Chapter 6

Lilith

The thick, handmade paper of the wedding invitation was rough against my fingers as I followed the looping scrawl of gold foiled letters with my eyes for the hundredth time. When I'd received the missive from an old college friend shortly after moving here, I'd been so focused on being miserable and getting the shop up and running that I hadn't had room to be excited about the prospect of returning home to New Caelora for only a few short days. Obviously, I loved my home and wanted to be back there, but the exhaustion of the recent move and upending my life had burned out any desire to travel anytime soon, especially for something as short as a weekend. So I'd begrudgingly sent my RSVP, arranged for a friend to attend as my plus-one, stuck the note on my fridge, and put it out of my mind while I dealt with rearranging my life and revitalizing the new business.

Eventually, after having rested and settled in, I'd found myself feeling more positive about the trip, even as short as it was. The pretty, hand-pressed paper full of flower petals and little bits of colored paper would catch my eye from where it had hung on my freezer for the last few months, slowly becoming something fun and familiar to look forward to amongst the annoyances of learning a new and unfamiliar place. It was only recently, within the last few weeks even, that I began to look at the invitation with a hint of dread again, although for an entirely different reason. Sure, getting to see my friends and grab a bite at my favorite cafe and sleep in my own bed and drop in on my parents would be lovely, no doubt. And yet…

I couldn't help the way my mind constantly drifted back to my thoughtful, funny, shy, excitable, handsome, adorable upstairs neighbor. This would be the first weekend in months that we weren't going to be attending yoga together on Saturday morning or having tea on Friday night. He'd reacted to the news that I would be away for a few days by loading me down with a bag of his precious apples and some fuzz berry pastries for the trip home. "You might get hungry," he'd insisted as he folded them into my hands before I left for the train, as if I couldn't purchase food myself on that very same train. "But you can't buy these on your train," he said with a grumpy buzz when I voiced the amused thought, his antennae twitching as he fussed over me. "What if you waste away to nothing while you're gone? That's not going to happen on my watch," he said with a put-upon air.

I'd rolled my eyes with a smile, explaining that my plump derriere wouldn't allow me to waste away in a matter of a few days, even in the extremely unlikely situation of being unable to find food.

"Well, I wouldn't allow it," he'd said haughtily, as if such a thing were even a legitimate concern, and I'd chuckled at him, wishing not for the first time that he'd been the plus-one I'd invited to the wedding. I consoled myself that I had a hard time picturing him in the concrete and glass confines of the city. Even our parks were neat and tidy, perfectly manicured gardens without a hint of the wildness that the forest races often preferred. Alistair had his orchard rows, but even they seemed somehow different from the exacting order that elves practiced in our cities.

But I had already secured a longtime friend from my girl's school days as my plus-one, long before I'd actually become friends with Alistair. Merri was another elvish girl I'd grown up with, from a similar working-class family as my own. She also knew Stella, the bride, from college and had recently moved back to New Caelora herself with her husband and son. I figured it would be a good way to introduce her around and help her make some new friends, and I couldn't wait to see her again. It went without saying that I so appreciated her acting as a buffer for me at the wedding, in case our other college friends weren't able to attend. I didn't normally mind small talk as long as it had some kind of purpose—like discussing what kind of plants a person liked as I helped them figure out what to purchase at the nursery, or talking about preferred train routes with one of my old neighbors who traveled to the same parts of the city as me—but the aimless, time-killing chatter with complete strangers at something like a wedding was utterly dreadful. Knowing I had an old friend to come with me made me more comfortable.

As busy as we'd both been, me with the move and my friend, Stella, with planning her wedding, I hadn't been able to chat with her and find out who from our college friend group was attending. At least this way, by bringing along someone who would already know our friend group, I would be able to concentrate on them and be present with them in a way I hadn't been able to in years. At least, that's what I told myself.

When I stepped off the train in New Caelora that evening, I was greeted by the familiar scent of cleansing rain that so often showered the city, cooking food, and waste bins in desperate need of being emptied in the hustle and hubbub of the busy station. Dodging the many passersby both inside the station and on the sidewalk out front was a dance I'd known all my life, but I wasn't sure I'd ever taken notice of just how many people there were before. After hours of traveling, all I wanted was to get home and crawl into bed, so I flagged down a passing cab and gladly paid the higher fare for one of the speedy wyvern-drawn carriages. The elvish driver never spoke to me, just a tilt of his head to acknowledge he was listening as I relayed my address and a nod of thanks when I paid him before getting out. It was lovely.

