Adrift (14 page)

Maura nodded, as if she could hear my thoughts.  “I think she is working so that you can join her in her world,” she said softly.

I took a deep breath, feeling light-headed.  My thoughts raced uncontrollably.  If Maura was right, then my mother had been laboring hard for me all this time.  And, if I was right, if the pieces fit, then the coat was almost finished.

My mother wanted me and it was almost time.  I would have to choose between her world and mine.

How could I ever do that?

The scents of crushed grass and wildflowers warned me of Omyn’s presence before I actually saw him.  As always, on facing him, my breath caught in my throat.  He was so very beautiful, so very strange and not human.   He smiled at me and my heart started pounding again.  I touched my face, knowing that my cheeks were burning.

“What is this place?” I asked, glancing around the silvered woods around us.  There was something not quite right about it.  Not quite mortal, I thought with a shudder.  The air was thick and sweet-smelling, the sky full of bright bird song.  The trees swayed around us, as if they could dance on their own accord.

“This is a little piece of my home.  I can bring this much with me, as I visit your dreams.”  Omyn’s voice was as beautiful as his form.  I shivered involuntarily, goose bumps rising on my arm at the symphonious sound.  My own voice sounded ghastly in comparison, and I was embarrassed to speak.

“Why?  I mean…” I stammered, searching for words, as his gaze distracted me from thought.  “Why visit me?  What am I to you?”

“Fascinating,” he breathed.  Suddenly he was right beside me and his breath was on my cheek.  My heart seemed to stop completely and my chest was filled with a sudden ache.

“Touch me,” I begged, ashamed at my sudden weakness.

“As you wish,” he murmured, drawing a fingertip across my forehead and down to my mouth.  I tasted honey on my lips, something impossibly sweet.

I jerked awake, my mouth cloyingly sweet, and tears dropping like a desert rain, hot and bitter, onto my pillow.

“I hate Omyn,” I said, bitterly.  Devin looked up from his whittling, his mouth open to whistle, and his eyes startled.

“Why is that?” He asked, discomfited.

“I’m not me around him,” I said, digging my own knife into my piece of driftwood.  “It’s like he controls me.  I hate that.  I wish he would just leave me alone.”  Giving up, I threw my piece of wood back into the water, with all my strength.

“No mortal can resist the power of the Fae,” Devin said, slowly.  I thought I detected a hint of bitterness in his voice.

“As you daily remind me,” I answered, sharply.  “I’m not fully mortal.  I don’t want him around.  I want… I want.”  I fished for the words, discomfited.  “Damn it!  Devin, will you kiss me?”

I turned and he was staring, wide-eyed, at me, knife forgotten and wood held loosely in limp fingers.

“Oh, never mind,” I shrugged, and turned away again, digging my big toe into the dirt, and frowning at it.

“Meg.”  The tone in Devin’s voice brought the hair up on the back of my neck.  I turned towards him and he slid his hand across my jaw line, warm, mortal, skin against my skin.  I closed my eyes against the sensation, luxuriating in the warmth of his touch.  His fingers climbed up the nape of my neck and into my hair.  I willingly let him tilt my head up to meet his, parting my lips to taste his perfect, mortal, skin… salt and sweat.

I sighed, leaning my face against his chest, letting my fingers cling to the folds of his shirt, feeling his chest rise and fall with his breath.

“Was that okay?” He asked, starting to move away.  “I’m sorry…”

“No, please…” I looked up and saw his shock as he saw the tears in my eyes.  Without thinking, I linked my hands together behind his neck and kissed him back, with all of my heart, trying to show him how his very mortality saved me.

I think everyone, at some point in their lives, wishes for that glorious person, that one true love.  I always had, though it had never been enough of a wish for me to go searching for it.  I had been content, living and working beside my father on our tiny farm.  Poverty had never really concerned me, not until he died.

