15
Vampires are slow to trust and quick to attack. Do your best not to piss them off. And if you’ve already done so, run.
—A Smart Girl’s Guide to Living with the Undead
It turned out it took a lot for me to trust him again. But it took even more for my friends to be willing to give him license to breathe in their presence.
“Ow!” he yelped as Jane attached her hands to either side of his head, yanking out a bit of hair.
“Hey, if your brain wasn’t so patchy, I wouldn’t have to get so close,” Jane admonished. “You’re lucky we’re not calling Sophie the lie detector.”
“Who?” he asked, wincing as she dug her fingers against his scalp.
Even with his—frankly, delicious, but I would never tell him so now—banana pudding, I held Jed at arm’s length until we could hold what Zeb called a “family meeting” at Specialty Books as soon as he was released from the hospital. Zeb was bruised and battered, his arm in a sling. I offered to take care of it for him, but he declined. He said it was good for him, to feel human, to remind him to pay better attention when he was in the shop alone. Jolene, who was now left to care for their twins while Zeb was on the injured list, objected to this strongly. But when Jane offered to take care of the hospital bills since the injury had occurred on her property, she seemed mollified.
It was strange spending time with Jed again with this new perspective. I’d missed him. It seemed strange to admit that. I missed the version of Jed I thought I knew. I didn’t know if that Jed really existed. He did his best to make it up to me. He helped me restore order to my ransacked living room and replaced my windows. The problem was that if it wasn’t Jed, who had broken into the shop? Who had gone through my things at the house? Had the Kerrigans sent another operative into our area?
Gabriel and Dick asked those questions and many more after I insisted that Jed confess his part in the Kerrigans’ plot. The vampires made it clear that they did not like or trust Jed. Zeb was confused about exactly who Jed was. But once he realized that he was once considered a suspect in his ass-whupping, he chilled considerably. Jolene was careful to stand between them at all times and appeared to be baring her teeth. Jane picked Jed’s brain over with a mental fine-tooth comb. She couldn’t detect any dishonesty, but she added that didn’t mean anything if Jed was good at covering up.
Dick also “offered” to let Jed stay in one of the other properties in town. Well, actually, Dick waited until Jane had Jed by the hair and leaned in close, growling like a jungle cat. “Just so you understand, that little girl over there is very important to me. If you hurt her again—I mean, if she’s the least bit unhappy, if she returns from any outing with you with so much as a hangnail—I will fix it so if people ever find your body, they won’t be able to tell if you’re human or a raccoon that got caught in a mulcher.”
“Dick!” I shouted. “I’m not a little girl!”
“Well, compared to Dick,” Andrea began.
I pointed a finger in her face. “Quiet, you!”
“Hey, I didn’t get to do this when you were younger, so I’m making up for it now,” Dick said.
“I had lots of uncles who did this when I was younger, and I hated it then, too.”
“He is being a little overprotective, but that’s sort of a thing with him and Gabriel,” Jane told me.
“Thank you.”
Jane turned to Jed and gave him a grim smile. “You do realize, of course, that none of us trusts you, and we reserve the right to whack you over the head with various blunt objects if the mood strikes us?”
Jed nodded after a moment’s consideration. “Understood.”
“How is that better?” I demanded. Jane shrugged.
“Before the head bashing begins, could I make a peace offering?” Jed asked before disappearing out the front door. He returned, hefting the heavy trunk full of journals under one arm. Suddenly, his ability to haul around paving stones made more sense. Did shapeshifters have above-average strength? Seeing Mr. Wainwright’s name stamped on the trunk, Jane was immediately intrigued. She knelt before the collection of old books and stroked the covers reverently.
“You’re still on probation,” she reminded Jed, who smirked at her.
She opened one and sighed. “It’s . . . in gibberish.”
“Jane,” Andrea admonished her. “I’m surprised at you. This isn’t gibberish. OK, who here speaks Mandarin?” Gabriel grinned broadly and raised his hand. Andrea handed him a journal. “And . . . Latin?” Dick raised his hand and accepted another. “I happen to read some Old Norse, thanks to a horrible ex-boyfriend whom we will not mention because it makes Dick pull his angry face. Which leaves us with old Gaelic, Sanskrit, and hieroglyphics.”
