Leana woke after a surprisingly calm night – well after she fell back asleep after her little episode; her last episode if she could help it. She tossed around twisting herself further into the sheets and reached for her phone, flicking on the device to read a text message from Jonathan.
Jonathan – Hey, hope you're alright after last night. I'll meet you at Coffeebes at 1?
The date! It has completely skipped her mind. Leana shot off the bed and even tripped when she got tangled in her bedsheet. She was never this frantic! Usually, she could be described as calm and collected but this morning she was a bumbling mess.
Looking in her wardrobe she saw nothing other than clothing fit for a court visit. She could hardly show up to a date in a human coffee shop wearing something that would be more suitable for a prom. Defeated, she turned to her drawers to pull out a pair of human jeans and a jumper – making sure upon inspection that they would cover her arms and legs completely. Luckily, it was a cold day for August so she was sure that she could get away with nothing more than a few looks of questioning from passers-by.
Leana made her way to the bed to lay the clothes down however, upon seeing the horrific mess of specks of blood over her sheets that had leaked through the crappy bandages, she decided to use to chair instead – making a mental note to change the sheets before she went to bed tonight.
Leana peeled off her nightclothes as well as the bandages and threw them into the bin – there was no use trying to wash them; the blood that speckled them couldn't be removed easily and bleach and tender faerie skin was not a good mix. Scabs that reminded her of her little 'episode' last night littered her arms; she winced as she saw them. Sulking to the bathroom, she took a dry rag and wet it under the cold tap. Squeezing out the excess, she began to wipe at her arms, cleaning away the leftover blood to leave only the pristinely forming scabs. Normally, a human would have winced at the contact, but pain was something that Leana had gotten used to. The amount of times she had bruised her ribs training as a child prepared her well enough for that.
Once all the blood was gone, she staggered back into the bedroom, neglecting to put on the bathrobe that she had hanging on the bathroom door. Leana was never one who was afraid of nakedness. Where she came from, she often had maids that bathed and dressed her – usually Annette – so she did not understand the human obsession with modesty – especially when she was in her own home alone. Human underwear was something that Leana had fallen madly in love with. The fun designs and attractive silhouettes that they created! She had to cover her eyes when she saw her first underwear isle when Katherine took her shopping once. In fact, she was so embarrassed that Kath had even compared her blushing to that of a nun! She didn't know what a nun was at the time but after a quick google search she got the joke. Despite her original scepticism, she rather liked the new garments; they were comfortable, breathable, and supported her bust in a way that she had never felt before. It didn't take long before she had practically cleaned the whole isle of the things. Eyes skimming over her drawer, she eventually settled for a pair of purple Brazilians – she had even learnt the names – and a matching balconette bra due to the light fabric; wearing that damn jumper she would need all the breathing room she could get.
After cautiously dragging the woolly fabric over her arms, careful not to disturb the building scabs, and squeezing into the jeans that were perhaps a little too tight for her behind, Leana took a seat at her desk and pulled out an eyeliner pen beginning to draw a small flick in the corner of her left eye. Her pristine faerie skin was luckily something that she kept when applying her glamour meaning that foundation to cover up blemishes was never needed. In fact, Leana had never met another faerie who needed makeup. A few pixies were a little spotty sometimes but never faeries. After that, she tackled her matted head and yanked each individual strand separate with a thick bristled brush.
It may be a shock to know that when Leana was a child, she had been rather hair sore. As dearly as Annette loved her, brushing Leana's hair had always been the low point of her day. Eventually, it got so bad with Leana's thrashing and whimpering that she enlisted the help of Marion, an older sister to a girl of three four years old, to help with the difficult child. It turned out that everyone won, Marion got to spend some more time outside of the kitchen, Annette got a break and Leana had more tender hands to comb her hair every morning and night.
Now, she was simply not bothered. She wanted to believe that it was her maturing that had removed his consistent annoyance from her daily routine however, she knew this not to be true. Deep down she was well aware that it was the strain and abuse that had been proposed upon her scalp over the past three years by her wicked king though she tried not to think about it.
