Chapter 25 #2
“Oh?” Quinn’s arm on my shoulder drifts lower, wrapping around my waist. “Is that regret I hear in your tone, Angel? Is someone offended they weren’t invited into the red rooms?”
“No,” I growl, looking up at him through a furrowed brow.
“Sounds like a yes to me." He chuckles, leading me forward. “Don’t worry, I’ll give you the official tour later. First, we need to get you checked out by Laurel.”
He nods ahead to the last booth in the row, wrapped in the shadows of the warehouse infrastructure surrounding it. It’s different from the others. No bustling crowd lingers within its fold, no energetic buzz of excited patrons rifling through its shelves. Even Laurel is not in sight.
I step forward, into the covering of the stall and peruse the contents of the shop.
Much like those of the herbalists and fortune tellers we’ve passed thus far, Laurel’s shelves are stocked with jars of all shapes and sizes.
Only, unlike those places, these have a weight to them.
A severity the others didn’t. The ones before were little more than smoke and mirrors, novelty items for those merely wanting to scratch the surface of such a world.
Whereas the ones here whisper their warnings—sing of authenticity as my touch lingers on them.
They tell of a healer well-versed in magic and well-equipped with the most potent arsenal.
I take my time, acknowledging the feel of each item’s energy before turning away from the shelf and letting my eyes roam over the rest of the stall.
Shiny, enchanting rocks litter every nook and cranny of the small space, tucked against the other goods like discarded afterthoughts rather than a shopkeeper’s inventory.
Deep-colored rugs cover the floor, torn and tattered with age.
Despite the lack of sunlight in the market, plants are tucked against every corner and atop every available surface, along with lit candles that drip wax down their sides.
I breathe in, noticing for the first time the earthy aroma coming from a single stream of smoke towards the back of the shop. I move towards it, watching the tendril weave through the air—as if following an invisible path as it juts and twists and performs just for me.
“Evangeline.” Laurel’s voice pulls me out of my daze.
I blink, nearly falling forward from how far I was leaning over to watch the incense burn behind the back counter.
I pull my eyes away from the plume of smoke and look up towards where Laurel now stands in a doorway just off to the side.
She offers me a kind smile, dropping the curtain in the doorway as she steps into the main part of the stall to greet us.
“I wasn’t expecting to see you again so soon.
” Her words are cheery, but there’s concern in her eyes as her gaze darts from me to Quinn, who’s pulling a cigarette from inside his cut’s breast pocket.
“Quentin, you will not light that in my shop,” she scolds in a stern voice.
Quinn raises his hands in surrender, slowly tucking the cigarette back in his pocket.
It takes everything in me to stifle the laugh bubbling in my throat.
Much like the day I met her, she’s draped in flowy, dark fabric—a dress this time—with a brown knit shawl layered over it. She steps towards us, wrapping the shawl around her bare arms, and leans on the top of the counter.
The night she tended to me, her eyes had looked so dark, like bottomless seas of ebony.
But now in the warm, candlelit glow of her shop, I can see the brown undertones, the rays of shadow and earth that catch in the low light.
Just like that night, she is entirely captivating.
And just like that night, I have the feeling that I’m in the presence of something I still don’t quite understand.
“Now, what seems to be the issue?” she asks, but her eyes are already landing on my hip. As if I don’t even need to answer her question.
“Seems Angel here has taken a liking to our Sterling,” Quinn jests, coming up beside me and nudging me with his hip. I wince when he comes in contact with mine, stumbling slightly to the side and sucking a breath through my teeth as I try to recover.
“Shit, sorry.” His wince mimics my own. He’s on the other side of me in the blink of an eye, draping my arm over his broad shoulders. “I didn’t realize it was that bad.”
“No.” I shake my head, trying to push out the pain that’s still coursing down my leg. “It’s not, you just caught me off guard is all.”
