13. Thirteen - A Courting Elf
Thirteen - A Courting Elf
Ana
“Wake up sleepy head!” My mother flings my curtains open, flooding my room with light and I groan before dragging my pillow over my face again.
“I am certain it’s not time for me to get up yet.” I mumble into the down.
But she pries the shield away from me. “You promised me we could go berry picking today.”
“I don’t think I did.” I wince at the brightness around her. “I have to open the shop in two hours. There’s no time to make it to the patch and back.”
Her favorite spot is at the base of the cliffs beneath the windmill.
It’s an hour’s walk to round the flat-topped hill and twice as long to get back if it’s been raining—which it was, an hour or so ago.
She makes a disgruntled noise and flops onto the bed. “Fine, maybe you didn’t promise me, but you really should take some time off. You work too hard.”
I don’t.
And I have three appointments today, along with the assumption that Mister Scoggin’s will pop in shortly after noon, as he usually does.
“We can go berry picking next week.”
She claps her hands and bounces, moving the mattress. And then she goes to my closet.
“You should wear blue today.”
Rubbing my eyes as she sorts through my dresses, I see her pause at the dress I wore last night, scowling at it before she moves on. “Where is that blue and white dress I gave you?”
The one that looks so much like the one she wears right now…
“It doesn’t fit anymore, so I gave it to Mina.”
She looks like she wants to spit. “Oh. Well then…”
The next dress she pulls out is a pale pink and green check pattern I’ve never really liked. I wear it for her birthday because she loves it, but otherwise…
“I need to wear brown today.”
She deflates, flopping her hands to her sides. “I hate you in brown. It’s not a color worthy of either of us.”
“Maybe not, but it hides all manner of sins.” And I have a batch of blood mushrooms to pulverize. Anything they touch will stain like their namesake.
Blood.
A sliver of panic traces through me and I pull my robe from where it lay across my nightstand. Shrugging it on, I tug the sleeves down over my wrists and make sure it covers my neck, sweeping my hair over that side too.
But she doesn’t notice.
She’s too busy scowling at my dresses.
She finally gives up her quest to put me in one of the light and frilly dresses she’s brought me in the past and flounces out, telling me she’ll put the kettle on.
I drag myself out of bed, because if I don’t she will bring the tea in to me and leave crumbs in my sheets.
By the time I get out to the kitchen—a cuff she bought strapped over my wrist and a ribbon fashioned as another necklace—she has a full tea spread out for the both of us. I glance toward Mina’s room.
The door is still shut. She is probably still asleep after waiting up for me all night.
I’m glad. Every time our mother does this, I see the little frown on Mina’s lips and I hate it.
“You’re certain you can’t skip today?” Mama asks hopefully.
“I am.” I don’t tell her what I need to do today and she knows I won’t divulge the maladies people bring to me, so she doesn’t ask anymore.
She pouts for a moment, but the rest of our breakfast passes pleasantly and she lets me leave, after checking that I have the other half of her talisman.
I keep it tucked away in my pocket. What’s the harm in carrying the tiny piece of metal?
My morning routine is set, but before I open the curtains to let the morning light in, I pluck the small vial from its place beside the scraps of paper I keep for jotting down detailed instructions.
It’s one of the odder tasting potions in my normal production schedule.
Not sweet.
Not sour.
Not good or bad.
My grandmother had perfected the previous version. Now, a person could be certain a roll in the proverbial hay had no lasting consequences without having to choke down a disgusting draft.
Leaf buys it from me by the case.
Mirella comes in a few hours after I’ve opened the shop, wringing her hands at me, and it takes a moment to figure out why she’s so distressed. When I do…
“I’ve told you a dozen times, Mirrella, this potion gets rid of warts.” I look at the bottle again, to be sure that it hasn’t been tampered with. “I don’t have one that gives them to you. Who would even want that?”
“I shake it on my hands every day and nothing happens.”
I take a deep breath and turn the bottle in her hand. “What does the back say?”
She rolls her eyes at me, but starts to read. “Take two teaspoons... with each meal.”
“It’s a potion, Mirrella. Not an ointment. Drink the stuff and your warts will clear up in a day or two.”
