Chapter 4
E ven if fate hadn't drawn him to Tara Lynch, that line about his eyes being the color of Ireland would have had Declan falling for her hook, line and sinker. The way she blushed easily was delightful, and he had a keen desire to see just how far down those blushes went, although he could hardly say so on half an hour's acquaintance. Nor could he explain that she accepted his ability to shift so easily because they were meant to be together, although he very badly wanted to. The best thing in his life had suddenly appeared in front of him. He could hardly be blamed for wanting to get on with the best part of his life with her.
You should have let me dance for her some more, his peacock said with a sniff. She would have swooned.
I think she came close enough to passing out when she saw me shift, Declan said ruefully. Let's give her some more time to adjust before you show her any more of your moves.
Hnf. The peacock fell silent, though, which Dec was grateful for. It was an opinionated bird, and most of the time he loved it, but if he was trying to charm an American tourist, he didn't need its running commentary about how many mistakes he was making.
The train trip from Anavee to Cobh was barely fifteen minutes, but despite them chatting on the journey, Tara was nearly asleep against the window by the time the train pulled into the station. Declan, feeling fond and rather protective of her, smiled as she took a quick sharp breath, trying to wake up when the train jolted to a stop. "Where are you staying?"
"The Waterside Hotel?" Tara said a bit uncertainly. "I'm not sure where it is."
"Just down the street," Declan promised. "Now, if I bring you there will you go straight to sleep or will you come out with me for the Titanic Experience and a meal?"
She admitted, "To sleep," with a laugh.
"Then if you want to stay awake a while longer, we'd better do the tourist thing first."
"Okay, but how far is it?" They'd exited through a gated, arched doorway of the red brick station as she asked, and Declan took a sharp right, leading her down to the building's corner before he gestured broadly at the covered entrance to the heritage centre.
"About this far," he said cheerfully.
Tara blinked a few times, then laughed again, sounding more awake. "Oh. Well. I guess I can make it that far. Where's the hotel?"
Declan pointed across the car park. Tara stared, then dissolved into another laugh, repeating, "Oh. Well. I think I can make it that far, too. I'll just drop off my bag so you don't have to haul it all around the exhibition, okay? I was imagining a much longer walk."
"Not much in Ireland is very far away from itself," Declan promised.
"Just wait right here," Tara said, sounding happy. She took her bag and hurried off to the hotel, offering Declan a delicious view of swaying hips and a bouncing bottom as she went. He cleared his throat and looked away politely, then found his gaze drifting back as she disappeared into the hotel. Some things were worth getting caught staring at.
A very few minutes later, Tara emerged again without her bag, and dusted her hands as she approached him. "There we go. All right, I'm yours until I suddenly collapse face-first in the exhibit, or food, or whatever."
Declan bit down on the impulse to say—or at least ask—that she should be his forever, and instead offered his elbow again. "One exhibit coming up, then. And no collapsing!"
"I make no promises," Tara warned as they went into the old building. It had been converted from the train station lobby longer again than Declan knew, and the exhibition, which he'd been to before, was actually rather excellent. To his pleasure, Tara lingered, taking pictures, reading placards and pausing to look things up in more detail on her phone. They had to rush the last few bits when it was announced the exhibition was closing, but overall Declan thought they'd done well enough, and Tara beamed at him as they left. "That was really good. I don't know if I would have gone on my own, so thank you."
"My pleasure," Declan said, and meant it. "Now, dinner? The hotel's restaurant is more than decent and you can just go to your room to sleep straight after, if you like. I won't walk you all over town. Not today," he added with a smile.
"Oh, are you going to be my personal Irish tour guide? That sounds great. But it's a Tuesday. You must have a job?"
"Ah, no, I'm a man of leisure," Declan said expansively, and then as Tara's eyebrows crawled upward, mumbled, "Well, no, I'm an artist, but it does let me make my own hours."
"Oh! What kind of art?" Tara let him lead her toward, and into, the restaurant, a nice place with a seaside view that they were sat beside, much to Declan's pleasure.
