Page 36 of The Witch’s Spell (Season of the Witch #4)
Aurora
THOUGH THORNE TRIES TO HIDE it, I see the pain on his face as he lowers himself into a chair at the kitchen table. The day is gray and dreary, and fat snowflakes drift silently from the sky, falling in a thin sheet of white.
“You’re hurting today,” I say as I pour him a steaming cup of mint tea. He’s not wearing his glamour anymore, now that everyone knows what he is, and I’m finding it hard not to stare at him, even as he does something so simple as sit at the table.
“Yes,” he says. One hand rubs absently at his knee. “I believe a storm may be coming in. The weather shifts cause my body to ache.”
“And what of your pain potions?” I ask as I turn from the countertop to place the teacup in front of Thorne. He looks up at me and smiles. The sunlight hits his pale eyes, and I’m reminded of the pillars of crystal quartz I have sitting in the windowsill. It takes me a moment to tear my gaze away .
“I’m almost out,” Thorne says. “Perhaps half a vial left at this point.”
I pour myself a cup of tea while asking, “Why didn’t you tell me before?”
Thorne’s laughter is soft and melodic. “Because it’s not your burden. You’ve done too much for me already.”
Rolling my eyes, I take a seat across from him. “Nonsense. I already told you I’d help.”
Thorne meets my gaze and holds my stare. It’s just for a moment, but it makes my heart leap in my chest. His eyes trace my face before dropping to my lips.
I wonder if he’s thinking what I’m thinking, wanting to try our kiss one more time. But then he turns away, clearing his throat.
“It would be much appreciated. So long as it’s not any trouble.”
With his eyes averted, looking out the kitchen window, I’m able to catch my breath. “Not at all. I should have the ingredients I need here. Chamomile, honey, cinnamon, white will—”
Wait.
Pushing to my feet, I go to my jars of herbs. Grasping the white willow jar, I pull it down to find that it’s empty but for a light dust at the bottom of the glass. I used so much for Faolan when he was injured that I ran out, but I’ve not remembered to pick any up while in Faunwood.
“It’s all right,” Thorne says from behind me. “Truly.”
But when I glance back at him, he’s rubbing his knee again, a slight furrow in his smooth brow .
“No,” I say. “I can help. Niamh won’t mind if I take the ingredients I need while she’s gone; I’ll leave the eldertokens I owe her in the back. I’m not sure how to get in though...”
Breaking a window surely isn’t acceptable, nor would it be appropriate to break the lock on her door. So how will—
“I’m rather good with a lock pick,” Thorne announces. His pale eyes glimmer with a hint of mischief.
My brows rise. “You? A thief?”
“Hey, I’m no thief.” He holds his hands up, palms out. “My uncle taught me.”
“So, your uncle’s the thief, then?”
Thorne just smiles.
Sighing, I put the jar back on the shelf, then turn fully to regard him. “Are you sure you’ll be okay walking into town? Especially in the cold?”
“Aurora Silvermoon,” Thorne says slowly, making goose bumps rise across my arms, “I will be perfectly fine walking into the village with you. Now stop worrying and drink your tea. It’s getting cold.”
WE WALK HALFWAY INTO FAUNWOOD with Rowan before he ups his pace and leaves us on the snowy trail alone.
Our speed is slow, meandering. Thorne leans more heavily on his cane today than he typically does.
He needs this pain potion. I just hope he’ll be able to get us into Niamh’s apothecary—and I hope I’ll be able to brew something that’ll help ease his discomfort, though I already expect it won’t be near so potent as what the fairy apothecaries can make.
By the time we arrive in Faunwood, the snowflakes have started to come down more quickly, and the cold is nipping at my cheeks and nose. Thick gray smoke puffs from the chimneys throughout the village and coalesces into a cloud that lingers in the cold air.
“All right,” I say as I step up to the door to Niamh’s apothecary. “This is it.”
Just for good measure, I reach out and jostle the handle. Locked, as expected.
“Well, Mr. Blackveil.” With a sweep of my hand, I step aside, making room for Thorne on the shop stoop. “Let’s see what you can do.”
Since we’re in the village now, Thorne is wearing his glamour again, but his hair still looks shiny even in the dull gray light. He ducks his head to search through the satchel slung across his shoulders, then withdraws a lock pick. “Behold, my lady. I’ll show you how it’s done.”
I roll my eyes with a playful smile. It seems Thorne is starting to let his walls down a bit, at least around me. And he did speak and joke more at dinner last night despite how upset I still was at Faolan.
