There's one over there! She's attacking a car with a wrench. Constructively enough.

Okay. She can do this. It is a little scary because there are some things she has to say right at the start, but she knows what they are so she will start with them.

"Hi," says a very small, very dirty little girl that might be four or five, in a voice that only wavers a little. She has mud-soaked curls and pale skin and is definitely not human. "My mommy was a human and my daddy was a vampire, but they're gone. I had an uncle but I think he's gone now too. My name is Aurene, and," the pictures don't say she'll say no but what if she does anyway she's scared, "and, would. You please." Sniffle. "Be my auntie."

The vampire drops the wrench.

"Oh you poor thing," she coos, scooping Aurene up heedless of mud. "Of course I will. - how did you find me here, sweetheart -"

Oh good she is scooped she missed being scooped. Aurene clings.

"I um, I have pictures in my head? Uncle Blair said it was something called 'foresight.' And I followed the good ones."

"Foresight, wow, that's a very cool power," says Rosalie, arranging curls out of Aurene's face. "Let's go get you a bath, first thing, and while you're in the bath I'll turn a shirt into a dress your size, shall I?"

"Mmhmm," she whimpers. "Thank you, I. Really need a bath."

Rosalie brings her from the garage to the inside of the house and plops her clothes and all in the tub and helps her out of the muddy things while the water gets to the right temperature and fills up the tub. Once Aurene is situated with a bar of lavender-scented soap and a washcloth and some impromptu bath toys including a wooden bowl once full of potpourri and a stolen ear syringe, Rosalie digs into her closet and starts altering a nice yellow blouse with enough length to it to fit.

Aurene is a big girl, and so even though she would like it very much if she had help for her bath, it is fine she can figure it out. She is determined and the pretty lady is busy helping already.

There is a lot of mud, but she is in fact capable of scrubbing it all off. She feels much better already, even though not very much has happened.

The pretty lady comes back once the dress is all sewed up and washes her hair!

Oh, good! That was the part that was confusing her a bit!! And yay, she does get help after all!

"Thank you," she says, beaming and holding very still. Her hair is red, underneath the mud.

"You're welcome, sweetheart. Oh, what pretty hair you have!"

"Thank you! It's the same color as my mommy's. But it grows really long really fast and I don't like that at all! Whenever it gets too long I grab the ends of it and bite them off."

"Well, next time that happens we can get you a proper haircut instead."

"Okay! What's one of those like?"

"You use scissors to make sure all the hair is trimmed at the same length! And then you can put ribbons in it, if you like."

"Oh! Uncle Blair did that before. The scissors, not the ribbons, I don't think I've ever had ribbons in my hair. They sound pretty!"

"Then you will have ribbons!" says Rosalie, checking under tiny child toenails and fingernails for mud.

They do have some residual mud! Not very much, they're very short, and it seems like they have been chewed down instead of clipped.

"Okay!"

Rosalie has a nail file, actually, for when there's sparring and somebody chips a nail and can't find it on the ground. She fetches that and neatens up little nails.

Aurene watches with fascination, but does not resist the nail filing. It's weird, but grownups do a lot of fussing, and she absolutely wants to be fussed over right now.

"There, that's better." She will scrub Aurene's back where she can't reach, and let her play in the water till she's done, then let the bath out and give her a last rinse with fresh water. Here is a fluffy towel.

Oh man Aurene does not want to play in the water at all, she has had enough time in the water, thank you. Once she is properly clean she looks at Rosalie expectantly and moves on to the Next Step Of The Bathing Process.

The fluffy towel is great.

"Eeeeee," she says, wrapping it around herself.

"Aren't you just precious!" Scoop. Rub rub rub the towel into those pretty red curls till she is dry enough to try on her new dress.

"I am a precious little gremlin," agrees Aurene, with clear pride. Dry dry dry yessssss being the center of attention yesssss this is what this small child wanted she picked the best adult.

Okay! Dress.

The dress fits acceptably. "I'm going to have to take you shopping," Rosalie muses. "My - uh - my family will be home in a few hours, and then once you've been introduced we can nip out to Sears and see what they have."

"Okay! You can ask me questions now if you wanna, and if you would please snuggle me while doing it. It's going to be easier if you explain me to them after I explain me to you."

Rosalie locates a hair ribbon and starts braiding Aurene prettily. "Can you tell me what happened to your mommy and daddy and uncle?"

