I sniff and my eyes sting. I sit on a wooden stool. "Are you feeling better now, Mariposa?" Seth asks me carefully. I smack my head on the stone counter.

"I'm fine!" I smile. Tea cups and a tea pot float towards us and land roughly on the counter. Herbs follow close behind. They float in a jerky motions and land roughly. "Tea?" I look at Seth. I summon water and pour it into the teapot and heat it with a light purple fire. He stares at me strangely.

"Sure." He sounds nervous. He eyes me carefully, like I will fall over at any second. I steep a strong herbal tea. I pour us each a cup. His floats over to him. I chug mine. I pour another cup for myself and drink this one slower. "You need to sleep, Mariposa."

"What if something happens?" I look at him.

"Nothing will happen. No one will find us here." He reassures me. He eyes me warily. "Mariposa, when was the last time you slept a full night?"

"The last time I slept was two nights before I rescued the children." I finished off my tea.

"What?" He whispers.

"I've been healing myself with magic to keep going." I grumble. "That was two weeks ago, I think. That was when I had stopped at an inn. I ate a good meal and slept the whole night. It was nice. Then I rode for two days to the next town. That's when I met you and that night I had rescued the children. We rode for two days straight and I healed myself and the horse so we wouldn't get caught. We were gonna stop at the next town."

"But I found you and you killed the man and had to keep running." I nod to his add on. "Then you rode all the way to the coast?" I nod. "Then you found me and spent that whole night taking care of me?" I nod again. "Then we were traveling here and you were trying to figure out the charms every night while we weren't moving."

"Correct." The teapot floats over to me, but it's shaking violently. Then, it falls and crashes to the ground. My body starts to shake. "Oh, it's been a while since my magic has run out." I stare at my hands. My body aches everywhere.

One second I am sitting there on the stool, staring at the broken glass. The next second, my feet are off the ground and strong arms are carrying me, bridal style. I shriek and thrash around. "Knock it off." He grumbles. I stare up at Seth.

"Put me down!" I hissed. "I'm perfectly fine!"

"You don't need to pretend to be strong around me. I won't judge." He starts carrying me up the stairs. "You saw me at a bad time and you helped me. So, I am going to do the same for you." I stared up at him. He carried me to the other bathing room.

"I can't make water anymore, though?" I stare up at him confused.

"That's ok. There is a creek nearby." He sets me down on a wooden stool. "I will be right back." I grab his sleeve.

"I can try to make the water. So, don't leave." My voice wobbled but he stared at me with pity. It was just the anger I needed to summon the strength to create water. I fill the large stone tub and heat the water with purple flames.

"I will hand it to you, Mariposa, you are stronger than I ever would have thought." I smile at the compliment. Then he comes up behind me and starts untying the lace up back of my dress. I spin around and shove him.

"What are you doing?!" I shriek as I try to hold up the falling dress.

"Making you bathe." He grumbles. "Don't worry, I won't do anything." I sigh and let the dress fall and step into the bath. He pulls the soap from earlier out of his pockets. He sits on his knees and tips my head into the water. I keep my arms crossed over my chest as I stare at him. "If you keep your eyes open you might get soap in them." He warns and I huff.

He scrubs soap into my hair and rubs his thumb in circles on my scalp. He applies just the right amount of pressure to make it a gentle experience while getting the grime off. He rubs my temples with the soap and works the knots out of my neck.

"Mari." My eyes flutter open. I look up at Seth. "You dozed off." He says gently.

"Oh, sorry." He hands me a towel and I get out of the bath. He turns away as I dry off. He doesn't turn around as he hands me a slip. "Thank you."

"So... where am I going to sleep?" He asks and I walk past him.

"Hm?" I look up at him.

"There's only one more room, with one more bed." He mumbles.

"Oh, I forgot about that." I scratch my head. "I was gonna wait until I had rested a bit to make another one. It was really draining." I sigh in frustration. The room starts to rumble as I try to change its shape.

"Stop using your magic, good lord!" Seth grabs my hands. "I will sleep on the floor as long as you don't use any magic until you are well rested! A nap in the bathtub doesn't count!" His eyes burned with emotions. "You are going to hurt yourself! Are you really that careless?" He lets go of my hands and grabs my shoulders. "If you burn yourself out and put yourself completely out of commission, who is going to teach Josephine to control her powers? Who is going to heal Joseph when he gets hurt during training? Who is going to help the new witches that don't understand their powers yet? Who will be able to convince the witches to come with us? Tell me, Mariposa, who will do all of that if you hurt yourself because you don't take care of yourself?"

"I'm sorry?!" I shout at him. "Someone had to keep you from dying. Someone had to heal those kids! Someone had to create a whole house so that bad weather wouldn't be the death of us! Someone has to take care of everyone else and I am that someone. I ran out of the time to take care of myself while I was running from my father. While I was running from you!" I stared at him.

"If you take care of everyone, who will take care of you?" He looked mad at me when he had no right to be angry.

"Myself." I spat.

"No." His words held so much finality my eyebrows shot up. "I will take care of you." My eyebrows go impossibly higher as my mouth falls open in shock. "I will help you take care of the children. I will train the men that come to this mountain base so that they will protect the witches with weak powers and the children without powers. So, let me help you!"

"You really are going to protect a witch and take care of her?" He nods. "You are going to help every witch that we find and even take care of the young?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because, I made a mistake just because I was spoon fed lies." He looks towards the floor. "I will not do that again. Especially not when I have people to take care of."

I burst out in laughter. "You are so weird." I sigh and lay down on the large bed. "You can sleep on the other side of the bed. After you bathe." He nods with a smile. I curl up in a blanket as he goes to bathe. I don't think this is what they mean when they say to take your enemy to bed. He isn't an enemy anymore.

I smile as sleep claims me for the first time in a long time.