Page 53 of Bound

He leaned back in his chair, frowning ever so slightly. “This,” he repeated, gesturing toward her. The plate between them. The tea itself. “It’s nice, isn’t it? To not... to not always be working.”

“Oh,” she murmured, more relieved than she cared to admit. “Yes,” she agreed, thrilled that she could do so. She did not like to argue with him. To argue with anyone. “It’s easy to just... keep going, isn’t it?” When there was no one to insist on proper meals. On breaks throughout the day. To sit and rest and take a moment simply to... be.

“Precisely,” Braum affirmed with a nod and a sigh. “Is it wrong to want that?”

Wren picked up her cup and took a long sip. “Of course not. Not sure it’s worth offering to teach me to oil an entire fence, though.”

He shrugged. An awkward lurch of his shoulders that was wholly unnatural. And... perhaps learned from her? It was enough to make her shake her head, to laugh a little at the attempt, although she smothered it quickly enough behind her hand. She would not like to be laughed at. “Sorry,” she murmured, eyes still bright, but genuine in her apology.

His eyes were steady on hers for longer than was comfortable. Until he looked away, down at his mug as he shook his head and hunched those same shoulders slightly inward. “It is fine.”

It wasn’t. Not if she’d made him feel self-conscious. She nudged the plate of biscuits closer to him. “No, really. I’m...” She huffed. “Take one, please. Let me buy your forgiveness.”

The corner of his mouth turned upward, and he obliged her, yet the tension did not leave until he’d taken a bite.

Which happened to be half the biscuit.

She hadn’t fed him enough, had she? When he’d worked so hard, and his proportions were... large. Almost burly.

Which she knew because she’d seen him stripped of most of his layers as he washed at the pump. Not watched him, of course. Because that would have been intrusive and indecent. But she’d... noticed.

Her cheeks burned.

She took another sip of tea. Wished she’d sweetened it, just a little.

A comfort when things were difficult. More difficult than they needed to be, perhaps, but...

She glanced at the little pot on the counter. She should have asked how he liked it. Made it up special. Offered to fetch cream and...

A friend would know how he liked his tea.

She rubbed her fingers across the tabletop, feeling strangely shy as she tried to force herself to ask him. She wanted to know him, didn’t she? That did not have to be such a vulnerable thing. There were no obligations, no expectations.

Wren almost snorted to herself. There were always those, even between stall-mates. How to behave, how quiet to be. Who got the privilege of packing up first, to make use of the market carts and in what order.

“Should I not be the one to decide how my labour is purchased?” Braum enquired patiently as he took a long pull from his mug. “If I think that tea and biscuits and your company are more than sufficient, can that not be enough?”

She frowned down at the table. “But it isn’t fair. To you. Which means... which means you’ll ask for something later. Something to make up for it.”

She huffed out a breath. This is why she’d escaped into the house in the first place. Why she wanted to be alone. To be quiet and thoughtful until she could push all the little parts of herself that she hated back into their respective corners of her mind.

But he’d knocked.

And she’d answered.

So he was here, and she wanted him to be. Didn’t want him to be.

She swallowed, rubbing at her eyes and trying to sit properly, to make him feel welcome and not... not allow the tension to spread through her body. To coil in her throat and the corners of her eyes, to allow past wrongs and assumptions to be unjustly applied to the man across from her.

Merryweather appeared on the kitchen window ledge. The windows were open, and she had no trouble flitting across the counter and onto the floor.

Then to her favoured cushion on the chair beside Wren.

Wren reached out a hand dazedly, the long strokes down Merryweather’s back more habit than active choice.

Merryweather did not mind. Curling and preening into her palm, until she sat, her blue-green eyes staring at Braum across the table.

“I did not take your cushion,” Braum reminded her, and Merryweather blinked slowly in answer. “Your minder would not have let that happen.” He glanced at Wren, and she tried to take a steadying breath. She was safe. Everything was fine.