“Ilane, unfortunately, appears to be rather taken with you, sir.” Dylan picked a young man standing near the edge of the audience, and as close to the glass dividing them from the seals as possible. He had been back every day for some time now, staying as long as possible each time, eyes glued to Ilane’s sinuous swimming. There was something twisting behind his startled expression as Dylan addressed him, enough of the Old World in that one to be caught in the glimmer of Ilane’s magic as she danced through the water.
“You, sir, what is your name?”
The young man blinked wide eyes twice before answering. “Nick.”
“Karen, if you could bring Nick over to the stage here, I think Ilane wants to give him a kiss.”
Dylan was afraid for a moment that Nick was going to suffer an unfortunate bit of heart failure before he made it to the stage, the way his eyes went wide and he fumbled every other step, but Karen delivered him in more or less one piece. Dylan patted him in what he hoped was a reassuring fashion, trying to keep a toothy grin from breaking across his face.
Gesturing for Ilane to come, Dylan waited until she had slipped up into the shallow water at its edge before coaxing Nick to kneel. It was a familiar scene—every seal show played it through daily. The audience member kneels as the seal, at a command from its trainer, moves forward to press its nose against a cheek—a whiskery, fishy kiss that never failed to bring the crowd to a frenzy of applause. Ilane carried through with the expected, and then brushed her face across Nick’s, catlike in her attempt to mark territory, before slipping back into the water. The audience let out a collective whoop of excitement and applauded.
Nick wobbled, looking like his foot had fallen asleep as he tried to stand. Dylan reached out, not to steady him, but to keep him from lurching into the water after Ilane. Smitten, bewitched, Nick’s muscles flexed, considering breaking free of the interloper.
“Jump in now, and the park will surely throw you out. Permanently.” Dylan whispered the warning into Nick’s ear as he pulled him to his feet.
It was an ancient game in which Nick found himself a player. Dylan watched him fumble his way back to his former place by the glass, eyes tracking every twist of Ilane’s body in the water. Only the setting had changed, not the rules. But behind the play was the dedication that made a seal wife so desirable, in all the old tales. Beyond the unearthly beauty was a fierce, fae loyalty. Yes, she had him—but Nick just as surely had snared her with his shy smiles and evident adoration. Dylan wondered just how long it would be before he was short a seal, before Ilane wandered off on two legs the way Aine had, to live with her human in a house by the sea.
It was a fishbowl they were living in, Dylan and his hodgepodge little family. But for every concession made there was a gain. There was salt enough in their filtered tank, salt enough falling from human eyes. Nick’s eyes shimmered with the unshed tears of having seen the sublime. A young girl in the crowd laughed so hard she cried as Carrick knocked a ball around the water with his nose.
It was tribute enough, the tears of joy, love, and worship that greeted them each day. Gone were the moonlit shores with their selkie maids brushing out their long hair, perfectly placed to catch wandering human eyes, the selkie men beckoning from just beyond each wave.
But in the evenings, when his lover’s taste was still strong in his mouth, slightly salty with sweat, and he gathered his seal skin from where it was carefully folded in the closet of his small office, it seemed the niche they had settled into was nigh unto perfect.
The shoreline was fake under his feet, the water not quite the right temperature, but he had to agree with Ilane, curling his seal skin around himself in the moonlight and slipping into the water, that it was good enough.
HOOKED
Anton Strout
“Leannán?” the stranger asked, his eyes filled with caution, the same as all those who had come across her doorstep before him. He was handsome enough, for a human—black hair, eyes as blue as the bright sky over Central Park itself, but he carried himself with a swagger that spoke volumes. He stood there, hands shoved down into the pockets of the knee-length wool coat he wore against the early sudden chill that had crept into September.
“Yes?” she asked from behind her partially opened cottage door. She pulled her short emerald colored robe closer around herself, letting the green of her eyes hold him in place on the dirt pathway that led back through the trees to the more travelled areas of Central Park. She couldn’t help but grin as he stepped back a little. She twisted the power of her eyes along with her smile, strengthening her hold on him. She gave a toss of her head, her short, shaggy blonde bangs swaying as the tip of her swept up ponytail swung wildly back and forth. Leannán fought back the urge to giggle. “I see you found my little home here among the trees.”
The stranger looked down as he fumbled through his pockets looking for something. She had seen his kind before. Wall Street maybe, she guessed. Probably liked it rough, and that was okay with her. The thought of it only quickened her heart, even though she was simply watching him search his pockets now.
The man lifted his head and waved a tiny slip of paper no bigger than one of the candy wrappers she occasionally saw blowing down the path past her cottage.
“I’m here about your ad,” he said, his eyes showing lust behind them. “It was on the base of one of the statues over by Conservatory Water, kinda near all those miniature sailboats the kids play with.”
Leannán took the slip of paper from his hand, but not before letting her pointer finger draw slowly across his palm as she pulled away. “Did you recognize him?” she asked.
“Him?” the man asked, looking over his shoulder with wariness in his eyes. “Him who?”
“The statue,” she said, letting out a soft laugh. It sounded like chimes in the wind.
