Page 32 of Tusks, Tails & Teacakes
Iris eyeballed the puffy triangles. “This isn’t one of your gran’s recipes.”
“Not entirely. These are her scones, but I added cinnamon. I thought they would go well with the chai.”
Iris took one of the slightly burned scones and bit into it from the side that wasn’t scorched. Then her eyelids fluttered, and she released a sound of pure pleasure. “Delicious.”
Lira’s pulse quickened. “Truly?”
“I could eat these all day,” Iris mumbled through a mouthful as crumbs scattered from her lips. “Not that I would say no to some of her teacakes.”
Crumpet had snuck back in on silent feet and was swiping each burnt bit as soon as it dropped from Lira’s blade. Lira took a bite of the scone she was holding, smiling as she savored the buttery crumbly texture that was infused with the sweetness of the cinnamon.
Iris finished her scone, even devouring the burned edges, swallowing and locking her eyes onto Lira. “You’ve done your gran proud with these.”
Lira wanted to soak that in but there was something else she wanted more. “Why did you do it?”
“Do what, love?”
“Teach me all those things when I visited you. I know my gran didn’t send me to you to learn to pick locks and grapple with daggers. Did she know?”
Iris's expression twisted then her brow smoothed as she released a breath. “Elia knew everything. Do you think I would have done any of that without her blessing?”
Lira shook her head. “But she was a crofter. She taught me to gather eggs and bake. She took me in when my mother died, and my elf father was long gone. Why would she want me learning any of that?”
Iris let her gaze flicker to the doors, but whether she was hoping for a reprieve or hoping no one was behind them to hear, Lira didn’t know. “It doesn’t matter how lovely a village is, there will always be those who cannot stay and those who cannot leave. Your gran was one who couldn’t stay until much later in life, when she needed to. She suspected that you might be the same, and she wanted you to be able to make your way in the world.”
Lira scoffed at this and then pressed on, guessing at something she’d suspected for years. “Did she know you were once a rogue?”
Iris smiled and put her hand over Lira’s. “Of course, she did. That’s how we met, love. We ran together long before you were a thought, long before even your mother was a glimmer.”
A far away ringing started in Lira’s head, as if warning her not to push farther, not to ask the next logical question. The truth waited like a precipice before her; one more step and she would fall. “Ran together?”
Iris's eyes crinkled as she held Lira’s, not a sliver of deception in the soft green. “We were on a crew together when we were young. I was, well, you know what I was.”
“And my gran?” Lira's voice was so low she wondered for a moment if she'd only imagined asking the question. Her heart thrashed in her chest, a desperate rhythm against her ribs, as if trying to escape what was coming.
“Love, your gran was the mage.”
She blinked at Iris slowly, the world seeming to blur at the edges,before giving her head a shake that felt as though it might unravel her completely. “What?”
Before Iris could repeat her words, Lira held up a hand. “No, I heard you, but I don’t believe you. My gran couldn’t have been a mage. She would have told me.” Her voice cracked, splintering like thin ice beneath too much weight, the idea that she hadn't known such a huge part of her gran cleaving her heart in two. “She wouldn’t have lied to me.”
“She never lied to you, Lira.” Iris’s voice held an edge. “You were too young to keep such a secret. It would have been an unfair burden to tell you.”
As sensible as this was, Lira didn’t want to hear it. She didn’t want to hear anything that would ruin the memories of her gran she’d held so tightly.
Her gran had been her gran, a warm old woman who tended chickens and baked amazing cakes. She’d been Lira’s constant after her mother died, the one person she’d always been able to rely on, the only person she’d trusted with every fiber of her being. And Lira hadn’t known her at all.
All the grief she’d been holding at bay for so many years came rushing to the surface. Lira pressed a hand to her mouth as a sob threatened to burst from her lips, pushing past Iris and rushing up the stairs to the small, cold room she shared with Sass. Only when she was lying face down on the bed so the pillow could muffle her cries, did she let the tears flow.
Nineteen
Lira punchedthe heel of her hand into the dough, satisfied when the elastic mixture cowered from her touch.A mage? Her gran had been a mage?
She scowled as she worked the dough, ignoring the warning sounds from Crumpet who sat to one side holding his tiny hands together as if in prayer. Had everything she’d known been a lie—the small farm, the cozy house they’d shared, the simple life of selling eggs and raising hens?
She shook her head like she had a hundred times since she’d run from Iris and escaped to her room. She’d cried until her eyes were sore and her chest ached, but she’d finally come back to the kitchen. Therewas something about baking that calmed her, and this was a time she needed calm.
Despite being steadier, questions still swirled in Lira’s head. How had she not known she’d been living with a mage who’d run with an adventuring crew?