It felt so wrong to me that I was beginning to care for two people.  I already knew I loved Devin, but with Omyn… he was dangerous, no good for me, and oh so attractive and desirable.  I didn’t know if I hated him or if what I felt was that much more complex.  Surely, I couldn’t fall in love with more than one person?  That was madness to even consider.

And how could I claim to love Devin, even though not out loud, and even look in Omyn’s direction?  Was I that fickle?  That inconstant?

I didn’t deserve either of them.

It was cherry season in Trinity.  Maura’s little orchard was rich with ripening fruit. 

There is nothing quite like a fresh, perfectly ripe cherry right off the tree, still warm from the sunlight.  I paused in picking to savor the fresh fruits.  Juice stained my fingers and arms until I looked rather like an axe murderer.  My only crime was against cherrydom.  I couldn’t seem to stop eating. I popped into my mouth almost as many as I managed to drop into my basket and only the spitting out of the pits kept me from eating them all.

Under the trees and in the cottage we were all busy at work.  Cleaning, pitting, packing, drying, making jam.  There were a million ways, at least, to celebrate and preserve the harvest. 

Cherry-filled tarts and cherry fritters, cherry cobbler, and even cherry syrup for pancakes were our fares. We were awash with cherries and I never grew tired of them, not even when we had them for breakfast (cherry filled French toast), lunch (cherry chutney on turkey sandwiches), and dinner (pork chops in cherry sauce with cherry sorbet on cherry cobbler to finish).

Just as the cherries were under control and mostly packed away, either in our bellies or in storage in all its forms, it was berry season.  Blackberries and blueberries, strawberries, rhubarb… the garden was filled with a bounteous color and aroma.  There was little time for anything but preserving the harvest.

I suddenly realized that summer was halfway gone.

Surely I couldn’t expect to live off of Maura’s charity when the weather worsened and winter came?  How could I earn my keep, my board, without the garden to keep me busy?  My weaving and knitting were improving, but I was under no disillusions that I could create anything that Maura couldn’t make herself better and faster.

I swallowed hard, so aware that I had nowhere to go.  I didn’t want to leave.  I felt like it would rip my heart out and kill me to not be near Maura and Devin.  I couldn’t bear the thought of it.  I also couldn’t stomach the thought of being a burden, taking too much advantage of Maura.  I knew she would never complain.  She would starve herself to feed me and I could never even know.  I couldn’t let her suffer for her kindness.

I tentatively brought the subject up to Devin as we were sorting out blackberries for jam.  Maura was manning the stove out of ear-shot.

Devin blinked at me in surprise.  He rubbed his arms, staining skin that had already been scourged by the blackberry brambles.  “Of course you are welcome here,” he said, as if it were blatantly obvious.

“I can’t intrude on your kindness forever,” I answered, firmly.  “I was raised to be self-sufficient.  It’s bad enough that you give so much for the little work that I do.”

He scoffed.  “You work like a slave and you know it.  Why, Maura told me the other day that you did the work of two full hired men on the harvest alone.  You more than pay for your board and keep with the expense of labor that you have saved us.”

I flushed at the praise, but shook my head, stubbornly.  “It’s not enough, Devin.  And when winter comes, I will not be contributing at all.  I will just be an expense, not useful in the least bit.”

Devin rubbed his chin, creating a blackberry juice goatee.  I snickered to myself, but somehow failed to mention it to him.  “I don’t know.”  His eyes twinkled at me.  “In the winter we all hole up and go slowly and quietly mad.  A few extra stories, here and there, an extra voice in the singing, why, it’s worth a lot.”

I elbowed him.  “You’re too generous.”

His eyes twinkled at me and he ate a berry, clearly savoring the rich juices.  He let his hand lie on mine and suddenly every part of me was on high alert, so aware of him that my skin prickled with it.  I tried to imagine being locked up in close quarters with him all winter long and felt my face burn.  I swallowed hard and looked down under the pretense of poking at a particularly bad scratch on my hand that the blackberry bushes had branded me with.

