~Torin~

Blast the gods for sending him a woman they knew he'd be intrigued by.

He'd thought his luck was far too good, catching sight of her in town as he went about the errands for his father. Never did he think it would be so easy to actually catch the witch unawares and be able to talk to her — to find out why she was there. But damn it, why'd she have to be so kind and pretty to boot? Her eyes shown like the hills surrounding them and the way her long hair swirled in waves and curls down her back was distracting.

And her magic. By the gods, when she had brushed it against him in the truck he'd almost driven them off the road. No, there was nothing malicious about her magic. He doubted she'd be able to even hurt a fly. But what struck him, even more, was that it was familiar. It was the same sort of feeling the magic in the land emitted when he ran along its surface with four paws or his feet bare. It was calming and welcoming and home.

Blast the gods, indeed.

Following through the woods like he didn't know the way himself was more of a challenge than he had anticipated as well. Despite the bags weighing his arms down, he had to keep himself from trying to help her maneuver the bike through the tree roots and underbrush. They might not have spoken too much in the ride out of town but he knew enough by now to know she wouldn't appreciate it. She had fire in her veins, that was certain. She kept turning back to look at him with her brows raised as if she was waiting for him to give her some of the bags. His only answer was to raise his own brows right back. She seemed to give up after the fourth time. He wasn't able to contain the chuckle.

When the forest finally fell away, revealing the cottage in its daytime glory, Torin was honestly a little speechless. He hadn't seen the house in the sunlight for some time. It had been an awfully cloudy day when he'd first followed Brigid through the forest, and he didn't exactly make it a priority to run through this area. The sun gleaming through the trees and onto the clearing had its own sort of magic to it. Not to mention the magic in the air was palpable, far more than it had been early that morning when he had come by in his other form. He wondered what she must have done earlier that day to make the magic so much stronger than it had been hours ago.

"Here, come inside so you can set those down since you refuse to give them to me." Brigid looked back at him with a brow raised. He offered her a smirk in return. Shaking her head, Brigid pushed open the door and stepped aside.

Although Torin can't exactly say what he was expecting the inside of a witch's cottage to look like, it certainly wasn't this. A traditional early kitchen sat to the left, the range stove looking a little worse for wear. A few herbs hung from the rafters, covered in more dust than anything. They went well with the few sigils and other magical items he could see with a quick glance. It's only the main living area that looks cleaned and lived-in. Brightly colored blankets cover the well-loved couch. A fireplace sits on the far wall, a low ember still glowing in the ashes from the nighttime fire. The table, a sturdy oak thing with thick legs, was covered in clothes and other knickknacks. Things that Brigid was quickly pushing into a duffle bag to make room for the bags still in his arms.

"Sorry," he could just make out a slight flush on her cheeks in the dim light, "I didn't exactly plan to have someone else come inside. You can put the stuff here."

He smiles gently as he places the bags down, ignoring the slight discomfort in his muscles. "Don't worry about it. I won't intrude for long, I promise." He makes a show of glancing around the place. "Doesn't appear like you've been here very long."

Brigid shakes her head as she begins to unpack some of the bags. Torin spots a small can of purple paint amongst the cans of food he'd help gather from the pavement in town. "Just arrived yesterday, actually. So no, I haven't been able to clean much, yet. Hence the supplies."

"Found any critters hiding amongst the dust?"

Brigid send him a slightly alarmed look over her shoulder, her brows pulled tight on her forehead. "No."

"Good, then the roof might not be in nearly as bad condition as you think." His smile is sharp when he sends it her way. He makes his way back out of the house, intent to actually do his job properly and assess the thatching on the cottage. Despite his Shifting status, he didn't lie to Brigid. He was actually a thatcher by trade, just like his father and grandfather before him. He'd learned everything from them, as a young boy who'd have much rather been shifting and racing through the trees than sat on someone's roof. But he learned to love the traditional trade and takes great pride in fixing up people's houses. Nothing beats a thatched roof, in his opinion.

Taking a trip around the perimeter, the roof looks in relatively good condition from ground level. He can see from there, however, that the top ridge needs to be replaced, along with a number of the holding wires. He'll have to get up there to look more at the actual thatch sections of reed. He should've grabbed one of his ladders from the truck but he'd been so distracted by Brigid's presence that he'd forgotten. His father will never let him live that one down — if he ever finds out.

"So? How does it look?"