“I can take the Gaelic portions, or at least muddle through them,” I said. “And if you have some books on Sanskrit and hieroglyphics or, even better, Mr. Wainwright’s guides to those languages, we can get to work on them. Maybe we can find something in the journals that will give us some clue about the bell.”
“Oh, good.” Zeb sighed, shifting his arm uncomfortably while he and Jolene settled into the comfy purple chairs with their assignments. “Homework.”
* * *
It was a relief to have something to do, something we could all focus on for the week before the deadline. Although I found nothing to do with Mr. Wainwright’s trip to Ireland, the journals were pleasant and interesting reading. I did learn that I should consider the possibility that every animal I saw was actually a middle-aged man named Wally. Nana had told me that Mr. Wainwright was looking for were-deer, but it was still a bit shocking to find out that there were people out there who turned into skunks and weasels. Think of the dry-cleaning involved.
Using the journal dates, we constructed a timeline of where he had traveled when. To give our eyes a rest from Mr. Wainwright’s small script, we took turns contacting his favorite buyers, asking about bells, just in case. We visited every pawn shop in the surrounding two counties, but bells didn’t seem to be frequently pawned items. I continued working at the clinic, but each afternoon, I left earlier than my previously established routine, something that Dr. Hackett frowned on. He knew, though, that I’d be leaving soon and he would have to adjust to running the clinic without me.
I sent scans of the Gaelic portions to Penny, a swipe to my pride, considering how often she’d told me to study the language more faithfully, as I would need it someday. Her translations were interesting but ultimately unhelpful. Eventually, we were able to determine which journals were the volumes written just before and about two years after the Ireland trip, but we couldn’t seem to find the Ireland volume. The only bright spot, Gabriel observed, was that Mr. Wainwright never referred to selling or giving away the Elements in subsequent journals. We were sitting around the shop again, going over the journals, when Dick suddenly dropped to his knees in front of the trunk and knocked on the interior of the lid. Jane watched him warily, but as he tested the lid, she seemed to pick up on his line of thinking.
She laughed. “Mr. Wainwright, you crazy, adorable old bastard.”
Andrea raised an eyebrow. “And the award for abrupt and inappropriate statements goes to . . .”
Grinning at me, Dick peeled away the fabric inside the lid. A sort of shell popped out of the lid, and two books fell out into his hands.
“A false top?” I laughed as he handed me the two journals. “I haven’t heard that one before.”
“Clearly, you’ve never met my cousin Junie.” Jane snorted.
“Gilbert was a good boy, but he wasn’t stupid,” Dick said proudly.
The first thing I saw when I opened one volume was a sketch of each of the Elements. The writing surrounding the sketches was a mix of Gaelic and Old English. I could pick up words my family used regularly: “magic,” “fire,” “tradition,” and “mother.” But everything else was nonsense. “I’ll send this to Penny, too, which means I will have to put up with more of her ‘I told you sos.’ Fortunately, we won’t be on video chat, so I’ll miss out on the accompanying dance.”
Tucked inside the journal, I found pictures of Nana and Mr. Wainwright. It was nice to see them from his perspective. In his pictures, he was smiling down at Nana, pulling her close to his side. She was grinning widely at him, a look of complete adoration on her face.
Andrea picked up one of the pictures. “Hey, the inscription on this one is in English!”
I plucked it from her hands and read aloud. “ ‘Fiona is a beautiful, intelligent woman who shares my open view of the world. I could easily see myself spending every day happily with her. But I don’t think she will ever be ready to leave Kilcairy. And I would never be ready to stay. She is needed here, and I would not make her choose between myself and the people she cares for. But I cherish our time together and hope that our paths may cross again.’ ”
“I thought that would make you feel better,” Jane said. “But you look like you’re ready to burst into tears.”
“It’s sad,” I said. “Nana loved him. And if he’d asked, she might have followed him home to America. My mother would have grown up with a father. She would have had an entirely different life. It sounds like they were held back by bad communication skills and fear. Mostly fear.”
Jane ran her hand over my shoulder. “I’m sorry, Nola.”
Gabriel carefully thumbed through the other journal. He grinned broadly at me. “I don’t think you’ll need to contact Penny. This is the last journal, Mr. Wainwright’s daily journal from seven years ago, which he tucked into the lid along with the Ireland volume ‘to protect Fiona.’ ” This section is in Latin, which I speak just as well as Dick, thank you very much. And he says he entrusted the bell to a friend. He says he couldn’t bear looking at the bell because it reminded him too much of what he left behind.”
