The Faire Play Job

(Author’s note: First, I wrote this before the Leverage: Redemption Renn Faire episode aired, I swear. And I wrote the line “Nerf swords and inflatable horses?” based on his line about fighting someone with a Nerf sword in Damascus in “The Cross My Heart” job.  Second: this one is really long. Grab a snack and stay hydrated.)

“This job would be a lot easier if you’d stop bugging me, Parker!” Eliot barked into his com.

“But you promised we could meet her if you had a second date and now you’ve had tons of dates and you still haven’t let us go!” Parker hissed back. She was on top of a moving elevator that contained their mark, so not being heard was crucial. Eliot thought it was crucial; Parker clearly had other priorities. He slammed two guys together in sheer frustration.

“You can go on the next one if we live through this!” he said, punching a henchman probably harder than the henchman deserved. Tough.

On the flight home, she crept past 18 rows of sleeping passengers to his seat. He was reading Puck of Pook’s Hill, which Ophelia had given him before he’d left, but only after she’d read him the first four chapters. He had chosen the book from her shelves because it was old and looked interesting in a battered, well-read kind of way. If she’d been surprised he had chosen a book for children, she didn’t try to talk him out of it.

“I really am a Federal Air Marshall,” he said without looking up from his book. “I really can shoot you and get away with it.”

“I want Hardison to meet her!”

“You’ve met her, Parker. Why do you care what she’s like with me and not Sophie? And how do you know it’s not the same?”

“Because you like her so much you went to her office without telling any of us,” Parker said.  Elsewhere in the plane, Sophie made a note to remind Parker that sometimes girls could have secrets about Eliot that they didn’t tell him.  “We want you to be happy and if she breaks your heart we want to know how to kill her. So we need to find out her weaknesses.” Eliot knew full well her weaknesses were (in no particular order) her dog, pretty clothes, and sweetened iced tea. And possibly him, but there was no need for Parker to know that. Also: kill her? That was extreme.

“Go back to your seat!”

“You are so grumpy after jobs,” she huffed, unrepentant.

Upon consideration, Eliot thought this was her disquieting way of being supportive. It was the most unsettling thing she’d done in a while. Maybe for Ophelia’s safety and peace of mind, he needed to rethink telling Parker she’d moved to Tahiti.  Parker showing up in Ophelia’s classroom was likely to be far more chaotic than Dr. Wes Abernathy, vampire serial killer, could ever hope to be.

All the details of her lunch with Sophie and Parker had never quite emerged, even when Eliot presented Parker with the most lavish box chocolate candy Europe could offer. She had eaten all of it without disclosing a single detail. And enjoyed every bite. He hadn’t bothered to ask Sophie after their talk (the most unsettling Sophie had ever had with Eliot so far), but when she didn’t try to dissuade him from asking her out again, he took it as given that she approved. Infrequently, she would ask after Ophelia, and whether they’d had a good time doing whatever it was they’d done. Once, she had offered him theater tickets, which he had accepted. He had appreciated Ophelia’s enjoyment of the show more than the show itself, but had duly relayed her gushing thanks back to Sophie, who had congratulated herself. He felt good about that.

The next day, he called Ophelia when he knew she was out of class.

“Hey! Back from retrieving the lost ark?” She always seemed pleased to hear from him, no matter when he called. That was good for a man’s ego.

“We defeated the Nazis again,” he assured her. So was her way of pretending he was Indiana Jones. “Are you busy Thursday night? Parker and her boyfriend are going to watch a hockey game at their local bar. We could meet them if you want to. I mean, we don’t have to stay for the—”

“I think it sounds great! I’d love to meet Parker’s boyfriend. Tell her I said thank you for suggesting it.”

“We can leave if you don’t—”

“Eliot, I’m sure it won’t be a problem,” she said patiently. Almost too patiently, he thought, which might mean she had one of her students in the office. On the other hand, she might feel like this was the natural consequence of asking him to her faculty mixer. Since he already thought of her as part of his family, he had no idea that meeting his friends, especially a couple, might seem daunting to her. “It sounds great. Do you want me to meet y’all there?”

“I’ll pick you up,” he said. Literally any excuse to get her to himself for a while would do. “And if you’re not busy tonight?”

“I was thinking of making macaroni and cheese.”

“I think I can bring something that’s better than whatever that orange stuff is.”

They hadn’t been dating long, but he had already pointed out that just because she taught college students didn’t mean she had to eat like one. She maintained that cooking for one was a hassle, and that he was fortunate she wasn’t living on Cocoa Krispies. They usually compromised by either having something delivered to her place or him racking his brains to find a quiet restaurant that catered to his eccentric request to have her bring a book along. He hadn’t figured out how to offer to cook for her without it sounding like an outright proposition, even though it was something he very much wanted to do. But he was also afraid that such a suggestion, no matter how he meant it, would destroy the fragile magic between them. So one of the most feared men in the entire world stayed in thrall to his girlfriend, who would have been the first to encourage him to cook if he were so moved.

“Have it your way,” she laughed. “See you tonight!” She didn’t ask for details about when, which he found refreshing.

Thursday night found them in his car driving to Hardison’s pub, since it was raining. He had promised Devil he could go too if the weather was nice, so everyone concerned was a little disappointed. Eliot especially had been looking forward to the look on Hardison’s face when Ophelia walked in with a German Shepherd that looked like it was part moose.

“Have you met Parker’s boyfriend?”

“Alec Hardison,” he nodded. “Good guy. Super smart. I really like him.”

“What does he do?” She didn’t ask whether he was a spy like Parker, as she assumed that was not the truth but also an avenue that was bound to be twisty and confusing and best left unexplored.

“He owns the bar,” Eliot admitted. Probably best to tell her a little of the truth, because it was likely to come up. “And he does some IT consultation. If you ever have computer problems, he’s your guy.”

He’d rather throw her computer into a volcano than let Hardison get his hands on it.

“I told him about your typewriter and he got really excited about it. So if he asks you a million questions, that’s why. He kept asking me all this stuff about it that I couldn’t answer. But he builds robots and stuff all the time. He wondered about your process.”

Her hair swung forward to hide her face, and that’s when he realized she was nervous. Nothing about Hardison should make anyone nervous unless they had a credit card and used the internet, which now that he thought about it might make her really nervous if she knew. And if she knew how much research he had done on Eliot’s behalf about her…Eliot wasn’t sure what she’d do, but it wouldn’t be pretty.

Without taking his eyes off the road, he reached for her hand and kissed the back of it.

“Hey,” he said softly. “Don’t worry. They’re gonna love you.”

He would look back on that later and wonder if just maybe he had over-valued the opinion of his coworkers. Of course they loved her, which in no way made up for what they roped him into.

Ever since Sophie had pointed out how very much she communicated using her clothes, Eliot had tried to take notice of them. Tonight, for a casual night with friends, she was wearing jeans and flats and a hockey jersey, but not for either team they were watching. Instead, hers was…he had to guess, but he was pretty sure it was Captain America. Pop culture wasn’t really his thing, but he could at least respect that she was wearing the Captain for his benefit; it was a nice gesture. Later, Hardison would point out that her jeans had a red, white, and blue star on the back pocket, and that her intensely beaded purse had the same theme. These observations would not improve the quality of the conversation.

Hardison had alerted the staff that he and a party of friends were taking the back booth to watch the game tonight, mostly so they wouldn’t think he was spying on them. The staff was excited because Hardison was a good boss and if he was watching the game then they could all watch the game too. Tips were bigger on game nights, especially if the staff could get a good rivalry going between the patrons. He and Parker were sitting on opposite sides of the booth waiting. Parker played a game on her phone, Hardison watched the parking lot feed on his, which enabled him to see Eliot and Ophelia before they even reached the door.

“She’s a Captain America fan?” Hardison asked. Parker shrugged. It hadn’t come up at their girls’ brunch.

“How can you tell that?”

“By her jersey, woman! Did you get a picture of her at brunch? Never mind, I’ll pull it up myself.”

Parker didn’t even look up from her phone.

<Hardison>: Did you know she dressed like Scarlett O’Hara for your brunch?!

<Sophie>: Yes. She also has a bit of a hero complex, which makes her perfect for Eliot if he ever notices. She is quite smitten. He’s in way over his head with this one.

Nothing good could come from Hardison looking so happy before they’d even been introduced, Eliot was certain.

“Alec Hardison, this is Ophelia Mason. Ophelia, you’ve met Parker.”

“Hi,” she said genially. “It’s nice to meet you,–”

“Call me Hardison,” he said as he reached for her hand. “Everyone does.”

“Hi Parker. Cute top!”

Parker looked furtively down at her sweater, then grinned hugely at Ophelia when she realized the other girl wasn’t being mean or catty like some girls were. She reached out both arms for a hug, which nearly made Eliot stagger. Parker almost never hugged people who were expecting it. He hoped she wasn’t picking Ophelia’s pocket, because he just could not with Parker’s crazy right now. Parker would claim she was checking Ophelia for a weapon, Ophelia would rightly wonder why anyone expected she would conceal a weapon on her person to watch a hockey game at a bar, Parker would say everyone else at the table and a number of the patrons to say nothing of the servers were pretty well strapped for a Thursday night in a bar and also Eliot had the ability to use the cutlery AND the table as a weapon so who really needed a gun anyway. Eliot would end up having to separate them and between two angry, confused women was not a place he wanted to be.

Eliot slid into the booth next to Hardison, while Ophelia sat on the side with Parker.

“Eliot tells me you own this brewery,” Ophelia said. “I regret to say I’ve never been before. But a lot of my students come here, and they love it.”

“And we love students,” answered Hardison, who looked like he was barely older than most of them himself. “Tell them if they come here and mention your name, we’ll give them 10% off.”

“That’s very generous,” she chuckled. “You might regret it.”

“Look at this thing I found!” Parker exclaimed, shoving her phone at Ophelia with enthusiasm. They bent their heads together over a video, which gave Hardison the opportunity he’d been waiting for to gloat at Eliot.

“Are you sure this is the girl you’re dating?”

“She’s sitting right…I mean, she’s here! What kind of question is that?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Mr. I Don’t Watch Movies shows up with a girl wearing a Captain America jersey? Why is she with you?”

“It must be my charming smile,” Eliot growled as the girls laughed at something on the screen. A waitress arrived with menus. As she passed them around, Eliot raised an eyebrow at Ophelia, who smiled back without a trace of irony.

“First round’s on me,” she said, which earned her a hard high-five from Parker.

They had negotiated their way to appetizers when Hardison attempted a casual inquiry about her jersey. He completely failed at being subtle, which didn’t bother Ophelia; she loved discussing both clothes and nerd stuff, Eliot had discovered. Weird things made her happy, but then he also knew Parker. Under those circumstances, he couldn’t honestly say Ophelia was anything more or less than completely normal.

“I have an Iron Man one that lights up,” she said. “It’s great at Halloween.”

“Are you kidding me?” he asked.

“Totally serious. You clearly don’t, so maybe you need their website?”

“Gimme,” he commanded, handing his phone to this near stranger. Sure, he knew her credit score, but trusting her with his phone? Eliot was baffled.

“Done,” she said. “I like your background. The Spirit?”

“Look,” he said seriously, “we gotta talk.”

“You know there’s a Comic Con here,” she answered.

Eliot glared at Parker.

“Are they speaking English anymore?” he asked in a low voice.

“You know how he gets,” Parker shrugged.

“The Renn Faire is going on through the rest of this month,” Hardison was saying.

“Indeed it is, good cousin! I’ve already been one weekend this year.”

“You just go? Like, on your own?” Hardison found that both sad and great, and he texted Eliot a note to the effect he was going to be real disappointed to find out Ophelia had asked him and he’d declined to go. Eliot couldn’t give that the response he felt it deserved, but he landed a harder punch than Hardison expected on his shoulder as the Otters got a penalty.

“One of my friends teaches Chaucer, and I am a history professor. Lydia goes every weekend and gives her students extra credit for finding her. Lots of us go with her to hang. out. She also sits at a table drinking ale and nitpicking the details.”

“For the playtrons?”

“For the Faire,” Ophelia clarified. Well, for Hardison it was clarified; picking on cosplayers was mean. Picking on the inaccuracies at the Faire was part of the fun. Eliot and Parker remained completely in the dark although Parker was staring in a way that made Eliot consider all the decisions of his life that had led to that exact moment.

