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The two dark rectangular buildings sprang to life as a flip was switched and multi-colored Christmas lights lit them up. Now, Rafe could see the center of the camp, where picnic tables sat and even a small plastic playground had been placed for the kids. The owner of the voice stepped out of the shadows wearing a long cream-colored robe. His hair was balding on top and his beard was white and pointed at his sandal-covered feet. He was the Caucasian version of every ancient samurai master ever seen on TV.
“Horace,” she said as she jogged to him and wrapped her arms around him.
“You, my dear, grow younger every time I see you while I simply grow older,” he said.
“Well how old are you now?” she asked.
“Five hundred and two,” he said, “Or something like that. I don’t know. I stopped counting at three hundred. If it weren’t for everyone showing up on my birthdays and reminding me, I’d have no idea. I swear Thane hashes it out on his cabin wall. The man never forgets my age.”
“I’m sure you have another five hundred in you,” Kalina said.
“Lord let’s hope not,” Horace said. “And who is your human friend?”
The old man turned his attention to Rafe, and Kalina knew she only had a matter of seconds to explain herself before he started making embarrassing assumptions. His guesses would probably be right. Not only because he had a supernatural insight unmatched by any other, but also because there were only a few reasons she might have brought him here.
“He’s someone special to me,” she said as she took Horace’s hand in hers, squeezing it tightly.
“Ah,” he said wagging a finger at her as if to say he was on to something.
“We have a war headed our way,” she said.
She turned to look at Rafe and then kissed him gently on the cheek and said, “Wait here. I need to talk to Horace alone.”
“You can trust me,” Rafe assured her. “Whatever you have to say, I promise your secret is safe with me.”
“If I am seeing this correctly,” Horace said, “you will be finding out this secret soon enough.”
His chuckle pulled at Kalina’s nerves. These were the kinds of jokes he was likely to make if she let silence linger to long. He loved to make people uncomfortable. He’d done it to her all her life. At one point, she’d had a small crush on Simion. She’d never told anyone, but she’d watched him in class and had gotten anxious every time the boy looked her way. Horace caught on quickly and changed the lesson from physics to psychology, suddenly focusing on the need to speak up when something was in your heart. He’d looked directly at her as he’d said, “The heart always knows what it wants, even if the vocal chords refuse to meet it halfway.” He’d continued to make quirky remarks like that one, but thankfully nobody had caught on. Rafe was smarter than any of the others had been and would piece the puzzle together quickly if given half a chance.
“Give me a second,” Kalina said, “and I promise it’ll all make sense.”
She left him sitting at the picnic table looking up at the stars. As she walked into Horace’s home, she looked back once at Rafe and remembered how many times she’d sat in that exact spot, wishing to be whisked away to some faraway land where she had more friends and a mom and dad that loved her. Usually, one of the others would come out to the table and snap her broken thoughts back into place. Her mind had been a fragile twig, but Horace had made it a strong and sturdy bamboo branch, able to bend, but unlikely to break.
Once inside and out of earshot, Kalina took Horace’s hands in hers.
“I’m so sorry to come here for this,” she said, “but this boy is special to me. Really special. He’s the one. He’s my one true mate. I know it.”
Horace chuckled.
“Then what is the big deal?” he asked. “You are a woman. He is a man. Do I need to explain to you how it is done…again?”
“Please,” she said. “Trust me. I know how it’s done. But this is different.”
“What are you asking, Girl? Get on with it.”
“The tent,” she said.
That was all she said for a long while. Horace looked down at his feet and wrinkled the corner of his mouth. She knew at this point there was less than a fifty percent chance he would say yes, which left the scale tipping toward a no. He didn’t like doing it, she knew that, but he’d done it for her. Not exactly this, but close to it.
If Thane had come and asked for Rafe’s friends to go through the process this way, Horace would have refused. He didn’t agree with making more of their kind unless it was for mating purposes. He’d explained to Kalina all through her upbringing that love is the only force strong enough to keep a paranormal shifter on the correct path. If the gift were given to everyone who wanted it, the outcome could be disastrous. He’d actually made them paint
pictures of the gift gone wrong. Hers still hung somewhere in the sleeping cabin. She’d painted a man sitting on a poolside throne, his crown crooked on his head, while people bowed their heads to him from hotel balconies. Evelyn had been born into their world and was becoming a prime example of how the gift could be wrongfully used.
If Faith went through with changing Rafe’s friends, Horace would be pissed about it later when he found out. That would have to be something for Thane and Faith to deal with later. Right now, Kalina needed to focus on getting Rafe into that tent.
“I won’t send him in alone,” she said, hoping it would calm his nerves. “I will go with him. And I will do what needs to be done. All I’m asking is for your…your help.”
“And why is such a thing needed, little one? Why can’t you do it the natural way?”
