“Jane,” he said, laying a hand on her arm. “Let’s go.”
She snapped her head around to look at him. Fire blazed in her eyes. “But Charlie—”
“It’s time to go,” he said, treading the fine line between voicing a suggestion and telling her what to do, an action that would probably direct her temper at him.
Their gaze held for an intense moment. She looked away first, but her anger didn’t stay dampened for long.
“Where are my boxes?” she demanded of Eagar.
“Boxes?” The steward looked confused.
“My boxes. I realize they might not mean anything to you, but I had a lot of money tied up in their contents. I’d like to get it back when I return to Earth.”
“I’ve not touched your boxes or their contents,” Eagar declared.
Jane looked him up and down. “No, you probably wouldn’t know what to do with the stuff inside,” she sniffed.
Charlie thought it best to intercede before another argument started. “I have your boxes. They’re in one of the storerooms.” Jaspar had placed them there after they all had returned from the portal.
Jane nodded. “Good. Let’s get them and blow this popcorn stand. This place gives me the creeps.” She looked directly at Eagar as she said the words.
Charlie slipped between the two and took her arm in a firm grip. Before she could say another word, he pulled her in the direction of the storeroom, leaving Eagar behind.
“Watch yourself, Jane Drysdale,” he warned. “The king can be your friend to a point. Past that, others decide your fate.”
“What do you have to say to me?” Charlie asked an hour later, as Jane settled into Hugh and Mara’s cottage.
Jane smiled at him, feeling more comfortable now that she’d left the castle. They’d collected her boxes and stored them in an unused corner of the barn behind the house. She’d successfully argued with Mara about not taking the main floor bedroom. Instead, she’d been shown the half of the loft recently vacated by Tisha, Hugh and Charlie’s younger sister. A cot, a chair and a few pegs on the wall comprised the new quarters. And a curtain of fabric separated it from Charlie’s similarly almost-bare half.
Interesting, Jane thought, sitting in a chair in the main room after descending the ladder. The firm set of his jaw confirmed that Charlie wasn’t thrilled by the plan. Well, too bad. She was looking forward to it. Her attraction to him had only grown. Still waters ran deep, and all that. Fire and passion lay below his surface. She wanted to churn them into the open. The sleeping arrangements only made it easier.
“Do I have something to say to you?” she asked, all innocence and batting lashes.
“When we left to see the king, you mentioned you had a surprise that would change my world.”
“Rock your world,” she corrected. She exchanged glances with Mara, who stood at the stove cooking. Muttle kept guard outside the door, so Jane was free to talk. As free as she could be with a mind-reading Belwaith nearby.
“I do have a secret, but you have to promise not to freak out over it. This is as much a mystery to me as to you.”
He pinched the bridge of his nose, as if battling a headache. “I’m almost afraid to ask,” he muttered.
“Better to know now than later,” Mara declared.
Jane began to unlace the front of her bodice.
“What are you doing?” Charlie asked, bolting from his chair.
Her fingers stilled. “You have seen a woman’s body before, haven’t you, Charlie?” She hoped he had; it would make things easier in the future. She wasn’t promiscuous by any means, but the seduction of the strait-laced Charlie held more and more appeal. Those wings had been playing in her mind. . . .
“Of course I have,” he stammered. He indicated the open room and Mara. “Only not yours, and not like this.”
“I’m afraid it’s necessary,” she explained. Even her clients at her Realm of Pleasures parties had never been more flustered. She continued unlacing her bodice and slipped from it. “I promise to be discreet.”
With exaggerated care, she loosened the neck of her chemise and drew out her left arm, exposing the tattoo. Charlie approached slowly, his forehead wrinkled in concentration. He knelt at her side and touched the writing with a delicacy that sent a tingle along Jane’s skin. She almost jerked away at her body’s reaction.
“How long have you had this?” he asked, his eyes solemn. He continued to trace the lettering with his fingers, sending major goosebumps down her spine.
Jane wet her lips before answering, her mouth suddenly dry. “About five years.”
