Each pastry was different from the last, some of them drenched in a clear glaze, others coated with sugar or decorated with drizzles of honey and almond slices. And the cakes were… odd. One was covered in what looked like mint leaves; the second, in orange slices; and the third merely had an actual pine cone unceremoniously shoved into the frosting. It was a disaster. And it spoke of a painfully sincere effort.

He’d even remembered to bring four small plates, all of them stacked neatly together.

Aramis’s eyes welled. “Percy, this is so… sweet.”

“Wait,” Galen said. “Why are there three cakes?”

“I figured Ranka’s never celebrated her birthday, like, ever, so we might as well let her experience a shred of joy for once.” He pointed to the cake with the pine cone. “That one’s yours.”

Now it was Ranka’s turn to look at him through blurry eyes. It was a small thing—and yet it was everything. She’d been born on the last day of winter and had counted the years as they ticked by quietly, often with no celebration, only dread. Ever since her blood-magic had awoken, she’d wondered if each turn around the sun would be her last.

Until this past winter. It’d been dark when the cabin door creaked open. She’d woken with a start, half expecting to find an enemy witch in her bedroom, or a Skra needing her to dress for a fight.

Instead it was Yeva, her palms filled with strawberries.

“I’m sorry it’s not more,” she whispered. “But I wanted you to have something, to celebrate your last year as a witchling.”

“I’m just here for the strawberries,” Asyil announced loftily—though from the small smile on her lips, she was also pleased by the tears in Ranka’s eyes.

Ranka still had no idea where Yeva had gotten them; in late winter strawberries were well out of season, and by then no Skra should have been trading with humans unless out of necessity. The strawberries were small and bitter, half of them covered in a white fuzz of mold they had to scrape with off their thumbnails, but it didn’t matter. They could have tasted like dust, or pine needles, or nothing at all, and it still would have been one of the loveliest moments of her life as they sat in the dark, licking their fingers clean of berry juice as the sun rose and Ranka turned seventeen.

A heaviness settled in her. She’d had no way of knowing that her last birthday as a witchling would be the last one she shared with Yeva, too. That only four months later she would head south in a desperate attempt to bring her home, and fail.