Page 30 of Pumpkin Spice & Orc Cinnamon Roll
I reach for the axe without a word and line up the first log.
He watches me split it clean through before he nods, slow. “Better form than last week.”
“Didn’t know I was being judged.”
He snorts. “Everyone’s judged. That’s just livin’. Difference is, you’re finally worth measuring.”
I pause at that, the handle warm in my grip, the blade buried deep in the heart of a knotty round. His words settle like weight on my shoulders—not heavy, just real.
We split wood for a while without speaking. There’s something sacred in the rhythm: the thud of blade against stump, the snap of bark giving way, the sharp, sweet scent of ciderwood rising like incense. The cold bites my knuckles, sharpens my breath, and yet there’s a kind of warmth building too—something earned, slow and clean.
After a while, he huffs, then says, “You look like a man carving roots, not profits.”
I stop mid-swing, blade hovering over the next log, and look up at him.
And for once, I don’t dodge it. Don’t bury it in some dismissive grunt or sarcastic jab. I just meet his gaze and say, “Maybe I am.”
Bramley squints like he’s trying to see straight into my ribs. Then he jerks his chin toward the barn. “You’ll need a better knife if you’re gonna keep carving.”
“I’ve got one.”
He nods. “Then you’d best keep going.”
Back at the inn that evening, the fire’s already crackling low in the hearth. I drag an old patchwork rug to the floor in front of it and sit cross-legged like I used to as a boy, carving in the corner of my mother’s forge while she hammered steel and whispered old songs under her breath.
Funny, the things you carry with you.
The carving rests in my lap—flower and frame now shaped with more precision. I’ve smoothed the roughest bits, hollowed out the curve of the petals, added tiny veins to the leaves. I keep thinking about how Tessa touches the dried blossoms in her shop—gently, reverently, like even things long dead deserve kindness.
This one’s not dead.
It’s blooming.
And so help me, it’s blooming forher.
I stare into the flames for a long time, the shadows dancing across the floor like ghosts I don’t fear anymore. The sounds of the village drift in through the window—distant and familiar now, no longer a foreign language. Dogs barking, a child’s squeal of laughter, a fiddle warming up again even though the gala’s long over.
It feels like a town that could hold a future.
One with flannel mornings and fresh-cut herbs, the clatter of shop bells and the low hum of someone humming while she arranges eucalyptus behind a foggy windowpane.
I reach for the flower carving and cradle it in my palm.
Not a gift yet.
Not until I find the words to go with it.
But close.
I press my thumb to the base of the bloom, feeling the grain, the shape, the hours carved into every line. Then, quietly, to no one in particular, I murmur, “I’d stay.”
Not for the resort. Not for a project. Not for redemption.
“For her.”
And maybe for the version of myself I can finally bear to look at in the mirror.
Tomorrow, I’ll finish the carving.