"Mostly woodworking. Some painting. A little commercial success." Declan flexed his fingers, feeling the callouses from those efforts. "And you carry around a real camera. Professional photographer?"
Tara hesitated, looking over the menu, then casting a shy glance at him. "Sort of? I'm a secretary most of the time, but in all my off time, yes, and I've sold some work, so I guess that makes me a professional."
"Keep the day job," Declan said wisely. "A lesson I should have learned by now. That's why only two weeks in Ireland? Don't Americans only get two weeks of holiday?"
"Yes, but…'only?'"
"It's four weeks minimum here in Ireland," Declan explained. "European Union law sets it. Plus we've ten or so bank holidays, so it adds up to six weeks but some of it's a bit here and there. France has thirty days minimum," he said a bit darkly. "Wouldn't I like to live in France. Well, no, I wouldn't, my French is terrible."
Tara was staring at him. "Are you serious? You get six weeks of vacation time every year?" At Declan's nod, she said, "Jesus. I've got to move to Ireland. Do you know anybody who'd like to, I don't know, marry a random American?"
Declan's peacock yelled, NOBODY BUT US GETS TO MARRY OUR MATE! , leaving Dec to wince, then try for a smile. "I'd offer, but I don't think you'd believe me."
She laughed. "No, and I wouldn't believe anybody else, either. But yes, that's why just two weeks, it's all the vacation time I've got. What is a bank holiday, anyway?"
"It's…" Declan trailed off, arguably lost in gazing at her—her eyes were so bright and interested, and her smile so curious—but really, he was trying to figure out how to answer the question. "It used to be the days that banks were closed," he said a bit helplessly. "I mean, they still are, but it's a bit more of a national holiday now, maybe? St. Patrick's day, like, or Christmas?"
"Oh. Federal holidays, kind of. Memorial Day and stuff. Okay. I guess we've got a bunch of those, too, but they're not always paid time off. They are here?"
"Usually," Declan said with a nod.
"Yep. Moving to Ireland. Marrying a nice Irish boy."
That's us! We're a nice Irish boy! Show her your tail!!!
Declan closed his eyes momentarily and said, That would get us thrown out of the restaurant, as patiently as he could. Please let me talk to Tara without shrieking inside my head.
His peacock looked sullen—and it was very good at that—but subsided. To Declan's surprise, Tara was grinning when he opened his eyes. "Is it talking to you again?" she asked.
"Is it that obvious?"
"Kinda, yeah. Only if you know what's going on, obviously, but…yeah. It's a little funny."
"Ah, sure," Declan said broadly. "I meet a lovely woman and she starts laughing at me."
She did laugh, and put her menu aside to reach across the table toward him. "Come on, now, wouldn't it be worse if I didn't laugh? It's good if I think you're funny!" She glanced at her hand then, as if she'd never seen it before, and drew it back toward herself before he had a chance to put his own hand over it. "At least, I've always thought it was better to think your friends are funny. I mean, friends is doing a lot of work there, I know we've just met, but you've been really nice and helpful."
"I'd be happy to be a friend," Declan said. At least for the moment, he told his peacock before it started shrieking. It fluffed its feathers but settled, mollified before it could really work up a head of outrage. "Would it be too bold to offer to be your personal tour guide? At least around Cork," he said, not wanting to come on like a freight train. "It'd be my pleasure."
"I'd love to, but I don't want to drag you into things you've probably seen a million times. I was going to go out to Blarney tomorrow, but I think I'll go back to that wildlife park, what was it called? I want to see the back half of it. Do you think I can do that in the morning, and go to Blarney in the afternoon?"
"Oh, sure. Neither of them is that big. And it's the Shamrock Safari Wildlife Park."
"Do they do a lot of safaris there?" Tara wondered. "Or does riding around in one of those golf carts count as a safari for its purposes?"
"I think it's the golf carts," Declan admitted. "And if you'd like the company, I've an annual pass I can get you in on."
