Tally had also managed to sneak in some gorgeous dresses made of satin and tulle and delicate embroidery that Penny had no idea when or where she’d ever have a chance to wear. Tally had even washed, attempted to repair, and folded the clothes that Penny had come in to give her a piece of home. She couldn’t remember the last time someone had gone so out of their way to take care of her. Penny’s eyes stung with tears and she turned and abruptly embraced the fae. 

“Tally, you have no idea what this means to me. Thank you.” She managed to choke out. Tally hesitated in the hug for a moment before sighing and returning the embrace. 

“Now, now, Miss Penny. None of that.” she pushed off with one more strong pat of Penny’s back. Tally made her way to leave the room. “ There’s no need to fret. We want you to be comfortable here.” 

And she was. Penny hadn’t known comfort or peace or joy like she had experienced in the last 24 hours for the past six years. She held her old clothes to her chest as she sat on the bed. Tamlin had seemed surprised that she’d said she wanted to stay, but with every moment here, she was more sure there wasn’t a life worth going back to. Even if she couldn’t help with the timeline here, could she be happy here? Could she build a life in this magical world? 

Pressing her face to the folded clothes once more, she inhaled deeply then turned to put them gently into a box beneath the bed. Even if this wasn’t forever, she was determined to enjoy her time here, and she couldn’t do that while she held onto the remnants of her other life. With one last look towards the box under the bed, she turned and left the room. 

_________________

Tamlin and Penny fell into a rhythm easily. They would eat breakfast together most days, then Tamlin would go to patrol and Penny would seek out the employees of the manor and ask how she could help. Most often, she found herself in the kitchens, where she was entranced by all of the ways the cooked foods that she'd never even considered. Everything tasted so much better here, and she was bound and determined to try everything. There were roasted meats that simply fell apart in her mouth, with spices like nothing she'd ever experienced. Fish from the nearby streams with lemons grown in the groves that surrounded the manor and greens from the local gardens were a favorite of hers. The little desserts that the kitchen came up with were absolutely out of this world. Penny considered herself a fairly good cook, but this food made everything she'd ever made pale miserably in comparison. Tamlin had taken to pushing the dessert tray towards her at the start of every meal with a joyful smile because he knew she wasn't going to wait until the end of the meal to try the newest treat the kitchen had come up with.

The staff loved her, after the first few days of adjusting to her presence and insisting she didn’t need to help. Once she pushed that she wanted to help, and “what else would she do here?”, they relented. Soon, the smiles became less polite and demuring and more friendly and mischievous. They even went so far as to rib her a bit about being “the High Lord’s new lady friend” with raised eyebrows as she scoffed and blushed and sputtered. 

It was hard to parse out her feelings towards Tamlin. Just over a week in and she felt strangely compelled towards the male–a rash turn from her normal reaction to any men she met. He was frustrating beyond belief at times, prone to quick frustration and impatience, but she could tell that he was fighting the impulse. She couldn’t help but feel he understood her in a way that most people did not. While they hadn’t had the opportunity to speak openly again about their personal fears or shortcomings, that day in the meadow had changed how she viewed him, and she was resolute in her claim that she wanted to get to know him outside of the knowledge she’d gained from others. 

She truly enjoyed spending time with him, especially when that gruff exterior lifted and he smiled or laughed with her. She felt like she was seeing a side of him that not many were shown, and it made her feel special. However, that feeling tipped over into the occasional burst of butterflies in her stomach when he would look in her eyes or say her name. She worried that, for her at least, the lines were dangerously close to blurring. She couldn’t deny how attractive she found him. In fact, her first impression continued to be correct in that she thought he may be the most beautiful individual she had ever seen. She was doing her very best to hide these thoughts each time they came up. She refused to ruin this budding friendship, especially when she was staying with him. As far as she knew, Tamlin was too hurt by Feyre to ever even consider caring about someone in that way again, and she refused to put him out or harm what they had by entertaining her rogue thoughts. 

So, instead, she cooked. She helped in the gardens. She brought lunch to the sentries, all of which she now knew by name and joked with every chance she got. She helped Tally with various tasks in the manor and learned to truly enjoy having friends for the first time since school. She loved being in Spring. It was a freedom she hadn’t had in as long as she could remember, and it felt more like home than anything she’d known since childhood. The sun on her face and the wind in her hair stirred something beneath her skin that made her heart feel wide open. She wasn’t sure how or why she’d ended up here, and there had been no response to the parchment she sent. But Penny was glad she was here. She was glad to feel like she was home. 

