Lorehnin: A Novel of the Otherworld Read online

  “Don’t worry lover boy, Kelly’s gone,” I said with a smile.

  His frown deepened and he glared at me, which only made me laugh. I threw my hands up in a defensive posture. “Only teasing!”

  Jonathon cast Moira a wary glance when she joined us a few minutes later, but fortunately for his pride, she got busy wiping down tables and gave no indication she had heard any of our conversation.

  “Hey, think you can man the cash register for a few? There’s a lull right now, so I’m going to go find out more about our new co-worker.”

  Jonathon blanched, but I held up a hand. “Don’t worry, I won’t even mention you. I might like to torture you, but I’m not that cruel.”

  Tucking my hands into the front pockets of my apron, I walked around the counter and headed toward the small group of tables set up beside our floor-to-ceiling front windows. Moira paused when I got closer, a look of concern on her face. Good lord, she resembled a rabbit caught in a trap. I smiled, hoping the gesture would convince her I wasn’t coming over to chastise her on a job poorly done.

  “Hi, I didn’t get a chance to introduce myself earlier. Robyn Dunbarre.” I held out my hand and she reluctantly took it.

  “Moira Barry,” she responded.

  I glanced around the shop. Only a few customers lingered and no one was in line to buy coffee, so I shrugged. “Have you had your break yet?”

  Moira shook her head.

  “Me neither. Want to sit with me? You can tell me more about where you’re from and what you’re doing in San Luis.”

  The girl leaned her broom against the window and took a seat across from me. I didn’t normally reach out to people, but considering Moira was going to work with me, I thought it best to get to know her. Turned out she was from Wales and her brother had recently moved to the Central Coast for business reasons, so she’d decided to look at colleges in California. After that, Moira proceeded to talk animatedly about her favorite reality TV programs. Yay for me.

  Crossing my arms, I leaned back in my chair and tried not to look bored. She spoke a lot with her hands, and I was afraid she might accidentally smack anyone who should pass by. That would be an interesting development. Yet as carefree and bubbly as she seemed, something about Moira was off, as though her outer appearance was only a shell covering something else, something I couldn’t quite see. I narrowed my eyes, wondering what my instincts were trying to tell me. When I glanced back up at her face, I noticed that her eyes appeared lighter in the sunlight.

  “That’s an interesting tattoo,” she said out of the blue, snapping me out of my contemplation.

  Dusting off that weird vibe I was getting from her, I glanced down at my forearm where a primitive-looking design rested below my elbow. Three swirls and some zigzags depicted a rudimentary thunder cloud with lightning. The image had come to me years ago and never really left my mind. Odd, I know, but I had liked it enough to give it a permanent place on my skin. Usually the sleeves of my shirts were just long enough to cover it, but not today.

  I sniffed. It was only one of a few tattoos I’d gotten since turning eighteen. There was a robin on the back of my left shoulder and a larger Celtic pentagram above and just to the left my right hip, as well as the one Moira was studying with not-so-subtle interest.

  “Thanks,” I finally said, my tone dry.

  She cautiously eyed the rest of me before saying, “Are you like, into witchcraft or something?”

  Given my black eyeliner, pierced eyebrow and black hair with its electric violet streak, I shouldn’t have been surprised at her assumption. And here I thought I was the master of forthright, uncomfortable questions. After getting over my mild shock, I shook my head and gave her a tight grin.

  “I wouldn’t call it witchcraft,” I answered as coolly as possible. “In high school I discovered Wicca and started doing my own research. I consider myself a pagan now.”

  How about that for blunt?

  Moira looked horrified, so I took a deep breath and prayed for patience.

  “We’re not devil-worshipers. Pagans just feel more in tune with the Earth and nature. I’m part of a local group called Earth Bound. We get together and sometimes go on hikes or talk about old pagan rituals and mythology. We celebrate seasonal festival days throughout the year too.”

  To my great surprise, Moira started to relax.

  “Really? You know, back home we talk about the old Celtic myths, but I don’t know anyone who is really pagan. My parents and most of their friends told me pagans were idol worshipers and that they practiced black magic.”

