Total pages in book: 254
Estimated words: 240032 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1200(@200wpm)___ 960(@250wpm)___ 800(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 240032 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1200(@200wpm)___ 960(@250wpm)___ 800(@300wpm)
“But what if you need help?”
“No. We don’t know who or what that was,” he argued before a very faint smile slowly crept over his mouth. His eyebrows scrunched together. “You worried about me?”
I made a face. “What do you think?”
“I think you’re not such a brat after all.” Before I could give him crap, the werewolf took a step back. “If you hear anything, holler. I’ll hear you.”
Unfortunately, I was too hung up on him being out here with me without a shirt or underwear on to do more than stare as he stepped off the deck, his form shimmering briefly before his other body. The gorgeous black wolf shot off into the woods, his stride reminding me more of a horse than what he was.
I had the strangest urge to hug him.
And I suddenly missed my parents so much. I hoped they’d call me soon. Sometimes they forgot they had a needy kid who liked hearing from them while they lived their isolated and quiet lives, just the way they wanted to.
And then I wondered where I got it from.
I waited and watched Henri disappear in the distance between trees that seemed even taller and more unreal in the darkness. Moonlight reflected off some of the bark, giving it that shimmering quality that I’d seen the first day we’d gotten here. It was faint, but it was there.
Minutes passed. Then more minutes, and I slowly realized just how quiet it was out here. There wasn’t a hoot, a howl, or frogs.
It was spooky silent.
But that got me thinking about how I wasn’t really alone. How….
I took a couple steps off the deck before calling out, “Mr. Gnomes? You never told me your names, but are you there?”
Nothing and no one answered, and I felt a little dumb for thinking they would have. What did I expect? That they were waiting around, listening?
Rustling at the tree closest to me had me looking down to find four sets of eyeballs through a small circular knot in the wood.
How did they do that?
I crouched. “Hi.” I felt like a jerk for bothering them, but not enough of one to tell them never mind. “I’m sorry for waking you up yelling,” I apologized instead.
“We were not in slumber,” one of the gnomes answered. They all had such similar features that I wasn’t sure whether he was one of the ones I’d spoken to in the past or not.
“We prefer to work under the cover of the moon,” one of the others explained.
“Oh, all right.” I still felt bad for being so impulsive. “Thank you for coming. I don’t have an offering tonight, I’m sorry.”
The gnomes peered at me.
I guess I was forgiven?
“I called you because I wanted to know… did you happen to hear anything? A few minutes ago?” I asked, feeling a little—or more than a little—foolish. They had literally just explained that they hadn’t been sleeping. Henri had said he’d heard the voice too, but it had been in his dreams.
“What is it that you expected us to hear?” one of them asked.
“I thought I heard a man calling out for a child.”
“In your dreams?”
I nodded.
The two in the front blinked at the same time. “Your kin, we would suppose.”
My kin?
My butt plopped down in the dirt and pine needles without my control, like some imaginary being had swept my legs out from under me. “You… think it was someone in my family? Why?” I croaked.
The gnomes exchanged the same kind of glance Sienna and I did when something extra ridiculous came out of Matti’s mouth and we were trying to decide who was going to give him crap about it. “Who else could traverse dreams?”
Of all the things that had happened in my life, this felt the most unreal. And I had a puppy with red eyes and a flame on his tail. And I’d sent people to the hospital.
“Did you respond?” one of them asked.
I squinted. “No… I thought….” The truth was, I wasn’t sure what I thought when they were implying I had relatives—parents—who could speak through dreams.
How was that possible?
“Do you think it might be my… father?” I squeaked, since that was the family member they had been so focused on before.
There was no hesitation when they agreed. “Could be him.”
I went lightheaded.
“Could be another member of your kin,” they suggested.
This wasn’t helping.
“I would answer if I were you,” the other one claimed. “The old ones don’t take well to being ignored.”
They’d gone there. The old ones. My hands started tingling for the first time in weeks.
Could they be right? Could it be a biological relative of mine? It didn’t add up. It didn’t. Not when I took into consideration that I was in my thirties and had never known anything about anyone I shared blood with. But… “I want to make sure I understand and that I’m not hallucinating. You’re saying that whoever is calling out for a child… I’m that person?”