Chapter 7 #2
“I’ve had fish before, but this is different.”
He took a drink of his tea and then picked up a chip.
That he seemed to really like and quickly ate the rest of it.
I took a deep pull from the bottle before setting it on the table and grabbing my own plate of fish and chips.
I started with the fish and immediately shook my head.
“No. That’s not quite right. I don’t recommend eating it.
It’s always been really good so far, so I don’t know what happened this time. ”
Asher shrugged. “The chips are good.” He shoved another in his mouth and happily chewed. I grabbed the shepherd’s pie, and after giving it a taste, I found that it was perfectly fine. We could split it, and I’d give a larger portion to Asher since I’d eaten earlier and he hadn’t.
“Would you like to try this instead?” I asked, holding it out to him.
“What is it?”
“Shepherd’s pie. It’s minced meat with vegetables and potatoes. It’s quite good, and we could share it.”
Asher stood, dunked his fork into the ramekin, and brought a bite to his mouth. I watched as he got his first taste and nodded.
“Oh, that’s pleasant.” He sat back down and grabbed another chip. “We don’t need to share though,” he told me. In a blink, another ramekin appeared in front of him, and I could only stare at my mate in disbelief.
“How did you do that?”
“You said it was in the hotel, correct? Well, that it came from a hotel eatery?”
I nodded.
“I know what it tastes like, and I just used magic to hone in on it, and now here we have another. Did you want fruit? I sensed fruit down there as well. I can also alter your ticket to add the things so we’re honest.”
“That would be acceptable, yes,” I told him.
I didn’t wish for anyone to have something go missing and get into trouble.
But on the other hand, there was definitely something off about the fish.
It could be that it wasn’t cooked quite long enough, or it was a day or two past its prime.
Either way, it shouldn’t be eaten, and if the shepherd’s pie was something he was willing to have, then we would eat it.
Once Asher had eaten all of his chips, he pushed that plate to the side and started in on his shepherd’s pie. I figured that was probably the best time to bring up certain subjects.
“Can I ask you something?”
“Why couldn’t you? Earlier, you said I could always ask you questions, no matter what. Wouldn’t it be unfair if I didn’t allow the same?”
He had me there. “Very well. My question is, why did you feel it necessary to hide when the food arrived? I’m not ashamed to be with you, and I never will be. Yet you seemed hesitant and nervous.”
Asher shrugged. “You mentioned that there might be places that weren’t necessarily as safe as others here. What if the person bringing the food isn’t someone who is all right with us being together? They could get others involved, couldn’t they?”
I thought about it for a moment. He had a point.
“All right. Valid point. But for future reference, I don’t want you to hide, ever.
I am not ashamed of you or us. We will claim one another soon, and once my message gets through to my father, he can come collect us and take us to my place in France.
I don’t have anywhere in Montana yet. That will have to wait until a little later. ”
“I’m all right with that. I would really rather not go through a fertile period here in the hotel.
” Asher placed his fork down and moved his hands to his lap.
“I’m not saying this will happen to me, but I’ll say that there have been other fae that while experiencing a fertile period, it’s possible that magic can sometimes escape. ”
This was a bit surprising. Did warlocks have the same issues?
“How so?”
“Well, maybe fireworks will go off? Or things will start floating around them. But it’s not necessarily limited to just the room they’re in.
We’ve seen things floating outside of a house before in our village.
There have been instances of small, colorful explosions in the sky.
There have been things that just blink in and out of existence.
I’m not sure it will happen with me, but it’s a possibility. ”
Yep, we needed to get to France as fast as we could. I reached for my phone, and when I looked, I was sad to see it had no service. I wouldn’t be able to get a message out to them, but I could work on sending them a message later.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. There’s just no service, so I can’t get ahold of my father. He will be up now, and I did message my dad before we lost the cell service.” I glanced at my computer. “I wonder if the hotel still has Wi-Fi. They will be wired, but my phone is cellular, so the storm is interfering with it.”
I woke my laptop up, and after I clicked on the internet icon, I was pleasantly surprised to see that I did have connection through the computer.
“All right. I might be able to get something through to my fathers. Are you ready to leave soon?”
“How soon is soon?”