“Do you love her dearly but sometimes feel like boxing her across the ears?”
Isa laughed.
Despite the fact that she was standing so close to him, her laugh soothed him rather than bothered him. He loved the sound of it.
“That is an apt description,” she responded.
“So then, you understand,” he replied. “That was Erich. My younger brother.”
“He looked excited to have found you,” Isa said, staring back over the canyon at the building crew. “I take it your family is a little miffed at you right now?”
“That about sums it up.” Aden sighed. “The foundation on that side is nearly ready. They’ll have a rope pulley connected to this side in a few days that will be strong enough to ferry him across. You’ll get the pleasure of meeting him yourself.”
“Should I be looking forward to this meeting?”
“It won’t be dull, that’s for sure,” Aden responded. “It will be good to see another human, won’t it? Oh, he said he has news and it’s not good. I don’t know what that means, but I suppose we will find out soon enough.”
“Mhhh.” Isa stared across the canyon. “He gave no indication what it was about?”
Aden shook his head. “Shall we head back?”
“I brought a book,” Isa responded, holding up a hardcover tome. “I’m going to stay down here and read while I watch the progress. Perhaps...” She stopped speaking, but it sounded as though she had more left to say.
Aden waited for her to finish her thought, hoping she would ask him to join her.
She said nothing further.
“You deserve the rest,” he said when the silence grew awkward. “Enjoy it.”
“I will.”
Was he imagining it, or did she sound disappointed? Aden forced himself to turn his back and walk up the hill. He could ask her to read aloud to him—he could not think of a more delightful way to spend the afternoon—but he knew he had to be smarter than that. Their time was short. The bridge would be completed soon, and she would leave to fulfill her responsibility to the Council.
He went back to his room, the intoxicating scent of the rose hitting his nostrils as soon as he stepped inside. Another petal had fallen that morning. He focused as well as he could on the brown blossom. He had been noting the subtle differences in the few colors he could see, and even though his eye saw the color brown, his mind now registered the rose as red. He could not count the remaining petals, but there were still enough that he could see the bloom, which was a good sign.
Uncomfortable with the tight walls in his room, he made his way to the library. Erich’s arrival was upsetting. An abrupt reminder of the outside world. The past few days had seen him fall into a rhythm of normal that he was loath to part with.
Isa had worked diligently on her task, making two of the scrolls into sturdy bound books ready for travel. She would easily have the final book complete by the time the bridge was done. Aden had spent lazy mornings chatting with her in the library, asking her about different elements of her craft and discussing the stories and writings that had moved them most.
In the afternoons, he often sought Blanca, either interrupting her work with his clumsy attempts to help her or listening to her stories—many of which centered on Isa as a child.
Luca was less inclined to share words with him, but Aden tried to make use of his own brute strength in service of things the older man struggled with.
He paced through the room. The books on the library shelves mocked him, inviting him to escape into their pages when they knew he could not.
The bridge was not done yet, he reminded himself. The rose still valiantly held some of its petals.
He ran the sensitive skin of his soft paw pads along a row of books, feeling the texture, smelling the leather, imagining the contents.
Isa would be back soon, and he would do his best to help her finish her task. He had some time left, and he intended to use it to the best of his ability.
He settled into a comfortable chair in the library. The quiet sound of the rustling leaves from the trees outside seeped through the stone walls of the large room, lulling him to sleep.
He awoke, cozy but disoriented, to the persistent patter of rain on the tall glass windows.
He looked up, surprised. The weather had been warm earlier, but they were in the mountains where things were likely to change. He recalled his first night at the villa when Isa had thrown him out into a light drizzle, which had quickly turned into a raging downpour strong enough to cause a flash flood that carried away the bridge.
The bridge. Isa was at the canyon. Had she returned? How long had it been raining?