__________________

A few days later, Tamlin invited Penny to come on border patrol with him. She hadn’t been on horseback since she was seven and went to the saddest State Fair she’d ever seen, where she’d ridden a horse so old and angry she feared she may never ride one again. So Tamlin insisted she ride with him until he could teach her to ride on her own. He helped her up onto the horse, a beautiful white mare, and instructed her to hold on to pommel in front of her. Tamlin swung up behind her and settled in, and that familiar rushing filled her chest. This was perhaps the closest they’d been, and she couldn’t help the flush sprinting up her chest to the tips of her ears. 

If Tamlin clearing his throat and shifting around was any indication, he couldn’t help noticing either. 

Horrified and embarrassed, Penny willed herself to think about anything else. 

“So, what are you looking for when you patrol out here?” She blurted out in a rushed panic. Tamlin laughed, his breath too close, fanning out over her ear. Dear God. 

“Monsters, mostly.” He whispered. Her throat was drier than the desert. 

“Oh, that’s–wait, monsters?? What do you mean??” He laughed, a full belly laugh this time as he raised his head back to the sky. 

“Fear not,” He cackled. “Most won’t come out during the day, but I will protect you regardless.” She could tell he was joking with her. She jammed her elbow back into his gut and heard him grunt. 

“You’re a dick, you know that?” He laughed again and it warmed her like someone was winding a steady flame through her chest. 

“Only for you, Sunshine.” 

“Sunshine?”

“Yeah, you know, because of your bright and sunny disposition.” At that, she turned over her shoulder to glare at him, prompting a wide grin from him that made him appear more boyish than she’d ever seen him. In fact, at this proximity, she could tell that he looked much more well-rested than he had two weeks ago. Perhaps he was finally getting some sleep. Penny was glad to see it.  

“I know you don’t think I’m fully human, but I also have no idea how I would defend myself should I need to.” She became serious. “Could you show me, maybe?” She was nervous to ask. Despite giving him his own chance for them to get to know each other, she remembered how he had outright refused to train Feyre, despite her begging. He surprised her. 

“Train you? I would be happy to train you. What do you know?” She could barely get over the shock long enough to form an answer for him. He hadn’t even hesitated. 

“Uhm, well, some very paltry self defense classes from a few years ago. I worked out occasionally at home, but nothing serious. We’d probably be starting from scratch,” she said apologetically. 

“That’s actually for the best. Then we can build from the ground up. Would you like to start tomorrow?” There it was in his voice again. Hope. She couldn’t even bear to look at him as a feeling she couldn’t begin to describe bubbled within her chest. Could I be different? Could he? She squashed the thought so violently she almost felt herself jerk back. 

“Yes, tomorrow, I would love that. Thank you, Tamlin.” As they finished the ride, she could barely keep a tether on the excitement rolling within her, and that night she fell asleep still trying to get a leash on that hope and joy that threatened to break free and override all her common sense. 

______________

If Penny had thought that it was difficult to keep herself together over Tamlin before, the training dialed that up to a level where she was struggling. She was so thrilled to be spending every morning training out near the barracks with him, despite him absolutely kicking her ass on a regular basis and in a litany of creative ways. 

The first week had been entirely strength training–he hadn’t even let her touch a weapon. She was embarrassingly out of shape, as evidenced by her sweat-covered form all but limping back to the manor every afternoon to collapse while Tamlin did patrols. Occasionally, she’d lay on the couch in the study and read in the evenings while he worked on paperwork, but she was so exhausted that she’d found herself passed out and carried back to her bed more than once. The thought set her off blushing all over again and she’d have to cover her face with a pillow then scream her frustrations into it. 

Training in itself was hard, but focusing on training with him standing feet away from her, haloed by the sun and often shirtless, was enough to make her want to run into the woods and keep the monsters company herself. She was spending as much mental energy berating herself and trying to get herself together as she was spending physical energy to get into shape. After the first week of grueling strength training, the soreness was finally starting to abate and she was getting at least somewhat over the shock of seeing Tamlin walking around shirtless. Then came the added struggle of starting hand-to-hand combat. 

Repeatedly, he was having to fix her form, which required his hands on her body. The reactions he was pulling out of her had her feeling like a teenager again. She insisted repeatedly in her own mind that she stay focused on the task, but all that focus seemed to evaporate as he stood pressed against her. There was absolutely no way he didn’t know what was happening, either. She hated that most of all, knowing that he didn’t feel the same about her and she still couldn’t get it under control. More than once she’d dunked her head repeatedly under a cold bath to remind herself that he wasn’t interested and she was supposed to be learning how to fight, not fuck. 

Tension aside, she’d been in Spring now for what she assumed to be about a month, and her friendship with Tamlin was something she treasured. They had an easy way about their banter that was a far cry from his attitude in her first days at the manor. She wasn’t afraid to put him in his place when his temper got away from him, and that seemed to be something he needed more than he would ever admit. Her stubbornness could absolutely get her in trouble, but something about him wouldn’t allow her to back down. 

