Page 5 of Mushy Stuff (Guardian Mates #1)

This little female…I can’t figure her out. She isn’t afraid of me, so she may be unwell.

She looks around the cave with genuine awe. I watch her as she studies each mushroom. She really seems to love them.

She pulls out her little light box. “Is it okay if I take a picture?”

I look at her light box warily.

She says, “It’s just my phone. I won’t use flash or anything.”

I decide that I can’t see how her light box could hurt anything, so I nod to let her know it’s okay.

She’s so excited that I agreed that she squeals.

The sound stings my ears, but it’s worth the look of happiness on her face.

I watch her use the phone to take pictures .

Her face is bright with joy, and she looks very pretty this way.

Why am I thinking about how pretty a human is?

The longer she is in this small cave with me, the more her scent permeates the air. Hers is the only scent I can smell, and I feel like it has sunk into my core. Her scent is a part of me now.

She stops to look at me while I’m standing at the wall. “Can I take a picture of you?”

This makes me anxious, and she notices how uneasy I am.

“It’s perfectly safe.” She does something on her phone, then she stands in front of me. She’s very close to me, probably within arm’s reach. She holds the phone up in front of her and it makes a small clicking noise. I’m too busy looking at her to pay much attention to the phone.

“Perfect!” she says as she steps away from me.

She’s still looking at something on her phone when she gasps and says, “Oh! You have a tail! I just noticed it in the picture!” She walks around me to get a better look at it.

She studies my tail for a minute, and the attention makes me uncomfortable, so my tail loudly thwacks against the floor. I practically groan with embarrassment.

She giggles. “Is that good or bad?”

Before I can respond, she continues, “Can I touch it? ”

I just stare at her dumbfounded. She wants to touch me?

She blushes. “Your tail…can I touch your tail?”

I’m still so shocked that I can’t reply, so I just nod.

She squats down and pets the tuft of hair on the end of my tail. She’s being very soft and gentle, but her touch still makes my tail twitch. Maybe it’s because her touch is so soft and gentle that it twitches.

She stands back up and goes back to looking at mushrooms, and I watch her as she does.

She surveys the room and says, “It’s so beautiful! I can’t believe I’m seeing this.”

I think for a moment. “Do you want to see more?”

She turns to me and her eyes light up. “There’s more?!”

“Yes, come with me.” I walk toward the exit of this chamber, and she follows me.

We enter another chamber of the cave, and she gasps as soon as she walks in.

This room has an opening in the ceiling where sunlight comes through. There’s a small waterfall that pours through the opening and into the cave. It creates a small pool towards the back of this chamber.

As we walk in, I say, “This is where I keep the mushrooms that like more light.”

There are many, many kinds of mushrooms here.

The room is full of color from all of them.

They range from beautiful with perfect little rounded caps to grotesque looking.

There are some that look like almost exactly like eyeballs.

There are other clusters that ooze horrible fluids from their deformed caps and smell foul.

Lydia stands in the middle of the cave surveying everything in silent awe. She finally looks at me with huge, rounded eyes. “Wold, this is amazing. You did all of this? You take care of them?”

I rub the back of my neck and reply, “Yes. It is what I do.”

“How do you care for them? It doesn’t seem like they need watering.”

“No, my magic cares for them. It helps them grow strong,” I explain.

She’s still looking around the room as she says, “This really is beautiful. I’ve never seen anything like it. I don’t even know what to say.”

I watch as a tear rolls down her cheek. This startles me. Did I do something to make her upset? I thought this would make her happy.

I say, “Why do you weep?”

She smiles and wipes the tear away. “Sorry, I’m just being emotional. It’s so beautiful that it makes me cry.”

This concerns me. Humans cry because something is beautiful? There are so many beautiful things in the world. If all of those make them cry, then how do they continue existing? She must see the concerned look on my face.

She laughs. “Don’t worry about it. I’m just crying because this place is so perfect for me. I never could have imagined seeing something like this in person.” She pauses for a moment. “Can I take some pictures in here too?”

I nod, and she wanders around, taking pictures of the mushrooms in this chamber. I watch her face light up with each new mushroom she sees.

It is strange with her here, but I go back to tending to my mushrooms. I check all the newest ones first to see if any need extra magic poured into them. Once they are tended to, I check to see if any others are struggling to survive.

As I’m working, I realize that it’s quite peaceful with Lydia here. I like hearing the little noises she makes. She gasps frequently about things that she has discovered. She also talks to herself as she explores. It’s the opposite of the silence I usually live in.

Eventually, Lydia comes back near me. “Hey, Wold, do you happen to have anything to eat? I’m getting pretty hungry.

I have some snacks in my bag, but unfortunately nothing that really counts as a meal.

Water would be nice too. My bottle is empty.

” With that she turns her…bottle…upside down and a couple of drops of water hit the ground .

I gesture toward the pond at the back of the cave. “You can refill your bottle with water from there.”

She glances at me uncertainly, then looks at the pond. “Is that water safe to drink? I don’t think I can just drink untreated pond water.”

Ah, right. I remember now that I have heard that humans are sensitive to things. It is very easy for them to get sick from eating or drinking the wrong thing.

I nod. “Yes, you will be safe drinking this water. It is of the Fae Realm, so it is clean.”

She gives me a skeptical look, but then says, “Okay.”

Then I add, “If you want food, I will have to hunt something for us to eat. Do you like hoppers?”

She looks at me confused. “Hoppers?”

“Yes, they are small fuzzy animals that hop quickly everywhere. They have long ears and like to eat plants. They have tons of babies.”

Her eyes get big. “You mean rabbits? You eat rabbits?”

I nod.

Her eyes are still huge when she says, “But they are so cute. I don’t know if I could eat one. What about not cute animals? Like rats. Can you hunt those?”

I recognize the word rat; they are the small scuttling vermin with bare tails. I stare at her for a moment, then I say, “You would rather eat a rat than a hop—erm, a rabbit ?”

She starts laughing. “Okay, that does sound pretty ridiculous when you put it like that. No, I don’t really want to eat a rat. I guess rabbit will be fine. Do I have to see their cute little faces though?”

I stare at her for a couple of moments. How do humans survive in the world?

“No, I can clean it before you see it.” It has been a long time since I have cleaned a kill, so it’s probably best if she doesn’t see me do it. “I will hunt for hoppers. It is getting dark; you stay in the cave where it is safe.”

She smiles. “Okay, thank you, Wold.”

***

In no time, I chase down two hoppers and kill them. I skin and clean them, then begin preparing the pelts for drying. It has been years since I have taken the time to do any of this.

I have only just met this Lydia, yet I am taking all this time to prepare food for her. And I am preparing pelts to dry so that she may have something nice to snuggle with.

I don’t understand the hold that she has on me.

I take the pelts to a nearby cave so they will dry properly .

I then realize that she will probably want her hopper cooked, so I gather wood and kindling to make a fire and a spit.

All this work just to feed one little human female.