However, when I finally arrived at my downtown condo and began opening windows to freshen the musty air that had accumulated in my unused home, I discovered that the aforementioned cleansing rain that was so ubiquitous in my city had been coming in through a split in one of the window casings in my living room—and evidently had been for some time. Dripping water had saturated the wall below the window, the hardwood floor around it, and several pieces of furniture nearby. I was in the middle of frantically trying to sop up the puddles of water as I waited for the building super to arrive when Merri, my plus-one, sent me a spectral messenger. I answered immediately, pushing some of my magic into the little pebbles we referred to as calling stones, assuming Merri wanted to compare notes on what I was wearing tomorrow or double check the time I was picking her up, and I didn't want to put her off and then forget to respond while dealing with the mess in front of me.

"Oh, Lilith, I am so sorry , but I'm going to have to cancel for tomorrow," her voice said as the lines of rainbow-colored spirit danced and flickered in the space in front of me. Spectrals had been carrying our messages for us since time immemorial, feeding off the magic we pushed into our little chips of stone for them as payment for their services, but that wasn't what I was paying attention to just now. "Little Bartleby has been teething lately, and he's got a tiny bit of a fever just now, so I'll need to stay home with him tomorrow," she explained, referring to her one year-old-son with a woe-be-gone sigh.

I was stunned, not knowing how to respond. Far be it from me to know how to deal with a teething toddler, but Merri had a husband, who also happened to be her child's father, and she had planned for him to watch their baby during the wedding anyway. "I'm… sorry to hear that," I told her, my statement coming out sounding like a question. I didn't want to be presumptuous, but… "Is it not possible for your husband to stay with—"

"No, sorry," she cut me off, her mind already clearly made up. "Chadwick just isn't as good with him as I am," she said, referring to her husband. "And a baby really just needs his mommy, you know? You understand."

A lump formed in my throat. "Sure," I lied.

"I'd love to get together after the wedding though," she inserted hastily. "Maybe the day after, if you're still here?"

"I'll be here," I said numbly, not understanding how she could know her baby would be well enough to be without her the day after tomorrow if he wasn't well enough for tomorrow. I'd planned to stay through Monday so I could stop in to see my uncle at the shop and visit my parents, but I could rearrange my plans on Sunday if I needed to make sure there was time for her too. None of my other friends had been able to meet up this weekend, so I'd kept my trip short. Just long enough to attend the wedding and see my family.

"Great! Talk soon," she said before the spectral winked out, leaving me in my empty, stuffy apartment with a dripping window and no date to the wedding tomorrow.

"This is utterly distasteful."

The elvish man next to me hadn't shut up about how much he hated the wedding since he'd taken his seat at my table after the ceremony. He was a dark elf, with gorgeous, flowing silver hair and an impeccably tailored suit. The permanent expression on his face looked like he'd just caught a whiff of old cat piss. His wife sighed from her seat beside him.

"No, Darla ," he whispered aggressively, as if she'd actually spoken. " It is. You know his parents have to be completely disgusted. It's bad enough he's marrying a—" His eyes cut to the side, taking in the other couple seated with us at the table, and correcting the word he was going to say. "—a non-elf . But the least he could have done was provide them a dignified wedding. Something they wouldn't have to be ashamed of." He'd been about to say, "marrying a goblin ," because my friend Stella, the bride, was just that—she was a cheerful little goblin with big doe eyes, impossibly cute freckles, and a wide, impish smile who'd lived on my floor in college. She'd met a seemingly nice elvish man who worked in finance with her after she graduated, and now they were getting married in a small garden wedding in the city. This asshole was talking about my friend!

His vitriol surprised me. Though New Caelora was one of the oldest Elvish cities, and certainly more homogenous than many other cities within our realm, it still had tons of diversity. Mixed race couples had been a non-issue for generations, and our generations were very long lived. I'd been somewhat shielded from the prejudices of the upper classes due to having grown up in a middle-class family, but I'd still not expected someone from our generation to feel the way he did, let alone be bold enough to say such a thing out loud, at the very couple's wedding, in front of their other goblin wedding guests.

" Excuse me—" I started to respond, outrage growing in my chest, but the goblin man across from us, who had clearly picked up the subtext of what Mr. Prissypants was putting down, forcefully interrupted me with a sneering, sarcastic, "Right, right. I was just saying the same thing to my wife too, you know? A traditional goblin celebration, right here in the middle of the city. I bet we could get a bonfire five stories tall going right here in this park." The goblin's wife swatted half-heartedly at his arm, rolling her eyes but ultimately choosing to focus on the buffet line, trying to see when it would be our table's turn to join the fray.

