diligence, chapter 5

Primrose said it one afternoon when Aurora was leaving after her latest watering, as casual as if he’d been discussing the weather. Maybe after many cycles of ambrosia harvest, it was just that simple for him. “Come early tomorrow,” he said. “The blooms should be ready to harvest in the morning, and I’ve found we can extract the most nectar in the morning.”

“Really?” Aurora was positively beaming at the news, earning a raised brow from Primrose.

“Ah– yes, I suppose. It might not be an exact science, but I have found it to generally be true among the harvests here that they’re most bountiful earlier in the day…”

“No, no,” she hummed, waving off his misunderstanding with a dainty wave of her hands. “I mean, are they really ready? It’s felt like ages since I first spilled that bag of seeds!” She giggled, though judging by the harsh look on Primrose’s features, the incident might have still been a soft spot for him. Even if it felt like ages, in reality, it hadn’t been that long since she’d almost ruined an entire season’s worth of ambrosia seeds by running headlong into Primrose.

He cleared his throat. “Yes, well, I’m just relieved that your diligence has produced what looks to be a fruitful harvest this time. I trust that I’ll see you in the morning?”

“Of course!”

Early as Aurora felt that she was, it was no surprise to the succubun that when she arrived, Primrose was already adjusting a few different baskets in front of the patch she’d tended over the past weeks. He wore a pair of gardening gloves and apron, and in one of the baskets was another matching set– though instead of the soft cream hue of Primrose’s own, this set was a gentle pink. “A gift,” he explained before she could ask. “The… nectar will stain your clothes if you’re not careful.”

“Oh,” Aurora said, too touched to formulate a proper response beyond picking up the gear and trying them on. “For me? You’re sure?”

Primrose turned to her, and it was obvious to her in that moment that he found giving a gift nearly as embarrassing as she found receiving one. “Y-Yes, well… like I said, it will protect your clothes from becoming stained. We’ll be harvesting the flowers, but also processing them into their separate parts, too.”

Aurora tilted her head. “Separate parts? Don’t they all just make ambrosia, or whatever?”

Primrose seemed far more comfortable moving into explaining, though not without a heavy sigh as he knelt down and waved her over to observe. “We utilize every single part of the flower,” he explained. “Even in the Heavenly Meadow, where ambrosia grew far more abundantly, we were taught that each part of the flower is valuable.”

“Ah,” Aurora mouthed, taking a gloved finger to run over one of the petals. In her weeks of persistent monitoring and watering the plants, she realized then that she hadn’t taken a chance to get close and truly appreciate the blooms. The ambrosia flowers before her seemed to almost glimmer slightly in the warm light of the greenhouse, the multi-hued petals so soft and thin that she hesitated to even touch one with her fingertip.

“We can make herbal teas and other beverages from the petals,” Primrose explained, watching her admire them. “I doubt that you could drink them any more than we could drink alcoholic beverages, but they have a sort of… indescribable flavor on the tongue. Beanny is always trying something new with them.”

“Booze for cherubuns?” Aurora joked, earning a small, only half-serious scoff from Primrose.

“Not at all. We’ll use the leaves and stems to create medicinal ambrosia that can cure any manner of ails, and the nectar itself can be distilled into transformative ambrosia.” As he explained, he took two fingers to adjust one of the flowers, showing first its green stem and then the inside of the bloom.

“Oh. So, in essence, booze for cherubuns,” she said decisively, and she even got a well-earned amused sniff from Primrose.

“Sure, though it has no inebriating effect on us, so not like booze at all,” he replied. Before she could insist, he continued. “The important thing to understand is that we’ll need to separate out the different parts of each bloom as we go. Everything keeps better that way, and it will save us some time overall.” Aurora nodded. “Alright. I’ll do a few blooms first so you can see, then I’ll watch you do a few…”

In the end, she was a relatively quick study, watching Primrose dismantle a few of the ambrosia flowers (with just a hint of sadness, considering all the work they’d taken to get to this point!) before attempting her own. “Snip a bit lower, we can get more nectar out that way,” he explained on her first try, reaching over to point out where she should aim the small pair of clippers in her gloved hands. “You don’t need to strip the leaves, just the petals.” 

Aurora nodded, and after just a few little critiques and only a handful of mangled flowers, she was evidently able to be trusted well enough for Primrose to only look up now and then. She looked up, too, in fairness, though mostly to try and mimic the pace he was working at.

“Slow down,” came his nearly immediate chastising, though his next words were softer. “It’s more important to do it correctly than fast, just like when you planted the seeds in the first place. You’ll get quicker with each harvest.”

“Mm,” was Aurora’s reply, though after a few moments she glanced up over the flower that she was working on. “So… next harvest, huh?”

Primrose didn’t reply for a few moments, though she could hear his own clippers still working at a few of the stems near him. “You’re under no obligation, of course,” he answered. “I would say that after today, we’re even for that little accident with the seeds.”

Even still, Aurora cringed thinking of it. Sort of silly how it had all happened, but even now, her arms aching from the hundreds of tiny, beautiful blooms they were picking apart, all to create a beverage that she couldn’t even consume, she could only feel a sense of relief that she could come back again and continue taking care of the flowers. “I would like that, sincerely,” she replied, tossing a few of the petals from the flower in her hands into the appropriate basket. “There’s something else that I would like to help out with, too, if I’m allowed.”

Primrose placed a couple petals from his own flower in the basket. “And what would that be?”

“You’re going to make ambrosia with this stuff now?”

“Well, yes, like I explained–”

“Mhm. You talked about all kinds of ambrosia.”

“...Yes?” Primrose’s hands stopped working so he could look up completely at Aurora, his typically stern expression only twisted into one of slight confusion.

“I’d like to help with that, too,” she said decisively, not stopping what she was doing but meeting his eyes nonetheless. He seemed to visibly soften. “If there’s so many different types to make, I’m sure another set of hands would lighten the load.”

“Ah. It’s a rather delicate and time-consuming process, you know. And as I said before, you’re certainly not obligated to help with it.”

“I know,” she answered. “You remember what you told me at the start, though, don’t you?” Her voice lowered just a bit and she raised a gloved finger. “‘Diligence isn’t just an afternoon of work.’ I’m serious about seeing this through!”

Primrose stared for a moment, before laughing genuinely. “Ah… did I really say it like that?”

“You did! You said it exactly like that!” she giggled.

“I suppose I was right, but I think I was also angry with you at the time,” he sighed, picking up his clippers again to move on to the next flower. “In any case… yes. You can help with the ambrosia, and the next harvest, too.”

Aurora picked up her own clippers, an unshakable smile left on her face as she moved on to the next flower.