Meryn held up her hand and began counting off on her fingers. "Food. Shopping. Food. Entertainment and food."
Bethy laughed. "Meryn, each level is self-sufficient and trade directly among themselves for foods and goods. Going to Level Six everyday would be like going out to eat every night."
"And?" Meryn asked as if unsure of her point.
Bethy sighed. "Meryn, normally people don't eat out every night."
Meryn looked around the table guiltily. "Oh. Well, I didn't either before I met Aiden," she said quickly. "I cooked a ton of Hot Pockets for myself."
"Don't remind me," Ryuu murmured.
Etain relaxed back in his chair. "I'm glad to hear that the people still support our prince. It will make patrols go much smoother."
"Agreed." Adriel added.
"So like twenty thousand people huh?" Meryn hedged.
Bethy nodded. "Yes, Meryn."
"So, like these peeps are kinda like homebodies and don't get out much huh?"
Bethy shrugged. "I suppose."
"So, how do we know they aren't sick?" Meryn asked.
Etain felt his heart begin to race. He looked around the table to see varying degrees of horror on the faces of his closest friends.
Ellie, Rheia, Anne and Adriel stood quickly.
"Stop!" Kari shouted holding up her hand.
They turned to her, eyes wide.
"Running out of here with your hair on fire will not solve anything. Obviously if they are ill, they are not reporting it. If you all storm out of here panicked, we will have nothing but chaos on our hands."
Slowly, the four sat back down still looking a bit wild eyed.
Kari stood. "Let us instead have the normal level patrols done by the warriors go door to door for the next few days. We have not done a sweep in a while looking for our errant feral Augustus Pettier, let us use that as our explanation to speak with everyone."
Kendrick rubbed his chin as he stared at Meryn. "How is it that you somehow manage to see things we don't?"
Meryn shrugged and stared down into her latte. "My grandmother used to say that my defective brain focused on the wrong things."
Etain clenched his fists. More than once he had heard off comments about Meryn's grandmother, and none of them were good. Having gotten to know Meryn well over the past couple weeks he could only imagine how precocious she must have been as a child. She would have been a delight to know. It angered him that her upbringing had been anything but a happy one. Hearing the gasps around the table at her quiet comment he knew the others felt the same.
"You are not defective Meryn. You are extremely special and should be treasured as the rare mind you are. If I hear of anyone saying otherwise, they will have to face me," Magnus said his eyes darkening to a deep burgundy.
Meryn smiled shyly at his pronouncement while Aiden continued to rub his cheek against the top of her head. "So if I need a favor?" she started, a calculating look on her face.
Magnus smiled, his eyes returning to their normal color. "You have only to ask."
"Will you take me down to the vaults today? I'm kinda tired, so I was thinking we should just take it easy
and have some fun," she suggested.
Beside Magnus, Bethy stilled as did Adriel. Etain knew the two of them along with Sebastian had been pushing Magnus to rest more. The prince was pale and looked exhausted. A day with Meryn might be just the thing to help him recoup.
Magnus became thoughtful. "I do not know Meryn, so much is happening. I have the meetings with the Founding Family members this morning." He strummed his fingers on the table. "I could have Sebastian escort you down so you could pick out your rewards."