“We were thinking about going,” he said to a table of his very surprised coworkers. “Maybe we could go when you’re going too?”

“That would be fun,” she agreed. The waitress arrived with drinks, which seemed like a great time for Eliot to change the subject to something he could understand. Like hockey. Or urban warfare.

Parker waved a basket under Ophelia’s nose.

“Do you like pretzels?” she asked, with a noticeable edge to her voice. Ophelia recognized that pretzels must be significant, although she was unclear about how. She had intended to ask Eliot about Parker, but the opportunity had never presented itself, which was fine because she wasn’t sure she could articulate the question with any tact anyway. Parker had seemed nice enough, but also deeply strange. Which was really saying something, since one of Ophelia’s best friends taught Chaucer for a living.

“I do,” Ophelia answered without taking one. “But I prefer nachos.”

Parker’s satisfied smile was met with relief from the two men, although Ophelia would have been hard pressed to say why. Eliot had never been called nachos before; he thought he could grow to like it. Hardison thought there was no need for him to be so smug about it.

The game was more exciting than Eliot thought it would be; so was watching it in the bar. The other customers had chosen up sides when they realized that the game was on and nobody was going to stop them, the servers had chosen up likewise. Except for the near-fight (caused by Parker, because of course it was) that Eliot had broken up, it had been a reasonably fun time.

They were still having a good conversation more than an hour after the game ended and the customers started going home. Not that any of them noticed. They were completely engrossed in talking about everything. Eliot wasn’t sure, but he thought Ophelia had joined Parker’s book club plus Hardison’s trivia team. Parker was the one who went back to the topic that was to haunt Eliot’s dreams.

“So, that fair thing you were talking about,” she began. “Does it have rides?”

“Oh, some,” Ophelia said, changing conversational gears fairly easily for someone talking to Parker. “But it’s a Renaissance Faire. You know, Shakespeare? People dress up in costumes and pretend to be from like 1600? And there’s jousting. And sometimes mermaids. And shopping. And shows. A lot of shows.”

“You like that?” Eliot asked. Everyone at the table and the server would have called his response “unenthusiastic.”

“Love it,” she smiled. “But I get that it’s not for everyone.” She really was a doll, he thought. Trying to give him a way out. Because he definitely saw the path ahead of them as if it were lit by runway lights.

“How do you know?” Parker asked.

Ophelia blinked for ten solid seconds. Eliot counted.

“How do I know what?” she answered slowly, before throwing a glance that was obviously a plea for help. Eliot sat back and crossed his arms over his chest. Hardison leaned forward, his elbows on the table. Fat lot of help those two were going to be.

“If it’s for you?”

“I guess you go?” Ophelia offered. “Maybe wear a costume? See if you like it?”

“I want to try,” Parker announced. “It might be for me. It might be for all of us, so we can all go.” Just like that, Parker slammed Ophelia’s escape door shut right in Eliot’s face.

Eliot and Hardison exchanged poses like synchronized swimmers.

Ophelia glanced at both of them again, just to make sure they still didn’t plan to help. They didn’t. She drained off the rest of her drink.

“I want to be a princess,” Parker decided.

“I can probably help with that. What kind of princess?”

“A thief princess!” she answered gleefully. This was going to be so fun!

“Oh, like a Robin Hood kind of thing?”

“Yes,” Eliot and Hardison answered together, cutting off Parker’s response.

“I was going to go a week from Saturday,” Ophelia said, stepping with ballet-like precision into the path of the barreling C-130, to extend Eliot’s metaphor. “You could come over Friday night and we could have a spend the night party, try on costumes and stuff. Then some of my colleagues are going to meet for breakfast and we’re driving over together. Would you like that?”

“Yes!” Parker thought this was the best idea ever. “And Eliot and Hardison can meet us there!”

Ophelia signaled for another round.

Eliot knew she wouldn’t argue, she’d just walk out into the flight path knowing he’d rescue her. He had a less clear picture of who was going to rescue him.

“Costumes?” he asked, again, when they reached her door.

“I just invited Parker to spend the night in my house,” she reminded him. “Is Parker her first name or her last name?”

“Yeah,” he said absently. “Are you sure this is a good idea?”

“I’m no longer certain that my opinion of whether or not it’s a good idea counts. I don’t think there’s going to be any getting out of this for me.”

“What are you going to…be, I guess?”

“A fairy. My Chaucer friend always goes as one of the characters from The Canterbury Tales to make it easier on her students. But there are three or four of the rest of us going, and we agreed to be fairies because everyone had something that would work.” Eliot, who knew f-all about the Canterbury Tales, had no idea what he should look for, but a gaggle of fairies should be easy to pick out. He guessed.

“You have something in your house right now that would work as a fairy costume?” He actually didn’t believe her, although her explanation didn’t have the quality of a lie. He just couldn’t believe such a thing existed. Hardison had friends who did that stuff, but how he could have failed to mention that Ophelia was into…whatever this was…was mind boggling.

“I have multiple things,” she assured him. It was meant to be an enticement, but he completely missed it, concerned as he was about his next question.

“You don’t expect me to dress up as a fairy.” He didn’t even attempt to make it a question. That was as flat a denial as she’d ever heard.

“No, but please call me first if you change your mind and want some pointers.”

“Not Ophelia?”

“Robin Goodfellow.”

“Puck? That’s a male character,” he pointed out. “You’re going to all this trouble to dress as a guy?”

“Robin Goodfellow is like Ariel from the Tempest,” she explained in that way she thought was helpful but he usually didn’t. “He can manifest into whatever form he wants. And in this case, it’ll be as a girl fairy.”

“With the wings and all that?” He had visions of her as a fairy but was now concerned that her reality would somehow fail to live up to his imagination.  It was just as well he couldn’t figure out a way to voice that thought without sounding tactless.

“You know that you don’t have to do this,” she reminded him. “You can tap out or fake an injury or whatever. It’s okay. I promise I won’t mind.”

It was the kindest thing she could offer.

He had single-handedly defeated terror groups. Whole ones. How much trouble could one nerd faire really be?

“I’ll be fine, Princess. Don’t worry about me.”

He kissed her goodnight, made sure nobody was lurking around her house, then drove back to the bar. Maybe he was going to twist Hardison into a pretzel; he’d decide on the way.

The next day, he and Hardison presented a united front to Sophie, who laughed until she cried.

“Wait, wait,” she said for the fifth time. “You want me to get you costumes so Eliot’s fairy girlfriend can take the two of you and Parker the Thief Princess to the Renaissance Faire?”

“Would you like to come too?” Eliot snarled. “This isn’t funny, Sophie.”

“Well I can see that you don’t think so, but believe me when I tell you that it is truly hilarious.”

“Can you just get us the damn—Please, Sophie? Does this have to be a whole thing?”

She wiped her eyes again on a napkine that was completely soaked in tears and mascara.

“What,” she giggled, “would you like to be?”

“Shakespeare,” Hardison answered promptly.

“Something that isn’t stupid,” Eliot grumbled. “I ain’t wearing tights. Maybe a knight or something.”

“Impractical,” she waved the suggestion off. “I can find you a suit of armor, but it’s going to be hot and heavy and you’re going to be miserable. How about…,” she studied him for a long moment. This was going to be a tricky pitch for a man who was already angry and suspicious and letting himself think his girlfriend had conned him into this. “How about a pirate?”

“Fine,” he sighed. “I don’t want her friends laughing at me.”

“I can assure you they won’t. Come on, let’s go to the theater.”

“Sophie,” he was trying to be calm. “This shirt laces up the front. I told you I didn’t want to look stupid.”

“Which is why I didn’t bring you the shirt with the ruffle on the front! Will you trust me? I do this all the time, and I promise nobody will look at you and think stupid.”

Parker was so excited she called Ophelia every day that week, which was an unexpected hazard on Ophelia’s part. Also, Ophelia realized that “day” had a much wider definition for Parker than it did for most people with day jobs.

She wasn’t surprised when Parker arrived at her house 90 minutes earlier than the time upon which they had agreed without having asked for an address or directions. For the sake of her own sanity, Ophelia decided to pretend Eliot, who would not have under any circumstances, gave her the information and directions. She also ignored that fact that Parker was inside the house Ophelia was certain she had locked. Devil, who had been hiding from the intruder behind the couch, came out to tell Ophelia it was not his fault, exactly, that there was an interloper.

“Oh my god! You have a dog?! Will he like me?”

Ophelia had never seen Devil back away from a person before that night. He looked questioningly at her, to receive only a shrug in return. Parker was already on her knees cooing at the dog.

“Maybe you could give him a treat,” Ophelia suggested. “They’re just in that jar right there.”

Devil was somewhat pacified, but not easily fooled. He stuck like a burr to Ophelia the rest of the night. After dinner and some cartoons, Ophelia suggested they look at costumes.

“I pulled some things I thought you might like,” she said. “But if you hate them we can try something else.”

“I definitely want to be a thief princess,” Parker insisted.

Ophelia and Devil led her up the stairs.

“That’ll be your room tonight,” Ophelia gestured. “Let me know if you need anything. And here’s my wardrobe.”

She flung open the door to a room that would have made Sophie weep with joy. It was an actress’s dream, well lit, full to bursting with costume pieces, and with many reflective surfaces. Parker didn’t even care that nothing was organized. She gasped in amazement.

“I didn’t know people had this many clothes,” she whispered.

“It’s my hobby,” Ophelia said bashfully. “I probably shouldn’t. Or, I should tell Eliot. He doesn’t know about this yet.”

“It’s not bad,” Parker assured her. “It’s not like you steal people’s mail or something.”

Not going down that rabbit hole, Ophelia thought. She instead reached for a garment bag hanging on a nearby rack.

“Have a seat,” she offered. “This is what I found for you.”

Parker was enthralled at her selection. The green and gold skirt, the green corset, and the cape were, in her opinion, completely perfect.

“What about shoes?” she asked.

“Those boots you’re wearing will probably be fine,” Ophelia advised. “You want a lot of material between your feet and whatever’s on the ground out there. This laces up the front, do you need any help?” She held up a handful of ribbons in assorted colors, inviting Parker to pick the one she liked best, then advising her on how to lace it.

“Wait!” Parker exclaimed. “I have something too!”

Ophelia and Devil exchanged a look while Parker ran downstairs to get her backpack. She returned a few moments later with a linen bag, having tossed the rest of the backpack carelessly into the guest room.

“Here!” she said, thrusting the bag at Ophelia. “A princess needs a tiara!”

Ophelia opened the bag onto her lap and wondered whether she could be arrested as an accessory. These jewels all real, and all really valuable. Parker had tossed them at her like they came out of a gumball machine.

“Um…”

“I inherited them,” Parker explained. “So they’re mine.”

Ophelia continued to stare and attempted to gather her thoughts into something coherent before finally deciding acceptance was going to be the easiest way to get out of this conversation. She delicately pulled an emerald necklace from the priceless tangle on her lap, then slid the rest back into the bag. Carefully. Trying not to get her fingerprints on them.

“Do you mind if I do something with your hair?” she asked. Parker nodded enthusiastically as Ophelia reached for a ponytail holder and a comb. “Let’s try this…”

She pulled part of the blond’s hair into a French braid, formed the loose ends into curls that she draped over the girl’s shoulder, then arranged some fringe pieces to frame her face.

“And then we’ll add this.” She reached behind her without looking for a handful of bobby pins, securing the necklace into place. “Princess Diana did this one time when she had a sunburn and couldn’t wear a necklace. It looked amazing.” It looked, frankly, like the necklace she was holding right now. She pinned and re-pinned a few more places on the necklace to be absolutely certain it wasn’t going to move. Then she stepped from in front of the mirror on the wall and gave Parker a hand mirror.

“What do you think?”

Her eyes shone with ecstatic tears when she turned back to look at her hostess.

“I love it!”

After that, they examined Ophelia’s costume, which Parker also loved. She was especially entranced by the wings, offering to let Hardison work on them so they could flap on their own. Ophelia was more concerned with the composition of the outfit.

“Are you sure?” Ophelia asked, holding some of the garments in front of her. She had tried and rejected 18 versions of this outfit before settling on this one, yet she still had doubts.