"Mm. I know about my mommy and daddy, but I don't know about my uncle. My mommy had me in her tummy, but when daddy got me out, the..." She squints and remembers her Uncle Blair's exact phrasing, "'venom didn't take fast enough' and she didn't make it. And then my daddy was really sad and I think wanted to go, too, and Uncle Blair said it was kinder. But I do not know what happened to him, because I was sleeping and then he threw me anyway and told me to run, so I did." Little sniffle, can it be snuggle time please. "But I think I must have done something wrong because all of the pictures were bad and I can't find him anywhere and I had to do so much swimming to get to any of the good ones."

Rosalie snuggles her very snugly. "The pictures were bad?"

"Mhmmm. Some of them had fire and then darkness and some of them had scary vampires with murder eyes yelling and a few had scary people in dark cloaks with their fingers reaching into people's heads and I mostly didn't want to look at the specifics because I was very busy."

"...I see. My - brother - can read minds, so he might want to look at what you remember about those pictures, okay? To find out what we need to do to keep you safe."

"Mhmm. I don't see them anymore, though, they're gone. I remember them, but that's it, I can't look. Also can I please stay near you while he's here? That way he won't ask me to think about them until I'm ready, he's scared of you. ... And also really grumpy."

"Yes he is. I'll stay with you, sweetheart, don't worry."

"Okay, good. Thank you. His face is always scrunched up, no matter where I look. I like you and the other ones better."

"The other ones are very sweet. Their names are Carlisle and Esme Cullen, and the grumpy one is Edward."

"Okay! I'll remember. And what do I call you besides the pretty rose wrench lady, because that seems kind of a rude thing to call you by, but I'm sorry the pictures didn't tell anything better."

"I'm Rosalie." She is finally satisfied with this really rather overcomplicated braid and beribbons it. Finds a mirror to display Aurene to herself in.

"Oh! Maybe that's where the roses came from! I was wondering, they didn't make sense." She looks at herself in the mirror and tilts her head. "I like having it out of my way and the braid is pretty but I miss having little curls, next time can you do one that leaves little..." She twirls her finger around in a little circle. "Oh, I see one, like this!"

She reaches over and gently touches Rosalie's hand and a gorgeous painting blooms in her mind. It is of an artfully painted Rosalie, braiding the hair of a similarly painted Aurene, sitting on a bed that fades out into nothingness, like the paintbrush ran out of paint mid-canvas. There are, indeed, little curls, prettily left out of the braid. Interestingly, the painting is... not entirely accurate to something that would actually happen in the future. Rosalie is in a certain white dress she might recognize, but with gold eyes instead of newborn red, and is accessorized with gorgeous roses that are the same bright, brilliant red as blood.

"I can do it like that next time, yes - I don't have that dress any more -"

"Oh. The pictures like dramatics, is how Uncle Blair described it. It liked to dust him with ashes and make his fingers bloody. They like putting you in that dress, I don't know why. It's pretty, though."

"It's certainly dramatic. So you can show people your foresight paintings, huh?"

"Mhm! Only when touching, though. Uncle Blair had me check, and it didn't work."

"Well, they're very pretty. And not, hm, literal?"

"They are! I like them. ... Mmm. Sometimes they are and sometimes they're not? It varies. I don't know why. Sometimes it's really obvious but sometimes it's sneaky and I don't see how until it's not a picture anymore."

"Huh. I've never heard of a power like yours before.

Aurene, what do you eat? And how much of it?"

"Birds are my favorite, they're fun to catch! But I can eat other things, too. Not people, people are not for eating, but lots of animals. Even fish, but I don't want to eat any of them for a while. And human food, I can also eat human food, but that's usually even more gross."

"Okay, are you hungry now?"

"Mmm-mmm. I ate before I found you because if I didn't we'd have to unsnuggle and I didn't wanna."

"Well, I could probably figure out how to buy some chicken without unsnuggling you but it would make it hard to hunt, yes."

"Mhm! This is better."

"How many birds?"

"Oh! Ummmmm. Well it's changed as I've gotten bigger? And it depends on the size of the bird. I used to be full with just one or two little ones, but now I can go through six or more bigger ones if I'm really hungry. But birds are easy to find and fun to catch so I tend to grab them whenever I see a chance and no humans can see me do it."

"Okay. We can take you out hunting every day if that's what you need."

