He doesn't come back.
Hours pass. The sun sets. I try to work, try to read, but I can't focus. Through the bond, I track his movements. Patrol patterns around the estate, over and over, mechanical and precise.
He's coping the only way he knows how. By being useful. By doing what he's trained to do.
By avoiding me.
I should give him space. Should let him process. Should respect that he needs time to deal with what I've told him.
Instead, I go to the kitchen and start baking.
Not regular bread this time. Something else. Something Grandmother used to make, back when I was very young and she still sometimes smiled. A recipe I found in her journals, written in her early hand, when she still had a mother teaching her, before she became The Terror of the Northern Kingdoms.
Nightmare bread. Not the kind that gives nightmares, the kind that chases them away.
Rosemary for protection. Honey for sweetness. Lavender for peace. And magic, so much magic that the dough practically glows under my hands. It flows out of me in a steady current. If all goes well I’ll be tapped out by the end of this.
*Safety,* I pour into it. *Peace. The courage to choose. The strength to believe in yourself. Rest for the weary. Hope for the hopeless.*
I knead until my arms ache, until the dough is smooth and perfect and humming with intention. Then I shape it into loaves, three of them, and set them to rise.
While they do their thing, I make tea. Chamomile and valerian, the same blend I've been leaving outside his door every night. My own blend that hopefully says: I see you.
A few hours later, the bread emerges golden and perfect, filling the cottage with the scent of herbs and comfort. I slice one loaf while it's still warm, slather it with butter and more honey, and set it on a plate.
Then I sit at the kitchen table and wait.
Dawn is starting to break when he finally returns.
I'm half-asleep at the table, my head pillowed on my arms, surrounded by cool loaves of bread. The fire in the stove has burned down to embers, and the cottage is quiet except for the soft sound of snow against the windows.
I hear him before I see him, the whisper of displaced air, the soft footfall that means he's trying not to wake me.
Through my lashes, I watch him pause in the doorway.
He looks exhausted. There's snow in his white hair, mud on his boots. His hands are raw from the cold, unnecessary for a vampire to feel cold, but he's let himself feel it anyway. Punishment, maybe. Or just a way to feel something other than fear.
He stares at the bread. At the tea I left for him. At me, slumped at the table.
I stay very still, feigning sleep, giving him space to react without being observed.
He moves into the kitchen quietly, shedding his coat and boots. Then he stands there, looking at the bread like it's a puzzle he doesn't know how to solve.
Finally, finally, he reaches out and breaks off a piece.
He eats it slowly, and I watch through barely-open eyes as his face transforms. The magic hits him, all that intention I poured into the dough, and he staggers slightly, catching himself against the counter.
"Iris," he whispers, and his voice cracks.
I could pretend to wake up. Could let him think he's been caught.
Instead, I stay still. Give him this moment of privacy. Of being able to feel without being watched.
He eats another piece. Then another. And I feel the way the magic settles into him. Soothing the panic. Easing the fear. Not erasing it, but making it bearable.
*You're not alone,* the bread tells him. *You're not broken. You're not a monster. You're allowed to be afraid. You're allowed to not have all the answers.*
*You're allowed to just be.*