“Aw, that’s sweet,” I said.
Gabriel grimaced. “He apparently meant someone named Bridget, whose father was a silversmith.”
“That’s less sweet,” I grumbled.
“Your grandfather was a bit of a man-whore,” Andrea informed me.
“Yes, thank you, I blame genetics,” I said, eyeing Dick.
“Those are your genes, too,” Dick reminded me sternly.
Gabriel cleared his throat. “Would you two like to know who he gave the bell to, or will this uncomfortable family moment continue for the rest of us to enjoy?”
* * *
My palms were sweating as Jed and I waited outside the outdated offices of James H. Mayhew, Esquire. It was late in the afternoon. The reception area had certainly seen better days, with its worn leather chairs and battered tile floors. The secretary’s desk had long been abandoned, so we were left to wait while Mr. Mayhew finished up a phone call. Jed was amusing himself by sorting through six-year-old copies of Ladies’ Home Journal and Newsweek.
This was what a last resort felt like. I had no idea what our next move would be if this didn’t pan out. And the depressing thing was, I was sure it wouldn’t. Jed tried keeping a more optimistic perspective . . . until I threatened to smack him with a rolled-up magazine.
Jimmy Mayhew was exactly what I expected in a small-town lawyer. Elderly, with a full shock of pure white hair and out-of-control matching eyebrows. His suit was a dapper if unfashionable blue silk, with a tie that set off his clear cornflower-blue eyes.
“So, you’re the appointment Miss Jane referred to me?” he said, flashing some very respectable dentures at me.
Having long since tired of subterfuge, I introduced myself as Mr. Wainwright’s granddaughter. Mr. Mayhew’s white eyebrows shot up to his hairline. He sat back heavily in his club chair while I gave him a brief summary of the events that had brought me to his door. A parade of conflicting emotions crossed his handsome face as I told my story, ending with shocked resignation as I concluded with, “So, we were hoping, Mr. Mayhew, that you might still have that bell he gave you all those years ago and, if so, that you would be willing to part with it.”
“He really had a daughter?” he asked.
I nodded. “You can ask Dick Cheney,” I said. “He’ll vouch for my story.”
“Why would Jane’s shifty friend know anything about it?”
I offered him an easy smile. “Never mind.”
“Well, you do favor him. And if Miss Jane believes you, that’s enough for me . . . Gilbert having descendants would have drastically changed his will, you know,” he said, frowning. “Are you here to challenge it? Because he was very fond of Miss Jane, and I wouldn’t be comfortable—”
“Oh, no,” I assured him. “I think the shop is in very good hands. I was just curious about the bell.”
Mr. Mayhew blew out a long breath. “I haven’t got it.”
My heart dropped somewhere near the location of my feet. Jed gave my hand a squeeze, but at the moment, I couldn’t find it in me to look up at him.
“Gilbert did give me a bell, about twenty years ago,” Mr. Mayhew said. “He asked me to put it in my safe, something about not feeling right about keeping them all together. And then, five years ago, right before Miss Jane started working there, he took it back. Said it was time and that he was going to hide it in plain sight.”
“He didn’t tell you where that might be?” Jed asked.
Mr. Mayhew shook his head.
“And what about your friend Bob Puckett? He was one of your card circle. Would Mr. Wainwright have given it to him?”
“Bobby Puckett died ten years ago,” Mr. Mayhew said, shaking his head. “I’m sorry, Miss, but if Gilbert said he was going to hide it in plain sight, then you should look in the most obvious place first.”
“We kind of covered those,” Jed told him.
“I’m sorry I can’t be more help,” Mr. Mayhew said, shaking his head.
I stood, my knees shaking, and took his hand.
“After all this time,” Mr. Mayhew said. “Gilbert has a grandkid. He would have gotten such a kick out of you, young lady.”
“Thank you.”
“You know, I have something for you,” he said, crossing to his bookshelf. “We started playing poker together about fifty years ago. And one night a few years back, your grandpa ran out of cash. He had a lot of confidence in his hand, so he threw this into the pot.” He took an old linen-bound edition from the shelf and handed it to me. “It was one of his prized possessions.”