“If you’re worried about Eliot, you shouldn’t be. I mean, you didn’t ask but it’s kind of obvious that you want him to at least not hate this.”

“Is it,” Ophelia asked faintly.

“I do stuff with Hardison all the time that I don’t hate, like go to those robot death matches, but that’s okay because he does stuff that he doesn’t hate with me. And sometimes he does stuff that he really hates, but it’s okay because we’re together.”

“That’s…I think I like that philosophy,” Ophelia said.

“It’s not a philosophy,” Parker answered carelessly. “It just is.”

When they called Hardison late that evening to confirm their plans, Eliot was there too, because he was making damn sure Hardison didn’t pull up lame at the last minute. Hardison, who had no intention of doing so because he’d wanted to do this for years, wondered how long Eliot was going to sit around being in a bad mood. He also wondered how long Eliot would let himself think this was Ophelia’s fault, when it was obvious that he was dying to see her in a fairy costume. He’d already mentioned it about fifteen times. But if he wanted to sit there and drink Hardison’s beer and growl at the television, whatever man.

“What time are we meeting at this place?” Eliot asked. He thought his tone was pleasant; Hardison didn’t. Eliot very much wanted to spend all of a Saturday with Ophelia, but he was also deeply suspicious that this whole costume thing was a con and he was going to look like an idiot.

“How about 10?” Ophelia suggested. “We’re meeting the ladies from work for breakfast at 9, so that should give us plenty of time. Do you know how to get there?”

“It shouldn’t be hard to find.”

“See you at 10 sharp!” Parker said into the speaker phone.

Behind her, Ophelia murmured “Doesn’t need to be that sharp.”

“See you then,” Hardison answered, ending the call before Ophelia had to acknowledge Eliot’s bad mood. That was no good for a new relationship.

“We’ll just follow the line of nerds,” Eliot muttered.

Devil slept curled up next to Ophelia that night in a way he usually reserved for thunderstorms.

The next morning, Parker was already up and dressed when Ophelia came downstairs.

“You look amazing!” Parker squealed. “I can’t wait for Eliot to see you! Did I do this right?” She gestured at her own outfit.

“Perfect,” Ophelia assured her. “I forgot, I have a quiver with some arrows that won’t hurt anyone that you can carry. But not a bow, because they won’t let you in with a weapon.”

Parker didn’t point out that the arrows themselves, even tipped with tennis balls, could be a weapon in the right hands. Her own hands, for example. But honestly Ophelia had so much to learn; Parker had no idea what Eliot was doing with all their time.

“How did you make your hair do that?” She gestured at the spiral curls Ophelia’s hair hung in; her hair had been straight last night. To be truer to the character, Ophelia also had two small spiral horns on her head, surrounded by leaves that complemented her skirt. She tried not to be completely unnerved that Parker failed to notice them.

“Oh, I just pulled my hair up and this clips on. That way I don’t have to use a bunch of hairspray and be all sticky and gross when the day is over.”

“You’re not wearing a tiara.”

Just because a thing is true doesn’t mean it isn’t also weird.

“Here!” Parker dug into her bag, coming out in a few seconds with a citrine and emerald brooch the size of a lemon. “You can wear this! It’ll go perfect right where your hair meets your hair.”

Ophelia pulled five bobby pins off her sleeve.

“Let’s make sure this is on really, really well before we leave,” she said. “Because I would feel terrible if I lost your jewelry.”

Parker didn’t see the big deal, since stealing it had been ridiculously easy, but enthusiastically helped her pin it in place.

“What are all these pins for?” she asked, around a mouthful of them. “Are we going to have to pick a bunch of locks?”

“Costume first aid,” Ophelia explained, ignoring the entire lock picking conversation. “I’ve also got safety pins, band aids, stuff for blisters, and a tube of costume glue. Sometimes you run into people who need stuff, and it’s no trouble to carry.” She zipped down the top of her boot. “Plus I’ve got a place for ID and money.”

Parker stared at her in awe until Devil dropped his food bowl on Ophelia’s foot. She gave the dog his breakfast, walked him around the yard for a few minutes, then put the TV on his favorite channel before leaving him with some reassuring words. He wasn’t worried; she always came back.

Breakfast in a fast-food restaurant was not a thing Parker did often. If the job required it, someone gave her money. If she was in an unfamiliar place and needed to eat, she lifted the money. But all the women in line ahead of them were Ophelia’s friends, and the people in line behind them weren’t obviously criminals. She was stuck. She stared at the menu board in a half-panic, wondering what to do. When they reached the cash register, she looked helplessly at Ophelia.

“Oh damn,” Ophelia realized. “I gave you a costume with no pockets, didn’t I?”

Parker attempted a smile.

“That’s totally my fault,” Ophelia assured her. “But don’t worry about it. Order what you want.”

Parker was suspicious. Already, Ophelia had introduced her to this group of women as her friend. Nobody did that with someone they’d only met twice, surely. And now she was offering to just pay for a meal, like money wasn’t important.

“Anything?”

“They have chocolate croissants,” Ophelia coaxed. “Have two.”

Eliot and Hardison leaned against a tree waiting for the girls to appear. Eliot watched the crowd carefully. All the people weren’t wearing costumes. Some of them were, as Sophie had predicted, hairy men in ironic t-shirts. Most of the women were dressed…well, they were dressed. There was that. There was a lot of cleavage on display, which didn’t bother him, he was just surprised that so many people were willing to pay to do this. Then three young women also dressed as pirates (he guessed) asked if they could have their picture made with him. Hardison volunteered to take it without laughing even a little. Eliot would have refused, but the bandana and the sunglasses (which he was afraid someone was going to tell him to take off at any second) hid his face well enough.

“Ain’t looking so bad now, is it?” he asked when the girls ran off, giggling.

“I feel like an idiot,” Eliot hissed. “And what are you, even?”

“Man, I am William Shakespeare. The playwright. The genius. The Elizabethan man. The man who invented words for his ideas and added phrases to the–”

Parker’s GPS pinged on his phone, interrupting his soliloquy.

“They should be coming out over there in a minute,” he said, gesturing for Eliot’s benefit. The path out of the woods disgorged an entire group of women, with Parker and Ophelia near the end. Eliot stood up when he saw her, stunned. Someone behind them obviously called her name, making her hesitate. She turned to answer, which was when he saw her wings and every thought he had flew out of his head.

She looked mesmerizing. The sun glinted off the coppery wings and the red ringlets in her hair. His nagging fear that dressing up as a character who was generally considered male dissipated completely; how she looked today was so far from the picture in his head, he was offended at himself. She was wearing a short, flared skirt in autumn colors that perfectly matched the park, and a leather corset that cinched her waist in so much he was surprised she could breathe. Her sleeves were belled on the end, dwarfing her hands. He had never wasted a second of thought in his entire life about whether fairies were real. He went from a complete absence of thought to the full belief his girlfriend was one in less than a minute.

Parker raced across the path and flung herself around Hardison. He could tell by the force of her bounce off the path that she was in love. God help Ophelia, he thought.

“Can you believe it?!” She cried, spinning in a circle with her arms thrown out, causing both men to back out of slapping range. “Ophelia made me a thief princess!”

She flung the green hood back to reveal a necklace Hardison knew to be worth more than $100,000 affixed to her hair like a crown.

“What do you think?”

“It’s you, girl,” Hardison answered. “What about us? You got nothing to say about me and Eliot here? We did this for you!”

She elbowed Hardison and pointed to Eliot, who was still staring. She eased up behind him to whisper in his ear.

“Still sorry you did this?”

“You could have told me, Parker.”

“I knew you’d like this surprise.”

Having finished whatever her business was with her colleague, Ophelia crossed the path to meet her friends, stopping just short of Eliot.

“You look very dashing,” she said softly. He thought she sounded impressed.

“I won’t embarrass you in front of your friends?” he asked. “I didn’t know.”

“You’re perfect.” He didn’t know about that, but he was glad she liked it.

“I can take these sunglasses off, if they’re illegal or something.”

“I promise there are no costume police,” she grinned, tapping her own. He wasn’t sure when he would have noticed them otherwise, although he had registered the little horns while he stared. “Your sunglasses will be fine.”

She smiled and reached for his hand, pulling him into Parker’s excited and one-sided conversation to Hardison. He pulled her closer, his arm around her waist. She felt like sunshine.

“Why do these wings have holes in them?” he asked, just to say something.

“So that they don’t rip when the wind blows,” she answered. He could feel the smile in her voice. “Or turn me into a kite.”

Hardison thought Ophelia had achieved a feat: both women were dressed in appropriate gear, while neither of them was a hard sneeze away from a wardrobe malfunction. He was impressed that she had pulled together two outfits in just over a week; maybe she could help talk Parker into Comic Con after all. Eliot was just glad people weren’t pointing and laughing at him. If anything, he seemed to fit in with the crowd; he wasn’t sure how he felt about that. But he was certain it was better than standing out.

“Ready to go?” she asked when Parker finally ran out of breath. “You look great, Hardison. May I pet your cape?”

He held out one elbow regally, deigning to allow her to feel the soft velvet.

“You both look spectacular,” she said. “Everyone else is going to be so envious today.”

“You made Parker a Thief Princess,” Hardison said as the thief radiated happiness. “It’s all she ever wanted.”

“Was this all your stuff, Parker?” Eliot asked.

“This was all her stuff,” Parker enthused. “I want a closet just like hers.”

Ophelia smiled apologetically at Hardison. “It goes all the way to Narnia.”

“We have to talk,” he answered.

“I’m here to help,” Ophelia smiled. “Speaking of helping…” She rummaged in a pouch at her waist that Eliot thought couldn’t possibly be that big. It was like she was reaching into another dimension. “Everyone gets a roll of $1 coins. For tips,” she explained. “For the performers.”

Eliot glared at Hardison over her shoulder while Parker ripped into her roll.

“And here is my phone number in case we get separated and you want to meet somewhere for lunch, or if you get tired and want to leave or whatever.”

“Can I see your phone?” Hardison asked. “I can just add you to our network. It’ll be easier.”

She passed it to him without a thought, though Eliot just barely kept from yanking it back out of his teammate’s hand. He wouldn’t put spyware on her phone today, probably. Eliot tried to communicate that with a glare, but Hardison wasn’t looking at him. In a few minutes he handed her the phone back. If there was anything wrong with it, she wouldn’t notice for days. Ophelia linked her arm through Parker’s and led them towards the gate. Parker was still chattering away, excited for an adventure. They could tell the exact moment when Ophelia mentioned a climbing wall, although neither of them wanted to hazard a guess about how Parker intended to climb it in that get-up.

“You better not have–,” Eliot began at Hardison.

“Relax, man. I’m not spying on her. This will just make it easier for us to find her if we need to.”

“Can anyone else find her?”

“Her own parents won’t find her if we don’t want them to.”

She flashed her phone at a man dressed as Falstaff, then gestured behind her. The man nodded as he called out an extremely rude greeting. Eliot was already drawing back to punch him when Hardison grabbed his arm.

“It’s their thing,” he warned. “Get ready to be offended all day. But, like, literarily offended. And I wouldn’t worry too much about her. In those boots she could kick a dude into next week. Do you think they really wind up? There’s that key sticking off one side. Parker texted last night to see if I could make her wings work, and I bet I could.” He pondered for a moment. “You know, I could redo them so they would flutter based on the way she walks. And then if Parker wore them, they’d flutter a different way for her, and if Sophie wore them she’d be different from the other two. I’m pretty sure I could even—”

“Dude,” Eliot interrupted. “Next time. I’m sure she’ll let you.” He had lost track of the conversation anyway after the bit about her walk causing the wings to flutter, wondering what exactly that would look like and whether or not she’d go for it. And whether or not she’d realize he’d be staring at her ass all day trying to figure out what changes Hardison might make.

They passed a lady in a long dress handing out maps, each taking one, then gathered around in an out-of-the-way spot under a tree to discuss the strategies.

A possibility occurred to Hardison.

“Wait, did you have the tickets for all of us on your phone?”

“Sure,” she shrugged. “We get a faculty discount. Otherwise you have to drink something like 30 Cokes to get $5 off or something. They use the college to recruit help and also boost the attendance numbers. The college uses it to recruit future students. It washes out.”

