Page 21

AUTUMN

T he Spellbound Sip was unusually quiet for a Thursday morning.

Most days, it hummed with quiet magic and soft clinking mugs. Laughter. Flirtation. Whispers that curled into the rafters and stuck to the enchanted teacups like dust on old parchment.

But today, the quiet felt intentional .

Autumn stepped through the door and immediately smelled cardamom, sage, and something a little like citrus and memory. She tugged her knit sweater closer around herself, brushing damp curls off her forehead as she moved toward the bar, boots echoing faintly on the stone floor.

Nerissa, the siren-barista, was behind the counter as usual—long blue-black braid draped over her shoulder, and that serene, sea-glass expression she always wore like it had been stitched into her skin by moonlight itself. She didn’t say anything, just looked up with a knowing smile.

“I need something honest,” Autumn muttered.

Nerissa raised a perfectly shaped brow. “Oof. Dangerous request in this place.”

“I can handle it.”

The siren tilted her head slightly, then reached for one of the ceramic mugs hanging from a copper rack overhead. This one was pale green with faint swirling glyphs etched into the glaze.

“Truth-teller’s brew,” she said as she poured. “Cinnamon for warmth. Mint for clarity. Marigold to reveal what’s buried.”

Autumn stared at the mug for a second too long, then nodded and took it.

She didn’t sip yet. Not yet. She turned and walked toward the back, to Nico’s usual booth—half-hidden by a curtain of enchanted vines that occasionally bloomed if the gossip got juicy enough.

They were already there, of course.

Nico Voss always knew things. Not in a nosy way, more like the universe whispered the good stuff in their ear just for fun.

Today, they wore a velvet blazer over a T-shirt that read Hexually Active, a cluster of charms dangling from one wrist, and a mischievous glint in their eyes that said they were already brimming with unspoken questions.

“Well, well,” Nico purred, folding their hands under their chin. “If it isn’t the ghost-wrangling goddess herself. And is that a truth-teller mug I see?”

Autumn sat across from them, wrapping both hands around the warmth. “Don’t start.”

“Oh, honey. I haven’t even opened the bottle yet.”

She sighed, staring down at the tea as it steeped. “Can I just… talk? Without being roasted?”

They blinked dramatically. “That’s a bold ask, but fine. I’ll only lightly sear.”

She rolled her eyes and took a long sip of the tea.

It hit warm, then cool. Sweet, then tart. The taste shifted mid-swallow, curling into something oddly nostalgic. The scent of a forest after rain. The sting of hope just before it hurt.

Nico waited.

“It was supposed to be fake,” she said finally, voice rough. “This whole… setup with Dorian. Pretending to be his girlfriend so the realtors and supernatural creeps would leave the inn alone.”

Their perfect brows climbed, eyes widening. “ Fake? ”

“Yeah.” Autumn exhaled hard, shoulders curling forward. “It was just supposed to be a ruse. A means to an end. In. Cleanse. Out. Done.”

Nico blinked, stunned. “You mean to tell me… that the two of you—with your heart eyes and stormy porch kisses and unspeakable kitchen tension—that’s all been pretend ?”

Autumn’s cheeks burned.

They threw a hand over their heart like she’d wounded them. “You witches are dangerous. I was this close to making a couples prediction for the winter solstice board.”

“It’s not that simple,” she muttered, tracing the rim of her cup. “I didn’t plan for… him.”

Nico softened. “No one ever does, darling. That man has the emotional range of a bear in a flannel-covered romance novel.”

“He is a bear in a flannel-covered romance novel.”

“Exactly.”

They fell quiet for a moment. The vines above fluttered faintly.

Autumn didn’t look up. “I want him,” she admitted, so quiet it barely carried. “I want him in that messy, terrifying, soul-baring way. But…”

“But you don’t trust fate.”

She nodded.

“And why would you?” Nico said gently. “You’ve been alone a long time. Taught yourself that being safe means being untouched. That being seen means being left behind. Or so I’ve been told.”

Autumn’s throat tightened. The tea went down like truth lodged behind her ribs.

“I’ve never had anyone stay,” she said. “Not really. Not when it got hard. Not when I stopped being useful.”

Nico reached across the table, their rings clicking softly against the ceramic as they took her hand.

“Maybe,” they said, “the lesson isn’t that people don’t stay. Maybe it’s that you’ve never let them.”

Her eyes snapped to theirs, sharp. But she didn’t argue.

“You think I’m cruel,” they said, smiling gently. “But I’m not. I see people. And I see you. And I see him. And babe… whatever this thing started as? It’s not pretend anymore. You know it. He knows it.”

“I’m scared,” she said.

Nico squeezed her hand. “Good. That means it matters.”

She finished the tea in one long swallow. The mug glowed faintly as she set it down, then dimmed.

“I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“You don’t have to,” they said. “You just have to let it happen. Love’s a spell that only works when both casters surrender control.”

She snorted. “That was annoyingly poetic.”

“I’m annoyingly everything.”

Autumn laughed despite herself.

Outside, the clouds had parted just enough to let light spill through the stained glass over the bar, painting her sweater in fractured gold and blue. She stared down at the mug.

“I’m not ready to say it,” she whispered. “But I’m not ready to let go either.”

“Then don’t,” Nico said. “Let him be your slow burn.”

Autumn stood, her chest a little looser than when she’d walked in. “Thanks, Voss.”

“Anytime, Ghost Girl.”

She paused at the doorway.

“And Nico?”

“Hmm?”

“Don’t put us on the solstice prediction board.”

“Too late,” they said, grinning. “Already etched it in glitter pen.”