you learn all of that?"
Sugar let out a bright, unabashed laugh, licked her lips, and announced,
"From Robin sister's collection, obviously! I have been studying with great dedication!"
She looked thoroughly pleased with herself and entirely too winning at this moment. Lloyd reached out and lifted her from Monet's arms without ceremony.
The instant she settled against him, Sugar began to squirm, restless and pliant, wriggling like a small, sleek creature that had no interest in staying still.
Lloyd lowered his head and pressed a firm kiss to her upturned lips. Sugar dissolved into a fit of giggles that she made no effort to restrain.
Behind Lloyd, Shalria stood with her head bowed low, wearing the expression of someone who had watched an entire evening's prospects slip through her fingers and land squarely in someone else's lap.
The undeniable winner of the night was this shameless, impish girl.
Sugar, still flushed and giggling, abruptly arranged her features into something pitifully sincere. She blinked her large, guileless eyes up at Lloyd and asked,
"Young Master, can Sugar sleep with you tonight? I want you to guide me further in developing the Wind-Wind Fruit."
That single sentence was enough to quietly defeat Hancock, who had been gathering her courage to offer the very same thing.
Lloyd's mouth curved into something that was not quite a smile.
"Very well. I am curious myself to find out how sweet Sugar is."
He tucked her against his chest in a smooth carry and turned toward the bedroom, leaving Monet, Hancock, and Shalria standing in a line, looking at one another.
It was not a matter of capacity. They all understood perfectly well what this night represented for Sugar. There was an unspoken understanding among them regarding such occasions, a quiet mutual respect for what a night like this meant. Shalria, for her own part, held certain convictions about how such things ought to unfold, and she was not about to dispute the matter.
When Lloyd's bedroom door clicked shut, the three women turned and made their way to their own rooms.
The sleeping arrangements had been reorganized some time ago at Lloyd's suggestion. The maids' dormitory had been abandoned in favor of rooms in the main palace. Hancock and Monet shared one room. Olvia, Robin, and Pudding occupied another. And now Shalria had a single room of her own.
On the walk there, Monet spoke up, her voice carrying a genuine note of apology.
"I am truly sorry, Saint Shalria. I apologize on Sugar's behalf."
She was sharp enough to have seen exactly what Shalria had been hoping for tonight, and sharp enough to know that Sugar had cheerfully dismantled it.
Shalria let out an awkward laugh and waved a hand.
"There is nothing to apologize for. There is always tomorrow." She paused, then tilted her head. "Actually, since Sugar is not in your room tonight, would it be all right if I stayed with you?"
Monet blinked, then nodded quickly.
"Of course. Though I should mention, there is only the one bed. If that is not a problem..."
"Please do not say another word about problems or minding." Shalria shook her head firmly. "I have no reservations about it at all, and if Saint Lloyd heard you talking that way, he would certainly be displeased."
She had made her peace with things. If she intended to remain at Lloyd's side, she needed to build something genuine with Monet and the others. Sharing a bed was an inevitability, and it was better to grow comfortable with it sooner rather than later.
They were still talking when they reached the corridor of rooms. Hancock stepped forward to open the door, and at that precise moment, Olvia's voice carried clearly from the room next door.
"Robin, what is all this? Where did these books come from?"
"Mom, I am not a child. I put what I read to good use."
"Nani? Robin! What on earth are you thinking?! These, all of these, these are forbidden books!"
"They are not forbidden in the slightest. The World Government has placed no restrictions on reading material of this kind. And I am hardly the only one who has read them. Pudding has read them as well!"
"Sister Robin!!!"
"Pudding, stop shouting. You two are impossible. Come here, both of you. Take a stack, put it on your head, and go stand in the corner."
"Auntie Olvia! I have done nothing wrong!"
"I refuse to surrender, Mom!"
The three women in the corridor stood still, listening, and exchanged a slow, collective look of recognition before a shared smile passed between them. They were, to a one, loyal readers of Robin's collection themselves.
Monet nudged Hancock in the side, urging her to open the door. Hancock came back to herself and pushed it open.
The room was richly appointed and well furnished. The single bed Monet had mentioned was wide enough to make the claim almost laughable. The three of them, all slender, could have stretched out with room to spare even if they had been twice the size.
All three of them had come straight from the bath and were still wrapped only in white towels. Without ceremony or particular modesty, they pulled the towels free, left them where they fell, and climbed into bed.
Shalria turned her head and studied Hancock lying flat beside her.
"Hancock, you have a remarkable figure."
The bluntness of it caught Hancock entirely off guard. She fumbled for the blanket and pulled it up around herself, flushing.
Shalria regarded this reaction with mild bafflement. She pushed herself upright, sat cross-legged, and looked across to Monet on the other side.
"Monet, what do you suppose Sugar is doing right now? Is she still... developing her Devil Fruit?"
She asked it with full awareness of how the question sounded, and her face went red the moment it left her mouth.
Monet pressed her lips together and found, after a brief consideration, that she had no satisfactory answer to offer.
Tonight, in all likelihood, it was not the Wind-Wind Fruit being developed in that room. It was its user.
===
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