Otherworld Tales by Yasmine Galenorn

Author:Yasmine Galenorn [Galenorn, Yasmine]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Nightqueen Enterprises LLC

Chapter Six

“Well, I haven’t had a greeting like this in a while,” he said, laughter bubbling just below the surface.

“Not another word, Johnson. Not another word.” I cautiously eased off the counter, stiff from the pain and sores. I wanted to sit down, but one look at the hard seats and I changed my mind.

Chase wiggled his eyebrows at me, but then the smile vanished and concern took over. “Are you okay? I don’t mean to comment on your ass but damn, you have a lot of nasty bruises and cuts back there. What happened?”

I bit my tongue, trying to stem my irritation. I knew it was partially caused by the pain. Chase was actually trying to be nice and he did seem concerned. “We’re not sure. We got attacked out on our land by some creature, and I fell in a pile of bramble bushes. Apparently the briars liked me and wanted me to stay and sit with them awhile.”

“What sort of creature? I have a group of my men waiting on the front porch. They’re ready to go hunting, but first we need a description of what we’re looking for.”

“We don’t know what it was, but we can tell you what it looked like.” Menolly had moved in a blur, so silently that Chase let out a shout and jumped as she appeared by his side. She started to laugh. “What’s the matter, detective? See a ghost? Or maybe…a vampire?”

“What the hell? Don’t do that!” Chase edged away from her. I could smell the fear coming off of him, along with a spicy, meaty smell. Whatever he had eaten for dinner was sticking with him, oozing out of his pores.

“Don’t tease the detective. It’s not nice.” Part of me wanted to scold Menolly and part of me wanted to cheer her on. But the diplomatic side won.

She rolled her eyes, but muttered an apology. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“Uh huh, right. So what did it look like?”

“Short, about so tall.” She measured from the floor with her hand. “And it was covered in fur. It had a gnarled face, and the mouth—we definitely saw a ring of teeth.”

“It absorbed the magic I sent out it. Absorbed it, then threw it right back at me. So we know that it can feed off magical energy. Although I doubt it would object to a dinner of body parts, either.” I strained remember anything else that might help. “We don’t think it was demonic. It felt nasty, but not deliberately evil. Honestly, it reminded me of an animal.”

“A hungry one,” Delilah said.

I nodded. “Yes, true. I think it was hungry. Why else would it continue to attack us when it saw there were three of us?”

“Because we weren’t very effective against it? Because it thought it could win? But you’re right, it did remind me of a hungry animal. Only smarter.” Menolly slowly floated up toward the ceiling. She had taken to hanging out up there when Delilah and I ate, or when she wanted to think.

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