He rolled his lips in to keep from laughing. “I might have stepped in some.”
“And you’re still wearing your boots? Oh, for the love of—” She leaned back into view. “Don’t be in a rush to get married, honey. It just means your house never stays clean.”
My father slanted his eyes at her. “Now, Klara, I don’t think I tracked anything in.”
“This floor is definitely going to have to be mopped,” I heard her say.
He looked at me again and shook his head. At least he had the good sense to look sheepish. “Your mother’s a little mad at me because I ate half of the cupcakes she made for the book club.” He shrugged. “I didn’t know they were being saved.”
“They had books on them,” my mother yelled back. “Why would I make cupcakes with books on them for you?”
I chuckled. My parents’ fights were rare and barely constituted fights, but I had my father’s sweet tooth, so I understood how he’d gone wrong. “Well, I’m sure you didn’t mean to eat the wrong cupcakes.”
He sighed and small tendrils of ice vapor curled into the air. “I didn’t. But enough about that. What’s going on there?”
“Besides this ice age we’re living through, there’s a little something else to report. The snow globe that was in Myra Grimshaw’s house? It got broken. Purely by accident. I don’t know if you want the pieces back or you just want me to—”
“It’s broken?” The sharpness of his voice made my brows go up.
“Yes, in about a hundred—”
“Did that globe have a red velvet ribbon tied around it?” His expression had gone from relaxed to serious in a split second.
“Yes, why? What’s going on?”
He muttered a few choice words before answering my questions. “I was able to locate a globe that went missing. It’s old news. Or should be. Forty-two years ago, we were working on a new version of the snow globe technology. Trying to combine communications with transportation. We couldn’t get it right. Still haven’t. Anyway, the globes were too buggy to put into daily use and eventually they were scrapped. They’re all still in storage. All but the one that went missing.”
Buggy magic might explain the shock I’d gotten, but I wasn’t sure why my dad was so bothered by it. “So that’s the one Myra had? Well, it’s not missing anymore.”
“Jayne, those globes were unstable. There’s a reason they were shelved.”
I nodded. “Right, I get that. But this one isn’t an issue anymore. It’s in about a hundred pieces. It’s also frozen to the floor of Myra’s basement, but as soon as this deep freeze is over, I should be able to collect them and send them back to you.”
He rubbed the bridge of his nose. “This is…not good.”
“Can you elaborate? How not good is it?”
“There’s an excellent chance that breaking that globe opened a portal between the North Pole and Nocturne Falls. It’s very likely why your weather turned so sharply. The North Pole is spilling through.”
I thought about that. I wasn’t sure when Jansen had broken the globe yesterday, but the timing seemed right. If he’d broken it in the late afternoon, which was what I was guessing, then the portal could have opened, and the North Pole weather would have started leaking in. It seemed reasonable that the ice and snow in town now could have built up that much overnight. Winter magic was a powerful thing.
With a nod, I answered, “I knew it felt like winter elf magic and not an ordinary storm.” Maybe the opening of the portal had created that weird pattern in the snow around the house. Like a small sonic boom of magic. But that couldn’t be. The snow had to have been there first. “But is it really that bad? I mean, it’s just snow and ice. Once I get the portal closed, it should all go away. Right?”
The look on my dad’s face didn’t inspire confidence. “Yes, it should. However, I don’t think closing that portal is going to be easy.”
“Well, I can tell you I tried to absorb the cold out of it so the ice around it would melt, and it shocked me pretty good. Kind of threw my magic back at me.”
Concern filled his eyes. “Are you okay?”
“A little light-headed, but fine.” I smiled to show just how fine I was. “But if magic won’t work, I’ll melt it the old-fashioned way. Heat.” If only Cooper were here. He could use his magic to turn that ice puddle into slush in a heartbeat.
“I don’t think it will respond to that. Think about when you create something with your power. Our ice is pretty impervious to heat.”
