Page 84 of The Last Rose of Ashwood

The dryness of it nearly escaped Seren before she caught it.

Elira’s mouth shifted faintly. “You did not appear concerned.”

“I wasn’t.”

“Charming.”

“I’ve been told," Mara grinned something sharp.

Seren looked between them and decided, with some resignation, that allowing Mara and Elira prolonged access to one another might eventually become its own operational hazard. She returned her attention to the scholar. “You know these mountains?”

“Somewhat.” The answer came smoothly enough—too smoothly. Seren had begun recognizing Elira’s particular talent for building lies around pieces of truth. She rarely invented outright when she could offer something technically accurate and allow everyone else to misunderstand it on their own.

Beside them, Mara had already begun tightening the straps on her saddle. “If we’re staying on this road,” she said, “we should move.”

No fear. No argument. No wasted urgency. Just a woman who had looked at the mountains, received their answer, and expected everyone else to possess the good sense to believe her.

By midafternoon, the old road had become a pale thread beneath snow and roots. The trees crowded closer as the ground rose steadily toward Listener’s Rise, their branches catching white along every dark limb. Coren’s eagerness had faded into watchfulness. Mara remained composed, though she had begun studying the road behind them as often as the one ahead. Elira had become quieter. Not merely silent. Seren was learning the difference. Silence was her preference. Quiet was something else—the compression of thought, attention, and fear until none escaped. One hand remained tight around the reins, while the other flexed occasionally beneath its glove. Her gaze kept returning to the ground as though something beneath the snow tugged at her awareness.

The flakes thickened into curtains, erasing the road ahead.

Seren slowed her horse. “We need shelter.”

“We need the hill,” Elira replied.

Seren ignored her and searched the trees. Elira did the same, though with a different kind of attention. She examined the slope, the line of the old road, and the way water must have once moved through the land beneath the snow.

“There may be a structure east of here,” she said.

Seren looked at her. “May be?”

“Would you prefer that I invent certainty?”

“No. I prefer when people say what they know.”

Elira turned her horse east. For once, Seren followed without argument. They found the cabin half an hour later, tucked among pines above the stream and nearly concealed beneath snow. The roof sagged but remained whole, while a narrow stone chimney leaned away from the wind with the stubbornness of something too old to be easily removed. Elira dismounted first and approached the door. Seren watched her brush snow from the frame, revealing a small carving near the lintel: three roots beneath an open eye. Her hand withdrew immediately.

“What is it?” Seren asked.

Elira allowed the silence to stretch. “Shelter.”

“That is not what I asked.”

“No,” she said as she pushed open the door. "It was not."

Inside, the cabin contained one room, a stone hearth, a rough table, and two narrow sleeping platforms built into the far wall. Dust layered the shelves. An abandoned clay cup sat cracked beside the cold ashes. It was not warm, but it was dry, and the snow had already erased most of the world beyond the windows.

Mara inspected the ceiling. “It will hold.”

Coren looked relieved enough to embrace the walls.

“We remain until the storm clears,” Seren said. “Mara, secure the horses in the lean-to. Coren, help her.”

The scouts went out through the attached side door. Seren crouched at the hearth and cleared the old ash with brisk, practiced movements. Flint, dry fibers from her pack, split wood left stacked beneath the table. The work asked nothing from her beyond patience and hands that remembered how to make warmth.

The first flame caught reluctantly, shivering along the edge of the kindling before settling into a narrow tongue of gold. Then it bent sideways. Seren paused with the flint still in her hand, watching the flame stretch toward Elira as though pulled by a current no one else could feel. It did not follow the draft creeping beneath the door or lean toward the chimney’s draw. It reached across the hearth toward the scholar with an almost deliberate curiosity, thinning until its bright tip pointed directly at her.

The absurdity of it held Seren motionless.