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  License Notes

  Printed in the United States of America

  Copyright © 2018 Amanda Booloodian

  Published by: Walton INK

  Cover Art by Deranged Doctor Design

  Formatting by Deranged Doctor Design

  ISBN-13: 978-1-947382-90-9

  All rights reserved

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any manner without the express written permission of the publisher, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law. For permissions, please contact Walton INK.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author's imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental

  Walton INK

  booloodian.com

  This is dedicated to Aunt Donna.

  Thank you for all of your enthusiasm and support.

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  Table of Contents

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  About the Author

  Chapter 1

  Gremlins. My first day back in the field and I had my first gremlin call. Agents had wrestled with the gremlins a few times while I had been stuck on desk duty.

  "You sure you're up for this, Cassie?" Logan asked. "It's quite a hike."

  "My leg is fine," I insisted. "Good as new."

  "Let's saddle up then," Logan said. "These varmints can be a nuisance. Best to get them sorted before they reach the junk yard."

  "Varmints?" Rider's face crinkled, while he slung the gear bag across his back. "I do not know that word."

  Logan looked stumped for a minute. "Um, small creatures."

  I heard the small hint of a question in Logan's words. "Troublesome or mischievous child or other small creature." Logan raised an eyebrow at me and I shrugged. "When I was little, Gran used to call me and the neighbor girl varmints when we played together." I didn't want to encourage the continued cowboy lingo, but I had looked that one up and the definition had stayed with me.

  "Right." Logan beamed as only an elf could. "Let's round them up."

  We plunged into the woods with Logan leading the way. Once we were hidden from the gravel road, Logan's ears twitched. They slowly unfurled until they stuck out behind his head, ending in points. The skin and flesh rolled thin at the farthest reaches, and you could practically see the bright early morning sun shining through.

  "Do your ears get cold in this weather?" I asked. The thought of that much exposed skin in the freezing temperatures of a Midwest winter made me nestle down deeper into my coat.

  Logan chuckled. "Not in the way yours would."

  "Did you have winters like this where you're from?" I asked.

  "Not quite like this," Logan said. "The weather can't seem to make up its mind here. At home, it got cold and stayed cold until it was time to get warm again."

  "How about you, Rider?" I asked.

  "I am from here," Rider said.

  "I mean where you grew up," I corrected.

  "It was cold north of where we lived," Rider said, "in the mountains. My father took us twice when we were young."

  "We?" I asked, interested in hearing more about my new friend's family.

  Rider looked uncomfortable. He always did when he talked about his family. A look of sadness also began peeking through, which I hated to see.

  "I didn't think about the weather," I said, changing the subject quickly. "Does it get cold in the gremlin world? They're not going to get sick or anything, are they?"

  Rider didn't look at me, but I could see relief in his expression.

  "Not too sure. We don't have a reliable portal going there," Logan said. "Although, with this one popping open all the time, we'll probably get enough readings to create a stable one before long."

  The dimensional portal opening repeatedly was a consistent reminder of the mess we had faced last fall. Having someone trying to kill you wasn't a pleasant memory to get thrown in your face over and over again. Being reminded of a missing partner was even worse.

  Where was Vincent?

  When I fell silent, sadly turning inward, Logan filled the void with humming. Before long, he was whistling an old western tune. I didn't need to know the words or the name to know what type of song it was.

  When elves take an interest in something for more than a few hours it tends to stick, driving everyone around them slowly insane. Logan had been stuck on westerns for almost a year now.

  However, since it came from an elf, the song could be one that tavern drunks sang, yet it would still be enchanting. Logan could make it sound like two people whistled in harmony, and it all came from him.

  Whether he had meant it to or not, it lifted my spirits.

  "What's our plan of attack?" I asked after his performance ended.

  "Are we going to attack the gremlins?" Rider asked, sounding distressed.

  "It's a figure of speech," I said. "What I meant was, what are we going to do?"

  "Hank thinks there are about five of them, based on their heat readings," Logan said. "But there could be more. We'll tranq them if we have to, but we can probably get away with only cuffing them."

  "With zip strips," I said. "Not actual cuffs." In training, I had learned a little about gremlins. Someone in class had chosen them as a discussion piece for debate, which had been quite interesting.

  "Right," Logan said. "Cuffing them with metal would be as good as wrangling them with smoke rings. They're only about a half-mile away or so. We can drop the metal just shy of their location and lure them out. How's your leg?"

  I rolled my eyes. "It's fine. How are you all? I can't believe you aren't cold out here."

  Logan chuckled. Rider only shrugged.

  It baffled me that I was wrapped up in a coat, hat, gloves, and boots while they both wore light jackets. As a werewolf, Rider was extremely warm blooded, so his wasn't even zipped. Just looking at them made me shiver.

