The bar is out-of-the-way, almost outside of town limits, in a relatively new area of Valkaria. It’s on the southern border of the town, so Harvest isn’t surprised to see that there is no welcoming symbol affixed to the door or on a bronze plaque or somehow worked into the logo.
Valkaria may look like an average-sized, rural municipality on the map, insignificant due to its lack of notable landmarks or tourist-worthy attractions, but the reality is that there is an unspoken divide. A line splits the town in half: the north is all magic and mischief while the south is mundane. Normal. Mortal. The mischief-bound community has never settled on a word for those who are non-magical; at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter the language used. The divide must be maintained and so it is, through the continued efforts of the Valkaria’s northern residents. The welcoming symbols are just one of the ways to delineate which side of town is which.
Of course, it’s not the symbol itself that matters, merely the presence of one.
All welcoming signs are variations of the symbol for salt, the carved or painted lines denoting a circle of protection that is largely agreed upon more so than physical. The lack of a symbol is a reminder to Harvest that she’d do well to keep her mischief to herself.
Then again, even if she were to blink into her second-sight momentarily, the resulting white glow could always be played off as a trick of the light. The fact that it is Saturday night means that the bar is packed with people, all of them with no clue that beyond their gated communities, or hiding in their sprawling suburbs up north or disguised as a rundown dilapidated warehouse district, is a world of mischief and magic. They are drunk and laughing and carefree. A flash of white glowing eyes would hardly warrant further inspection.
Harvest has never been to this bar, but it’s not an entirely unusual choice for Ezra. The institution that Ezra teaches at is the Valkaria-Grim College of the Arcane, a magical school that lies to the west of Valkaria city limits, not too far from the unspoken southern line. The southern residents know it as a nature preserve, which is off-limits due to the almost constant reports of a wild boar infestation. It’s entirely possible that Ezra was on his way home from the college and merely stopped off for happy hour.
Then again, it’s almost nine o’clock and happy hour has long since passed.
Harvest pushes her way through to the far side of the room where she can just see Ezra’s messy hair above the crowd. He sits at one of the high-top tables, nursing a glass of whiskey, darting his eyes around until they land on her rose-gold hair. He stands to meet her and suddenly, it all feels more like a date than it should.
“Hey, you,” he says, dropping a quick kiss to her cheek, his hand on the small of her back. He’s not as drunk as she thought he’d be, or maybe he’s hiding it well. “Ordered you a glass of Pinot Grigio.”
She takes the proffered glass with a smile and clinks it against his tumbler of whiskey. The sound is drowned out by the crowd around them though, the voices and laughter and thump of heavy bass seemingly louder all of a sudden. She takes a sip and then leans closer so he can hear her as she asks, “So, how was your day?”
“I had my first years today,” he says with a grimace.
Harvest laughs at his miserable look. His latest class of first-year students are learning the basics of elemental magic and more than a few are having difficulty grasping the concepts. It doesn’t help that the Saturday morning start time is an abomination at that particular age and the students are less than alert most times. Of course, the coursework should be entirely theoretical, but a few of the students are more enthusiastic than Ezra would prefer. “And what did they burn today?”
“Nothing. Today was water. And the entire classroom was flooded within a minute.”
“Lucky for them, you can heat up a room in mere seconds,” she says, thinking of his affinity with fire and not quite realizing the implications of her words.
He smirks and leans closer. “Is that right?”
She hates that her cheeks are flushed, and she hides her emotions in her glass as she takes another sip of wine. “Well, my day was terrible,” she says.
He frowns and places a comforting hand on her knee. “Tell me about it.”
So, she does.
They chat about nothing and everything for two hours, while the crowd around them ebbs and flows. The music seems to disappear, though maybe that’s because their heads are bent so close together, they might as well have transported themselves to a pocket universe, populated only by them.
Her glass is refilled twice, his three times. Harvest takes a sip, aware that she hasn’t eaten dinner. Ezra seems to read her mind, sliding a menu over to her.
“So where’s Hazel tonight?” she asks, eyes reading through the list of bar snacks, wondering if they have fried pickles.
“We broke up,” he replies.
Harvest looks up, startled. She isn’t sure how to respond, but she feels the knowledge like a live wire, a shock against her sternum.
“We had a fight last night,” he adds, after finishing his whiskey in one smooth motion. His eyes are downcast, trained on the table, his glass, his hands. Anywhere but at her. “She stormed out. I think that’s a good sign that she’s through with me.”
“You know Hazel,” she says. “All drama until her emotions settle down. She’ll come back. She loves you.”
He takes a deep breath and seems to steady himself before looking up at her. “I think she’s cheating on me.”
Most likely, Harvest thinks. Why else would Hazel lie about being with Ezra tonight? “Hazel would never—” she begins to say.