Upon getting ready to leave for her walk to the café, Leana threw her phone into the back pocket of her jeans – it was nothing special, only what she had bought at a second hand store to make herself blend in amongst the other students. A ten pound note was stashed into her other pocket as well as the key to her complex. However, just as she was about to step through the door, she caught a glimpse of the purple haze of hair fey hair in the corner of her eye. Turning, she took the fresh bottle from her desk and uncorked it, tipping a tiny drop down the back of her throat. Resealing the bottle and placing it back down, she looked up to see her hair turn back to dusty brown and her eyes the same. Sighing, she turned back to the door and left to meet Jonathan.
The scenic route that Leah had specifically left early to take, took longer than she had anticipated making her five minutes late. She prayed that Jonathan hadn't been waiting long. Stepping into the shop, the smell of pure coffee bombarded her. Luckily, it was one of the smells that seemed to relax her, along with fire and baking. She took a deep breath, inhaling as much of that smell as possible however, all air left her lungs when she saw the back of Jonathan's head sitting at a small table in the corner, occasionally sipping to drink a coffee.
Mustering up her courage, she made her way over to the table after mentally preparing herself. You can do this. Jonathan's nice. He won't hurt you. The part she left out was 'He's only a human, you could kick his ass' but even in her head she didn't want to sound prejudiced. Was that considered racism? To think of yourself as fey higher than humans? She had never thought about it before but she guessed it was.
She stood next to him to find him enthralled in some news article in the paper. Something on stock market figure. Something that Leah didn't understand; not that she needed to understand. Cautiously, she tapped the man on the shoulder. He jumped out his skin and beamed when he saw her, quickly standing which, she found strangely old-fashioned. His face spelled a combination of shock and excitement. Little did she know that she shock came from the fact that she had actually touched him! Skin to skin (minus the clothing) touching. She hadn't even stood too close to him before – a fact that sent Jonathan's thoughts mental – let alone touched him. "Leah!" He gushed with a smile, extending his hand to the chair opposite him as she smiled nervously shocked at herself that she even gathered the courage to come so close to him.
After she took a seat, a barista hurried over to take her order of a tall black coffee. Once she walked away just as quickly as she had arrived, Jonathan cocked a brow at her with a smile. "You like it strong?" He asked. Leah had to think for a moment to realise what he meant. Of course, he was talking about the coffee! What else would he be talking about? Why was her mind in such a tangled mess?
"Oh," She laughed cautiously as she curled up as small as she could appear without seeming weird on her chair. "Yeah," She told him with a smile. "I'm addicted, I'd never tried it before I moved here," Jonathan paused mid-sip of his drink and lowered it carefully.
"They don't have coffee where you're from?" He asked as Leah mentally cursed her own stupidity. Options of what she could do in this situation rolled through her mind ranging from breaking down and telling him everything to slaughtering him with a knife from the table next to them and running. Neither option was particularly desirable.
"Oh, no I just never had a local café and I never felt the need to buy it from the supermarket," She laughed nervously, hoping that Jonathan wouldn't continue the conversation and just forget about her continuity error.
"You're really not used to the city, are you?" He asked with a cheeky smile, sipping at his drink. Leah just smiled, she was unsure what to say and was simply overloaded with relief that he seemed to be dropping the discrepancy. As if sensing the awkwardness building in Leah, the barista made her way back over, placing the drink in front of her.
"That'll be £3.25," She beamed as Leah began to dig in her back pocket for the cash but Jonathan beat her to it, his wallet sitting in the much more accessible front pocket of his jeans. Leah never understood why humans made men's clothing with more and often bigger pockets – it seemed rather unfair if she was honest.
"Keep the change," he said with a smile after handing her four pound coins. The barista blushed at him and dived into her shoulders when she took the money from his hand. She clearly found him attractive but then again who wouldn't? By human standards he was gorgeous! Even to a faerie woman like Leana he at least matched the beauty of some fey men. She didn't think much of this fact though as Kath had shown her many humans who seemed to have gotten the good end of the gene pool – perhaps somewhere down their ancestry there was even fey in their blood. It was rare for fey to seek human partners back when the barriers weren't as well policed but certainly possible. Ruby Rose, James Dean, Audrey Hepburn, Johnny Depp – all of them had fey in them somewhere in their ancestry – she was sure of it. Jonathan's impeccable beauty aside, Leah's hand finally gabbed the note from her pocket holding it out to the smiley barista.
