Page 35 of On Tap for the Bear
We end up behind the bar, sitting on the floor with our backs against the cooler. The metal is cold through the flannel. Eli pulls me against his side and I tuck my head into the curve of his shoulder, my cheek against bare skin. His arm wraps around me, hand settling on my hip. My body still hums—satisfied, loose, every muscle relaxed in a way I'd forgotten was possible. I can feel my pulse between my legs, a pleasant ache.
"Can I ask you something?" My voice comes out quieter than I intend.
"Yeah."
"What is this place?" I trace idle patterns on his bare chest. "Why can I taste your food when I can't taste anything else? Why does everything feel different here in Redwood Rise?"
Eli goes still beneath me. He doesn't answer at first, and I think maybe I've pushed too far. Asked for more than he's willing to give.
Then he takes a breath. "You're going to think I'm crazy."
"Try me."
"Redwood Rise sits on ley lines." He says it carefully, like he's testing the words. "Old magic. The kind that existed long before cities and highways and all the modern noise that drowns it out."
I lift my head to look at him. "Magic."
"Sounds insane, right?" His hand moves to my hair, fingers combing through the tangled strands. "But some places hold power. The land remembers things—old rituals, old blood, old bargains. Redwood Rise is one of those places."
Part of me wants to laugh. Wants to tell him he's messing with me, making up stories to explain the unexplainable. Butanother part—the part that's been tasting impossible flavors since I arrived, the part that felt something fundamental change the moment I crossed into this town—that part hesitates.
"Magic," I repeat, slower this time.
"The tavern sits right on top of one of the strongest convergence points." Eli's voice stays steady, factual. "Food prepared here, cooked with intention, it carries that energy. Most people just think it tastes better than it should. But you...” He pauses. "You're more sensitive to it. Your loss of taste made you vulnerable in a way that opened you up to feeling things others miss."
I search his face for signs of deception. For the punchline. But he just looks at me with those steady brown eyes, completely serious.
"Prove it," I hear myself say.
Eli stands, offering me his hand. I take it, letting him pull me to my feet, and follow as he leads me toward the back hallway. Past the kitchen to the cellar door.
He flicks on the light and starts down the narrow stairs.
"The cellar?" My voice wavers slightly.
"Trust me."
I do. That's what terrifies me—how easily I follow him into the dark, how much I've already given him in one night.
The cellar smells like earth and stone and something else. Green and alive, a scent that shouldn't exist underground. Eli guides me down carefully, his hand steady on my lower back.
At the bottom, he stops. "Close your eyes."
Close my eyes, hyperaware of the darkness pressing against my eyelids, the cool air on my bare legs, Eli's presence beside me.
"Now feel," he whispers.
At first, there's nothing. Just the ordinary sensation of standing in a basement, cold concrete under my feet. Then,slowly, I become aware of something else. A pulse. Rhythmic and deep, like a heartbeat in the earth itself.
Warmth spreads through my chest, tingling down my arms, pooling in my palms. Not uncomfortable, just present. Undeniable.
"Open your eyes."
Open my eyes and gasp.
The walls glow. Faint lines of silver-green light trace patterns through the stone foundation, pulsing in time with that subterranean heartbeat. They form geometric shapes that hurt to look at directly, spiraling and intersecting in ways that seem to move even though they're perfectly still.
"What...” My voice fails.
