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19

Are You… Chicken?

Hot showers—by definition—should be deemed a miracle because after accepting the Night Drop win, Harry headed back to Pierce House and showered no less than ten times before collapsing on her bed in a haze of exhaustion and sore muscles.

It hadn’t been a dreamless sleep, or terribly restful. Instead, her mind replayed the moment back in the woods when her magic surged and picked up a hitchhiker. Every time she found her thoughts wandering to it, she caught herself subconsciously rubbing her sternum, still feeling the occasional shadow tugs.

Witch’s Peak was the place that fueled all spooky tales told by the people of Fates Haven.

Have something peculiar happen? Its cause originated at Witch’s Peak.

Experience a run of bad luck? The way the moon bounced off Witch’s Peak was to blame.

But as far as Harry knew, no one had ever ventured up to Witch’s Peak, all the stories and hearsay enough to keep both the superstitious and the not superstitious far, far away.

Eventually giving up on the idea of a nap, she slipped into a breezy sundress and sandals and found a note from Nora telling her that she and Grace had already left for the Midnight Moviethon at Havenhood Park. She briefly considered the merits of skipping the event altogether for an hour of quiet time, but quickly vetoed the idea, already knowing that if she didn’t show, it wouldn’t be long before someone knocked on the door and dragged her there anyway.

Plus, she’d missed too much of Fates Haven life already and didn’t want to miss a second more.

A small smirk on her face, she headed out the front door, momentarily panicked that she’d fall through the rotten beams. But there was no ominous creak, no groan. She glanced down at the fresh boards and even did a little bounce, surprised not to feel even an inch of give.

A deep chuckle turned her toward Jax, leaning casually against a newly built railing. “How did you do this in a day, and how did I not hear you doing it?”

“I had a few extra sets of hands, and Nora placed some kind of silence charm around the house perimeter so you and Grace could rest.”

“And you didn’t need to rest after all of last night’s fun?” Harry teased.

“What can I say? I have great stamina—as you have found out for yourself.”

Excited nerves fluttered in her stomach as she slowly descended the new stairs. Jax’s gaze slid over her body with each step, warming every inch of skin not already heated by the humid night. “Were you volunteered to make sure I showed up tonight?”

“I actually did volunteer.” His lips twitched. “Nora was having such a good time telling Sanjay ‘I told you so’ about the tourist flow picking up that I didn’t want to tear her away. And Grace and Devon were hunting for their perfect movie-watching spot.”

Her eyes narrowed at the mention of the teens, making Jax laugh. “He really is a good kid.”

“I guess only time will actually tell.”

She stopped on the step above him, the position putting them eye level as she fought for something to say. They hadn’t spent any time alone since the night they’d gone to Tomlyn’s—and back to his cabin. And they sure as hell hadn’t talked about what happened, or what it meant.

Not that she knew the answer to that herself, or even what she hoped it meant. Hope led to disappointment, and she wasn’t sure she could handle that right now with everything else hovering over their heads like an anvil-weighted question mark.

They followed the trail of music and laughter toward the park. A few people mingled and talked, neighbors with strangers and vice versa. But it being a few minutes until midnight, most had already found their perfect viewing spots on the lawn and settled in for a double feature film showing.

Jax hadn’t been wrong. The park was packed.

Even more people had shown up to watch the outcome of the Night Drop than for the Paintball Pandemonium showdown. Shoppers hopped in and out of the boulevard boutiques, open late to take advantage of the bevy of new potential customers. Harry lost count of how many carried the signature pink Sugar Tits boxes. The sight of her hometown flourishing brought a smile to her lips.

“Looks like we’re being summoned.” Jax touched her elbow and gestured across the street, where Elodie and Lenny waved from the Starlight Gazebo.

Jax and Harry dodged the traffic and headed across the grassy knoll toward her friends, and realized El and Lenny weren’t alone. Sitting on a blanket at the bottom of the steps were Grace and Devon, the teens giving them small waves.

Jax chuckled at her sigh of relief.

But what surprised Harry was the presence of a brooding Silas. Sitting opposite Elodie and almost mirroring the angel in stiff posture and painful grimace, the demon stared ahead as if the movie had already started.

Gavin and Maddox sat on the steps, bookends to Lenny, who winked at her. “Evidently the best seats in the house were reserved for the Night Drop’s winning team.”

Elodie snorted and slid an unsubtle glare toward Silas. “But for some reason they showed up, too.”