"No please, I'll pay," She told her with a nervous smile but Jonathan pushed her hand back down with a smile.
"Don't worry about it," The girl, sensing that she wasn't going to get the money from me instead so she just scuttled away. Once the distraction of the barista was gone, Leah noticed that Jonathan's hand was still over her own! Feeling all the fear rushing back, she yanked her hand away and clasped it close to her chest, causing the wool to rub against the scabs up her arms. When Leah winced, Jonathan snatched his own hand away and a look of regret and dread flooded his face. "I'm sorry!" He gasped reminding himself that touching her was possibly the stupidest thing he's ever done. He knew the way she was around men why did he even think that it was a good idea! After he had gotten over his initial regret, he noticed how she had winced and grasped her arm even tighter. Leah could feel his eyes all over her! Did he know? No! Of course not, how could he know? He was just a human! "Leah," He paused unsure if he was asking too much of her. "Is your arm alright?" Leah's mind scrambled. She couldn't hide this! She dropped her arm and tried to look as calm as she could.
"Yeah, I…" She stuttered. "Tripped on the gravel outside my place," She lied.
Jonathan didn't believe her for a second but if he knew one thing about the strange girl was that it was not a good idea to press her about things. "Well, you're fine now?" He asked, masking his concern with a final sip of his drink. Leah nodded and thanked him for the concern nervously.
Trying to diffuse the situation, he placed his empty cup down and squinted his eyes thoughtfully. "You know, my mother used to have the best remedy for things like that – she was one of those mad home-remedy people you see on the internet," He laughed. The thought of Jonathan's mother made her laugh, she had never met any family of the friends she had made as most of them lived in accommodations in the city alone. Stirring her coffee with a content smile, she pictured her own mother – how she imagined she looked anyway.
"I never knew my mother, or my father actually. They died when I was a baby," She revealed. Jonathan looked sad at first but he relaxed a little when Leah's smile assured him that she thought fondly of her parents and was clearly over the emotional weight of it for the best part.
"I don't remember much about my father either," He told her thinking himself, trying to imagine him. "He died when I was a baby. All I've seen is pictures,"
It seemed rather dark to bond over a mutual lack of parents but for some reason it comforted her knowing that Jonathan could imagine what it was like – even if the circumstances of their parent's deaths were probably about as different as you could get. She hated to make assumptions but she thought that it was highly unlikely that Jonathan's father, a human, was hacked to death so much so that his body was unrecognisable.
"My dad's best friend raised me," Leah remembered Ariana fondly in her memories. "She said that my father loved me very much," She had once doubted this fact as she had never seen her father. Ghosts were a rare sight in her Avalon however, they were in fact real as long as you shared a personal connection to the person you saw. Ariana claimed that she saw her husband many times! If that was so, then why hadn't her father appeared to her also? As she aged, she needed all the assurance of love that she could get and decided that there must be some reason for his absence. Perhaps, because she didn't remember him, the link was too weak for him to appear? Nonetheless, she tried not to think about it.
Jonathan smiled at her story and reached his hand out to rest it in the centre of the table just before hers and reassuringly leaned in to get her attention.
"I'm sure that they both did," Leah looked into the man's eyes and for a moment she forgot all of her fear and nerves about the man and looked down to her own hand. Leah inhaled shakily and made the decision to carefully slide her hand just an inch or so forward to touch Jonathan's.
The moment that their skin touched, Leah had expected everything to come flooding back but it didn't. She was still just as in control and powerful as before! Jonathan, on the other hand, was flooding his own brain with thoughts about what was happening. For the second time today, she had touched him! She really was trying for him and it warmed his heart.
