“A different deal than trade?”
“Maybe. Or different trading than I was led to believe, but then again, Mother Dearest didn’t actually inform me of much. I expected there to be a lot more paper-shuffling, though. They wanted…” Eunny broke off, hiding a grimace with a shake of her head. “I can’t really remember. Those were shit times. All I’ll say is that the Coalition doesn’t care about good or right for the world, just for themselves. If others benefit, that’s nice and all, but they’re looking out for themselves first.”
Ollas didn’t know what to say. It was the most he’d ever heard Eunny say of her time with the delegation. It felt like a chance to do some explaining of his own, despite the bitter sort of finality with which she’d spoken—the window of opportunity, if he was going to take it, already beginning to close. They were in a carriage, no interruptions present. The school was still a few minutes away. Nothing but silence and dwindling opportunities between them. Hadn’t he come back to Sylveren to try and make amends, start something new?
“I’m sorry,” he murmured. “About what happened to the delegation. I’m sorry for my part in it.”
Eunny swung around to face him, confusion on her face. “What are you talking about?”
“It’s my fault.” Ollas looked down at his hands clasped atop his knee. He steeled himself, forced a steadying breath. This had gone on far too long. “I found signs in the woods, thought it was poachers. I’m the one who insisted to my group that we follow them. We found this cache, and I was digging through it when the fight started. I broke protocol—I just ran out there after the noise. If I hadn’t done that, if I hadn’t gotten hurt, or at least stopped you from?—”
“Hold on.” Eunny raised a hand to stop him. “You’re apologizing because your actions led to me and a bunch of others being rescued? From Eyllic kidnappers?” Her voice rose with each word.
“I— Yes?” Ollas said, wary. “That’s kind of simplifying it a?—”
“If you hadn’t, we’d still be kidnapped, you dolt.” Her hands shook as she gestured emphatically, nearly hitting him in the close quarters of the carriage.
“Yes, well, no, but I mean, it’s my fault because I didn’t stop you! I-I screwed up your magic,” Ollas protested. “I knew you were tired, but when you tried to heal me, I just… And then your magic?—”
“Ollas, you didn’t make that happen. It— It got away from me. That’s not your fault.” Eunny reached out and pressed her hand against his mouth when he tried to speak. “Listen to me. It’s. Not. Your. Fault. No one blames you, least of all me.”
“You should,” he whispered, and steeled himself to admit the rest. How he’d wanted to feel her magic, to know that side of Eunny Song. His once-in-a-lifetime chance, or so he’d thought. “Do you re?—”
She pressed her finger against his lips. “If anything, you should hate me. I’m the Healer Who Hurts, remember?” Though her tone was light, the smile she gave him was sad.
“Never,” Ollas said. “I’ve never hated you. Never blamed you, either. I just… I don’t know what to say. Whenever that day gets mentioned, you’re pretty quick to shut it down. Understandably,” he added.
Her lips twitched, more grimace than smile. “I can talk about it, in general. But no, I don’t love being asked to recount how it felt to have my magic go rogue. I’m not lying when I say I don’t remember much of that day. When I try, it’s… unpleasant.” Her gaze went unfocused again, as if she was looking into the past and not at the carriage wall. “Doesn’t put me in a rush to try and get it back. It was the worst day of my life, Nev, but none of that’s on you.”
“Even though?—”
She took one of his hands between hers, leaning closer to meet his eyes. “I am grateful that you still want to be friends. More than you can ever know. I don’t know that I deserve it, but can we just go on from that?”
Ollas wanted to refute her points, convince her that she deserved everything. Happiness. Peace. Desperation and despair spiraled through him at her gentle, relieved affirmation of friendship. All he could muster was a soft, “Okay.”
“Good.” Eunny sat up, her manner morphing from solemn to light and brisk once more. “Glad that’s settled.”
“Do you ever miss it?” he asked, hesitant but curious. “Graelynd. Your life there?”
“Not really. Living in Central is…” Eunny wrinkled her nose in thought, then shrugged. “It takes a certain kind of personality. I made better friends during my summers up here anyway, Dae excluded, but she was so wrapped up in her old life there, too, that we didn’t see each other much even when we lived in the same city. And the work—well, I couldn’t have opened the café down there. Not the style.”
The carriage rolled to a stop at the stable area below Sylveren University’s main courtyard.
“You up for finally giving me the greenhouse tour?” she asked.
Eunny and her way of moving, practically barreling on. She shrugged off the heaviness of their conversation, not with flippancy but with a surety that left him standing in her wake. He was stunned, maybe a bit confused, definitely unnerved.
“Sure,” Ollas said, somewhat dazed as he reached for the door lever located on the side of his bad arm.
“Here, Nev, let me help.”
“It’s okay, I can manage a door.”
Only, the word “door” ended more as a yelp when it opened with less resistance than he’d expected. Ollas couldn’t get a hand free, limbs tangling with his cane in the tight confines of the carriage. Oh, gods all break. He was going to fall on his face. Tear something. Maybe break a bone while he was at it, and wouldn’t that just?—
Arms encircled his waist, caught him, and heaved him back, a muffled grunt sounding at his ear though the motion was smooth. Eunny’s was a firm, solid kind of strength that denied gravity, that pulled him not simply into the carriage but farther, until they thumped onto the narrow bench.
Ollas was pressed against Eunny’s chest. Was engulfed by her, as if her body endeavored to wrap around him: one hand was snug around his middle while the other reached past to brace against the carriage’s side panel.
