Page 74 of A Spell of Heart & Havoc

I carried on through the dining hall, exchanging a wave and tired smile with Orinno, as I admired how much more full of life the manor felt now. Clean and warm, with the new heaters we’d installed in every room keeping the light chill of early spring away. Pillows on the seat of every chair, and flowers bursting from pitchers on each table. Three of Dove’s large, vibrant paintings hung on the walls, adding even more color to the room.

When the Takers Guild had stolen everything on the night of the heist all those long months ago, Dove had been devastated. And I, with her. All of her work, every beautiful piece that had hung on the walls of her studio—gone.

And then one morning, a few weeks later, she’d opened the front door to find a large butcher paper–wrapped canvas on the doorstep. Inside, one of her paintings. A favorite that I affectionately thought of as Big Blue. Pinned to it was a note that just read:

Thought you’d want this. Have sold the rest of your work.

Take the profit for the young ’uns.

—Z

PS—Tell anyone, and I’ll raze your precious gardens to the ground, M.

Tucked behind the painting’s bulk we found a little wooden chest, filled to the brim with gold and silver coin.

Once we’d finished screeching and counting up all of the money, Dove and I realized we could expedite our plans for the orphanage. At that point, things were finally starting to calm down. We’d just finished settling her parents into a pleasant but humble three-bedroom flat nearish enough to their ideal neighborhood, and they seemed to be keeping busy with their social calendar and plans to open a small gallery on the empty ground floor. The Wistrallo’s butler, Frandin, had insisted on joining them permanently—not having, as he put it, “a disposition inclined to tolerate sticky youths”—and along with Mother’s maid, they were well set up for happiness now. At least for a time.

And while things between Dove and her parents weren’t exactly pleasant yet, they were cordial. They exchanged letters occasionally. Dove had gone into Talon to visit once or twice. They had their lives, and we were free to have ours. For now, it was the best we could hope for, though I knew she missed them sometimes.

In any case, with the coin left from the sale, along with this chest from Zephyra, it was then full steam ahead on our orphanage plans. Everything, somehow, had come together. Not perfectly—not by a long shot—but just the way it should be. I had everyone and everything I needed now. Dove. Our home. Most importantly, my brother, safe and healthy.

Even now, it still felt miraculous every time I saw Balfie around the orphanage. Alive—living, breathing. Driving me mad just like he used to, before, but now I adored every minute with the little troublemaker. Every fucking minute.

All these months later, we’d successfully been dispensing the cure out to everyone we could find suffering from dwarfdrop across Kurriel. Dove transformed one crystal a day, when she felt magically and physically able to, and the priory used their network to get them to those in need. Bastion had already taken two shipments with him across the sea at the end of his merchant route back home, getting it out to folks as surreptitiously as possible. There were rumblings that the Orlavian government was catching on, and a couple crime bosses were starting to sniff around, but Bastion was slipperier than an ottereel. He’d be fine. Probably.

Now, I strolled down the side hall toward the kitchens—formerly known as the servants’ hall—reminiscing about all the good we’d done in just half a year. So many people cured, and so many children safe and happy in these halls. Healing together. Balfie, just this morning, running circles around me with a group of his fellow middlings until I got dizzy. Gasping with laughter, more joy than I’d seen in his face in years. My chest blazed with warmth at the memory.

I’d nearly reached the kitchens entrance when a hand shot out of a nearby storeroom cupboard and pulled me in. The door snicked shut, locking, and darkness spilled around me.

“Hiding from the twins again?” I said, bemused.

A mage orb glowed on softly at a flick of Dove’s hand. She groaned, plunging her face into the crook of my neck. My runic tattoo was still there, but faded, nothing but a reminder.

“They’re positively relentless,” she whined. “You’d think two eleven-year-olds would have better things to do with their time than follow around a boring old coot like me.” I smoothed a hand over her back, her hair. She snuggled closer.

A couple weeks ago, two of the children, Lyanne and Leela, had discovered that the artist behind the paintings in the dining hall and scattered around the manor was none other than their very own Headmistress Dove. Aspiring painters themselves, they hadn’t given her a moment of peace until she agreed to tutor them both. Individually. Apparently, there was somewhat of a rivalry between the two young artists, and they’d recently begun to each seek out their teacher in every spare moment they had, when they weren’t bickering with each other or painting, of course. Between private tutoring, group classes, co-running the entire orphanage with me, making magical dwarfdrop cures, and now evading her two young proteges, my dear Dove had begun to run out of steam lately.

My hand slipped down her back to get a heavy handful of her bottom. Her breath against my neck turned hot as she nuzzled like a cat, and she pressed the length of her body to mine, moving me back against the cupboard shelves.

“I think it might be time to start planning that trip to the Southern Isles,” I whispered into her ear. “You need a break soon, sweet.”

“Really? I know we’ve talked about it… but we can’t leave the orphanage. Not when things are finally starting to come together.” She sighed.

I moved my leg between hers, loving the hitch in her breath as I began to slowly rub against her core. “Everything will still be fine without us for a little while. We can trust Choia and Orinno. I’ll get our volunteers from the community to pitch in more while we’re gone, and I’m sure Prioress the Younger would send extra help too.”

“I don’t know. Maybe next year. Or the year after that…” Dove said breathily, her eyelids fluttering closed.

I tugged the hem of her silky dress up, finding my way into her wet panties. She shuddered at my touch, gripping my shoulders tightly. I didn’t wear my thieving leathers anymore, trading them months ago for sturdy overalls or the occasional tailored trouser and jacket for special occasions. The leathers were only brought out sometimes in our bedroom, on Dove’s request.

She gasped my name now as I brought her closer to climax, and I bit her earlobe gently.

“In the fall. In six months, for our anniversary, you and I will be on a boat together to the Isles. I’ll plan everything. Alright?” I whispered with amusement, pausing my fingers.

Dove whined, low and sweet, but I didn’t relent. “Alright! Alright, you menace,” she said finally. “We’ll go. Now please.”

I acquiesced, moving quick and firm over her clit once more, nipping her ear, her neck, until I felt her shuddering breaths on me, her release move through her body. She clung to me, close and warm, and I held every precious bit of her that I could gather in my arms.

After a while, she moved back slightly. “This,” she said, eyes twinkling, “is a marvelous cupboard. I see many more such liaisons here in the future.”