Chapter 19 Elara
ELARA
Elara lay still on the couch, eyes closed, breathing even. The fire snapped. The door opened; cold air pushed across the floor.
Boots thudded. The door shut. Silence stretched, then his voice, low.
“Elara?”
She didn’t move.
Another pause. The scrape of his hand through his hair.
“I shouldn’t have left you like that,” he said, almost to himself. “I shouldn’t have—”
He stopped. Metal clinked; he set something on the table. The blanket shifted when he tucked it higher over her shoulders.
“You’re warm,” he murmured. “Good.”
She kept breathing slow. He stood there a long moment. The floor creaked when he stepped back. He doused a lamp, fed the fire, and tried again.
“I’m… not good at this.” A soft, humorless breath. “Understatement.”
He didn’t push. He moved around the cabin, deliberate and careful, as if noise might break something fragile. Dishes touched the sink. The kettle filled. He spoke once more, barely audible.
“I’ll do better in the morning.”
She wanted to sit up and say, “Then do better now.” She didn’t.
Water eventually simmered. He poured it. The chair across from the couch sighed under his weight. The storm pressed fingers across the panes and then backed off. He stayed still.
Minutes dragged. Her throat hurt from not talking.
He tried again, voice lower. “Elara.” A beat. “I’ll be here.”
She didn’t answer.
He let out a slow breath and settled in the chair. The fire worked at a log. The kettle clicked as it cooled. The storm fell into a steady hiss.
She waited until his breathing deepened. She stared at the ceiling, eyes open now to the dark. Her mind went to Twyla’s tilt of a smile: He looks at you a certain way. Freya’s calm certainty: If he’s paying attention, it means something.
“Maybe you were wrong,” she whispered to the ceiling. “Maybe I was wrong.”
The room didn’t argue.
She replayed the couch, the blanket, the way he’d touched her like reverence and then hit the brakes like a brick wall. She’d watched him walk out into the storm as if the cold could fix his restraint. She’d watched his eyes—raw, yes, but shuttered a second later.
Duty. Habit. Fear. She couldn’t name it, and that irritated her more than anything.
She rolled to her side and watched him in the chair. His head tilted back, mouth set even in sleep, scar shadowed along his jaw. The fire carved copper lines across his throat. His hands looked tired even at rest.
She whispered into the blanket, quiet enough for herself. “What are you afraid of?”
He didn’t stir.
She stared at the window. The storm trudged on, gusts and lulls, like a tired animal circling a den. She dozed in snatches and dreamed of gray eyes in snow. Every time she jolted awake, she swallowed his name.
When she couldn’t stand the silence, she sat up and pressed her feet to the rug.
It was still warm from earlier. She reached for the herb packet in her coat, carried it to the counter, and set a pinch into a mug.
She didn’t light the stove. She just held the dry mix under her nose and inhaled.
Chamomile and something else. Clarity, Freya had said.
She put the mug down. “Okay,” she breathed. “Clarity.”
She looked back at him. “You’re not a project,” she whispered. “You’re not a story either.” She made a face. “God, I hope you’re not a mistake.”
He shifted, lashes flickering. She froze. He exhaled and stilled again. She put the mug away and went back to the couch, intentionally loud with the blanket to warn herself against bad decisions. She tucked in and closed her eyes.
He woke once near dawn. She heard it in the way his breath changed.
“Elara?” Soft. Hopeful.
She let her breath stay slow.
He hovered between calling her name again and letting it go. He chose quiet. The storm thinned to a murmur.
Gray seeped around the edges of the shutters. The air wasn’t as tight; the pressure had broken. The cabin felt like it exhaled.
She pushed the blanket off carefully. She stood, waited until he didn’t move, and tiptoed to her sweater. She pulled it on. Jeans. Socks. Boots. She eased her glasses off the mantel and slid them on. They fogged; she pushed them higher.
His voice came from the chair, gravel-soft. “You’re up early.”
She turned. He was awake, eyes on her, sleep-dark and unreadable.
“Storm’s breaking,” she said. “I should get back.”
“You could wait for full daylight,” he said. “Roads will be better.”
“They’ll be worse if I wait and it ices again.”
He sat forward, elbows on his knees. “I’ll drive you.”
She shook her head. “I’ve got it.”
“Elara.”
She kept her tone even. “I need to shower. And I left my laptop on the bed where I was writing like a maniac about absolutely nothing.”
The corner of his mouth tugged. “That sounds right.”
“It does.” She zipped her coat. “Thanks for the blanket.”