There was also an intimacy to the friendship that Penny had never experienced before. She was so comfortable being in companionable silence with him, and it never failed to strike her as comforting. The most surprising change, however, was how the two of them could play. 

In the weeks since they’d been training, that touch had become more commonplace, and his walls had fallen further. It allowed him to be, as odd as it sounded, silly with her. She’d caught the open jaws of his sentires and staff as the two of them joked easily, and she couldn’t help but wear it with pride that she had drawn that out in him. She may never have him as more than a friend, but this relationship was unlike any other she’d ever had before. It filled a place in her heart that she’d long since sealed off and left empty. Even if she could never have him the way she truly craved, she would do everything in her power to keep him in her life this way. 

The long, warm spring days carried on, and she felt more and more like this was truly her home. Though Tamlin and his staff had almost entirely fixed the manor from the war years before, there were still places where the ravages of Hybern and the situation surrounding it were evident. They were working to replant the southern groves of fruit trees that had been razed, the new barracks had finally been finished shortly after she arrived, and the towns were all but entirely rebuilt and thriving again. When she went into the local village for supplies, the people were always friendly and kind, though she still met whispers of “the High Lord’s lady friend” wherever she went, and it was always a task to get them to allow her to pay for things. That’s where she had found herself today, and she was now returning to the manor with paint for the last remaining room in the manor. 

Tamlin had told her that a room upstairs, the library, had been particularly hard for him to be in. Due to that, it remained in tatters from the war and its aftermath. Ripped paintings had lined the floor, books thrown from the shelves, and a suffocating layer of dust lined every surface. He had held a pain on his face that hit her straight in the chest as she watched him open the doors and bring her in a few days before. 

“It’s time to do something about this. It’s the last room. Will you help me?” And so she had. She could tell it was hard for him to sort through this, and she could very well guess why with all the torn and shredded canvas on the floor. She helped him sift through and throw away everything that needed to go. They spent two days cleaning, reshelving, and tearing out the torn wallpaper. With each task completed, it seems the weight on his shoulders lightened a bit, and by the third day, they were ready to paint. 

Penny had selected a pretty, silvery gray for the library, thinking how it would catch the sunset through the windows on this side of the house. With their brushes, they talked while they painted. With each stroke, it was almost like she could feel the closure for Tamlin. He joked with her and the light seemed to re-enter his eyes little by little. 

“You see, I know you’re a shapeshifter already, so I only ask because I am genuinely curious.”

“You’re a smart ass, is what you are, Penny.” He quirked a brow from across the room. 

“Listen, I think that you would be a simply wonderful puppy. I could carry you around, give you treats so you learn to stop acting like such a dumb ass when you’re cranky.” He gave a half-hearted glare. 

“Careful, or I am going to pick you up and start carrying you around when you tick me off.” He pointed the brush at her accusingly.

“You can’t just remove me, Tamlin. You’re stuck with me harassing you endlessly, that’s the deal. I don’t make the rules.” He came to re-dip the brush in the paint and bumped her to the side with his hip, accidentally pushing her back into the freshly laid paint on the walls. In the same moment, both their eyes widened. His with amusement, and hers with disbelief. As she slowly peeled her back from the wall, she shot him a glare that could have sent an army fleeing. 

“Tamlin. Did you just get paint all over my back and hair?” She asked with a deceptively calm voice. His laughter was barely suppressed as his eyes danced with amusement. 

“Of course not, my lady. It would appear you got paint all over your back and hair.” He couldn’t hold his laugh anymore. “Truly, silver is a wonderful color on you. Really brings out your ey–” He couldn’t finish before she slopped her entire paint brush over his face and ran it from eyebrow down until it plopped down off his lower lip. Beneath the paint, his eyes opened and the look within them was as playful as it was feral. 

The laugh burst forth out of Penny before she could stop it, as Tamlin reached up to rub his hand down his face to remove some of the paint. “I’m going to give you a five second head start–” But Penny was already off, tearing out of the room and down the hallway giggling maniacally. She vaulted over a chair the staff had pulled out to clean and whipped around the hall corners as she heard his footfalls turn the corner behind her. With a shriek of laughter she threw herself around the bannister to race down the stairs. 

The excitement was crawling up her throat and bubbled out of her as a high pitched laugh. 

“Sunshine!” He called out behind her, closer than she anticipated, and with one last shriek she grabbed the post at the bottom of the bannister and swung herself out into the foyer at a sprint. Before she could get more than five steps towards the study she was grabbed up from behind and jerked back into his chest. Her breath stuttered as his mouth found her ear.