Page 88 of Woods of the Raven

I grabbed her and hugged her tight.

“Okay, okay, get off me.” She walked over to the still open trapdoor. I was strangely concerned that if I closed it and extinguished the light, it might disappear, though that seemed a bit insane. “Why is this open? I thought you said you liked the man. What if he falls down and breaks a leg?”

“Look in there. There’s been some renovations.”

She knelt and poked her head in. “Oh, Xan, this is lovely and—why is there a book perched on the ladder?”

“A book?”

She reached down and then held out the small red-leather-bound book, making a sound of disdain at the same time.

“What’s with you?”

“I hated this book in high school,” she groused. “Even with your grandfather trying to make it interesting,” she said, leaning back down and turning the knob to extinguish the light and then gently closing the trapdoor. “I still hated it.”

“What?”

“Oh, don’t give me the face.” She replaced the rug over the trapdoor. “You hated it too.”

Turning the book so I could see the spine, I read The History of Osprey.

“I mean, yes, we get the Iroquois and the settlers, and that was fun to read, but other than that, it’s a snore fest.”

It was. I remembered now. The history class in junior year. My grandfather explaining how the Native Americans and the settlers had to band together during the harsh winters, and how everyone had bonded, intermarried, and the community had flourished.

“You know,” she mused, “if that business about the cannibalistic family had been in there, I probably would have liked it much more.”

“The cannibalistic family?”

“Well, yes. You’re the one who told me all about it last week. You’re supposed to be finding me that book at the library. My God, man, your memory.”

Something about her saying the word jogged mine. I needed to ward her home, and Lorne’s, and I needed to do that now before they were attacked but then…why…

...why had I forgotten about that? And yes, things had happened, good and bad, but—that made no sense unless…for some reason, it wasn’t necessary.

The fact of the matter was, I wasn’t worried about Lorne’s family, or Amanda and hers because the reality was, no one was coming for them. The focus of the preternatural attacks was me. I was the guardian of the rift, no one else who wasn’t here with me on Corvus, was in danger. And while that was comforting to know others were safe, Lorne was with me now, which meant I had more than myself to consider.

“Are you listening to me?”

“What?”

She grunted.

“You brought me produce,” I said warmly. “Aren’t you an angel.”

She growled in response.

I watched her start to unload the things she’d brought from the bags she’d bumped down on the table. Clearly, she’d been to the farmers’ market very early in the morning. You had to arrive right at opening to score all the lovely fruit she had. The vegetables tended not to move, but the fruit went fast.

“I heard through the grapevine you’re getting your job back at the library, so you have no excuse not to find me that book about the crazy people.”

“They weren’t crazy, just cannibals.”

“There’s a difference?”

“Yes…?” I said, slightly distracted by the glimmer of an idea.

“I mean, I guess they did make a choice to eat other people, but we’re not talking about something horrific like the Donner Party or those poor soccer players in the Andes. It was the Andes, wasn’t it? You know I’m terrible with geography.”