“Do you know what it says?” He gripped her arm just below the tattoo. His gaze, mocha-brown and steady, held hers.
The stillness in him frightened her. The room telescoped into itself, leaving her alone with him in a claustrophobic container. She fought to breathe.
“Not until today. Charlie, I copied it from something of my mother’s.”
“Does anyone else know of this?” he asked, looking from her to Mara and back again.
“No one,” Jane answered.
He nodded. “Good. It must be kept secret.”
“What does it mean? Why would my mother have an Elven verse in her possession?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know. I can tell you two things about it, though. First, somewhere since I started working in Sylthia, I’ve seen this before. And second”—Charlie tapped the inscription—“it’s not written in pure Elven. From its construction, I’m sure it’s Malik.”
Chapter Nine
A sharp whistle from outside canceled any further talk.
“Muttle,” Charlie explained. “Hugh returns.” He stood quickly, placing himself between Jane and the cottage door. She scrambled to rearrange her clothing, tying the last lacing on her bodice as Hugh walked in.
Lunch followed. Talk of Tivat’s death and the trial dominated the conversation, as did discussion of the delayed arrival of Wesant. The third member of the council to preside at Jane’s trial, he was away on a hunting trip.
Jane tried to concentrate on the lunchtime discussion, but her mind returned to the words tattooed on her arm. The many conclusions whirling in her head finally narrowed to two. Either someone from Malik had contacted her mother on Earth or, scarier yet, Marion Drysdale had traveled to Lowth and back again. Neither explained why nothing had been said about the otherworld contact. Of course, on Earth, unless one wanted a lifetime of psychiatric treatment, it was best to stay quiet.
At the end of the meal, the men rose to return to work: Hugh to his tanning sheds and Charlie to the castle.
“Don’t worry too much about this,” Charlie advised as Jane walked him to the front gate. “I’ll remember where I saw the inscription. It may give us more insight into this newest mystery of yours.” He turned, casually waving good-bye.
Newest mystery. If she had any more mystery in her life, she’d need her own shelf at the library.
Jane returned and entered the cottage, intent on helping Mara with washing up. She stacked the dishes and watched with interest as the other woman added heated water from the stove to the cold water she’d pumped into the sink. The amenities here were clearly not the same as at Sylthia.
“Mara, what’s the Dymynsh?”
“Ah, the Dymynsh.” Mara plunged her hands into the dishwater. “An evil, Jane. A nasty evil come over the land.” She explained the effect of the scourge—how everything was fading and dying—and the popular belief that Blacwin, the wizard of Malik, was behind it.
“You know this for a fact?” Jane asked.
“Well, no, it being so far away and all, but rumor has it the crops in Malik don’t suffer. And I haven’t heard of any Malik women losing babies,” Mara added, her words sharp.
“I’m sorry.” Jane touched her arm. “You and Hugh?”
“Nothing, after five years of trying.” Mara twisted away, her expression bitter. “Not much of a marriage, either.”
Jane suspected as m
uch from observing the two, but she didn’t want to get into a discussion of their marital woes.
“Tell me about Charlie,” she said in an attempt to distract her friend. “It will be a long day before he opens up to me. Is he the only Whelphite in the family?”
“He’s a quiet one, is Charlie,” Mara agreed. “He needs to get out and enjoy life more.”
“Oh, I think he’ll soon have plenty of enjoyment,” Jane predicted. Charlie intrigued her, what with his reserved manner, in contrast to her own get-out-of-my-way attitude. He had layers she wanted to uncover. Many layers. She glanced at Mara and grinned.
“Good, then.” Mara returned to Jane’s question. “Charlie’s a foundling. In truth, Hugh’s the one who found him. Named him, too. I would have picked different, but Hugh was eight at the time. Charlie’s an odd name for an elf.” She shook her head as if she didn’t approve. “Anyway, Hugh was hunting with his father, heard a noise and investigated. It was Charlie, a few months old, lying next to the one they think was his real father.”
“His real father?”