  I made a face. “Yeah. That’s a very common misconception but it isn’t true. When Christianity and modern religions moved into pagan areas, they demonized their gods and then adopted their practices in order to convert them. Sure, some ancient pagan rituals were pretty atrocious, but we don’t do anything like that anymore.”

  A memory of the Noctyrnum trying to sacrifice kittens came to mind. I shivered and batted the image away. Okay, most of us didn’t practice ritual sacrifice anymore.

  “Wow, that sounds pretty interesting,” Moira was saying.

  For some reason, I found myself asking, “Why don’t you come to our next meeting? It will be the Saturday after Halloween. We’ll be celebrating Samhain, the Celtic new year.”

  Moira’s eyes grew wide again, but I simply held up a hand. “You don’t have to dress up if you don’t want to, and there will be lots of goodies. You can come with me if you’d like; that way you won’t feel so out of place.”

  For some bizarre reason, I felt it was important to prove to Moira that my beliefs weren’t evil. Maybe because I’d be working with her in the foreseeable future or maybe because I was just tired of people judging me.

  Moira bit her lip, and her hands fidgeted with the dish towel she had in her lap. After several seconds, she conceded. “All right. Why not? It might be fun.”

  There was a razor sharp edge to her smile but I chalked it up as nothing more than nerves warring with curiosity.

  “Awesome. I’ll get you the information later this week. When’s your next shift?”

  The door swung open, and the bells chimed as a small herd of new customers flooded in. We rose from the table, and I returned to the cash register to help Jonathon while Moira returned to table-wiping duty. As I called out orders to Jonathon and handed back change, I thought about my interaction with Moira. Sure, she wasn’t the usual type of person I hung out with, but maybe if I got to know her, my opinion would change. And maybe whatever it was she seemed to be hiding would eventually work itself free.

  -Eight-

  Halloween

  Those next few weeks flew by like crimson leaves caught in an autumn breeze. Moira was opening up more at work and although she was settling in with our routine, something about her just didn’t sit well with me. Every time I thought I had found the trail that led to some answers concerning my enigmatic co-worker, my mind would get fuzzy and my focus would turn to something else. It was frustrating, to say the least.

  Kelly decided early on that Moira had a strange case of over abundant self-consciousness. If that was what made her so aloof around us, I had no idea why. I mean, Moira was tall and gorgeous with flawless grace and a perfect complexion. Every man that came into the Green Tea Leaf noticed her right away. One guy actually spilled his scalding hot coffee all over his friend because he’d been so busy gawking. Even Jonathon was having trouble focusing at work.

  “She’s too perfect,” he told us before the cafe opened one morning. “I mean, I feel like an amoeba standing next to her.”

  Kelly rolled her eyes and I gave Jonathon a hard look. I was about to open my mouth and argue with him; tell him that such a notion was juvenile and ridiculous, but I held off. As airheaded as she might seem, Moira did have her attributes. Not to mention that whole exotic, foreign thing going for her. Shrugging and giving Jonathon a sympathetic look, I got back to work, making a deal with myself not to hold Moira’s personality again
st her. She probably couldn’t help it, after all.

  “Hey Robyn,” Moira asked later as we were getting ready to close up, “can I still go to your pagan outing?”

  I’d been mopping the last patch of dry floor, and some of my hair had fallen out of its clip. I straightened and blew it out of my face.

  “Huh? Oh! Right, sure!” I managed as I set the mop aside. “I never gave you the information, did I?”

  I pulled out a piece of paper and jotted down the address of the location where we were gathering for the bonfire.

  “Dress is casual and we’ll probably be meeting around four.”

  I grinned and handed her the paper. She took it and pursed her lips, reading through what I had written

  “This Saturday, November third, right?” she asked as she tucked it into her pocket.

  “Yeah,” I answered.

  Moira smiled. “Sounds like fun. See you then!”

