Chapter 5
FIVE
Yerina woke at dawn, as was her usual. She lay in bed, staring at the ceiling.
In only a month, just a matter of weeks, her body had grown accustomed to rising especially early.
A half hour extra before opening the Mighty Leaf to the early bird public, just enough time for enjoying a quiet cup to herself. With Dexter.
Restlessness had her twitching, all trace of sleep gone as soon as she’d opened her eyes.
And we get up now, her body seemed to say.
Up, slip down the stairs to find Dexter waiting at the back door.
They’d enjoy those small hours of the morning, then she’d open up the teashop.
Have hot water and a selection of teas waiting for the pair of grad student mages who were always first through the front door.
Dexter would keep an eye on things while Yerina checked on the girls.
Sometimes he’d stay until they woke; others he’d be off on whatever odd jobs he had scheduled for the day.
In no time at all, they’d fallen into a routine, their lives finding a natural pattern without any conscious effort. The thought of giving it up hurt so much.
Yerina pressed a fist against her mouth. It didn’t have to stop. They were still friends, right? She could still see him, just with a sense of distance between them. Surely the jagged edge of that notion would wear down with time.
Careful not to disturb the sleeping children, Yerina got ready for the day.
She would always think kindly of Dexter. Coming back to the Valley had always been about the teashop first. Yerina hadn’t thought Dexter would still harbor any feelings for her. Nor had she let herself entertain any such…dreams. Silly hopes given wings by nostalgia.
Except they weren’t. Not dreams, but something real, and shared. More than friends.
Is that all you want for us?
Yerina stepped outside, eyes immediately going to the teashop’s back door.
The courtyard remained empty. She pressed her eyes closed, steeling herself to go down to the tearoom.
To carry on about her day, like normal. Because this was her new normal.
She had wanted the impossible. She’d meant it, her insistence she’d never resent him.
And she believed that he never wanted to cause her pain, intentionally or otherwise.
Wonderful qualities, and why a relationship between them could never work.
They were too different. The more she had wanted…
Well, she would just have to want something else. Be content with less.
She continued on down the stairs, mentally wrapping up the feelings she’d allowed herself. Setting them aside, where they could mellow with time. There had been so many good memories formed in the last few weeks. She could hold onto them, hold them in her big heart.
Love was not in the plans for her. Not the romantic kind, anyway. Yerina had learned that lesson twice over. At least, no romantic love with Dexter, and if not with him, then she didn’t want it with anyone else.
It wouldn’t be so bad, Yerina told herself. She was lucky in so many other ways, and far from loveless. Familial and platonic. She would still see him, and they would still be friends. Still close. Just…not the same.
She sighed, letting it be dramatic and full of self-pity. Her one self-indulgence before the feelings would have to be firmly packed away.
Hand resting on the handle, Yerina pushed the back door open. It slid open, creaking with reluctance, before it thudded into something solid. Yerina pushed against the door, but it wouldn’t budge. The sound of groaning wood met her ears.
“What in the Goddess,” she muttered, peering through the narrow margin she’d managed to create.
One of the shelving units had fallen over to block the door.
The larger canisters they used for bulk storage of tea, many of which had freshly reapplied sealing enchantments, were spilled across the floor, lids askew, if not broken into pieces.
Papers from the desk had joined the mess, and Yerina thought she could see one of the big sorting table’s legs in midair.
Which made no sense, for the table was too heavy to simply flip over.
Even if one of the legs had spontaneously collapsed—and the shelving unit too—it wouldn’t have landed in such a way.
Setting her shoulder against the door, Yerina heaved with all her might. Her efforts amounted to maybe a finger’s width gain for the opening and what sounded like a new gouge mark on the floor.
Rubbing her sore shoulder, Yerina eyed the gap.
It was small, and she was not. She doubted even one of the children would’ve fit.
Had she somehow slept through a land shake the previous night?
No, not unless the children had too, and wouldn’t there have been more noticeable damage to the other buildings? But then how…
As Yerina walked around the side of the teashop, she paused at the courtyard window for a better look inside.