“Harv, I know you think the best of your sister, but she’s human. She makes mistakes.” He pauses, his eyes glancing down to her lips. “So do I,” he adds, half to himself.
Her cheeks burn under his gaze, and she takes a sip of her drink. “I know Hazel isn’t perfect.”
“Let’s get out of here,” he says suddenly, standing up but still leaning close, his lips almost touching her ear.
She can feel the anxiety rolling off him. She doesn’t need her second-sight to know that his aura is vibrating. A burned orange. A sunset in summer. She feels a little jittery herself, as if his aura is a living, sentient thing that has latched onto her, reverberating through her body. There are two tangled notes in the same chord.
“There’s a Chinese restaurant next door,” she says. “We could grab some food.”
He shakes his head, a hand on the small of her back, leading her out of the bar. “I’ve got something better.”
She glances up at him and sees something quite like trouble glistening in his eyes.
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The beach is technically closed to the public at this hour, but there is no one around to tell them to leave. They sit in the sand, shoulders just shy of touching, and watch the dark green waves roll up onto the shore. The sky is a pale grayish-purple with smudges of clouds, a slim line of teal where the ocean meets the sky.
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The air is crisp, salt-infused, and biting against their cheeks. She licks her lips and tastes the ocean, mixed with the fresh apricot and pear notes of the wine they picked up along the way and are sharing now, taking turns drinking straight out of the bottle like teenagers at a bonfire.
Ezra is attempting to explain how to wield fire. He has adopted what she has dubbed his teaching voice. Instead of the quick-paced frankness of his normal tone, his teaching voice is slow and steady. Entirely sure of itself.
It’s almost like he’s singing to her. Of course, she highly doubts his voice is this low and husky while he’s teaching his students. It’s a voice reserved entirely for her and this moment. The thought makes her stomach flip.
“It starts in my chest, usually. I can feel the heat just under my skin.”
She frowns and looks down at her hands, searching for the feeling he’s describing.
He watches her frustration deepen for a moment and then lets out a short chuckle. “Let’s try something else.” He shifts so that he is sitting behind her, stretching his legs out on either side of her
She moves too, scooting backward as he reaches around her, one hand on her belly, fingers splayed wide, and the other hand grasping her own.
“Relax,” he mumbles against her hair. “Breathe with me.”
She can feel his chest, rising and falling, and she closes her eyes, taking a deep breath. After a few seconds of breathing, he says, “Now, focus on your core—” She feels a slight pressure on her belly, and she tries not to squirm, “—and think of fire. Heat. Sunlight. Lightning. Crackling wood. The smell of smoke.”
With his body pressed against hers and his thumb rubbing tiny circles against her stomach, slipping a little lower with each breath, it doesn’t take much to think of heat. She feels like she is already on fire, like there are flames in her blood.
She opens her eyes, steadies her breath, and snaps her fingers.
The tiny spark is just a flash in the night, the wisp of smoke just visible in the starlight.
“Well that’s useless,” she says.
She can feel the amusement in his body before he even speaks, a soft exhale of breath that is warm against her neck. “Keep practicing. Sometimes a quick spark is all you need to start a fire.”
She turns to look up at him, not quite sure what to say or do in reply, but not yet willing to leave his embrace. His hand shifts even further down her stomach.
Ezra looks at her with eyes half-lidded, lips parted. The heat from his skin sinks into her own like sunshine.
His mouth is on hers before she can catch her breath. Before she can remember who she is and who he is and why they’re there together, at night, with the soft lull of the waves and the cool soft sand. His mouth is warm, the kiss bruising, needy, hungry. She is shaking, and she isn’t sure why. She needs to take a breath. She needs to back away from him and his embrace, but she wants to lean forward, wants to run her hands through his already messy hair, wants to bite his lower lip, wants to press her body against his until the sun rises.
Ezra pulls back slightly, his breath still on her lips.
“I…” She pauses, licking her lips, tasting peach and salt and a hint of whiskey. “It’s really over between you and Hazel?” she asks softly.
He nods, his lips brushing delicately against her own, a small spark zapping against her skin. “I’ve wanted this for so long,” he murmurs.
She’s not sure if it’s his gift or simply his words that make her feel like her own body is on fire. He ducks his head to capture her lips again and the second kiss is gentler, soft, but not fleeting.
She has thought about Ezra constantly since they met, her thoughts becoming increasingly more romantic as their friendship grew. Still, there was a wall between them, a barrier keeping them apart. She is all too willing to let it fall tonight, but now that it has, she feels lost. Although she can’t deny that she is attracted to Ezra Evans, the fact remains that he was, up until very recently, going to be her brother-in-law.
The thought seems to wake her up. She pulls back with a sharp intake of breath. “We shouldn’t.”
“If this is because of Hazel, I told you. We broke up.”
