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"And there you have it. Kress and Blue take the win, with 2 points for each of their teams, while Ellenell and Burgandy take second place," said Thyme with a grin. There was a round of clapping for the winners, though it didn\'t take long for Thyme to speak again. "Normally I\'d want to go through everyone\'s scores and explain who got what… but I can see the judges are ready to beat me up if they don\'t get their promised free food. So I\'ll be assigning everyone random seats so you can all get to talking," 

Lily quickly jumped up into Kat\'s arms and glared up at Thyme as if daring the dryad to try and separate them. "Fine, couples can stay together if they\'re holding hands," allowed Thyme with a sigh. Kat noticed that while a few people did share some glances, it was only Gareth and Green that held hands. Though part of that was because Kress and Stan were too far apart. The demon did look like he wanted to run over there and grab Kress by the arm. 

Lily of course transformed back into her humanoid appearance to latch onto Kat\'s hand, just in case Thyme decided sitting in Kat\'s arms didn\'t technically count as holding hands. Which while accurate, would\'ve been annoying for them all. *Well this has been an interesting round. I\'m not too surprised that Kress won, but I am surprised by how much stuff he and Blue managed to build. Maybe we should\'ve stuck around to watch instead of going off and training?*

[Perhaps… but we put in some good effort for the training and I doubt watching everyone build sandcastles would\'ve stayed interesting for four whole hours. Though… perhaps training nearby would\'ve been fine.]

*I still say that it\'s safer to make sure we weren\'t going to be a distraction. Based on what Thyme said Blue and Kress were using the area outside the marked squares, so it\'s quite possible the other teams were as well.*

Before Lily could say anything Thyme had teleported everyone. There were six to a table, or seven in the case of Kat\'s group because of Lily. These weren\'t the standard dining room tables either, instead there were all outside under the stars with a few stray torches burning with what looked to be normal fire, but considering Kat couldn\'t smell any smoke coming from them she had her doubts. 

The tables themselves were split into three benches, each clearly intended for two people. In the centre was a big pile of food on a slightly raised platform that Kat would quickly learn you could spin around so that all the food was… mostly within reach. All sorts of dishes were piled high on the turning table, and each guest was provided their own set of cutlery as well as a cup that had \'tap and speak the name of your drink request\' printed across them. 

Kat wondered exactly how random this selection process was. Mostly because the bench she\'d be assigned with Lily also had Oditr on it. Kat knew that if they\'d been assigned just about anyone else save Romilda, and perhaps Borgick things would\'ve been a squeeze, but at it stood the three of them fit fine on the bench. Even if their cutlery was a spreading out a bit into the others\' sections. 

On Kat\'s left was Burnice, with Burgandy on her other side. Burnice didn\'t seem to mind this, but Burgandy looked a little despondent. Kat\'s best guess was that the fae had wanted to sit at the same table as Titania, but that was just a guess. On the last bench was March, who made Oditr next to her look even smaller, and finally Marigold, who somehow managed to look perfectly comfortable next March. 

It did prove that it wasn\'t \'one per team per table\' which had been an assumption Kat had made about Thyme\'s seating arrangements. It meant they had nobody from Blue\'s team around, or Romilda\'s. Of course, Kat found herself questioning the whole \'random seats\' thing even more when a quick glance revealed Gareth, Green, Kress and Stan all sitting together at a table with Auctifer and Ellenell. 

"Random fruit juice," said Oditr as she tapped the cup in front of her. Kat watched as the cup shook for a few seconds before letting out a high pitched sound similar to a bell being run and the liquid appeared in Oditr\'s cup. It was a pretty dark juice, whatever it was from. Kat sniffed slightly and determined it to be something vaguely grape-like. 

[Kat… I think I have to ask. But I\'m sort of embarrassed to do so. I just… I NEED to know what\'s up with the juice thing.]

*I can ask for you Lily. It\'s fine.* Kat felt Lily\'s thankfulness across their link as Kat rolled her eyes, hiding the motion behind reaching for some food. Kat felt it was a bit silly to be worried about asking, Oditr surely got the question all the time. "Hey Oditr, I\'m pretty sure it\'s rude to ask, but I\'m going to do so anyway. What\'s with the juice thing?" 

