Misa Moon's Arc

Chapter 6 of 10

The door opened before Misa reached it. Two travelers stepped in, snow on their shoulders, and a third behind them. They looked at the fire, at the beds, at the sleeping figure on the bench. Then they looked at Misa the way hungry people look at anyone standing between them and a table. "You have beds," the tallest said. His voice was flat with cold. "Do you have food?" Misa opened her mouth. Nothing useful came out. The storeroom held frames and mattresses and blankets. It held no flour, no salt, no dried meat. She had been so busy giving people a place to sleep that she had forgotten they would wake up hungry. "Sit by the fire," she said. "Warm up. I'll see what I can find." She went to the back room with Hades a step behind. She opened the crate she had ignored yesterday. Iron pegs. She checked the shelf above the blankets. Empty jars. A tin with a spoonful of tea leaves gone gray. "They'll leave by morning," Hades said. "Cold and hungry travels faster than cold alone." "I know." Misa pressed her palms to her eyes. A sanctuary that sent people back into the snow was not a sanctuary. It was a waiting room with a fire. The fox spirit slipped past her boot and stopped at a narrow door she had taken for a cupboard. It sat. It waited. Misa lifted the latch. The door opened onto a room she had not built. Warm air came out. A stone hearth. A long table. Copper pots on hooks. And a woman at the table, sleeves pushed up, kneading dough as if she had been doing it for an hour. She was small and round-cheeked, brown hair tied up, flour on her apron. A recipe book sat open beside her, its pages faintly gold. On her shoulder perched a small creature with leaf-shaped ears and a tail like drifting smoke. A tiny winged figure hovered above a pot, sprinkling something bright into steam that already smelled like onions and butter. The woman looked up. Her eyes were warm and unsurprised. "You took your time," she said. "I'm Mabel. Bring them in before the soup catches." Misa's raven tattoo did not move. She stepped aside. Hades brought the travelers through the door one by one. They sat. Mabel set bowls in front of them without asking their names. The small creature on her shoulder flicked its tail, and a jar on the shelf refilled itself with barley. The tallest traveler ate three spoonfuls and started to cry. He wiped his face and kept eating. He was not leaving. Misa stood in the doorway and watched the room she had not known was there. The lodge had beds. Now the lodge had a kitchen. She would have to learn what she owed the woman who came with it, and what the woman wanted in return.