Fall was in full swing, scarves and thicker coats a staple again, and Sabrina had added grabbing a cup of coffee on her way to her first class. Or well, tea on her way to her vocal ones, wanting to soothe her vocal chords. But holding a hot beverage in her hands as she walked down the street, enjoying the crisp morning air, was a nice added routine, something to look forward to after long morning runs with Nick, Shadow and the hounds.
There were plenty of coffee places on the way to the university and she wanted to try out all of them to figure out which one she liked the best. Depending on her mood and order, different ones stood out, offering up a variety of choices and flavors. Her current tea smelled like apples and cinnamon and she brought the to-go cup back up to her nose, breathing in the scent as she stepped out onto the sidewalk.
Colorful leaves were scattered along it, the crunch of them under her feet and everyone else’s adding to the sounds of her early morning commute. It wasn’t quite the same as when she’d walked in the forest, the towering treetops traded in for buildings and streetlights. Part of her missed her link back to the magic of Vallo there, the ease with which it rumbled through her as she’d stepped barefoot along the ground or wound her way through its endless, ever changing maze.
She’d learned that the city had its own magic, something foreign to her that she was still learning how to navigate and step in tune to. In some ways it felt harsher than the magic of the forest, but at other times it was more soothing, less raw than the frantic energy she’d always picked up around outer boundaries of the mortuary. The contrasts were one of the things she loved about the city, slowly learning its own heartbeat and letting it help set her new pace.
People moved faster here at times, intent on getting to their destinations, but she saw the slower paced too--the buskers in the corner, the chess players in the park challenging one another to game after game, the older woman feeding the birds on a bench--a new harmony to learn and explore.
And one she needed to ignore so she would make it to her vocal class on time.
Teleporting allowed her to make it with minutes to spare and Sabrina put her coat, scarf and bag down on one of the chairs before finishing off her tea. Several vocal exercises and an hour of rehearsal later and she was chatting with Lorelia about their final piece as they pulled on their coats.
Sabrina blinked. She’d worn her scarf, hadn’t she? She remembered using it to pull Nick in for a goodbye kiss before wrapping it around her neck as she’d left the apartment that morning.
“You ready?”
“I can’t find my scarf.” Sabrina shook her head, looking behind the chairs to see if it had dropped back there.
“Maybe one of the others accidentally picked it up?” Lorelia suggested with a small shrug.
Sabrina nodded. It wasn’t that big of a deal, she had plenty of other ones back at the apartment and they needed to head to the next class.
She didn’t see Aidan in the back of the hallway as they headed out of the classroom and out of the building. Nor did she see him bring the scarf up to his face, breathing it in before he tucked it into his bag.