“Yeah, but you love me.”
“I do,” Laurel said, folding herself into his arms.
When class let out for the day, Laurel headed straight for the parking lot, knowing how anxious Tamani was. And, admittedly, she was a little curious to see what kind of car he drove. She shouldn’t have been surprised to see a convertible. Tamani said nothing as he unlocked her door and lowered the car’s top.
For the first couple of minutes, Laurel was simply fascinated by the sight of Tamani driving. The novelty of seeing him in distinctly human situations was starting to wear off, but it wasn’t gone yet.
As Tamani pulled onto the highway, Laurel finally broke the silence. “I’m sorry,” she said.
“For what?” Tamani replied, donning a convincingly unaffected air.
“For not taking you seriously. About Shar.”
“It’s okay,” Tamani said guardedly. “I overreacted.”
“No, you didn’t,” Laurel insisted. “I should have listened.”
Tamani was silent.
Laurel sat, not knowing what to say next.
“If anything happened to him, I don’t know what I’d do,” Tamani finally said, his words coming out in a rush.
Not wanting to interrupt and make him clam up, Laurel simply nodded.
“Shar is… I would probably say he’s like a brother, if I knew what that was like.” He glanced over at her for a second before returning his eyes to the road. “Everything I am now, I owe to him. I wasn’t even technically old enough to be in the guard when he took it upon himself to make a proper sentry out of me.” Finally, Tamani smiled again. “He’s the main reason I got to meet you again.”
“He’ll be fine,” Laurel said, trying to sound confident rather than dismissive. “From everything you’ve told me and everything I know about him, he’s really amazing. I’m sure he’s okay.”
“I hope so,” Tamani said, edging his speed up a little higher.
Laurel watched the road, but out the corner of her eye she could see Tamani stealing glances at her. “You hardly talk to me at school,” Laurel said a few minutes later as Tamani sped down the passing lane, overtaking a convoy of RVs. She was impressed. He had a manual transmission and was shifting through gears way better than she had when she was a new driver.
Tamani shrugged. “Well, we’re not supposed to know each other, remember?”
“Yeah, but you talk to me in Government. You could at least wave in the halls.”
Tamani glanced her way. “I’m not sure that would be a good idea.”
“Why not?”
“Because of Yuki. Klea. Trolls. Take your pick.” He paused. “I worry about too many faeries being together in one place. I’d like to,” he added, smiling, “but I don’t think it’s a good idea.”
“Oh, absolutely!” Laurel said in mock cheerfulness. “We should hide our friendship instead, and then if anyone sees us driving around like this they’ll assume I’m cheating on my boyfriend. That’s a
“What do you want me to do?” Tamani asked.
Laurel considered that. “Wave in the halls. Say hi. Don’t ignore me in Speech class. In a couple of weeks, it won’t seem out of the ordinary to anyone. Not even Yuki or Klea, assuming they care.”
Tamani grinned. “Don’t you think you’re brilliant.”
“I don’t think,” Laurel said with a laugh, leaning her head a little to the side so the wind caught her long, golden hair and threw it back behind her. “I know.” After a pause she added, “You could be David’s friend too.” She glanced at Tamani when he said nothing. He was frowning. “The two of you really have a lot in common, and we’re all in this together.”
He shook his head. “It wouldn’t work.”
“Why not? He’s a nice guy. And it would do you good to have some human friends,” she said, hinting at what she suspected was the root of the problem.
“It’s not that,” Tamani said, gesturing vaguely with one hand.
“Then why?” Laurel asked, exasperated.
“I just don’t want to cozy up to the guy whose girl I have every intention of stealing,” he said flatly, without looking at her.
Laurel stared silently out the window for the rest of the trip.
WHEN THEY ARRIVED AT THE LAND, TAMANI TURNED to her. “Stay here,” he said, his eyes on the tree line. “Just until we know it’s safe,” he added. Laurel relented; after all, he was combat-trained and she wasn’t. He unbuckled his seat belt and sprang out of the convertible without bothering to open the door.
Just before he reached the shadow of the trees, someone in green leaped out from Tamani’s right and toppled him over. At first Laurel couldn’t identify the blur that knocked Tamani to the ground, but as soon as she realized it was Shar she opened the door and hurried to them.
The two sentries were tangled in the dirt, Tamani with his arms wrenched firmly behind him, his legs wrapped around Shar’s waist, pinning him to the ground. Each struggled to get free of the other, but it looked like a stalemate. Laurel crossed her arms and grinned as the faeries grunted out Gaelic epithets and outlandish faerie slurs.
“Rot-headed spore! Make me worry.”
“Pansy sentry, totally unprepared.”
Finally Tamani called truce and they got to their feet, dusting off their clothes and shaking leaves out of their hair. Laurel noticed that Shar’s hair, like Tamani’s, was no longer green at the roots. Apparently Tamani hadn’t been the only one to change his diet.
“Why didn’t you answer the phone, mate? I’ve been calling you all week!”
Laurel put up a hand to cover her smile as she listened to Tamani’s accent thicken with every word. Shar reached into a pouch on his belt and pulled out his iPhone with the same look Laurel’s mother reserved for leftovers found moldering in the back of the fridge. “I can’t work this blighted thing,” Shar said. “Half the time I don’t feel it buzzing until it’s too late, and even when I do, I put it up to my ear like you said and nothing happens.”
“Did you slide the bar?” Tamani asked.
“What bar? It’s as smooth as a holly leaf,” Shar said, looking at the phone Laurel noticed he was holding upside down. “You told me it’s as easy as picking it up and talking. That’s what I did.”
Tamani sighed, then reached out and punched Shar in the shoulder. Shar didn’t even move, much less flinch. “There’s not even anything to remember! It tells you right on the screen what to do. Let’s try it again,” Tamani said, reaching into his pocket.
“No point in that,” Shar said moodily, his eyes darting toward Laurel. “I can hear you now.” He turned and walked down the path. “Best get out of sight. Would be our luck that after six months with no trolls, one would wander by as we’re standing out in the open, gawking at human trinkets.”
Tamani stood for a few seconds, phone in hand, then shoved his hands in his pockets and tromped after Shar, looking back with a shrug to make sure Laurel was following. But Laurel could see the relief in his eyes.
About ten feet into the woods, Shar drew abruptly to a halt. “So why are you here?” he asked, his face serious, playful demeanor gone. “The plan was never for you to bounce back and forth. You are supposed to maintain your post in the human world.”
Tamani sobered as well. “The situation has changed. The Huntress enrolled a faerie at Laurel’s school.”
Shar’s eyebrow twitched; a big reaction, from him. “The Huntress is back?”
Tamani nodded.
“And she has a faerie with her. How is that even possible?”
“I don’t know. Supposedly, Klea’s people found her in Japan, where she was raised by human parents. We don’t know what she’s capable of, if anything.” Tamani’s eyes darted to Laurel. “I told Laurel about the toxin. The wild faerie — Yuki — looks too young to have made something like that, but who could say for sure?”
Shar’s eyes narrowed. “How young does she look?”
“Younger than thirty. Older than ten. You know it would be impossible to say for sure. But from what I’ve observed of her behavior, she
