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“You don’t know the Fair Queen?” Gerard asks, eyes widening. “Ach, poor bairns, not raised with any eye to the past.”
He leans on the table as he shakes his head. “Well, I’ll tell you the story, but fair trade, buy an old man a pint?”
“Sure,” Ryan agrees readily.
“Ach, well enough,” Gerard says, leaning back in his chair. “The Queen of Elphame, she is the fairest of all the fair folk. Many are the tales of her and any well-schooled bairn knows well to steer clear of her path. Do ye know the tale of Thomas the Rhymer?”
“No,” I say, shifting in my seat.
“Ach, he was a laird of old who went wandering the Highlands, alone as a fool does,” Gerard says. “When a highland fog rolled in, he was nae wise and did nae return to his home but indeed was turned around and more than a bit lost.
“He heard a lamb mewling and, following the sound, he came across a fair lady with a wee tup in her lap. She was calming the beast with the sound of her voice which Thomas did relate to be most beautiful.
“When poor Thomas stepped on a twig makin’ a snap, she looked up and he knew this could be no mortal lass. No mortal could ever be as beautiful in form or look but she had fiery eyes, like twin flames that burned so harshly they froze him in place.”
The hair on my arms raises as a chill settles over my body. In my head, I’m there, on the highlands with Thomas, seeing this unearthly beauty. Gerard’s voice fades to become background to the scene playing out in my head just as it did when my Mom would tell me stories.
“‘Thomas,’ the beautiful lass says, knowing his name without him having spoken a word. ‘Will you kill the tup or let it live?’ she asks. Now about then, Thomas’ belly was grumbling. He’d been hiking for a long while, and that without a bite to eat. So he says that he’d slaughter the tup and then they could eat.
“The lass nods, and with one swift motion, snaps the neck of the tup. She rises to her feet and moves to him. She and Thomas spent that night in each other’s arms in the way a man and a woman are wont to do. Thomas declared his love undying for her, but she only smiled and said come the sun’s light it would be but a memory.
“And in the morn’, when the fog had retreated back to its hiding place and the sun was bright, he awoke alone. When he came down from the highlands to his home, his once fancy castle was no longer fancy at all. It was naught but a ruin.
“Thomas sought out a local, and when he begged to know what had happened, the good old man looked him up and down as if he was right mad. He told him that the laird of that castle was lost when he was but a lad some fifty years hence. That no one had known what happened to him and he left behind no heirs to care for it.”
“How did that happen?” I ask, breathless.
“Ach, he was with the Fae Queen,” Gerard says. “When the highland fog rolls in, the walls between their world and ours thins. They wander here as real as you and I, lass.”
“What a fascinating story,” Savannah says.
“’Tis more than a story, lass,” Gerard says. “Truth be in these old tales, if you’re sharp enough to learn it.”
“Is that what happened to that kid?” Ryan asks.
It’s as if the entire world stops on its tracks when he speaks. Gerard’s bushy eyebrows pull together forming one long, wiry, gray caterpillar that partially cover his eyes. The air in the room is oppressive, making it almost impossible to draw a breath from its sudden viscousness.
“Sorry…” Ryan adds. “I didn’t mean…. I wasn’t…”
Ryan stumbles over words in a way I’ve never seen him do before.
“He didn’t mean to offend,” I say, jumping in to the dark and deep waters Ryan had taken us into and offering him a life preserver.
“Right, yeah,” Ryan says, looking at me gratefully.
“We saw the poster at the train station,” I continue. “I can’t imagine the tragedy of it and how it must affect everyone here.”
“Aye,” Gerard says. “You cannae.”
He takes a long drink from the pint in his hand.
Something moves in the corner of the room past Gregor, drawing my attention. The dark stranger is there, and though he’s still shrouded by his cloak of shadow, I’m certain he’s watching us. No, me.
He’s watching me.
My heart thumps hard, and a sensation flutters in my stomach, but I push all that aside.
“We’re very sorry,” I say, leaning in and placing one hand on Gerard’s arm.