“And she didn’t put up a real big fuss about them sticking around, so…” Lenny smirked.

Elodie scoffed but didn’t deny it.

The movie screen flickered to life and the rest of the crowd slowly settled in, Harry climbing the steps into the gazebo. She and Jax cozied up on the built-in bench as the first film—a mix between a cartoon and live action—flickered to life.

A few minutes into the movie and her mind wandered to what happened on the mountain.

Jax’s arm brushed hers as he stretched his out behind her shoulders. “You’ve been a little quiet… especially for someone who’s halfway to securing a win.”

Harry smirked. “We may as well have the win in the bag, you know. You and the others should start practicing your dance moves.”

“I think we’re good to hold off practicing for a bit yet, but seriously. You’ve got that look in your eye like you’re faced with a puzzle that you can’t solve as fast as you’d like.”

“I guess you could say that. I’ve been feeling a little off since being back in Fates Haven, but when we were in the middle of the Night Drop, something weird happened.”

“What?”

“My magic sensed another’s, and it was eerily familiar and yet nothing like mine. I don’t know how to explain it.”

Jax’s brow furrowed. “All the way out there? They dropped us off in the middle of literal nowhere—nothing and no one for miles.”

“And yet…”

His fingers slid toward the back of her neck, gently massaging the tight muscles. “Did you talk to Nora about it?”

She shook her head. “Not yet. She’s been busy making sure Operation Fates Festival is a success. Plus, I don’t want to bother her if it turns out to be nothing but my own magical wonkiness.”

“Wonkiness?” He chuckled. “Is that an actual term?”

“It is in my world.”

“Maybe we should go back there and check it out?”

Harry spun her gaze to his. “You heard the part where I said it was eerie, right? And I had a little time to recover, but in the moment, it nearly scared the piss out of me. That tug and its antique little compass wanted to send me up toward Witch’s Peak.”

“Are you… chicken?” He waggled his eyebrows, looking so ridiculous she couldn’t help but laugh as he quoted a line from what had been one of their favorite movie franchises to binge-watch.

“This isn’t Back to the Future , and I am not Marty McFly. Calling me chicken will not goad me into doing something potentially stupid.”

“So you’re saying you don’t want me to go with you?”

“I didn’t say that at all. I’m saying that we’d both be pretty stupid to go there, alone or together.”

“So when are we going?” Jax smirked knowingly.

She swatted at his chest playfully and he caught her hand and held it, both their gazes dropping to where his fingers caressed hers. Neither pulled away. Linking their fingers together, he pulled their joined hands into his lap where they stayed for the rest of the first movie.

Harry could honestly say she had no idea what the plot was, because she couldn’t tear her gaze or her attention away from the man whose side she was deliciously pressed into.

M ORE DEAD ENDS .

Harry prepped to throw the book in front of her into the nearest trash can when two large hands carefully plucked it from her grasp.

“Let’s not take our frustrations out on the ancient fae tome,” Gavin admonished, gently placing the book back on Nora’s kitchen table.

When more searching and spell casting had wielded nothing in the way of results—or useful information, she’d sent an SOS to the research big guns. For the last two hours while Jax and Grace “trained” outside in the guise of weeding and landscaping the Pierce House garden, she and Gavin pored over each page of Tomlyn’s book.

“I’m starting to think Tomlyn knew we wouldn’t find any answers in here and that’s why he agreed to let us borrow it.” She rubbed her fingers along her temples as if able to will her brewing headache away.

“Tomlyn may be a twisted bastard, but he wouldn’t have loaned you the book just to get a few jollies.”

“So you think there’s something in here we can use?”

“I think that Tomlyn chooses his words extremely carefully, and if he told you that the book would remain in your possession until you found the path to the answers you seek, then, yes, I think the clue is still buried in here. Somewhere.”

“And there’s no way you think those answers are playing hide-and-seek? Because I feel like the harder I try to find them, the more elusive they get.”

Gavin laughed dryly. “Knowing the fae—and Tomlyn—that’s exactly what’s happening… but from everything I’ve heard about you from Jax and the others, you’re not the type to let that deter you.”

“You’re right. I’m not. I just may gripe about it for a bit.” The faint sounds of laughter from the backyard garden pulled a small smile to her lips. “And she’s the main reason why failure is not an option. Now, if Fate could just give us a damn break. I’m not even talking about a major one. A minor crack would do. I can work with a crack.”