The man relaxed at the sound and turned back to her. “No. Who was he?”
“Hans Christian Andersen.”
The man’s face lit up with recognition. “The father of the fairy tale? Makes sense now.”
Leannán cocked her head. “Does it? How so?”
“Your ad,” he said, pointing to the slip of paper. “ ‘Making your once upon a time a happily ever after … one encounter at a time … ?’ ”
She smiled. “Yes, I suppose that is true then. It does have fairy tale written all over it, doesn’t it?”
He looked over his shoulder again, shoving his hands down deep into the pockets of his long coat. “Do you mind if I come in?” he asked. “Not for nothing, but this isn’t the type of thing I want people to spot me out and about for …”
Leannán kept the door firmly in place between them. “That depends,” she said, coy. “Do you have the payment, Mr … ?”
“O’Farrell,” he said. “Alan.”
She smiled. There was a great power in the knowing of names. “Very well. So, do you, Mister O’Farrell?”
“Of course,” he said, digging to the bottom of his outer coat pockets. When he pulled his left hand out, the objects in it shone like miniature suns as daylight hit them. “Although I have to say gold is a bit hard to come by. Wouldn’t cash be easier?”
Leannán took the coins from his hand, feeling the weight of them, loving the familiar heft. “Currencies come and go, but gold, well, that’s eternal… .” She pulled the door open, waving him inside the darkened cottage. “Don’t try anything funny. This place is charmed… .”
He laughed, following her in. Like most mortals, he probably took it all as part of the role-playing act, but the laughter soon stopped. She turned back to look at him. He was still following, but his eyes were trying to take in the interior of the cottage as he slowed to a shuffle behind her.
The walls were bright white pine, the woodwork around all the interior doorways and shuttered windows carved with intricate mythological figures. Sprites, pixies, naiads, and fairies flew and flittered up and down the wood, so well rendered that they almost looked alive. Throughout the space, table
s, sideboards, chairs, and benches sat, cushioned in bright fabrics that resembled the near-cartoonish exaggeration that one would expect straight out of a fairy tale. At the center of it all stood an elaborate four-poster whose sheets looked like a shagged green swatch of moss. The man’s eyes worked their way around the main room all the way up the carved beams that reached high overhead. He looked back down after a moment.
He whistled. “Am I allowed to sit on the furniture? It’s not made out of candy, is it?”
She gave a bitter laugh of disgust. “That’s Hansel and Gretel … they’re more of a tag team duo. Not really my thing.”
He laughed at that. “What is this place?”
“This?” she repeated, twirling around. “They used to call it the Scottish Cottage.”
He raised an eyebrow. “You’re Scottish, are you?”
“I’m a lot of things,” she said.
“I can see that,” he said. “Has this always been your home?”
“Not exactly; they built this cottage for the Centennial International Exhibition in 1876, but that was in Philadelphia. I remember them moving it here after, along with several of the other cottages, but I think the only other one that still stands is the Swedish one … they turned it into a marionette theatre, I believe.”
He cocked his head. “You remember them moving it here? In 1876? That’s over a century ago … you mean you remember someone telling you about it, yes? Your grandmother, perhaps … ?”
“I stand by my words,” she said, giving a smile. “Fae, remember?”
“And this Disney-fied pastiche was all part of the attraction?”
“No,” she said with pride. “This is all of my own making.” She twirled around on point in her robe, the bottom of it rising, pulling his eyes to it. “You know, most men don’t come here asking me about my family. They don’t seem to like thinking of me as someone’s daughter.” She crossed to the lavish bed at the center of the room and sat on the edge of it, making her face doe-eyed and innocent. “Unless you’re into that sort of thing… .”
His face washed over with lust, but there was still some reluctance in his eyes. “Don’t you worry about getting caught?” he asked. “I mean, leaving flyers out for chrissakes and running your operation right here in the middle of Central Park?”
“Don’t worry about that,” she said, standing back up, laying the slip of paper off to the left of the room on a sideboard next to a decorative ball. She tapped at the slip with one of her polished nails, looking down at it. “That ad does not catch the eye of everyone.” She narrowed her eyes at him. “You ask a lot of questions. Are you an officer of the law?”
“Me?” he laughed, shaking his head. “No.”
“Too bad,” she said with mock sadness as she walked off toward the enormous bed, pouting out her lips. “Some of my best clients have been men in uniform.”
He held up both his hands, like he was being held at gunpoint. “Not me,” he said. “I’m definitely not a cop, although I’d be down for the handcuffs, if that’s one of your things.”
She gave a small seductive laugh.
“But believe me,” he continued. “My job is the last thing I want to think about right now.” He walked over to the little slip of paper on the sideboard. “I came here for the theme you listed in the ad.” His eyes shifted to the decorative ball sitting next to the piece of paper, then his right hand drifted towards it.
Leannán jumped up from the bed and ran over to the sideboard, blocking him from it, driving him back a step.
“What is that thing?” he asked. The light of the room danced across the orb, soaking into it, looking as if it was filling it.
“It is nothing,” she said, but the man didn’t seem convinced.
“It must be something,” he said. “Or else you wouldn’t have it placed here in your little fairy cottage set up.”