“Bring her back here.” Laurel lifts a leaf in the counter to allow us through and ushers us through the curtain towards a back room in the stall. I try to pull away from Quinn, but he holds strong, insisting on helping me back towards a small cot on the far side of the space.
The back room matches the front half of the shop, only on this side of the curtain things feel even more serious—sacred.
In addition to a small office, more jars line even larger shelves and the walls are adorned with handmade creations, woven string with beads and bones and all sorts of elements of nature.
“They’re beautiful.” I nod towards a piece hanging on the wall beside the cot. “Do you make them?” I ask when Laurel kneels beside the cot.
She hums, nodding softly. “In my free time. Which these boys seem determined to rob me of.” She cuts a cold glare Quinn’s way, where he lingers at the foot of the cot.
“Hey, I’m not the one that fucked her so hard it left bruises,” he argues, hands going up in defense.
I melt with mortification, moaning as my hands fly to my face in an attempt to hide my shame. “Must we continue sharing this information with people?” I ask through the gaps between my fingers.
“Perhaps if you wanted to hide it, you shouldn’t have done it on top of the second-in-command's cut." He snickers, leaning against the wall and folding his arms over his chest. His white T-shirt strains against the muscles and I immediately force my gaze away. “You should have seen the look on Aamon’s face when she gave him back the cut, Laurel. I don’t know that I’ve ever seen him so enraged. ”
“Tact, Quinn. You could stand to learn some,” Laurel chides, turning back to me. “May I?” she asks, gesturing to the hem of my dress. I nod and she gathers the dark material in her fingers, delicately lifting the edge till my hip is exposed.
Laurel’s features betray nothing, but Quinn’s sarcastic demeanor drops the moment he sees the bruises. He stands up straighter, swiping the mask away from his face as he leans in with a severity that has me flinching. “Sterling did that?” he asks, eyes zeroed in on the blue and purple marks.
“It’s not him.” I tense, quickly covering the bruises. What to him should be only jealous remnants of Sterling's touch, seem to me now like a bright red warning sign. And despite the kindness I see in his eyes, I wonder if behind the ruse of kindness, he sees the rot inside me. If all of them do
“I just . . . bruise easy. I always have.” I hope it's enough to excuse away the markings. I neglect to mention the way Tamiel’s treatments have always left me littered with bruises and discolored, irritated skin.
Or how that has typically been the least of my concerns with my health in the past. Part of me had always assumed the treatments were responsible for my fragile state, but it seems a week without them has left me even more delicate than before.
“Quinn, go to the desk over there and grab the wide amber bottle with the gold lid,” Laurel instructs, twisting my leg carefully back and forth and testing it with the soft press of her fingertips.
He stares a moment longer at my bare hip, my cheeks reddening with color the longer he refuses to move.
“Quinn,” Laurel repeats, an edge of bite in her voice this time.
He grimaces, turning away at last and stalking through the small back room.
I can’t see him by the time he reaches the desk, but I can hear the way he fumbles roughly through the contents of the desk to find the jar.
“Your hip joint seems to be misaligned.” Laurel’s voice is low, and I know it's in an attempt to give us some privacy. It’s pointless.
With Quinn’s heightened senses, he’d be able to hear our conversation outside the stall, standing amongst the busy row of other merchants. But I appreciate the sentiment.
I tense as she shifts the direction of my leg, testing the rotation of the joint. “It’s dislocated?” I ask, surprised.
Laurel shakes her head briefly. “No, not quite. But it could easily become so if I don’t adjust it.” Her eyes flick up to meet mine. “Is that okay?”
It’s so jarring, experiencing the way she heals.
With Tamiel, nothing was ever my choice.
I was told to sit still, told to not squirm, told to take her treatment without argument and trust she knows what’s best for me.
Often, I wasn’t even told what was going into my body or how it may affect me.
But much like with the boys, I’m beginning to notice that consent is everything with Laurel. It’s . . . not what I expected.