“I mean,” he protested, “we can’t just take your money. You’ve given up tickets and $40 worth of coins and we’re barely in the park.” And she was a professor and they were all very successful thieves. The difference would not just wash out.

“If it makes you feel, better, we can deal on the coins.”

“Deal how?” Eliot asked. He didn’t mind if she paid, if that floated her boat, but he certainly didn’t expect it, and he really didn’t want her to do it just to convince him to like this. He was still having a hard time shaking the whole fluttering image too, and planned to tell her that was payment enough as soon as he could find a way to articulate it that wouldn’t be completely offensive. The picture her book had created of Robin Goodfellow had been very different, and adjusting to her reality was taking time.

“We’ll meet for drinks before the fireworks, and you have to either bring back the coins or the story about what you used them for.”

“There are fireworks?!” Parker’s voice had nearly reached a pitch only dogs could hear.

“At a Renaissance Faire,” Eliot attempted to clarify.

“Sure. Traditional Chinese celebration at an English Middle Ages Faire. Don’t think about it too hard,” Ophelia counselled. “Besides, one of the other sponsors is that big fireworks place on the state line. Except the fireworks are adults only this weekend.” She took in the blank expressions around her. “To sell booze. Not because it’s rude fireworks. Although if they could figure out a way to do that, it would be super on-brand.”

She pulled everyone’s attention back to the maps.

“The joust is that way,” Ophelia gestured. “They do that in the afternoon. If you want a seat in the shade, get there early.”

“Guys in inflatable horses with Nerf swords?” Eliot asked skeptically.

“Guys on actual horses with actual lances,” she answered. “It’s horrifying!” He looked impressed, as she had hoped he would.

“The shopping areas are here,” she continued with a look at Parker. “The food is all in this area. The tents get really crowded around what you might think of as meal times, so plan accordingly. These are the theaters and the shows,” she paused to point out several places. “All of them are pretty good, and the ones marked with an X are adult only. Which means ruder jokes than usual.”

“What’s that one?” Eliot asked. He realized too late that standing behind her got him a mouthful of wing. He could adjust.

“The bird show,” she said. “Hawks, falcons, vultures. I love it.” She glanced up at Hardison and Parker. “Do not take food.”

“Understood.”

“And the rides are here, but they’re not, like, ride rides,” she warned. “They’re a great place to sit down if you get tired, though. Any questions?”

“Is that a dragon master tent?!” Hardison exclaimed. She grinned.

“It is, and I know them, so tell them I said hi,” she answered. “Ask for Alric the Unwell.”

Hardison hustled Parker away, leaving Eliot and Ophelia standing alone. She turned to find he was much closer than she had anticipated, and she was certain she’d been able to feel him in every nerve ending in her entire body.

He tried not to stare, finally lighting on the ornament in her hair. From here he could see she had clipped her hair on, not transformed it from more or less straight to extremely curly in one night. Didn’t necessarily make her less magical. He was fairly certain she’d never had horns before, but was so off-balance at her interpretation of the character his only thought was how she’d kept them hidden thus far.

“Did Parker give you that?” he asked.

“She did, and I’m terrified it’s going to fall off and I’m going to lose it. Do you have any idea how much jewelry she carries around? Or why?”

“I try real hard not to explain Parker. You make it through last night okay?”

She decided this was no place for propriety, stepping closer to fiddle with the ties on his shirt. The idea that this costume thing might not be so bad fluttered across his mind. He could feel her breath on his neck.

“I did, but Devil may never be the same. She scared the bejeezus out of him.”

“She has that effect on a lot of people,” Eliot agreed. “But she likes you.”

“How can you tell?”

“She said you smell like cinnamon,” he said. Then he decided not to talk about Parker anymore and leaned in to kiss her. She was an excellent kisser. Eliot had also been led to believe through Hardison’s research that her grandmother had kissed for England (and about five other Allied countries) if all the stories were true. He could do this all day. He actually lost track of the time until he heard the unmistakable click of a camera phone and a quickly hushed giggle.

“You’re going to end up with glitter everywhere,” she warned, rubbing her face against his cheek.

“Don’t threaten me with a good time. What do you want to do?” he asked, hoping her answer was to find a less public tree and make out against it for a while.

“You can tell a good pirate by the way he handles his sword,” she answered. “I know where the armorer is.”

She swished away with an insolent flip of skirts. He stood with his back to the tree a moment longer before chasing after her.

“Do you plan to do that all day?”

“I certainly do.”

To yank his attention away from her retreating figure and the whole fluttering situation, he looked around at the crowd. His first thought was that this was a completely indefensible, very soft target. His second thought was that there were kids everywhere, and all two million of them were enjoying the hell out of this place. Every kid he could see had a sword or a shield, was wearing part or all of a costume (or several, in some cases), and were chasing each other all over the place. This was probably a great place to be a kid, he realized. It was more or less fenced in and all bets were off. Rules didn’t apply until someone started bleeding. Frankly, it wasn’t a bad place to be an adult either. You could make rude comments all day without getting slapped (unless you were into that) and it was just considered part of the show. Everyone in a costume wanted to be seen, and everyone not in a costume seemed to admire them without overstepping and trying to grab something that didn’t belong to them. Plus, about half the women were carrying weapons including a lady dungeon master toting a convincing mace. Yeah, this wasn’t so bad.

He hurried to catch up to Ophelia, only to be stopped by a six-year-old pirate with an eyepatch and a sword. He also had a pirate hat and pants but a shirt with the Incredible Hulk on it. Eliot thought as looks went, it was pretty intimidating.

“Halt!” the little boy shouted. “I challenge you to duel Captain Hook, you stinky pirate!”

Ophelia turned, then gasped with laughter. A woman who must have been the little boy’s mother grasped her arm, apologizing.

“Oh no, are you in a hurry?” the woman asked. “I think we’ve let him watch Peter Pan a few times too many.”

“We’re good,” Ophelia assured her. “Just on the way to look at swords.”

The woman looked at Eliot, then back at Ophelia. Eliot would think about what made them both laugh like that later. The high five was disturbing too.

On the deck of the imaginary pirate ship, there was only one thing Eliot could do.

He pulled an imaginary sword from his side.

“Gladly. Prepare to meet your doom, you scurvy cur!”

The little boy shrieked with glee and ran at Eliot, chasing him all over the spray-painted outline, finally letting himself get caught by the pint-sized pirate. She had to admit, he could fake death by stabbing very well.

He gripped an imaginary stab wound, staggering around the gleeful little boy.

“Only one thing can save me, and that’s a kiss from a fairy!”

She waited until he was on the ground to save him, still laughing through her kiss.

“Is he still watching?”

“I don’t think he’s blinked since you started dying. That was excellent work.”

She helped him up to applause from the people who were gathered around, dropping a curtsey while she still held his hand.

“Were you serious about the armorer?” he murmured.

“Yeah,” she seemed surprised. “He’s a retired blacksmith. He makes actual weapons grade weapons.”

“Good, because I’m not about to go around the rest of the day armed with an imaginary sword.” He could have sworn she stifled a laugh at that.

But before they could reach that tent, Ophelia saw a performance of acrobats about to start. She pulled him into the theater at the last second. He could appreciate the athleticism, but still couldn’t get on board with idea of wearing tights. He watched her out of the corner of his eye, to see if she was overly impressed by guys in spandex. She didn’t seem to be, as much as she enjoyed the show.

“Sorry!” she said as they exited the theater and she dropped two coins into one of the performer’s hats. He greeted her by name. “I saw them last year and they were so good. In their last show they juggle fire.”

“Are they good at it?”

“I mean, if they aren’t it’s an excellent lead-up to the fireworks. But we were off to the sword master.”

Honestly, the best comparison she could think of was kid in a candy store. Eliot and the blacksmith had a disturbingly technical discussion about…stabbiness? And metal and alloys and firing temperatures and a lot of things she guessed he didn’t get asked by the average attendee. He belted one over his pirate sash, turning all the way around for her approval. The thought that he would probably do that again if she asked crossed her mind. Twice. Rather than act completely undignified, she walked a slow circle around him. Although he was flattered, he was in no way fooled.

“Are you sure you weren’t a pirate in another life?” she asked. “Because that’s really a good look for you.”

“The sword? Does it work for you?”

Everyone in the tent turned. Time seemed to stop while his words hung, very much spoken, in the air. And they were much louder than he intended. He thought he’d give anything to be able to rephrase what he’d said, then couldn’t help but grin at her impudent smirk.

“Amazingly well,” she said, pitching her voice into Lecture Mode, just to make sure everyone could hear her answer. The buzz of conversation began to rise to normal levels around them.

He stepped closer, stroking his thumb across her cheek.

“So that’s a yes?”

“Aye, Captain.”

He wrapped his other arm around her waist, pulling her very close; she was almost standing on her toes. It looked like a tender moment between two lovebirds, which it was, just not the moment anyone else was likely to think. He bent his head to whisper in her ear. Two, he decided, would be playing this game.

“Princess, you are one smart comment away from a walk the plank joke. You feel me?”

He honestly didn’t know how she caught her breath like that in a corset laced so tightly.

Ten minutes later found him paid out with the vendor, who gave Eliot his card and his private email address. Ophelia was leaning against a post, fanning her face with a map. She looked cute that color pink, he thought.

“Is it time for the bird show?” he asked. He liked bird shows too.

“Sure!” He was positive that surprised yelp was unintentional. She cleared her throat and tried again. “You like bird shows? That’s great! It’s that way.”

He grinned at her babbled response before he put his hand to the small of her back, guiding her towards the amphitheater. Giving her time to recover her wits a little, because she clearly had not expected him to play this game at her level. Well, he was full of surprises.

“What’s the deal with all this…is it chicken? What are these people eating?”

“Would you believe it’s the poor performers from last year’s show?” she asked. Good recovery, he thought. “They’re turkey legs. It’s not my thing, but there are some people who come here just for this.”

“Turkey legs?”

She nodded, her distaste for the concept as clear on her face as if it had been written in glitter.

“You know turkeys don’t look like that, right? I mean, I’ve seen some ostriches that don’t look like that.”

“I don’t really like to think about it,” she said. “Because I’m not sure meat intended for consumption should be that color either.”

“Do you want a drink?”

“More than anything.”

“Go on and get us some seats. I’ll meet you there. Okay?”

“I’ll be over to the side. Out of swooping distance.”

“Don’t worry, Princess,” he grinned. “I’ll find you.”

Since she didn’t know what Hardison had added to her phone, she thought he was a gentleman pirate indeed. He was certain he could pick her out of any crowd in the world, with or without software.

The state of the lines indicated he would be a while, so she shopped her way through the faire, poking around stalls full of clothes, jewelry, boots. Boots were one of her main weaknesses, so the boot vendor stall called to her like a siren. At one point, she was pretty sure she heard Parker laughing from the top of the climbing wall.

Along the way, she ran into some of her colleagues, joining their party for a moment, listening to their tales of the day so far. More than one of them had something to say about the man they’d seen her meet earlier, but he would have been pleased to know it was all complimentary, and a lot of it was envious. Especially the comments from her married coworkers.

A band shared the venue with the bird show this year. Ophelia wasn’t familiar with the Celtic rock band; she wouldn’t have necessarily picked them, but they had a big, enthusiastic, slightly tipsy crowd. Maybe they were more than slightly tipsy.

“Look!” Dr. Jenkins, Chaucherian educator,  exclaimed. “They’re dancing! Let’s dance, Ophelia!”

Dr. Liz Jenkins taught Anthropology, so she should have been the first to identify that what this crowd was doing in no way resembled an ancient dance of any kind, from any culture, in any part of the world. But she also would have been the first to identify that everything gets its start somewhere, and there’s no time like the present. She dragged Ophelia into the fray without waiting for an answer. She often did this to her students as well, which was why her classes were so popular. Another reason was that Dr. Jenkins was an older, comfortably sized woman who could and frequently did drink them all under the table, She was the only department head who was routinely invited to student parties.

Hardison and Parker caught up to Eliot in line for drinks, where none of them acknowledged that they might be breaking the line. It was a good-natured crowd full of people who had been drinking anyway, which was good because Eliot didn’t really feel like getting in a fight here. Despite what Sophie had said, there were plenty of guys here in chainmail and carrying shields that looked like they’d be really great weapons. Plus, it would be hard to explain to Ophelia how a brawl had started in the drinks line, probably. Although she’d been hugged by a princess in a rose crown, a kid in what looked like footed pajamas, two knights, and a wizard so far today. Maybe she wouldn’t think anything here was that weird.

