Giggle. "How new?"

"Two hundred twenty by my count. I'm ninety, my friend here's the first one of her she ever heard of and she's that."

"Wow. That's pretty cool. How do you start?"

He turns to the other one. Whisper whisper. "...Figure we're sticking with tradition and not sharin' that."

"Is it rude of me to ask people this?" she wonders. "I don't really understand why it'd be a secret, but I don't want to cause offence."

Karil gives a deer equivalent of a shrug while the two diggers scratch their heads. "Hm, not really rude to ask, but kinda rude to keep on asking, or to try an' find out?

She nods. "Fair. Is it rude to ask why it's a secret, in the cases where it is?"

"A bit, yes."

"Well, that's frustrating, but alright, won't ask. Other than that, though, do you have magic?"

"Why do you think we're called diggers? We dig and we just know how to dig sturdy and well and make whole underground vaults an' tunnel systems. I'm nearly finished with the first one I'd call a proper home after six years working on it."

"That's awesome! And you live a long time, too?"

"Neither of us feel creaky-boned yet."

"Oh, are you two the only members of your species?"

"Nah, there's my mom and pa, and my friend's husband, and we heard of ten or twenty of more of us out by the world tree, some in the Reaches too, maybe more further. I'm the only one who likes languages so I get to be the one who talks to folks for everyone else."

"Hah, cool. What's the world tree? That huge tree I passed by on my flight here?"

Speaking of flight: back come the wings.

"Yep, just so. No real way to tell how old we can get without trying it, to hear the brainy types tell it. We got pixies beat at least." He chuckles.

She purses her lips. "Mm."

"Pixies they last about ten, twenty years. To hear them tell it they don't really think dying is so bad. New pixies are almost a copy of their parents, memory and all, you sniff."

"Oh. Why 'almost'?"

"Two parents, not just one. They get a blend."

"Huh. Fifty-fifty on memories and personality?"

"Sometimes sixty forty, but yeah. They talk about it a lot more than most everyone else. They talk more than most everyone else period."

"I think I want to meet one."

"Mm, meeting one's more like meeting twenty. And they're all asleep now anyway and would get right fierce if you woke them up."

"I can wait until they're awake." Especially since Terel said he'd want a day without her...