  Logan held up a hand and slowed. Rider and I halted, watching Logan move silently through the underbrush and into a small clearing. He took out a plastic bag full of filings and dumped some of the metal onto the ground. He backed off to the side and we waited.

  A screech filled the air, quickly echoed by other scratchy voices. Loud rustling seemed to come from everywhere at once as the gremlins moved through the woods.

  One gremlin broke through the tree line and went straight to the metal. It propelled itself forward by running and then pushing its fists against the ground to launch itself farther than a step would take it. The little green creature screeched again and plunged its hand into the metal as two more gremlins appeared.

  The two bounded on and over each other in a scramble. I had to put my hand over my mouth to keep from laughing. For such ugly little people, they were cute to watch. They squabbled a bit, but plenty of metal had been laid out for them. They began the fruitless endeavor of trying to shape the shavings.

  We watched and waited.

  I shifted and looked at the woods around us. Had the others been hurt?

  When the screech came from beside me, I felt a little relief. Looking over, I saw that one of the gremlins had climbed the tree next to me. I spotted it as it launched itself toward me.

&nbs
p; "What the—" On instinct, I threw up my arm to ward off the little creature. When it hit, though, I realized how big they actually were. This one felt like thirty pounds of solid muscle smashed into a figure two feet tall. It knocked me to the ground, raking sharp claws over my coat.

  An embarrassing half-scream, half-shriek burst out of me right before my back hit the ground. In my panic, I reached for my power. My mind scrambled desperately for the furthest reaches—where the end of my knowledge of this world ended, a black chasm awaited. My power as a Reader waited on the other side of that darkness. Once I reached the edge, I stretched… but reached nothing.

  I couldn't make the jump to the Path.

  The weight of gremlin lifted before I caught my breath. Rider held the little green person up to his face, and the two inspected each other with what seemed like great interest.

  I rose up on my elbows and looked over my ripped coat. When the next two gremlins pounced, I managed to push one off and Rider picked up the other.

  "Get off!" I yelled at the gremlin, and then pushed the little creature further away, trying to scramble to my feet.

  "They're after the zipper," Logan called. He had one gremlin zipped, and he then dumped even more metal out onto the ground.

  Rider had two gremlins in hand, Logan had taken care of one, and I struggled to push away a fourth.

  So where were...

  Two more gremlins screeched. One jumped on my back and started trying to tear through the coat. The gremlin fell off when I finally got upright. I unzipped my coat and tossed it away. Two of the Lost chased it.

  I leaned over, breathing heavily and trying to calm the frantic pace of my heart. Stupid zipper. Stupid gremlins and their stupid love of metal.

  Logan moved quickly to my coat and started to cuff another gremlin.

  "Why didn't they go after your coat?" I snapped crossly at the elf.

  "Can't imagine," Logan said, wrestling one of them to the ground.

  "They—ep!" Another gremlin scrambled up my leg and clutched at my shirt. Its friend gave up on my coat and joined it. "Get off!"

  "Are you wearing jewelry?" Logan asked, running over.

  "No!"

  "Any other metal?"

  "No! I—" Oh crap. I scrambled even more desperately to shove them away.

  "Are gremlins predators?" Rider asked.

  The calmness of his voice ticked me off. "It's not my soul. It's—Dammit!"

  Logan managed to pull one off. I knocked the other away and turned around, yanking away my shirt in the process.

  "I don't think—" Logan started.

  I took off my bra and flung it away. The lone gremlin remaining on the ground scampered after it.

  My face held the only warmth I felt, and the cold even tried to suck that away. I wrapped my arms tightly around myself to keep from being exposed and to keep in what little heat my arms could hold in.

  "You are bleeding," Rider said, a hint of worry in his voice.

  "Of course I'm bleeding," I snapped. "I've been mauled." Without letting go of myself, I tried to look all over for signs of blood, but I only found a few mild scratches. I shivered and looked around for my coat. Two very sedate gremlins sat next to the torn shreds.

  "How bad?" Logan asked, sounding far too serious for an elf.

  Rider no longer had any gremlins in his hands, but held up the remains of my shirt. They had managed to turn it into strips of cloth.

  My shoulders began to hunch over as I tried to make myself smaller. "I-I-It's n-not—" I stopped, my teeth chattering.

  "Hang in there, partner," Logan said. "Taking care of the last one."

  I didn't bother looking around.

  Rider moved next to me, and I naturally gravitated to his warmth. He held out his jacket.

  "Th-thank y-you," I stammered through clenched teeth. Trying to keep myself covered, I took the jacket. I turned around and clumsily wrapped the thin coat around me.

  "Are you angry?" Rider asked, moving back into my line of sight.

  I wrapped the material tighter around me. "Wh-What?"

  Logan added his jacket to Rider's, but it was no use. I needed a parka to keep out the winter. Sometimes being a human sucked.