I ran my fingers over the cover, stamped in gold: A Guide to Traversing the Supernatural Realm. Mr. Mayhew grinned sheepishly. “It’s a first edition. He read that book I don’t know how many times when we were kids. An uncle gave it to him when he was home sick once with a cold, and it sparked his interest in the paranormal. From that moment on, all he could talk about was traveling the world to look for werewolves and vampires. I didn’t really want to take it. He had four of a kind, but I had a straight flush. He never could spot a tell.”
“Family failing, apparently,” I muttered, turning the book carefully in my hands.
“I held on to it,” he said, guilt tingeing his voice. “To teach him a lesson about bringing enough cash to the games. I always meant to give it back . . . I’m sorry. I think he would want you to have it.”
I smiled up at him. “Thank you, Mr. Mayhew.”
* * *
I leaned my head back against the car’s seat, clutching Mr. Wainwright’s book to my chest.
“Hey, hey.” Jed slid across the seat and tried to put his arm around me. Instinctively, I pressed my hand against his chest to push him away, but my arm went limp. I let him wrap an arm around my shoulders and pull me close. “It’s OK. We knew it was a long shot.”
“I don’t know what to do now,” I said. “I don’t know where to look. And I looked closer at those locator spells. You’re right. That is definitely some Dark Lord, point-of-no-return sort of stuff.”
“You tried one of them, didn’t you?”
I held up my thumb and forefinger, measuring a tiny amount of evil. “Just a little one.”
“And since we just harassed a perfectly nice old lawyer, I’m assuming it didn’t work?”
I shook my head and buried my face in his shoulder. He stroked my hair away from my face to press a kiss against my forehead. “You’re exhausted. Let’s get you home, honey.”
I closed my eyes and stayed quiet for most of the ride home. What the hell would I do now? I had used up all of my luck, all of my happy coincidences and convenient clover patches.
What had I missed? Although I’d already done it a dozen times, I reviewed each find in my head and the steps that led up to it. Could anything be repeated? Mined for more information?
And I was back to blind luck again.
I must have dozed off, because I woke to Jed carrying me up the porch steps and using my keys to unlock my door. I should probably have objected to this. He was still the guy who had lied to me for months and stolen priceless artifacts from me. But he also smelled like the forest and fresh laundry, and every time his chin brushed my forehead, a little thrill zipped up my spine.
I let him stretch me across my bed, opening my eyes long enough to catch his hand and drag him down next to me. Jed scooted in behind me, pulling my back against his chest, and laid his face against my hair.
“If you keep all that sad to yourself, it’s going to leave a bruise,” he murmured against my neck.
“I don’t think there’s such a thing as emotional contusions,” I whispered back, wrapping his arm around my waist as I rolled onto my back, facing him.
“I meant here,” he said, drawing a finger over my heart.
I stared intently at the ceiling, willing away the anxious despair that seemed to have a choke hold on my throat. “What was Nana Fee thinking, leaving this task to me? I never showed any interest in being the family’s leader. No one ever asked me if I was ready or even wanted the job. It was just shoved in my lap because I happened to be a good nurse. And I am drowning here. Why didn’t Nana send Penny or Uncle Jack or someone who actually embraces their abilities and might have gotten through this with some dignity?”
“Maybe she knew you needed it more,” he suggested gently, playing with a lock of my hair. “You needed to come here so you could get to know your grandfather.”
“If she was that concerned, she could have sent me here before Mr. Wainwright died. She could have told me about him, let him know me,” I shot back, my tone more than a little bitter. “She could have let my mother know him. Then maybe she wouldn’t have turned out to be such a . . .”
Jed propped himself on his elbows. “What?”
“Anna McGavock wasn’t a good mother. She wasn’t even a good person.” I smiled to cover the odd little sob that escaped through my nose. “Everything she touched was tainted by her bottomless need for whatever she thought she deserved but wasn’t getting. Nothing was ever enough. Maybe if she’d known her father, she wouldn’t have felt like she had some missing piece she had to make up for. Or maybe she was always meant to turn out to be a cancer on the backside of humanity. Who knows?”
“The Kerrigans told me she died a while ago,” he said quietly, and the mention of his former employers didn’t exactly calm the little storm of nerves brewing between my temples.