“They never knew for sure. A man of the fairy race. Dead, poor thing, from a bad heart. So far from Isleighah, the land of the fairies, it was thought he was on his way to the child’s Elven relatives.”
Poor Charlie. “The mother?”
Mara shook her head. “Unknown. Hugh’s family took him in and raised him as an elf.”
“But he isn’t,” Jane observed. “Though he pretends to be. He’s more fairy than he wants. His wings”—she paused, stilled by her one and only, but she hoped not last, glimpse of them—“are magnificent.”
Mara raised an eyebrow. “Seen them, have you? Charlie, there may be hope for you yet.”
The woman dumped her dirty dishwater into a bucket and opened the back door. In the yard, she carefully poured the water into the window boxes hanging against the cottage. Sad-looking petunias and geraniums struggled to grow in them.
“The Dymynsh reaches even my poor flowers,” Mara remarked, setting down the empty bucket.
Jane, remembering her mother’s flourishing garden back on Earth, touched the leaves on a couple of the plants.
“I hope the water helps,” she said, homesick for her family. When would she see them again?
As if sensing her mood, Mara linked her arm with Jane’s. “Come on. It’s time to meet the people in the village.”
Chapter Ten
A few days later, Charlie, bone weary, returned late to his family cottage. Lowth’s second moon, Slumber, crested over the Malin forest to the east. Its companion, Rest, neared its zenith. An occasional dog bark or muffled voice disturbed the quiet of the village. A nocturnal breeze lifted the edges of his hair and tipped leaves from their anchors. A week had passed since Jane had turned his world upside down.
The delayed trial loomed closer. Wesant would return from his hunting trip the next day, and Charlie dreaded telling Jane the news.
His day had been hectic, starting with a confrontation with Eagar, an uncommon event. The steward’s irritation at Jane’s liberty manifested itself in paperwork that demanded Charlie’s time. In addition, he’d been drawn into a protracted meeting with some of the village leaders, discussing the Dymynsh. Today, he’d talked them out of sending a small party to Shallen to speak with Blacwin the wizard and demand a reversal of the spell he’d cast.
Work lay on his desk, but Charlie didn’t care anymore. He was tired of not sleeping in his own bed. Twice, he’d set up his cot in his office. Fine for an occasional late night, it lost its appeal after a couple of uses.
He missed his family. Up early and returning late, he rarely saw Hugh or Mara. Or Jane. At the thought of her, his heart tripped. His wings, folded beneath his shirt, vibrated.
She hadn’t caused any major catastrophes yet. From what Mara told him, Jane helped with the housework, fit in with the villagers and tried hard to adjust to a new world.
But she still sleeps in the next room, he reminded himself. He heard her even breathing as he lay down each night, imagined the dreams that made her sigh, and wondered what she looked like in moonlight.
He didn’t have to wait long for the last. As he approached the cottage from the rear, he saw Jane sitting on a bench near the back door.
“Well met, Charlie,” she said in a soft voice. “You’re out late tonight.”
He stopped at her side, struck by her casual use of an Elven expression. “There’s much work to be done at the castle,” he admitted.
“Ah, yes, wool-gathering time. Literally.” She patted the bench.
He hesitated. He’d not been close to her since the day she’d shown him her tattoo. Though preoccupied with its implications, he’d still been aware of her lightly tanned skin and the delicate scent of her tousled hair. A repeat of those distractions appeared inevitable, especially as she was dressed in something tighter and shorter than what he remembered women wearing to bed.
“I won’t bite,” she said, looking at him with wide eyes, her face luminescent in the moons’ soft light.
Gingerly, he sat next to her.
“You have two moons,” she remarked.
He glanced at the night sky. “Rest and Slumber. They follow each other, two hours apart, never to meet.”
“Forgive the pun, but they sound like star-crossed lovers.” She placed one ankle over the other, exposing enough bare leg to stop Charlie’s heart for several seconds.
The word “lovers” conjured up myriad images in his mind, none decent or proper. He shook them away and cleared his throat.
