Lost in Mist and Shadow: A Between the Worlds Novel (8 page)

“They wanted me to stay, of course,” he said, watching closely for her reaction.

“Obviously you didn’t.”

“Maybe I only came back to say goodbye,” he meant it to be teasing but she looked so upset at the words that he immediately added, “or maybe I told them to go get stuffed.”

She pretended to hit him across the space between them. ”That’s not funny.”

“What? Telling my mother to get stuffed? I don’t think I actually have the courage to do such a thing but it is a wonderful thought.”

“I just can’t imagine you not being here,” Allie said.

“And what shall I do if you choose to go with your Elven Guard?” he retorted. “I can’t imagine my life without you either Allie.”

She looked down, biting her lip, “I need to go to the bathroom, I’ll be right back.”

“Allie-“

“I’ll be right back,” she got up and started to turn but he grabbed her arm.

“It’s alright Allie. I’m not going to push you to choose,” he said softly. She nodded slightly pulling free and heading for the bathroom. She didn’t know how to get him to see that he was already pushing her, and that she knew she was being unfair to him, but she also didn’t know how not to depend on him.
Why can’t things just be simple? Why can’t he be my friend without also wanting to be in my bed? Why couldn’t he have just told me years ago how he felt instead of waiting until I was with someone else
?

When she re-emerged from the back he was standing by the counter holding a small white bag. Seeing her he smiled. “I have to go. I wanted you to be the first one I saw when I arrived back, but I need to make sure I still have a job and find out when I can get back on the schedule.”

She blushed and looked down, tracing the wood grain of the counter. “I can’t imagine Henry would fire you. You’re his best employee.”

“Perhaps, but I also just took a month’s vacation without much warning. I’m not so sure he’ll welcome me back with open arms.”

Suddenly she wanted to ask him if he’d stayed sober while he was gone, wanted it desperately, but she was afraid of the answer. So instead she asked, “What’s in the bag?”

“A gift,” he replied simply, smiling wider and holding the bag out. When she hesitated he actually looked offended. “Allie, you know it’s honestly given. Surely you don’t suspect me of offering anything with a hidden cost?”

She blushed harder, feeling stupid. Bleidd might push her as far as he could, as often as he could, and drive her crazy half the time with his persistence, but he had never in all the time she’d known him, tried to take advantage of her in any way through trickery. She reached out for the bag “Of course not. I guess I’m just a little thrown off today.”

He opened his mouth to ask why at the same time she opened the bag, but his question was overridden by her exclamation of joy. “Oh! Apple cider donuts! Oh dear Gods, you’re the best.”

He couldn’t resist preening under the praise, “I know how much you love them and when I was driving into town I saw that the Orchard had them for sale today.”

She caught herself before she could tell him that she loved him for thinking of her because that would surely be dangerous territory. “You are the best. They haven’t even made them in months.”

Eagerly she pulled a small sugar coated donut out of the bag, the sugar gritty under her fingers. The local apple orchard in the neighboring town made the donuts with their own cider and they were delicious, but only available at random and unpredictable intervals. It was one of the few things Allie was willing to go entirely into regular earth for, but most of the time as soon as she found out they were being offered they were already sold out. Bleidd knew how much she loved them and had certainly chosen the perfect way to show his affection. He watched her devour the treat in amused silence until she popped the last crumb into her mouth.

“Allie…” he said. She paused, swallowing, her hand held in mid-air and he took advantage of the opportunity to grab her hand and pull it to his lips. His eyes locked with hers, enjoying the shocked expression on her face as he licked the sugar off her fingers. She blushed crimson and he grinned wickedly. “…I’ll see you at home later.”