"Oh! Yeah, I do catch some every day, I get hungry if I don't eat anything."

"We don't usually hunt that often but it's no trouble."

"Okay! I can catch them all by myself, anyway, I don't need to be thrown to them anymore."

"Thrown to them! Do you still like being thrown to them?"

"Yes! It's fun even if I don't need it."

"Well, I can probably throw you at birds all right."

"Eeeee!" she says, bouncing a little in Rosalie's arms. "Then yes that would be very fun, thank you. Now the pictures have you throwing me at birds so much, I wasn't even trying for that!"

"Are you usually trying for everything that happens to you?"

"Mmmm. Not usually but I have been a lot lately. Uncle Blair was easy and I didn't really have to try for things to be good with him, they just were? And things are getting that way with you but there's... lots of potential pictures to get settled, and not all of them are as nice as the others. And I don't like that at all, I have had enough bad pictures, so I am aiming for the very best."

"Huh... how do you do that?"

She gives a thoughtful hum and starts nibbling on one of her nails.

"I.... try to? Like... like running through a new place I've never been, at top, top speed, and paying as much attention to things that are far, far in the distance as possible, and then continuing to move in that direction while I... figure out how to navigate a twisting jungle of pictures to get there, even though it keeps moving every time I move, while also still doing things that are not just looking? It's hard."

"That sounds really hard, yeah. Gosh. - how old are you?"

"Ummm. My birthday is on the 19th, but Uncle Blair said we celebrate it monthly instead of yearly because I grow so fast and he didn't want me to miss out. And we have celebrated five of those. But then I was running around without him for a while and I might have missed one."

"It's the eighteenth now. So I guess your birthday is tomorrow! That's not very much time to plan your party."

"Oh! It's not, but that's okay. I don't like cake and it's just an excuse to celebrate me being born anyway. Finding good new grownups is a very good good birthday present."

"Oh good. And I suppose we are going to be getting you a whole wardrobe."

"Mhm! Can I help pick my clothes, Uncle Blair wasn't very good at it. I think you're better at it, but I still like picking."

"Of course! I'll bring you to Sears and we can look at everything they have. Do you know how to act human in front of people?"

"Yeah! You should hold me for most of the time there though, sometimes I still break things even though I don't mean to if I get too excited. But I know that if anyone asks I just tell them my birthday was on the nineteenth and let my grownup say what year it looks like I turned!"

"Very clever. I can carry you the whole time, I'm not going to get tired of it."

"Okay! I will eventually but not for a while." Snuuuuuugs.

Snuuuugs! "What were your parents' names?"

"Yvette and James Orland. They were married. But mommy used to be 'Lowell' and Uncle Blair said it made more sense for me to go by that when I was with him, and I don't think he liked to think about daddy very much."

"So he was your mother's brother, I see... would you rather be Orland, now, or use my last name, or Carlisle's last name?"

"Mmmm... It'd be weird to be Orland now when I haven't been at all. But I don't know what other one would make the most sense. I want it to make sense and have none of the humans question it at all.... But can I keep Lowell somewhere, maybe as a secret? I don't need the humans to know it, but. .... Uncle Blair did his very best."

Sniffle. Sniffle sniffle.

"Well, right now I'm not married, but if I get married one day I'll have a new last name. The one I have right now is Hale. Sometimes we pretend to have different names so we'll seem related in different ways. So how about for now, if any humans ask, you can be a Hale, and pretend that I was your daddy's sister, but we'll know that you're Aurene Lowell, all right?"

"O-okay," she agrees, a little wetly. Sniffle. "Daddy had the same hair color as you, too."

"There you go, then. And right now we're pretending that Carlisle and Esme are my cousin and cousin-in-law, and Edward is Esme's brother, but it'll be something else next time we move."

Nodnod, nodnod. This makes sense to her.

"I would please like you to be my auntie every time, if that's okay. At least while I'm little."

"I think we can do that."

"Okay. Thank you." Sniffle, sniffle. "Can I cry on you?"

"Of course, sweetheart."

"Thank you," she mumbles, and then she clings and begins quietly crying.

Pet pet. Rock rock.

Yeah, she's going to need a while. She has done a lot of crying in her time without Uncle Blair, but the pictures were never this nice and safe then. And now they are. She doesn't understand why, but that hurts.

Rosalie will hold her and sway and pace and eventually sing.

