"Alright." I clap my hands together. "I'm no pixie, but I have learned a few tricks from living with one. Just copy me and I'll correct you if you stray." Embarrassment forgotten, Elise turns all business.

We walk through the somatic and verbal components with my nudging her magic into the proper channels. I can only offer a strong guiding hand compared to Apricot who can take control directly, but she catches on fairly quickly.

"...Regenerate!" Elise's magic flows into the patient, and although stymied by his mana, it does the job. "Slower than when you did it, but that's to be expected. It's working though, and I doubt anyone will mind that it takes a few hours to re-grow a finger instead of just one. Wake!"

"Huh?" The poor guard blinks and then smiles when he spots his finger. "See, that's what you should have asked for." He ribs his friend who wanted to be awake for the whole thing. I ignore the teasing and hand him a smoothie to drink since Elise put him under before I could give him one.

...

"Well done, Jana." Martin compliments his apprentice after her first successful cast.

"See, I told you that you could do it." I send her a smile. "Now, you three should practice on the rest of the soldiers, while I get started on my team. Do you still have those smoothies I gave you?"

"Yes, but could I get some of that calcium powder for them." I just hand her the jar I made and start on another. "That was just limestone poured into lemon juice, right?"

"Yup." I nod and turn to my people. "Hughes, you're not going to be able to walk for a few days, but I can make you a wheelchair to help you get around."

"As long as that lift of your's works or I can get a bed down here, that should be fine." He agrees. "I slept on the couch last night anyways, so it's not like I'll miss the loft bed."

"Idiot, Sorrel." I facepalm. "Why didn't you say something at dinner? I'll give you a proper bed down where you can reach for tonight. And, I still need to do a bit of enchanting for the elevator, but as long as I'm in the building all you have to do is push the button outside the doors and it will work for you."

"Thank you." He bows to me.

"So, who's first?" The three of them look at each other before the older men push Fawne forward.

"Cowards!" She shoots back at them, but takes a seat next to me. "And, Toni! No peeking when he does that first bit, I know how you get."

"Don't worry, she'll be fine." I reassure her partner. "She's going to be sick of these smoothies by the time we're done, but she'll be fine."

"Nng. Stupid beastkin appetite." My guard grumbles as I set a whole pitcher full in front of her. "I've eaten worse; a lot worse, but please tell me you still have some of those brownies left."

"One or two." I materialize another plate and snatch one for myself. "Now, drink up. I'll make sure Toni doesn't peek."

"Mhm." She grumbles and downs the pitcher as quickly as she can. "Oh, that fishy taste really comes through when you have to drink that much." She shakes her head after setting the pitcher down.

"Sorry, but you need that protein to grow muscles." I reply and then twirl my finger at Toni until she turns around. "Nighty night." I put Fawne under and immediately start dissolving the scar tissue of her stump.

"Hey!" Toni shouts when she tries to turn around only to find that her clothes are now holding her in place. "Dammit! Freaking crazy-ass mages always doing the impossible."

"I promised her that you wouldn't peek." I reply and move her arm to block her eyes when she tries to turn her head. "I could turn your top into a blindfold if you prefer." I threaten when she tries fighting her clothes to look anyways.

"Hahahaha! I think he's got you out classed Toni." Cyril laughs as she stops her struggling.

"It's alright, baby. You can look now." Fawne says after I wake her up. "There's not much to see just yet, but I can feel it working."

"Any issues with the larger limb?" Martin asks while all three healers probe her arm with their magic.

"No, the mana cost and complexity scaled up as expected." I say. "You and Elise should be able to handle anything up to small thigh but might have to work together for anything larger. Jana, you should be able to just handle a small arm like this, but I wouldn't recommend anything bigger than a woman's hand. And, only then, after practicing on a lot of fingers."

"Hopefully not too many." She giggles nervously at the thought of countless severed fingers.

...

"Man, where was one of those when I needed it?" Gen grumbles as Hughes plays around with his new wheelchair.

"Just be glad that you don't need it anymore." Fawne replies distractedly while playing with the tiny hand growing from her stump. "This is so weird."

"You keep saying that, dear." Toni rolls her eyes at the beastkin. "Looks like it's time to take your medicine again." She laughs when I place another pitcher in front of Fawne.

"Oh, joy." She sighs, but starts downing it anyways. I roll my eyes at her and turn to the pet carrier.

"Alright, Test Subject A." I pluck the first salamander from the cage again and feed it some more sap. "Sorry about this, but you've had to regenerate the least out of everyone." I knock it out again and wrap its kidney and part of its liver in my magic. The cleanse spell cuts them off at the same point that Gen is missing his before they get sucked into storage.

"Did you?.." Elise looks from me to the newt and back again.

"I need to know if this will work." I nod. "And, this way I'll be able to transplant it back if it doesn't. Thankfully, it doesn't seem like I'll need to do that." I send my healing sap to speed up the process, and the newt soon has perfect replicas of its missing parts.

"It worked!" Her eyes light up even more than when she saw the guard's finger start growing back.

"Yes, it did." I heave out a relieved sigh. "And, I have had more than enough of torturing these poor things for today." I set it back in the cage and turn to my people. "Time to torture my poor guards instead. Gen, want to find out what it feels like to re-grow a kidney?"