Her mouth moved but no sound came out and he laughed his way out the door, leaving her standing there still stunned. Part of her couldn’t believe he’d done that, but the rest of her knew she should have seen it coming. It was just so Bleidd. He might not push her to choose but he was going to make it clear that he wasn’t giving up on courting her either. She wiped her hand on her jeans, flustered by how good his mouth had felt. She balled her hands into fists.
Why am I even thinking this? I’m with Jess. Sweet Gods, I’m worrying about him giving in and sleeping with someone else which should be a total non-issue in his culture, I’m making him miserable, and I’m here getting off on someone else sucking on my fingers.

She closed her eyes, trying to banish thoughts of Bleidd and the bells over the door rang again. She looked up quickly, still flustered, and saw a strange elf standing just past the threshold. For an instant she felt a surge of panic but shoved it down; if he meant her any harm his entrance would have broken the wards on the door, but the bells had rang out with their usual cheer. He was dressed in a pair of ripped jeans and a sweatshirt, and it struck Allie as an unusually grubby outfit for an elf to wear. Elves prided themselves on their sense of fashion, whether they were wearing their own styles, which humans often mistook for medieval human clothing, or adopting human styles. His hair was also shorter than she’d ever seen on an elf before, barely curling past his shoulders.

“Can I help you?” she asked keeping her tone friendly but cautious.

He started slightly, as if he hadn’t seen her. “Yes. Well, possibly. I am looking for a copy of Terevelien’s treatise on water magic and weather working. I was told you carry some rare books.”

Allie shrugged, “I do but not many elvish works. Most of my customers aren’t interested in those or can’t read them. I think I do have a copy of Terevelian’s though, but the condition isn’t good.”

He glanced around the shop, “Could you show me, please? I have had no luck finding it elsewhere.”

“Certainly,” Allie led him over to the single shelf of elven books and pulled out the battered copy he was looking for. “The binding is starting to go and the cover is badly damaged, but the text is entirely intact.”

He was nodding, seemingly lost in thought. She handed him the book and started to turn away when he thrust it back into her hands. “I’ll take it.”

She tried to cover her surprise by briskly heading back to the counter and wrapping up the book. She had expected him to at least thumb through the pages and see if they were as she said they were, since he couldn’t know she wasn’t fully human and had no reason to simply take her word. Better not to complain about a sale though, especially one of a fairly expensive book, “Okay. Let’s see, with tax…it comes to $536 even.”

He counted out the money quickly, five crisp hundred dollar bills, followed in equally quick succession by a twenty, ten, five and one. Exact change. Something about that rang a warning bell in Allie’s head but before she could even scoop the money off the counter he had grabbed the wrapped book, mumbled his gratitude, and was out the door. She stood for a minute frowning. Reaching out for the cash she felt the slightest tingle of magic against her fingers.

“Oh crap,” she sighed. Glamouring money was an old trick, a way to get something valuable for nothing or virtually nothing. She usually checked any time she was dealing with any Fey she didn’t know or who was acting suspicious, but this time everything had happened so quickly…
You are totally off your game today
she thought wanting to hit her head on the counter. That book was expensive and hard to find; he’d have no trouble reselling it. Even some of the pawn shops might take it.

She chanted a quick spell that would dispel any glamour; it was far too weak to work on magic being actively fed energy so her own subtle glamour remained in place. The money on the counter, however, shifted shape and color revealing itself to be a small pile of dried leaves. “Leaves?
Leaves
?” Allie groaned out loud. “Are you freaking kidding me? That is like literally the oldest trick in the book.”

She gave in this time and slumped over, gently tapping her head onto the counter, muttering “Stupid, stupid, stupid….”

Gritting her teeth in frustration she finally straightened up and reached for the phone. As much as she wished she could forget this embarrassment – and there was no way around how enormously embarrassing this was – she couldn’t afford to get ripped off. Not only the amount, but if word got around that she was an easy mark she’d be dealing with this kind of crap constantly. There was no choice but to call the Elven Guard and report the crime.

She had just started to dial when she glanced up and saw Jessilaen and Brynneth walking in the door in uniform. Like an idiot she glanced from them to the phone in her hand, before shaking herself slightly and hanging up.

