"Well, you'd better. Most of the musicians have forgotten all about it, but Wesley still thinks the animal stunt is cause for a pay raise."

"Rogers, I don't have the time for this right now. I'll make it up to him after the wedding. If there even is a wedding at this point."

"To be fair, it was a pretty dumb thing to say."

Trust the turtle to state the obvious.

"I know, I know, I messed up. Again. Can we move on now to the part where I fix this?"

"Pfft, zat should be obvious, non? Go and pick some flowers, give her a smooch, et voilà! It is fixed."

Normally Derek resented the addition of Jean-Bob to their inner circle at the top of the tower. For so long it had been the comfortable sanctuary where he, Brom, and Rogers came to play chess, enjoy Stutgard brew, and pick over the finer details of the latest tournaments. After that business with Rothbart and the Great Animal, Derek hadn't minded including General Puffin and Lorenzo Tra… Tru… whatever, Speed in on it.

It was Odette's other friend that presented a problem. It wasn't just Jean-Bob's voice that grated on him. It was his arrogance, his inability to comprehend that he was not, in fact, a prince, and the fact that he was constantly flirting with Derek's betrothed. Not that Derek was particularly worried. Jean-Bob was, after all, a frog.

And right now, he was actually grateful for his advice.

"Of course, I vould never 'ave said anything so stupid if Odette vas my bride."

Then there was that.

"Derek," said Rogers, "before you apologise, I think you've got to ask yourself first why you keep putting your foot in your mouth around her."

He had a point. Derek threw himself in the windowseat and racked his brain, but nothing. There had been numerous instances throughout his childhood summers when Odette refused to talk to him, then the infamous "What else is there?" catastrophe, then the Overgrown Sheep Debacle last month, and now this. Why did he keep messing up, saying the wrong things? He was drawing a blank.

"I just… she – well, there… I don't know!" He finally spluttered. "I never had this problem with other girls."

"That's just it, there, Derek. She's not a girl."

All heads turned towards Brom, leaning against a tapestry on the wall, who may or may not have just said the most stupendously idiotic thing any of them had ever heard.

"Er, actually, she is, Brom," said Speed kindly.

"No, no, no," Brom shook his head. "I mean, of course she is, but Derek, she's not a girl to you. She's just, you know, Odette. She's not like those noble's daughters you used to sneak around with when the queen wasn't looking."

"You're right, she's not. She's a hundred times more beautiful, much more of a girl than any of the others. What are you getting at?"

"Odette grew up with us." Brom frowned, unable to think exactly how to articulate what he meant to say. "You needed to impress those other girls, but Odette's, you know, seen you covered in tomatoes. She put you in a cast and sling for three months. So you don't need to impress her. Or you think you don't, so you don't really think about what you do or say around her. Sort of like when you're around me, because we're friends. And that's good, you should be friends with her. But I think maybe she'd like to be treated like one of those other girls every now and again."

The room went quiet for a moment. And then –

"Non, non, non – flowers, I tell you. It's ze only way!"