Page 20 of Tino

“Maybe she shouldn’t have wasted her time baking, but spent it figuring out how to hide our magic from the false leaders,” I muttered to myself as I put the note back down.

“Willow baked this?” Tair asked, startling me as he appeared around the corner.

“Yeah, and some other mages. It’s a sort of welcome basket.”

“Mmm. Smells wonderful,” he sighed and then picked out a blueberry muffin. “Join me?” he asked, then sat down on the couch.

I sat, unable to do otherwise, then picked up what smelled like a cinnamon and apple muffin. “Damn,” I mumbled, the crumbs falling from my lips. “So fucking good!”

“Right!”

“Mmmhmm,” I replied with a nod. Maybe it would be a waste of time if Willow did anything but bake, if this was the result.

He wiped his mouth and dusted his crumb filled shirt. “Maybe we should take a walk or something, try to leave the cabin seeing as we can’t really do much in here other than talk and sleep.”

“Oh,” I replied with a smirk. “I can think of several things to do here that don’t involve those two things.”

He blushed. “Yeah, but since we aren’tallowed, maybe going outside will help us actually listen to them and not tempt fate.”

I sighed and rested my head back against the couch. “Why do you have to be so sensible?”

He giggled. “One of us has to remain the rule follower, and last time I did such an amazing job at it. We never got caught or yelled at.”

I shook with laughter as I remembered the many times he’d have to stop me from doing stupid shit. “The swing,” I laughed, remembering it like it was yesterday.

Altair burst out laughing, too, “Oh my gods, I’d completely forgotten about that! Mrs. Olsen’s face!”

“I was certain it was a swing!” I defended myself, still laughing.

One day we’d walked past Mrs. Olsen’s house and spotted a bra held up by strings on either side. As an adult I knew it was laundry left out to dry, but seven-year-old me? I’d thought the very big bra was a swing with cool floral prints on it. As you could imagine, oncemy tiny butt had placed itself on top of it, the line broke and caused all her other laundry to tumble down on top of me.

The shriek of surprise had alerted Mrs. Olsen and she’d found me buried in her clothes. She wasn’t happy. And what had Tair done? Well, he was lying on the ground laughing his ass off because I hadn’t listened when he’d told me to stop.

“She never liked us after that day,” Tair said, shaking his head, his smile still big and filled with humor.

“Uuuuh! What about the box!” I said, remembering the day I’d locked myself in a tiny chicken coop for when hens needed to be separated. It had been further from the other coops so I’d believed it was just an empty wooden box on legs. The tiny door allowed one side to be opened completely and while Tair had told me not to go in, I’d done it anyway, then closed the door, sealing me inside, unable to get out since it couldn’t be opened from the inside.

“Yes! You were so afraid in there!” he cackled.

I winced. “Sorry again,” I said, remembering how I’d kicked the door with my left leg, not knowing Tair was opening it, causing the door to smack straight into his face, giving him a nasty case of nosebleed.

He shrugged. “I lived.” Then his eyes widened, “But you almost didn’t! remember the go-carts?”

I groaned. Did Iever.

We’d each gotten a go-cart for our birthdays, matching ones, mine was red and black, Tair’s green and black. We’d pulled them up to the highest hill so we could drive down it with maximum speed. We were eight, and we hadn’t told any of our parents what we were up to. Had we done that, they would’ve stopped us. No doubt.

On top of the hill, we’d placed them side by side and then we’d raced down. It was too fast.Waytoo fast. We had pedals, but we’d had to place our feet on the sides because we couldn’t keep up with the speed, making us unable to push the brakes too. We’d flown down, down, until we’d reached the forest. Tair had yelled at me to jump out of the dangerously fast go-cart, but I’d been too afraid to do it, causing me to drive straight into a tree.

“I didn’t almost die!” I said indignantly. “I just broke my arm.”

He grinned. “And I still have the scars from jumping off mid drive,” he said, showing me the tiny scars on his arm. I remember coming back from the hospital, looking him over and asking if he’deaten spaghetti with meatballs since his face and body was filled with red dots.

“Maybe it’s a good thing you keep being the rule follower,” I conceded.

Chapter 15

Altair