1
Lindsay
Ipour another glass of wine and hand it over. Later it will be shots, but for the moment it’s a meal and telling tales. I should feel something. Shay was Danni’s father and for a few months I’d thought myself in love with him.
Back then I’d been a naïve fool who’d been enamored with riders and all things fae, I believed Shay would take me there and we’d be a family. In hindsight, that would’ve been a disaster. He’d never wanted a wife and kids; he’d lived only for the fight. And in the end, it had taken him. I have no doubt that he'd be happy with the way he went out.
Maybe I should’ve relented and let him use the café as a meeting place like the other riders, but I can hold a grudge as well as any fae. He derailed my life, our daughter’s life.
Maybe I do feel something, anger.
These fae men swoop into the human world to kill monsters and have a good time before going home. They promise magic and faery, but don’t always deliver. They never look back and see the wreckage left behind. The single mothers raising fae kids, the lucky ones know what to expect. The unlucky ones discover their kid can see monsters.
This café is for riders, and the women they leave behind, the ones who know, who need help. And the ones who never got to go to faery because their rider kept fighting until he was killed. They are the ones I really feel sorry for; they had partner and were making a life in the human world while waiting to be taken to faery.
Riders can be selfish and cold.
But tonight they are somber and hurt and remembering their lost brothers. Some of them I knew. Some of them never came this far north. Some died before I was born.
Every rider here is old, even though most of them barely look mid-twenties. And some have been in this job for nearly one hundred years. I have no doubt some will be here for another hundred, or until they make a mistake that ends their fight.
Daire holds out his glass for a refill. His eyes are glassy. He’d volunteered with Shay, and they’d been friends for decades before becoming riders together. But Shay ditching me after getting me pregnant so he could keep fighting, had caused a rift between them.
“I’m sorry,” I say. It’s a lame thing to say. Every time I host a wake, I vow to come up with something more interesting, and every time I say the same dumb shit.
He glances as me, blue eyes, and dark hair. Like all the fae, he’s pretty. Had I let my self be swept up by the wrong man? I try not to think about it, but on days like today my mind wanders. It doesn’t matter, I can’t unravel twenty years of history. I have a life, and I’ve built a business.
Life is good.
“I know you won’t miss him,” Daire says.
“Danni will, he was more a father to her than a partner to me.” She isn’t here. She’ll be hunting with her rider. I wish he’d just take her back to faery and be done with it. I don’t want to be hosting a wake for either of them.
Daire nods and takes a drink. “Do you have any good tales to tell of him?”
“No one wants to hear me talk. Tonight is for you lot.” I top up his glass. “I’m happy to be in charge of food and drinks.
Shay might have left me, but I couldn’t walk away from what I’d learned about monsters and the fae. I’d built my life around it, hoping that I could protect my daughter.
Some would say I had because she’s a rider in her own right. Others would call it a failure. I’m still undecided, but Danni is happy.
“Daire…I am sorry. I know you were friends for a long time.” I lick my lip. “I’m sorry I came between you.”
He draws a breath. “What he did to you was wrong, but it wasn’t the only thing we disagreed on.”
I lift my eyebrows, but I know I won’t get the story tonight. Maybe not ever, and I’m not sure that I care enough to dig. It may have been nothing more than weapons choice, but at least I wasn’t the only cause of the rift.
2
Daire
Idon't hang around the cafe much, in part because Shay was banned but mostly because seeing Lindsay hurts. Twenty years ago, Shay stole her from under my nose, she got pregnant and he promised to take it a faery. And I like a fool believed him. Six months later it was clear he was never going to give up being a rider and do the right thing by Lindsey, by that point it was too late for me to do anything and I was pretty sure Lindsay wanted nothing to do with the fae.
When she started up the cafe, I came by a few times to see other riders, but seeing Lindsay and her baby was too much. It felt like Shay had stolen my life and then tossed it aside like trash. I finish the glass of wine and walk back over to the counter where Lindsay is pouring, but I don't have the balls to tell her what happened.
Our friendship was never the same after. I could never trust Shay fully the way I could other riders—he’d known I liked Lindsay and had swept in while I was hunting. That was the last time I’d told him anything of importance.
Lindsay smiles and picks up the wine bottle.
