Page 2 of A Heart of Winter
I accepted the teacup, trying to ignore the way it rattled against its saucer as I took it.
Morwenna stared. Then she sighed. “He’s not worth this, Johannes.”
“I know.”
“But you’re still miserable.” She poured her own cup, adding honey and then stirring, her moves as rote and efficient as a doctor sewing up a patient. Tapping the spoon on the edge of the cup, she set it in the saucer and took a drink. “Honestly, I don’t know how you can be unhappy about that leech leaving. You love this place. Your life. All your beautiful things. Michael was always an annoying little shit, and he gave you more trouble than anything else.”
I sighed, slumping into the plush sofa and sipping at my tea. “He was . . . I was . . . I don’t know, Mor. We argued a lot, sure. And he always wanted things I couldn’t give him. Or things I didn’t want. But I just?—”
How did I explain something to her that I didn’t understand myself?
Michael and I hadn’t been right for each other.
He wanted to dress up and go out to a party, where he was the center of attention. He wanted to drink vodka martinis and dance and just . . . things I had no interest in.
I hadn’t been dancing since the modern style was ballroom dancing, and I hadn’t even liked it then. Now, with the flashing lights and gyrating sweaty bodies and bumping and grinding? It was a lot of work and messy as well, and thoroughly not my cup of tea.
Me? My cup of tea was the literal kind, preferably with honey. Add some ginger cookies and a good book, and I was set for the night.
Morwenna glanced out the window, where the snow was still pouring down. “They’re saying it’s the worst snow Manhattan has seen in a decade.”
I slumped even lower. “I know, I know. I’m . . . I’m sorry. I haven’t done this since I was a teenager.” I’d caused a blizzard because a boy rejected me once before—when I was sixteen. I had thought the control issues with my power had slipped away when I’d become an adult, just like the control issues with my stupid libido.
But no. Michael had left me, telling me all about what a boring, wretched person I was. He’d been brutal, ranting as he’d packed his things, about how tragic I was. He’d focused on my lack of willingness to experiment in bed, and seven hells, I didn’t even think that was true. Was it my fault he’d never seemed interested in doing anything other than plain old missionary, and I hadn’t pressed the matter?
He seemed to think so.
A lock of my silvery-white hair slid into my eye, and I moved to brush it back but instead caught it, staring at it. “Is my hair ugly? Michael said it looks stupid.”
Morwenna blew a raspberry, setting her teacup down on the table with a clack. “Now I know that bastard was up to no good. Sweetheart, anyone who tells you your hair is anything but gorgeous is lying to you.”
“He said I look like a cartoon character.”
She rolled her eyes heavenward, like she was begging for strength from above, and sighed. “Yes, sweetheart. You do. Like the cartoon character all the boys and girls swoon over. Your skinny little white-haired ass is just what everyone likes.”
I had a hard time imagining anyone finding me more compelling than her, with her lion’s mane of corkscrew curls and flashing black eyes, but I supposed we always did want to be what we weren’t.
Except her.
Morwenna was the best influence, always perfectly happy with who and what she was.
“If I were more like you, I wouldn’t be causing an emergency in Manhattan,” I grumbled. “I’d have told Michael good riddance, changed the locks, and moved on.”
Her eyes narrowed. “You haven’t changed the locks?”
I barely refrained from groaning again. “No. Does it matter? He left. While he was leaving, he told me that every single thing about me is inadequate, and the entire last twenty years have been awful, and a waste of his time. He’s not going to change his mind and come back.”
She didn’t have to say aloud that she was unconvinced; her glare and pursed lips said it all. She’d always disliked him, even insisted on coming to see me when he wasn’t home after the first year or so. Even told me that teaching a witch who didn’t want to put in the time and effort to learn properly was a waste of my skills.
And she’d been right about that. Michael had learned just enough to extend his life—to continue looking young and virile, without a speck of gray hair even though he was pushing sixty now. He’d had no interest in doing more work. Long workings of magic were a waste of time, he’d decided, and hadn’t read the books or learned the theory or . . . cared. At all.
Then a week ago, he’d decided that was how he felt about me as well, and he’d packed and left.
I’d been hurt, naturally. I’d spent twenty years thinking that Michael was my future. My literal forever. But he didn’t want that with me. Didn’t want me at all.
He wanted something fresh and new and exciting, and I’d never once in my life been any of that.
“Okay,” Morwenna announced, clapping her hands together and pushing up off the sofa. “Here’s what we’re going to do. You have to leave Manhattan before you accidentally cover it completely with snow. I’ll stay here and close up the penthouse for your extended vacation, change the locks, and ward it to kingdom come.”
