The stranger flashed her a smile that sparked and smoldered. “Well now. What is so fair a lady doing out on so foul a morning?”
His accent branded him an incomer—a man of education. A gentleman. A tourist. And a charming one, at that.
She couldn’t help her smile. “Looking for a pirate prince.”
His grin said he could be persuaded to take on the role. “What a coincidence. I was looking for a princess.” He took a step to the side, proffered an arm. “Shall we search together? It may keep us from stumbling into each other.”
“How gallant.” She tucked her hand against his arm, almost wishing she wore her lacy gloves and one of her lovely day dresses. Or that she’d done her hair up properly.
But no, this better suited the fairy tale. Visiting gentleman, common island girl. He most likely was no prince, but she’d forgive it. “Are you staying here or just visiting for the day?” Her eyes moved again to the mast she’d spotted on the water.
The fog had cleared a bit in that direction, fickle as it was. Revealing that it was no little sloop like the Naiad anchored there. It was a small yacht, its every sleek line screaming wealth.
“Just a day trip. I never pass up the chance for a bit of exploration. Sailed over last night.”
He must have been anchored there all night, then. A visitor wouldn’t have dared to sail such a craft through the shallows in this fog. “And how are you liking our island chain?”
“Well.” He angled a charming smile down at her. “I confess I’d been thinking it a bit dull. But I may have to revise my opinion. I didn’t realize it boasted such lovely locals. Do you live on St. Agnes?”
He wasn’t the first tourist to offer her a piece of flattery. But he was the first she wanted to believe meant it. Even so, she wasn’t about to spill her life story. “No. Just a day trip.” She offered a cheeky smile instead of more information.
It earned her a chuckle. “A lady of mystery, I see. Seems appropriate for a pretty girl who materialized from the fog. You probably live in a fairy cave somewhere. There are a few of those in the Scillies, aren’t there?”
“Two, both dubbed Piper’s Hole—one on Tresco and one on St. Mary’s. Said to have earned their names because you could hear the fairies piping in their depths.” She leaned a little closer and put a bit of Tas-gwyn’s inflection into her words. “And legend has it that the two caves are connected. That a dog who got lost in one emerged four days later from the other, half his fur rubbed off from the tight passages he squeezed through—but they’re big enough for a fairy, of that there’s no doubt. So one never knows when a troublesome little beastie might steal a sweet cooling on a windowsill in Hugh Town and leave it as a gift at a house in Grimsby.”
And when the fairies were too lazy for such mischief, Beth and Mabena had helped them out a time or two, just to get the talk going in the pubs that week.
His eyes danced. “And how many sweets have you stolen? Or is that beneath a fairy princess? Because certainly that’s what you are.”
Laughter tickled her throat. “You’ve found me out.”
“I knew it. No mortal could possibly have eyes that color, or a face so enchanting.”
And he had a tongue of pure silver. She wasn’t fool enough to take it seriously, but she was human enough to enjoy it. “Inherited from my grandmother, who all of Cornwall knows is the fairy queen.”
“She, then, is Titania. Which makes you . . . ?”
“Oh no, good sir. A fairy mustn’t tell you her name. There is power in it. Learn my name and you could hold me captive with it.”
Her companion lifted his brows. “I thought that was only true of Rumpelstiltskin.”
But it was such an interesting element that Tas-gwyn had borrowed it for countless stories, whenever a magical creature waltzed into his scene. “Who obviously had fay blood. So why should you doubt the same rules apply to a distant cousin?”
“Ah. Foolish me. Though now I’m even more intrigued. All I must do is learn your name and I can hold you at my side forever?”
Gracious. It hadn’t sounded so flirtatious when it had come into her head. Though she couldn’t quite decide if she wanted to parry it or keep it going a bit longer. She opted for a tilt of her own brows. “You can’t expect me to reveal all the secrets, good sir. That would be foolish of me. And Titania’s granddaughter is no fool.”
“I’d never think you are.” They’d meandered their way out of the heather, to the edge of the sand. “I’ll simply have to guess, then. Let’s see.” He turned a bit to face her, screwing up his face in thought. “Peaseblossom?”
He knew his Shakespeare, she’d grant him that. “That’s Grandmama’s servant, not her granddaughter.” Or so said the Bard in A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
“Of course. My apologies. Ah, I know. Rhiannon.”
She drew away a step in mock irritation. “I am Cornish, sir, not Welsh.”
“More apologies.” He swept his cap from his hair, revealing hair that was not Prince Rupert’s black, but rather a deep red. He wiped the mist from his face and put the cap back on again. “Then you must be Morgan le Fay.”
She sobered instantly. Morgan. In their house, it wasn’t the name of a sorceress of Arthurian legend. It was her brother. And hearing it fall from unknowing lips brought a flood of loss into her soul.
Here she was, flirting with a stranger and hunting pirate treasure, and Morgan was gone. Having never done most of the things he’d helped her dream of doing. Contenting himself, year after year, with tales of her adventures, when he never had the strength to find his own. It was so unfair. Why had God made him with a body that constantly betrayed him but paired it with a spirit that had so much to give? Why had his flesh withered away when his soul still had so much life left in it? She’d spent hours curled up beside him, exaggerating the mischief she’d found. Telling him of all the new places she’d explored.
Would she ever stop missing him?
Her companion’s smile turned to a frown. “I haven’t guessed it, have I? Is that the look of a fairy now bound to a mortal man?”
She had to blink to clear the past from her eyes. She managed a smile, but she knew it was dimmer than before. “No, I’m afraid not.”
“Then—”
“Beth? Where are you? Who are you talking to?”
She spun around, just able to make out Sheridan tramping through the heather at the top of the hill. She briefly considered letting him meander by, but he’d clearly heard her. The fog had probably carried their voices to him, which made her cheeks warm. It had only been a silly conversation, innocent flirtation, but still. The thought of him having heard it made a strange something wiggle its way through her chest.
He spotted them in the same moment that she turned, and he started down the hill.
Her stranger muttered something blistering enough that her head snapped his way again. He’d taken a step back, and his gaze was locked on Sheridan’s approaching form.
Sheridan shouted the same phrase and broke into a run. “Scofield? Get away from her! Beth!”
Scofield? Nigel. The red hair, the handsome face—probably all the more pleasing to her eye because she realized now that it was familiar. She’d never met him, but he and Emily looked enough alike that she ought to have realized straightaway who he was.