“We’re going to the bird show,” Eliot said. “What have you been doing?”

“I climbed the tower!” Parker said. “Then got to jump off!”

“We won’t be going back to the tower any time soon,” Hardison mumbled. “It’s okay to drink here, right?”

“Looks that way. Have you tried these turkey legs everyone is eating?”

“You think that’s turkey?”

“That’s what Ophelia said too,” he admitted. “I hope that’s not our only lunch option.”

“I saw a place with pizza,” Parker interjected. “You plan on getting her the pink drink, right? I think she’d like that best.”

Eliot studied the limited menu before looking back at Parker.

“You think?”

“Yeah, it’s not carbonated. If she drinks something carbonated in that corset she’ll strangle before someone can cut her out of it.” A vivid picture, certainly. Eliot finally decided if he was going to cut through the lacing on her corset, it wouldn’t be in nearly so public a place.

“Did you get that sword after we got here?” Hardison asked. “That looks real, and like you can really stab someone with it.”

“Yeah, man! Isn’t it great? She knew the blacksmith. I got his number; he’s going to do some custom work for me. How did it go with your dragon guy?”

“Great,” Hardison answered, launching into an explanation that Eliot tuned right out. He couldn’t have listened anyway, since it was their turn to order. Hardison was still talking about elves or something when the three of them came around the corner to the field near the band.

“Is that what a fairy ring looks like?” Parker asked. “I always thought it was a ring you wear.”

Hardison reached to take the drinks away from Eliot before he dropped them all, because that’s where this was headed. He guessed Eliot had never seen her dance before, and certainly not dressed like that. The sight of dozens of women dancing in a circle, weaving in and out, laughing while clapping out of time with the music, was mesmerizing. A number of them were dressed as fairies, and the sun glinted off of wings and skirts and flower crowns, making a constantly shifting haze of color around them.

“Let her know I can definitely fix those wings for her,” he said quietly to Parker. It was no trouble on his part to give Eliot the moment.

“I’m pretty sure she’s magic,” Parker reiterated. She’d already mentioned the idea to him several times. “Do you think they’d let me dance too?”

“I don’t think anyone would stop you, babe. Go for it.”

She dropped her phone into her boot and ran shrieking into the crowd. Ophelia heard her and turned, beckoning her into the circle with a smile and an outstretched hand.

“Parker thinks she’s magic,” Hardison murmured from just outside punching distance. Startling a hitter was a really bad idea, even when he didn’t have a sword strapped to him.

“Parker’s right,” Eliot answered. His frankness surprised Hardison, because he was positive the ex-Ranger did not actually believe in magic or fairies or anything even sort of like that. “Did you know that about her?”

“Nothing I could have checked would have prepared us for this.”

“Keep telling yourself that, man.”

The band finished their set to a roar from the crowd, announced that they were selling a CD and would be back later. Eliot bought a copy, not because he thought they were all that great, but because it seemed like the right thing to do for a group that entertained that many people. That must have been what she was talking about with the tipping thing: someone did a thing you liked, you paid to show your appreciation. Even though the band wasn’t exactly responsible for the dancing, he’d enjoyed it more than anything he had seen in months.

He cut the girls from the dance, discovering too late it wasn’t nearly as easy to take the dance out of the girls. They twirled and spun around each other and him as if they’d already been drinking, or maybe like they were under some kind of spell. It was certainly some kind of magic that they ended up at seats on the side, recently vacated and in the shade. Parker leaped back and forth over the bench where Hardison was still holding the drinks while, under the trees, Ophelia continued to dance to a beat that was no longer there. Fortunately for him, her space here was much more limited, which constrained the amount she was able to move. He watched, counting for a few beats, timing until he could reach in and snag her by the waist, pulling her in tight and letting her momentum drag them both around once more. She wrapped her arms around his neck, throwing her head back to laugh.

“Please tell me you dance,” she giggled.

“If you called that back there dancing,” he answered, “I think I can handle that.”

She rested her forehead against his, still laughing, just in time for Parker to snap their picture. Usually Eliot was a no-pictures kind of guy, but she was pretty sure even he would commit murder to have it. And Ophelia would adore it. She loved to make people happy.

They joined their friends in the shade, eager for drinks, eager to hear how they’d passed the morning.

“Is this mine,” Ophelia asked, swiping her hand across her forehead. Everyone noticed that the glitter on her face, which should have wiped off, did not. “It’s pretty!”

“I knew you’d think so!” Parker crowed. “I picked it!”

“So drinks are okay here?” Hardison asked.

Ophelia drank deeply of…whatever that was, something vaguely strawberry flavored, and took a few breaths that Eliot guessed were supposed to be deep before nodding.

“Yes,” she answered confidently. Eliot doubted very much she remembered the question.

“You mean here at this show? Or here at the Faire?”

“Either,” she answered. “There’s a separate pub crawl ticket you can get, so you can drink your way through the Faire. I think it’s popular among dads.”

Eliot got the appeal, although the idea of having to wrangle more than two people in this crowd while drinking heavily made him think he’d made some correct life choices along the way.

“And it’s fine in here, especially since they had the band before and people dance.”

“Are there ever more people dancing than that?”

“For the last show it looks like Renn Faire Woodstock out here. It’s…it’s not exactly what you’d call pretty. And it’s no coincidence that the pub crawl ends right across the path there.”

“But not food?”

The announcer for the bird show had entered the stage with a vulture on his arm. The vulture flew off the trainer’s arm and immediately got into a tug-of-war with a Viking over a turkey leg.

“$20 says the Viking wins,” Hardison said. “Now I get it.”

The Viking lost, but it was not for lack of trying, and he was heard to shout something about a feathered headdress over his shoulder as he went to pillage another turkey cart.

“You’re kidding with all this, right?” Eliot murmured right in Ophelia’s ear.

“I am super not,” she promised. “Today is not going to get less weird for you. So drink up, me hearty.”

The planned show was no less funny than the unplanned excitement with the vulture winging it (between the lack of oxygen, the dancing, and the alcohol, Ophelia was in pretty good form with the bird jokes. Hardison estimated that she was likely to find Eliot 37% intentionally funnier than he usually was.) with one of the audience members. But Parker asked the most reasonable question Eliot had heard all day.

“When do we eat?”

“And where do we eat that isn’t half-raw meat still on the bone?” Hardison seconded. “Because, that’s nasty, and I ain’t fighting a vulture over lunch.”

“Is fighting the vulture an option? Because I think I could take him,” Eliot said. Hardison glared. Eliot was very confident he could beat a bird. Ophelia giggled at the idea.

“I’d even let you hold the sword,” Eliot continued. “And fight the vulture bare handed.” Which made Ophelia laugh so hard she had to sit back down.

“You were saying about where to go?” Hardison prompted.

Wiping tears from her eyes, Ophelia pulled a bedraggled map out of the side of her corset. Eliot had no idea how it got there; it certainly hadn’t been there earlier.

“There’s a food court kind of thing here,” she pointed out. “They have pizza and hot dogs and turkey legs and some kind of meat pies and clam chowder—”

“Meat pies?” Eliot asked.

“Clam chowder?” Hardison sounded faintly disgusted.

“Meat pies are truth in advertising, because they don’t tell you what kind of meat or what part of the animal. My best guess would be clam chowder-ish, and I wouldn’t eat it. Unless you love food poisoning. And in that case, you can get it in a bread bowl.”

Eliot suspected she meant the clam chowder came in a bread bowl, but agreed that food poisoning in a bread bowl was just as likely.

“And then there’s a pub here,” she put her finger on a numbered structure that looked like a tent, but it also had an enormously endowed cartoon tavern wench, so Parker guessed “not to scale” included the type of building too. “I mean, it’s sort of a pub, but it’s more or less indoors and has seats and you can order from their very limited selection. But they cook it right there and I’ve never known anyone to get sick from it.”

“You think that’s a ringing endorsement?”

“I think it’s better than meat pies. Plus you can get drink refills. Also, if anyone is up for it later, there’s a steak place on the way back into town that offers a 25% discount to people in costume. But you have to show your ticket.”

“That’s some genius marketing,” Hardison observed. “Get hungry people at the end of the day. I like it.”

“What do you mean, you have to show your ticket?” Eliot asked. “You mean there are people who would dress up like this and go out to a steak place just to get a discount?”

“Broke college students would do a lot of much weirder stuff for a lot worse meal,” she shrugged.

“What wouldn’t you do to get her to dress up like that again?” Hardison muttered.

“That’s different,” Eliot maintained. “And shut up.”

As they made their way back to the pub, Hardison told Ophelia all about the dragon master tent. Nobody would have known she had only the vaguest idea what he was talking about as she enthused right along with him.

“I think I can fix those wings for you,” he offered, when he ran out of things to say about dragons.

“Are they crooked?” she asked, reaching both up and down for them, behind her back which took no small amount of coordination. Behind them, Eliot saw her gesture, but couldn’t hear the conversation because Parker was still talking about how many rules they had at the climbing tower. Not that she had obeyed any of them, but she still found them annoying.

“No, I think I can make them move and look like real wings,” he said. “I mean, flutter and flap and everything. And I think I can base the fluttering on your gait, so they move when you move.”

She tilted an interested look up at him.

“You think so, Shakespeare? Because that would be awesome!”

“Right?!”

“And you can do all of this without making them weigh twenty pounds and have a battery pack taped somewhere? Because I can already tell you, the only phrase that strikes more fear into cosplayers than “taped battery pack” is “furry mascot head”.”

“I’ll work on it,” Hardison promised. “No taping battery packs.”

They paused so a family could get their picture made with Hardison, then walked on.

“Thanks for what you did for Parker, by the way. She loves it.”

“Well I’m so glad! I had fun. I hope she did too. Do y’all ever go to the con here?”

“We haven’t yet, I’ve been trying to talk her into it. But maybe she’ll consider it now.”

Behind them, Parker turned a serious look on Eliot, who had no idea what she was about to say.

“She’s magic,” Parker said. “I’m positive.”

“I agree,” Eliot said grudgingly. “Why do you think she’s magic?”

“She picked all this!” Parker said, twirling to make her skirt stand out.

“But maybe she just buys a lot of clothes,” Eliot argued. “I mean, I’ve seen five places here so far selling stuff like that. I don’t know why you think her ability to pick clothes are magic. She could have borrowed them from a friend.”

“My favorite color is green, Eliot. She didn’t know that.”

He stopped walking and turned to look Parker in the face.

“She didn’t ask you ahead of time?” He couldn’t believe it.

“Nope, she had everything in a garment bag in her closet when I got to her house. She didn’t even offer me anything else, but she said she could if I didn’t like this. But I did.”

“It could have been a lucky guess,” he countered uncertainly.

“Or she could be magic.”

The pause while Hardison had his picture made with another family allowed Eliot and Parker to catch up to them. He put his hand to the small of her back, noticing the way she shivered when he did.

“I was thinking,” he began. “How do you think I’d look with a hawk? Like, I could name him and he could be my mascot.”

Ophelia rejected the first nine responses that leapt to mind before settling on, “I don’t know the bird people, but if you want I can ask to rent their hawk for a weekend to see how you like it.”

He grinned at her, sure she was serious, sure he had overloaded her operating system too. She had all but glitched into squares. He’d seen Hardison do it often enough to know the signs. He had moved so slowly in his relationship with her that he could barely be said to be moving at all, but she was different. She wasn’t temporary entertainment, good for a weekend or even couple of months. Taking the time to get to know her, as Sophie had suggested, let him see her as an entire person. Just right now he wished he could get her entire person away from this crowd. Instead, he found himself seated next to her in a courtyard surrounded by tents and families.

A tavern wench seated them all, handed out the menus, and then said she’d either be back in a moment or made a very rude suggestion about what they could do when she got back, Eliot wasn’t sure. Given the way Parker glared after her, he guessed it was a rude suggestion.

“Did she mean that?” Parker hissed to Ophelia.

“No,” she said absently. “It’s just what they do. Everyone here does it, from the tavern wenches all the way up to the royal court. You get used to it after a while.”

