Chapter 3 Faith in Us #3
“Now you have this, too.” Ko reached out and took the stitch book, laying it in her lap and flipping it open to the wolf.
“Feather.” Her tears hit the linen, blooming dark. “Mama’s wolf.”
“Check out the last one.” Zane tightened his arm around her shoulders. “That’s some next-level skill, buttercup. Your mama was talented.”
“Winter evenings, she worked on her stitches while Papa read to us.” A soft, wondering smile touched her lips as she stared at the apple page, the specialty floss glimmering faintly. “She was teaching me before she died. I never got past basic cross-stitch.”
Leaving the book on her lap, she reached for Rasputin’s bell and held it to her ear like she often did with the conch shell.
“He’s dead, isn’t he? Arabesque didn’t sell him like she claimed.”
“I’m sorry, beloved.” Ko rested his hand on her knee. “Z saw it in Eluned’s memories, and Foster confirmed it.”
“I suspected as much. He was old, even when Mama was alive.” She set the bell down gently. “What else?”
I’d expected tears, braced for a storm of grief. Instead, she handled each item with gentle appreciation, gratitude radiating from her in waves. Not for the first time, her resilience left me humbled.
“Thank you,” she said, looking up at us. “For saving these. For making sure they weren’t damaged or cursed.”
Her eyes were filled with a different kind of emotion. Not grief for what was lost, but joy that fragments had survived.
How remarkable.
“And thank you for waiting until you thought I was strong enough to bear it. One question, though. Were there… Were there any letters? Notes?”
“No,” we all chorused.
“You don’t have to lie to protect me,” she chided us.
“There were never any letters or notes, beloved, and that’s the truth,” Koa assured her.
“Oh. I thought Papa might have written something. To say goodbye, maybe.”
“If he did, Arabesque still has it or destroyed it,” I suggested.
When she only nodded and sniffed a little, Ko stood and went to where he’d hidden the fishing pole.
“There’s one more thing, beloved. Something we’ve been working on.”
“By ‘we,’ he means mostly him,” Zane interjected. “I supervised from a safe distance. With snacks. Casimir did nothing.”
I shot him a unicorn fist.
Ko held out the rebuilt reel on its new pole, and Seri froze. Time seemed suspended as her fingers hovered inches from it, not quite daring to touch. Her eyes were full of disbelief that something precious, something she thought lost forever, could somehow find its way back to her.
“Koko,” she whispered, voice breaking. “You fixed it.”
“Of course he did,” Zane said, as if it had never been in doubt. “Ko can fix anything. I mean, have you seen some of his inventions? It’s his superpower, besides the brooding and the ability to eat his weight in steak.”
“Took some doing,” Ko admitted. “Had to make a replacement for the broken spring mechanism, but I preserved everything I could.”
She took the pole with trembling hands. Her fingers traced the scar, following its jagged path across the green metal. When she looked up, her eyes were glossed with tears. I reached for a handkerchief, but not one crystal drop fell.
“Thank you.” She passed the fishing rod to Zane and launched herself at Koa. Her arms wrapping around his neck, she buried her face in his chest, and my baby brother’s eyes closed as he crushed her against him.
Then she turned to Zane, enfolding him in an equally fierce embrace, and I rescued the rod before it could be damaged.
“Hey, I just provided color commentary while he worked,” Z protested, but his arms came around her just as tightly, one hand cradling the back of her head. “And some essential beer delivery.”
“The most important support service,” she laughed.
When she turned to me, I had no time to brace myself before she cannonballed into me, all flying curls and uneven breaths.
“Zane’s right, Seri. I did nothing,” I confessed.
“You did,” she disagreed, voice muffled against my chest, but I felt the growing dampness. “You kept all these things safe. You keep all of us safe.”
“You’re getting snot all over Cas’ shirt, baby girl,” Zane smirked. “Ten bucks says he has a breakdown about it later.”
“Fifteen says he’s already mentally tallying which detergent will best remove tear stains,” Ko chimed in.
I shot them both a glare over Seri’s head even as I reached into my pocket for a handkerchief. Gently, I tilted her chin up and dabbed at the tears tracking down her cheeks.
“Ignore them,” I told her in a gruff voice. “They’re just jealous because you hugged me the longest.”
Her watery giggle was worth the knowing looks my brothers exchanged behind her back.
I’d never been the one to make her laugh; that was Zane’s territory.
I was the pragmatic one, the strategist, but in this moment, the boundaries between our roles seemed less defined than before.
I wasn’t one given to much introspection, but I clearly realized that I was no longer the man I’d been before we met her.
I was a better one now. Or at least, I was trying to be. For her.
Trying to be less rigid, less solely focused on the mission at the expense of everything else. More aware of the impact my words and actions had on others. More willing to question things that conflicted with protecting those I cared about.
She’d changed my brothers, too. Koa was more vocal about his feelings, less likely to internalize everything until it overwhelmed him. Zane was still as irreverent as ever, but there was a new thoughtfulness to him, especially in how he gauged Seri’s reactions before pushing a joke too far.
“We prepared something else.” I leaned down and kissed her forehead. “A trip to the lake to test out the reel. If you’re interested.”
“Really?” Her entire face lit up, the last traces of tears forgotten as excitement took over. “Now? Can we go right now?”
“Breakfast picnic’s already packed.” Zane bounced to his feet. “And Mrs. Wentzel made that shortbread you like. The one that turns Cas into a moon-damned vacuum.”
“He does eat them disturbingly fast,” she snickered.
“Efficiently,” I corrected with a frown. “No point in prolonging consumption.”
“Unlike when you consume our girl,” Zane stage-whispered with a wink, earning a backhand to his shoulder as my eartips burned.