She squeezes slightly harder when Rosalie begins singing, and mumbles, "You're a very good singer could you p-please, keep. doing it."

Of course. Rosalie nods and sings every song she's ever heard since she was turned.

Aurene is so glad.

Eventually she does give a couple final sniffles and stops crying, but still nonetheless seems very unwilling to unsnuggle.

Rosalie will not get tired of this.

When her family comes home they are pre-bewildered before even opening the door, because of -

- Edward.

"Hello, Aurene," he says.

"Hi," she mumbles, from Rosalie's arms. She THINKS he should already know the general idea of who she is and why she is here because he is a MIND READER, but if he doesn't, Aurene followed the pictures to get here. She lost all of her adults and wanted new ones and she was very picky but found some anyway, they have gold eyes and everything, ha. And now Rosalie can probably explain the rest please, explaining to four vampires is scarier than just explaining to one, and explaining to one was also very scary.

(Separately, she thinks that it's kind of rude to say someone's name before they've introduced themself. Her uncle taught her manners for her things she shouldn't rightly know yet, where is his uncle, hmmm?)

Edward raises an eyebrow. Looks at Rosalie.

"She's a half-vampire. Somehow. Her mother died bearing her, her father must have been mated to her mother and is also gone, her mother's brother Blair was looking after her but I think someone may have suspected her of being an immortal child and he - covered her escape, I think. We should get out of the area, move around more than usual, maybe camp for a year, maybe go to Denali - she's six months tomorrow, it won't last long. If you argue with me about it I'm taking her and going without you."

"No one's arguing with you about it," says Edward.

Little, tiny giggle. Rosalie is so cool. See! That was so much better than what she could have done! She's so pleased.

"It's very nice to meet you, Aurene," says Carlisle. "It was very clever of you to find Rosalie."

"Mmmmnot really? It was hard but not really clever," she corrects. "Clever was digging a hole into a hill from underwater for a place to sleep so nobody could find me. I know the difference." Wait, oops, she skipped a step. "... Hi, it's nice to meet you, too."

"I'm Esme," says Esme. "We're very glad to have you with us. May I hold you?"

"Okay," she agrees, nodding. She gives Rosalie a squeeze and then goes to hug the other grownup. "You were my second choice," Aurene informs her, because this is high praise and probably she should know it.

"I'm so delighted to hear it," says Esme. "Welcome to the family."

"I'm going to take her to Sears for clothes and possibly other birthday presents, if you-all could get started on the process of extracting us from the likely search radius."

"We can do that. Carlisle and I may need to stay for at least a week or two at work but you can go ahead of us."

Wait, no, that doesn't.... that doesn't look right, something important is going to be missing she sees it she remembers where it used to be.

"...Mmm..."

Aurene frowns and gives a hum.

".... but there's about to be another one?"

"...again? Already?"

"...do you know who it is, sweetheart?"

"Um. You were carrying him? He's very big and smiley and you were happier with him there. I can try to find him and show you, but he's... buried under... this."

By 'this' she means, specifically, 'the situation my presence has caused.' It looks sort of like a wall of (messy, fragmented, painted on top of each other) artwork has covered what used to be there, but... she remembers. She can't show anyone, but Edward can see what she saw. A fallen, bloody bear, a large man with dark curls whose chest has been torn open by it, a flash of Rosalie scooping him up and carrying him off to a golden light, leaving blood red rose petals in her wake. Then his eyes opening newborn red.

"We could save him without turning him, with - advance information, couldn't we -"

"Mmmnn."

Probably, and that's... better...? but she's not sure it's the best. And it doesn't... he was... Edward's missing something important... she pulls up other memories of what she saw, wishing she'd been paying more attention then. It didn't seem important, then, but it was. He was happy, as a vampire? She slides memories of moving paintings across her mind, he was one of the happiest here, he brightened Rosalie up so much—oh! Oh, yes, this one she saw, and stopped to look at to figure out what it meant because it was weird. It illustrates the thing perfectly! Okay here.

It is an artistic rendering of the man that will be Rosalie's mate mid-turning. Stylized, greyscale fire burns him from the heart out, burning slowly, draining him of color, and tears run down his pained face. There is a golden light beside him, and in it is Rosalie. The man twitches, and he reaches up to take her hand, and she says with him while he burns. The tears still fall, but he smiles.

There was a thing that was going to be there and it was beautiful and valuable and, and. Aurene would be sad if they just. Decided to make none of that happen at all. Because it's easier.

