I hadn’t seen her in almost a century. Last I heard, she’d given up her wings for some lad who lived up near Longshadow. “Melodious Binne.”
“Voice of an angel.” Padraig sighed. “Legs for days.”
He had that right.Those legs were long enough to wrap around a man twice. I’d checked. On multiple occasions.
Keelynn slammed her glass onto the table, rattling my own. “Aren’t faeries really small?”
“Not always.” This was where the stories got things wrong. Faeries could become human-sized one day a season. Or, if they gave up their wings, they could stay human-sized forever. But that would mean giving up almost all of their power. There were a few who had done just that. Rían kept a record of them in one of his many ledgers. Most had given them up for silly things, like love. Some, like Clara, had their wings stolen from them. Thinking of Clara made me sad, so I squashed that right down, smiled at Keelynn, and added, “I’m half-fae and no one’s ever called me small.”
“I’m sure other faeries find you quite adequate.”
I’d show her feckin’ adequate.
Padraig lost his drink all over the table. “Milady!”
This night kept getting better and better. “Oh, I like drunk Keelynn.” How many pints had she sipped? One? Two? Her eyes weren’t glazed or glassy, yet the steely shield she usually held in place seemed to have slipped.
Padraig launched from his seat, grabbing my arm. “Whatever’s in yer head, boy, get it out. She’s had it hard enough since that wretch—”
The blush from Keelynn’s cheeks evaporated when she clutched his hand. “Thank you, Padraig.”
Wretch? What wretch? When I looked to Keelynn for an explanation, she started playing with the foam on top of her pint. It must’ve been bad to have stolen the smile from her lips.
“You’ll hear no argument here,” I said. “Any man with eyes in his head can see she’s far too good for me.”Almost every woman was far too good for someone like me. That didn’t stop them from sinking to my level.
Padraig gave Keelynn a warm smile and a soft pat on the back of her hand. “If ye would excuse me, milady.” Pushing away from the table, the old man stumbled toward the privy.
Finally.
Finally.
Alone.
Well, not alone, alone. The merrow and the pooka shot glances our way every so often. And Maeve was doing the washing up behind the taps. But at least Padraig had gone. Padraig with his interruptions and glares and judgement.
Some of Keelynn’s hair had fallen from its pins. She brushed it behind her ear, sighing wistfully toward where her coachman had disappeared. Without my kohl, I could almost convince myself I was just a man and she was just a woman.
Sitting together in a pub.
Having a drink and a laugh.
If I were a human, would she be interested in me? She had been married, so she was no longer a maiden. Did she miss her husband warming her bed? Had she liked the way he had touched her? Had she liked—
“Why are you looking at me like that?”she asked.
So many reasons. None I should have said aloud. “You’ve confounded me.” I shouldn’t want to bed such a hateful wasp when there were plenty of women who would welcome me—including the merrow tugging on that invisible string.
Yet, here we sat.
“Don’t do that with your mouth,” she grumbled, snagging her pint and taking a deep sip. A drop of condensation from the glass fell onto her chest.
This ought to be good.
Leaning across the table, I asked what I shouldn’t do with my mouth because at the moment, my mouth wanted to lick off the foam clinging to the bow of her upper lip.
“When you get annoyed, you do this,” she explained.
Was she trying to frown or smirk or grimace? Whatever it was, I was fairly certain I had never made that face in my life. She started giggling.Giggling. And the sound was like a thousand chiming bells. Eventually, the giggling ceased, and she frowned again.