  She disappeared into the back and gathered her things. I waited for her to exit out the front, then mopped up behind her before sneaking into the back myself. It took me fifteen more minutes to clean out the dirty mop bucket and turn off all the lights. Once darkness descended upon me, I made my way to the front, setting the alarm and locking the door behind me.

  Halloween was a day away, and already the college town was alive with idiots who thought running around at night and scaring people was the height of entertainment. Normally, I would have loved it, but ever since the night saber-toothed mummy cat tried to rip me to shreds, I’d been pretty edgy after dark. Okay, I guess technically I’d been jumping at my shadow longer than that. A few weeks had passed since my latest Otherworldly encounter, and I hadn’t heard or seen anything since, so maybe I needed to just let it go and relax. Then again, it was Halloween, the time of year when the evil creatures of the Otherworld were supposed to lurk in our own.

  Gritting my teeth, I stood up on the pedals of my bike and picked up speed. The sooner I got home and locked inside my place the better.

  Only a few people in grotesque masks tried to scare me on my way home and most of them had a real issue with the whole hide-and-jump-out process. Yes, barely silenced laughter and the rumble of quiet voices behind low cut shrubs were a dead giveaway. Once within the safety of my apartment, I pulled out my costume for tomorrow. This year I had managed to throw together an autumn fairy ensemble. The dress had been an old one I’d added scraps of gold, green and copper fabric to, and the wings I’d designed myself out of wire and a golden, gossamer-like fabric I’d found on sale at a local fabric store.

  Grinning in anticipation, I returned the costume to my closet then curled up in bed with one of my favorite books. Sometime around midnight I finally dozed off, hoping that the faelah, should they be unable to resist the lure of the mortal world, might pick another town to roam around in tomorrow night.

  * * *

  Twice, I considered donning my autumn fairy outfit the next morning but the recollection of how much time I’d spent forming the wings so they’d look just right finally convinced me that wearing my Halloween costume to class was a bad idea. If one of the crazies on the bus didn’t crush them while trying to find out what realm I’d come from, surely some idiot in one of my classes would insist on touching them and make a tear. Nope. As tempting as it was, I left my costume in the closet where it was safe and opted to wear my black leggings and dark purple skirt. My favorite T-shirt from high school, a black one sporting a pentagram, went on next, followed by a black zip-up, hooded sweatshirt with the silver outline of a skeletal tree. Ah yes. And for the first time in several weeks, I took my time with my makeup, applying more dark eyeliner than usual. I flat-ironed my hair and left it down, the length now just brushing my shoulders and the electric violet stripe in front recently re-dyed, and pulled on my black and purple striped, elbow-length gloves. Before leaving, I looked in the mirror, grinning at the image that greeted me. Memories from high school, the good ones, came flooding back.

  Feeling rather cheerful, I left my apartment behind and walked to the closest bus stop. Along the way, I popped in my earphones and selected my pre-set Halloween music soundtrack to get in the mood. As if I needed any more encouragement. This was my favorite time of the year; All-Hallows Eve. Samhain. The Celtic New Year. The beginning of the dark half of the year. The nights were growing longer, the trees were painting the skyline in various shades of red and yellow, and the flavors and scents of the harvest were all around. I shivered with delight, looking forward to my work shift later that day. Margie had allowed us to hang some Halloween decorations, and she’d even let me put together a Halloween mix to play in the cafe. Sure, I’d rather be with Jonathon and Kelly or some of my pals from Earth Bound, walking around the city in full costume, avoiding the drunken troublemakers and observing all the younger kids in their cute costumes than be stuck in the Green Tea Leaf making drinks and counting back change, but it wasn’t too bad.

  The bench at the bus stop was crowded when I arrived, so I leaned against a nearby tree and traced the pattern in the bark with my finger. The bus pulled up ten minutes later, and we all piled in. I ended up standing most of the way, so I was eager to get to class and sit down. A chilly wind brushed the grounds clean of lingering leaves, and I had to tuck my hands under my armpits to keep warm, despite my gloves. The weather was unnaturally cool for this time of year. Normally the Central Coast experienced warm temperatures in October, but I wasn’t about to complain. It should be cold on Halloween. Fortunately, my professor had noticed the chilly weather as well because a wave of warmth hit me when I entered the classroom. As our instructor stepped through a side door and began lecturing on the basics of running a business, I put my wandering thoughts aside for the time being and focused on jotting down helpful notes.