I took several deep breaths, nodding and concentrating on slowing my heart rate. The last thing I needed was some magical spike that took out the bedroom windows. “I got a call from the Florida State Police about three years ago. They said that her remains had been found in some burnt-out fleabag motel in Sarasota. It’s a wonder they were able to contact me. We hadn’t spoken in more than ten years.”
Jed tilted his forehead against mine, tucking my body against the curve of his hip. “I’m so sorry.”
“I’m not,” I admitted, in a voice so soft it was a wonder that he heard me. “It was a relief.” And now the tears were slipping down my cheeks in earnest, gathering in the hollow of my throat. “It was a relief to know that she wasn’t coming back, that she couldn’t hurt us anymore. She had a particular talent for hurting Nana, who always seemed to think she could just love Mom out of being bat-shit crazy. Every time she hurt us, it only proved that I was right not to trust her. For Nana’s sake, I pretended I was just as shocked as she was when Mom was arrested in Jacksonville for soliciting or that time she took Nana’s money for rehab, only to spend it on a three-day bender in Atlantic City. But I’d come to expect it. I feel guilty for not loving my own mother, but I feel even worse for letting Nana believe that I did.”
I sniffed. “I feel like so much of my relationship with Nana was a lie now. I don’t know what to believe anymore. I’ve known all my life that my grandmother didn’t want to discuss my grandfather. And I thought I understood it. I’d been angry at my grandfather for years, imagining him as some sort of cad who fathered my mother and ran. But I realize now the part Nana played in all this, and I didn’t realize how angry I was at Nana Fee until I came here and saw what I had missed, not knowing him. She sent me on this wild-goose chase to the middle of nowhere, after giving supposedly sacred objects to a man who was some sort of book hoarder. What if Jane wanted nothing to do with me? What if his shop had burned down? What was she thinking?” That last bit was muffled by a hiccuping sob, which was mortifying.
“You’re not used to bein’ angry with her, huh?”
I shook my head, wiping at my cheeks. “I’m also not used to crying in front of some man while lying in bed with him.”
“I’m not just some man.” His tone was indignant. I chuckled, but he cupped my face in his hand and forced me to look at him. “Look, you know my secrets. You know things I’ve never told a soul outside of my family. And I gather you’ve never told anyone about your mother or your grandmother. That means something, Nola. I don’t take it lightly.”
I nodded and tucked my face into the crook of his neck. “I know.”
I settled my weight against Jed’s side and breathed in his spicy woods scent. I closed my eyes and let that scent soak into my skin. I knew Jed didn’t take this sort of admission lightly. This was an intimacy he was sharing with me, an emotional bond one didn’t forge with a convenient fling. The question was, how was I supposed to take it? How was I going to walk away from someone who knew so much about me? Did I really want to?
* * *
Hours later, the room was dark, and the windows were open. I turned over toward Jed. Bright beams of moonlight poured through the window, highlighting the smooth planes of his face. Jed’s completely normal, human face. I sat up, my fingers pressing against his cheeks.
He inhaled sharply, sitting up. The moment his eyes opened and he caught sight of the windows, his face shifted. His skin was blue and smooth. Inky black markings highlighted the sharp cheekbones and arched brows over a leonine nose. He had fangs, long, shiny, and white. His eyes were wide and round and an electric, unearthly green.
I reached out to touch the strange blue flesh but felt only Jed’s warm, smooth skin. I traced my fingertips along his long nose, over the ridges of his cheekbones. He purred, the vibrations of the rumbling sound traveling down my arms to my heart. It was an illusion. He was still Jed underneath. I could feel his eyebrows under my fingertips. I leaned forward and kissed the blue, feline nose.
Jed flinched, drawing back from me as if I’d slapped him. The only thing I felt against my lips was Jed’s plain old human nose. I chuckled, making the blackened eyebrows crease. I leaned forward, taking one of the soft lips between my own. He jerked away. I sighed, pushing up to my elbows so I could thread my hands in the inky black hair and pull him down to me. I claimed his mouth. This was my mouth. No matter what form it came in, it was mine.
Outside the windows, a cloud passed over the crescent moon, and the room was dark again. Under my fingertips, Jed’s skin became his regular golden peach. His features shifted back to human. I laughed aloud, kissing him again. He dove for me, attacking my mouth with a zeal that made me glad he didn’t have real fangs. He threw my leg over his hip and thrust forward, grinding his hard length against flesh that was already warm and wet for him. I cried out, the first tense pulse of pleasure seizing through me as he tugged my jeans away. He growled, nipping and biting down the length of my throat as he tore the material at my hips and threw it over his shoulder.
