Chapter 4
CORIN
The Vane workshop smelled like sawdust and machine oil, the familiar scent of generations of bears who built things with their hands.
Corin shouldered through the side door with a crate of damaged hive frames balanced against his hip, the wood warped and discolored in ways that made his stomach turn.
Elias was at the main workbench, running a plane along a length of oak with smooth, practiced strokes. He didn't look up when Corin entered, but his shoulders shifted with awareness.
That was Elias. He noticed everything.
"Frames?" Elias asked without turning.
"Yeah." Corin set the crate on the empty bench near the door. "Need to see if any of them are salvageable."
Now Elias looked. He set down the plane and crossed to the crate, wiping his hands on the rag tucked into his belt.
At 6'6", he was the biggest of the Vane cousins—massive shoulders, deep black hair streaked with silver at the temples, and silver-gray eyes.
Years of night guard work had carved him into something solid and watchful, the kind of man who filled a room without trying.
Corin had looked up to him since they were kids. Still did, if he was honest.
Elias pulled out one of the frames, turning it in his scarred hands. His brow furrowed. "This isn't weather damage."
"No."
"Mites?"
"Checked. Clean."
Elias ran a thumb along the warped edge, his expression unreadable. "How many hives?"
"Four. Maybe five by now."
"Since when?"
"Noticed it this morning, but it probably started earlier." Corin crossed his arms, then uncrossed them. Couldn't seem to find a comfortable position. "The cold snap masked it."
Elias set the frame back in the crate and turned to face him fully. That silver gaze swept over Corin's face, reading him the way he read a jobsite, looking for cracks, stress points, places where things might give.
"What else?"
"What do you mean?"
"You're wound tight." Elias leaned against the workbench, arms folded. "And you drove all the way out here instead of calling. So what else is going on?"
Corin's jaw tightened. He should have known better than to think he could slip anything past Elias. The man had spent years running night patrol, protecting Hollow Oak from threats most residents never saw. His instincts were honed sharp enough to cut.
"The orchard beds are showing the same thing," Corin admitted. "Soil's gone sour. Plants struggling. And Freya's herbs behind the apothecary are the same story."
Elias's eyes narrowed slightly. "You talked to Freya?"
"This morning. Dropped off honey." Corin hesitated. "Chloe was there. Her winter starts are failing too."
Something flickered in Elias's expression. "The herbalist. The one with the druid blood."
"That's what people say."
"What do you say?"
Corin shrugged. "I say she knows plants better than most witches I've met. And she felt the soil the same way I did. Whatever this is, she's not imagining it."
Elias studied him for a long while. Corin resisted the urge to shift his weight, to look away, to do anything that might betray the unease coiling in his gut.
"Winter losses happen," Elias said finally. "You know that."
"This isn't winter losses."
"Then what is it?"
"I don't know." The words came out harder than Corin intended. His bear stirred beneath his skin, a low rumble of frustration that wanted out. "That's the problem. I don't know what it is, and I don't really know how to fix it."
He stopped. Breathed.
Elias waited.
"The bees are confused," Corin said, quieter now. "Not sick. Not dying. Just... lost. Like they've forgotten what they're supposed to be doing. And the soil feels dead where it should feel dormant. There's a difference."
"I know there's a difference."
"Then you know this isn't normal."
Elias nodded slowly. "I know."
The admission helped, somehow. Corin's shoulders loosened a fraction.
"Have you told anyone else?" Elias asked.
"Finn saw me checking hives this morning. Made a joke about burying bodies." Corin's mouth twitched despite himself. "Didn't tell him anything real."
"And you came to me."
"You've seen more than most. Figured if anyone would know what to look for..."
Elias pushed off the workbench and moved to the window, gazing out at the gray afternoon. His profile was hard and weathered of a man who had spent too many nights walking the borders of Hollow Oak, watching for threats that came in silence and shadow.
"When Kaia first came to town," he said, "the dreams started going wrong before anyone noticed. Small things. People waking up tired. Bad sleep. It wasn't until the pattern showed itself that we understood something was feeding on it."
Corin frowned. "You think something's feeding on the land?"
"I think patterns matter. Bees. Soil. Plants." Elias turned back to face him. "Keep watching. Document what you see. If it spreads, we'll know it's not coincidence."
Corin nodded, but the knot in his chest didn't ease. He'd come here hoping Elias would have answers, or at least tell him he was overreacting. Instead, he'd gotten confirmation that his instincts were right.
Something was wrong with the land. And no one knew what.
"Thanks," Corin said. "For listening."
"That's what family's for." Elias clapped a hand on his shoulder, grip solid and grounding. "You're not wrong to be concerned. But don't carry it alone. You've got people."
Corin managed a nod. He gathered the crate of damaged frames and made his way to the door.
"Corin."
He paused, looked back.
Elias's expression was unreadable again, but something knowing glinted in those silver eyes. "The herbalist. Chloe. She good people?"
Corin's bear rumbled, low and warm.
"Yeah," he said. "She is."
Elias nodded once, as if that confirmed something. "Keep an eye on her too, then. If the land's hurting, she'll feel it before most."
Corin didn't trust himself to answer. He just nodded and walked out into the cold.
The drive back to the orchard was quiet. His bear was clawing at his skin, as if agitated. The bees were struggling. The soil was wrong. And he'd just admitted to Elias, steady, unshakeable Elias, that he didn't know how to fix any of it.
He hated not knowing. Hated the helplessness that came with watching things he'd tended for years start to fail.
But more than that, he hated the creeping suspicion that this was bigger than winter losses. Bigger than drainage issues or cold snaps or anything he could solve with patience and careful hands.