Chapter 16
XVI
Celeste: My friend Maisie is a reporter for the Argleton Gazette, and she put a notice in yesterday’s paper about your mead samples. I think you’re going to have a crowd today!
“I’m nearly finished,” I call back as I tighten the laces on my corset. I do a little twirl in the narrow back room we use as a prep and storage area, admiring my distorted reflection on the stainless steel fridge.
I stayed up last night converting an old set of sheets and a linen dress into a suitably appropriate ‘mead wench’ outfit – a white underdress and peasant shirt with a beautiful forest green layered overdress, a leather corset, and a chain belt where I attached a few fun tools – a bottle opener shaped like a medieval mace, a honey dipper, a leather pouch for money, and a tiny sword.
Years ago, I made a leather corset with hand-tooled vines and bees for a local medieval faire.
I was so surprised that it still fit. The whole outfit has come together exactly how I imagined it – I feel like a hobbit, minus the hairy feet.
A handful of bees fly around my face, buzzing their approval. They tug down the hem of the skirt, making sure it’s straight. I pick up the tray where I’ve measured lavender and strawberry meads into tiny plastic thimbles, and cautiously open the door into the meadery.
It’s almost ready. Rafe knocked up some decent tables, and I won that online auction for a bunch of mismatched chairs, and got stools and sofas cheap from estate sales.
Mina’s husband Quoth gave us some artwork of drunk medieval knights with silly Gen Z phrases, like “Good sir, thou art delulu if thou thinkest thou canst defeat me,” “This quest is low-key cooked,” and “I hath rizzed the Queen with mine lute.” (The bard looks an awful lot like Rafe.)
Rafe stands at the window in human form, peering at the growing crowd outside. There are a lot of people. I swallow down the nervous buzzing in my stomach. Warrick’s voice creeps along the edges of my mind, but I shove it down. I guess I’m doing this.
I tug at the leather corset. “What do you think?”
Rafe turns to me. “I think that we—”
His mouth freezes open. His tail pops free of his trousers and shoots straight into the air.
“Rafe?” Now the wings in my stomach are more like a hummingbird, flapping so fast that I’m afraid I might take flight. “Is everything okay? You can’t be nervous. I’m nervous enough for both of us.”
“I…”
Why can’t he speak? Do I look that awful?
Oh, goddess, I look completely ridiculous. This is a bad idea.
“I’m making it too gimmicky, aren’t I?” I set down the tray and pull on the laces as I back into the kitchen. “I’ll change back into my normal clothes. It’s fine. No big deal. It’ll only take a few minutes and—”
A strong hand swipes out, closing over mine, stopping my fingers from moving.
Rafe is right there, pushing me back into the tiny room until I’m against the fridge, his eyes darker than I’ve ever seen them, like the ocean before a storm.
“Don’t you dare change,” Rafe growls. He has one hand clasped over my fingers, the other one wrapped around my waist, where the corset cinches. “If you alter anything about this outfit, it’s that it needs a warning bell so unsuspecting males know when a goddess approaches.”
I’m aware of how close he is, of all the places where our bodies brush together.
I can’t think about what he’s just said or that dark look in his eyes, because I’ll do something stupid. I try to tug the laces. “Look at me! I look like an extra in The Last Kingdom.”
“You look like the sunny windowsill I’ve been chasing my whole life. The only person who should take off that corset is me,” he snarls. “Slowly. With my teeth.”
His words hum through me, like a swarm of bees descending on a particularly delicious flower. I’m warm all over, but where his hands touch, I’m on fire.
His eyes have turned even darker, the black irises creeping towards the edges, swallowing the blue. His body trembles. Or maybe that’s me, maybe I’m trembling.
Rafe’s tail flicks at the hem of my skirts, lifting them, sliding up my leg. A whimper escapes my lips.
In the years that I’ve been married, I told myself that I’m content, that as long as I have my cottage and my garden and my bees and Warrick’s devotion, I’m happy.
And I believed it in my bones because I thought that was my lot in life.
But ever since Warrick didn’t come home and a menace of a Siamese cat strode into my life and blew it to smithereens, my whole body aches with wanting.
It’s as if I’ve been sleeping and he’s woken me up.
And this, right here, his lips inches from mine, his fingers clenching around my waist…I’ve never wanted like this.
All I have to do is lean forward, and my lips would be on his, and I’d learn what would happen when this heat between us burned down the wick.
“Rafe…”
He steps back, his shoulders shaking. His tail slips from beneath my skirt. He shakes his head, once, sadly.
Heat flares in my cheeks.
That slow, cheeky smile plays across his lips. He picks up the tray and pushes it into my hands. “I’m just messing with you, Mead Maestro. You look amazing. Get out there – your public awaits.”
I’m all wobbly and flustered when I walk outside, my lips buzzing with the promise of all that we didn’t do, but for once, I’m not stressing about all the people waiting outside. It turns out that I didn’t need to worry anyway. The free mead is a hit.
Within minutes, the green is filled with villagers clinking tiny plastic thimbles, shouting ‘Prost!’ and ‘Sk?l!’ and threatening to duel each other.
Rafe-in-human-form moves between the groups, talking excitedly as he hands out samples, working his particular brand of magic.
Thankfully, his tail stays down his trousers.
At some point, he pulls a fiddle from goddess-knows-where and breaks out some rowdy folk tunes.
A group of children circle him, clapping and dancing.
Celeste decides to get in on the action and circulates through the crowd, offering a tray of bite-sized pieces of brownie and sourdough with a balsamic dip.
“I know you’d like to eventually serve your own food,” she says as she passes me leaving my shop with a fresh tray of thimbles to restock her own.
“But what if we worked together on your opening menu? Because the building is split, we’re both licensed for each other’s shops.
We could allow it so patrons of the meadery could order pies and treats from your POS system, and I’d bring them through. ”
“I love this idea.” That would mean we could open with a food menu, which I’d always wanted to do. Mead tastes best paired with simple, warming fare.
“Great. You look hot, by the way.” She leans in close. “What did Rafe say when you walked out in that outfit?”
My cheeks heat as I remember his body pressing mine against the fridge, his chest heaving as his fingers clamped over the laces on my corset, and his tail inching up my leg. “Oh, not much.”
Celeste grins. “I doubt that. Get back out there before he breaks into song.”
As I plaster a smile on my face and rush outside to serve more mead, I notice a figure moving at the edge of the crowd. Veronika. She gestures wildly at me while she talks to Sergeant Wilson, who nods sagely. My skin buzzes. What are the two of them saying about me?
What do they know?