“Remember when you walked in and what I said about this place being charmed?” she asked. He nodded. “Well, this is the source of that, a source of power for me, if you will. We fairies are bound by certain laws, such as this remaining out in the open to keep my fair cottage looking so fair.” She twirled around on one foot, laughing. “A fair fairy in her fair cottage.”
He laughed at that as well. “You are truly a wonder,” he said. “Tell me your tale then, oh fair one.”
She stopped her spinning and looked at him. “You might not like me so much if I tell you,” she said, coy and pouting.
“You’re right,” he said, giving her a devilish smile. “I might like you more. Indulge me.”
Another hardcore role player, she thought. Fair enough. Let me give him what he came for then. Let him think my truth a lie. Playing that game would only add more mischief to this whole event, something that spoke to the dark core of her very being.
“Very well,” she said, scooping up the orb, dancing it along the top of her fingers. “You know those happy stories people tell about fairies? The kind they make movies of, with songs and dancing and ever so much fun?”
He nodded.
“Well, mine is not such a tale,” she continued. “Those stories are an insult to our origins. Many fae tales are born in, of, and about death—an omen of such things, and you see, I’ve been a very wicked little pixie.”
“How so?” he asked, enchanted as he watched the ball drifting back and forth across the back of her hand.
“I am known as the Betrayer of my people, one with a hunger for humanity that my kind found … distasteful. They do not like the manner in which I dabble in mortal affairs, not caring for my reckless disregard for humanity. I’ve done what many of them consider dark deeds in the fairy world, crimes against mankind for which they wish to punish me. When taken to task, I fought for my freedom, and even killed several of my own kind escaping their judgment.” She flipped her hand over, grabbing the orb, stopping it. She held it up. “The powers of this ball are many, you see. Not just a charm over my home. Its power is what saved me, transported me, allowed me to escape.”
“I do see,” he said, his eyes coming to life again now that the ball was no longer in motion. Leannán could tell by his face that he wasn’t quite buying the tale, but it was no matter. That wasn’t what he had really come here for now, was it?
“Anyway,” she said, replacing the orb on its stand with a wicked grin. “I don’t think you came here for a history lesson on the fae.”
“You could say that.” He looked down at the slip of paper under his hand on top of the sideboard, then up again at her in her robe. “Can I see them?”
She gave a slow nod of her head, her eyes locking on his as she undid the robe, shrugging her shoulders and letting the garment fall to the floor. Underneath she wore an outfit she knew most men found familiar, a short green strapless dress that left little to the imagination. She tossed her blonde ponytail to the side so the tip of it flipped just over the front of her right shoulder.
“You really did go for Tink—”
She held a finger up to her lips. “Shh,” she said. “I am most definitely not like the Disney version of that fairy at all.” A soft whisper came from behind her back and two opaque wings rose up, fluttering open to their full expanse, standing almost two feet higher than her shoulders. They pulsed with a gentle rhythm that matched her breathing, shimmering in the low light of the cottage.
“They look so … real,” he said, raising his hand out towards her to touch them, but she stopped him, taking his hand in hers.
“I do strive for an authentic experience here,” she said, backing him over to the bed. She twirled around once again, spinning like a ballerina, before she wrapped her arms over his shoulders and around his neck, finally dropping the gold coins onto the bed. Her heart raced with excitement as her lips touched his and their tongues met, knowing what was coming next.
She pushed him back onto the bed, his body giving at the joint of his knees, and she threw herself on top of him. She felt his body reacting to her touch as he elbowed his way
further up onto the bed. Her wings fluttered as she ground herself against his body, opening her eyes to look at him as he grabbed her hips. His eyes were open as well, looking over her shoulder as he fixated on the wings, marveling at them. She leaned down, his breath hot on her skin. She raked her teeth along his neck, and then bit down.
He let out a grunt of pleasure, but as she pressed her teeth harder against the skin—breaking it—the sound turned to pure pain. He tore his hands off her hips and shoved them between their bodies, forcing her up by her shoulders.
As Leannán sat up, a warm trickle of salty blood ran down the corner of her mouth. “Not the strongest of humanity I’ve tasted,” she said, a bit disappointed, “but it will do.”
His eyes locked on it, widening. “What the hell?”
“Too rough?” she asked, sweet and coy, running her finger along the corner of her mouth, working the blood up to her lips. Her wings vibrated with delight. “I warned you I wasn’t the Disney version.”
“Get off me!” he shouted, anger and disbelief in his plea.
Leannán remained where she was, pressing down hard against him before dropping the glamour she had held in place. All around her the interior of the cottage wavered, then faded away. The cozy confines were gone, replaced with the worn down abandonment of a dark, dirty house in ruin. The bed beneath them became a cold stone slab with tatters of blood-soaked sheets underneath them, some of it still tacky to the touch. Three of the walls were barely visible in the surrounding shadows of the main room, piles and piles of stacked skulls and bones obscuring them. She herself became her true gaunt, wiry form, dressed in tattered, stained remnants and blonde hair crusted with blood and dirt.
The Modern Fae's Guide to Surviving Humanity Page 16
