“For what?” I asked. He seemed quite self-conscious, for such a physically imposing man.
He smiled again and ran his hand over the semi-messy knot at the back of his head. Several soft tattoos that looked to be done in silver ink circled his scalp, including one that turned several of his scars into the branches of a tree.
Other small, round sigil tattoos lined his forearms.
Silver tats. An air of magic around him, but not by him. The man in front of me carried protection spells.
They obviously didn’t protect from everything. He had a big soot smudge on his neck, like he’d run into a burning building.
“Are you from one of the new lots?” He nodded toward the lake. “Lots of cabins going in.” He nodded again, this time toward the east. “My house is on the other side of the peninsula. I figured I’d come over here to see if Marcus Aurelius had decided to camp on someone’s doorstep.”
He smiled yet again. “Looks like I was right.”
I should run—hobble, with my thigh—on up the shore and vanish back into my prison, but something told me that Mr. Victorsson would follow to make sure I was okay.
I did my best to not touch him when I pointed at his neck, since he seemed so self-conscious. “You have a smudge.” But it was difficult.
“Oh.” He rubbed at it, but spread the grime more than removed it.
“Here.” I pulled the sleeve of my hoodie over my hand and stood on my tippy-toes so I could rub his skin. “It’s sticky.” I frowned but took a moment to peer at his tattoos. “Like ash.”
He shrugged. “Had to take care of something last night.” He patted Marcus Aurelius’s head. “Glad you found somewhere safe to stay, boy.”
I didn’t know if Marcus Aurelius had chosen somewhere safe, but like his owner, the dog did seem to have a sense of when others needed help.
Mr. Victorsson’s spells wove around his body, and when I moved close, I felt them weave around me, too. Whatever he “took care of” last night had been magical. It had to be. Why else would his protection enchantments pulse the way they did?
Was my cottage attracted to expended magic last night? It hadn’t pulled me back in. Was this man why?
No, I would not be distracted. Perhaps he could help. Perhaps not. Either way, sharing would be dangerous—if not for me, most definitely for him. And I shouldn’t talk to a strange man about magic, especially when I didn’t know whose magic he carried.
Marcus Aurelius wagged his tail. He first leaned against Frank’s leg, then padded over to me and sat, once again, on my foot.
“I think my dog likes you,” Frank said.
“He’s a good boy,” I said absently as I rubbed the dog’s neck.
Marcus Aurelius barked.
Frank chuckled and stuck his hands into his pockets.
Time to distance myself from this situation before it became something I would end up regretting. No more friends. No more endangering others. Not after losing Chihiro. What if I hurt Frank? Marcus Aurelius? We’d only just met and hurting either of them would break me. I would walk into the lake. I couldn’t descend onto a new place and lay out devastation.
“Hey.” Frank touched my elbow again. “Are you okay?”
I stiffened. Was he reading me the same way I was reading him? “I just lost a friend,” I said. I wouldn’t lie, even if this interaction would never lead to anything deeper.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “There’s nothing anyone can say to that.” He pointed out over the lake again. “The town is here for you,” he said. “We’re good at sharing sorrow and buttressing victories.”
Frank sounded more like an old-school warrior than a guy who lived in cabin on a lake. I peered more closely at his markings.
“The tattoo around your ear.” I pointed at his head. “It looks familiar. What is it?” He carried elf enchantments. Maybe he really was a giant.
“Oh,” he said yet again and twisted his ear toward me so I could get a better look. But he caught himself. “What does it look like to you?”
“A tree,” I said. It looked a lot like my tree’s new ash configuration, to be honest. “I have an ash tree in my garden that looks like that.”
His eyes narrowed for a moment. “It’s Yggdrasil,” he said. “The world tree.”
I had landed in an elven realm—Scandinavian elf territory, to be specific.
I backed away. I didn’t mean to, but it happened anyway. The elves were not friends of the fae or fae-born seers.
The elves were friends only to themselves.
I stumbled on the rocks.
Frank’s face softened. “Ellie,” he said, and grabbed my waist. “Careful.”
I turned in his arms to find a wall of chest between me and the world. Traces of smoke rose off his skin as if he’d showered and changed after “whatever he took care of,” but it was going to take a while to scrub it off for good.
His protection enchantments slid along my skin on their own, as if they sensed why I’d come down here.
Elven magic wanted to “take care of” the bad in my life, too.
Or maybe that was what I sensed from Frank’s broad chest and equally broad arms. For the first time in my life I wondered if I’d met someone who could take on my mother’s enchantments and win.
But his “here” was full of elves.
I should have sequestered myself in my cottage and waited for the world to move again, and come out only when enough time had passed that no local would remember me.
I’d miscalculated with Chihiro. I’d thought my neighbor wouldn’t pay attention.
I must have hiccupped, because Frank touched my shoulder. “It’s okay,” he said. “The grief. It’s okay. It’s real and it’s supposed to be here.”
I stared up at his concerned expression. I just… stared.
His suspicion evaporated. This man named Frank Victorsson, with his cold fingers and his elf-made magical tattoos, took on the same body posture as his dog.
