Page 69 of Seer

I chuckled. “Have you read the diary?”

“Yeah, sort of, when I was ten or so. My dad had just died, and I wanted to see if he was mentioned in there.” He glanced over at the book in my hands. “He’s not, fyi. It’s all about the Elves and what they wanted us to do. I wasn’t interested at the time, but Edgar’s right. It’ll be good background reading for you.”

“I’ll save it for later then.”

I switched it out for the next title in my stack,Mysterious Creatures in Folkloreby Archibald Manning. Published in 1964. A lot of tiny text with no illustrations. Great.

Before I could start on that, Greg’s phone rang. The Bluetooth connection showed “Mom” on the console screen.

“Huh,” Greg said before answering the call. “Mom? Is everything okay?”

“Of course it is. Why wouldn’t it be?”

His tone turned biting. “Oh, I don’t know. Maybe because we haven’t been gone even thirty minutes?”

Delphia made a huffing noise, then said, “Can Cal hear me?”

I sat up. “I’m here, Delphia.”

“Oh, good. Edgar and I were talking about how strong the connection is between you and Greg already.”

“Okay?” I glanced at Greg, but he was watching the road. His knuckles were white on the steering wheel.

“We were speculating that your connection might be so strong already you could call a vision. Do you want to try?”

“Like,now?” I shifted in my seat.

“No, silly. You’ll need to be in a quiet room without any distractions. I wanted to walk you through how to do it so you could try later. But start with something boring. Don’t look for the fog monsters or anything.”

“Yeah, I don’t think I’m up for that yet.” Or ever. Except I’d probably have to at some point, given how little progress we were making in finding those assholes.

“Right. So all you have to do is clear your mind, then focus on what you want to know. But you can’t force it. I was better at it when my husband was alive, but these days it works best if I picture holding my question in the palms of my hands.”

I sent a skeptical look at Greg, but he just shrugged. Hetucked his perfect hair behind his ear. I watched him for longer than I should’ve.

Oh, Delphia, right. “Um, okay?”

“And that’s it.”

“That’s it? I just sort of meditate, and it happens?”

She hesitated, then said, “Well, it is different for everyone, so you’ll need to practice until you find what works best for you. Edgar says he knew someone who focused on a piece of crystal.”

I rubbed my face. “Okay, I’ll start practicing.”

“Maybe have Greg with you the first couple of times. We don’t know anything about those fog monsters, and Edgar and I are a little worried whether they were able to tell where he was physically when they saw his vision self.”

“I’m sorry, what? You think they might’ve been able to track him? That would’ve been fucking good to know before now!” I wasn’t quite yelling that last bit, but it was close.

“Well, I’m sorry, but we didn’t think of it until he and I were talking a minute ago.”

Greg said, “Do I only need to be with Cal when he’s trying to call a vision, or are you saying we should stick together all the time?”

Delphia blew out a breath. “I don’t know, Greggy. I’m sorry.” Then her tone perked up. “But once you complete the bond, you won’t be able to be apart very long in the beginning anyway, so it might be easier to get used to staying together now.”

Um,what? I was so fucking tired of not knowing what the hell was happening to me and then finding out everyone else knew but hadn’t told me.

“Okay, that’s it,” I said. “I have questions and I need you to answer them.”