I picked up my shoes and crept around to the tunnel and down to the main cavern. Daylight lit the entrance to the cave, but the interior remained shadowy. The torches no longer burned though I could smell the shadow of their smoke and whatever they had been dipped in to make them burn.
I washed my face and hands in the fall of the water in the small back cavern. The view through its doorless entrance showed me the thrones, and the mouth of the cave. There was no sign of movement from the cave containing the bed. No naked golden-haired man walked towards me.
I had to make myself useful, I told myself. I was not entirely sure how I would go about that, but I decided that starting breakfast would be a good beginning. I regarded the kitchen. I had never prepared food before, nor started my own fire. There was a first time for everything, I told myself sternly. How difficult could it be? I had to make myself useful or the golden-haired man would not permit me to stay, and I needed the dragon.
The maids had always made starting the fire look easy, but I could see no way to light it. Was there a secret to such things? Men had been lighting fires for as long as history was recorded, and yet, I was flummoxed by it.
“Poor princess,” the golden-haired man observed from the doorway. He had put on a pair of dark trousers and a loose-fitting shirt that was untied at the neck, dispelling my theory of Fae curses. If anything, I noted, he was more beautiful, dressed. At least I could look at him closely now, without being inappropriate, and there was a lot to look at. It was like studying an artwork, a marble stature, or a painting by a master, he was perfection personified. “Kneeling in the ashes wondering how to make fire, something most of mankind conquer as children.”
I rose to my feet. “I am a quick learner.”
He arched a golden eyebrow. “You would be better to leave here and find a ring of standing stones. There is one on the Graceplains.”
“I have been there,” I told him. “Three nights over the full moon, I slept amongst the stones.”
He regarded me with his unusual eyes inscrutable, that unnatural stillness settling upon him again. After a long moment, during which I squirmed beneath the burn of those purple eyes, he released me from their gaze, and stepped into the kitchen.
“You need to clean out the ashes of the last fire. Use the bucket and scoop to the side. Empty the ashes off the ledge. When that is done, stack the wood in the fireplace. Use small pieces that burn easily.”
As I scooped ashes from the hearth, I watched him. He rolled up the sleeves of his shirt to reveal his strong forearms and flicked his hair over one shoulder as he laid various ingredients out upon the tabletop. When I returned from emptying the ash and stacked the wood ready for the fire, he regarded me again, his expression unreadable.
“Wash yourself,” he indicated to the rear of the cavern.
A fire burned brightly in the hearth by the time I had washed the ash from me, and the torches in the main cavern were lit, making the caves as bright as day. I wondered what he used to make them, as they burnt smokeless compared to those in Vienthrey, and lasted by far longer.
He swung a pot over the cheerful flames. “Take down two bowls from the shelf, and two spoons,” he told me, moving back to the table in order to tear the leaves from berries. “And place them on the table. Then stir the contents of the pot. Be careful not to set yourself on fire, nor upset the pot.”
Both cautions were wisely delivered, I discovered, as stirring the pot meant leaning perilously close to the fire, my hair and gown seemingly drawn towards the heat, and the pot hung suspended from a hook which swung over the flames and rocked as I stirred. Oatmeal simmered within the bowl of it, looking both familiar and foreign to me in its current state.
“How do I know when it is done?” I asked him with worry.
“Does it look done? Has it absorbed the liquid?”
“Yes, I guess.”
He sighed and came to my side, the scent of incense drifting over me, and his golden hair swinging near the flames as he leaned over. I gasped and scooped it back for him. It was heavy, a thick silken skein, warmed by proximity to the fire, or contact with his body.
He looked down at me, and for a moment, I imagined what it would be like if he closed the distance between us and kissed me. I inclined towards him instinctually.
“I am not mankind,” he said mildly. “The flames will not harm me. The oatmeal is done.” He lifted the pot from the fire and carried it to the table.
I knew enough about metal and flames to know that the handle of the pot should have burnt him, and yet it did not. He scooped the contents of the pot into two bowls and filled the pot with water, returning it to the hook over the fire to bubble away.