3. Lissy
LISSY
Amug of mead thunks down in front of me. I look up to find Lyra grinning proudly.
"Drink, Lissy. You look like you could use a thirst quencher."
I wouldn't call alcohol a thirst quencher, but after the past few days, I can't shake the malaise clinging to me. So I pick up the mug and take a swig. Then I grimace, cough, and nearly spit it back out. "How can you drink this stuff?"
"How can I..." Lyra repeats before scoffing. "Lissy, that's my family's secret recipe. A combination of hops and orc-specific spices that my Aragos loves, brewed in small batches, just for you to cough it up like outhouse water."
I give the mug a forlorn look. "Sorry, I..."
She barks out a laugh. "I'm fucking with you, Lissy. Cheer up." Before I can answer, she pulls out a chair and sits across from me. "That's the shit we stopped discounting because it's so bad. A failed brew."
I stare at her, horrified. "And you gave me a mug?"
She shrugs. "On the house. It's not going to kill you. It's only eighty percent alcohol." She nudges it toward me. "Drink. You could use something to take the edge off your sobriety. You're making everyone else feel too sober for a pub."
I glance around June's Tavern. The few patrons here in the middle of the afternoon are picking at bowls of nuts, their mugs nearly empty. None of them are paying attention to me, and none of them care what I say.
I open my mouth to point this out, but Lyra leans into my line of sight. "So," she says. "What's gotten into you?"
I debate whether to tell her or lie and say nothing is wrong. Lyra would know. She would also know exactly how far to press before giving up.
You want a potion that makes someone fall out of love, correct?
I don't want it to break her heart.
That orc lord had been trying to make someone he knew fall out of love. As if love stories come in spades and a person gets to choose who falls in love, when, and when their heart breaks. Something about it rubs me the wrong way, especially when I have nothing like that in my own life.
No prospects. No love story. Certainly no happily ever after.
And that orc is trying to end one for someone else.
I don't know why it bothers me so much. Maybe it's because my grandmother has always told me the story of the Oak and the Needle, our family's own fairy tale.
Except it doesn't end happily for anyone in my family.
It's why I grew up without a father. Why my mother wasn't around. Why my grandmother raised me.
I shove the thought away and take another drink. This time, it's a little more palatable.
Barely.
"This tastes like disappointment, if disappointment were beer," I manage.
Lyra smiles. "So it does, then."
The door opens, and two women step inside. One is tall with dark, tanned skin. The other is petite, with a mass of curly red hair.
"And there's the rest of our group." Lyra twists in her chair. "Bella! Noemi! Over here!" She waves them over. "I'll get you a couple of steins."
"Not of this shit," I say, holding up mine.
Lyra winks. "Of course not. They tip better than you."
"Har, har," I mutter as she gets up and Arabella and Noemi join me.
It's Friday, which means our usual night at June's.
The tradition started several years ago, when the three of us looked at one another and realized we were workaholics with no social lives.
We started meeting here every Friday to drink.
Lyra moved back to Starling Vale about a year ago and joined us, and the rest is history.
She married an orc a few months ago, which reminds me yet again of the orc trying to undo something as strong as love. Things have changed a little since her wedding, but we still make time for this.
Having a routine helps. Having friends helps more.
Without them, I'd bury myself in my work.
A wedding dressmaker who will never make a dress for herself.
Why the hell is that bothering me so much? The interaction lasted only a few minutes, but it has followed me around for days.
I take another drink.
"Whoa, easy there," Arabella says in her warm, smooth voice. She raises a cautioning hand. "I can tell from the smell that that's the stuff Lyra gives me for my sourdough beer bread. It's rank."
"Perfect," I croak.
Arabella and Noemi exchange a glance. Then Lyra sets down their steins and places a fresh one in front of me. "There. That one should be better." She gives me a wink.
They drink and sigh happily. I eye my new mug before taking a cautious sip. Unlike the first one, this goes down smoothly and settles warm in my belly.
That's how a drink should taste. Not... whatever Lyra gave me before.
"So." Lyra throws an arm over the back of her chair. "How is everyone doing these days?"
Arabella lifts a shoulder. "Same ol', same ol'. I have an order of cookies that has to be ready tomorrow. Fifteen dozen. Can you imagine?"
"Are they all for one person?" Noemi asks.
