Chương 4: 02-2: Magic, Rations, and Wine

I carried the candle upstairs, picking my way along steps that groaned under every footfall. The second floor was more ruin than shelter. Plaster had peeled away in long strips, dust choked the gaps between floorboards, and the air carried the combined reek of mildew and slow rot. Each step produced an ominous creak, as if the building were politely suggesting I leave while I still could. Following Jessi's advice, I tested each plank with my toe before committing my weight, checking the rooms one by one.

Luck was with me. The room at the corridor's end still had most of its roof intact—no maddening drip of water through the ceiling. I dragged in the waterproof pack from Bruce's back and pulled out the heavy animal hide inside, still carrying a faint, musky scent but mercifully dry. We were in the first days of the Wasteland Moon now. During the day, movement kept the cold manageable. But at night, the temperature dropped like a blade, working through every seam in your clothing straight to the bone.

Without the hide between me and these moldy boards, I wouldn't just wake up sick—my old shoulder injury would lock solid. I unbuckled my armor piece by piece and let it fall. The weight hit the boards with dull clatters, sending up thin clouds of dust. My shoulders immediately relaxed—and ached more sharply for it. I splashed cold water over myself, wiping away the day's sweat and grime. Goosebumps broke out everywhere. I hurried into a dry linen undershirt and hung my sword from the bedpost within easy reach.

The wilderness taught one lesson faster than any other: don't sleep too far from your life. I had barely settled down when two sharp knocks came at the door. Knock. Knock.

"How's your room?" The door opened before I could answer. Right. The knocking was just a courtesy announcement. Jessi slipped inside with the soundless grace of a cat. Arms folded, she swept the cramped room with a single glance, her eyes settling on the hide I'd just laid out. The corner of her mouth curved slowly upward.

"Well, well. Cozy setup you've got, little lordling."

"That sounds exactly like someone planning to steal my room." I watched her with immediate suspicion. Jessi rolled her eyes and leaned against the doorframe.

"That Lucas had the nerve to claim he needed a meditation space to restore his mana and took the room I'd already picked. Not an ounce of courtesy toward women."

"So?" I raised an eyebrow. A very bad feeling began coiling in my chest. She blinked, her tone shifting to something entirely too matter-of-fact.

"So... can I sleep here?"

"You come in, and I go sleep in the hallway?"

"You could stay too." She stepped forward, voice dropping slightly, eyes moving over my linen-clad frame without any pretense of subtlety.

"The bed's narrow, but two people pressed together should be warm enough."

"Do you think I'm that easy to mess with?" I drew a slow breath, trying to project whatever remained of my noble dignity. Which, standing in a ruined room wearing nothing but thin cloth, wasn't much. Jessi looked at me, and then she smiled—not her usual sharp, infuriating smirk, but something quieter. More knowing. I've already seen right through you.

"I think you're putting up a front."

"..." I didn't have an answer. Because she was right. Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings. She was soaked through. Her clothes were barely there. Sending her to sleep on the floor in weather like this was functionally the same as tossing her into ice water. I was quiet for a moment, eyes moving to the wet hair plastered against her cheek, then to the rags that couldn't stop a single gust of wind. Finally, I sighed.

"You can come in. But find your own place to sleep." I pointed to a narrow strip of floor beside the bed.

"And wash up first. Don't bring fleas into my space—that hide wasn't cheap." Jessi clicked her tongue.

"Tch. Such a neat freak." But her feet carried her straight into the room, and she pulled the door shut behind her. Until midnight, Jessi was surprisingly well-behaved. When she came back, she'd somehow acquired a thick piece of burlap—musty, but substantial—and spread it on the floor without ceremony. She curled herself up on top of it like a small animal long accustomed to cold and hunger, settling into silence. Watching her, that wire pulled taut in my chest eased just a fraction. Maybe it was exhaustion.

Or maybe there was something different about having another person breathing in the same broken space, compared to those nights of keeping watch alone. Either way, I blew out the candle, lay back on the hide-covered boards, and let the cold air slowly pull my thoughts apart. I slept lightly. Nobody who'd spent time in the wilderness slept any other way. At some point—I couldn't say how long—a small, weighted shift traveled through the bed from the other end.

Then a presence that wasn't mine: the faint scent of rainwater, a thin trace of soapwort, and the unmistakable warmth of another body. My eyes snapped open. My hand moved toward the sword before I'd finished waking.

"Jessi—""The floor is freezing." Her voice came from right beside me, perfectly level, as if stating an obvious law of nature.

"That's where dead people sleep." I went rigid. Because without so much as a glance in my direction, she lifted the edge of the hide and slid underneath with complete composure. Half the bed. Gone.

"You can't just—" I kept my voice down, but couldn't suppress the panic threatening to blow the top of my skull off. The next second, my brain went blank. Because I had just registered— She wasn't barely dressed. She wasn't dressed at all. Heat slammed into my face so hard I thought I might start smoking. This wasn't a shock. This was an ambush.

"M-men and women over thirteen aren't supposed to share a bed—that's basic etiquette—surely you know that—" I forced the words out through clenched teeth, voice wavering with mortification. Jessi turned her head. Moonlight slipped through the broken window slats, catching in her eyes—cold and bright, like some nocturnal animal's pupils in the dark.

"Whether we're supposed to share a bed," she said quietly, "I genuinely don't know." Her tone was flat, unhurried.

"What I know is that if I stay on that floor tonight, your party will be one person short by morning." She said it calmly. And it landed exactly where she aimed.

"You can have a nicely frozen corpse, or you can have your precious etiquette. Pick one."

"..." I opened my mouth. Nothing came out. Because she was right. Against the raw logic of staying alive, all those rules I'd had pressed into my bones since childhood—the ones I'd always quietly prided myself on—suddenly looked flimsy and useless, like clean paper flowers. And Jessi wasn't finished. She shifted slightly closer, voice dropping lower, carrying that particular brand of shameless provocation she deployed without effort.

"Or maybe..." The corner of her mouth moved.

"Little lordling has been hoping something would happen all along?" A beat.

"The way you're reacting, you'd think I was forcing you."

"You—!" I nearly choked on my own response. Did this woman have any idea how lethal she was? She knew. She knew exactly. And she enjoyed every second of it. In the end, I turned over with all the grace of a wooden plank—spine rigid, facing the wall, pressing myself to the absolute edge of the bed as if I could merge with the plaster. It didn't help. The warmth seeping through the hide from behind. The soft, steady rhythm of her breathing. Even the faint trace of soapwort still caught in her hair.

All of it landed on my back like sparks, one by one, impossible to ignore. I closed my eyes and told myself firmly: Just warmth. Just survival. Nothing else. Just warmth. Just survival. Just—"Cedric." Her voice came from just behind me, barely above a whisper. Every muscle in my body locked.

"... What."

"You're actually really warm." She said it simply. Then nothing more. And I lay there, more awake than I'd been all night. The cold rain of the Wasteland Moon kept falling outside, steady and relentless. Wind scraped across the broken roof in restless gusts—like something out there whimpering low against the dark. But beneath that teeth-chattering symphony of rain, I realized something with startling clarity— What truly keeps you awake at night isn't always the cold.

Sometimes, it's the woman who slipped under your hide blanket and claimed half your bed without a hint of remorse. And worse than that— Somewhere in the feverish tangle of my thoughts, I actually caught myself wondering, just for one unguarded moment: When I wake up tomorrow morning, what should I worry about first? The rations. Or my own heart.