Everyone looked at her, waiting for her response.
“She’s not gonna do it,” said Kel, shaking their head.
“Not a chance,” agreed Stephan.
“Let’s have a little more faith in her than that, guys,” said Naomie.
“I appreciate your confidence, Naomie…even if it is drastically misplaced.” Rowan put her head in her hands. “Why is this so hard?”
Her big brother’s large hand came to rest on her back. “Because he might run,” he said in a knowing way.
“There’s a reason I’m dating a fellow witch,” said Zaide. “That and the fact that Naomie is really fucking hot.”
Naomie blushed and laughed, but nodded. “I think we’ve all been left by someone who couldn’t handle it. We get it.”
Rowan nodded and closed her eyes, taking a deep breath and letting it out. “He deserves to make that choice.”
But though her rational mind could acknowledge it, that didn’t mean her heart was in it.
30
December 28
The Eighth Day of Yule
The morning of the Hunt arrived. There had been no new snow since Christmas, but the world had frosted over in the night. It was a perfect day for staying inside with a hot drink and a warm blanket, and yet most of Elk Ridge would take to the streets—most but not all.
Of the winter festival’s traditions, the Hunt was the most unabashedly Pagan, unfiltered by church fathers or consumerism, and so those who believed in the wickedness of the old ways steered clear, but the adventurous, the young, and the open-minded were joined by an influx of tourists who came specifically for its unique flavor. The tourists were primarily of the witchy variety, as the event attracted most of the covens in the Pacific Northwest and even some from farther afield.
The wary weren’t entirely wrong to avoid the nighttime half of the celebration. The ritualistic elements truly were ritual—an invitation for otherworldly beings to join in the festivities, and the fair folks’ idea of fun wasn’t always so for the hapless mortals.
Rowan was struggling into her costume when Gavin arrived.They shared a lingering look before he walked over to where the Krampus costume was laid out on a table.
“Good morning,” he said, his voice neutral, his expression guarded.
“Morning,” Rowan said, swallowing a lump in her throat and returning to the fight with her costume. “Thank you for doing this.”
“I made a promise,” he said, as if it were that simple. Of course, with him, it was.
As Frau Perchta, she had to wear a high-necked black Victorian dress, and the effort to loop its many thin crocheted closures over smooth pearl buttons was proving vexing. The costume had been made for someone smaller than Rowan, and she struggled to both hold it closed and manipulate the buttons into place.
And then he was there, hulking with the bulk of his Krampus costume. Gavin took over buttoning her bodice without comment, and despite the awkward tension and the layer of fabric between them, the brush of his fingers against her chest did not go unnoticed. She yearned for him to keep touching, but he stepped away the moment he was done with a clearing of his throat.
“Remind me,” said Gavin, fixing his eyes back on his own costume. “What tradition did this come from?”
Surprised by his making conversation but relieved to fill the silence, Rowan said, “It’s…a bit of a pastiche.”
A half smile passed over his face. “So it’s made up, then?”
Rowan moved over to where the masks waited. The Perchta was a wrinkled old woman with a hooked nose and a wicked grin.
“Well, the exact way we celebrate it is, but it’s based on Krampusnacht and the other traditional celebrations that are, essentially, Wild Hunts.”
He lifted his own mask to study it. It was mild as Krampus masks went, no dripping blood or yellow eyes; only a sneering, tusked and horned face of gray, knobby skin.
“Wild Hunts?” he asked.
“A Wild Hunt is when some fae or the other descends onto the world with a team of minions to hunt down misbehaving mortals. Most of the December hunts are pretty tame, and it’s usually about encouraging you to get your winter chores done. If you did, they rewarded you. If you didn’t, you got a punishment instead.”
