Page 39 of Enchanted Heir
“It’s your hands,” he offered.
Oh.I’d forgotten. What was the part of the body the Enchanted were hyper focused on above all else? Hands. And here I was, playing with Krew’s hands trying to teach him an artform he’d never need another day in his life. My breath caught and I spun to face him. “I’m so sorry. I forgot about the whole Enchanted and hands thing.”
He smirked, reaching to grab my hand. “No. It’s fine. Really.” His hand was slightly sticky and dry from the flour, just like mine. And sure, my father had helped my mother and I in the kitchen with the dishes, but I wasn’t sure I had ever felt another man’s hands like this before. Baking was not a man’s job in Wylan. I couldn’t help but look at his hand on mine and then absently wonder if the fascination with hands and palms was rubbing off on me.
But then Krew added, “They are remarkable hands. Swift and deadly.” He turned my hand over as if to better see the palm. “I was just thinking had you been born Enchanted, you could’ve brought kingdoms to their knees.”
So really, brought his father to his knees. “Oh, I still can,” I said with a smile as I turned back to the dough, “just with my bread instead.”
He let out a short laugh. I finished the second batch of dough and placed it in the oven with the first.
“Are you sure you don’t want a drop of my magic to see?” he offered after we washed our hands at the sink and returned to our area to pick up.
“To see what?” I asked. “How cruel I can become?”
He leaned against the table and turned back toward me, a kitchen towel still in his hands. “No, to see what you could accomplish with it. To feel the rush and buzz that magic gives you.”
I shrugged. “It doesn’t really matter, does it? No one is more powerful than the three Valanova Enchanted. Plus, we don’t even know if I can receive magic.”
Krew wrinkled his nose. “Yes. There is that.”
Owen rounded the corner effectively interrupting our moment. Which was good because I was fairly certain Krew had just been nonchalantly offering me a drop of his magic.
After they filled each other in, Owen turned to me. “So you have the bread done?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. I’m trying my best.”
He just looked at me a moment, then finally said, “This isn’t your fault, Jorah.”
I sucked in a breath, not realizing how much I had needed to hear those words. “Yes, it is.”
“No,” Krew snapped. “No, it’s not.”
I moved to finish cleaning up our mess while the two of them talked about the rest of the day. It felt like it was midnight, not lunch time. I was going to need alongbath after all this.
Thirty minutes later, I checked on the bread. It was rising faster, but I wasn’t sure it was going to be enough. But that was okay. That was why we made two batches. It might just have to be more dense than usual. A dense bread was better than no bread at all.
“How are we coming on the ham, Maurice?” I asked.
He gave me a thumbs up from where he was getting out plates and preparing the warming trays. “Not my best effort, but it will be done, Chef Tiny.”
“The green beans?” I asked Jakob.
“Done in ten and then they can simmer while they wait,” he offered over his shoulder at the stove.
I spun toward Tilly. “The cake?”
She gave me a shrug. “Should be out in five minutes and the ham can go back in. Working on the frosting now.”
I looked from the wrapped up ham to the oven holding my dough. As long as the bread rose properly, we just might pull this off. But then a thought struck me. If Owen could warm the food for the wolves with his magic, could he gently warm the bread too?
Eyes wide with the idea, I headed back to the two of them.
“What is it?” Owen asked, seeing the look on my face right away.
I wasn’t sure how to phrase what I was wondering. “Is it possible for you to warm the dough like you warm the food for the wolves? But not very hot? Just slightly warm?”
Owen’s eyes went to Krew’s. “Krew can probably control his magic and the temperature of it better than I can, but yes, either of us could technically do that.”
