Teren deflates, like he’s failed a test. His magic pulses, but I interrupt, “Please, tell meeverything.”
“Ice cream is measured in scoops,” Nomi says. “Each of these bowls has a single scoop, because ice cream in the Quiet—in Crystal Hollow now, I suppose—is in short supply.”
“Why?”
“Becauseiceis in short supply.”
“Here,” Zan interrupts. He holds a spoonful of the ice cream up to my mouth. “Try it before it melts.”
At least some decisions in life are easy.
I taste the ice cream for the first time.
My eyes, if possible, go even wider.
This is everything I have ever wanted in a food. In theworld.
My wondering gaze meets Zan’s, intent on me.
Once again, I belatedly realize that letting him feed me directly is strangely intimate. My cheeks heat—
—And when I lick my lips, his eyes stray down to my mouth.
“More,” I whisper.
Zan’s gaze darkens for a moment, his pupils blowing out.
But then he smirks. “See,” Zan says smugly. “Ice cream.”
I turn to take a bowl and spoon from the tray, registering Nomi’s amusement as well as Teren’s pleasure but not really caring in my haste to eat more of the best thing in the world.
“Don’t eat it too fast,” Teren cautions.
I give him the look this deserves. “It will melt if I don’t. You think I’m going to waste it?”
I eat another bite, restraining a groan of pleasure with an effort.
Bliss.
“It still tastes good melted,” Teren says, “but if you eat it too fast, you get what we call a brain freeze—”
It takes me several more rapid bites to experience what he means.
“I’m told it fades quickly,” Zan says with amusement.
I glare at him. “Youdon’t get them?”
“Dragon,” he says smugly.
I scowl. Okay, fine, I’ll take a breath or three before inhaling more.
Maybe I can come up with a kata to counteract this effect. The gods know I’m enraged by the delay.
I will not be defeated in this.
“Tell me why this is in short supply here,” I demand, because that is anoutrage.
Zan doesn’t get to introduce me to the best thing in the world only to tell me I can’t have it.
