I should have stopped. I knew I should have stopped. Instead I said, “They’re beautiful.”
For one terrible second, I thought I had broken my own neck with embarrassment.
Then he said, very quietly, “Beautiful.”
“Yes.” I swallowed. “The shape, the symmetry, the texture. They’re…” I made a helpless little gesture. “Remarkable.”
A strange, quiet look crossed his face. Something almost like surprise, but something warmer than that too.
“They are just horns,” he said.
“Nothing about you isjustanything,” I whispered, and the air between us changed.
He held my gaze, and suddenly I was very aware of how little space there was in the aisle, how close we were standing, how easy it would be to lift one hand and touch him…
A small voice interrupted from the end of the row.
“Are you a monster?”
We both turned.
A little boy stood there clutching a dinosaur book to his chest, his eyes huge behind crooked glasses. He looked maybe six, but he didn’t look frightened. He looked thrilled.
I opened my mouth, but Rion crouched first, folding himself down with surprising grace.
“I’m a minotaur,” he said, his voice gentler than I had ever heard it. “Half man, half bull.”
“Like in the stories?”
“In some stories.”
The boy considered this. “Do you eat people?”
I bit the inside of my cheek.
Rion shook his head solemnly. “No. I prefer cookies.”
The boy nodded as if that seemed reasonable. “I like cookies too.”
I laughed, and Rion’s mouth twitched.
“Can I touch your horns?” the boy asked.
My breath caught, but Rion hesitated for only a second before lowering his head. “Gently.”
The boy reached up and touched one horn with one careful finger. His whole face lit up. “It’s warm.”
“Jeremy!”
His mother appeared at the end of the aisle, clearly prepared to scold and immediately derailed by the sight of Rion crouched in front of her son.
“I’m so sorry,” she said. “He wandered off and I?—”
“He was asking very important structural questions,” I said smoothly.
Jeremy beamed. “Mom, he’s a min-o-toor and his horns are warm.”
“Minotaur,” Rion corrected gently as he stood.