"Rosalie's mate," says Edward. "She'd like him to be part of the family, apparently. She thinks he'll be happy."

"None of us chose this, Aurene," says Carlisle softly. "None of us would inflict it on someone who had a choice short of death."

"Mmmmmnnhmm." She brings her fingers to her lips to nibble at her fingernails.

There are probably paintings she could look through to figure out how to get to where she wants. But she doesn't want the paintings, the paintings are hard and annoying and fiddly and don't always work. Uncle Blair said the paintings could become a crutch if she lets them, she has a point and she wants to make it and, and. She thinks she can make it with words.

"... But it is anyway, though." It is transparently obvious to this half human, half vampire, that humans like her mother are very squishy and breakable and die very easily. They always die. "And he might want something different."

It is NOT FAIR to not let him PICK. That was why Uncle Blair was raising her at all, so she could get to CHOOSE (what she wanted to do about Thing That Looms), it is IMPORTANT.

"Sweetheart, do you know how old your uncle or your father were?"

"Mm-mmmm," she says, shaking her head.

She doesn't see what this has to do with anything, but, okay?

"Vampires can die too. Sometimes they die younger than some humans. And - it's going to be especially dangerous to be around us, for a while, while you're growing, and -

- if you tell me you want this man to be your uncle, that you're going to miss him, we can go - track him down in some way that doesn't let me see him, and ask, but we all agree that the only thing it would make sense for him to say would be no."

"Mmmmmm." Nibble nibble nibble these poor little fingernails.

"I... would miss him, he was happy, but." This is not the crux of her argument. His choice matters more than whether or not she'd miss him, him saying no and meaning it would be important. It would mean that, that. She didn't show up and change all the paintings and erase his entire life-that-could-have-been without him ever even knowing. She showed him, and he decided which path he wanted to take, and that is the best thing she could have possibly done. If he decides to leave it and erase all she'd seen, that's sad but it's fine? Her mommy dying to bring her into this world was also sad, but. It was what she chose.

"...I'm not sure how much we want me to be rendering this argument verbally," murmurs Edward.

"Honey," says Esme, "except Carlisle, vampires - wind up killing people. It's an awful thing to wrestle with."

…. Okay, this is apparently new information to her. But killing people is bad! And, and. They have gold eyes!! They are good vampires, she checked!!

"Yes, we eat animals," says Edward. "But it's hard not to kill people. Carlisle is as far as we know the only vampire who never has."

"I didn't eat any people," mutters Rosalie.

Sniffle.

… Vampires maybe killing people throws a wrench into her whole argument, and she doesn’t know how to recover. She can passionately regurgitate what is clearly her late uncle’s philosophy at them, or at least at Edward, but actually refuting a new point is a bit beyond this six month old child.

So instead she guesses she’ll just cry, because she is sad, and because using your words is so hard.

Rosalie collects her back from Esme and snuggles her.

Yes, okay. Snuggles. Snuggles and quietly crying. She seems kind of close to throwing an actual tantrum, at least to Edward’s senses, but it mostly seems to be about how hard it is to make yourself heard and know all of the things instead of not having this Cool New Family Member.

Pet pet pet. Poor kiddo.

(Edward whispers, a little, to check her hearing and then to communicate about the prospective tantrum.)

There is definitely a range that she can't hear! It is perfectly possible to conspire against her with her none the wiser.

Emotions are hard, and while she doesn't really know her own mind yet, it's clear that she's emotionally exhausted. It makes her a little cranky but being snuggled is extremely nice. It becomes clear as she flails at her own emotions that she is not actually going to throw a tantrum, at least not right now. She is still scared that the good pictures will scatter to bad ones of fire and darkness and fingers in minds and that she will lose even more grownups and she'll be alone again, and. No. That would be bad. She doesn't actually know these four very well, even if Rosalie is extremely nice and good at snuggles and thoughtful, and so she doesn't feel like they are immutably on her side. They could just leave! Whenever they wanted! It's scary. So she will be very good and maybe they won't leave her.

(And maybe, if she's very clever, they won't die.)

"Thank you," she mumbles, because her Uncle Blair did teach her manners. ("Sorry kiddo, it's what your mom would have wanted. A polite little bitey gremlin.")

"You don't need to be sorry, sweetheart." Pet pet. "Do you sleep?"