  "I don't suppose there's any way to get warm in the Path?" Logan asked.

  I squeezed my eyes shut and shook my head. With my power as a Reader, I could do amazing things. The glittery Path allowed me to affect the emotions of those around me and see their past movements. Recently, after my soul had been shattered, my strength as a Reader expanded and I could even move things by manipulating the Path. Getting warm in the Path wasn't an option.

  "Rider, take her back to the truck before she freezes to death." Logan handed him the keys. "Turn up the heat as hot as it can get. Once she's warmed up some, get on back here and we'll bring 'em in."

  "I c-can w-w-walk." The words had barely left my mouth before Rider picked me up with no effort whatsoever and started to run.

  For a few moments, I did nothing but soak up the heat. Then my brain kicked in. I really hated being carried.

  My teeth stopped clicking together, but I couldn't stop shivering.

  "This sucks," I said.

  Chapter 2

  In the history of the agency, ending up mostly naked in below freezing temperatures might not have been the worst first day back in the field. It had to be toward the top, though.

  Logan made it worse by not wanting to leave the mad scramble for the underwire in my bra out of the report. I could see his point. Yes, people needed to know so they didn't make the same mistake, but seriously, how many women field agents are there? In this office, I was the only full-time female field agent. It wasn't a mistake I would make again.

  At least Logan had the foresight to call ahead and get Hank to track down an extra shirt for me. I had no idea who donated the shirt, but once the gremlins were unloaded, I kicked everyone out of the truck and put it on, then added Rider's jacket over it.

  It took me a few moments to psych myself up before going inside. There was no way I was going to hang my head or look embarrassed. It could have happened to anyone. At least, that's what I told myself over and over again.

  After a quick trip to the clinic, at Dr. Yelton's insistence, I made it back down to the control room. Desks littered the wide-open space. Hank presided over many large monitors on the far side of the room, and conference rooms surrounded the area.

  It was tempting to go to my office and do paperwork there, but the truth was, we never worked in our office. I had been there once in the past six months, and I had nearly died for my trouble. My near-death experience had been a mistake, yes, and it had the added benefit of bringing Vincent into my life, but I wasn't about to hide away today. And that's exactly what it would look like—hiding.

  Besides, Logan liked to talk to all the other agents. Today, he chatted with anyone who came near while I worked with Rider on the files.

  The fact that my powers had let me down depressed me the most. As Rider and I slogged our way through the paperwork, with me explaining everything along the way, my mind kept wandering to my status as a field agent. Would I be effective if I couldn't read the Path?

  Vincent had shattered my soul, which caused my powers to go haywire. It was a workplace accident, more or less, and I now held more power, but more power came with less control.

  The thought weighed me down almost as much as Vincent’s disappearance.

  "Hank has something for us when you've wrapped things up here," Logan said.

  "Sure," I said, trying to pull back from the self-loathing. "Almost done. You'll need to sign off on this, though."

  Logan moved around to see the monitor, taking a cursory glance at the report. "Does it have everything it needs?"

  Somehow, I managed not to roll my eyes. "Yes. I’ve got everything in there." When I finished the last line of the report, I slid the keyboard over so Logan could sign off.

  He didn't bother reading the report. Even when the paperw
ork was computerized, Logan wanted nothing to do with it. With that finished, we went to see our handler.

  Hank didn't look our way when we approached. "I've got a few changes for you over the next few days." His gaze remained fixed on his screen.

  "Sure thing," Logan said.

  "There's a new agent coming on board, and we want to send his team to the Sanctuary tomorrow," Hank said.

  Logan shrugged. "It's winter. They aren't going to get much out of Essy this time of year. Do we have anyone else out there right now?"

  "A Piasa bird came through around Alton and created some new rumors for the area," Han said. "It's at the Sanctuary until we can find it a permanent home."

  "What's a Piasa Bird?" I asked.

  "Hmm." Hank looked away from his computer for the first time. "Picture a mountain lion with scales, wings, and antlers. We had another one fifteen years ago in the same spot. Native American murals indicate that these things might have been popping into our world for hundreds of years, but they're pretty rare. The two we've had are the only two confirmed in the official records."

  "Are they intelligent?" I asked.

  "No," Hank said. "It's classified as an animal. Thankfully, they can't actually fly. The wings seem to be more for gliding."

  After the sordis last year, I didn't want anything swooping down on me from the trees.

  "But," Hank continued, "the Sanctuary is a good introduction to the area."

  "What's on our agenda?" Logan asked.

  Hank turned back to the computer. "I've been studying some satellite images, and there's a tribe of goblins more active than we would normally expect this time of year."

  "I figured they'd be hunkered down for the winter," Logan said.

  "Usually they are," Hank said. "But something has them stirred up."

  "I've never worked with goblins," I said. I knew next to nothing about them as well, but I wasn't willing to admit that.