Chapter 10 Maren
MAREN
"Watch me."
It was more than the words, it was the tone. The emotion behind them.
Maren searched Tristan's face for doubt, for the polite distance that usually followed bold statements.
She found neither.
"More tea?" she asked, because the silence had grown too thick.
"Yeah."
She moved to the kettle, grateful for something to do. The storm battered the cabin from all sides now, wind howling through the gaps in the shutters, snow piling against windows. Inside, firelight painted everything gold and shadow.
Her shadows included. They moved lazily across the floor, more relaxed than they'd been in days.
Because of him. Because he was here.
She poured two cups of chamomile and carried them back to where Tristan sat near the hearth. He'd shed his outer layers, leaving him in just a thermal shirt that stretched across broad shoulders. Firelight caught the angles of his jaw, the sharp line of his cheekbones.
Dangerous thoughts crept through her mind before she pushed them aside.
"Can I ask something?" Maren sat down across from him.
"Depends on the question."
"Fair enough." She wrapped her hands around her mug. "Why Hollow Oak? You could work security anywhere. Military background, tactical training. Cities would pay well for someone like you."
"Cities are loud." He sipped his tea, ice-blue eyes watching her over the rim. "Too many people. Too much noise."
"That's not a real answer."
"It's the one I've got."
She let the silence stretch, waiting. People often filled silence when they weren't comfortable with it.
Tristan didn't seem uncomfortable. He seemed patient.
"Kieran vouched for me," he finally said. "Our families knew each other before. He said Hollow Oak needed someone who understood how to protect without controlling."
"And he thinks of you as someone who knows the difference?"
He shrugged as his gaze dropped to his tea. "Don't always succeed. Your turn," he said. "Same question to you. You could've gone anywhere after your last town. Somewhere bigger, where nobody knew your name."
"Bigger means more people to fear me with more chances for history to repeat." Maren stared into her tea. "Hollow Oak felt hidden. Safe.”
The fire crackled as the wind rattled the shutters. Maren found herself relaxing despite the storm, despite the danger, despite everything telling her to keep her guard up.
Something about Tristan made her walls feel unnecessary.
"The things Bram said about shadow magic," Tristan said carefully. "About bloodlines and forbidden work. Is there more you haven't told me?"
Maren's hands tightened on her mug. She'd already revealed more than she'd planned about the Pitch Sisters, the outlawed magic, the abilities that had been purged from her line. But there was always more. Always another layer of darkness to confess.
"My grandmother was accused of blood-shadow crimes," she said quietly. "Using shadow magic to manipulate memory and fear. The kind of magic I told you about before."
"Accused. Not convicted?"
"Never proven. But accusations were enough back then." Maren set down her tea, needing her hands free. "She was exiled from her coven. Spent the rest of her life moving from town to town, never staying long enough for rumors to catch up."
"What happened to her?"
"Died alone. My mother found her body three days after." Maren's voice stayed level through practice. "She'd stopped eating. Stopped caring. Exile does that to people eventually."
Tristan was silent for a long moment. "And your mother?"
"Kept her head down. Married a human who didn't ask questions. Had me." Maren traced a finger along the arm of her chair. "She taught me control before she taught me anything else. Said our bloodline couldn't afford mistakes."
"That's a lot of pressure for a child."
"It kept me alive." She met his gaze. "When the fire happened in my last town, when they blamed me, I knew exactly what to do. How to survive. How to wait until the truth came out."
"But it cost you."
"Everything costs something."
The fire had burned low. Maren rose to add wood, aware of Tristan's eyes tracking her movement. Her shadows followed her across the room, curling around her ankles like loyal hounds.
"Your grandmother," Tristan said. "Do you think she actually did what they accused her of?"
Maren paused, log in hand. No one had ever asked her that before. Most people assumed guilt ran in bloodlines the same way magic did.
"I don't know," she admitted. "My mother never talked about it. And by the time I was old enough to ask, my grandmother was already gone."
"Does it matter? What she did or didn't do?"
"It matters to the people who want to judge me for it." She placed the log on the fire, watching flames lick at dry wood. "Blood carries memory in magic families. If she was guilty, some people believe that guilt passes down."
"That's not how guilt works."
"Tell that to Bram."
Tristan snorted. "Bram's an ass."
The bluntness surprised a laugh out of her. "He's on the Council."
"Doesn't make him less of an ass."
Maren returned to her chair, something warm uncurling in her chest. "You really don't care, do you? About my bloodline, my family's history, any of it."
"I care about what you do. Not what your grandmother might have done decades before you were born."
"Most people don't see the difference."
"Most people are scared." His eyes held hers steadily. "Fear makes everything look like a threat."
"Even me?"
"Especially you." He leaned forward slightly. "You're powerful and different and you don't apologize for existing. That terrifies people who need everyone to fit in neat little boxes."
"And you? Do I terrify you?" Her voice sounded vulnerable, but she couldn’t resist asking.
Suddenly, wind slammed against the cabin hard enough to shake the walls.
Not natural wind. The force carried magic in it, cold and sharp and wrong. The same wrongness she'd felt at the stream, at the candle, at every incident since the first storm.
The window beside Tristan cracked, causing Maren's shadows to explode outwards.
They moved faster than thought, faster than intention, wrapping around Tristan in a protective cocoon of darkness. Glass shattered inward but the shadows caught every shard, suspended them mid-air, then let them drop harmlessly to the floor.
The supernatural wind died as quickly as it had come.
Silence pressed in, broken only by the crackle of fire and their ragged breathing.
Maren stared at her shadows in shock. They remained wrapped around Tristan, dark tendrils curling over his shoulders, across his chest, around his arms. Protective. Possessive.
She'd never seen them do that before.
Not for anyone.
"Maren." Tristan's voice emerged rough. "Your shadows."
"I know." She tried to pull them back but they resisted. "I'm trying to—they won't—"
"It's okay." He held very still, letting the darkness wrap around him without flinching. "I'm okay."
"They've never done this." Her words came out slightly shaky. "Protected someone else. They only protect me."
Her shadows finally loosened, retreating slowly back to her, but traces of them lingered on Tristan's skin like they were reluctant to let go entirely.
She understood the feeling.
"That wind wasn't natural," Tristan said, rising to examine the broken window. Glass crunched under his boots.
"No. It was the same magic that's been interfering with me." Maren hugged her arms around herself. "It found us here."
"Or it's been here all along, waiting for the right moment."
"To do what?"
Tristan turned to face her, blue eyes sharp in the firelight. "To see how you'd react. To test your magic."
"Or to test yours."
They stared at each other across the cabin while wind howled outside and cold crept through the broken window.
Maren's shadows still reached toward him, thin dark threads she couldn't quite pull back. They'd made their choice, apparently.
"We should board up the window," she said finally.
"I'll handle it. You stay by the fire."
He moved closer to the door to retrieve tools, but paused beside her chair. His hand lifted, hesitated, then settled briefly on her shoulder. Warm and solid and real.
"Thank you," he said quietly. "For the protection."
"I didn't do it on purpose."
"I know." His thumb brushed her collarbone once. "That's what makes it matter."
Then he was gone into the cold, leaving Maren alone with her traitorous shadows and the echo of his touch burning through her skin.
Whatever was happening between them, it had just gotten a lot more complicated.