"Mhmm. My bedtime is eight o'clock."

"Okay. Esme, can you set something up -"

Esme goes.

Aurene seems content to let her newfound agency slip away and be a cute small child that is held and snuggled by the adults! This is fine. She was tired of doing things anyway.

...

But she is definitely keeping more of an eye on the paintings than she had been with Uncle Blair, because never again will she be caught off guard like that. Never.

"Let's go to Sears, sweetheart."

Rosalie puts on a hooded jacket and carries Aurene to Sears through the partly-cloudy afternoon. Sears has clothes for little girls.

Yay! Clothes for little girls!

She likes bright colors and ribbons and little bows and ruffles, and is very easily steered towards things that would actually look very cute on her!

Then she can have her whole wardrobe in short order. She's going to grow a lot very fast so Rosalie preferentially goes for things that are long enough and draw-strung enough to be let out in a couple weeks, and only buys a dozen outfits, but probably some of them will get ruined hunting or whatever so she does get the dozen Aurene likes best. And cute little shoes, and a Red-Riding-Hood-esque coat with a peaked hood.

She is delighted by the coat, but dismayed at the shoes. But they're uncomfortable! Annoying things on her feet! They're dumb and she doesn't need them!!!

"Humans need shoes, so you need shoes," says Rosalie, in a low voice. "Do you like another kind better?"

Pout.

".... No," she admits. "Do I have to wear them always?"

"Not in the house and not when you're just playing or chasing birds."

Siiiiiiiiigh.

Fortunately this is a fight that Aurene has had many times with at least one grownup already, so. Yes. Fine. She'll tolerate it. But be very pouty. And wear the dumb shoes.

Rosalie thinks the shoes are very adorable but does not dwell on this aloud. She swings through the toy section, since it's Aurene's birthday tomorrow.

Hmmmmmmmmmm.

Aurene is a little overwhelmed by all of her choices, honestly. There are so many things!

Well, Rosalie thinks little girls should have dolls and blocks and also this little engineering kit with wrenches and screwdrivers from the boy section, how's that?

... Yeah okay! Sounds good to her!

They can check out with all those things then.

Aurene is a good snuggly little child and will help hold something while she's being held! It will have to be small and not too heavy, but it's both plausible and helpful.

She can hold her doll! "Do you want to name her?"

"Oh! Hmmm." This is a very important decision. She has to think about it carefully. "Petunia. She has a purple dress and a flower would match you!"

This seems like the obvious thing to do, since Rosalie is the one getting her the doll.

"All right, you hold on to Petunia till the clerk needs to have a look to tot up all the things."

All the things are totted up and paid for and Rosalie carries Aurene and the shopping home.

Hooray!

Once they are home, Aurene immediately gets to taking her shoes off. She heard what Rosalie said, so that means now she doesn't have to wear shoes anymore!

That's right, she can be barefoot in the house. "Do you want me to go out and get you some birds, or bring you along? Are you a neat eater?"

"Bring me along! I want to catch them!" Hmmm. Is she a messy eater? What counts as messy? "Does leaving a lot of feathers count as messy? They have a weird texture, I don't like to eat them very much."

"Mostly I'm thinking of bird blood on your clothes."

"Oh! No. I drain all of the blood out of them, and then I eat them. Uncle Blair showed me how, he said it's sneakier."

"It is! All right, let's go get you some dinner." She swings Aurene up onto her shoulders and starts strolling out toward the woods at the edge of town.

Aurene is excited, and bounces accordingly. Birds!

"Throw me?" she requests, because she hasn't been thrown at birds in a while, and she misses it.

Hmmm how about that mourning dove there. Toss!

She snatches it out of the air, bites its head off, and drains it dry. Then she hums to herself while plucking the feathers that are the most annoying to eat; these seem to be the long flight feathers and the tail feathers. Once they're strewn about on the forest floor, she eats the bird, too.

"Nicely done, not a speck on your clothes. Should we find you another? I heard a turkey but that might be a bit much."

"Bit much," she agrees. "Mmmm. One more, a little one? I already ate this morning, I'm not very hungry."

"Of course. There's a chickadee over - there." Fling!

"Eee!" says Aurene, and she catches it out of the air. Soon it is divested it of a head, blood, feathers, and then the entire rest of it. Her snack finished, she leaps back to Rosalie's arms for snuggles.

Snuggle! And home they go.