As it turns out carving was not one of Mibbet’s strong suits at the start. (To be fair the whole opposable... or any... for that matter thumbs thing was quite new to her, so maybe we should cut her a little slack on that front.)

Still she had plenty of chance to practice here, and thanks to a hell placed spell by Hagatha the images she had drawn were projected onto the wood. Of course that didn’t stop her hammering, I mean malleting (please don’t tell Hagatha) her fingers thing, and more than one nick with a chisel meant that despite Wormwood’s best effort to keep the anointing process cruelty free the damned thing was given an extremely thorough accidental blood sacrifice or ten. (Which in all fairness is a logical conclusion to the thought you should suffer for your art. Because any sculptor using wire, stone, clay, or wood will tell you that you definitely will.

What had she been thinking with an angelic fallen Buttons Grey bearing his brother aloft. Sure the scene had been touching, and definitely made her smile at the time but why the hell had she actively chosen to carve feathers? Did she not notice how many bits were involved in the damned things despite riding an owl-bear into battle? Here’s a hint, there were a lot of them, like waaay too many of them.

Yet despite all that and the choking dust she found herself really enjoying her work springing to life, and she was quickly learning that even if altering her design went against the grain you never ever EVER went against the grain. Well not unless you wanted the sculpture to seem so lifeless that not even a master necromancer could make it lively.

************************************************************************

Hagatha and Hestia watched on in shock. They had a suspicion that they had a budding bristlehead on their hands from the start, yet this was really beyond their expectation.

She was no weaver they knew that much, but on a design front she had a real knack. (Though anybody who knows anything about art will tell you not to point that out to her or she WOULD double down on the fault finding, and there were always faults to find... so... many... faults.)

So they did the kindest thing they could and didn’t suggest any modifications lest the frenzy descend upon their newest friend. Eventually Hestia pulled Hagatha to one side, carefully out of earshot for a talk.

“That’s one nasty curse that she’s been hit by aint it?” She asked. “I see bonding to the deep soul, there’s two of them in there. Wonder if there’s anything we can do to help them.”

"Nope there isn’t, and at the level of bond they’ve hit they wouldn’t thank us even if we could. Do you think the frog would thank us for going back to the pond after all this? Cause I think now she wouldn’t last five minutes out there. Either that or she’d teach the other frogs everything she’s learned, and personally I think that every frog in the kingdom being able to use magic wouldn’t end well for humanity, I mean we used to eat them.”

“So a world where only Wormwood and her herbivore horde would be spared” Hestia chuckled. “But what about The Princess herself? Surely being in a timeshare body can’t be all that sweet for her.”

“I wouldn’t know, we could ask her, but for now it’s best that we don’t distract her for anything. Remember how Wormy gets when you interrupt her in her garden? Not to mention Song can be downright cranky when elbow deep in an array. Neither of those are armed with multiple sharp objects and kinda infamous for their temper either. It seems this whole timeshare deal has really mellowed her out a lot.”

Hestia looked again, she couldn’t miss that sparkle in the duo’s eyes. (It was so hard to acknowledge sometimes that there were two souls in there, whatever witch had cast that spell it had backfired in a spectacular manner.) They really did make a good team, where things were too hard for the frog to manage The Princess took over, and from the stories she had been hearing lately it seemed that was a two way street. Still Hestia felt that as a good friend she should still at least offer to help, even if that offer was still rejected it would be the right thing to do.

************************************************************************

Mibbet finally managed to get the shape “roughed out” after hours and hours of work, and it really paid off. She was rewarded with files and paper, and the instruction to do even more bloody sanding.

She felt at this point that her arms were about to drop off, but she’d worked too hard on this to give up now. She would see this through or die trying. (Right now though she was so bloody knackered she was pretty sure that the outcome could go either way.)

Wormwood reappeared with more coffee, and this one was just the way she liked it. Black as the abyss, and strong enough to practically melt the spoon. Mibbet nodded in thanks and took a quick swig, ignoring the expression of horror on all assembled. Hestia was probably wondering whether she would notice if she accidentally swigged the metal polish instead. (In truth she really would, if for no other reason than the lack of caffeine. Mibbet had a tendency to notice when she was drinking decaf. One that usually lead to cranky rampages which would not exactly go well for anybody.)

Oddly Mibbet was starting to use Choppy in her sculpting, being more familiar with it than any proper carving tool it seemed she was better with it. The dust was stinging her eyes really badly by now, but it was all coming together into a true work of art.

************************************************************************

Hestia watched her work with open admiration, wondering whether The Princess knew about the other curse, it was weak and practically passive, but somebody had to have told her right?