Page 55 of Last Rites

I kept the altar and offerings tucked away in the guest bedroom. Kit hadn’t stumbled across it yet, or if he had, he hadn’t said anything. It might have looked enough like miscellany to pass as a setup for drawing practice. Objects placed to be rendered, candles to cast light and shadow. That was believable. Probably.

Arriving on Rosie’s doorstep, I barely had time to knock before her mother swung the door open.

“Penny?” Her brow furrowed over her dark eyes. “Is everything all right?”

Considering the work our resistance had been doing in secret over the past few days, she was right to be concerned.

I held up both hands. “Nothing’s wrong, sorry. I’m just…”

The smell of cooked fruit wafted from the house, and my mouth watered. I realized I’d fallen silent when Rosie’s mother continued to stare, and I blushed.

“I’m just hungry.”

Her expression eased into one of amusement, and she cleared the entry. “Well, that is a problem I’m sure my daughter can solve.” She looked toward the kitchen, where I spotted Rosie in her apron, working on something at the counter.

“Rose? You have a helper.”

Rosie turned, wearing a wide smile. She beckoned me in, and I thanked her mother before darting by. The exhaustion of my day’s work was tempered by a renewed sense of energy at the prospect of filling my belly with sweets. And spending time with my friend, of course.

As I entered the kitchen, I snagged my own apron and threw it on, then went to the sink to wash my hands.

“What are we making?” I asked.

Rosie abandoned the dough she had laid out to join me beside the basin. “Cherry strudel,” she replied, then threw her arms around me. She took a deep breath, and when she drew back, her nose was wrinkled. “Ugh, you stink.”

Little wonder after toiling outdoors all day. I’d never sweat that much at the smithy, though I was rarely near enough to the forge to feel much of its heat. At least, I hadn’t been when Kit was still working there.

While Rosie fanned her hand in front of her face, I informed her, “That’s the smell of a man.”

She snorted. “A dirty man. Did you come straight from the mill? It was your first day, wasn’t it?”

“Yep.”

Snagging a wooden spoon, she directed me to the pot simmering on the stove. “You may stink, but you can still stir,” she said.

Stirring and kneading were most often my jobs. Sometimes mixing when working with thick dough. But my arms were so tired it was a labor to even lift them. Still, I swirled the spoon around in the pot while keeping watch over the cherry filling.

Rosie returned to where the dough was resting and sprinkled it with a fresh layer of flour before reaching for the rolling pin. “So, how was it?”

“The lumbering?” I asked.

She paused. “The what?”

With a sigh, I gave the spoon another turn. “It was fine.”

The cherries had been pitted and mashed, and were steadily reducing to a jammy texture. It looked so scrumptious I had to fight the temptation to dip my finger in for a taste. Instead, I kept stirring while pondering.

“Do you think my biceps are any bigger?” I looked down the length of my arm, checking for any new bulges beneath the linen sleeve.

Rosie snickered and poked me in the side with the rolling pin. “It’s only been a day.”

“It felt like an eternity. I didn’t see any wolves, though.”

“Wolves?”

I nodded. “In the woods.”

She tilted her head as though in thought. “Probably not… They’re wary creatures. Skittish. And the lumber mill is awfully loud. They’d know to stay away.”