"..." He just gulps. He's not the only one.

"I take it back." Jana says with a nervous laugh. "You being able to put someone to sleep with a word isn't scary. Stealing organs out of a living body? Now, that's scary."

"What am I going to do with a bunch of organs?" I chuckle at her. "I don't even know what to do with this salamander kidney. Does anybody want it?" My chuckle turns into full-blown belly laughs at the looks on everyone's faces. "Not you, Gran, I don't even want to know what you'd do with it." That does the trick and soon everyone is laughing along with me.

"Oh, shut up and heal your man, so we can get started on the sauce." The chef grumps at me.

"Drink up, Gen." I hold out a large smoothie to him with a little healing sap in it to speed things up. "And, lie down here." I make a small cot for him. The healers and I gather around him when he does. "Do you three have a good image? Alright, we'll see you in a few minutes, Gen. Sleep! Cleanse! Regenerate!"

"It's working." Jana breathes out as if fearful to speak any louder than a whisper.

"Yes, it is." I agree. "And... that should be a good head-start. Time to wake up, Gen." I smile down at him when he blinks up at me? "How does it feel?"

"Alright, I guess." He shrugs. "I can feel that something is happening, but it's not uncomfortable or anything."

"Good." I nod sharply. "Just take it easy for now, maybe play some cards or board games while Granville and I work on the sauce." I fill the conference table with ways to pass the time. "And, think about what scars you all want to keep, if any. Once the big jobs are done, I'll start in on the more cosmetic stuff."

"Thank you." He nods to me, his voice filled with emotion.

"Thank me after you get sick of these things." I pull out a smoothie for myself to recover from the sap use. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to go grow some fruit for a crazy steak sauce."

Leaving everyone to their own devices, I head outside with Granville in tow to grow some tamarind.

...

"Not again." Fawne whines when yet another pitcher appears in front of her. "Damned beastkin physiology."

Gran and I are working on the latest of I don't even know how many batches of Worcestershire sauce. We're getting close though, and I can't wait until we nail it. But, while we've been working on that, I've also been monitoring my patients and feeding them smoothies as needed. Much to a certain beastkin's lament.

"They're not that bad." Hughes counters. "At least, not when you don't have to drink a whole pitcher of them at a time. I could do without my bones vibrating every few minutes though." I'd noticed the new bone was growing in weaker than the old. So, knowing that bones need to be stressed to grow strong, I started adding in that stress every so often.

"That I can handle." Her arm has been getting the same treatment; beastkin need strong bones to support all that strength, after all. "I've just never been a fan of fish, and even the small aftertaste in this gets to me."

"If it helps, it's not actually fish." I offer. "It's just a fishy-smelling plant." Not really a plant, but close enough. "You need the protein in it to grow your new muscles, but if it bothers you that much, I can replace it with some lentils and soy and roast up a bunch of chickpeas for you to snack on instead. I'd offer you some real meat, but with your appetite, I'd run out in no time."

"You could have said that before I downed the pitcher." She gets a light swat from Toni for that. "Sorry, I just really don't like fish."

"That's alright." I smile over at her in understanding. "I'd love to make some *tofu*, just to mess with Gran some more, but I don't have any of the coagulants. Hmm?" I send a speaker box down to Melanie who returned to her lab earlier. "Hey, Mels, do we have any gypsum?"

"You need to quit doing stuff like this, Sorrel." She huffs at the little box. "And, sorry, no."

"What about *Epsom* salt. Argh! Stupid translation." I grouse when the word doesn't come out right. "I bet we have it too, but I just don't know the right name. That just leaves calcium chloride... which is a byproduct of the *Solvay* process."

"Here we go again." She smirks, knowing that I just thought up something.

"Yeah, yeah." I roll my eyes and write down the process and formulas for her before teleporting it over through storage. "Here, this will make soda ash from limestone and brine, but what I want is the byproduct. It's a bit of a finicky process, if I remember correctly, but you should be able to handle it."

"We'll need more salt... thank you." A twitch develops under her eye when a bag of it materializes next to her. "And, you really need to finish writing down the rest of your alchemy knowledge."

"I know, I know." I sigh. "But, I don't remember what I remember until I remember it. I learned this stuff through rote memorization to pass a class, so most of it just sits in a dark closet at the back of my mind until something jostles it loose. Like just now."

"I understand." She copies my sigh. "But, it's still a little frustrating when you drop tidbits like this on me out of the blue. What triggered this one, by the way? Want some more lingerie for your girls?"

"No, just some food." I laugh. "I need it to coagulate some bean curd because a certain beastkin guard of mine is a picky eater." Toni cracks up at the flush that fills her partner's face.

"Heh." Melanie snorts. "Well, Eliot and the new workers seem to be handling the silk production well enough, so I'll get started on this."

"Thanks, Melanie." I fill my voice with sincerity. "You're the best, and I couldn't be doing any of this without you."

"Yeah, yeah. Just let me work." She waves her hand like she's trying to shoo away the speaker box. "And, no more making stuff just appear in front of me like this."

"Sorry. I'll just send a paper airplane next time." One pops into existence and circles the room before vanishing again. Seeing the twitch form under her eye again, I pull the speaker back into storage and leave her alone.

***