“Then I don’t need to defend Parker’s honor?” asked Hardison.

“It all depends on how you handle a sword,” Ophelia replied. “Be ye able with one, sir, then happy your maid will be.”

Parker just stared, while Eliot and Hardison each silently parsed out what she had suggested, independently arriving at the conclusion that she had indeed just made a fairly rude suggestion in two dialects without even looking up from her menu. It didn’t appear she’d given it any thought at all, the words just came out.

Eliot slid his menu on top of hers, definitely recapturing her attention.

“You pick,” he instructed with a smirk. She quirked an eyebrow at him while giving him a moment to consider all the possible ways she might answer. He nodded, daring her.

“You wish that I should choose that upon which thy shall dine, good sir?”

Dammit all, he thought. He was sure he had her. This game was harder than he thought.

“Aye, Princess.”

“’Twould be mine honor,” she conceded with a smile, breaking out into a laugh when his ears turned red.

“One of my best friends teaches Chaucer, and she spends two weeks on the Wife of Bath,” Ophelia reminded them. “Every semester her students think they’ve discovered the original dirty jokes and we all have to hear them all over again. We basically never get a break. I can do this in my sleep.”

“Really?” Eliot asked.

“It’s not as much fun as it sounds,” she promised.

“What do you mean Court?” Parker asked. “With a jury and trials and stuff?”

“The Royal Court,” Ophelia elaborated, but not nearly enough.

Parker began to speak again, “I was on a jur—”

“Who is the monarch of this fair kingdom?” Hardison interrupted. No need for anyone who was Ophelia to hear about jury duty right now.

“Her most gracious majesty, Queen Elizabeth.”

“There’s a queen?!”

“Dammit Parker!” Eliot hissed, afraid everyone was going to turn to look at them. “Settle down!”

“Would you like to meet her?” Ophelia asked, moving just enough to give Eliot an affectionate bump. “I’m known in the Court circle here. I can have you presented.”

“When? Soon? What should I wear?”

“Today, when we’re done here,” Ophelia smiled indulgently. Parker’s enthusiasm, while odd, was charming. “It’s not a problem at all.” She glanced at Hardison and Eliot. “Would you like to be presented as well?”

“Not this time,” Eliot evaded.

“We’ll let Parker go first,” Hardison added.

Parker bounced up and down in her seat.

“How well known?” Eliot asked, hearing the echo of what she’d said. She had waved and spoken to people all day, but it just occurred to him that maybe she was Faire-famous and he should appreciate the fact that she was being seen with him more. “And as who?”

“As Robin Goodfellow,” she answered. “And pretty well. I haven’t ever been a paid Rennie, but I’ve been called on to perform with the Court on several occasions.”

“How did they know you could?” asked Hardison. This was something he’d missed entirely in his research, but probably because she never got paid for it.

“Please,” she snorted inelegantly. “My name is Ophelia, my mother teaches British Literature, and my father is huge in the theatre scene. They’re super well-known in everyone’s Court circles. It would be weirder if I couldn’t help them out.”

“What can you do?” Parker asked, thinking magic tricks but with actual magic.

“Recite a lot of Shakespeare from memory,” she answered as the tavern wench set their drinks down with a lot more cleavage than anyone (except Ophelia) expected.

“Really?” Eliot asked.

“It’s not as much fun as it sounds,” she repeated.

“Do something,” Parker insisted. Hardison held up a $100 at Eliot, who nodded; this would be the easiest money he’d ever made. If she said she could do it, he was confident she could do it very, very well.

“Were beauty under twenty locks kept fast/ yet love breaks through and picks them all at last,” she replied. They all stared at her; she hadn’t taken time to even think before opening her mouth and producing a perfect quote. A furtive glance made its way around the table, managing to skip over Ophelia, who didn’t notice it because she was signaling for a pitcher of ale.

“Told you she was magic,” Parker said quietly.

“I’m not sure I remember that from high school,” Hardison said into the ensuing silence.

“Venus and Adonis,” she supplied. “You didn’t miss anything.”

They all agreed: pub food was a much better option than clam chowder.

After lunch, Ophelia steered Parker towards the Royal Enclosure while Hardison and Eliot left for any other direction. They found the tents and businesses of several craftsmen, all of which could have kept Eliot entertained for a week.

The fourth time they stopped to look at knives, Hardison spoke up.

“I know it’s none of my business, but I think you’re slow playing this one,” he said. “And you wouldn’t be so interested in knives if you would just tell her you lost something in the back seat and need her to help you find it.”

Eliot carefully considered his answer.

“She’s different,” he said finally.

“Yup, if that wasn’t obvious this morning, it became obvious at lunch when she called Parker out as a thief in iambic pentameter. And when I was trying to get together with Parker, you said—”

“Parker already knew you were a thief,” Eliot answered hotly. “Ophelia doesn’t know. She doesn’t know about the jobs we take or the work we do…”

He stared towards the royal tent.

“And if I tell her now, she’ll leave. I don’t want her to know what I’ve done.”

“What, forever? How are you gonna pull that off, Eliot?”

“I don’t know, Hardison,” he shot back. “I’ll come up with something. I just don’t have all the details yet.”

“Man, this is not the time or the place to be talking about getting all the way out. And that’s what you’re talking about, right? You’re gonna just come up with something and hope she believes it for the rest of your life. Do you get what you’re saying?”

“I–,” he started to argue, without thinking. But he knew he didn’t have a leg to stand on, and that Ophelia was different from Parker in every way. She wasn’t like Sophie, and she wasn’t even like Maggie Ford. “I know I have to tell her something. But there has to be something in between telling her everything and—“

“And lying to her,” Hardison finished.

“Yeah,” Eliot nodded.

“Do you really know the Queen?” Parker bubbled.

“I really do,” Ophelia nodded. “I’ve been coming here for years, so I know most of the court. Sir Walter Raleigh is one of the Theater professors, and sometimes if I’m here for the late court show I do A Midsummer Night’s Dream with him.”

All of which went over Parker’s head, but she still thought it was glamorous and magical and that Ophelia was amazing.

When they reached the tent, a man in puffy bloomers smiled broadly at Ophelia.

“Mistress Goodfellow! Well met!” he boomed, causing Parker to look confused.

“Sir Walter,” she answered, resigned to the fact that she was about to get bear hugged. “A pleasure as always.”

“How art thou, mistress, and how might a lowly knave such as I serve the right hand of the Fairies?”

“I should like to present my worthy companion to her majesty, if she be inclined to hear a petition from a subject today?”

“For you Mistress Robin, anything,” he promised. “She’s just about to finish the knighting ceremony. Follow me. I’ll put you at the front of the line.”

“You could have Eliot be a knight?” Parker whispered, awed and quite loudly, directly into Ophelia’s ear. She hadn’t been expecting it. “We should go get him! He’d love to be a knight!”

She repressed a longing sigh at the image of Eliot as a knight before answering. That was, were she honest, an amazingly appealing thought.

“It’s for little kids,” she said. “I think you have to be under 12 to be a knight of the realm here. But I’ll try to find something else for him. You really think he’d like to be a knight?”

Before Parker could answer, and much to Ophelia’s disappointment, Walter Raleigh beckoned them forward. Ophelia reached for Parker’s hand; the thief was vibrating with excitement as the fairy pulled her forward.

“My Lady Goodfellow,” the Queen intoned. She was sitting on a real throne with a crown and everything. Parker could have exploded into fireworks herself. “Such a long time it has been since you availed yourself of our company. We have quite missed you.” Parker stared at Ophelia, who was still looking at the Queen.

“Your majesty,” she replied, sinking gracefully into a full-court bow, which was no mean feat in that outfit, “your memory humbles a lowly fairy such as I. ‘Tis mine honor to be in your presence again.”

Parker gripped Ophelia’s hand so tight Ophelia thought she could feel the bones rubbing together.

“Who have you brought to us today, Mistress Goodfellow?”

“Your most gracious majesty,” Ophelia said in her Lecture Voice, “please allow me to present her Grace, Lady Parker of Locksley Hall, recently of service as a spy in her majesty’s army, granddaughter of Sir Robin of Locksley to whom our most royal King Richard was so indebted. She brings honor to the name of her family.”

Which was complete historical bullshit. Undeterred, she tugged on Parker’s hand until the other girl bowed as well.

“Welcome, Lady Parker,” the Queen answered. “May your days be long and merry, and may we enjoy your company again soon. We thank you for your service in this most noble but secretive undertaking.”

“You’re welcome!” Parker shouted. Sir Walter choked on a cough that sounded suspiciously like a laugh as the queen turned her wide-eyed gaze on Ophelia, who returned a shrug. A hushed giggle rippled through the crowd.

“She is new to the court, your majesty,” Ophelia explained.

“But such a welcome addition,” the Queen answered regally. “Fare you well, Lady Locksley!”

Ophelia dragged Parker up the aisle while the enchanted thief waved over her shoulder.

“She called me Lady Parker!” Parker exclaimed. “Can I be royal now?”

“You are! Lady is a royal title in this case,” Ophelia answered. She was almost prayerfully relieved when Hardison and Eliot appeared seemingly from nowhere.

“That’s like a princess, right? So I’m really a princess now?”

“Yes!” No!

“Did you see me?! I got to meet the Queen!” She shouted this directly into Hardison’s ear, but he seemed to be braced for it. “She spoke to me! Did you see her crown?” She turned back to Ophelia. “Who’s Robin Goodfellow? Why did they keep calling you that?”

“I have rendered service to the good queen before,” she answered. “Usually as entertainment when the Fool gets sick and the Faire’s Shakespeare is here. He’s not today.”

“Because you can’t have more than one Shakespeare?” Parker asked, with a glance for Hardison.

“Because he likes to drink and drive and try to get out of tickets by reciting soliloquys,” she answered. “It’s a problem.”

She flashed a look at Eliot, who handed her a mimosa.

“Told you it wouldn’t get less weird.”

“You haven’t disappointed me yet, Princess.”

“But what did you find whilst we met her most gracious Majesty?” she asked. “Anything good?”

Hardison immediately produced a leather dice bag and a set of dice in what was purportedly unicorn horn. Eliot had placed an order with one vendor but found a journal he thought she’d like in a leather worker’s booth. It featured a quote from Midsummer Night’s Dream and a fairy embroidered on the front. The vendor had asked whether he was looking for a particular style or color of fairy as there were many from which he could choose.

“Well, my girlfriend is one today,” he answered, unsure what more to say.

“Might I have had the pleasure to meet this fairy before?” the vendor ventured. “Mayhap at a previous faire?”

Eliot gave him an inscrutable look as Hardison prepared to drag him out.

“Art thou familiar with Mistress Robin Goodfellow?” he asked. Hardison nearly fell over in shock.

“Aye, friend! Mistress Goodfellow is a welcome visitor to our village, and well known amongst even the shopkeepers such as meself. Allow me to offer you just the thing suitable for the emissary of the fairies?” He scuttled off to a back room behind a beaded curtain after Eliot nodded in approval.

“How the hell did you do that?” Hardison demanded.

“I’m not an idiot, Hardison,” he growled. “She said she’s performed here before, and even if she hadn’t, she told me when we first set this up who she was going to be. It’s from Shakespeare, which you should know. Even the people who suck at this should know the name.”

“Look, I know who Robin Goodfellow is,” Hardison started, only to be cut off by the returning vendor. Eliot had pronounced it perfect, then they departed, tent right.

“Do you have one already?” He had noticed that she had, just, a ton of journals in her house and her office.

“I don’t,” she said. “It’s beautiful. I love it!” She opened it carefully to smell the page. Hardison got it. Eliot got it. Parker assumed the pages were full of fairy dust and she was recharging.

The mimosa line had been short, since they were generally a morning drink and it was now the middle of lunch time. But it hadn’t been short enough to keep Eliot from hearing a familiar, if irregular, noise.

“What’s over there?” he asked, pointing vaguely in the direction of the mimosa cart.

Ophelia put her hands on his chest and stood on her toes to look over his shoulder. Nobody in the entire park was fooled, and neither was he. But he still grinned foolishly and held on to her, ostensibly to keep her from falling over. While he was reasonably sure it wasn’t a good idea to keep handing her this much alcohol knowing she couldn’t really breathe, he couldn’t convince himself it was a bad idea when she seemed so happy. Plus, he had bet Hardison that after four she’d be able to fly.