“You’re welcome.” He stood. “At least let me walk you to the car.”
She hesitated. “No need.”
“I’m doing it anyway.”
She sighed. “Fine.”
They didn’t speak while she tucked the herb packets into her bag. He grabbed his jacket, pulled it on, and opened the door. Cold air cut through, cleaner now, the storm reduced to a drip from the eaves. The sky was the pale, exhausted kind of dawn.
Snow layered the steps. He cleared the rail with his forearm and offered a hand. She took it because slipping on frozen stairs to make a point would be stupid. His palm was warm. He didn’t wrap, didn’t squeeze, just steadied.
At the bottom he let go. She missed the contact more than she wanted to.
Her car sat exactly where she’d left it, snow packing the hood, a small drift along the passenger side. He brushed the windshield with his forearm and used his sleeve to clear the driver’s mirror.
“Pop the hood,” he said.
She pulled the handle. He lifted, checked cables, connections, the belt. She hovered by the front bumper.
“Well?” she asked.
“Looks fine. Cold’s a bully. She probably sulked herself to sleep.” He shut the hood.
“Relatable.”
He stepped back. “Try it.”
She slid into the seat. The interior smelled like cold vinyl and last night’s panic. He leaned down to the open door.
“If it doesn’t turn,” he said, “I’ll bring you back in and we’ll try again after breakfast.”
“Alaric.”
He paused. “Yeah?”
She looked at him straight on. “Last night…”
He went still.
She nodded toward the cabin. “You don’t have to explain anything.”
He didn’t answer right away. “I want to,” he said finally.
“Do you?” Her voice stayed calm. “Because it felt like you wanted to and then didn’t and then left me with a blanket and a lot of quiet.”
His jaw flexed. “You deserved better than quiet.”
“I agree.”
“I’ll fix it.”
“You don’t have to fix anything,” she said. “You just have to stop acting like I can’t handle a sentence.”
He huffed a breath that wanted to be a laugh and failed. “Fair.”
“Say a sentence, then.”
He looked at the snow, then back at her. “I wanted you to stay.”
She waited. He stopped. She made a face. “There. See? You can form words.” She put the key in the ignition and didn’t turn it. “Twyla says you look at me a certain way.”
He didn’t blink. “Twyla says a lot.”
“Freya says your attention means something.”
“Freya’s dangerous with a kettle and facts.”
She held his gaze. “Do they know you better than you know yourself?”
He didn’t look away. “Sometimes.”
“Right.” She faced forward. “I’m going to try the car.”
“Do it.”
She turned the key. The engine coughed once and died. She tried again. Nothing. She sat back, jaw tight.
He straightened. “Back inside. I’ll grab tools. We’ll—”
She slapped the steering wheel and yelled at the dashboard. “Start, damn you!”
She turned the key a third time, hard. The engine caught. The car roared like a miracle. She stared at the odometer, then snorted.
“Really?”
Alaric leaned down, eyebrows up. “You threaten machinery often?”
“Worked, didn’t it?” She gripped the wheel. “I’ll text Diana when I’m back. I’ll… we’ll talk later.”
“Count on it.”
She eyed him. “I mean it.”
“So do I.”
“Good.”
He nodded toward the road. “Take it slow over the first rise. There’s a dip that ices.”
“Noted.”
She pulled the door closed, put the car in gear, and let it roll forward. He paced beside her for three strides, making sure the tires caught, then fell away.
At the turn she glanced in the mirror. He stood in the road, hands on his hips, head bent, like a man arguing with himself and losing gracefully.
She looked back at the windshield. “Don’t read into that,” she told the dashboard. “Just drive.”
The car obeyed. Pines blurred by, snow shaking loose in soft plumes. The sky opened in a thin, pale strip above the trees. Her throat tightened and she coughed the feeling away.
“Fine,” she said out loud. “We’ll talk.”
The inn’s weathered sign swung into view in her mind before it appeared on the road.
She pictured Diana’s face, Twyla’s meddling grin, Freya’s calm eyes.
Maybe they were wrong. Maybe they weren’t.
Maybe she’d just seen what she wanted to see.
Maybe last night had been proof he wanted something else entirely.
She snorted again. “Maybe I should stop arguing with myself and ask him.”
The heater coughed warmer air across her hands. The tires hummed. She crested the rise, eased into the straight, and let the inn pull her like a magnet.
Behind her, the cabin shrank into trees and white. In front of her, the town waited. She tightened her hands on the wheel, yelled one last time just to make herself laugh, and the car purred right along as she drove back to the Hearth & Hollow.