They’d make The Enchantments mid-morning the next day. She said the ride to the center, where her mother was, Dora was, Aelia was (they’d heard word she had arrived), and Elena’s treehome was located was about half a day’s ride farther.

Once there, they’d have a good deal to occupy their attention and very little time alone.

He’d wasted what they’d had, for a reason, but their time was nearly gone.

He had to give her that reason.

And to do that, he had to burden her with it.

He saw her golden hair in the moonlight where she sat beside the brook, watching the lazy but colorful flight of the pixies, these streams of bright Cassius had noted were getting fewer in the evenings as the leaves fell and the temperatures cooled.

She but glanced over her shoulder at him when she heard his approach, then turned back to the brook.

He sighed, carried on toward her, and when he arrived, he dropped his blanket to the still-green, lush, thick grass by the water and joined her on the blanket she’d set out.

He cocked his knees, rested his wrists on them and said quietly, “I must explain something to you.”

“Hmm?” she hummed, pretending not to care when he knew she cared a great deal.

She’d grown fond of him.

He had no idea how.

But she had.

“I do not wish to do it,” he went on.

She turned her head at that, and her voice was sharp to hide the hurt when she replied, “Then don’t.”

“I do not wish to do it, Ellie, because it is vastly unpleasant and the knowing of it is a burden I do not want you to bear.”

He saw the surprise light on her features before they softened.

Yes, as he was finding with Elena, she did not hold her pique. She did not make him work to gain her attentions after he’d (somewhat) spurned them these past days.

She opened immediately to him.

For she was Elena.

“I keep telling you, I’m stronger than you think,” she replied with the softness he saw in her face.

“You do not know, my lamb,” he replied.

“Tell me.”

His eyes moved over her beautiful face and his lips whispered, “I hate this.”

It was then, her expression grew alert, as did the air about her.

“By the goddess, Cassius,” she whispered back, twisting to him and reaching out to wrap her fingers around his thigh. “What is it? Tell me,” she urged again.

He looked to her hand, felt her touch hot as a brand, left it as it was because he liked the feel, then he turned his gaze to the slowly rolling brook.

“You know my mother is dead,” he said.

“Yes,” she replied.

“She died of a chill.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“That was what I was told.”