The turnips were doing fine.

  Ronan would never admit it. He walked the rows with his hands csped behind his back, squinting at the leaves with the critical eye of a man who'd been reading soil since before his sons were born, and every few paces he'd stop and grunt.

  "You're watering too early in the day," he said.

  "I water at dawn, Da. Same as you taught me."

  Leo looked at the field. The turnip leaves were green, upright, and growing exactly the way turnips were supposed to grow.

  But Ronan's critique had nothing to do with the field. His father showed up once in a while, always with the same verdict: Leo's farming was substandard and required supervision. Leo had stopped fighting it weeks ago. He surrendered with a resigned grin and let the old man work beside him. There were worse things than spending a morning with your father in a field.

  They walked the dirt path toward the vilge in comfortable silence. The sky had been darkening from the west for the past hour, bruise-colored clouds stacking along the horizon. No wind. Insects droned in the hedgerows.

  Leo's hands were caked with soil. He could smell turned earth on himself, mingled with sweat and the warm green scent of turnips.

  At the fork where the path split toward Ronan's cottage, Leo stopped.

  "Da. Don't forget dinner at our pce. Tomorrow evening."

  Ronan looked at him. The permanent squint deepened a just a little.

  "I remember. Your mother reminds me everyday."

  Which meant Maren had probably spent days grumbling about how Leo was probably wasting his money again. Leo could already hear it - "Meat, I bet. He'll buy meat. As if barley and root vegetables aren't good enough."

  They parted. Ronan's bowed shoulders and iron-gray head moved down the path with the gait of a man who had rarely rushed toward anything in his life and saw no reason to start now. Leo watched him for a moment, then turned toward home.

  Shortly after, the first drop hit the back of his neck, fat and heavy.

  It nded on his skin with a pt that made him flinch. A second drop struck the dust at his feet, raising a tiny puff of dirt. Then a third, a fourth, and the sky opened.

  The rain came down like something from above had been holding it back and let go all at once, pouring down an immediate curtain, dense and gray. Leo's shirt was damp before he'd taken three steps.

  The morels.

  They'd been drying in the yard since the morning after the dungeon run. Days of careful work: caps spread on cloth so they didn't touch, stems trimmed, the whole operation positioned where the sun hit longest and the breeze moved freely. Sera had managed the process with the same precision she brought to everything that involved money, checking the caps each morning, rotating the cloths, shooing away a curious hen that had developed an interest.

  Leo ran. The path was slick under his boots. Rain soaked his eyes, blurring the hedgerows ahead into a wash of gray and green. The smell had shifted - wet soil, and the sharp green punch of rain striking growing things.

  When he stepped past the gate, Sera was already there. She was on her knees, gathering morels off the drying cloth with both hands. Her hair had escaped its braid, wet strands pasted to her cheeks and neck. Her shirt was soaked dark, clinging to her shoulders and back. She worked fast, scooping caps into the fold of her apron, shielding them from the downpour with her body.

  Leo dropped beside her without a word. His hands found the nearest cloth and started gathering, fingers working through the caps, bundling the edges of the fabric to cradle them. Rain hammered his bent back. Water ran down his face and dripped from his jaw. Sera's knuckles brushed his as they reached for the same cluster, and she didn't look up, just shifted to the next section and kept going.

  The st cloth came up. They got everything inside, Sera backing through the door with her apron held like a basket, Leo behind her with the bundled cloths pressed against his chest.

  The door shut, and the sound of the rain muffled to a steady, heavy drumming on the thatch roof and shutters, constant and close, like being inside a drum.

  They spread the morels on clean cloth before the hearth. Sera's fingers moved through the caps one by one, pressing gently, turning each over to check for water damage. Her brow was furrowed, her lower lip caught between her teeth, calcuting potential losses.

  "These outer ones took water," she said, separating a handful of darker, softened caps. "The rest are fine. They'll need some more drying, but we didn't lose the batch."

  Leo exhaled. The fire was warm on his face, and the wet fabric of his shirt was starting to steam faintly at the shoulders. The morels, spread before the heat, began releasing their scent almost immediately - a deep, savory, buttery aroma. It filled the cottage, yering over the woodsmoke and the clean mineral smell of rain on stone drifting through the shutters.

  They stood dripping on the floor boards, the rain still drumming insistently on the thatch above. Sera's braid had unraveled completely now, dark hair pstered in wet waves to her shoulders, her shirt clinging like a second skin. When she reached for the hem, Leo was busy drying his face with the rough cloth, but the sound of wet fabric hitting the floorboards was unmistakable.

  The room grew warmer as he turned to look, the firelight catching on the curve of her hip, the smooth expanse of her back before she twisted to fold the soaked shirt. And Leo couldn't deny the heat rising beneath his wet tunic.

