Page 54
I climbed higher, the air growing colder, the cottage above shifting from a distant silhouette to a looming, crooked reality. The world shrank to the scrape of bark under my palms and the fragile, stubborn rhythm of my own ascent.
The final step brought me level with a wooden porch woven seamlessly around the trunk. The planks not nailed, but grown, a living part of the tree’s architecture. The cottage no longer loomed like a threat; it smelled of damp soil, drying herbs, and something warm baking inside. It felt less like a witch’s hut and more like a stubborn, cozy pocket of peace carved out of the chaos.
Wide windows wrapped each side, designed to drink in light, though from outside all I could see was a soft, undefined glow. The front door was less a door and more a wall of paned glass, like an old greenhouse entry, left slightly ajar.
The raccoon poked its head through the gap, fixed me with a knowing gaze, chittered softly as if to say “About time,” then ducked back inside.
“Definitely a fae trap,” I murmured, but the words lacked their earlier edge.
I reached for the door handle, expecting my hand to pass through it, but this time, my fingers met cool, smooth wood. I pulled.
The door slid open without a sound, and the air that drifted out wrapped around me, sweet with baking pastry, fragrant with floral tea, earthy with old incense. The warmth of it sank into my skin.
Inside, Ivan sat cross-legged at a low chabudai table, pillows scattered around him, surrounded by open books and small clay bowls. The raccoon claimed a cushion across from him and delicately nibbled a piece of bread. Ivan reached for his own pastry, his movements calm, unhurried.
For a heartbeat, cold dread iced my veins. He’s eating their food. He’s taken a seat. Did they already have his name?
But as I stepped fully inside, a gentle breeze brushed over me, stirring my hair, and lifting the hem of my shirt. I could feel it. Not as a memory, not as a ghost’s impression, but as pressure, as touch.
I looked down at my hands. They weren’t translucent. They were solid. Pale, yes, but whole. Real.
The floorboards creaked softly under my weight.
“Ivan,” I whispered, fearing someone would hear and half-afraid that speaking would shatter whatever held me here, and I’d dissolve back into a ghost between one heartbeat and the next.
But he heard me. He looked up, his expression shifting from mild surprise to something so bright and open it stole what little breath I had. And then he launched himself from his cushion and across the short space between us.
His arms wrapped around me, tight and warm, his face buried against my shoulder. He was solid. I was solid. And I held tight to my brother, grateful he was alive, and fearful I’d shatter into a ghost again any second.
I stood there, frozen for a second by the sheer, staggering weight of the feeling. The pressure of his hug, the scent of his shampoo, the living, breathing reality of him incomparable to any vague memory, before my own arms came up, clumsy but certain, and I held him back.
The motes fluttered in behind me, bouncing around as if they wanted to explore, and find themselves reflected off things and floating in midair like unpoppable bubbles of darkness.
Ivan sobbed in my arms, cursing me between gasps while holding on like I’d dissolve if he loosened his grip. I let him. He deserved to break.
“Sorry,” I whispered, the word useless and necessary all at once. “I’m here. It’s okay.” I repeated it like saying it enough times might make it true. “You had me worried sick,” I told him. “Vanishing like that. Everyone is worried.”
Behind us, the raccoon chittered, loud, indignant, the universal language of where’s my pastry, peasant, as the plate in front of it was now empty.
“Yeah, yeah,” a voice drifted from somewhere deeper in the cottage. “I hear you. Not like you couldn’t stand to lose a few pounds.”
I went rigid, arms tightening around Ivan. Every internal alarm I possessed screamed fae trap, fae trap, you’re about to meet the witch who seasons children with rosemary.
“It’s just Beau,” Ivan mumbled against my shoulder. He pulled back, wiping his face with his sleeve, and tugged me toward the table like this was a casual afternoon visit for tea.
Beau appeared in a doorway to my left, balancing a tray piled with pastries and a teapot surrounded by mismatched cups. He was not what I expected.
Small, for one. Close to Ivan’s size, lithe and narrow, with none of the looming presence I’d braced for. His blond curls, a mess the color of dried prairie grass, straw, and wheat fields at the end of summer, were yanked back into a knot that had given up hours ago, spewing chunks in every direction. He wore a plain t-shirt and worn jeans, both speckled with dirt, and over them a canvas smock whose pockets bulged with what looked like garden twine, seed packets, and the dried husk of something I couldn’t identify. A smudge of soil ran along his jaw like he’d wiped sweat with a dirty hand and missed a spot.
His skin was a warm, deep tan, scattered with freckles that spilled across his nose like someone had flicked a paintbrush. And his eyes, slightly upturned at the corners, hinting at something mixed and complicated, were a shade of green so dark it felt like looking into a forest at dusk.
If this was glamour, it was the best I’d ever seen. If it wasn’t, I had no idea what to make of him.
He set the tray down on the table. The raccoon lunged immediately, snatching a pastry the size of its own head and retreating to his spot with the smug satisfaction of a creature who knew exactly what it was doing.
“Sit. Eat.” Beau’s voice was soft but carried a quiet authority. His gaze landed on me, those deep green eyes assessing. “You’re barely here at all.” He glanced around the room, frowning at the rising slew of motes gathering in his space.
“And scattered.”
