Page 29

HAZEL

S unday mornings used to be for sleeping in and regretting bad decisions.

Now they’re for smoothies made out of bloodfruit, half-exploded mushrooms, and trying to stop Derek from murdering a six-eyed goat with a superiority complex.

“Don’t stab it,” I say, holding out my hands like I’m trying to defuse a bomb. “It’s a baby. It doesn’t know not to eat your boots.”

“It ate my boots, Hazel.”

“Correction—it licked your boots aggressively.”

“It hissed and then spit fire.”

“That could describe me before coffee.”

Derek gives me the look. The one that says he’s half in love with me and half certain I’m the reason his blood pressure’s abnormally high.

I grin.

He sighs.

We’re currently standing in the new enchanted creature enclosure we built behind the ward cabins. Technically it’s just a reinforced glade with charm-thread fencing, a minor levitation net, and a bunch of very smug magical animals who know we won’t actually cook them.

Yet.

In the far pen, Milo is trying to wrangle a group of bouncing star-fleas back into their stasis jars with a net made of moonthread and sarcasm.

“Could you not levitate the container over your head?” I shout.

Milo yells back, “They respond to authority! I’m asserting dominance!”

One flea explodes in a puff of glitter.

“Yeah,” I mutter. “That’s going great.”

Derek’s pacing now, still grumbling about his boots.

I sidle up beside him, holding out a smoothie cup. “Peace offering.”

He eyes it. “What’s in it?”

“Bloodfruit, resilience root, a dash of ginger, and a charm to make your muscles slightly less stabby.”

He takes it. Sips. Raises a brow.

“It’s not terrible.”

“I know! I’m evolving.”

He hums and wraps an arm around my waist, pulling me in for a kiss that lands somewhere between “thank you” and “I’m never letting you out of my sight.”

I melt against him, because even after all this time, every touch still zaps through me like spellfire.

“Stop being cute,” I mutter.

“Make me.”

Rude.

Hot.

I love him.

We spend the next hour checking habitat spells, re-scribing the sigils on the salamander pond, and chasing down a runaway whisper-mole who keeps reciting my old break-up poetry from under the dirt.

“Who taught it that?” Derek asks, mildly horrified.

“I might’ve vented near its burrow last fall.”

He side-eyes me. “You rhymed betrayal with impale .”

“Artistic license!”

After everything’s stabilized—and I’ve threatened the goat with therapy and Derek’s death glare—we collapse in the shared hammock strung between two glow-barked trees just behind the main enclosure.

It's barely big enough for one person, let alone two full-grown magical disasters, but we make it work.

Mostly.

He grunts when I elbow his ribs trying to get comfy.

“You’re pointy,” I whine.

“You invited yourself into my side.”

“You love it.”

He doesn’t deny it.

The breeze smells like sun-warmed moss and fruit. Fireflies drift between branches overhead like lazy sparks. Somewhere, a sleepy chirping starts—probably the bug-cats in the northern pen, lulling each other to sleep with off-key lullabies.

“I like this,” I say quietly.

“The chaos?”

“The calm after the chaos.”

His hand finds mine.

“I do too,” he says. “It’s not what I thought life would look like.”

“Same. Thought I’d be somewhere else by now.”

“Dead?”

“Or world-famous.”

He snorts.

“But this?” I look around. “This is better. This is ours.”

He presses a kiss to my temple.

We lie there in the hammock, tangled and tired, full of smoothie and snark and maybe—just maybe—a little peace.

Because this isn’t a fairytale.

It’s a mess.

It’s home.

And it’s enough.

The hammock creaks as I shift, curling into Derek’s side just a little more.

The sun’s long gone now. In its place is a lazy dusk sky, all smudged purples and silvers. The Grove glows faintly beyond the trees—steady now, alive, like a heart that finally stopped skipping beats.

Everything’s still.

Except my brain.

Derek’s thumb brushes circles against the side of my hand. It’s such a small thing, that touch—but it makes my whole body quiet.

Which is saying a lot.

“You’re thinking too hard,” he murmurs, his voice thick with the kind of softness he saves just for me.

“You can tell?”

“You hum when your brain’s chewing on something.”

I lift my head enough to look at him. “I hum?”

“Yeah. Like a kettle with anxiety.”

“Charming.”

“Accurate.”

I nudge his chest with my nose. “It’s not bad stuff. Just... a lot.”

He nods, his other hand sliding up my back. “Yeah. It’s been a week.”

“That’s one word for it.”

He doesn’t press.

Doesn’t need to.

Because he knows.

He always knows when to give me space and when to just exist next to me until I can untangle whatever’s sitting in my chest.

I sit up slightly, straddling the hammock now with a knee on either side of him. His hands settle instinctively on my hips, thumbs stroking through the fabric of my shorts like I’m something precious.

And hell maybe I am.

“You know,” I say, “I used to think love was a kind of performance.”

He raises a brow. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. Like you had to sparkle at the right moments. Be clever, but not too clever. Be easy to leave.”

His brow furrows. “Hazel?—”

“But this,” I say, voice cracking just a little, “this doesn’t feel like performance. This feels like presence. Like showing up in the mess, and staying.”

He sits up, slowly, so we’re face to face. One hand lifts to my cheek, the pad of his thumb catching a tear I didn’t even realize had fallen.

“I don’t want the version of you that’s easy to leave,” he says. “I want the one who sets shit on fire and then tries to teach the ashes something new.”

I laugh. Snort, actually.

“Romantic,” I say.

He kisses me.

Slow.

Thorough.

The kind of kiss that feels like it has weight. Like it knows exactly what it’s doing.

By the time we break apart, I’m breathless and a little dizzy.

“You’re not easy,” he says, brushing his nose against mine. “You’re extraordinary.”

My heart stutters.

Because I’m me—I whisper, “You say that now, but wait until I turn our laundry into a sentient sock monster.”

He smiles. “That already happened.”

“And you still want me?”

“Every version.”

And gods, I believe him.

Because his hands are sure.

Because his voice is steady.

Because he’s seen every broken, glitter-streaked, spell-scorched part of me and he’s still here.

“You’re it for me,” I say, softly. “You know that, right?”

His eyes flicker with something unspoken.

“I do,” he says. “And you’re it for me.”

We kiss again, deeper this time. Slower. My fingers thread into his hair, and his hands map the shape of my back like he’s memorizing me one breath at a time.

We don’t need fireworks.

We have fireflies.

And quiet.

And the kind of love that doesn't demand to be loud to be real.