He was right. The things I could make out of ice and snow weren’t like normal ice and snow. They were much, much more durable.
“And complicating things is the magic of the North Pole has now mixed with the magic of Nocturne Falls. This is brand-new territory. I’ll have R&D get to work on it, but in the meantime, keep people away from that basement and that portal. There’s no telling what might come through.”
I frowned. “Come through? Dad, it’s a broken snow globe. That puddle isn’t any bigger than a dinner plate. And how could anything come through a communications device?”
“It couldn’t, if this was a standard snow globe.”
“But it’s one of those experimental ones. Right, you mentioned that. What does that mean, exactly, in terms of capabilities?”
He shook his head slowly. “I wish I knew. And that unknown was a big part of why we shelved those units. I can tell you this much, that red velvet ribbon that was around the base? That wasn’t any red velvet ribbon. Those were cut from a Santa’s Bag.”
I sat back, a new chill creeping up my spine. “I thought…nothing living has ever successfully been sent through a Santa’s Bag.”
“Nothing has. That wasn’t the case with these snow globes.” His jaw set with resigned firmness. “Be careful, Jayne. That’s all I’m saying.”
After my dad and I hung up, I sat on the couch just staring into space and thinking. The North Pole was an amazing place. It was filled with more wonders than you could imagine. Ice caves that glittered like jewels. A sky that lit up with the most amazing aurora borealis. A town that looked like it was built from gingerbread. There was magic everywhere. But like all things, there were two sides. Even to the North Pole.
Mischief and mayhem existed in the North Pole, just like they did everywhere else. But the mischief and mayhem that live in the NP aren’t like anything you’d find in the mortal world. The presence of darkness wasn’t a subject winter elves spoke much about, except maybe to their children when parents wanted to get them to do their homework, or eat their vegetables, or go to sleep already.
Don’t be fooled, though. All magic had a dark side. Some was darker than others. And in the land of snow and ice, there were some fearful things.
We have glacier goblins and frost giants. Ice serpents. Polar tempests, a sort of living winter tornado. The occasional wendigo, an absolutely terrifying creature that lived in the most secluded depths of the polar forests.
And there were some things that were less fearful and more just flat-out bothersome. Swarms of snow flies. Blizzard badgers, whose only purpose seemed to be to get into the trash. Krampers, a kind of burrowing worm that weakened ice sculptures and destroyed snowmen.
But then there were the yetis.
Yetis were a mix of fearful and bothersome, with a few other adjectives thrown in. And let me get one thing straight right now. They were not the abominable snowmen that the human world would have you believe. Oh, they’re abominable all right. But not in the kind of way human mythology had painted them.
For one thing, they’re not these lumbering, eight-foot creatures. They’re fast. Very fast. And small. About the size of a four-year-old. And just as easy to reason with. Which was to say not at all.
In fact, they’re a lot like four-year-olds in several ways. They abhorred discipline. They fought with each other constantly. They’re always getting into things they weren’t supposed to. Which was why they were usually covered in something sticky. And they were not
house broken. They also had short attention spans and were easily distracted, except when they wanted something. Then they were mercilessly focused.
They also found farts and burps to be the height of comic genius.
But I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the ways in which they differed from four-year-olds. They smelled bad. (That one maybe wasn’t so different.) They had mites in their fur. They loved raw fish. And rolling in garbage. Or dead things. They also had pointed, needle-sharp teeth and dagger-like talons, which they were quick to use.
And they wielded winter magic.
The good news in all this was that they were also generally very shy. They tended to run in packs and stick to the deepest, darkest sections of the polar forests, hiding among the pines and making their snow forts far away from any possible elf interaction.
They would occasionally venture into the outskirts of town, but there had to be a strong lure. During the salmon runs, for example. Or when the sugar pines had been tapped and the juice was being boiled down for syrup. The smell of that even used to wake me up with a smile on my face.
