The Green's Hill Novellas Read Free

burst out with the truth, and Whim had never been tempted to test that particular weakness.
    “And don’t believe what you hear about foot size and penis size,” Whim added for good measure.
    “I’m sorry?” There was a curious blink, and Whim felt he should explain.
    “Humans believe that foot size is proportional to penis size. You were looking at my feet. They are very large. In fact,” Whim said as he held up a forearm, “they are the exact length from the crease of my arm to the edge of my wrist, and so are yours. I know, because I have a friend who makes socks.”
    “Burns?” asked the boy curiously, and it was Whim’s turn to blink. “You said the cold iron burns,” the kid enunciated patiently. “That’s why I was staring at your feet.”
    Whim nodded and shrugged and made a very rash decision, which would have surprised no one who knew him. It was Litha. If he breathed in deeply, he could set a shield between himself and this man-child that would deflect bullets and keep even the subtle, warm breeze at bay. With such a shield, he could stand on the railroad tracks and let the train batter him like a wave batters a beach ball and walk away without a scratch or even a blister from the iron itself.
    On such a night, with such power brushing his skin, what could this boy do to him, even with the truth?
    “My people are allergic to the iron,” Whim told him, and his glamour, which hadn’t been very firm in the first place because he’d been caught unaware, dropped completely, on a whim. The youth looked up into his triangular features, his wide-set eyes, and saw what he was ready to see.
    He must have been ready to see the truth, because his arm rose and his fingertip moved immediately to Whim’s curved ears, and he stroked gently, like a child stroking a rabbit’s nose. Whim shuddered sensually and purred. The ears of most sidhe were sexually sensitive, and his were no exception.
    “You’re real,” the boy whispered, his voice barely audible in the night quiet. In the rushing darkness, the shushing of the freeway could be heard. It was nearly three miles away.
    “You’re taking liberties I haven’t given you,” Whim told him, but he cocked his head and moved his body sinuously anyway. It was his ear . It just felt so damned good. “Of course I’m real.”
    The boy dropped his hand reluctantly, and Whim sighed and straightened his body. “It is dangerous out here for unwary boys. I’m an elf, and even I know that not all strangers mean well.”
    The boy shrugged, pulled his foot from the space between the two railroad ties, and hopped off the track altogether. “Folks don’t care much where I am,” he said.
    “Don’t you care where you are?” Whim was there under the moonlight because this was his holiday, a treat to himself. He wanted to feel the warmth of the lingering sun and the faint, cooling breeze. He wanted to smell the new-mown hay, brown grasses, and burgeoning green orchard smells that permeated the Sierra foothills in June. He wanted the absolute aloneness to seep into his bones, because it was so very different than the masses of family that beat in his blood from life on the hill. He cared very much where he was.
    “I care that I’m not at home,” the boy said on a bleak sigh.
    “Well, then,” Whim said, feeling a little disappointed that he would not be sharing flesh with someone this night—the boy was too young, after all, “for tonight and tonight only, I will care where you are, and this roof of darkness can be ours.”
    The boy looked at him with narrowed eyes. “Do you want me for sex?” he asked suspiciously, and Whim gasped a little. He had forgotten that with the changing of the years, human children had become more like sidhe children about these matters.
    “I don’t even know your name,” Whim replied, affronted. “And you are too young, even if I did.” The two of them began to walk together through the darkness, using the tracks as a guide but