5.3 — The Slap Heard by No One Who Minded

It happened, as these things do, entirely without premeditation.

Vaelira had finally set the bread to rise, wrapped in a cloth near the hearth, and had returned to her preferred position of supervising everyone else's labor from a safe and comfortable distance — currently draped along the low stone wall, one leg swinging idly, watching Vesalia wrestle a stubborn joint of meat onto the spit with an expression of profound, unearned satisfaction.

"You're enjoying this," I said, passing behind her to check the fire, "entirely too much for someone who has contributed one loaf of bread and several opinions."

"I contain multitudes," she said, without opening her eyes. "Not all of them are useful. I've never claimed otherwise."

I don't fully know what possessed me — some easy, familiar impulse built out of years of exactly this kind of teasing between the two of us, never minding, before tonight, whether anyone else happened to be watching — but as I passed, I reached out and gave her a light, affectionate swat, right at the curve of her hip where the dark fabric was gathered.

"Soft as ever," I said. "Sleep well, tonight, if the bread doesn't rise properly and it's entirely your fault."

The reaction was immediate and layered. Vaelira let out an indignant, delighted yelp, twisting to fix me with a look of scandalized outrage that fooled absolutely no one, least of all herself. "How dare you," she said, without any real heat behind it at all. "In front of company. I have a reputation to protect."

"You said that earlier too," Vesalia observed, from the spit, not even trying to hide her amusement. "I'm beginning to suspect the reputation doesn't exist."

"It exists. It's simply been thoroughly compromised this evening." Vaelira settled back against the wall with visible, unbothered satisfaction, entirely unrepentant, and shot me a look promising retaliation at some unspecified future date that we both understood would never actually arrive.

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Ilyrisse, at the counter, had gone very still for a moment, watching the exchange with an expression I couldn't quite read — and then, with the particular deliberate composure of someone testing unfamiliar water, she crossed to where Flora stood at the cutting board, reached out, and gave her a small, gentle pat, right at the same curve of hip, mirroring the gesture with obvious, careful intention.

"Sleep well," Ilyrisse said, dry and warm at once, "if that's the going custom tonight."

Flora went bright red, an actual, visible flush climbing all the way to her ears, and let out a small, startled sound that was half laugh and half squeak, spinning to stare at Ilyrisse with wide, mortified eyes. "I — what — is that a thing we're doing now?"

"Apparently," Ilyrisse said, entirely unbothered, "it's tradition. I'm simply honoring it."

Vesalia, without a word, set down her tongs, crossed the small distance to Flora's other side, and delivered a second, matching pat, considerably more brisk and businesslike than Ilyrisse's had been, closer in spirit to a commanding officer approving of a soldier's posture than anything else.

"Good work tonight," Vesalia said, entirely straight-faced. "Carry on."

Flora made a sound that was no longer even trying to be a word, covering her face with both hands, shoulders shaking with helpless laughter, caught now between two women she'd met only that evening, both of whom had just, with perfect solemnity, done exactly the same small, absurd thing to her within the space of ten seconds.

"This is so much worse than I expected tonight to be," Flora said, from behind her hands, voice thick with laughter she clearly couldn't suppress.

"Worse," Vaelira said, delighted, from the wall, "or better?"

Flora lowered her hands just enough to look at all of us, cheeks still burning, and something in her face had gone soft and open and entirely happy, the particular unguarded joy of someone who has just been folded, without warning, fully into something she didn't know she was allowed to belong to.

"Better," she admitted, quietly. "Much better, actually."

Even Ilyrisse laughed at that — a real laugh, unguarded, nothing like the composed, measured amusement she usually allows herself in front of people she hasn't known for centuries — and for a moment the whole clearing was simply full of sound, all five of us caught in the same easy, ridiculous warmth, the fire crackling steadily behind us, the bread rising slow and patient beneath its cloth, none of it needing to be anything more than exactly what it already was.