While Thorne gets to work jimmying Niamh’s lock, I look in the direction of Alden’s cabin. I can’t see it from here, but that doesn’t stop me from staring into the trees, wondering if Orla is helping Cathal with his wounds in the same way I helped Faolan.
I feel I have some apologies to give her.
Yesterday, I was so angry at her for not trying to stop the brothers, for not stepping between them.
But when my anger simmered out, I realized how foolish—and dangerous—it would have been for her to put herself in the middle of their conflict.
She could’ve gotten hurt as well, and then we’d have three injured shifters.
I’ll apologize as soon as I see her , I promise myself.
Within a moment, the lock clicks, and Thorne straightens up, smiling victoriously. Even with his glamour in place, his teeth still look sharp, like I might cut myself on them were I to run a thumb across one of his canines. He grips the door handle, and the door opens with a whisper.
“As I said.” With a bow, he gestures for me to step inside.
“Very impressive,” I say, drawing my cloak closer as I step into the apothecary. With Niamh being gone, the apothecary is dark and cold. I can see my breath in the dim light.
Immediately, I move to the hearth on the far wall and grab a few split logs from the firewood stand, then begin arranging them as Thorne closes the door to the shop.
He drifts through the apothecary quietly, taking in all the bottles and vials and tinctures on display.
Meanwhile, I get a small fire going. It’s slow to start, and I glance over my shoulder at Thorne, remembering what he did when we were at the library. “Can you help with this as well?”
He arches one brow. “I thought you’d never ask.”
With a sweep of his hand, the fire roars to life. I sit back with a surprised breath, then laugh and hold my hands out, feeling the blood creep back into my frozen fingertips.
“That’s amazing. What else can you do?”
“Oh, this and that.” Thorne reaches out to run a finger over a bottle, then retracts it and casts me a glance before disappearing behind a shelf full of bundles of dried herbs.
“Fairies have elemental magic, mostly. Some are more attuned to one element than the others—not so unlike witches, I’d guess. ”
Pushing to my feet, I go to find him, my boots treading quietly across the familiar wooden floor. He’s toward the back corner of the shop, tipping his head while regarding talismans hanging in one of the vine-covered windows.
“So, you have water magic as well?” I ask, easing up beside him. “And earth magic, like me?”
In response, he holds out a hand, and the frost on the windowpane in front of us starts to melt into tiny droplets.
Thorne sends the water drops skating across the glass in delightful patterns, twisting and curling around one another, reminding me of glowbugs in the forest on a summer night.
At the same time, the vines on the outside of the window begin to shift, crawling to either side to allow more gray light to filter through the window.
Then, with a flick of his fingers, Thorne sends a few drops of water dribbling across the bridge of my nose.
“Hey!” I pull away with a giggle.
And it feels so good to laugh after how stressed I’ve been lately. Maybe, for just a short while, I can pretend like the fog isn’t still out there and like I don’t have a wounded shifter at home whose brother is lurking mere paces from here, probably waiting to start yet another fight.
For now, I just want to be a witch in an apothecary, warming myself beside the fire and laughing with the strange fairy I met in the middle of a snowstorm. For now, that’s enough .
I wipe the water from my face, still smiling. When I look up, Thorne has taken a step closer to me.
“You’ve something just”—he reaches out, and I go still when his thumb brushes my cheek, whisking a water droplet away—“there.”
Having wiped the water away, his thumb lingers on my skin.
And when my eyes catch his, I think I see something in them that’s most certainly reflected in mine: curiosity, a longing to explore something new, perhaps even a sprinkle of fear.
My gaze goes to Thorne’s mouth, to the lips I kissed but the one time. I almost lean forward.
But then Thorne pulls away, turning from me to regard the firelit apothecary once more. In my chest, my heart squeezes.
Does he not want me as badly as I want him? Is he holding back? And if so, why?
“Are you okay?” he asks, his back to me as he starts down one of the aisles, cane thumping along with his boots.
I calm my rapidly beating heart, then trail after him. “What do you mean?”
“After yesterday. With Faolan... I know you were quite upset at the situation.”
“Oh. Yes. We spoke last night, after dinner.”
“Do you know the source of the conflict between them?” Thorne has wandered toward the bottled dried herbs at the front of the shop.
One of his lithe fingers runs slowly across the little labels on the wooden shelf, and he pauses when he gets to the one that reads White Willow Bark .
Plucking the bottle from the shelf, he lifts his brows at me, and I nod.