“You have a moon on Earth,” he said, remembering his fourth-year education on different races and worlds.
“With a dull, uninspired name of ‘Moon.’ Not as pretty or romantic as Lowth’s.”
Lovers. Pretty. Romantic. Was she trying to incite his emotions on purpose?
“I’m sure there are things on Earth that outweigh the attraction of our moons.”
Jane sighed. “Walks on the beach always seem popular in the singles ads. But you have a beach, don’t you? Tell me, Charlie, do lovers in Sylthia walk there in the moonlight? Make love in the sand?”
Charlie shifted uncomfortably on the bench. How had the conversation changed to sex? “I’m sure they do,” he answered, wondering how to propel himself from the edge of the chasm where he teetered.
“You sound as if you don’t know.”
She turned. He swallowed hard. The front of her shift was cut low and hugged her body, leaving nothing to the imagination. Or leaving too much to it.
He struggled to remember what she’d said.
“I . . . I assume they do. Walk by the water, that is.”
“Do you? Walk there with your sweetheart?”
She crossed her legs again. Charlie pivoted away, taking a sudden interest in the moons and stars. He willed his thoughts from breasts and legs and bare flesh and anything else that involved Jane and nakedness.
He cleared his throat again. “I’m not courting anyone.” She must know this. Mara had probably told her his life history by now—his broken engagement three years before, the smattering of girls since then, his dismal love life lately. Though dating held a sudden appeal, he decided. He needed to find someone to take his mind off this troublesome Earthwoman. Someone he could hold and plow his—
Charlie stopped, stunned. He didn’t mean it. It was the moons’ light and a half-dressed woman and the change in weather that made the air thick and hard to breathe.
“What are you wearing?” he blurted, wishing the words back even as he spoke them. Idiot!
“This?” Jane glanced down at herself. “This is an Earth-style chemise. Sharezee, the seamstress, made it for me. She already has orders from some of the village women who’ve seen it. Sexy, isn’t it?”
Sexy? Charlie wasn’t about to comment on that. As for her other news, he closed his eyes and tried not to think of Elven women for miles around clothed in such attire. Or the effect it would have on their men. He’d been pre
mature with his opinion that Jane hadn’t yet caused a catastrophe.
“She’s going to start making bras for them next week,” she added, her tone proud.
He didn’t know what a bra was and didn’t have the courage to ask. With Jane, sometimes ignorance was best.
“The trial starts the day after tomorrow.” The words escaped before he could stop them.
Her expression darkened. The spark in her eyes died. Charlie could have kicked himself for the callous way he’d presented the news. They had a slim hope of winning; he should have let her enjoy her freedom while she could.
She drew in a shuddering breath, and he thought her about to cry. He watched as she controlled her emotions and said, “Is it boiling oil, or does Eagar toss me from one of the towers?”
His heart squeezed in compassion. He felt an idiot, upsetting her and not being able to comfort her.
“Jane.” He touched her arm, surprised by its coolness. “Jane, it won’t come to that. I promise.”
“How can you promise?” Her voice quavered. “You were there. I killed Tivat. It was an accident and I’m sorry, but the fact remains he’s dead.”
“We still have no body.”
“But Eagar has five witnesses, including himself. How unbiased can his judgment be when he knows the truth?”
Charlie knew she was right, but only the king had the authority to remove Eagar from the deciding council. And the king was not in the best of health.
“I don’t know,” he said truthfully. “We can only hope the other two will listen to our reasoning and give you a fair trial. Jane—” He tilted her head up so he could see her eyes. “We still have a chance.”
Her smile floated to him through layers of tears and worry. “If only I could bring him back to life, like the garden.”
The garden? What? Okay, now he would have to ask.
“What are you talking about?”
“The garden,” she sniffed, gesturing around her. “I thought I was done with my ‘powers’ when I left Sylthia, but they’ve only taken a new direction. I’m the anti-Dymynsh.”
What Do You Say to a Naked Elf? Page 8
