CHAPTER 15

CHAPTER 15

AUREN

It’s only the second time I’veseen him without the concealing armor and helmet he always wore when he pretended to be Rip. It’s a bit jarring. He looks so much like Slade that I can’t help but stare, trying to pick out the small discrepancies.

He comes in carrying a wooden crate that looks to be overflowing with sacks, bottles, and root vegetables poking out of the top. He stops just inside the room, taking in the silence before his eyes land on me. “Good to see you without the puddle underneath you.”

I blink.

Did he just say I peed myself?

I look around to see if Judd is smirking. He seems like he’d laugh if I’d peed myself. Only, there’s no smile to be found. Hopefully that’s a good sign.

“Excuse me?” I ask.

“Your gold,” he says slowly. “When you started to come to, it was leaking out of you all over the place.”

Oh.

An awkwardness descends, because I have to go from possibly peeing myself to realizing that he’s talking about my power so openly. The fact that he just casually mentioned seeing gold stream out of me is more than a little disconcerting, and I can’t quite wrap my head around this new version of normalcy. It’s become second nature for me to hide my power, to hide from touch, so this feels almost…wrong.

“Sorry about that,” I say awkwardly. Then I squirm on my feet. “Umm, since we’re on the topic, where’s the washroom?”

He frowns. “We were on that topic?”

I feel heat flood my cheeks. “Oh. Nope. No, we weren’t,” I blurt before I look over to Lu, hoping she’ll take pity on me. “Washroom?”

“Come on, Gildy,” she says, unfolding herself to lead me out of the room. Her slippers really are very large and furry. I’m surprised she’s still so light of foot with those on.

I follow her as she takes me to a door down the hall. “This is my room, the washroom is right through there, and grab some clean clothes from my closet too—I set a pile aside for you.”

With a nod of thanks, I quickly go inside, do my business, and wash up as best I can. Then I take off my ruined, gold-splotched clothes, feeling like they dried with paint splattered all over them. Though as soon as I drag the shirt off my back, I freeze at a sharp stab of pain that shoots down my spine.

I stop.

Suck in a breath.

And I slam walls up so fast that I make my own mind spin.

I’m not going there. I’m not.

With determination as strong as steel, I carefully pick up an oversized shirt and slip it on and then drag on a new pair of leggings. All while I breathe through braced lungs, fortifying my mental walls.

With one last breath, I force myself to unclench my teeth, to relax my arms at my sides. When I’ve secured myself, I head out, going back into the main living room. As soon as I do, everyone’s murmured voices go quiet as they all turn to me.

“Better?” Lu asks from her spot on the sofa next to Judd.

“Much,” I reply, hovering in the doorway. Everyone in the room is stilted in silence, and I don’t miss the way they keep shooting questioning looks at Slade.

“Okay...” his brother drawls out, shifting on his feet before he glances at the others. “Well. Like I was saying, I went to the Cellar for supplies because I know none of you had dinner. But it’s not my turn to cook, so one of you assholes can do it this time.”

Judd gets up from the sofa to take over the duty, but I rush forward, beating him to it. “I’ll do it!”

Everyone looks at me, but I pretend not to see as I head for the open doorway.

“I didn’t mean you,” Fake Rip says.

“I’m hungry, and I want to help,” I call over my shoulder.

“Auren...” Slade begins, but I sidestep him before he can reach for me.

As soon as I pass into the kitchen, I hear quiet murmurings behind me, but I ignore them and instead look around the space. It’s just as homey as the living room, except instead of wood paneling, smooth white walls make up three sides, and then the fourth is made up of the same brick as the fireplace. It’s here at the brick wall that an iron stove sits, its grate glowing slightly from embers within and a stovetop just above it. There’s a round black table with curved benches tucked beneath it off to the right, and the rest of the walls have hanging shelves along their length stuffed full of cookware, with wooden countertops just below.

After a few more seconds, I hear footsteps, and I turn as Slade’s brother comes inside. He heads for a small door just past the dining table, which I’m guessing is the pantry, where he sets down the crate. I hear him rummaging around before he reappears a few seconds later.

