Chapter 19 #3
“Sorry,” she said, looking up at him and grinning. “Let me make it up to you?”
She scurried away across the room, weaving among the empty tables (recently polished and shining, thanks to Ruraidh) until she reached the reception desk. By the time Ainsworth walked over, she had retrieved a small parcel wrapped in waxed paper.
“I baked these yesterday,” she said.
“Oh? Alvea let you in the kitchen?”
“Hush. I might not know how to cook fancy fare like you two, but I can still cook. Anyway, I— When we were talking the other night…” she said, looking away briefly.
Ainsworth resisted the urge to also look away as he recalled the night they had spent talking into the dawn.
“We— You said you missed the little pastries and cakes you got in Hinslyth. Well, I wouldn’t know what those are like, but…
” She seemed flustered as she unwrapped the waxed paper.
“I do like to make these every so often. Orradan cakes, that is.”
“Orradan?” Ainsworth exclaimed, momentarily forgetting to feel grateful that Honey had made something for him. “Wherever did you get orradan? Surely—surely Alvea would cook with it if she had any!”
Honey smirked. “Well, I’ve had a small tub for a long time; a visiting traveler gave it to me. I’m running a little low, and I don’t know when I’ll be able to get some more, so I am quite stingy with it, but…”
How could she be so blasé about such a precious commodity?
The spice was from an elusive southern settlement of the republic, not open to general trade, and any produce that made its way through was from privateers, smugglers, foot soldiers, or travelers who had kept some of their products untouched throughout the journey.
“I have never so much as sniffed orradan,” he said, peering into the bundle.
Stout, spongy, muffin-like cakes were piled on top of one another, the savory spice mixing deliciously with the sugary, citrusy flavors that Honey must have mixed into the batter.
And the campfire on a clear night was the perfect place to enjoy such a treat, he decided. Ashe rolled back over and sat next to him to take her share. “Ah! Always good when she cracks the orradan out,” she said over a mouthful.
When Ainsworth didn’t reply, too busy savoring the wonderful taste, she added: “Honey must really like you to go to such lengths to impress you.”
He choked on his last bite. “What? N-nonsense!” he said after his coughing fit, hitting his chest.
Ashe shrugged. “Well, it’s obvious you like her, too.”
“Nothing is ‘obvious’!” Ainsworth stood up and wiped the crumbs from his front. “Besides, I am—I am spoken for. I have someone back home.”
“Ah, yes. Someone you barely speak about. Someone you have not even written to since you arrived.”
“Who told you that?” He shot her a scowl.
She held up her hands. “You don’t have to be a scholar to figure it out. If you needed a letter delivered, you’d have to go through me.”
“I…” He trailed off and looked to the stars. “Just because I haven’t sent him any letters doesn’t mean I haven’t written any.”
“Oh,” Ashe said. An uncomfortable silence descended.
His stomach squirming, Ainsworth thought of the letters he had written Enach.
At first, they had been full of anxious words begging for Enach’s forgiveness, desperate to smooth things over.
He had burned them all, too fearful that sending one would be like poking at a wasps’ nest. Better to let things cool, he decided.
And then…something had shifted. The more recent letters he wrote were not exactly scathing, but they were…angry. A simmering, righteous rage laced his ink as he demanded to know what he had ever done to deserve such treatment. And declared that he would be treated like that no longer.
Those had gone to the flames, too, but it was a different kind of fear that sent them there.
Ainsworth supposed that was it, then. The end of it. Surely, surely if they had something worth saving, Enach would have reached out by now? And surely Ainsworth wouldn’t be throwing his feelings into the flames?
“Actually…” Ainsworth said quietly. “Maybe I don’t have anyone anymore.”
Ashe finished her cake. “Seems to me that unless you had someone say they’d wait for you back home, you’re under no obligations.
” A moment passed. “And…You are so much happier now, Ainsworth. You were insufferable when I first met you. At first I thought it was because you were a snob, but I think you were just unhappy.”
Each word was like an opening of his wounds that had managed to scab over but remained unhealed. “Goodness. Thank you for your honesty, I suppose.”
“Well, the way I see it, it isn’t the rest of us making you as happy as that little bag of cakes there.”
Ainsworth let her words sit for a moment. “Actually, the rest of you do make me happy.”
He wasn’t sure she had heard, for he had made his voice as small as it could go. But when she silently shifted into a mountain cat to do one last patrol of their surroundings before bed, she briefly brushed her head against his knee in passing.