Page 135 of My Monster’s Keeper

Stix turns, ducking his head down until we’re level. “Not without you, Wilder, and Frost.”

“And Puppy?”

“You are Puppy’s home. He’ll go with you, it stands without speaking.”

“No, that is not my home,” Puppy growls from behind us. “Here is home.”

And that answers that question. Stix laughs softly. His long fingers linger over the skin of my arm, and then he lightly bounces down to the grass below.

“Do you want a new name?” I ask my Grim. “You have so many already. But we can leave Puppy behind and give you something new if you wish.”

He tilts his head to the side. “I have names?”

I turn, stalking towards him. “Mmm, Grim, Earth Defender, lover. Friend. Family. Brother.” I tap my chest over my heart. “Mine.”

His eyes get uncertain. “Do you want me to have a new name?”

“I want you to be happy when I call you.”

“I will be happy, whatever you call me. No, I’ll keep it. It is mine.”

“Okay, but if you want to at any point, you can change your mind.”

He takes hold of me, walking us to the edge until my feet dangle off. I’m helpless in his arms. My stomach flutters but not in nerves, never in nerves.

Shadows reach out, and I’m gently released into their hold. He lands beside me just as the shadows withdraw.

“I’m going to have to keep you,” I murmur to the Grim. “No matter what happens,you’re mine.”

His lips quirk up at the side. “I’m keeping you, too.” He hesitates and then glances at me and away. “I like it when you say my name.”

My heart fills to bursting. I swallow the thickness in my throat and nod. “Then I’ll keep saying your name forever.”

***

Stix wakes us up in the middle of the night with a hand over my mouth. His eyes are intently focused on the front of the house. Puppy, Frost, and Wilder are alert, too.

“Get dressed,” Frost whispers. He shifts into his other form and forms a ball of fire at his fingertips.

I roll to the other side of the bed, grab my clothes, and pull them on as fast as I can.

“What is it?” I ask but then wish I hadn’t because the sound of the booms echo through the house. It sounds like it’s taken out the front yard. The bedroom door slams open, but Stix is already turning, throwing us all through the shadows and into the backyard. I crash to my knees in time to see Puppy launch himself at a dark spindly shape that has cracks in its skin the colour of molten lava. Its eyes are easily the size of my fist and tusks poke out at least a foot.

It’s the strangest thing I’ve seen in a long list of strange. But when it fixes its eyes on me, I shudder.

There is so much intent. Too much for me to be able to dismiss this. It’s here for me.

“Becky, run!” Wilder shouts.

I look up and find seven more of those creatures sitting on the roof. I take a step back and see their bodies tense.

Nope. No way, this is not happening. Are they here for me? If I run, it will get bad because we’ll be separated.

“Puppy!” I shout when he yelps.

He roars and throws himself back into the fight. Wilder throws vine after vine at these creatures, but they just turn them to ash. Frost is straining himself, the ice he’s directing isn’t doing anything.

I take another step back, and one of them jumps off the roof, and now Puppy and Wilder are both engaged in hand-to-hand combat with these things.