Other than those rare moments, we didn’t see them much. Which was a good thing considering that they also had unbelievable appetites. Like a cross between a goat and piranha, my dad once said.
Oh, they don’t eat people. Or pets, as far as I knew. But anything else that wasn’t nailed down was fair game.
All of that just meant I still needed to make sure Myra’s house was a no-go zone. I called the sheriff’s department and filled Birdie in on what I’d found out from my dad and how the house now more than ever needed to be cordoned off. “I know Sheriff Merrow said he and Deputy Blythe would do it, but this is a dire situation.”
“Don’t worry about it one bit, Princess. I’ll run out there on my way home tonight and make sure things are locked up tight.”
“I hate for you to go out of your way, Birdie. This isn’t the kind of weather anyone needs to be doing extra driving in.”
“Myra’s is only a couple blocks away from my place. It’s no inconvenience.”
“Well, I appreciate that.” That gave me some peace of mind that things would be okay until my dad and his Research and Development department could figure out how to close the portal.
“Of course! Now you rest up. Hank told me you had a little trouble at the house with your magic.”
“I’m resting, I promise.” We said goodbye and hung up.
A second later, Spider crawled onto my lap and leaned his face in toward mine until our noses touched. “Mama sick?”
Amazing what he picked up on. “No, baby. Just need a little rest. And guess what? Sinclair is coming back to stay with us for a little bit and he’s bringing Sugar.”
Spider’s tail went up. “Spider likes Sugar.”
“I know you do. You two can have all kinds of fun together. It’ll be like a kitty vacation.” Although I didn’t know what a cat would need a vacation from.
I was just nodding off when I heard a knock on the door that was followed by, “Hey, babe, it’s me.”
Sin was back.
I almost yelled for him to come in, then I realized he’d have his hands full. I put Spider on the cushion beside me and got up to get the door. My head was only faintly buzzy. The worst of the magical backlash was gone.
I opened the door. Sure enough, Sin’s arms and hands were loaded. He had Sugar in her carrier in one hand, a duffel bag slung over his shoulder, and two fabric grocery bags brimming with food in the other hand. “My boyfriend, the supernatural pack mule.”
He grinned as he came in. “I didn’t want to make two trips.”
“Stairs too much for you?” I teased.
He put the carrier down and let Sugar out, then set the rest of his bags on the kitchen counter. “No, I just didn’t want to have to leave you again.” He pulled me into his arms. “How are you feeling?”
“Almost normal. Which is about as normal as I get.”
“Tell you what. You take a nap and I’ll make us some brunch. What do you think?”
I think I was being spoiled, and I was okay with that. “Seems decadent to take a nap on a work day.”
He kissed my forehead, then went into the kitchen to unpack his bags. “Extenuating circumstances.”
“I guess.” I went back to the couch. A nap sounded pretty awesome, actually. But so did food. That one doughnut and all that vending machine junk wasn’t really holding me. “What’s for brunch?”
“House special.”
“Which is?”
“Whatever I can make up from the stuff I brought.”
I laughed. “Okay, I’m not picky.”
“Probably why we’re dating.” He winked at me. “Really, it’s one of your best qualities.”
“Sweet talker.” I put an old movie on, covered myself with the throw off the back of the couch and snuggled in. “Don’t let me sleep past brunch.”
He twirled a frying pan by its handle. “I won’t.”
And he didn’t. A while later, he woke me up with the most beautiful plate of food. My apartment smelled amazing. I blinked at the plate in his hand as I sat up. “That came out of my kitchen?”
“It did.” He set the plate down on the coffee table, then joined me on the couch with a plate of his own. He’d already set out silverware, napkins, and glasses of juice.
“I had no idea that space was capable of eggs Benedict and home fries.” The man was incredible. There was even a little sprig of red grapes on the side.
A bell went off. He put his plate on the coffee table. “That would be the apple turnovers.”
