Her attention caught on her hair, and she tilted her head back and forth as she considered what the puck had done to it.
He had braided several smaller braids down each side, just enough to tame her hair and keep it back off her face, while leaving the rest of it to tumble crazily down her back. It actually looked pretty nice, kind of tribal.
She decided to leave it and got on with the business of washing up and brushing her teeth. Then she slipped into the bedroom to dress in jeans, the Doc Martens, and a black scoop-neck T-shirt. She glanced at her makeup bag and laughed under her breath—like anybody cared what she looked like, least of all herself—and left it tucked in the open suitcase. Then she grabbed up her own cell phone and the heavy, old keys to the manor house and walked out.
Nikolas had finished dressing, and he had strapped the sword to his back. He stood as still as a statue, arms crossed, staring out the kitchen window at the manor house.
He had absolutely none of the affectations or sense of male fashion she had seen in many other men. None. His hair was cut short. He wore simple plain black clothes and his weapon, yet there was a simple, powerful lethal quality about him that made her weak at the knees.
He looked like he could face down an army, and he was fully prepared to do so.
As she cleared her throat, the statue came alive, and he turned to face her.
“Give me your list of things to buy for the colloidal silver,” he said. “I’ll send Gawain after them.”
She nodded. “Okay. I brought magic-sensitive silver with me, so he doesn’t need to waste time looking for that. I know it’s pretty rare and expensive here since most of the mines are in the States. You’ll need to get some, but for now we can use mine.” She thumbed the screen of her phone on. “What’s your number? I’ll text the list to you.”
He told her, and she keyed the numbers in, copied the list she had already made for him, and sent it in a text. When he received it, he studied the items. “Interesting.”
“We’re going to be building a machine,” she told him. “It’s a very simple one, but this version won’t work in an Other land because it requires batteries. There’s another system you can set up that doesn’t require batteries, and I can show you how to make that too. In the States, I could pick up everything I need at a local hardware store. I’m sure there’s a version of something like that here, but I don’t know where to look for it.”
“Not a problem.” He worked briefly on his phone then slipped it in his pocket. “Gawain will pick up everything we need. I also rang the local butcher and the grocer while you were dressing. They’re putting packages of groceries together. The orders will be ready to be picked up in a few hours.”
Not what would you like to eat, Sophie? Do you drink coffee? Are you allergic to nuts? Of course not.
He was so arrogant she was beginning to suspect he didn’t even know when he was being arrogant. Was she even going to bother to point it out, yet again? Gritting her teeth, she decided not to waste the time or the energy. If she wanted to buy herself groceries, she was by God going to go into town and buy herself some fucking groceries.
Shaking her head, she stalked out of the cottage, and she didn’t stop walking until she stood a few feet in front of the manor house.
Nikolas caught up with her and stalked along by her side. After a minute, he said between his teeth, “I took care of all your needs with a few phone calls, and you’re acting like I committed some kind of crime. What on earth is your problem now, woman? Because clearly there’s a problem.”
“I’m not talking to you. Hush, and let me think.”
He muttered something in his language. It sounded beautiful, and it probably had something to do with her being insufferable again. She curled a lip at him and turned her attention back to the house.
The day was gorgeous, a perfect hot summer day in England. Bees droned by. Lavish, untamed greenery spilled from underneath trees, barely held in check by the simple, crude mowing job that kept the wide lawn from turning into an overgrown pasture.
Soon her shirt began to stick to her back, and she almost wished she had put on a pair of shorts. She asked him, “How many gables do you see?”
He had crossed his arms again and stood with his chin tucked close to his chest. At her question, he gave the house an indifferent glance and shrugged. “Five.”
Smiling, she shook her head at him. “There’s more than five. I want to walk around the whole house.”
His attention sharpened, and he gave the house a second, more thoughtful look. “How many gables do you see?”
“I’ll tell you after I’ve gone all the way around.”
They strode the circuit around the massive house in silence. For the first time since she had arrived, she caught a glimpse of the small lake behind the house. Nikolas remained watchful, his expression grim. It must still be difficult for him to be in the place of such a painful defeat. He had lost friends and comrades here. She couldn’t imagine how that must feel, actually, and since she couldn’t find the right words to say in sympathy, she left him to his own thoughts.
When they finally stood in the same spot in front of the house again, she said, “How many did you see?”
“Still five,” he told her. “What about you?”
“On this side of the house, I can see seven. But there’s an eighth gable tucked around the back.”
“I want to say that’s impossible, but mostly I think it’s inexplicable,” Nikolas muttered. “How do you see more gables than I do?”
She held up her hands and gestured around her. “I think it’s the land itself. The crossover passageway is broken, but all the pieces of that magic are still here. Kathryn, the surviving member of the Shaw family, said that when her father was young, he was able to get into the house, but that was quite some time ago. She didn’t say exactly when, but she indicated it had been hundreds of years ago.”
“They’re not human,” he said.
“No, they’re Wyr. From the story she told me, I gather her ancestor fought for the Light Court. The last time her father tried to get into the house, the key turned in the lock but the door wouldn’t open. Nobody can break a window, she said, or make the door budge.” She turned sparkling eyes to Nikolas, who was listening to her with close attention. “I think it’s because the house isn’t fully here. It’s mostly here, but it’s slightly—ever so slightly—not in sync with this Earth where we stand.”
He frowned. “But we can see and touch it.”
“You can see some of it and touch some of it. I can see more of it.” She put her two fists together, side by side and aligned the knuckles of each finger to their opposite. “Think of tectonic plates, and then the earth moves. Maybe it’s a massive earthquake, or maybe it’s just a small shift.” She moved one fist slightly. “Then all of a sudden, the two plates don’t match up the way they had before and the land isn’t quite aligned as it was. I’m wondering if this is something like that, only more so. This isn’t just a place shift. This is a time, place, and dimension shift.”
He was wholly engaged now, listening closely to every word. He jerked his chin at the house. “Do you think you can see more of it because you’re part Djinn?”
“Yeah, maybe. If I’m right.” Looking back at the house, she chewed on a thumbnail. “Kathryn said the family had gotten experts to try to get into the house, but she didn’t say who those experts were or what they were experts in. It had all happened so long ago, and nobody had kept decent records of what they had done. I’m guessing they didn’t engage a Djinn as one of their experts. Why obligate yourself in an unnamed, possibly dangerous favor to a Djinn for something that was, to them, merely an exasperating mystery?”