Page 5 of Good Golly Miss Molly

Come on! Really? Inside my head, I’m giving a disapproving frown to whichever minor deity has decided to yank my chain today. With a song told by a man who finds himself so head-over-heels for a woman that the only possible cause is magic. Ha. Ha ha. Ha. Hilarious!

I check the music app to make sure the shuffle setting is really engaged, and I give it a fresh start, just to make sure. It’s like shuffling a deck of cards. Gotta make sure you’ve done a thorough job…

Wait for it…. Wait for it…

Mother of twelve gods!

I stole that expletive from Brighid, but it seems to fit right now. Because what’s coming out of the speakers is Olivia Newton-John’s “Magic,” a sweet little post-disco ballad full of hope and prosperity, as the singer tells the object of her affection that she’ll support and inspire him to achieve his dreams, together.

She’s a flippingmuse! (Girlfriend, we should really compare notes sometime…)

It’s the second time today that this muse thing has (apparently randomly — magically, even) come up.

This isn’t random chance. It’s someone with a twisted sense of humor, divine power and too much time on their hands. But then, when you’re omnipotent and you’ve got literal eternity to entertain yourself, I guess I’m lucky I just got themed music and not a lightening bolt to the ass. Ask me how I know. Go on. Ask. You know what? Nevermind. You wouldn’t believe it if I told you. SometimesIdon’t believe it.

And that seems to be the other theme of the day: how much temptation can one leannán sidhe take? Someone threw down the gauntlet today, lobbing a Druid luthier musician right into my path. But I can handle this. It’s like walking past the doughnut shop when you’re on a diet. You summon your willpower and just do it. Logan? One tasty doughnut. With a creamy filling and sugar sprinkles on top.

Great. Now I not only want Logan, I want a doughnut, too. Luckily for me, the bakery is closed for the day.

I glance at my watch — 8:37. The music shop, however, is open for another hour.

Don’t look at me like that — I have not been stalking a luthier. I just know when I’ve stayed late to help Brighid close up, the music store’s still fully lit until 10. They’re musicians — of course they’re up late. And I didn’t know Logan Gilmour existed until this afternoon. Which is… odd, come to think of it. I should have sensed that musician-luthier-Druid-male confluence from miles away, let alone half a block.

My hand goes to the necklace around my neck. The one I promised I’d never take off. In fact, it was soldered in place while on my neck. If I want it off, I’ll have to break it, and since it’s made of stainless steel, that’s unlikely to happen unless I’m desperate. Just enough carbon to make wearing the metal tolerable. Just enough iron to keep me contained. Probably.

The elaborately detailed pendant on the chain features a three-armed spiral symbol — a triskele, representing the three realms: land, sea and sky — inside of a ring of Celtic knotwork. It’s beautiful, as magnificently crafted as Logan’s guitars. It’s also a containment spell designed to reinforce the constraints of the steel chain it hangs from. Constraints designed to ensure I keep my promise, and to keep someone like Logan safe. A lot of effort went into that, and a lot of effort is now additionally required of me. Just to keep me from walking back out that door and right back into the box trap for leannán sidhe that has been cleverly disguised as a relatively standard human music shop.

And forget catchingme— such a trap would all but guarantee a painful demise for Logan. Oh, before he went, he’d have some wonderfully fulfilling, astoundingly successful months, or even years, writing songs that, today, would be top tunes on the streaming services and download shops.

You want a guaranteed hit? Don’t bother with artificial intelligence-based bots that “create” music based on scientifically tested algorithms. Give a pass to the hacks who churn out Top 10 hits for every bubblegum teen queen and dance-music diva… No — you want a 100-percent guaranteed No. 1 single? Put a musician in the same room with a leannán sidhe. Especially one that hasn’t done her thing in a while.

Dark muse, some have called us. “Faerie lover” or “Elvish sweetheart” is how the name translates. Some liken us to vampires or succubi — a female spirit or creature who feeds on a man, in his sleep, in his dreams, in his bed.

Don’t get me wrong — we do take men as lovers. But the “feeding” is a two-way street, with the human mate gifted a fount of inspiration that many men would — and have — killed for. Would and most definitelyhavedied for. I’ve seen it. I’vedoneit.

And there is no question that the man, the musician, in question reaps the benefits. Fame, fortune, the favor of society’s most exalted — they get it all handed to them. It’s the dream come true for many an artist: overnight success rocketing them to the stars. Some achieve that through a combination of luck, talent and hard work. But most… Let’s just say I’m not the only one of my kind, and I am — as far as I know — the only one who’s sworn off (literally) taking new lovers after one has passed.

Because they do pass. It’s inevitable. The muse giveth, and the muse taketh away. Because there is a price. There’s always a price with magic… and some higher than others.

That rush of creativity, the burst of inspiration — it takes a toll on body, mind and spirit. They literally spend — expend — their lives like ink on a page, bleeding out the years theywouldhave had at the rate blood pumps from a severed femoral artery, instead of a nick to a narrow vein. The ones who don’t perish quickly from the creative effort find their well has dried up and suffer with the loss of something that became the full focus of their lives. Many will make an early end for themselves just to escape that agony — because itisagony once they’ve tasted the fruits of their enhanced success.

And should a leannán sidhe decide to be merciful, to give up her own sustenance — risking the same kind of tortuous withering, lingering death as her prey — and leave before the fatal result is certain, he generally dies anyway, of a broken heart.

The only way to prevent that is to never let the thing start in the first place. And no leannán sidhe that I’ve ever heard of has simply stopped taking lovers. Until now.

I have good reason, as I confessed to Logan. You see, I was one of the unlucky few of my kind who fall in love with their lovers. It’s rare, but it happens. And the outcome is the same. He dies from hastily expended creativity or he dies pining for his faerie lover. The only difference is measured in the misery of his dark muse. And, believe me, I was as miserable as one can get.

But, unlike those other unlucky ones among my kind, I’ve been given a potential out. And, ironically, it was my choice to betray one to whom I owed my fealty that granted me respite, here among the humans in this small coastal town. Had we not been at war, I would never have made that choice, would never have met the one who offered me a chance to redeem myself and build a life — mundane as it is — where my suffering would at least be tolerable, my existence something I could endure. And when I say “endure,” you should know that the sidhe are immortal. I’ve seen more centuries than I can count and taken more hapless lovers than I can remember. Except the one. Him I cannot forget.

Hair like sable, eyes like moonlight reflecting off the silver coins tossed in a well and a voice that turned a woman’s core to liquid upon his first note or utterance. Even mine. He was kind, generous, talented in his own right, and I simply could not resist, any more than he could resist me. He fell in love with me, writing a song that told of a fishmonger who shared my name. And I, unexpectedly, fell in love with him. Together we built a life of tremendous success and happiness.

See — I told you that Olivia Newton-John song hit close to home.

It was an idyllic life. Until he began to wither. A mere two score years had he. A short life even by the standards of the time. A blip on the clock that ticks, ever onward, marking my long, long life. I would never have been able to keep him, but I had hoped that, somehow, with love given freely, he might be spared the usual cost, the price of my magic: His life.

But it was not to be.

So I left, hoping distance might reduce the speed of his demise, give him more time on this earth. I paid to ensure his care until the inevitable end, but still I came back — more often than I’d like to admit — just to hear from a distance one more song, one more word in that melodious voice, to glimpse a rare smile and those grey eyes, whose bright light faded by the day. And when I stood at his grave, the hood of my cloak drawn over my head to avoid being recognized, I swore that I would take no more lovers, no matter the cost.

---