My nails bit into his shoulders, welting the skin, and I was rewarded with a pleased rumble. He knelt over me, and I moaned at the broken contact. He trailed his hand between us, sliding it over my breastbone, down the line of my stomach, and between my legs. I shrieked when his thumb stroked over that little hard nub. He chuckled, so I reached up and tweaked his nipple in retaliation. He yelped and grinned down at me, redoubling his efforts.
When he finally plunged between my thighs, I was already coming. I pulsed and rolled underneath him, my breath too short to scream his name properly. All I could manage was a series of exhausted whimpers. I closed my eyes and tilted my head back, trusting him with my body as I had before, and let myself float away.
* * *
We stretched across the couch, Jed’s legs sprawled across mine. My hand trailed down a back that was still a pleasant human tone. Jed was breathing, deep and even at my side, while we both enjoyed a long, comfortable moment of silence. Of course, I couldn’t leave things alone.
“Am I crazy, or did you just shift into one of those things from Avatar earlier?” I asked.
“A Na’vi?”
“You were blue, and you had this weird tail and a cat lip.”
“Huh.”
“When was the last time you saw that movie?”
He shrugged. “I was flipping past HBO earlier this morning and stopped on it.”
“Tree of souls scene?”
He nodded.
“Bloody pervert. So you see a sex scene between two otherworldly creatures, and then we’re all snuggled up together, and . . .”
“So you think I turned into a Na’vi because I watched Avatar?”
“Yes, I do. And the first thing we’re going to do is remove Aliens, Predator, and all zombie movies from your DVD collection, because I am not prepared to deal with that. I don’t think you’re cursed, Jed. I think you’re some sort of were-creature. Only you’re not limited to one form. You can have any form you choose. But because you never learned to control it, the form is determined by whatever is happening in your subconscious.”
“So how do you explain the moonlight factor?”
“I honestly don’t think it applies. For one thing, that wasn’t the full moon. And second, the moon was shining on you earlier while you were asleep, and you didn’t shift until you woke up and saw that the curtains were open. I think it’s psychosomatic. If the witch all those years ago was some sort of sensitive, she might have been able to tell when your ancestor was getting ready to shift for the first time. She may have been able to use that, saying she was cursing him with ‘a thousand faces.’ When he shifted into some animal form for the first time, he was convinced it was a result of the witch’s curse. I would imagine he did it under the light of the full moon, making that connection in his mind. The next time a family member shifted, he blamed the curse, and the next, and the next. You were going to shift no matter what, but the witch just used the power of suggestion against your ancestor to a devastating effect.”
“You’re going to explain what that means, right? In much smaller words?”
“Think about it this way,” I said, sitting up. “If you’ve been told all of your life that you’re allergic to peanuts, that everybody in your family is allergic to peanuts, you’re probably going to believe you’re allergic to peanuts. Especially if you frequently see your relatives having allergic reactions to peanuts. So when you’re exposed to peanuts, even if you’re not really allergic, you’re probably going to at least hive out a little bit. Which would reinforce your belief that you’re allergic, and that will start the cycle all over again. Does that make sense?”
“No, and now I really want a Nutty Buddy.”
“Your brain has tricked you into thinking you’re allergic to moonlight. You can probably shift anytime you want, into anything you want. Frankly, I’m amazed that no one in your family has accidentally shifted during the day or fallen asleep outside before.”
“Well, this isn’t something we talk about a lot.”
“Really?”
“Do you run around your village telling everybody about your witchy stuff?”
I nodded. “Among my family members, yes. We talk about it all the time. Soccer and magic, those are the main topics of dinner conversation. Sometimes both together, which would be my aunt Penny making comments about David Beckham that make the rest of us uncomfortable.”
“Well, we don’t talk about it. On full-moon nights, we shut ourselves inside our houses and pretend it’s because we want to watch TV or play cards.”
“Fine, you’re poorly adjusted, I get it. Try shifting now.”
He frowned. “I can’t just change.”
“Why not?”
“Just think about whatever form you’d like to assume, and change. Feel the energy flowing up from the ground, into your legs, and spreading up through your body. Picture that energy filling in all the places between your cells and changing your shape into whatever you wish.”