We stand facing each other awkwardly before he says, “I guess I never got the chance to properly introduce myself. I’m Ryatt. Nice to formally meet you.” He reaches up to scratch the back of his head full of black hair. It’s the same as Slade’s.

“You two really do look alike,” I blurt out.

He snorts. “Yeah, I’ve heard that a time or two.”

I think there might be an edge of bitterness to his reply, but I don’t know him well enough to be certain.

“I’ll just get to work on making dinner,” I say before I move toward the pantry. It’s bigger than I thought, with cabinets against the bottom and shelves lining above them. There are all kinds of ingredients stuffed in bottles and sacks, and what looks to be strips of jerky hanging on a drying rack.

I circle the room, trying to come up with an idea for something I could make. But then I remember that I don’t actually know how to make anything.

“Dammit,” I murmur under my breath. I was in such a hurry to escape conversation that I didn’t really think about the follow-through. But how hard could it be?

Squinting at the labels on the different containers, I finally find rice and dried peas, along with some eggs. That’s a good meal, right?

Right.

I grab the ingredients and head out, but when I eye a bottle of wine on the cabinet just in front of the door, I swipe that too.

I’m going to need it.

Once I come back into the kitchen, Ryatt is gone, and I let out a breath of relief that I can just have a moment alone. A moment where I don’t have to pretend, don’t have to talk.

Placing everything on the counter, I eye the spices on the shelves above, but none of them are labeled, and I don’t recognize a single one.

“Want some help?”

I flinch at Judd’s voice, pasting a smile back on my face before I turn around. “No, thank you. I’ve got it.”

His hazel eyes watch me for a moment before he nods and ducks back out of the room. More murmurings erupt in the living room, and I can hear Slade’s rumbling tone cutting through right before Lu’s softer voice says, “Just give her some time.”

Yes. Time. That’s exactly what I need. The more time I can have, the better.

I spend the next hour running around the kitchen, trying to make something edible.

It’s not going well.

Bright side though, the wine is fantastic. Not only does it taste great, but it’s taking off the edge. And when I’m nothing but edges and sharp points, where one stray thought is all it would take to make me ram against one and burst, I could use a little dulling.

By the time I plop bowls down onto the table, the kitchen is filled with steam and smoke, and I’m a little drunk.

It’s lovely.

“Dinner’s ready!” I shout.

Everyone comes in. Quickly. As if they were all standing just outside the doorway. Everyone takes a seat except for Slade, who pulls out one of the benches for two and waits for me to sit.

Giving him a smile, I take a seat, and then he lowers himself next to me. Our thighs touch, which seems like such a silly thing to focus on, considering we’ve done much more intimate things than touch thighs, but my stomach flutters anyway.

“So,” Judd says, rubbing his hands together in front of him. “What’s on the menu?”

I reach over and pluck up the lid to the serving bowl with a smile. “Rice!”

All four sets of eyes stare down at the contents. After a moment of silence, Lu says, “Why is it green?”

“Oh, that’s the peas. They sort of melted.”

Stirring it with a spoon, it slops together, stickier than honey. I start scooping it up and serving a spoonful on everyone’s plates, but when I try to give Ryatt a third heaping, he holds up a hand. “That’s good.”

With a nod, I uncover the half a dozen eggs next, but there’s a bit of a smell.

Judd wrinkles his nose. “What kind of spices did you put in that?”

“I have no idea,” I answer honestly before I spoon some onto his plate.

After I’ve served everybody, including myself, I lift my fork but notice no one else has. As soon as they see me looking around expectantly, Slade clears his throat pointedly. Everyone picks up their forks very quickly after that. Then, with Slade being the first, they each scoop up some rice and take a bite.

Smiling, I follow suit.

Regret. Instant, immediate, firm—nope, mushy—mushy regret.

“Oh goddess,” I say around a huge bite of the sticky slush, because it’s bad. Really bad.