It’s okay, his arms said. You’re okay. I’m here.
“You’re magical, aren’t you?” he said. “It’s hanging around you like a heat mirage. Not a lot of color, but it’s there.”
I opened and closed my mouth. Did he see magic? Only I saw magic, and I needed tools to do so.
He chuckled again. “You seem surprised.”
I wouldn’t lie—and I didn’t have to. I think every part of my body would have shattered if I’d lied to this man. My soul, too. But I needed to be careful.
Chihiro wouldn’t have wanted me to lie.
Frank stepped back enough to see my eyes. “You don’t look okay.”
“Is this place safe?” I blurted out. With me here, no one was safe. How could they be safe? The concealment enchantments around my cottage messed with every head that got within noticing range.
Frank’s chest tightened. He looked as if he wanted to pull me close. “Yes,” he said.
It’s safe because I’m here, his body said.
“You won’t remember me tomorrow morning,” I couldn’t stop the words tumbling from my mouth. “The enchantments hide me. We can interact and we can talk, but come tomorrow morning, I will just be another of your neighbors.”
Maybe now he’d walk away on his own.
“So you have to grieve alone?”
How could I answer? Frank Victorsson spoke a truth I had not realized was true.
“Concealment enchantments?” Frank looked up the shore. “Someone put a spell on you?”
I pointed at Marcus Aurelius. “He might remember me tomorrow. He’s the first dog that has taken notice of me, so I don’t know for sure.”
And he really was a special dog. Not enchanted. Not magical. But real and warm and special.
Frank took in my words. He didn’t ask for more explanation. He didn’t pry. He just spoke his truth. “I will remember you.” Frank’s voice rumbled. His body rumbled, and a hint of anger danced across his features.
Frank Victorsson did not have a good
poker face.
“You won’t,” I said. “The enchantments are layered.” But Chihiro somehow remembered. I dug the plate out of my pocket. “I…” How do I say this to a man I just met? “My friend. The one I lost. She took this photo.”
He opened his mouth, but closed it again without commenting.
I looked up at the lovely blue sky of this North American elf country. “I have an ash tree in my garden,” I said. An ash with an eagle, two ravens, a squirrel, a snake at its roots, and a stag that came looking for a good nibble.
Frank had Yggdrasil on the side of his head.
Chihiro wanted me to find roots. She wanted magic to leave my world alone.
Maybe my friend was more magical than I thought. Maybe she’d tapped into something magical like me, or the tattoos Frank carried. Or the fae, elves, and kami. Or the other creatures who walked the earth—the werewolves and the vampires.
Or maybe Chihiro and, in his own way, Marcus Aurelius, saw a truth that one blinded by magic could not see. Maybe she’d given me the true gift only a friend could give—the understanding that only came from calling someone family.
I wished I could share the burning tears. I wished I could lean against Mr. Frank Victorsson and not grieve alone.
I held up the plate. The sigil on the sheath rose up as I rubbed my thumb over the mark.
I might have to grieve by myself, but perhaps I could ask one small favor.
I handed Frank the plate. “Have you ever met a seer?” I asked. The truth—a fae-born witch—were not good words to toss around, no matter how much my gut said it was okay to trust this man.
“Yes,” he said, though his shoulders tensed. He clearly understood that I was using seer as a euphemism for witch.
I steeled myself for the worst. He could walk away. Hell, he could go find the elves. Either way, I would hobble home on my bruised leg and hide behind my mother’s protections. I’d be safe, even if I wasn’t truly safe.
I tapped the sleeve. “Do you know what a daguerreotype is?”
He nodded. “I haven’t seen one in ages.” Something in his stance told me that for him “ages” meant something different than it did for normal, mundane people. That maybe for Frank Victorsson, “ages” meant lifetimes.
“Some seers use cards. Some crystals. I take and read photos.”
He peered at the sleeve. “That’s complicated, isn’t it?” He touched the sigil and the sides as if he really wanted to know.
“The photos allow me to see magic,” I whispered.
Once again, he opened and closed his mouth.
“The photo in that sleeve needs rinsing. I couldn’t at my cottage. My pump isn’t working.” I inhaled. “Your dog brought me down to the lake.” I pointed at the water. “Taking this photo was the last thing my friend did.”
He took the plate from my hand. “You came down here to see.”
Maybe. Maybe I would have lost my nerve and thrown the plate into the water.
“Do you want me to look?”
He saw magic. At least he said he did. He could be lying, but I doubted it. A man with a dog like Marcus Aurelius would not be a liar. And he couldn’t control his facial expressions very well. And a group of elves had deemed him worthy of their protection.
Elves might not be anyone’s friends, but they were creatures of the earth, and they were not deceitful.
I nodded. “If you would.”
“I should take it out of the sleeve and wash it in the lake?”
I nodded again.
Frank stepped around me and squatted next to the water. He pulled the plate from the sheath, which he carefully set on the rocks. The plate, he dipped into the water once, then twice. He looked at the plate. Then he dipped it again.
