Page 63 of Beneath the Watching

MABEL

Stefan leftme to go meet with Ilya and some others. It seemed like they were stuck in endless meetings, and I knew they were trying to figure out how to get Kiara back. Lucian stopped by a few times to check in on me, making sure I was adjusting to life here as well as asking for personal antidotes on his daughter. I filled him in where I could, and he enjoyed the stories of us clubbing and having a great time together. He was, of course, unhappy to hear of Kiara’s mental health struggles. I shoved down my unease around the man, attempting to humor him and provide a connection with his offspring.

I was trying to open up more and not hide behind my quirks and be more sociable. Stefan had done the same when he told me about what happened with his sister, Zyra, and their mother. It helped me understand his own reluctance to get close to anyone and I couldn’t blame him, considering all he’d gone through.

Servants and cooks were bustling around me in the castle’s kitchens, and they’d finally given me my own workspace. All it took was for me to be a bit friendlier and stop seeing others as a threat, and I’d started making some friends. There weremany questions I couldn’t answer, but I still found ways to start building relationships.

“I can’t believe you actually thought about using dirt to make brownies,” Tiffany laughed at me. She was one of the first girls I’d warmed up to. “It's still dirt.”

“Yeah, but it's not dirty dirt. Not like in the Third Realm. Nothing dies here, remember?”

Tiffany rolled her eyes. “Oh my God yes things die here. Just not as quickly. Please promise me I won’t find you in the gardens with a measuring cup.”

I laughed, picturing myself doing exactly that. “Fine, I won’t.” I grabbed a handful of asparagus and began chopping it for a food processor. “You do know there’s tons of beneficial minerals in dirt though, right? And it smells good.”

She stepped over to my table and started pushing the vegetables through the slot of my appliance. “I’ll tell you what—pine trees.” She glanced up at me. “The bark and the meat; there’s a bunch of nutrients in them. Let’s go get some later and make some stuff with that.”

Why did I never think of that? “Yes!” I exclaimed. “That’s a great idea. I can’t believe I never thought of that.”

Closing the cover of the mixer, I pushed the button and we both stared at it while it pulverized the contents. I let Tiffany remove the container and dump it into my mixing bowl. “You do know it was just a fleeting thought about dirt, right?”

She eyed me suspiciously. “Mm.”

“I swear. Okay, I do like the idea, and I know I make weird stuff but notthatweird.”

“Uh huh,” she droned.

I stopped stirring the ingredients. “I will ban you from my bakery when I open it.”

“What are you gonna call it? The Sludgery?”

Somehow, my spoon found a nice green, mushy lump that Iaccidentallysent flying in Tiffany's general direction.

Which she then gathered from her chest and sent back my way.

That was how we found ourselves trekking off into the woods to gather pine tree ingredients, having been booted out of the kitchen with a stern warning from the head chef. I knew I shouldn’t go far so I insisted to Tiffany that we stay in the woods right by the castle. She didn’t question why and didn’t seem too eager to wander off into the wilderness.

Tiffany pulled out a small sharp-looking knife from a holder at her waist and began sawing a tiny offshoot from a larger branch. “We’ll just take a couple like this,” she said, placing the twig in a basket hanging from her wrist. “This is a white pine, the one over there is a red. Go take a sample.” She pointed several feet away.

“Okay,” I replied. “We can’t stay out here long.”

Stefan didn’t want me going outside and Benjamin and Jack never came with me to the kitchen seeing as I was always surrounded by people, including a couple of members of the Black Guard who were stationed right outside the doors. Ever present, I realized I hadn’t seen them when we’d ducked outside. They’d practically become invisible due to my familiarity with them.

Keeping an eye on her, my feet crunched pinecones and other debris and I stopped underneath the tree she’d pointed out. I was too short to reach any low hanging branches, so I jumped a little bit and grabbed the first limb I could. With my other hand, I snapped a twig off. Sap stuck to the side of my hand, and I tried wiping it off on my leg to no avail.

“Is this enough?” I called over to Tiffany. There was no answer and I looked around, trying to find her.

The woods had gone completely silent. Not even the sound of the wind disturbed the utter quiet of my surroundings. The atmosphere felt different as well, as if the forest had been uprooted and replaced in an entirely different location and yet somehow it still appeared the same. I could hear my heart beating in my ears, just underneath an irritating buzz that began to fill my head. The buzz was disembodied, like the music I used to hear—which the voice had informed me was my magic awakening. Unlike the music, the buzz was staticky.

My friend was nowhere to be found, and I couldn’t see the castle. Where the building once stood, there was a deep ravine with low-lying brush and some wetlands. It was as if the fortress had never existed.

I started yelling for my friend but there was no answer, and I didn’t expect one. Something way beyond my control had happened, and I had no idea what to do.

He’s coming.

My hair stood on end when I heard the voice in my head break through. “Who’s coming?” I asked.

He’s coming.

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