It doesn’t really resemble rice. It’s more like overcooked porridge. The spices I put in it are at war with each other, and somehow, there are parts that are absolutely boiling hot, and others that are stone cold, with little stiff grains that seem like they weren’t boiled at all. Somehow, I manage to swallow down the bite.

Honestly, the green color was the least of our worries.

Embarrassment floods my cheeks as the others all make faces. “It’s bad,” I say.

“It’s really—” Ryatt jolts mid-sentence, and he scowls across the table at Slade. “Good,” he finishes before looking at me. “It’s really good.”

“Really?”

Judd and Lu nod their heads in unison, but I notice they’re still chewing.

Beside me, Slade swallows. It’s a testament to how sticky the slop really is, because I can hear the struggle of his throat to get it down.

“Try the eggs?” I say helpfully.

“Mm-hmm,” he replies, and everyone watches him scoop up a giant spoonful and stuff it into his mouth, their eyes widening slightly like he’s doing some amazing feat.

I let out a sigh and set my fork down. “Okay, you can all stop pretending for my sake.”

“Thank fuck,” Judd says, just as he spits out his bite into the cloth napkin at his place setting. “My tongue is so confused right now.”

Lu smirks. “I’ve heard women give you that very same critique.”

Judd tosses his napkin at her, but she somehow bats it away with her fork before it can land on her.

I clear my throat. “I should probably confess that I don’t actually know how to cook…”

Ryatt snorts. “You think?”

“Right. Who wants wine?”

Everyone speaks up immediately, and I rush up to go grab the wine bottle from the kitchen counter when I feel my back twinge painfully.

I freeze.

My breath hitches.

And agony, glowing and hot, pours down my thoughts and scalds its way down my back.

This hurts me a lot more than it hurts you.

You caused this.

You did this to yourself.

I can’t I can’t I can’t

Goddess, please...

My eyes squeeze shut as I force myself to breathe through the pain. I won’t think of it. I won’t. I slam up another wall. Barricading it high, blocking every bit of misery notched in my back.

“Auren?” Slade asks quietly.

I snap my eyes open, realizing that I’ve halted with only one leg slung over the bench, so I paste that awful smile back on my face. “Stubbed my toe,” I lie before I swing my other leg over—carefully this time—and move to the counter.

With my back toward the table, I let out a shaky breath, thankful that no one can see my face. The pain twinges and prods, like it’s trying to fish through the very depths of me, but that’s exactly the last place I want to feel.

I give myself one more strained breath before I turn back around, bottle in hand. Somehow, Lu has already brought cups to the table, setting the last two down in front of her and Judd as I unstop the cork and start to pour. It’s not nearly enough for all of us, especially since I helped myself earlier, but it’s something.

Yet even with the distraction of the food, my careful mood is threatening to tip. I’m up on the point of a blade, trying not to fall and cut myself open, but I know I can’t keep upright forever, no matter how stiffly I sit at this table.

Beside me, Slade is tense too, and the others are watching me, though they try not to be obvious about it. I grab my cup, holding it tightly, staring at the deep red color.

“Auren.”

“Not tonight,” I say without looking at him as I take a drink.

I’m not ready. I need more time. Not tonight.

I hold those words against my chest like a beggar’s coins, clutching at them because I know they’ll offer me the tiniest reprieve for a little while, until I’m empty-handed once again. “Tonight, I just want this.”

When I glance back up at the now quiet table, no one is pretending not to look at me, and I hold my breath with anxiousness until Judd jumps up. “Well, alright then,” he says with a nod. “We’re going to need more wine.”

He lopes over to the pantry and comes out carrying two more bottles along with some bread and jam he found. “Something a bit more edible,” he says with a wink as he sets everything down.

I let out a shaky laugh, relaxing when they all start to drink and talk and eat, relaxing even more when I join in.

And for a while, that’s all there is. That’s all that matters. I clutch my words and stay balanced on the blade, and for now, it works. For now, I don’t have to reflect or process or talk. I don’t have to face anything real.

For now.