The anger she’d worn since she bustled into the shop to holler at me for cheating her disappears. It’s replaced by something sheepish.
But she doesn’t apologize, she just hurries out the front door and I rub my eyes, reminding myself that she’ll be back to buy more of it next month because she won’t stop hunting magic toads to trick travelers with.
Dusting the shelf-stable potions I make in big batches that take a year or more to sell in their entirety, I don’t look back at the person who comes in through the door next. It’s nearly noon, which means Mister Scoggins will be by for his tonic.
The man should really stop eating hot peppers if his stomach can’t handle them.
“What kind was it today?” I ask, cleaning off one last bottle. “Orange and wrinkly? Or the small green ones that hurt all the way down.”
“I don’t know what that means.”
I spin so quickly, I knock three bottles off the shelf, but the glass doesn’t break.
“Lord Ceylon, what are you doing here?” I clear my throat as I bend down to pick them up and put them back in their rows.
Penny looks at me with quirked brows when I turn back to him. “I thought we’d be past that by now.”
“Sorry, I am in proprietrix mode.” I exhale and look him over. Hair tied up, shirt and coat fully buttoned... he looks utterly respectable.
But my memory supplies images that make me want to squirm.
“Did you come for a potion?” I ask, already knowing he didn’t.
“I have come to invite you to dinner.”
“No letter this time?” I put my dusting cloth away and clean off my hands.
“I didn’t want to risk it getting lost... and I worried Blicks might steal it so that he could deliver it, instead.”
He steps behind the counter with me and I know I should tell him he can’t be here.
I don’t.
“Viggo misses you horrifically,” he says, reaching up to caress my cheek. “He’s already planning to make his entrance into local awareness, simply so that he can come see you himself.”
“If that’s what he wants…” I lean into Penny’s palm. “I didn’t want to leave.”
“I know. And I know why you had to. Viggo has always done what he wants, he doesn’t understand limitations, or the amount of trust we’d be asking of you to give up the home you have with your family.” It’s not my home I worry over.
“Dinner tonight?”
He nods, thumb brushing my cheek. “The others will be home.”
“I didn’t think you wanted them to get their hopes up.”
“Our hopes are their hopes. If you dash them, we will want to be able to weep without having to explain why to them.”
Mina’s fairytale flits through my mind.
“Is it just because I’m the first one who’s wanted you both?”
“No, it’s not just that.” He leans close, lips brushing mine. “You’re the one that we want. Give us the opportunity, and we’ll do whatever it takes to prove that to you.”
He kisses me, but ends it too quickly and with a sigh, stepping away from me and around to the other side of the counter.
I don’t have to wait long to find out why.
The door flies open and Mister Scoggins curses all the way across the room.
“It was yellow-green and looked like a slug.” He’s sweating when he slaps his money down on the counter.
I manage not to laugh as I pull the bottle from its place on the shelf close behind me.
He thanks me as he tears the cork out and chugs the contents down.
“One of these days, you’re going to pick a pepper that gets you before you can get to me.”
He knocks the empty bottle back onto the counter top and smiles at me, his pain eased. “One of these days, I’m going to find the one that hurts the right amount.” He chuckles and then he flinches away from Penny. “What’s an Elf want with human potions?”
“Mister Scoggins!” I scold him, and the man has the decency to look sheepish.
“We can’t blame him too harshly,” Penny says, and the other man looks at him wide eyed as Penny smiles back. “It’s true, there are very few things in human potions that an elf like myself would need, but when an elf is courting a potion maker…”
“Oh!” Mister Scoggins stands up straighter. “Oh!” He hurries for the door, only pausing long enough to look back at us both. His gaze is firmly set on Penny when he says, “Good luck.”
Then, with a cheeky smile, he turns the sign on the door to closed and locks it on his way out.
Penny laughs under his breath. “I think it’s safe to say one member of the village has given me his blessing.”
“Mister Scoggins is not the person whose blessing you need.”
“I know. But we will take any and all support we can get.” He kisses me and I don’t stop him. “We will see you tonight?”
“Yes... and then we can talk about what comes after.”
He lifts my hand, slipping the leather cuff free of my wrist and kisses the bite marks there. “We will try to wait patiently.”