Page 19 of Hand-Fasting and Other Hazards
Becket had been brought up to speed earlier on everything that happened at Wulfric’s office.
“Yes.”
“Ouch.”
“I know.”
For a moment, neither of them spoke. Lochlan pushed his food around, calculating how much work he could put into the diaries the Videt had sent him before he’d see her again. Had she eaten yet? Did she like anything he’d picked out?
Every thought circled back to Nia. She made the world feel lighter, brighter.
“There is something…” Becket’s voice broke Lochlan’s thoughts, low and hoarse. His gaze was distant, as if peering through a fog. “…but it’s still too hazy to see.”
Lochlan watched as Becket blinked himself free of the seer trance.
“What I do know,” Becket said, “is you need to be useful to her. Learn what makes her happy. My mom would kick my stepdad out if he didn’t build her a barn for her chickens or grab something off the top shelf. Ladies love that shit.”
Lochlan snorted. “I don’t think a barn will fix this.”
“Maybe not, but it’s the right kind of place to start. Show her she can rely on you. That marriage isn’t so bad.”
The words kindled like a spark in the dark as Lochlan sat back, the gloom of doubt clearing ever so slightly. Becket was right. His mother and sister had spent years curating the idea that loneliness was Lochlan’s birthright. Nia made him want more.
But if he wanted a chance to keep her, he’d have to earn it.
“What do you have to lose?” Becket said, watching him carefully.
“Nothing.” Lochlan’s lips twitched in the faintest hopeful smile. “Everything.”
And, for the first time, both of these things felt like the truth.
Diary Entry: My eighteenth winter
The moon hangs high in the sky, her light casting eerie shadows on the snow below my window. But her presence holds little comfort. I can still smell the blood. My heart pounds in my chest, remembering the massacre that was my wedding only hours ago. He came for me.
A beast.
He tore through them all, even the elder who was to marry me to that monster. I had never seen such formidable magic. The raw power, the sheer brutality. And yet, beneath the horror, there was something else, something careful. Protective.
I should be terrified, and I am, but there’s also a strange sense of relief washing over me. The life of misery and abuse I would have known was snatched away in a single, blood-soaked evening. I can’t shake the images from my mind—his fierce incantations, the crackling energy, the devastation he wrought. But alongside those memories is the way he spoke. He stepped toward me and held out his hand, slow and certain.
“You can come with me,” he said. “If that’s what you want.”
And for the first time in my life, I felt like I had a choice.
I don’t know where this path will lead us, but for the first time in forever, I feel a spark of hope. The beast has set me free, and though the future is uncertain, I am not alone. I can even feel him now, watching over me. He will keep me safe. It is a promise I cling to, a beacon in the dark.
CHAPTER 8
Nia
“QUIZ TIME! WHAT SOLSTICE ARE YOU MOST LIKE?” —THE STELLA RUNE GAZETTE
Nia glanced at the clock again. Five minutes until six. She’d spent the last hour pacing and overthinking, nerves buzzing like static.
Her suitcase sat ready beside her, thrifted and well-worn, packed with essentials—toiletries, her favorite clothes, the blanket she couldn’t sleep without. She could have waited upstairs in her apartment, but it had never felt quite like home. Too plain. Too practical. Ivy’s place next door had life and personality, while hers just… existed.
Down here, she felt grounded. The work, the office—this was hers. Just like the tunnels that wound beneath Stella Rune, where magic moved freely and she could sit with coffee in hand, watching the world drift by.
