Page 18 of Built Orc Tough
I realize she’s still holding the flower.
“You want to try making the next batch?” I ask.
She raises her eyebrows. “You’re offering tolet memix potions?”
I shrug. “Just the mild ones.”
“You realize I once nearly poisoned someone with lavender oil and confusion over metric conversions.”
“I’ll supervise.”
She snorts but doesn’t say no.
I clear the station, make room.
She steps in.
For the next fifteen minutes, we don’t argue. We don’t posture. We just work—side by side. I guide her hand when she over-pours, correct her grip on the pestle when she crushestoo fast. She watches my demonstrations closely, mimics them without needing praise.
She’s precise. Focused.
Surprising.
“I thought you hated this stuff,” I murmur as she strains the finished tincture.
“I hatedyou,” she says, too casually. “Not the craft.”
I glance at her. She meets my gaze.
Then she smiles, and it’s not sarcastic or smug. Just soft. Real.
“Guess I was wrong,” she adds, quieter now.
I don’t know how to respond to that.
So I just nod, watching as she labels the vial in her tiny, perfect script—Ivy’s first brew: less dangerous than expected.
It’s the first time her handwriting ends up onmyshelf.
And for some reason, I let it stay.
The shop is quieter than usual after the last customer leaves—just the ticking of the old wall clock and the faint hum of bees drifting near the front window where Ivy’s sunflowers lean, greedy for the light.
I glance over at her. She’s tidying her side of the counter with practiced movements, aligning scissors, smoothing a cloth beneath a basket of unopened lilies, pretending like she’s not thinking about the same thing I am.
My stomach growls.
She hears it—of course she does—and looks up with one of those arched-eyebrow smirks that could gut a man in high society.
“Did the stoic orc forget to eat today?” she asks, already reaching into the cabinet under her station.
“Didn’t forget,” I mutter. “Just didn’t have time.”
She pulls out two paper-wrapped parcels, sets one down across from me without ceremony. “Well, lucky for you, Sproutoverordered sandwiches from Lyria’s café again. You get the reject.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Reject?”
She sits, unwrapping hers. “It’s goat cheese, beetroot, and something that tastes suspiciously like regret.”