Oditr looked Kat over for a few seconds, searching for something she didn\'t seem to be able to find. "Huh… you genuinely want to know don\'t you?" 

*Welp. Can\'t lie Lily… so… Kats out of the bag. Pun intended.* "Sort of. I\'m curious yes, but it\'s my girlfriend that really wanted to know. She was just too embarrassed to ask, so I did it for her," said Kat. 

Oditr\'s eyes immediately found Lily\'s, who was trying her best to look innocent, and mostly succeeding. Having big golden cat eyes and cat ears helped her look exceptionally adorable. Oditr sighed at the display, "Fine whatever, I\'ll tell you. It\'s at least somewhat interesting. Took a fair bit of looking on a number of people\'s part…

"But the best guess that anyone has come up with, and the one I chose to believe? Dwarves naturally have a disposition for fruit juice, or perhaps, it\'s more accurate to say that a long, long time ago we did. Somewhere along the line, that taste evolved from \'fruit juice\' into \'fermented fruit juice\' which, as you might or might not know, is one of the paths to alcohol. 

"The logic thus goes, that for some reason, I\'ve picked up the tastebuds of ancient dwarves instead of our current preferences. We don\'t really know why, but my parents were pretty old when they had me, and my grandparents were pretty old when they had my dad. So it\'s possible that I\'m a lot fewer generations removed from those… let\'s call them \'Ancient Dwarves\'. I\'m a lot fewer generations removed from the ancient dwarves then normal, and as such, had a higher chance of developing this condition. 

"The strange thing is, it\'s never been documented before. There was an assumption, with my being Queen of the Dwarves and rather publicly known for the condition that a number of dwarves would come forward and reveal that they too had this condition but were scared to admit to because… well because as a society we\'re pretty well hooked on alcohol. It\'s a hard thing to admit considering the social stigma you\'d gain if you did…

"But nope. Nobody has legitimately come forward with the condition. We\'ve got a few letters about grandparents or grand-grandparents that have sine passed that supposedly had the condition… but that\'s impossible to verify really. We\'ve had a few others come and claim they had the condition as well… but it didn\'t take much testing to reveal they were all lying. Not sure why they bothered to do that…"

Kat felt her eye twitch at that. She wasn\'t exactly sure why that happened, until she sneezed afterwards. Obviously it was the sneeze that\'s why. Oditr continued, "Well no that\'s not quite true. At least one of them was a perspective suitor of mine, but the other two weren\'t… or at least, I don\'t think they were. So I\'m at a loss as to why they\'d bother to lie about something like that. Sure having it is one thing… but being known for lying to the queen? That can\'t be a good look."

"Some people will do anything for attention," suggested Kat. 

Oditr shrugged, while Lily tried to muster up her courage. Kat started to gently rub Lily\'s back with her tail, and apparently that was enough encouragement for Lily to speak. "Um… so you said that\'s why you think you prefer fruit juice… but is that all you drink now? Or is there like… other stuff?" 

Oditr made a \'so-so\' gesture and explained. "I\'m not incapable of drinking other things, just that when the choice is presented to me I\'ll always choose fruit juice. There\'s enough water in it that I don\'t need to drink that much either, though I still do. Usually before bed to help clean out my mouth." Lily gave Oditr a look, the dwarf somehow managed to interpret. "Hey, I clean my teeth properly, it\'s just a mental thing I think. I like to drink water afterwards ok?" 

Lily nodded, "Yeah I kinda get it," 

*I don\'t really. But then again, I mostly just drink water so perhaps that\'s why.*

[Sometimes I really wonder how pleasant growing up in that orphanage was Kat. I know you like Gramps… but really just water?]

*Oh… see... Gramps did offer us other stuff, but I\'d just save it to bribe the younger kids not to cause trouble. Made less work for me.* Lily let out a long sigh. Yup. That was her girlfriend.