Chapter 2 #2
My father built this cabin before he died, but I never knew why.
We had a house settled in the pine trees on the other side of the town square.
One with three bedchambers, a warm kitchen, and a garden field where my mother used to plant an abundance of flowers and herbs.
So why he built this small cabin on the other side of town is still somewhat a mystery, but it was the only place that felt right for Finnick and me to live after their accident.
I took the small bedchamber as Finnick often went without sleep, spending his nights poring over old healers’ journals trying to understand what went wrong the night of the accident, and why the healers couldn’t save our parents.
I’d often hear his pacing steps on the creaky floorboards late into the night. Sometimes he would still be there pacing in the morning, and other times I would wake up to him asleep on the lounge with a book laid open on his chest.
These days I would do anything to hear those darn floorboards creaking in the night with his pacing. It’s so quiet now.
I crack the window open to let the breeze in, and almost immediately a sparrow appears on the sill.
“I’ll never understand it, you know.” I turn around to see Silas with a small smile on his face as he looks at the bird that is quickly accompanied by another.
I shrug. “They know I’m a friend, I guess.”
Animals have always been drawn to me, and I to them. The sound of birdsong in the morning soothes me like nothing else, and almost as if they know that, the birds often come to my window, their song floating throughout my small cabin.
Sometimes I see a fox walking through the clearing, and if the sun is shining through the trees like it is today, he will stop to lie in the grass and soak up the sun. I know he must feel me watching him, but he doesn’t scare away.
Silas shakes his head. “You really are like a real-life animal whisperer.”
I scoff, pulling the pot off the stove as it begins to whistle. “No, I’m not.”
He laughs. “Yes, you are. They’re drawn to you, and it’s always been like that. It’s beautiful.”
I turn back to look at him, and he’s looking straight at me. My cheeks heat as he holds my gaze. I’m paralysed by his attention.
The birds in the window are tweeting as if they’re gossiping about what’s unfolding in front of them.
I’ve always had a silly crush on Silas, but in the years since my brother disappeared, we’ve grown closer, and in the last year I’ve come to question if maybe he is starting to feel the same way that I do.
He looks at me more than he used to. Like right now, he still hasn’t broken his stare, so I do.
I turn back around to face the kitchen. “Mint for you?”
“What else?” he teases.
Silas has had an affinity for mint tea since we were kids; he’s barely tried anything else.
I used to tease him for it, but he’d just say, why change something that’s already perfect?
I didn’t have much of an answer for him back then, and I still don’t.
Though now I wonder if part of it is because of the memories it holds.
Perhaps it’s the one thing that’s stayed constant for him when everything else has changed.
When Finnick disappeared just two years after our parents died, Silas was the one person who knew exactly how I felt.
The one person who had lost just as much as me, and the only person I wanted to see for months.
He was the one who held me up—literally and figuratively—when we held a funeral for Finnick on the two-year anniversary of his disappearance.
Together we erected a stone atop the empty grave where my brother should be, next to our parents out past the old garden field.
It’s been another year since then, and a small part of me still doesn’t want to believe that he’s truly gone, truly dead.
My brother loved me more than anything. I’d like to think that if he were alive, he would be here. But he’s not. Everyone else thinks that means he is dead, but I don’t know what to think. I refuse to believe he’s lying beneath the dirt in an unmarked grave; I won’t believe it.
I pull a few mint leaves from the jar in the cabinet above me and drop them in his mug, pouring the boiling water over them and watching the leaves swirl around in the cup, dancing in the heat.
“Everleigh.”
“Hm?” I spin around to face where Silas now stands in the kitchen, leaning back against the counter.
“I’m worried about you.” His eyes hold the exact worry he speaks of.
My eyebrows draw together. “What do you mean?”
“All this ‘witch’ business. Like you said earlier, it’s getting closer and closer, and your apothecary—” He runs a hand through his hair, and I can’t help but walk over to him.
“Hey,” I interrupt his worrying, grabbing his hands in mine as I stand in front of him. “I’m careful. You know I am.”
“I know you are, but that doesn’t change the fact that this is dangerous now. What you’re doing is dangerous.”
I pull my hands away, turning my back to him as I walk back to his tea.
“What I’m doing is helping people, Silas.
” I mindlessly stir the tea even though it doesn’t need stirring.
“And I will keep helping people for as long as I can. Do you think Finnick would’ve abandoned his patients when things became hard, when they became dangerous?
” I say, spinning back around to face him, my cheeks warm with the heat simmering inside of me. “Because I sure won’t.”
“He would want you to be careful, just as I do. I don’t want to lose you too, Evie.” All of my defensiveness crumbles with that one sentence. How can I blame him for being scared when I am just as afraid?
I take two steps until I’m in his arms. “I don’t want to lose you, either.”
That familiar scent envelops me once more, and I don’t bother to convince myself that I’m not relishing every single part of his body that is touching mine.
These moments between us feel precious, the ones that push the boundary between friends and something more. Though we were never really friends, exactly. It somewhat feels like we’ve always been something more, but we were just too young to understand it.
But Silas is the one person that is still here, the one part of my family that is still intact. I don’t want to risk that, no matter the other feelings that swell every time I am in his vicinity.
“Well, lucky for you, with the length of time it takes me to train a horse, I believe I’m the last person to be accused of wielding magical powers.”
A laugh erupts from deep within my belly. Silas is known for being a tad on the slower side when it comes to getting unbroken horses ready for riders, but in a town like Sylvan, there’s only so many people that would be mad at him for it. The rest just shake their heads and move along.
“But you,” he says, flattening his palm against the side of my head. “Are magnificent at what you do. That makes you a target.”
He’s right, but I don’t want to think of that right now, so I simply focus on the sound of his heart beating deep in his chest where my ear is pressed against it. I pick up on the little inconsistencies, the change in pace as we stand wrapped up in each other.
A sharp, high-pitched bark shoots through the window, and I jump out of Silas’s embrace, my heart in my throat. But I let out a breath of relief as I see that familiar fox standing in the clearing.
“It’s just a fox,” I say to Silas, whose eyes went wide at the sound.
A fox’s bark always sounds so sinister—it’s fascinating. But I feel a shiver zap down my spine as the animal calls again, because this time its gaze is directed right through the window, right at me. In the blink of an eye, he’s gone. Vanished between the trunks of the tall trees.
Anxiety clings to my skin as I blink away the vision of the animal.
I clear my throat, shaking off the uneasy feeling as I reach for Silas’s cup of mint tea and hand it to him. “I’m being careful, I promise,” I say, bringing my focus back to our conversation. “You won’t lose me, not anytime soon.”
“Good,” he says, meeting my gaze over the rim of his cup. “Because I am not certain I would survive it.”