I cracked a smile at the smaller man's sarcasm. Where elves were known for our overly ritualistic, hours long wedding ceremonies that were often shows of wealth and stature, goblins traditionally hosted a raucous, roaring bonfire set deep in the woods. From the way Stella described it, everyone the couple and their extended families had ever known would be invited and the fire would be kept going for days as they roasted pigs and chestnuts and drank themselves silly. It sounded like a blast, and I kind of wished she'd opted for a traditional goblin wedding. At least people like this elvish asshole would have self-selected out of attending, but I understood why they'd opted for something tamer.

"I think it's incredibly charming that Stella and Ryne decided to do their own thing for their wedding," I told the asshole-elf sitting to my left, trying to deescalate the interaction when he sneered at the goblin man in return. The goblin man was more than a head shorter than the elf, but he was surprisingly muscular for a goblin, and I was already having visions of the smaller man with dark red skin and low-set, pointed ears climbing onto a chair to launch himself at the elf.

It had been a cute little wedding ceremony, followed by the guests gathering for a catered lunch at round white-clothed tables in a stepped down part of the garden nearby. A white cloth tent provided shade where the towering park trees were sparse, and birdsong and a string quartet provided background music. More and more of the younger generations were opting for these small, elegant, modern weddings they saw pictured in magazines or tabloids, and Stella and Ryne had chosen to go that route rather than hold to one family's traditional ceremonies and leave the other out. At least this way, both families were equally left out. And it was true that both sets of parents were probably not the happiest with their own people's traditions being eschewed, but to assume they were ashamed ? That was a reach. And to criticize their marriage to one another while sitting at their wedding? Beyond the pale.

"It shows a complete lack of regard for their elders and everything they worked for," he continued, gazing around the decorated space and pointedly not making eye contact with the goblin man who was watching him with narrowed eyes. If any goblin could have kicked Mr. Prissypants' ass, I'd bet money on this one.

"I don't agree," I responded. "Tradition is something you can be guided by if that's something you want, but if those traditions no longer work for you, then they become an unasked-for burden rather than a gift. I think there's beauty in creating something unique with your new family." Why did we have to assign some kind of moral value to the way things had always been ?

"Or perhaps they just come off looking like tacky, self-centered children," he retorted dryly, and the goblin man scoffed at him in return.

"Felis, you're embarrassing me," his wife whispered, finally giving a real name to the jerk as she seemed to shrink in on herself while looking down at her napkin wrapped silverware.

"This wedding is what's embarrassing."

The goblin decided he'd had enough, lifting his arm and jabbing a meaty finger at the table in front of him. "Why are you even h—"

"Look, Arek! It's food time!" The goblin's wife was up out of her chair in a heartbeat, tugging on his elbow. With a last irritated scowl for the very rude Felis, he clamped his lips together and allowed himself to be dragged toward the buffet line.

Seeing that the woman was right, I stood to follow them, leaving our elvish table mates to argue with one another about proper behavior at a wedding.

"That pretentious, weasel-faced prat…" Arek, the goblin man, grumbled when I joined the line behind them.

I nodded in silent agreement.

"Ignore them, dear ones," his wife said to both of us. "Your dress is beautiful, honey. I love the shimmer," she told me before she squeaked out an excited, "Oh, Arek, look! They've got roast pig puffs!"

I looked down at my dress and quickly realized that, though Alistair had never been around me when I'd worn this outfit, the shimmer she'd complimented was mothman dust. His sparkly scales had so thoroughly coated all of my things that nothing in my life could escape them. I felt a private smile spread across my face at the thought. I long ago stopped caring about the glittery coating that came away on my skin whenever I touched him. Every time I found the iridescent specks in my house or on my jacket, I couldn't help but smile to myself. They were a private reminder of the adorable, imposing, winged man who left them behind wherever he went.

"Do you like roast pig puffs too?" the goblin woman asked, misinterpreting my smile. She bore a lighter colored skin than her husband, a dusky pink color with the usual brighter pink coloration on her nose and ear tips that most goblins seemed to sport. Her eyes, like my friend Stella's, were a deep, soft brown. "I just love them with the bitter fern sauce," she continued. "They always hit the spot at weddings!"