Frank stood up. He held the photo side of the plate toward himself and at an angle at which I could not see the image.
“What was your friend’s name?” he asked.
“Chihiro.”
Frank grinned. “Japanese, correct?”
I nodded.
He stared at the photo. “There’s magic here.” He held his hand over the plate. “But I don’t understand what I’m seeing.”
He held out the plate. “I’m sorry I can’t be of better help.”
I took the plate. The moving world manifested along the silver and copper surface of my friend’s selfless act.
My home in mirror-finished sepia. My body etched against metal, my pain floating higher in the image than the high-backed chair, or the roses, or the hearth.
When the world moved, I literally, physically twisted. My friend twisted.
A burst of anger played across Frank’s face and shoulders. “Whatever happened hurt both of you.”
I looked up at him. “Yes.”
He pointed at the image. “Here,” he drew his finger up and outward. “And here.” He did it again, but swooping his finger in the opposite direction. “Looks like a tree.”
I stared at the image. And there, behind me, over the hearth, a shadow of a sigil. A Golden Ratio spiral, a symbol of unity and of life, but one with a trunk under it.
A trunk and roots.
Chihiro had aimed my camera past me and at the cottage proper. And she’d taken a magic-seeing photo of the enchantment in action.
Magic didn’t move the world. Magic moved me to another branch of the world tree.
In Japan, I’d had a small waterfall in my garden. I’d figured out how to semi-anchor to a similar waterfall in the forest.
Here, I had a world-ash in my yard and a new friend with Yggdrasil tattooed on his scalp.
“The world tree is not a symbol of death,” Frank said.
No, it was not. Not for me. Not for Chihiro, either.
“The enchantments may have hurt you, but I don’t think the tree would show if someone died,” Frank said.
The image I’d taken of Chihiro, the one of death breathing down upon her head, might not have been literal. It, like the tree, might have been a symbol. One that meant abrupt change but not a final ending.
I looked at the image in my hands and I understood what the photo called me to see: Chihiro had given me what I needed to see the truth of my new world. I had options here. Options that might allow me to find an anchor. Options that the photo was telling me I could trust.
I hugged Frank. “Thank you.”
He stuffed his hands into his pockets again once I let go. “What does it mean?”
“She gave me a gift.” I held out the photo. “So have you.”
He blinked a few times. “Would you like to get some coffee?” He pointed away from the lake in the direction I assumed must be the town. “There’s a place called Lara’s Café not far from here. You can tell me about your friend.”
There was safety in this man’s arms. Safety, I suspected, that he’d fought long and hard to create. “You won’t remember me tomorrow.”
“If I don’t, Marcus Aurelius will remind me, won’t you, boy?”
The dog barked.
Maybe Marcus Aurelius would. Maybe not. But I suspected Frank would try.
“I’d like to learn about your friend,” he said.
And I wanted to learn about him. “I don’t want to put you in harm’s way,” I said.
Frank Victorsson’s disarming smile turned cocky. “That’s not a problem.”
I believed him. How could I not? He was a truth-saying manly mountain of goodwill. “You’re not a frost giant, are you?” With elves around, anything was possible.
Frank’s hearty laugh echoed through the trees. “No,” he said. “No, I am not. The head elf in these parts asked me that same question when we first met.” He laughed again.
“Your elves may not approve of me,” I said.
Frank shrugged. “Then it’s a good thing they won’t remember you, huh?”
Now I laughed. It would be good to talk about Chihiro. About her life and our friendship. About, perhaps, using the technology of the world to check on her.
She
might be in her own home right now, feeding her cat before opening her books for an evening’s studying, utterly oblivious to the fact that she had been my friend, in a changed version of her world.
I extended my hand to Frank.
Frank curled his palm around my fingers. “Come, Ellie Jones.” He bowed graciously. “The emperor and I will keep you company until we can no more,” he said, and helped me up the rocky shore into the warm morning sun.
* * *
THE END
* * *
Even vampires follow rules—unless the vampire is a demonic terror not even elven magic can stop. Join Frank Victorsson and the magical people of Alfheim, Minnesota, in Monster Born, the first novel in the new Northern Creatures series from Kris Austen Radcliffe.
* * *
A little Penny Dreadful.
A tad bit Fargo.
All Northern Creatures.
* * *
Learn more: Northern Creatures
The Worlds of
Kris Austen Radcliffe
Genre-bending Science Fiction about
love, family, and dragons:
* * *
World on Fire
Series one
Fate Fire Shifter Dragon
Games of Fate
Flux of Skin
Fifth of Blood
Bonds Broken & Silent
All But Human
Men and Beasts
The Burning World
* * *
Dragon’s Fate and Other Stories
* * *
Series Two
Witch of the Midnight Blade
Witch of the Midnight Blade Part One
Witch of the Midnight Blade Part Two
Witch of the Midnight Blade Part Three
* * *
Witch of the Midnight Blade: The Complete Series
* * *
Series Three
World on Fire
Dragon’s Fate and Other Stories Page 35