Devin seemed to read my thoughts, despite my efforts.  “It’s no bad thing, really, being holed up all winter.  As long as it’s with someone you care about.  It’s just a matter of finding things to do… ways to stay… occupied.”

I felt my ears burning and knew my face was scarlet.  Devin looked so innocent, but he winked at me and I shook my head at him.

“Behave yourself,” I told him, primly,  “or you’ll find yourself in the barn all winter and I’ll hole up with Kip, instead.”

He clutched his heart, pretending to be wounded.  “Ouch, betrayed by my own dog.”

At our feet, Kip thumped his tail, having heard the sound of his name.

As I sorted, I glanced up at Devin thoughtfully.  I couldn’t count the stolen kisses or the times we had found ourselves locked together, only to throw ourselves apart.  We gave our relationship, or lack of one, no name.  It was forbidden, and all the more exciting for its impossibility.  As all forbidden things are, it was all the more attractive. 

I knew Devin wasn’t ready-- perhaps would never be ready-- to make our relationship real.  As long as we didn’t speak out loud what my heart already knew, then we were in safe waters.

Love, that four letter word to beat all four letter words, was dangerous.  As long as we could deny it, deny what we meant to each other, then we were safe.

So, we played a dangerous game, some days friends, some days something more, some days avoiding each other as if the other were clad in a robe and carrying a scythe.

I could not deny that I felt empty when Devin was away from me, that I looked for him in every shadow, that I felt a thrill whenever I heard his voice.  Deep down I knew that I was in trouble, but I hushed those voices.  I told myself I was just having fun, ignoring the fact that I wasn’t the kind of girl, and Devin wasn’t the kind of man, who went around just having that kind of fun.

“Penny for your thoughts,” Devin said, offering me a berry.

I shook my head.  “No thoughts here worth sharing,” I told him.  “Sorry.  I was just daydreaming.”

His face tightened.  “About Omyn?”

I stared at him.  “No!  Not about Omyn!  Why would you say such a thing?”

He scowled, not looking at me.  “Nothing,” he said.  “Forget it.”  A moment later he shoved his pile of berries into a bowl and stormed into the kitchen.  I waited for him to return, but he didn’t.

I sighed.  I wished I had never even mention Omyn to Devin.  For some reason I couldn’t even begin to comprehend, Devin felt threatened by Omyn.  I had tried to explain it to him, but any time I dreamed of Omyn, Devin looked as if I had punched him in the gut.

It wasn’t as if I went out looking to dream of Omyn or anything.

I didn’t, did I?

Chapter Twelve

When Maura sent us out to pick more blackberries I stared at her in disbelief.  Her pantry and cellar were spilling over with jars of jam.  Her freezer couldn’t have fit another berry in edge wise and dried berries were vacuum-packed and hiding in her attic.  I couldn’t imagine why she would want more.

“She really just wants to see if there are wild strawberries ready,” Devin whispered to me.  “It’s a bit of a ride just for sightseeing.”

My mouth watered at the very idea of wild strawberries.  To me it was well worth any amount of riding to get even a handful.  My first taste of the wild berries had ruined me for commercial ones forever.

I wasn’t, however, expecting to be sent off on an overnight trip for berries!

I saddled up the palomino mare, as she searched my pockets for treat.  “I just realized,” I told Devin, “I don’t even know this girl’s name.”

“Saffron,” Devin said, busy packing his saddle with a bedroll.

I murmured the name, liking it.  It seemed to be the perfect name for her.

Saffron nudged me again.  I stroked her nose absently.

To be honest, even the idea of going camping overnight with Devin made my stomach break out in flocks of butterflies.  Kip bumped my knee with his nose and I looked down at him.  He wagged his tail, as if to reassure me.  I stroked his head fondly.

“Is Kip coming with us?” I asked, heaving my own bedroll onto the back of my saddle.

Devin smiled.  “He wouldn’t let me leave him if I tried.  Last time he waited until Maura let him out on a walk and then took off to find me.”

Kip barked once, full of mischief.  Saffron lowered her head and the two touched noses.