"Oh." Tara's eyes shone. "I don't want to be any trouble."
"It's no trouble at all," Declan promised. "I can think of nothing I'd rather do."
The next morning as he was being chased around—in peacock form, of course—by a shrieking five year old child, Declan thought perhaps there were other things he would rather do.
He wasn't, to be honest, entirely sure how he'd gotten himself in this position. Finding out who was stealing tail feathers could wait until later, because he certainly hadn't intended to spend any part of Tara's precious time in Ireland as a peacock.
The light was very nice, his peacock informed him haughtily. It would have been a shame to not let our mate admire us in the sunshine.
Declan said, Yes, but— and then was too busy flapping and leaping to a higher vantage point in an attempt to avoid the kid to talk. Peacocks weren't great at flying, at least partially because of the tail, so he bounced his way up to the snack shop roof by way of using a fence post and the top of a vending machine to boost himself. A tail feather drifted down, and he gave a huge shriek of protest that stopped the child in their tracks. Declan said, Tail down, wings up! and for a moment, the bird agreed, making itself big with wingspan and screeching again.
The kid, facing a bird it couldn't reach that was also screaming at it and looking threateningly large, decided they had other places to be. Down below, a smiling Tara bent to pick up his fallen feather, and the peacock sighed happily. Our mate won't let our feathers go to waste.
"Sorry, miss?" A woman in a fabulously styled hat approached Tara. "Would you mind giving me that feather? My name is Colette Saunier," she said as if Tara should recognize the name, and when she didn't, Saunier's mouth pinched a little. "A fashion designer, darling. I'm collecting the feathers for a work I'm doing."
No! It's our feather!
It was their feather, but Declan perked up, tilting his head to look at the fashion designer with first one eye, then the other. She seemed likely to be the feather-stealing culprit, although he would never have imagined a skinny forty year old female designer as somebody who would go around breaking peacock tails off.
Tara couldn't possibly have heard the peacock's protest, but she glanced up at Declan where he perched on the roof, then smiled at Colette Saunier. "I can't, sorry. I already promised it to a friend of mine."
Even from above, it was clear that Saunier's pleasant demeanor went cold. "It's one feather."
"It is," Tara agreed cheerfully. "So it shouldn't be hard for you to find another. Good luck."
Saunier put on a brittle smile. "Of course, love. Thanks anyway, ta." She stalked away in a sweep of skirts that reminded Declan of his own fancy tail, although she wore reds and yellows, not blue and green. Once she and the child were both well gone, Declan hopped down to stand at Tara's side again. She put her hand out absently to stroke his neck, and the peacock crooned, leaning into the touch.
"Oh, you are gorgeous," she told him, then blushed. "I mean. Well. You are. In both forms," she added more quietly.
The peacock immediately lifted his tail and began to hop in a circle, showing off. Tara laughed, reaching toward the feathers, though she didn't quite brush them. "Now, stop that. You'll get me in trouble for getting too close to the animals. God, look at her," she added in a mutter. "Stalking the other peacocks. I have the urge to follow her around and get any feathers that fall, first. Which doesn't make sense," she added even more under her breath. "If I'm following her, I can't get to them first." She slid a smile at Declan. "Of course, you could get in the way…"
But we should be BIG first! Declan's peacock said in delight.
Absolutely not, Declan said. It was one thing to run interference. It would be another to shift into a larger form, a talent that only bird shifters had, among shifters in general. Right now he was at the smallest size he could manage, only slightly bigger than the average peacock. The biggest one was some four meters tall at the shoulder—roughly the height of a giraffe—which was, in the parlance of his people, feckin' enormous. While it would definitely make him an intimidating presence between the other peacocks and Ms Saunier, it would also raise far, far more questions than was safe to do.
Fine, the peacock said, and despite every other plan he'd had, Declan McCarthy went to spend the rest of the day not letting a rude clothing designer steal anybody else's tail feathers.