"You'll have to show me how to eat one," I responded politely as I picked up my plate, and her eyes positively lit up with curiosity.

"You've never had one? Oh, you must try it. And the braised oyster mushrooms too," she added as she began to load down both of our plates, chattering about the different goblin foods all the while.

"Oh, now you've gone and gotten her started," her husband muttered good-naturedly.

Luckily, Felis was gone from the table when we returned, and neither he nor his wife reappeared while we ate. Arek's wife—Edis, she told me—talked animatedly all through dinner about the food and the wedding and how she was distantly related to Stella's family. I sat quietly, stuffing my face and making appropriate noises at appropriate intervals, and was grateful for both her good cheer and the fact that I didn't really need to contribute much to the conversation. Arek wasn't much of a talker either, so it seemed that she was used to running the show. I liked her immensely, but by the end of the evening, I was exhausted. It made me grateful for the comfortable silence that often existed between Alistair and me when we sat together while enjoying his rooftop garden. It made me wish—yet again—that he'd been the one I invited to the wedding as my guest. Although, I was glad he hadn't been exposed to the rude elf's remarks, and I guessed that he probably wouldn't have enjoyed the pig puffs as much as I did. I left as soon as was socially acceptable, stopping by the wedding party's table to make my goodbyes.

"Thank you so much for coming, Lilith," Stella said as I wrapped her in a hug. Her dress was a light pink organza confection that set off her pretty mauve colored complexion. She looked like the world's most adorable cupcake. "It really means a lot to me to have you here. I'm sorry more of our school friends didn't attend to keep you company. I hope the seating arrangement wasn't objectionable."

"Edis and Arek were wonderful," I told her, the only true thing I could say about the seating arrangement. "And the food was delicious. Thank you for allowing me to celebrate you and Ryne."

Since I had a little more time than I'd expected due to leaving the wedding early, I decided to stop by my parent's house afterwards. This way, my day wouldn't be so packed tomorrow if Merri still wanted to do something.

"Don't you worry about that leaky window," my dad said as we were finishing up our visit. "I'll make sure to stop by and check that your super has gotten it patched up nice and tight."

My mom took my empty cup of tea from my hands and went bustling off to the sink with it.

"Mom, I can do that myself," I called after her. "She doesn't need to clean up after me like I'm a guest," I told my dad as I collected my napkin. "It makes me feel like a stranger. And are you sure you have time to do that this week? Downtown is a little bit out of your way."

He waved me off and patted my shoulder. "I'll make time. And she's your mom, you know how she is."

"Do you want to take some of your plants home with you?" My mom popped back into the room, practically like a jack-in-the-box, carrying one of my leather ferns. "Surely you must miss them. Isn't your new place just utterly dull without them? Do you want to go through your old bedroom and see if there's anything you want to take? I can go get your bins. We can go through them right now."

It was nine o'clock at night. "No, not right now, Mom," I said with a groan. She'd been caring for my plants—which I appreciated—having moved them in among the dozens of her own plants. "I have plants, don't worry." The pothos that Alistair had given me was happy and thriving in my living room, and my apple tree was living its best life on his rooftop. I stood up to hug her. "And I don't want the bins. Please, just throw them out. Or donate them. Or I'll throw them away next time I come." I'd tried to get rid of it all before, but she was horrified at the thought of disposing of my childhood macaroni art and yellowed trophies or the old, mangled toys that I didn't even remember playing with. So now, every time I came over, she tried to get me to take them home with me. Going through the old bins was the last thing I wanted to do on a quick trip home to visit.

"No! That's your stuff! I can't toss out your stuff. What if your kids want it someday? I'll just keep it in your old closet until you want it."

I had never really wanted kids of my own, but for some reason, the first image that popped into my mind was of me trying to cram a caterbaby into one of my old jumpers with not enough armholes. I shook off the old thought and sighed before kissing her on the forehead. We would have this conversation for the rest of my life, I was sure. "I love you, Mom," I said as I gripped her tightly. "Thank you for taking care of my plants."

I was just so tired.

My stop by Blossom and Bonsai the next morning was quiet and uneventful. Melantha was doing a great job filling in for me, and I brought her a cup of her favorite coffee as thanks. The stock boys were all new hires I didn't know, and it was weird not having a grumpy dryad drifting to-and-fro among the plants. My uncle was always pleased to see me, of course, but they were all busy getting the store ready to open and I didn't want to be a distraction. I air-kissed them both, checked to make sure the current financial records were satisfactory—they were—and headed back home to check in with Merri.

