He walked with me up the stairs and paused at the second floor, tipped his cap, a gesture so absurdly old-fashioned it almost made me smile, and walked off toward his own room.
I watched him go.
Later, lying in bed, I kept seeing his stupidly handsome face and didn’t fall asleep for a long time.
Chapter five
Iwoke up thinking about Darian.
His voice had threaded through my dreams all night—low and rhythmic, firelight flickering across his weathered face as he spun words into something that felt more like prophecy than story.
A myth from your home region. Your culture. Your family.
I lay in bed staring at the ceiling, listening to Ivy's soft breathing across the room. I had exactly one myth that fit all three categories. I'd known that when Vince gave the assignment. I'd known it when I didn't raise my hand to ask if we could choose something else.
Some part of me wanted to tell it. That was the unsettling thing. After six years of keeping Darian's story locked away, some part of me was ready to let it out.
I wasn't sure I trusted that part.
"You're awake early," Ivy mumbled, rolling over. "Even for you."
"Couldn't sleep." I swung my legs out of bed, reaching for my phone. "Dining hall opens in twenty. You want coffee?"
"Always." She squinted at me through sleep-crusted eyes. "You okay? You seem... tense."
"I'm always tense. It's part of my charm."
She snorted and threw her pillow at me. I caught it and tossed it back.
That was the thing about Ivy. She noticed things, but she also knew when not to push.
The Mythology classroom had been rearranged. Instead of rows facing the board, desks were clustered into groups of five or six, angled inward, forcing eye contact. My stomach dropped.
James had been in every single one of my classes today. Every one. PE yesterday had been a fluke, I'd told myself. Mythology was a large lecture—easy to ignore him. But today he'd appeared in my morning Psych, then again in my afternoon Wilderness First Aid, always a few seats away, always catching my eye with that easy smile.
Someone had shifted his schedule. Or the universe was personally invested in my discomfort.
At least I had Ivy in this class. One familiar face who didn't make my skin hum.
I scanned the room and found her waving at me from a cluster near the windows. Relief flickered through me—then died.
James was in her group.
Of course he was.
The hum flickered to life beneath my skin, that traitorous warmth I couldn't seem to silence. He looked up as I hesitated, and his face did that thing it always did when he saw me—opened, softened.
I considered turning around. Finding another group. Claiming a bathroom emergency.
"Lumi!" Ivy called. "Saved you a seat!"
Too late.
I crossed the room and dropped into the empty desk beside her, deliberately not looking at James. He was two seats over, close enough that I could smell pine and hay.
"This is going to be so fun," Ivy said, oblivious to my internal crisis. "I love hearing people's family stories."
"Fun," I echoed. "Sure."