“Oh! The games! You want to go see?”

“Games,” he said skeptically. He still followed her when she pulled on his hand.

“The Queen knew my name!” Parker enthused to Hardison. “I think the Faire is my thing!”

“Axe throwing?” Eliot said to Ophelia. “They have axe throwing?!” She wasn’t sure she’d ever seen him so excited about anything.

“Aye, Captain,” she answered cheerfully. “Go hand ‘em their axe!”

He didn’t even care who saw this time, he kissed her on the mouth right in the middle of the Medieval Midway. She heard at least three camera phones before she started to giggle. If her wings could move, they would have been a blur.

After the first half hour of Eliot gleefully throwing axes at the targets and handing stuffed prizes to the little kids who gathered in droves to watch, Parker wandered off to the climbing tower again while Ophelia and Hardison sat on a bench drinking more mimosas. The hacker figured the fairy had drunk enough and eaten little enough that he could pass this conversation off as something totally else if she had questions later.

“Do you know any of the security people here?” he asked. Casually.

“You mean the bouncer-type people?” she asked. “Because if you’re thinking Eliot could do this part time, I think you’re really optimistic. It would be more fun for me than it is for him. I think.” Hardison glanced over at her and wondered again what Eliot thought he was doing. Whatever it was had to be taxing his sanity at this point.

“The computer security people,” Hardison clarified. Maybe starting this conversation right now wasn’t a good idea. “Because there’s a lot of unsecured Wi-Fi around here.”

“Is that a problem?”

“It is, especially with so many transactions. So, if you know those people, you could give them my number. I could set them up something a lot more secure. You know, in the interest of keeping all this credit card data safe. And I’d do it on a volunteer basis.”

“Aren’t you the sweetest thing?” she exclaimed. “I know people who know people, and I’ll definitely tell them. Do you want, like, season passes or something?”

“Could…could you do that? Because that’d be awesome!”

She smiled.

“It shouldn’t be a problem at all.” He was glad she thought so, because actual criminals would have a field day in this place. Just in the time they’d been sitting there, watching Eliot throw hatchets over his shoulder and hitting bulls-eyes, he’d seen 56 different credit transactions flitter across his screen.

“How did he learn to do that?” she asked. She sounded surprised, which he guessed was fair. Anyone could get lucky a few times at a game like this; the game attendant was now going to other booths to get more prizes.

“You know, I’m really not sure. Maybe in the Army?” That evasion was obvious, even in her inebriated state. Part of her said to leave it alone, another louder part said there was something important here. All of her needed water.

It was her turn to look at him, one eyebrow raised.

“He was in the Army,” Hardison said. “I’ve checked. He was a Ranger, even. Honest.”

“Shakespeare,” she said, the word having slightly more syllables than usual. “I’ve met plenty of people who’ve been in the armed forces. And none of them can do that.”

“Chef’s school?” Hardison ventured, because he did not want to get pulled into this conversation, especially with Eliot right there with a handful of axes. She considered for a moment, then nodded. He couldn’t believe it had been that easy.

“Did he just throw three at once?” she asked. Eliot had turned around to make sure they both saw. She flashed him a smile and waved.

“Yeah, he did.”

They were still sitting there drinking in companionable silence (frequently broken by people stopping to talk to her. Hardison couldn’t identify any commonalities amongst them, but did take note of some really great costumes) when Benedic from Much Ado About Nothing arrived in the midway.

“Mistress Goodfellow, well met!”

“Well met indeed, good sir Benedic!” she replied. “Might I introduce my friend William?”

The two men shook hands before he turned back to her.

“Mistress Goodfellow, I am upon an errand,” he said. “Don John’s spies have alerted me to the presence of a man who is handy with an axe, and they further relate this good man has been visited upon us by you.”

“He has,” she grinned. “Isn’t he cute?”

“Missing the point, Ophelia,” he said impatiently. “The games master is weeping. Please, for the love of all that’s holy, make it stop.”

“You make it stop,” she suggested. “I’ll wait here.”

“You’re not out of throwing distance,” he pointed out. “Please? For me?”

“What’s it worth to you?” she asked.

“Thou art turned mercenary?”

“Thou bettest thine ass.”

“Faire passes?”

“Pass.”

“Gift card good for any vendor?”

“How much?”

“You’re killing me, Ophelia.”

“I somehow didn’t hear a number in that.”

He watched while Eliot threw axes at three different targets at once, hitting them all.

“One hundred dollars,” he offered. She snorted. He crossed his arms over his chest. Hardison moved to stand up, only to resume his place at Ophelia’s glance. It wasn’t commanding; it was crafty. Shit.

“Let me save you a lot of trouble,” she said. “Three hundred, and not a shilling less.”

The glare Benedic turned on her was so unfriendly, yet so resigned to his inevitable loss Hardison started to wonder if maybe she wasn’t at least part fairy. Or maybe she was partway to being a grifter. But probably Parker was right and she did have some kind of magical powers.

“Make it stop now and we have an accord,” he said, defeated. “Agreed?”

“Agreed, and my regards to the fair Beatrice,” she said. “Always a pleasure.”

“The wise man knows himself to be a fool,” Benedic responded.

“Bid me farewell, and let me hear thee going,” Ophelia said. “And fast, because he’s not going to take a break from winning.”

She waited until he was out of earshot to turn to Hardison.

“Can I ask a huge favor?”

“I guess?” he said, staring at the man’s back. “What was that?”

“That was the Faire manager losing a negotiation to a fairy,” she answered, as if that were a thing that happened every day. “There’s a shield maker near the climbing tower. First: would Eliot like a shield, and second would you pay them for it? With this, I mean. And give them my address for delivery. I don’t mean you should spend your actual money.”

“He’d love it,” Hardison promised. “What do I need to tell him?”

She tore a page out of her fairy journal and produced an ink pen from… Hardison wasn’t sure where she had the pen. But she sketched out a quick design and handed it to him.

“Do you think he’d like something like that?”

“Verily,” he answered solemnly. She absolutely had Eliot figured out.

Benedic reappeared a few minutes later with a freshly printed gift certificate.

“You first, my lady, I insist.”

She passed him her empty glass before proceeding with caution to the axe-throwing venue, then cut a path through the onlookers to tap Eliot on the shoulder.

“Are you not entertained, Princess?” he asked, grinning.

“I very much am, my lord. However, it be almost 3 and 20, so mayhap we should continue our progress to the joust?”

“Who’s the mad guy?” he asked under his breath.

“Faire manager. The games master is weeping in the front office.”

“Want me to throw this one at him?” he offered.

“Wasted effort. It would bounce right off his ego,” she answered. “But you may color me very impressed, Captain.”

“You are?” He kinda hoped she was.

“I am,” she smiled. “Let us away.”

He handed over his last axe and bowed to the assembled crowd.

“I must take my leave, good people!” he announced. The crowd cheered and started to disperse; the show was over. Ophelia nodded to Benedic, who handed the certificate to Hardison before stalking off in the direction of his office.

“What happened to Hardison?”

“I think he was heading to the climbing tower to make sure Parker isn’t in Faire jail,” she said. It was true in a roundabout way.

Eliot really and truly thought he was going to have to knock Parker upside the head during the joust; she and Ophelia had taken a turn through the stables after they arrived from all points to the jousting arena. Meeting the knights was almost as exciting as meeting the Queen. Eliot had followed at a discrete distance, just to make sure there were no problems. Had anyone asked, he wasn’t sure who he expected to start something: the knights, who were known to take what they pleased, Parker, for the same reason, or Ophelia for hopefully spurning the attentions of an unwise knight. Only one had seemed inclined in that direction; he had skittered back to the barn when he felt Eliot glaring.

“Not sure this was a great idea, Princess,” Eliot muttered as Parker stood and shouted. Again.

“It’s a little like letting Devil chase sheep once a month,” she whispered back. “Get all that energy out before you get her back in the car. That’s part of what the afternoon joust is for.”

“Is there anything they didn’t think of here?” he asked. “Like, anything?”

“Nap rooms,” she answered.

They took their time walking back to the parking lot after the fireworks. The crowd, though smaller, was not diminished in any other way.

“Are we going to that steak place?” Parker asked. “Because I could use some real food.”

“Sounds good to me,” Ophelia said. “Captain?”

“Yeah, a steak sounds pretty good,” he said. “Since you’ve been drinking all day, why don’t I drive your car, that way Parker and Hardison can take theirs?”

She had, in fact, had enough to drink that she didn’t spot the flaw in that logic, so Hardison yanked Parker away before she could point it out. Halfway to his car, he realized he didn’t know where they were going. Ophelia texted back a message that was more or less coherent but most importantly contained a name. Due to a series of events he couldn’t quite understand, Hardison and Parker arrived at the restaurant first, only to be offered a table in the family section. He was down to attempting to bribe the host when Ophelia and Eliot arrived.

“Oh! You didn’t say you were with the Court,” the host admonished him. “We have a table right this way.”

Hardison turned an outraged look on Ophelia.

“I should have mentioned that,” she apologized. “Ooops.”

“Did you call ahead?” Parker asked.

“I sure didn’t,” she said. “But that would have helped too.”

“Then how did he know who you were?”

“Magic,” she answered. “Everybody knows me, good princess.”

“I told you!” she hissed to Hardison.

“I thought you were kidding that everyone came here,” Eliot said.

“I told you today was going to be consistently weird for you,” she reminded him.

“You did, Princess. And you weren’t wrong.” He looked at the table where the host had pulled out a chair. “Why a table?”

“Wings,” she said solemnly. “Have you ever tried to fit wings in a booth?”

After watching her try to fit them in a car, he got it, but he still would have preferred the privacy a booth could have offered them. Especially since a cheer had gone up from the back half of the restaurant when they she arrived. Had the three of them arrived without her, he doubted they would have been seated at all.

“Oh,” she said, looking past him at the tables behind them. “Don’t worry. It’s really bad form to approach someone outside the Faire. And a bunch of them don’t know for certain who can put a hex on them and who can’t. I mean, sometimes you get a family that just means well, but mostly they keep the families in the front and the cast in the back.”

“You’re not cast,” Hardison pointed out.

“I’m close enough,” she shrugged. The lights danced over her wings, making them sparkle. “And even if I wasn’t close enough, there are plenty of people here who would vouch for me. So we don’t have to sit in the cranky child section.”

They drank (Ophelia drank and Parker drank) and enjoyed an excellent meal wherein all the components were identifiable as food, talking over what they had liked most about the day. Eliot was in such a good mood, he paid for everyone’s dinner and tipped their waitress, who had expressed envy at their having been outside at the Faire all day, well more than enough to make up for their discount.

“You’ve been drinking all day and you have a sunburn,” Parker said to Ophelia. “How are you going to get home?”

“I can take her home, Parker,” Eliot answered, trying hard not to kick her under the table.

“But then how will you get home?”

“Will you look at the time!” Hardison exclaimed. “We gotta be heading on out. Bunch of stuff to do tomorrow. You know how it is.”

“You had a good time, right?” Ophelia asked. “I mean, you’re not sorry this is how you spent the day?”

“It was great!” Parker enthused. “I think you were right! It’s my thing! Can we go again?”

“We absolutely can,” Ophelia nodded. “I’ll look at some of the theme weekends.” She glanced at Eliot, who was getting impatient for Parker and Hardison to leave. “I’ll call you, okay?”

“Great!” They hugged and Hardison propelled Parker out of the restaurant as fast as he was able, which was not as fast as Eliot would have liked it to be.

“What about you?” she said, more quietly. “Are you sorry this is how you spent the day?” Because he was the one she’d been worried about.

“No, Princess. It’s not my thing, but I had a good time. I mean, I got to spend the day with the right hand of the fairies. Not everyone can say that.” He rose and extended her a hand, which she more than likely needed. “Might I escort thee home, my lady?”

“Nothing would bring me more pleasure, good sir.”

“No rude jokes? Really?”

“You’re sunburned too,” she said, leaning up to kiss him on the cheek. Another cheer went up from the crowd. He couldn’t be bothered to mind.

He truly had not intended to spend the night at her place, and he would swear on anything someone asked him to swear on.