Harry stood to refresh her chamomile tea when the floor moved and she tripped over her own two feet.

Gavin zoomed toward her with his vampiric speed and caught her arm before she head-planted on the corner of the kitchen counter. “You good?”

“Sorry. Just…” The floor rumbled again, literally shaking the ground beneath their feet. “What the hell is that? Is that an earthquake?”

Panic for Grace washed over her. Grabbing the book from the table, she hightailed it to the back door with the vampire hot on her heels, already calling out Grace’s name.

Harry skidded to a stop on the back porch, her eyes wide and book clasped tightly to her chest. Gavin came to an abrupt stop at her side, the vampire’s mouth gaping, all his British composure shattered as he babbled, unable to form any actual words.

It wasn’t an earthquake that had shaken the ground.

Towering over a slightly bemused, and oddly proud looking, Jax, was a massive, winged animal that Harry had only read about in fantasies and seen in her Game of Thrones binge-watches.

A massive gold-scaled dragon stood in the center of what was once Nora’s weed-ridden garden. Very much living. Very, very large. And very much in possession of Grace’s golden shifter eyes.

“Holy. Dragon. Tails.” Harry clutched the book to her chest like a security blanket.

The golden dragon swung her head toward Harry, her massive mouth dropping open to reveal a double row of gleamingly sharp teeth in what almost constituted a smile. Dragon-Grace released a puff of air, and her tongue lolled out, making her look like an overgrown dragonesque puppy.

Jax laughed despite being so close that one dragon stomp could crush him into the ground. “Good news! We narrowed down what kind of fae shifter we’re looking for!”

Gavin followed on the laughter, and soon enough, Harry chimed in. Dragon-Grace dropped to the ground as she made a sound that resembled chortling giggles, each one releasing a small puff of minty-smelling smoke.

Drying the tears spilling from her eyes, Harry sighed. “I call not telling Nora that a dragon crushed her azalea bush.”

Nora stepped onto the back porch at that very moment, her hands resting on her hips as she gazed at the dragon in her yard as if one happened every damned day. “Oh my.”

“Oh my? You come outside and see a dragon sitting on your bushes and all you can say is ‘Oh my’?”

“That’s not any dragon, that’s a Grace.” Nora shrugged. “I better head to the grocery store before they close. If dragons are anything like the other shifters in this town, she’ll be a very hungry Grace when she manages to shift back. Gavin, sweetheart? Do you think you could give me a hand? I’ll need to buy more than my usual this time around because something tells me that she’ll be famished.”

“It would be my pleasure, Ms. Pierce.” Gavin extended his elbow and the two of them disappeared back into the house, leaving Harry alone with Jax and Dragon-Grace, who was busy checking out her wingspan.

Jax joined her on the porch, amazed smile still firmly in place. “She’s quite the sight, isn’t she?”

“She’s a dragon.”

He chuckled. “Yes, she is.”

“Like a real, winged, fire-breathing dragon .”

“We haven’t tested the fire-breathing part yet, considering we’re a bit too close to the house, but I hope to find out sometime soon in an open field. Safe bet would be that she can, considering her fire-prolific abilities in human form. She can probably camouflage, too.”

“I really need to call Cassie.”

Jax chuckled, slipping an arm around her waist. “How does one tell her best friend that her daughter is a dragon shifter?”

“I have absolutely no fucking idea.”

Grace caught a glimpse of something behind her and spun like a puppy chasing its own tail. The ground shook and Dragon-Grace stopped, only to start up again.

“How long before she can shift back to human?” Harry asked, curious.

“I figured I’d let her explore this side of herself for a bit, and then we’ll try and get back to two legs, but honestly I don’t think it’ll take her much. Her transition into the dragon was seamless. Almost mystical, actually. Definitely nothing like my first shift, or the first shift of anyone I know. That fucking shit hurt like hell.”

“She didn’t have any pain?”

“Like I said, seamless. And her clothes didn’t shred, they kind of… disappeared with Grace so I’ll be curious to see if they reappear the same way. It’s quite possibly a fae thing.”

“A fae dragon shifter.” Harry peered at the book in her hands, the tome warm to the touch. “I think I can narrow our focus now… but first, I better go call Cassie. You’ll stay with Grace?”

“Of course. I’ll give her a few more minutes of playtime and then have her go inside, too. I’m sure she’ll want to talk to her mother.”

Of that she had no doubt.