“Fine,” she said quietly. “Be careful.”
Something flickered in his eyes—pain, maybe, or regret. But it was gone before she could name it, replaced by that maddening blankness.
“I always am.”
He gathered his hunting supplies without looking at her again. A knife at his belt. A coil of rope over one shoulder. The heavy fur coat that had become so familiar over the weeks she’d spent watching him come and go.
At the door, he paused.
“Ember.”
She looked up, hope and fear warring in her chest.
“Stay inside,” he said. “No matter what. The storm may have driven predators lower. Don’t open the door for anything.”
Then he was gone, the door closing behind him with a quiet click that somehow sounded deafening.
She threw herself into work with desperate energy.
She cleaned the cabin from top to bottom, scrubbing surfaces that were already spotless, reorganizing supplies that didn’t need reorganizing. She hauled water from the barrel Rykan keptfilled near the door, heated it over the fire, and washed every piece of clothing she could find. She swept the floor twice, then swept it again.
None of it helped.
The hollow feeling in her chest remained, a constant ache that no amount of physical activity could ease. Every task felt meaningless without Rykan there to share it. Every silence felt louder without his presence to fill it.
This is ridiculous,she told herself sternly, scrubbing at a pot that was already clean.I’ve been alone before. I can handle a few hours without him.
But she’d never been alone like this. Alone with a deep aching emptiness inside her. Alone with the knowledge that she might have destroyed the best thing that had ever happened to her because she was too scared to be sure.
She paused mid-scrub, her arms trembling with exhaustion.
What if he didn’t come back? What if he decided it was easier to just disappear into the mountains than face this impossible situation? The thought of never seeing him again was an almost physical pain.
No.She refused to follow that thought. He would come back. He had promised he would be back. He would never leave her alone.
She returned to her tasks with renewed determination, but her mind kept drifting back to him. To the way he’d looked at her when he’d thought she was asleep. To the possessiveness in his touch when he’d kissed her by the wall.
He wanted her. She was sure of that. The wanting wasn’t the problem. The trust was.
And could she blame him? When her own trust had been so badly shattered by someone who was supposed to be family?
Marina.
The name surfaced like poison, tainting everything. Perhaps that betrayal had affected her more than she realized. If she couldn’t trust her aunt’s love, could she trust anyone’s?
I can trust him,she thought, and felt the truth of it. As that truth settled into her bones, she realized she wasn’t willing to give up on him. On them.
I have to go back and confront my aunt, but then I’ll come back,she promised herself silently.To him. If he’ll have me.
The thought brought a small measure of peace, but it was fragile. Would he want her back if she left him? Would the door to his heart close for good once she left?
She set the pot aside and stood, pressing her hands against her lower back to ease the ache. Through the window, she could see the forest stretching away in endless white, beautiful and terrible and utterly empty.
He’ll come back,she told herself.He always comes back.
But what would happen when he did? More careful distance? More walls? More nights lying side by side with an ocean between them?
Maybe this was how it ended. Not with dramatic confrontation or tearful goodbyes, but with a slow fading. Two people who’d briefly found something real, watching it slip away because neither of them was brave enough to fight for it.
