“Is it lonely without her?” I ask, attempting to perch against the wall as nonchalantly as I can. I wind up sliding down slightly and then am kind of stuck there, pretending that I’m not doing a weird wall squat thing I can feel in my thighs as I try to slide myself back up to standing.
Camellia looks like she’s surprised by the question, or maybe she’s confused about why I’m doing a kind of lap dance right in front of her, it’s hard to say.
“I guess I don’t need a lot of social interaction. None of us do here, which is probably why we were placed here in the garden,” she says.
I can’t help snorting. I doubt anyone cared enough to profile the weavers and decide to put them here, or maybe it’s fate or luck or something else entirely.
“It’s weird without her. We spent a lot of time together.”
“We spoke to someone Wren was friends with at the academy. He suggested that wherever she was, she’s probably not there for a good time. She’s either in danger or she’s running from something,” I blurt out.
“And how would he know that?” Camellia’s tone is cautious and I feel like we probably need to tread carefully here. I’m not sure why she’s so skittish, but it feels like one wrong word and she’ll shut down entirely.
I shrug. I should probably leave it to Brogan to answer as I’d imagine he has more tact than me.
“He’s a fate weaver too. I guess he read her cards or threw some bones or something and could see that she was going to be facing a boatload of danger in her future.”
Camellia is holding herself even tighter than before. She looks like a spring about to go off.
“What was the guy’s name?”
“Leif. Real friendly guy. Sounded like the two of you have a bit of a history,” Brogan says, his deep voice echoing through the hut as he wiggles his eyebrows at her. Camellia laughs, her shoulders relaxing slightly.
“You could say that.” She looks from Brogan to me and back again, eyes resting where his fingers are tangling with my hair like he can’t stop himself from touching me.
“What’s happening here?”
I take a deep breath. “Seems I’ll be hanging out here more than we thought since I have three mates all under one roof.” I wince slightly as the words rush out, remembering that it’s not exactly supposed to be common knowledge. Whoops. Although, if I’m going to be spending any time here at all, it’ll become pretty obvious to anyone around us.
“Mates?”
“Uh, apparently. Although we’d appreciate it if you didn’t tell anyone.”
She huffs a sad little laugh. “Who would I tell?” Camellia eyes the two of us warily and then lets out the deepest of sighs. “Look, I’m sorry if I’ve not exactly been welcoming, but I kind of thought you were one of Madame’s spies. But there’s no way you’re faking a bond between the two of you. I can actuallyseeit if I squint hard enough.” She waves a hand between us. “Be careful who you spend time with while you’re together like this or people will pick up on it.”
I nod. “Leif warned us it’s not something that should be possible and that we shouldn’t exactly go around telling anyone.”
Like I just did, because I’m an idiot. I need to keep a better hold on my tongue.
“Okay then, you’ve convinced me you’re not a spy,” Camellia says, blowing out a long breath and getting to her feet. “Come on, I’ve got something to show you.”
Hopefully, it’s not a cliff she’s going to push me off for being an abomination. I’m still getting a weird vibe from her I don’t fully understand.
She leads us through to the back of her hut and then through a hidden doorway. We step through and it’s so dark, I’m clinging to the wall with one hand and to Brogan’s hand with the other. We stumble along in darkness for a few steps before stepping into another room, and my jaw drops open.
Colored lights, a huge chunky sofa, a couple of huge desks with fancy computers and microphones all set up, it’s like a mixture between a game room and a den, cozy as anything and completely at odds with the rest of the hut at the other side of the door.
“What’s all this?” I nod toward the set-up on the desk. It kind of looks like the stuff you’d need for shooting videos or for podcasting.
Man, I hope this isn’t where she shoots her porny side hustle.
“Most of the time, our job is pretty straightforward and the decisions for the soul’s afterlife destinations are made for us. It doesn’t take a lot of deliberating, you know? So we have a lot of time on our hands, but we can’t leave the garden very often.”
“So you… livestream?” I ask cautiously. “What is it you do here?”
“We’d kind of read people’s fortunes on the internet, via video chat.”
Naked? No. That’s… not what I was expecting at all.