The curtains were drawn. She hadn’t done that last night, had she? Bioon’s fraught appearance and the awful way Dexter had left dominated Yerina’s memory of the night before. But she’d mostly had the Leaf closed up before Bioon had arrived. Nothing out of the ordinary.
Trepidation tightening her chest, Yerina hurried to the front door. Nothing appeared amiss,—until she grasped the doorhandle.
It had been loose since her first day back. The barest level of functional, perhaps, but it had been hanging onto the door. Sylvan being Sylvan, Yerina had never bumped a replacement higher on her list of things to do for the Leaf.
The handle slipped from the wood, coming off in its entirety in Yerina’s hand. Too cleanly for her to have broken it, though such a feat wouldn’t have been difficult. No, the handle and weakened lock had already been dismantled, then set back into place to give the illusion of all being well.
Heart sinking down to her feet, Yerina pushed the door open. It swung further inward than the back had done, enough that Yerina could edge past. Its full range of motion was still curtailed by an obstacle; a toppled chair this time.
If only that had been the worst of it. Yerina stepped inside the door, the useless handle tumbling from her numb fingers.
It landed amongst shards of pottery and wrecked furniture.
Not a single piece of anything remained whole or in its proper place.
Table legs had been snapped, chairs broken, cushions spilling their stuffing.
Bits of broken cups and mugs and teapots were strewn all over the room.
Furniture too big, or perhaps too loud, to break had been dragged and unceremoniously dumped into the waterfall’s pool.
The resulting overflow had caused numerous floorboards to warp.
The waterfall itself had run dry, its internal mechanism occasionally giving off a weak sputter.
And there was tea. Everywhere. The display shelves were toppled, and each jar opened and emptied. Tea leaves scattered all over and ground into the floor. Terryl’s painstakingly embroidered curtains were slashed to ribbons, along with the table linens provided by the weaving guild.
Yerina slowly turned a circle in the middle of the room.
Everywhere she looked, destruction screamed back at her.
Thorough, carefully wrought destruction.
Meticulously planned, for the inside and outside of the Mighty Leaf couldn’t have been more different.
Yerina believed in coincidences. She was optimistic to a fault, but even she knew without a doubt that her teashop had been targeted.
Her teashop. Not for much longer.
In a daze, Yerina took a step toward the counter. Something crunched underfoot. She looked down to find her tea pet; the graceful little koi Dexter had made. Yerina’s shoe added another break to the half-dozen its fins had already sustained. She picked up the pieces, vision blurring with tears.
“Hello? Are you o— Oh, gods all break.”
Yerina dashed her eyes with the back of her hand. The pair of grad students, her morning regulars, peeked around the door, mouths agape.
Yerina could only stare back at them, nothing in her head but the building of a scream.
“Yerina?” Concern darkened Dexter’s voice. He pushed the grad students aside, muscling the door open enough for him to get through. “Yerina, are you hurt?”
She felt more than saw him come up beside her. “Yerina, please, say something.”
“It-it’s over,” she whispered. “The Leaf is…done.”
The lender would be calling in the loan within days.
The Leaf couldn’t seat anyone. Couldn’t serve.
If the back room was as bad as the front, they didn’t have any drinkable tea left.
She didn’t have the funds to replace the broken stock and new furniture and a fresh round of repairs.
Milksplash Brewaway was supposed to be visiting soon, too.
The trendy, selective tea blender would never choose to collaborate with the Leaf now.
Yerina stared down at her broken fish. When her tears surged again, she didn’t try to stop them.
Crying helped. Terryl called it a cleansing, good for even as sunny a heart as Yerina’s when faced with such strain. Oddly enough, Yerina did feel better, calmer, once she’d cried herself out. There was nothing left but to pick up and move on. Not away, but the Leaf wasn’t going to clean itself.
The hardest part was comforting the children, as both had been upset to tears. Anadae especially wasn’t satisfied when Yerina couldn’t answer who or why one would do such a thing. Eunny cared less about reasons, preferring to bawl and make threats unbecoming of a five-year-old.