Page 66 of Mountain Man’s Mystic Touch

“Is this what you smelled?” I ask.

“Partly.”

The vendor lifts the kettle. A cloud of sweet smoke rises when caramelized sugar touches the heated edge. Loralee closes her eyes.

I position myself between her and the crowd. “Talk to me.”

“I’m fine.”

“That is not enough information.”

She opens her eyes. “The scent is close, but this isn’t the place. In the vision, I smelled cinnamon after the glass shattered. Here, it surrounds everything.”

“Sequence matters?”

“It may.”

We continue.

A child runs past wearing a red coat, pursued by his father. Loralee turns sharply, but the boy is laughing. He reaches a woman carrying three cups of cider and wraps both arms around her legs.

“Red clothing,” I say.

“Yes.”

“Not the same?”

“No. The flash moved differently.”

Near the center lawn, a worker adds wood to a firepit. One of the logs splits with a loud crack.

Loralee flinches. My hand closes around her upper arm before I think to ask. She looks down at it.

“Reflex,” I say.

“I know.”

I release her, but she catches my hand before it falls away. Her fingers slide between mine. The contact has nothing to do with balance. She does not pretend otherwise.

We walk through the crowd holding hands. The simplicity of it affects me more than it should. I have touched her while she worked on my shoulder. Held her upright after a collapse. Carried her against my chest. None of those moments prepared me for the quiet claim of her palm against mine.

“Does this interfere with your energy?” I ask.

“I’ll let you know.”

At the cider station, clear glass dispensers rest on a long wooden counter. Cinnamon sticks and slices of apple float inside amber liquid. A server opens the small stove beneath one container, and a ribbon of smoke escapes.

Loralee slows.

A girl in a red sweater stands near the counter, crying because cider has spilled down the front of her clothes. Her mother reaches for napkins while the child’s distress rises above the music.

Glass. Red. Smoke. Cinnamon. A child crying.

I feel Loralee’s fingers tighten around mine.

“This matches.”

“Some of it.”