  By five-thirty in the evening, I was back at home, the night already starting to grow dark. I popped a frozen pizza in the oven and jumped in the shower, letting the hot water warm my fingers and toes. Fifteen minutes later, I was wrapped comfortably in my bath robe. I checked the oven and proceeded to dry my hair until the buzzer rang. As my dinner cooled, I carefully pulled on my costume and applied my makeup. Slipping on my wings, I twirled in front of the mirror, smiling like an imp as the gold highlights glinted back at me. An old memory of my friends from high school came to mind, and a sudden ache threatened to take root. I stopped my foolishness and frowned. Sometimes I really wished Tully and Meghan had stayed in my life. The letters and emails just didn’t fill that void, and although I had my new friends in Earth Bound and at work, they just weren’t the same.

  Plopping down on the edge of my bed, I fished out the boots that best matched my dress and wings and tried not to feel depressed.

  It’s Halloween, Robyn! Cheer up! I decided to take my own advice and remembered that the Green Tea Leaf, decked out in all its spooky glory, awaited me. It would be a night of creepy music, specialty Halloween drinks and hanging out with Kelly, Jonathon and Moira. Sophia and some of the others from Earth Bound promised to drop by and hang out for a while, so really, I had nothing to be morose about.

  I glanced at the clock and realized I had better hurry. I scarfed down two slices of pizza, put the rest in the fridge, and grabbed a sweatshirt. Fortunately, my wings fit over the extra bulk, and in no time I was whizzing down the street, bypassing trick-or-treaters both young and old.

  Downtown was buzzing with activity, the local bars and restaurants even busier with the college crowd on this particular night. I took note of several people in costume. Okay, partially in costume would be a better description. I didn’t think animal ears and an overdose on black makeup really counted as an entire outfit, but at least my peers were making an effort of sorts.

  It was an entirely different story inside the Green Tea Leaf. Not only were the windows decked out in fake spiderwebs and glowing orange jack-o-lantern lights, but the place was rocking to the rhythm of some spooky music.

  “Robyn!” Kelly cried as she threw her arms in the air.
“Happy Halloween!”

  I grinned. My co-worker knew my love for this particular holiday, and she was definitely showing her spirit tonight. Kelly was getting her 80’s on with frizzed hair, a large neon sweater with the neck and sleeves cut away, and a pair of matching leggings.

  “Great costume,” I told her as I batted at the ponytail hanging from the side of her head. “You should wear this every day. You might end up bringing the look back into fashion.”

  Kelly made a face and pulled me behind the counter where Jonathon, appearing scholarly yet macabre while sporting a mad scientist look, gave me a welcoming wave.

  “Love the wings,” Kelly crooned. “Though they might get in the way.”

  “Not if you let me work the floor the entire night. And I think we recently got in a shipment of books that need placing.”

  “We shall see. I don’t mind, but Moira might want some of the action, too.”

  As if our conversation had called her into being, Moira stepped out of the break room wearing skin-tight black leather pants, a matching jacket, spike-heeled boots and cherry red lipstick. I wasn’t too sure what she was supposed to be, but if I hadn’t known her I would have said she was a wayward member of a degenerate biker gang.

  “Hey Robyn! Happy Halloween!” she cried, bending down to give me a quick hug.

  Feeling like a little girl being gushed over by an older cousin, I gritted my teeth until she let go. What had her all exuberant tonight?

  “What are you supposed to be?” she asked, one dark, drawn-in eyebrow arching in curiosity.

  “An autumn fairy,” I said, resenting the fact that I had to crane my neck to look her in the eye. Honestly, they should make some law against tall people wearing heels.

  “Oh, cool.”

  Without another word, Moira snatched up an apron and sauntered out onto the floor and proceeded to fill out tonight’s Halloween specials on the board.