“I know. But it’s too soon. I think…” She takes a shaky breath, stepping over the crumbling remains of that wall and joining him on the other side. “I think I love you. And I want this to happen, but not right now, for the sake of Hazel’s feelings. We should wait a bit…before we…” She lets her words fall between them.
Ezra’s gaze flickers down to her lips as he considers her for a moment. His lips are cherry-red from their kiss, his eyes darkened with want. He reaches out and runs his thumb against her lower lip as if he misses the way it fits against his own.
He nods, reluctant, yet resigned.
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Hazel lets herself into the apartment, cheeks red from the coolness of the night. The front hallway is dark, and she hangs her keys beside the door as silently as possible. She slips off her heels and walks softly to the kitchen, taking care to avoid the middle of the hardwood floor, which has been known to creak forlornly at the most inopportune times.
Her care is unwarranted, however.
“Oh, didn’t think you’d still be up,” she says, blinking against the harsh kitchen lights.
Ezra looks up from the tumbler of whiskey he’s nursing. “Couldn’t sleep,” he mumbles. “Didn’t think you’d come back tonight.”
She sighs. “I know. I’m sorry about last night. I didn’t mean—”
“Doesn’t matter.” He stands, the kitchen stool sliding against the tile with a screech. “I’m heading to bed.”
He moves to walk past her, but she reaches for his arm. “Don’t walk away. Don’t ignore this.”
“Don’t ignore—” He scoffs. “You mean don’t ignore you like you’ve been ignoring me? Don’t walk away like you’ve been walking away? I’m just doing what you’re doing.”
“That’s not f—”
“Fair?” he says, taking a step closer to her. His voice should be loud—she knows him as that: loud and brash, indulgent and uncaring. But when he speaks now, his voice is low and steady, the emotions having smoldered too long in between them. “I don’t give a fuck about fair anymore, Hazel.”
“What happened to us?” she asks quietly, more to the space between them than to the stranger standing in front of her. For the first time in their relationship, his anger feels insurmountable.
But then her sadness gives way to indignation.
“It’s not my fault,” she says firmly. “I took over a business for my family. We talked about it beforehand, and we agreed that it was the right choice. That Tabitha’s Diner matters. That my mother’s memory matters.”
That was the crux of the decision, after all: not that Hazel had any inclination toward running a diner, but that the diner was started by her parents and that it was named after her mother. Harvest wasn’t going to take over and Hazel wasn’t particularly beholden to any professional obligations at the time.
Initially, the main concern was the substantial cut in income, but Ezra said he could support both of them for a while until she got settled in at her new job. The goal was to bring the restaurant back up to the level of profitability it had been when her mother was still alive.
Neither of them had considered how time-consuming it would be to run a small business.
But it’s not just the diner that’s taking up her free time, she reminds herself. It’s her work for Locke, too, that adds to her exhaustion at the end of the day. It’s her work for Locke that has led to “late nights at the diner” and headaches that lead her straight to bed when she does finally make it home.
She takes a deep breath, pushing the indignation aside with some force. “But I can do better. I can delegate more often. I want to spend more time here. With you.”
His gaze softens, and he runs a hand through his already messy hair. Up close, she can smell the alcohol, see the redness of his eyes. She moves closer to him, reaching up to brush his hair behind his ear.
She lets her hand rest on his cheek, and he leans into her touch, just briefly, before he reaches up to remove her hand.
“I need to tell you something,” he says, in that low, steady voice again.
She frowns and takes a step back, a cold shock of anxiety washing over her shoulders.
“I thought we were…” He runs his hand through his hair, considering his words. Then he starts again. “Something happened between me and Harvest.”
She takes another step back, reaching up to nervously tangle the H charm on her necklace and wishing it was the pendant she made for Locke. She wants to run away from this conversation. She wants to be forgotten and disappear into the night.
“What do you mean?” she asks, proud that her voice is strong and clear despite the pounding of her heartbeat.
“I love her,” he says.
She takes another step away from him, as he continues to ramble off excuses. She backs away from him even as he lunges forward, reaching for her, even as the words I’m sorry tumble from his lips over and over again until it’s all she hears.
I’m so sorry. This isn’t working. I love Harvest.
With a sharp intake of breath, she says, “Get out.”
“Hazel—”
Leave. She doesn’t say the word out loud, but she pushes it toward him. He can feel the tingle of mischief against his cheeks. He shakes his head and spits out a curse word. She’s not even really sure what he says, because the roaring in her head is too loud.
He slams the door shut, and she is left in silence, in a pristine kitchen, countertops shiny and clear except for the half-empty bottle of whiskey and a fruit bowl. She lowers herself onto the kitchen stool and, absentmindedly, reaches for a cherry. As she chews, she looks at the pit in the palm of her hand and wonders if she should be crying.
Her phone pings, interrupting her numb musings, and she looks down at Locke’s name. Be right there, she replies, before slipping the cherry pit into her pocket.