Jed rolled his eyes. “Hippie.” He squinched up his face, as if he was concentrating, but then his features relaxed. Nothing. He squinted again, seeming to try harder. But nothing.
I patted his hand. “Don’t worry, I hear this happens to a lot of guys.”
He whacked me over the head with a pillow. “Shut it, you!”
* * *
For the next three days, the hours in which I wasn’t retracing every step I’d taken since I’d arrived in the Hollow were filled by working with Jed on his shifting. And by that I mean I called out random animals and monsters to see if he could change on the fly. It took some concentration, overcoming decades of belief in how the shifting worked, but eventually, he was able to see it as a biological function and not something that happened to him.
Jane, of course, saw this as an opportunity to research. She looked into shape-shifting from every culture. She brought over books by the barrow load. Jed was overwhelmed. After watching the process a few times, we came to the conclusion that Jed’s ability worked like a hologram. He never actually changed shape. The cells realigned to project an image, a defense mechanism against predators, like a chameleon, only in Jed’s case on a much larger scale. He could change size and shape entirely, but beneath the image, he was the same adorable redneck.
Jed was faster and stronger than the average person, which was helpful. While his physical form didn’t change, there were limits to what Jed could do. As long as the size and shape were close to his own and humanoid, he could master them. But he couldn’t become an actual animal or another person. The image of the other person’s face flickered back and forth over his own until it made bystanders vaguely ill, like an unsteady picture on TV.
Jed spent a lot of time on the phone with his parents, asking questions, informing them of our discoveries. It took him a few days to grasp that there was no cure for his “condition,” because he wasn’t actually cursed. He was a genetic anomaly, like were-creatures or people who could curl their tongues. Understanding that potentially he could eventually control it, he seemed to be more accepting of it.
I was sure there was an object lesson in there somewhere, but I chose to ignore it.
* * *
At this point, it shouldn’t have surprised me when I found myself with Mr. Wainwright, floating down a canal in Venice in one of those old-fashioned gondolas. A man in a ridiculous straw hat and a red-and-white-striped shirt was guiding the boat along, singing a throaty song of lost love and heartbreak. The canal water smelled rusty and pungent, certainly not somewhere you’d want to swim. But it provided a beautiful backdrop for the tidy rows of aged, fading-pastel houses.
“Hi, Grandpa.” I sighed, easing against his side as the water lapped lazily at the hull of our boat. He patted my shoulder in a sort of half-hug made awkward by the fluffy red-and-yellow cushions of the gondola seat.
“We’re finally comfortable with calling me Grandpa?”
“Seems rude not to,” I said, shrugging.
“So it has nothing to do with any sort of fondness you may feel for me?” he asked.
“Nah,” I said, shaking my head while my lips twitched.
“So how goes the search?”
“Still no luck,” I told him. “I’m sorry.”
“You haven’t anything to be sorry for,” he admonished me, tapping a finger against the tip of my nose. “Unless you’ve given up. Have you given up?”
“No,” I muttered. “I am nothing if not obnoxiously persistent.”
“You get that from my side,” he said. “Along with a healthy dose of bravado. Now, tell me, how are you feeling, really?”
“Like I’m running out of time and ideas and places to look,” I told him. “Oh, and I’ve some inconvenient feelings for a man who can transform himself into various sorts of wildlife.”
“Feelings can’t be inconvenient,” he said. “They’re just feelings.”
“For someone I’m not entirely sure I should trust,” I added grumpily as the gondola bobbed in the currents of the canal.
“You don’t entirely trust him,” he said. “Give him a chance to prove you right or wrong. At least you’ll know you’re making an informed decision.”
“I can’t believe I’m taking dating advice from my dead grandfather.”
“Smart-ass,” he scoffed, elbowing my ribs. “You spend a lot of time trying to make things come to you, Nola. Maybe it would best to sit back and relax and let something come of its own accord.”
“Because it’s the opposite of everything I hold dear?’ ” I asked.
“When you tried to force finding the Elements, did it work?” he asked.
“No,” I admitted. “Are you sure you couldn’t just drop me a hint or two about where you left the bell?”
“I could, but where’s the fun in that?”
“Even the subconscious versions of my relatives mock me.” I sighed, resting my head back on the fluffy pillows.
“Keep your eyes up and open, Nola. You never know what you might find.”