Once I was home, I pulled the locket containing the strand of Merri's hair from the string of leather that I kept them on and used it with a calling stone to summon a spectral messenger. The little spirits needed some kind of anchor—a little piece of the person you were sending them to—to be able to find their destination. Because of this, we couldn't call for just anyone; it had to be someone we were close enough to for them to gift you a piece of their person. It occurred to me that if Alistair had been capable of using the calling stones, I had enough of his ‘glitter' in my clothes to be able to send him a message, with or without him purposefully giving me a piece of his fluff. Unfortunately, the older forest dwelling races, like mothmen and dryads, didn't have the type of magic used to power the little stones. I felt a little glum that I couldn't send him a quick message to ask if he'd gone to yoga without me or what the mushrooms were up to.

"Hello, Merri, I just wanted to see how your little one was doing and if you still wanted to try to get together before I leave tomorrow morning," I told the dancing wisps of light that spun in front of me as the little spectral collected my message for her.

Merri's response was immediate. "Hi, Lilith! Bartleby's doing great. So much better this morning. I hope the wedding went well . I wanted to see if you care to join us at The King's Ace for dinner this evening at seven!"

"Oh, uh." I stumbled over my response because I'd expected her to want to know more about the wedding since she hadn't been able to go, but I recovered quickly. "Sure, of course. I love King's Ace." But something about her wording was unexpected. "Who is ‘us'? Is Chadwick coming?"

"Oh, no, he's going to be playing a game of paddle ball with his friends," she responded dismissively. "My upline told me to get some of my friends together this weekend to talk about a business opportunity with you, and she's going to be explaining how it all works to everyone. And I think you are just so amazing. I immediately thought of you when she asked and how you would be perfect for joining my business with me. How would you like to pick your own hours and work from home selling the hottest new weight loss shakes?"

I completely deflated. Here I'd thought I was getting together with an old friend to catch up with her about her moving back home to her old city and her new little family and recent marriage, but she was really just trying to rope me into some kind of multi-level marketing scheme. "Merri, do you even know what I do for a living?" I asked, my confusion and disappointment coloring my words, as it was rapidly becoming clear to me that she had no idea who I was these days and didn't actually care.

"Well, no." Her bravado faltered before she found it again, continuing with a false brightness. "But everyone is open to change. You could even do this in your spare time and keep your day job if you wanted!"

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. It was probably pointless to argue with her, but my hurt feelings leaked through anyway. "So you have no idea what I do as a job, but you immediately thought I would be the perfect fit to join your business… selling weight loss shakes?"

"I run my own business selling Skinny Slurp: The most delicious weight loss shakes! And you would be running your own business, as my mentee! It doesn't really matter specifically what you're doing right now. It's about your personality, and how you're such a go-getter!" The false bravado was back in full force.

"Do you not hear yourself?" I asked her, completely baffled and unhappy. We'd been friends once, but it didn't seem like we were even compatible anymore. "Forget about dinner, Merri. I am absolutely not interested in any of that, so I'm going to pass on coming tonight. Please don't invite me to anything like this again." I cut off the supply of my magic to the calling chip that was pressed between my thumb and my forefinger, and the spectral messenger immediately winked out, flitting off to find the next message being offered for delivery.

I walked to my room, tossed what little clothes I'd brought into my bag, making up my mind to return to my little college town a day early, and then tossed one last scathing look at my leaking windowsill as I left my apartment. I was angry for many reasons: that my weekend home had been tainted by a bad friend, that nothing had been particularly pleasant, that nothing had felt like home. The whole time I had been here had been akin to trying to fit myself into a jacket that had shrunk in the wash. It looked the same, and seemed the same, but it just didn't fit me right anymore. The entire time I'd been here, I'd been thinking about Alistair and how my heart fluttered at his deep, buzzy voice and that irritated me too. He'd ruined my dislike of that shabby little village with his wing sparkles and his quiet questions. He'd made it seem more like home than my real home. I wasn't even sure which one was my real home anymore. And that made me angry too.

"To the train station, please," I told the cart driver with a certainty in my chest that I hadn't expected as I climbed in and closed the door behind me. It was the only thing that had felt right this whole weekend.

"Sure thing, miss. That's a real pretty apple you've got there," he said, nodding toward the piece of fruit I'd pulled out of my bag and bitten into. "Can't say I've seen one like that before."

An unwilling grin spread across my face. "No, you haven't. They're very unique," I told him.

Just like the man who grows them.