“Humph!”
Haymarlen closed her mouth. That hadn’t escaped from her. She hadn’t released a breath beyond one from her nose. But the timing was more than coincidence.
“Not to missed,” the voice, and thankfully not her own continued. “Is that what they call a tree-hugger now?”
Haymarlen looked across to the frosted-magenta-eyed maiden, cross arm- sprawled on the next one. “At least he’s gone, Flora. For a moment I thought that he could see me.”
Flora humphed again.
“He might be a ‘crime-fighter’, but he knows fiddle twigs about trees. Calling this one of those red-stalked, dull-leaved over-dominant aphid-attractors. What’s he going to call the ‘greater magnitude’ one? A Juniper?”
“I did the same thing the first time I saw one,” Haymarlen answered. “It takes long enough for us, and we’re only scratching the surface. How much more difficult is it for them?”
“It’s a Plane, Haymarlen,” said Flora, “A plane. Flaky bark, long trunk. I know which one I’d rather be perched in.”
As if in answer, the upper branches of the tree rustled, letting speckles of sunlight dance over the lounging pair, and making the gems in their circlets