  "Don't even think about it," Sera caught his stare and her hazel eyes gleamed. She gestured between them, at the mud on their boots, the dirt under his fingernails. "It's barely midday, Leo. And we're both disgusting."

  "But..." His expression fell, disappointment clear as day, and she relented with a soft sigh.

  "I'll make it up to you tonight," she whispered, stepping close to press a kiss against his jaw. Her hand lingered on his arm.

  In the end, Sera still couldn't refuse a cuddle at the edge of the bed. She leaned into his side, and Leo's arm went around her, pulling her close. Her skin was cool where the rain had soaked through, but warming fast against him. The warmth of the hearth reached them in pulses.

  "They'll be done soon," Sera said, watching the caps near the fire. "Another few hours."

  "I'll take them to Rockhaven tomorrow then. We also need to pick up supplies for the house," Leo paused, running through the list in his head. "You want to come along?"

  "Someone needs to tend the field. Especially after this," she tipped her chin toward the shutters and the rain beyond them. Then she turned her head and fixed him with a soft gre. "Don't overspend. Like st time in Rockhaven."

  Leo ughed without commenting and leaned his head against hers. He couldn't promise her that. There were many things their house still cked, that Sera would never approved of him buying, unless the purchases had already happened.

  "You know what we should do?" He changed the topic. "Eat a few more morels. Just a couple."

  The pinch came fast. Sera's fingers found the soft skin above his hip and twisted, sharp enough to make him flinch sideways with a hiss.

  "Every cap we eat is money, Leo."

  "Just two. You won't even notice they're gone."

  "I will notice. I counted them."

  "Of course you did."

  He retaliated. His fingers found the spot on her ribs, just below the curve where the bone ended and the muscle softened. The spot that turned a woman who could put a spear through a beetle's joint at ten paces, into a helpless, gasping mess.

  Sera's composure shattered. Her body jerked sideways, a strangled ugh ripping from her throat before she could cmp it down. She grabbed for his wrist, missed, and the second wave of tickling sent her back against the mattress with a sound that was half shriek and half wheeze.

  "Leo, don't you dare, I swear I'll...Stop, please!"

  He dared. Both hands now, ribs, sides, the spot under her arm that she hadn't known about until he'd discovered it three nights ago. Sera fought back with real effort, legs kicking, hands catching his wrists and shoving them away only for him to find a new angle.

  She got him in a headlock. Actual technique, her arm hooking his neck, weight shifting to pin him. For half a second, she had him. Then Leo’s hand found the back of her knee, and whatever nerve cluster lived there betrayed her completely. Her grip dissolved. She colpsed onto the bed, ughing so hard no sound came out.

  They ended up a tangle of limbs and breathlessness, Sera's hair spread across the pillow, Leo's face pressed against her shoulder, both grinning with the particur stupidity of two people who had forgotten, for a few minutes, everything except each other.

  Eventually, Sera's breathing slowed against his chest.

  "Aelra's Grace is in a few days," she said.

  "Right."

  Leo's grin faded, but not completely.

  "You need to pick up an offering while you're in Rockhaven. Dried herbs, and a twist of first grain. And something for the communal meal at midday. Don't forget."

  He wouldn't forget. Aelra's Grace - the te-summer observance, held a few weeks before harvest. Each household brought a small offering to the vilge shrine.

  Then the shared meal, conversations about weather and crops, whether this year would be lean or full. No work on Aelra's Grace. Custom said if you didn't trust Aelra to hold what you'd pnted, you shouldn't have pnted at all.

  Some of the older vilgers even believed that whatever the weather did that day predicted the harvest. Clear skies meant abundance. Clouds meant a lean year. And a storm meant Aelra was angry.

  The new Leo, who grew up in a world of science, didn't have faith in folk deities who lived in the soil and listened to farmers' whispered prayers. But he respected the tradition and what it meant to Sera, to his parents, and to the vilge that had been observing it for longer than anyone alive could remember.

  "I'll get everything," he said.

  Sera nodded against his chest, satisfied. And they enjoyed each other's company until it was finally time for lunch.

  When evening came, the rain still hadn't stopped.

  It had settled into the long, soaking variety, steady and gray, turning the world outside the shutters into muted sound. The light inside was warm, orange and gold from candle and hearthfire.

  The morels were done. Sera had packed them into a pouch, tied it tight, and set it on the table near the door, ready for tomorrow. Even through the cloth, a trace of their aroma leaked out.

  Now she was cooking a stew built from their stores, barley and root vegetables and a heel of rye bread torn into pieces to thicken the broth, the liquid stretched the way Maren had taught her during that evening at Ronan's cottage.

