Swordfights & Lullabies Read Online Free

melancholy she was feeling tonight.  “I expected to feel sadder.  More lost.”  There would be some tears later—the Irish knew how to grieve things properly.  But they weren’t chasing her now.
    “I thought you might, too.”  Never tell a lie where the truth would do.
    “It’s why you came.” 
    “Sure.”  Nan sipped tea from her cozy rocker in the corner.  “Thought you might be needing a good kick in the pants.”
    Cass laughed and checked Rosie’s tuning yet again.  They had a special song to sing tonight, and it wouldn’t do to be off key.  “I think maybe I’ve grown up a little these last few months.  You’ll have less cause to be aiming a foot at my behind.”
    “Aye.”  Her grandmother stroked a stray pink sock.  “Picking up after a little one will do that to you.”
    It had far more to do with loving a man who had found the breathtaking courage to be happy.  “I think it’s going to be okay.”  Cass looked around the bus and realized she’d already said good-bye.
    The shape of Nan passed by in the growing dark.  “I’ll be inside, my girl.  I hear they’ve a passable Guinness here.”
    Cass watched her go—and felt the love that had been left behind to hold her hand.
    She looked around one last time and paused, attention caught by the motley, dog-eared calendar Tommy kept pinned to the wall at the front of the bus.  She never looked at more than one day at a time.  A rule.
    Carefully, she touched her finger to the 20 th  of June and smiled.  No fireworks.  No proclamations of the last day.  Just a place and a time, same as always.
    And someone, surely not Tommy, had drawn a whimsical flower on the 21 st .  Summer solstice.
    Tomorrow would be the beginning of a new season.
    An Irish witch knew something about trusting the seasons.  Cass firmed up her grip on Rosie, feeling the last of the strange fog slipping away into the dark.  And with the sturdy rumble of the rocks under her feet, walked off the bus and into a North Charleston pub.
    It was time for Cassidy Farrell’s last song.
    -o0o-
    “Hear you asked her to marry you.”
    Marcus looked up as Tommy slid into his booth in the corner—there was no mistaking that tone.  “Yes.”
    “Hmm.”  A Guinness appeared in front of Cass’s manager.  The man had beer magic.  “You better be good to her.”
    That went without saying—and yet, clearly Tommy had needed to say it.  Marcus dug for a reply that wouldn’t make both of them feel utterly silly.
    “He’ll do just fine by our Cassidy,” said a lilting voice, tucking in to Marcus’s left.  Nan, carrying a pint that looked almost as big as she was.  A reward for surviving the Internet pixies.
    Marcus read the lay of the land and looked at Tommy.  “And if I don’t, she’s far more of a threat than you are.”
    Nan beamed at the two of them.  “Indeed I am, and don’t you be forgetting it.”
    For a traveling musician, Cass had an awful lot of guardians.  And they currently had him neatly pinned into his quiet booth in the corner.
    Tommy looked at the newest arrival for a long moment—guardians exchanging messages—and then got up.  “I’ll go check Cass’s equipment.”
    Nan slid her pint Marcus’s direction.  “For you.  I’ve tea coming shortly.”
    For the second time in as many minutes, he found himself speechless and digging for words.
    Her smile told him that was entirely unnecessary.  “You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to my Cassie,” said the old woman softly.  “You see her for who she is, and allow her the dream of who she can be.”
    He was only a man lucky enough to stand in the light of her sun.  “I’m pretty sure she had all that long before she met me.”
    “No.”  Nan shook her head, and then nodded at the server who dropped off her tea.  “You wear humility well, but it’s not needed here.  You’re very good for her, and I hope you know it.”
    She would be good for him every day of