“Good afternoon,” she said carefully in Elvish, feeling entirely off balance. Brynneth, as always, looked calm but Jess seemed somewhat amused by the formal greeting. His expression turned serious quickly though when she said, “I was just about to call the Outpost to report a crime.”

“What has happened?” he asked, his eyes sweeping the store.

“Nothing too serious. An elf just paid me for a book with glamoured,” she winced slightly but forced the word out, “leaves.”

Brynneth’s eyebrows shot up in disbelief and Allie struggled not to squirm. Jess, to his credit, took her completely seriously, pulling a small report book out of one of the pockets in his uniform pants. “I can open a case for you. Your store has surveillance video, yes?”

“Yes, let me get my computer turned on and I can pull the footage up,” she muttered. It only took a moment to get everything online but when she accessed the surveillance system instead of a neatly divided screen showing different angles of the store she saw an error message. She mumbled in English, “What the heck?”

“What is wrong?”

“I don’t know,” Allie said, frowning at the screen. She typed quickly, trying to pull up an individual camera only to see the same error message. She picked a random time from last week and the four-way view immediately filled the screen. With a bit of hit-or-miss guessing she finally figured out that the system had gone down last Friday morning. Without thinking she spoke again in English, “Well crap. It looks like my camera system isn’t working.”

The two elves exchanged glances. “When did it stop functioning?”

“Last week. I didn’t notice because I don’t check it very often,” she blew out a long frustrated breath
and I don’t have the money to get this fixed right now.

“Can you describe the suspect?” Jess asked, switching back to Elvish and keeping a more formal approach. She might have been annoyed by that except that she was the one who had started off that way and set the tone. She wondered if dating was always this complicated, or if it was only because she was dating the Fairy equivalent of a police officer.

Allie quickly ran through a description of the strange elf, what had happened, the book, and how much it was worth. She also handed over her only evidence, the formerly enspelled leaves, only flinching a little. Jess wrote everything down with businesslike proficiency and Allie felt bad that she hadn’t offered him a more enthusiastic greeting. Elvish etiquette was complex and convoluted and she started to worry that she had forgotten some nuance or erred in some way. Carefully reaching out with her mind while he bagged the evidence she said “
I’m sorry I didn’t have a warmer welcome for you. It’s been a difficult day
”

His lips curved into a slight smile and he caught her eye “
Fear not my love. What is it the humans say? Business before pleasure?”
She smiled back slightly as well.

“We will file this as soon as we return to the Outpost. I cannot promise we will recover the book for you but we will make every effort to catch this thief,” Jess said gravely. Allie had no doubt they would make every effort indeed; it would be very bad for community relations to have an elf going around defrauding human businesses. The elves, who were very proud of their high place within Fairy society, would not stand for one of their own acting so dishonorably. It was one of the little idiosyncrasies of Fairy that while it appeared that the lesser Fey were treated more harshly by the elves, the reality was that they were far harder on themselves.

Having gotten that out of the way Allie relaxed slightly. She felt suddenly shy around Jess and unsure of how to act. She had seen him yesterday, but they had parted with so much unresolved that seeing him again so soon left her feeling uncertain. She couldn’t help but think of how they had spent their time together and oddly that made her think of Bleidd as well. Belatedly she realized that she never properly greeted Brynneth and, worried that she had unintentionally offended him, she said “Good afternoon Brynneth, I am glad to see you again.”

The dark haired Guard looked pleased at her words, and if he was bothered by the delayed welcome he did not let it show, “Good day Aliaine. I am sorry that anyone would steal from you. I am certain whoever did this will be found.”

She nodded slightly, accepting the reassurance. It occurred to her that she had promised Jason to ask Brynneth for help and she knew now was the time to do so. Instead she asked, “If I may, was it just luck you stopped in when I needed you, or did you have some other purpose in coming here?”