  Leo helped where she let him. He'd improved a lot, but Sera was still the authority at the hearth, and his role was to follow orders. He chopped turnips into cubes. Stirred when she told him to stir. Fed the fire. Fetched water from the bucket by the door, the rain misting his face when he cracked it open.

  And most importantly, he stole kisses.

  The first one nded on Sera's cheek as he passed behind her to reach the water bucket. She didn't react. The second caught the side of her neck when she bent over the pot, her braid falling forward to expose the warm skin below her ear. She twitched but said nothing. The third came when she handed him the salt, and he leaned in and pressed his lips to the corner of her mouth.

  Sera's eyes narrowed.

  The fourth, fifth, sixth came in rapid succession - jaw, temple, the bridge of her nose when she turned to gre at him. Each one pushed the line further, and Leo watched the tolerance drain from her expression.

  "Leo. I'm holding a knife."

  He kissed her cheek one more time, and the wooden spoon connected with his shoulder.

  "Ow."

  "I warned you."

  He retreated to the table, rubbing his shoulder and grinning. Sera pointed the spoon at him, her eyes promising worse if he tried again.

  As the rain drummed on the thatch, the stew bubbled, filling the cottage with the warm smell of barley and root vegetables. Leo was hungry now, and was ready for some dinner, when three knocks came from the door - firm and heavy.

  Knock - knock - knock.

  Leo's steps toward the door were measured. His fingers found the rough grain of the wooden tch as he leaned in, the wood cool against his cheek.

  "Who's there?" He called out.

  "It's me, Colm," came the response, deep and familiar.

  Leo's hesitation sted only a moment before he drew back the bolt and pulled the door open.

  The man on the other side filled the doorframe. He was in his mid-fifties, with a face assembled from sbs - broad jaw, heavy brow ridge, a nose broken once and set well enough to leave only a slight leftward list. His skin was the deep, permanent brown of thirty-plus years under open sky, creased into lines that stayed deep whether he spoke or not.

  His gray hair cropped close, thinning at the temples. A thick neck merging with shoulders that had been powerful once and settled into dense, immovable solidity with age.

  He wore a heavy coat of dark wool, rain-darkened across the shoulders. Mud caked his boots to the ankle. His hands were enormous, knuckle-scarred, and hung at his sides with the stillness of a man who had never fidgeted in his life. The smell of wet wool, cold rain, and the faint earthy tang of pipe tobacco came off him and into Leo's nostrils.

  His eyes were small, with the color of creek water over stone, and they swept the cottage once before settling on Leo with an expression that was pinly, unmistakably disinterested.

  He was Colm Brewer, the vilge headman.

  Behind him stood two guards. The younger one, barely twenty, had a long face and nervous hands that kept adjusting the spear across his shoulder. The older one, thick through the middle with a patchy gray beard, looked like he'd rather be anywhere else but here. Both were soaked. Rain dripped from the rims of their hoods and pooled in the mud at their boots.

  "Evening, Leo," Colm said. His voice was low, carrying the particur ftness of a man who'd already decided this conversation would be short. "Sorry for the hour. I'm making rounds."

  "Come in out of the rain?"

  "Won't be long enough to warrant it," Colm didn't move from the doorstep. "Two men were found on the road st night. Vilko and that big one he runs with, Bram. Both of them had their legs broken. Badly."

  "That's terrible," Leo kept his face still.

  "Mm," Colm's expression didn't change. "I'm asking everyone on this side of the vilge. Did you hear anything unusual st night? See anyone on the road after dark?"

  "No. We went to bed early. Didn't hear a thing."

  "Sera?" Colm's gaze shifted past Leo's shoulder.

  "Same," Sera said from beside the hearth. Her voice was steady, her expression carrying the polite neutrality of someone interrupted during dinner. "We were home all evening."

  Colm nodded, like he was checking a name off a list. The investigation, such as it was, had the energy of a chore being completed before supper.

  "Right. That's all I need," he stepped back from the doorway. "Lock your door at night. Stay safe."

  He turned and walked back into the rain, the two guards falling into step behind him. The younger one gnced back at Leo with a look that might have been curiosity. The older one didn't bother.

  Leo closed the door. He stood with his hand on the tch for a moment. Let the breath out slowly through his nose. He had been expecting to be questioned, and the performance of calm had come easier than he had thought it would.

  Though Colm's disinterest surprised him. Even though Vilko and Bram were exactly liked in Ashwick, the 'investigation' into their assault seemed too...superficial.

  Behind him, Sera was already back at the pot. She stirred the stew, tasted the broth from the spoon, then added a pinch of salt. She didn't look at him. The absence of comment said everything: the investigation came, the investigation left, and the stew was getting cold.