I pinched myself to make sure I wasn’t still dreaming. I wasn’t. I watched him take the pastries out of the oven and got a little glimpse into what a future with Sin might be like.
Looked pretty good, I had to say.
He came back and sat beside me. “They need to cool a bit. Shall we dig in?”
“Absolutely.”
The food tasted better than it looked, which was hard to believe. At one point during brunch, Spider and Sugar tore through the living room, around the kitchen island, then back into the bedroom, leaving Sin and me in a fit of laughter. They were clearly enjoying their time together as much as we were.
When we were finished, I reached for his empty plate. The least I could do was clean up.
He stopped my hand. “What are you doing?”
“You cooked, so I’ll clean. It’s only fair.”
“You need to rest after that jolt. I’ve got this. Plus, I’m the guest. I need to pull my weight.”
“One, you already pulled your weight by cooking that meal. And two, that’s sort of the opposite of how being a guest works. And three, I’m fine.”
He took both plates into the kitchen. “You might feel fine, but I still think you should rest. A day of relaxing on the couch, watching movies, and taking it easy isn’t going to hurt you.”
I leaned back and kicked my feet up on the coffee table. I really did feel fine, but I knew that there was no point in arguing with him. And really, to what end? We couldn’t go anywhere anyway, and my dad had told me to close the shop, so I decided to just enjoy the downtime. Still a weird feeling, but I was sure that weirdness would soon wear off. “Are those apple turnovers still in play?”
He laughed and shook his head. “They absolutely are. I just need to ice them. And not to ask a dumb question, but with or without cinnamon-bourbon ice cream?”
“Did you make ice cream while I was asleep?”
“No, it’s from I Scream.” He rinsed a bowl in the sink. “I had a pint of it in my freezer. I figured we might as well eat it before the power went out again and it melted.”
“Sounds like a plan. Yes to the ice cream. And yes to you leaving those dishes for later and joining me over here. I have a dishwasher. No reason to hand wash all that stuff.”
He put a pan in the sink, then lifted his hands in surrender. “Okay, let me get the turnovers and ice cream served up, and I�
��m on my way.”
We spent the afternoon in the most wonderful and laziest way possible. Right there on the couch, snacking our way through two On Demand movies that we’d both missed in the theaters, then finding a channel that was running a Twilight Zone marathon.
When we weren’t noshing, his arm was around me, or we were cuddled up close. We laughed and talked a little, but mostly we just enjoyed the rarity of a day off together. Even if it had been brought on by less than ideal circumstances.
Sugar and Spider joined us on the couch too. After all that playing, they’d worn themselves out. It was nice. I don’t think it had anything to do with the jolt of magic I’d taken, but I felt so blissful it was like I was still light-headed, but in a good way. The day wound down with no sign of the snow letting up, but when I looked out the window that evening, more of the town was lit up than had been before. I took that as a good omen. The generators were doing their thing, and this would all be over soon.
Sin yawned before I did, but that was understandable. The man got up early, so it made sense that he’d crash before me. Except I was ready for bed too. Despite having a day off, I was fine with turning in before my normal bedtime. All that lack of sleep had caught up with me.
I helped him pull out the bed from the couch and get it set up, then I got myself ready for bed. We kissed good night, and I went off to my bedroom.
I left the door open. There was no other option. Spider would have yowled his head off if he didn’t have access to the bedroom, and his litter box was in the bathroom, so there was no shutting him in with me.
But it was no biggie. I was safe with Sin. The man had already saved my life once. If he turned out to secretly be a serial killer, he was better at hiding things than the Easter Bunny.
I read a little, but my eyes were soon drifting shut. I turned my tablet off, stuck it on my nightstand and rolled to my side to sleep.
And I did. At least until my phone rang at six a.m.
“Hmm, hello?” I was too bleary-eyed to look at the caller ID.
“Miss Frost, this is Sheriff Merrow. Sorry to wake you, but I believe that answers my question.”
Miss Frost Braves the Blizzard Page 8