The three of them laugh, because most people would try to eat a hundred and eighty of Arabella's cookies by themselves if their stomachs allowed it. She's famous across the realm for her baking, especially her cookies and pastries. No matter how many you eat, you never gain a pound.
You can still run out of room, though. It happens more often than anyone would admit.
Her wedding cakes are just as popular. Good thing most people only need one. Maybe two, if life takes an unexpected turn.
"I hope not," Arabella says. "They're for a birthday party. What about you two?"
"Similar here," Noemi says. "Busy, but..."
And isn't that the truth?
Busy, but...
"That about sums it up for me too," I say.
I catch the look all three of my friends exchange.
Noemi studies me before placing her hand over mine. "Busy, but you're making gorgeous dresses? You've been coming into my shop at least every other day for the past month. You're in high demand, just like Arabella."
"And your work doesn't come with the risk of cavities," Arabella adds. She pauses. "Although I could stop that with an anticavity potion, if I didn't know someone would take it as permission to sit down and eat every sweet in sight."
"You're welcome," Noemi says proudly, giving her a wink. "Both you and Lissy have been keeping me busy."
Everyone turns toward me.
I swallow and nod. "Yep. Apparently, there are a lot of people getting married."
"Maybe you should raise your prices," Arabella says gently. "You make beautiful dresses, and I've seen what you charge. You could double your prices and still be undervaluing yourself."
I comb a hand through my hair. "Yes, but... I don't want to. Every bride deserves to feel like a princess, no matter how much money she has."
Gods know I couldn't afford one of my own dresses.
Not that I'll need one anytime soon.
Still, if the day ever comes, I hope someone would show me the same kindness.
"But you're working yourself to the bone, Lissy," Lyra says. "You deserve more."
I deserve more than a family curse, too, but I don't say it. I don't want to drag them into those thoughts, especially when it seems like all of us brought our own baggage tonight.
Everyone except Lyra. In her newlywed bliss, she keeps trying to pull the rest of us toward happiness, no matter how hard we resist.
So I change tactics. "Well, I might be forced to raise them soon. If the rumors are true."
"What rumors?" Lyra asks, alarm slipping into her voice.
I take another deep drink and gather my thoughts. "Supposedly, fabric is going to be harder to get. There's talk of tariffs on every textile coming into the Starlit Reach. If it happens, I'll have to raise my prices just to cover the cost."
Arabella stares at me. "Lissy, that's awful."
I shrug. "It happens, I guess."
Except it feels like a punishment handed down to those of us stuck at the mercy of other people's trade deals.
"If it happens," I say, "I don't want to make things worse for the brides who need me."
Because that's the truth. If I have to pay as much as the rumors say, I still don't want to ruin anyone's dream.
Noemi sighs. "Lissy..."
I draw in a breath and push away the melancholy, along with the memory of the orc in her shop. Handsome as he was.
Then I give her a sardonic smile. "Noemiiii," I say in the same tone. "I'm all right. I'll figure something out."
"Right," Lyra says. "Well, we're here tonight, and we're having a girls' night. No one is going to stop us."
"Ahem," says a low, deep voice behind me.
I jump. It's not the same voice I heard in Noemi's shop, but the timbre makes me think orc immediately.
Which is silly. Lord Oakenshade was only visiting. There's no reason he would ever come to June's Tavern.
Aragos, Lyra's newly minted husband and an orc hottie, if you think orcs are hot, which I'm beginning to suspect I do, stands behind me and glares at his wife.
She rolls her eyes. "If you think you can stop me from having a girls' night out, then you don't know the woman you married very well."
"You're right," Aragos says flatly. "I don't know her very well."
I don't know many details about how Lyra and Aragos met. Orcs are rare in Starling Vale, and Lyra, like me, keeps some things to herself. We know better than to pry into certain corners of one another's lives.
Lyra throws her head back and laughs.
"Well," she says, "you have a lifetime to figure her out."
"Good luck," Arabella adds with a chuckle.
"But for tonight, my love," Lyra says, "you are not invited."
He gives her a good-natured grunt and stalks away. Lyra leans back to watch him go, a wistful look on her face.
I wish someone would look at me like that.
After a moment, she gives herself a small shake and turns back to us with a huge grin.
"To tonight," she declares, raising her stein.
"To tonight," Arabella and Noemi say together.
I'm the last to join, but I clink my mug against theirs and drain what's left.
Happily ever afters aren't in my future.
But I can pretend they are tonight, right?