“I think you needed more words. But then you would have needed more ketchup.”
Wow. I kind of wanted to hit him. Hit him and see if the muscles bulging in his upper arms really were as strong as they’d looked when he’d had his coat off. Gods, he had me all jacked up. “I don’t hear any music, so I have no idea what that message meant, but she does that—gives me obscure messages. I think she likes to mess with me.”
“Do your sisters get the same thing?”
I nodded, thinking of the one Raven had told me about that morning. In violence conceived. I’d actually been thinking about it often. The possibility, the horror, of what it could mean popped up in my head like a jack-in-the-box on speed. I wanted that message to be about someone else—not me and not my sisters. So I kept pushing that stupid little doll back into his box. Maybe duct tape would help. I’d done that to a broken one we’d had as kids. That thing never sprang out at the right moment, and I hated surprises.
Raven’s message was a surprise because it meant that maybe, just maybe, Dru had a reason to be crazy. Not an excuse—there would never be excuses enough for the way she raised us—but maybe she had a reason.
“Hey,” Arun said softly. He took a step closer to me. “Where did you go?”
I cleared my throat, schooled my expression. “Nowhere.”
“Nowhere looked very sad. Here.” He pulled me into the closest greenhouse, took my hands, faced them palm up together, then put a small fragile plant on them. “This will make you feel better.”
Gods, he was strange. “Uh, I don’t have your affinity for plants.” Yet I stared at the slivers of baby leaves, the delicate stems. Tiny roots peeked from the clump of dirt at the base. The proof of life in the palms of my hands. “I’m afraid I’ll break it.”
“It’s stronger than it looks, which I’m starting to guess is a good description for you, as well.”
“Never underestimate a small package.” I handed the plant back to him, then watched as he buried its root ball in dirt. “My sister Coral should have picked you. She likes plants, too. You would have really hit it off.”
“Because she likes plants? Takes more than that for two people to hit it off. Common ground is always good.” He reached for a rag and wiped his hands as he turned to face me again. “So is chemistry.”
Flustered, I had to look away from him. For a teenager, he had the stare of a man with more experience than years. I didn’t really know how to take him, where to compartmentalize him. I didn’t know that many teenage boys, but none of the ones I met were anything like him.
Of course, none of them had the soul of a Norse god and could stroke health back into a plant with his fingers. My gaze dropped to his fingers, and I had this sudden image of him sliding them along my neck as he bent to kiss me. Startled, I cleared my throat and closed my eyes, pretty sure I did not like the twisted and weird feelings he raised in me.
“Hey, Kat, don’t go back to Nowhere, okay?”
My eyes flew back open at his soft tone.
“What’s Kat short for?” he asked, watching me as he continued to rub his hands with the small towel. “Kathy? Katherine?”
I shook my head. “Katriel.”
“Pretty. My mom chose the Hindi spelling of my name so it would mean sun—or the colors of it.” The corner of his mouth went up again. “She did that even before she knew about Freyr. What does yours mean?”
I sighed because lately the meaning of my name had meant something terrifying with all the nightmares my norn had been giving me. Dreams of my head being on fire. “It’s stupid. It means crown of god.”
He startled me when he reached out and pulled off my hat. My hair spilled all around my face.
“The name fits. I had a feeling your hair was going to be something. It’s really long.” He picked up a strand and rubbed it between his fingers. “Soft.”
The heat crawling through my body had nothing to do with the greenhouse temperature. I stepped back.
He dropped my hair. “Sorry.”
Arun didn’t look sorry. He looked curious more than anything, and the way he looked at me made me feel so strange and fluttery, I was pretty close to taking off. He must have sensed it because his next smile was gentle, calming. Kind of like the one my fourth first grade teacher had given me when I’d shown up terrified with only one month of school left in the year and a reading problem not even my sisters had known about.
My stomach abruptly growled again. Loudly. Guess the apple hadn’t been enough.
That smile of his transformed when real amusement was behind it. I sucked in a breath and eyed the door again.
He sighed. “Flight instinct is pretty strong in you, isn’t it?” He turned back to the plants. “Tyrone will be looking for us any minute with the sandwiches. He makes them great, too. Lots of cheese and crunchy lettuce. You like lettuce?”
“You don’t have to coddle me. I’m fine.”
“I’m not coddling, I’m curious. There’s a difference. Just like there’s a difference in the types of lettuce that work on sandwiches. Most people like iceberg. I’m not a fan. Tyrone likes a mix of green leaf and romaine—which I very much like. My favorite is arugula because it gives food a bite. Most don’t like it, though.”
He was talking about lettuce of all things. And he was doing it to calm me down. How he’d grasped me as a panicky flight risk so fast bugged the crap out of me, but his lettuce speech was cute. Really, really cute. I actually felt some of the stiffness leach from my spine. “I like all lettuce. I like most foods in general.”
“I need to get all these babies into pots, so why don’t you tell me about your sisters and keep me company.”
“Not much to tell. We’re triplets, we’re ruled by these crazy halts to time and we get cryptic messages. Raven went to find Odin and Coral to find Thor. At least, according to our guesses. There was a freaking hammer mentioned in the article about the guy Coral went to find. Life has ceased to make any sort of logical sense at this point.”
“I wouldn’t say that.”
“Oh, and technically, I’m the youngest, though I think that’s a load of bunk. What do a few minutes mean?”
“What does the rank of birth mean at all?”
I crossed my arms. “If you’re gonna interrupt...”
He chuckled, tucked dirt gently around the tiny plant. “I’ll shut up. Go on. Tell me about the one who likes plants.”
A small spark of jealousy flared deep in my chest, and I poured water on it fast because it was the most ridiculous thing ever. “Coral is like a baby witch, though that term would piss her off.” I remembered what he’d said about the redheaded girl and glanced around. Didn’t see her thankfully. “Our mother has Earth magic and can do spells. Coral can, too, though most of her skill is knowing what plants to use or mix together to make a spell. I don’t think she incorporates a lot of natural magic into her spells, but I think it’s there. She does have the same magic I do. It’s a form of seidr. Hers is pretty terrible—it can come with visions of the present. She’s kind of a softy, so it sucks that she has to see bad things sometimes. While they’re happening, so she can’t do anything to help.”
“And the urge to help is her first response?”
I looked at him in surprise. “Of course it is. Why wouldn’t it be?”
That intense stare of his hit me again as he smiled. “Not everyone is wired the way you are. And the other sister?”