Chapter 27 Avine
TWENTY-SEVEN
AVINE
The door to her bedroom burst open without warning.
“The moping ends now!” Junie and Cassia swept into the room together. Junie with a canvas bag that clinked ominously. “We’ve got wine, we’ve got supplies, and we’ve got absolutely no intention of letting you lie here feeling sorry for yourself.”
“I wasn’t—”
“You were absolutely moping,” Cassia said, three bottles of wine cradled in her arms. “I could feel the melancholy from the boardwalk. It was messing with the barometric pressure.”
“That’s not how melancholy works.”
“It is when you’re as dramatically sad as you’ve been.” Cassia set the wine on the dresser and immediately started opening the first bottle. “Don’t argue. Drink.”
Dahlia and Narla appeared next. Dahlia, carrying a basket that smelled like honey and lavender and a hint of magic.
Marzipan trotted at her heels, immediately leaping onto the bed and curling up against Avine’s hip with a proprietary air.
“I brought purifying mud masks. The glowing kind. They’re supposed to help with magical fatigue. ”
“Do they actually glow?”
“Like a beacon.” Dahlia smiled. “It’s very dramatic. You’ll love it.”
Narla settled in her corner with her customary quiet, and the four of them descended on Avine with the focused energy of a unit that had spent too long worrying.
Avine looked around at them—these women who’d burst into her life without permission and refused to leave. Something tightened behind her breastbone.
“I wasn’t moping. I was contemplating.”
“Contemplating with a sad face while staring at your phone.” Junie was already pouring wine into glasses she’d produced from her bag. “Which is moping with extra steps. Here.” She thrust a glass into Avine’s grasp. “This is a prototype. It changes color based on your mood.”
Avine looked at the wine. It was currently a deep purple, edging toward violet at the rim.
“What’s purple mean?”
“Longing.” Junie grinned. “Deep, yearning, possibly romantic longing. Interesting.”
“I hate you.”
“No, you don’t. Drink your feelings and let’s get started.”
Within the hour, Avine’s bedroom had been transformed into a cross between a spa and a slumber party.
The facial masks did, in fact, glow—a soft golden light that made them all look like benevolent spirits in the candlelit room.
Cassia had conjured music from nowhere in particular, sea shanties that she claimed were “thematically appropriate” and everyone else called “annoying.” Junie’s enchanted wine kept shifting colors as they drank, a constantly changing mood ring in liquid form.
Dahlia had produced a basket of pastries alongside the mud masks—“Comfort croissants, with a hint of calm baked in”—and Avine had eaten three before she realized she was actually hungry for the first time in days.
“So.” Junie curled cross-legged on the bed beside Avine, her glowing face mask catching the candlelight. “Are we gonna talk about it, or are we gonna pretend we came here for spa time?”
“We could pretend.”
“We absolutely could not.” Cassia sprawled across the foot of the bed, her mask glowing perhaps a bit too enthusiastically.
“You almost died. You developed mystery sea magic. And the alpha of the local wolf pack has been hovering over you like an intense, overprotective shadow for days. We’ve got questions. ”
“Many questions.” Dahlia’s voice was gentler. “But only if you’re ready to answer them.”
Avine took a long sip of her wine. It had shifted to a softer pink now—affection, she thought, or maybe the calming effect of being surrounded by people who cared about her.
“I don’t understand the sea magic. It’s not in my lineage. My mother was earth-touched, my grandmother was a hearth witch. There’s no sea anywhere in my family that I know of.”
“The inn.” Narla’s voice was quiet. Everyone turned to look at her. “It’s old magic. Sea magic. It recognized a resonance in you—woke it up.”
“But how can it wake up what wasn’t there?”
“Maybe it was always there.” Narla’s gaze held steady. “Buried. Waiting for the right trigger.”
The words hung in the air. Avine thought about her great-aunt Sue, about the way she’d orchestrated Avine’s move to Haven Shores without ever seeming to orchestrate anything.
“That’s terrifying.”
“Most real power is.” Junie refilled her wine glass. “Now, can we please talk about the wolf?”
“There’s nothing to talk about.”
“Avine.” Dahlia’s voice carried that particular maternal disappointment that made people confess to things they hadn’t even done. “He stayed at your bedside for two days. He shifted into a wolf and curled up at your feet. He looked at you like you were the sunrise.”
“How do you know about the wolf thing?”
“Marzipan was keeping watch.” Dahlia scratched behind the cat’s ears. “She’s very observant.”
“Your cat’s a gossip.”
“She prefers ‘information broker.’” Dahlia smiled serenely. “Now stop deflecting.”
Avine groaned, sinking back against her pillows. The wine in her glass had gone deep crimson—passion, probably, or embarrassment. Hard to tell.
“Fine. Yes. There’s… an attraction. Between us.”
“An attraction,” Cassia repeated, her voice dripping with sarcasm. “An attraction, she says. Like the entire town doesn’t already know you two are practically mated.”
“We’re not—” Avine’s cheeks flamed. “There’s no—we haven’t—”
“Not yet.” Junie’s grin was wicked. “Which brings me to my next contribution to this spa night.” She reached into her bag and pulled out a candle, setting it on the nightstand with a flourish. “Behold: my newest creation.”
The candle was a deep forest green, flecked with blue. Avine eyed it suspiciously.
“What is it?”
Junie lit the wick with a snap of her fingers. The scent that rose was immediately, devastatingly familiar. Cedar. Sea salt. An undertone that was wild and earthy—a scent that made Avine’s stomach flip and her pulse quicken.
“I call it ‘Alpha Essence.’” Junie announced.
“You’re deranged.”
Junie winked. “Also, you haven’t stopped breathing it in since I lit it.”
Avine opened her mouth to deny it. Closed it again. Drank more wine instead.
Dahlia cleared her throat. “Speaking of the Alpha… I’ve been experimenting with some new recipes.” She produced a small box from her basket, opening it to reveal perfect chocolate cupcakes topped with swirls of dark frosting. “Alpha Crush Cupcakes. Chocolate with a hint of protection magic.”
Narla raised an eyebrow. “Alpha Crush?”
“The marketing tested really well.” Dahlia’s face was perfectly innocent. “Marzipan approved.”
The cat, curled against Avine’s hip, let out a sound that might have been agreement.
“I’m surrounded by traitors.” But Avine took a cupcake anyway. The chocolate melted on her tongue, rich and perfect, and underneath it she tasted comfort magic, subtle but undeniable.