After a moment, Leah retracted her hand and smiled. Not because she was nervous or afraid but because the prolonged silent eye contact was becoming awkward. Jonathan himself also retracted with a smile. So there they sat, for what seemed like hours, nattering about everything and nothing. Tutors, university, Sam and Katherine's inability to confess their undying attraction to each other. The hours melted away and for a moment, Leah forgot all about her true life. She forgot about the court and her mental state; She forgot about him.
After a while, the shop began to fill up providing little room to breath. "Perhaps we should let someone else have a seat," He suggested with a laugh. Leah agreed – after all they had been there for over two hours. The man inhaled and stood, holding his hand out to lift Leah from her seat also which she took! Another pleasant surprise however, he didn't push his luck and let go as soon as she was comfortably standing. In unison, the pair made their way to the door which he instinctively opened for her before following her out onto the street.
Stepping away from the door making sure that others could enter the shop if they wished. Jonathan pulled his phone from his pocket and groaned when he presumably read a message. Stuffing the device back into his pocket, he raised his hands ready to explain what was happening to her. Was he going to leave? She didn't want him to leave. In the small amount of time that she had spent with him she had become addicted to the effect he had on her! The final silence of her mind that didn't think about anything other than the here and now. She couldn't bear to part yet! "So, a friend of mine kind of broke into my apartment. I have to go," He looked genuinely sad and for that fact alone, Leah did not argue. She just lowered her head and told him that she understood.
Jonathan stood there for a moment unsure of what he was about to do was a good choice or not. He reached out his hand to take hers which most definitely got her attention. Her sad little face looked up at him as he raised her delicate hand to his lips and kissed her knuckles lightly, his emerald eyes not leaving her own. The contact sent shivers up Leah's spine but not bad fearful shivers like good dare she say aroused shivers? She hadn't felt aroused for over three years!
The last time, she remembered vividly. It was after Ariana had given her blessing for her to wed Deploma and she had gone to tell him. As soon as the news was out, she had dived on him, unable to contain her poisonous attraction to him any longer. For a moment he had reciprocated but stopped her soon after claiming that he didn't want to 'ruin' her in the event of his premature death. Not a great thing to say in an erotic situation but when you were the future king of the Unseelie court, premature death was something that had to be considered.
"Can we do this again?" Jonathan asked as he straightened his back and let her hand go. Leah nodded and smiled as she watched the man rub the back of his neck. "How are you getting home?" He asked with a raised brow.
"I'll walk," She told him with a smile. "I like the scenic route," Jonathan didn't like the idea of any woman walking alone through the city but it was daylight and he was sure that she could take care of herself so he just wished her safe and departed back towards his own home.
Leah stood there only just getting a chance to process what had even happened to her! She had faced her fears of another man, she had touched another man not once but four times – only once recoiling – and she even let him kiss her! It was only her hand but that was a big deal for her. Proud of her achievements and stomach still fluttering with butterflies, she began to make her way back home.
The walk presented her with no issue the way she had expected but her rare high mood began fleeting the second she opened her front door. On the floor was a letter. No postman knew where she lived, she had no bills nor did she give her address to anyone. Any letter that she got was from him. The mere thought turned the taste in her mouth sour – or maybe that was just the aftertaste of coffee. Either way, she sighed, picking up the letter with shaky fingers and closing the door behind her.
The anticipation was killing her, she had no time to find her penknife, Leah tore at the seal and threw it to the floor, not caring where it landed. Carefully, she unfolded the letter and began to skim over its contents.
Leana,
There has been a shift of events here at court. I met with the Seelie Queen whom, like myself, wishes to end this trivial dispute.
"Marry her then, you prick!" Leah muttered under her breath with a sour tone. She continued to read.
I have set a confrontation for yourself and her knight. You are to meet with him on the plain before our gate at 2 o'clock tomorrow night. Do not disappoint me.
Deploma.
He signed with his first name only, absent of surname and titles. That was a personal threat. What Leah read was 'Do not disappoint me, otherwise I will outshine any injuries that bastard could ever cause to you,'. Delightful man really. Scrunching the letter in her hand, Leah caved and cast her head down onto the table, encasing it in her scabbed arms and cried.