Turning, he finds Brigid standing a few paces behind him. She'd taken her jacket off, a slightly over-sized green sweater replacing it. The sleeves were too long, her hands gripped the cuffs so they wouldn't be swallowed by them. Clearing his throat, he looked back at the roof if only to stop the way his chest seemed to squeeze uncomfortably. "Not as bad as I anticipated, given no one has been looking after this place in some time. The eaves and ridge will need to be replaced. I don't know about the rest yet, I'll have to get up there and get a better look."

Coming to stand beside him, her bottom lip trapped between her teeth. Releasing it with a sigh, she slowly nodded her head. "You can't give me an estimate until then, I assume?"

Standing this close, he could pick out the nervous energy around her like a current of electricity. His sense of smell might be better in his wolf form, but even in this one can he sense the unease around her. Unsure of what brought it on — and for some reason praying he isn't the cause — Torin tries to speak softly. Something the timber of his voice isn't good at doing. "Not a full one, unfortunately. But I really don't think it'll need much more. It looks in great condition. It shouldn't take me more than a month or so."

Her brows rose high. "A month?"

A smile quirked the corners of his lips up. "Ay, a month. Thatching isn't as quick as putting shingles on a roof." Smiling wider, Torin barely contained the urge to bump his shoulder against hers. "Guess we'll be seeing a lot of each other then."

Her arms folded over her chest, the long sleeves of the sweater hiding her hands. "Yes, I guess we will." He was standing just close enough that he could see the blush rise in her cheeks.

~~~

"So you used your burley charms on her and yet you're the one drooling like a puppy?" Flynn's eyes hold all of the mirth possible in one body. The smirk on his face doing little to hide how utterly amused he is.

Rolling his eyes, Torin kept his back firmly turned away as he fixed himself a drink. He'd been home all of twenty minutes and Flynn hadn't let him rest for even a second. He'd gotten the whole story out of Torin within minutes. To be fair, Torin had never been able to keep anything from his best friends.

"Love, I beg you, please leave the man alone before you two end up breaking something." Ciaran said in an almost bored tone from where he sat beside the fire, a book in his hands. Not that he's probably been able to read it with Flynn's constant teasing. Ciaran makes a good point, though. Flynn and Torin have been known to wrestle each other when the teasing gets too much, whether children or not. "Need I remind you of the portrait incident of 2012?"

Torin snorted while Flynn had the good graces to look sheepish. Not their proudest moment, by far. Turning to Ciaran with a smirk, he said over the rim of his glass, "I thought you promised never to mention that one."

The man's eyes didn't leave the pages of his book, but the smirk that grew on his lips spoke volumes. "And I thought you two would have gotten over this incessant need to bicker. You'd think you were the mates in this house."

The whiskey burns on the way down his throat, helping to clear Torin's head from the afternoon spent in Brigid's company. With a pointed glance in Flynn's direction, who returned it with a salacious wink, Torin chuckled. "I think I'm good, thanks. I've got far too much on my plate to need a distraction like that."

Laying his arms over the back of Ciaran's chair, Flynn ran his hand through the hairs at the back of his mate's neck before smirking in Torin's direction again. "Oh? And here I thought you were ready to ask this witch to forget her cottage and move in here."

Ciaran groaned loudly just as Torin rolled his eyes. "Very funny. I was simply taken by surprise and wasn't prepared to find myself giving her a ride and doing her roof."

Shutting his book with a slam, Ciaran's eyes finally met his. "No, you were only prepared to have a witch who meant harm and now don't know what to do when she's not what you expected."

Ciaran's words are like a bucket of ice being dumped over his head. The worst part is knowing that his oldest friend is right — he hadn't even considered that Brigid's presence in the forest was anything but bad. That is until her smile had rocked his world and made him lose his head. He felt like he owed her an apology. But that would include telling her the truth and he's not ready for that. Somehow spending hours in her company with her thinking he knows nothing about her magic — and she knows nothing about his — sounds so much easier.

"Aw, come on, Ciaran. And you told me to stop picking on him."

"You were teasing him. I was simply pointing out the truth that he clearly needed to hear."

"Mhm, sure, love."

Setting his forgotten glass on the drink cabinet, Torin left his friends to continue their conversation without him. Turning down the hallway, he made his way to the backyard. Ciaran's words still rang in his head and needed to run to sort through how they made him feel. He also needed to sort out these feelings he was having around Brigid and he'd always been able to think better when he ran.

Shifting from one breath to the next, Torin left the backyard at a trot, breaking into a run once passing the stone fence. His heart pounded with the beat of his paws hitting the earth and he instantly felt better. He'd go back to Ash Grove tomorrow with a fresh mind and be prepared for Brigid's magic.