But she had fallen asleep in the Jeep on the way to her house, so he’d carried her inside. Then he thought it was probably a bad idea to let her continue to sleep in her corset and boots, so he’d helped her out of those too. And while he very much wanted to remove her clothes from her, he didn’t want to do it while she was unconscious, so instead he unclipped her hair and pulled down her ponytail, then put her to bed and pulled the sheet over her. He would check on her in a little while. In the meantime, he went downstairs to Devil, who was thrilled to see him.

“She’s tired,” he explained. “But she’s also pretty drunk, so I’m going to stay down here. We’ll go check on her in about an hour, okay? Just to make sure she’s not sick or anything.” Devil thumped his tail on the floor, which Eliot assumed was agreement. He reached down to pick up her boots from where they’d fallen.

“Sophie would love these,” he commented, examining the pockets around the top. He set them aside when something fell out. Without stopping to think, because he was tired too after a long day full of nerds, he reached down for the folded page. It was a receipt. He turned to Devil. “Would she do something like buy me a shield?”

Devil grinned; it was exactly the kind of thing she would do. That, Eliot thought, was a game changer. She hadn’t known he’d ordered a chainmail shirt while she presented Parker to the Queen. He didn’t know Parker had mentioned he’d like to be a knight. She’d done it without even mentioning it, and definitely without taking delivery of it today, which meant she definitely planned to see him again. A girl wouldn’t spring for a gift like that if she planned to ditch him, right?

In the time he’d taken to get to know her, he had also realized she could do much better than him. Aside from the lies he had told her about his job and pretty much his whole life, she was a professor who was really good at her job. Hardison’s file said she’d written a book or something (Eliot had skimmed over the details), so she had that too. She could not possibly be meant for some guy from Oklahoma who couldn’t begin to tell her the truth. He was certain she would find someone better any minute, and they’d just spent an entire day with plenty of guys who had not only not bitched about wearing costumes, but they enjoyed it. And they enjoyed her peculiar humor without having to think about it. When he thought about it that way, he was desperate to keep her while knowing the odds were against him.

“All right,” he decided. “We’ll hang out, I’ll go check on her, then I’ll go get stuff to make breakfast for her. Deal?” Devil looked between Eliot and his empty dinner dish expectantly.

“Have you had dinner?” he asked. Devil barked, quietly because Ophelia was asleep, but in the negative. “Let’s fix that first, okay?”

A couple of hours later, Eliot went upstairs to make sure Ophelia was still asleep. She was sleeping soundly, exactly as he suspected an exhausted fairy would. Just to check, he told himself, he bent close to make sure she was breathing, then kissed her on the cheek.

“I’ll be back, I promise,” he said softly, stroking her hair back from her face.

Downstairs, he grabbed up her keys.

“You’re in charge while I’m gone,” he said to Devil. “If someone tries to come in and it isn’t me, eat them.”

Devil sat in front of the door, ready for anything, but hopeful that Eliot would bring back some eggs.

“She likes pancakes, right?” Eliot asked, right before he shook his head. He was talking to her dog like maybe the dog could answer. He didn’t know which would be worse: if the dog answered, or if he didn’t. But a fairy with a talking dog wouldn’t be the weirdest thing he’d seen today.

Since she was likely to be out cold for a while, he drove her car to his place, took a shower, and put on clothes that weren’t pirate clothes. Which he guessed was unfortunate in a way, since Ophelia had liked the look on him so much. The thought that all she had to do was ask and he’d do it again drifted across his mind before he decided to ignore it and get his griddle to take back to her place, because he was unsure whether she had one or not. Then, because he was tired and sunburned and a little out of focus, he made a list for the grocery store so he didn’t get bogged down. Fate or something was on his side, because the store wasn’t crowded this late on a Saturday night; in all, he was gone from her place less than an hour.

When he heard the shower turn on the next morning, he set to work, frying bacon, making pancakes, and putting a glass in the freezer to chill before he put tea in it for her. Because he suspected she’d have the mother of all hangovers this morning. Upstairs, Ophelia stood under the shower for a long time while she considered just drinking the water straight from the shower head. She had a headache so bad she was hallucinating the smell of bacon. Which was weird. As she dried her hair, the smell of pancakes wafted up from downstairs. Devil appeared in her bathroom, grinning his happy doggy grin and tapping around the bathroom in a most excited manner.

“Did someone break in to cook breakfast?” she asked. Devil gave his “hey! I know him!” bark, which he used to identify Eliot, mostly. “Eliot broke in to make breakfast? That…doesn’t really seem like him, does it?”

Devil didn’t have a comment, just went and stood half in the door, half in the hall, the picture of puppy impatience. So she hadn’t imagined the smell of bacon, because nothing made Devil that happy in the morning like fresh bacon, although it usually came from a drive-through window. Just in case it wasn’t Eliot, she pulled on some loose-fitting clothes (look, hanging out in a corset all day is painful, all right?) before heading downstairs.

“Eliot? Are you…?”

“Making breakfast,” he answered cheerfully. Sweet Jesus, he was a morning person. “Are you hungry? I made pancakes. Devil said you liked them.”

He handed her a cold glass of tea before pulling out a chair for her, which she sank into while trying to remember anything after they left the restaurant.

“Um, he was right,” she said. “Thank you?”

“You’re welcome,” he said. “Need some Tylenol?”

“Do you have some?” He grinned and passed two over, then set a plate of hot pancakes and bacon in front of her.

“These look delicious,” she said. Something in her tone still held a question, so he filled Devil’s prize ball with bacon and tossed it out the door. She might feel better asking them if the dog was outside.

He sat down with his own plate and something to drink that wouldn’t double as syrup.

“When…,” she started.

“What time…,” she went down a different path, but didn’t finish that one either.

He waited and ate. She ate and pondered.

“These really are good,” she said.

“You want some more?”

“Pancakes?”

He couldn’t help laughing.

“Phee, you went to sleep in the car. I put you to bed after I got the heavy equipment off you. Devil can tell you, me and him watched TV down here all night. And then I fed him, because he was starving.”

“Did he tell you that?”

“Seemed pretty direct about it,” Eliot answered.

“Did he also tell you I pay the neighbor kid to come over and feed him when I know I’m going to be late?” She picked up a vase of flowers from the table. “And he was here because the money’s gone.”

“He…might have left that out,” Eliot admitted. “Although it’s also possible I didn’t ask.”

She nodded slowly.

“More pancakes,” he offered, taking her empty plate when she nodded again.

“Why does that answer feel so disappointing?” she asked when he brought the plate back.

He kissed her on the cheek.

“I appreciate that you’re disappointed,” he answered. Then his gaze faltered. She laughed and almost instantly regretted it. “What?”

She wrapped one hand around his neck and rubbed her cheek against his.

“I’m not, actually. Because now I know you make excellent pancakes and would not take advantage of a fairy who wasn’t operating at full capacity. Even if the fairy would not have discouraged him.” Then she kissed him.

“Well, the fairy was unconscious. But I’m glad you like the pancakes.” He kissed her back before grabbing her tea glass to refill it. “Now, what does a fairy do the next day?”

“Usually lays on the couch and whines about how everything hurts,” she said. “And drinks a lot of water and then orders takeout for dinner.”

“Sounds like a full day,” he observed. “Maybe you need someone here, just in case you need a doctor?”

“Maybe I do,” she agreed. “That would be nice. I mean, unless you have other things you need to do. Then I…,” she couldn’t finish the sentence she’d started without telling a lie; she did want to keep him.

“They can wait,” he said.

In all, it wasn’t a bad day, even though he watched parts of three games and she drifted in and out of naps. He wasn’t sure how she did it, but every time he spoke to her, she answered without seeming to be talking in her sleep. He also watched enough to see that she tracked the sun streaming through the window like a cat, and staked out his own position accordingly. By that afternoon, she was mostly asleep in his lap while he watched the Vikings and gently rubbed a spot on her side that seemed to be giving her trouble.

“Yesterday wasn’t some kind of weird test you played on me, was it?” he asked quietly. He thought he knew her well enough by now to guess the answer, but he needed to be sure.

“I don’t give unannounced tests,” she yawned. “Ask my students. Just, life throws a lot of crap at everyone all the time, and I don’t care to participate in adding more. Why?” she twisted to look up at him. “Do you feel like you were getting tested?”

“I just, I mean, no,” he started.

“Because if anything, it was really a test for me, right? To see if my weird friends and the things we like to do would cause you to go insane?”

“I wasn’t–,” he wasn’t sure how she turned that around so fast, for one thing. That was generally his job.

“And honestly, I’m not sure if you did or not, but I like to think you didn’t completely hate it, because if you had you would have needed to alphabetize your socks or something today, right? Instead of hanging out here.”

“If you ever tell anyone I said this, I’ll say you’ve been drugged,” he warned her. “It wasn’t that bad, Princess.”

She turned her grin into something else before he could see.

“But you didn’t have to bribe me,” he continued.

“What now?”

“You know, with the coins and the jousting and the…your receipt fell out of your boot, Princess. I know about the shield.”

“You know there’s one on the way,” she countered, stretching. She even flexed her toes like a cat. “But you don’t know that was all you. The angry guy? The Faire manager? He paid me to make you stop throwing axes so he could get the games master out of his office. You earned that. I just turned it into something I felt like you could use. Unless you wanted season passes, I mean.”

Eliot rubbed a hand over his face and pondered, because he sure couldn’t look at her right now.

“You negotiated the manager from Faire passes to a shield when you had been drinking all day?” he asked.

“I negotiated him from just asking you to stop to a shield after I had been drinking all day,” she corrected. “Nobody ever thinks the tipsy fairy is going to outwit them, and yet she does.”

No wonder the guy had been so mad; she made a fool of the chief nerd in front of all the other nerds. And he himself had underestimated her capacity for alcohol and trickery.

“And as for the coins, I always do that if I bring guests to the Faire,” she went on, disregarding the fact that he was still puzzling over how she had negotiated anything, much less what she had, “because otherwise it’s like shoving people into the deep end of the pool and shouting “Swim!” at them.” She did look up at him then. “It’s confusing and unhelpful,” she explained. “And even though it’s just Nerds Day Out, nobody likes to walk around feeling confused and like they don’t speak the language, right?”

“How did you get him to agree to that?” Eliot asked, baffled. That was almost Sophie-level grifting. “I mean, did you threaten him with something?”

“I would never,” she snorted. “Besides, nobody would take me seriously.”

He could see that. He could see that they’d be doing her and them a terrible disservice too, because apparently she packed a wallop without ever having to lift a finger.

“I just traded him something he wanted for something he could afford,” she shrugged. “He wanted you to stop winning, he’s out slightly more than the cost of our tickets for the gift certificate, the shield merchant he hates who hates him in return got a customer and some business plus he gets to gloat when he cashes in the certificate, plus gets to advertise that he’s selling into the Fairy court. And in three to six weeks, you get a shield. Everyone on the midway could see that the games are, in fact, winnable, which is an accusation he gets every year, and a bunch of kids left happy because they got to meet an axe-throwing pirate who gave them prizes. Everybody wins.”

“I missed what you won in all that,” he said.

“I got to spend the day with the axe-throwing pirate, who went on to make pancakes for me and hang out for a second day even though he thought I was playing a trick on him by getting him to dress up like a pirate at all. And maybe later we’ll even order takeout.”

He didn’t answer for a long time, because he was busy considering whether or not time spent in his company was the reward she thought it was. Especially when she had free money at her disposal with which she could have done anything, but she chose to spend it on him simply because she could. She’d even found something he could appreciate (and maybe even use) just based on what little she knew about him. The idea that she might see him as redeemable after all lit a cautious little flame.

“You can use a shield, right?” she prompted.

“I can,” he nodded. “It just never occurred to me to get one before.” She arched up to kiss him, making him forget all of that for a while. “You really liked the pirate gig, huh?”

“I very much did, and I appreciated it too. I mean, you could have just gone for a t-shirt that said ‘This Is Me Costume’. Do I have Sophie to thank for that?”

“Yeah,” he said. “But if you could wait a couple of days to mention it, you’d be doing me a real favor.” Mostly so she’d stop laughing at the idea. Of course, Smug Sophie was almost as bad, and she would gloat about this for a while. “What were you thinking for dinner?”

“I thought maybe nachos.”