“Cassia?” he asked quietly.
“Told her to take off,” Mavek answered.
Aevrin nodded and wandered back into the empty dining room. He stood there for a moment, thinking where she might have gone, then headed decisively to the front porch.
Aevrin stepped out into the gloaming, where a line of orange glow lit the mountains from behind and the big sky hung heavy overhead. Sure enough, Cassia sat curled up on one of the rocking chairs, staring out into the night. Pale light filtered through the house’s lace curtains to paint her with a subtle glow. The windchimes on the porch rang softly.
Cassia’s trousers clung tightly to her curves, like they’d been sculpted on her. She’d put on her coat against the evening cold. It was a little large on her, in a way that looked awfully cozy. Just her fingertips stuck out from the ends of the sleeves.
At the sound of his approach, Cassia’s wide eyes flicked to him. He found his worries softening under the flood of warmth he always felt in her presence.
“You mind if I join you?” He stuck his thumbs in his pockets.
“No, of course not.”
“Nice night.”
“Yeah. I keep wondering if I’ll ever get tired of the view.”
He snorted quietly as he took the rocking chair next to her. Even in the dark the mountains really were something majestic. But it was hard to pay them any mind, when he was sitting next to Cassia. His whole body kept wanting to turn towards hers.
“I don’t think that happens,” he told her. “Saints, I’ve lived here my whole life, and they still take my breath away sometimes.”
“Aevrin?” She was still staring out at the mountains, her knees hugged up against her.
“Yeah?”
“Do you ever feel like your life is just happening to you? Like you don’t have control over any of it?”
His stomach clenched. What had she seen in that spellstone? Who, or what, had she been looking for?
He blinked at her and took a deep breath, considering. Aevrin waited a long moment to answer, turning to face the same fire-streaked view Cassia stared at.
“I’m doing fine,” Cassia clarified in the silence. “Just… wondering. If that’s something other people think sometimes, too.”
He leaned his head back against the well-worn wood of the rocking chair.
“Sure,” Aevrin said. “You’re not alone. I can remember thinking that way a few times before. When my mother passed, a whole year just kinda happened to me before I found myfooting again. And there have been times, other times, where I questioned…”
“Yeah?” she prompted when he trailed off.
“I love this ranch,” Aevrin told her quietly. “I do. Deep in my bones. But it’s all I’ve known. It’s always been a given we were all gonna stay and work it. That I’d grow up here, then grow old here, then be burned on the mountaintop one day. Y’know? And most days that’s all I really want, this life. But once in a red moon I get to wondering who I might’ve chosen to be if I’d grown up in some other family with other options on the table. Feels like I grew up so fast I never got a day to find out.”
“Huh.”
“That sound stupid?”
“Kind of,” she said. “This place is paradise. But… I mean, it’s not stupid. Just hard for me to understand.”
“Guess I’m pretty spoiled.”
“I didn’t mean it like that,” Cassia said quietly. “You’re not spoiled in the slightest, Aevrin Riveker. You’re a hard working, selfless man.”
Why did that make his shoulders straighten, an odd feeling in his chest? But this wasn’t about him. Something was off with her. He wrapped his fingers tightly around the rocking chair’s arms.
“You feel like your life is out of your control right now, Miss Cassia?” he asked her softly. “Are you unhappy here?”
“No,” she said quickly, fiercely, with a shake of her head. “I like it here. Quite a bit. Just, I guess everything’s changed so fast. And maybe that’s catching up to me.”
