Page 12 of Good Golly Miss Molly

“I’m sorry, Logan. You were too much of a temptation. It had been too long, and that music inside you. I tried to resist. It was just too much. Too strong.”

“I don’t understand. Why are you apologizing?”

“I am leannán sidhe, Logan — a dark muse, faerie lover. One that gives inspiration but steals away life in return. And… you wrote me a song. The day we met.”

“I did. But I write a couple songs a week, even if that one was especially good. It’s one of my gifts, along with instruments and trees. I’m not sure what point you’re trying to make.”

She ponders for a minute. She’s thinking hard enough for me to nearly hear it.

“The men who are inspired by me die, Logan. The creative expression flows out of them and their life with it. It’s more than a compulsion for a leannán sidhe. It’s sustenance. If we don’t take lovers and give them that gift, we die a slow death. It is the only way for a leannán sidhe to die, save by intentional acts. So it is always a choice between human lives and our own.”

“That bad breakup?”

“A couple hundred years ago. And I resolved — never again. I prepared myself for the inevitable. Rónan’s charm gave me hope, added restraint, the chance to live up to my oath to myself and never take another human life. But the call to you was just too strong. I faltered. And I can’t tell you how sorry I am. I’ve doomed you.”

“How so?”

“They all die.Youall die. Once you’ve been influenced by me, inspired by me, it’s a guaranteed death sentence. It may take a year or twenty, but it’s a certain death. I’ve tried before to fend it off. Nothing will. I’ve killed you.”

Tears are streaming down her face, her breaths shallow as fear grips her. I can’t help myself. I’m curious.

“Molly — why does that upset you so?”

“Because you’ll die! And it’s my fault.”

“And why does me dying upset you?”

“I l…ike you. And you’re so talented! It’s a tragedy! Why are you so calm about this?”

“You l…ike me? Is that all, Molly? Because you seem distraught, not just upset.”

She won’t meet my eyes. I grasp her chin and raise it up so she has no choice, save to shut her eyes entirely.

“You feel like home,” she admits. Reluctance rolls off her.

“Do you love me, Molly? This quickly? Do you? Because you feel like home to me, too, and I never had one except with Rónan. If what I’m feeling isn’t love, I’m not sure what it is.”

“Love didn’t save the one who came before you, Logan. He still died.”

“But you’re forgetting one very important thing.”

“What?”

“I’m nothuman. Abandoned or not, I’m sidhe, just like you. Rónan confessed he didn’t know if changelings were immortal. He didn’t know whetherhewas immortal. But I am not human. And from what you’ve said, the leannán sidhe feed off of humans.”

“We do.”

“Then you haven’t fed on me.”

She’s silent again.

“Changelings die because they think they’re human. It’s what’s expected of them, by them, so they live, age and die.”

“I’ve known I wasn’t human since I was 17. I didn’t know what to expect. But I knew I wouldn’t die as a human. Because I’m not one.”

“Then you could well be immortal,” she muses, hesitating.

“And therefore doubly unlikely to be drained of my life by a dark muse,” I remind her. ”But I don’t think you’re a dark muse at all.”

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