Page 26 of Glow

“Suspicions, but not solid info,” Liam replied. “Large reptiles couldn’t survive Adirondack winters, so we can rule out alligators and conventional lizard-style dragons like in the movies, if they even exist. But⁠—”

“What?” Quinn found himself leaning forward in anticipation.

“Have you ever heard of a Tatzelwurm?” Liam asked.

“Can’t say I have,” Quinn said.

“I’m not surprised. I hadn’t either, until I came upon a book on Alpine legends,” Liam replied, warming to the topic. “From Switzerland, Germany, and Austria, cold places, said to live in mountain crevices. It’s more of a big serpent with a demon-cat head, not a fire-breathing dinosaur. Nothing claims they’re native to the New World, but I imagine a crazy rich warlock might have imported one and lost control.”

“How do we stop it?” Quinn didn’t know whether to be relieved to get validation when it created a whole new problem of how to manage the beast.

“I’ve got a theory, and that’s all it is just yet, but I think it might explain the ‘wurm’ and why it’s showing up now,” Liam told him. “Suppose someone like a powerful witch acquired a wurm and then no longer wanted it. Maybe it couldn’t be controlled or didn’t work for whatever purpose they intended. But Tatzelwurms don’t die. Can’t be killed. All the legends say the same thing. Which means⁠—”

“He’d have to find a way to trap it and bind it. Like, say, a very deep cave,” Quinn supplied. “And the mountains around here have a lot of them.”

“Bingo!” Liam crowed.

“Then how did it get out?” Quinn was used to shifters and people with paranormal abilities, but dragons were more than he had expected.

“Still working on a theory for that,” Liam admitted. “But when I threw it out as a ‘what if’ scenario to my hacker group, someone raised the possibility that a new witch found out about the Tatzelwurm and wanted it, breaking some of the protections. But he or she couldn’t control it, either. I don’t know. It gets fuzzy at that point, but at least it’s a working theory.”

“Which is more than we had before,” Quinn said. “Of course, if you’re right, there’s an evil magic user out there as well as an off-the-chain dragon.”

“Yeah, not thrilled about that part,” Liam confessed. “And if we can’t kill the wurm, stuffing it back into the caves seems like our best bet. But to do that, we’d need to get the evil magic user out of the way first and figure out how to bind the wurm long enough to lock him back up and make sure he can’t get out again.”

“At what point do you take your theory to the sheriff? Because aside from the bounty hunters after Dan, if we’re going to need a posse to trap the wurm, he’s going to need to be in on it,” Quinn replied.

“One step at a time,” Liam said. “Let me go back to my research to confirm our suspicions, and you will be the first person I tell when I find something.”

“Thanks.” Quinn felt completely overwhelmed. “They did not cover this stuff in park ranger school.” He paused. “Anything on the hikers?”

“Not yet, I’ll keep you posted.”

They ended the call promising to talk again soon. Quinn ran his hands through his hair, trying to sort out his thoughts.

I’ll talk to Dan at dinner tonight, tell him everything, and see if he’ll go to the sheriff if I’m with him. We’ve got to do something. This is totally out of control.

Quinn finished his coffee and walked out into the sunlight. He closed his eyes and lifted his face, feeling the warmth and taking a moment to breathe. He opened himself to his powers and did his best to convey a warning about the poachers, concern over the missing hikers, and curiosity about the wurm without words. He kept the connection for several minutes, repeating the images in his mind, hoping some entity out there picked up on it and could help.

After a while, he sent a wave of thanks and closed down his extra senses. He checked his phone again for a message from Madden without success. Quinn had already gotten through his list of chores and still had several hours until it was time to meet Dan.

He went back inside and opened his computer to work on his upcoming presentations for the library on appreciating the forest’s smaller creatures, which helped, but didn’t completely stop the worry that repeated in the back of his mind.

Do the missing hikers tie into all of this somehow, or is their disappearance just a coincidence? How do I keep Dan safe? What do we do if the bounty hunters come? If Liam’s right about the witch and the Tatzelwurm, we could all be in danger. How do we stop it? What’s it going to take for me to get Dan to go talk to Armel?

Quinn didn’t have the answers but had lots of questions and knew Fox Hollow would need to come up with some solutions soon, for all their sakes.

CHAPTER 5

DAN

After Quinn left, Dan tried to go back to sleep, but the enormity of everything that had happened kept him awake. He tossed and turned, then buried his face into the pillow Quinn had used to take comfort from his scent.

My mate, he thought, still overwhelmed by that turn of events.

He likes us, Wally ventured. I promise I didn’t peek, much, but he makes you very happy.

Dan wasn’t completely surprised that his other half had been a silent third party to his tryst with Quinn, and figured that was probably common for anyone with a shifter side.