Baehrly Alive (4 page)

“I can’t help you, I’m afraid,” Hypatia said, her beautiful stone-like face still and remote as she looked past me to break the news.

Once I would have been offended by her refusal to look at me, but I knew her well enough by now to see how much she regretted giving me the bad news. The stiller her face got, the more emotional she was getting.

Inside that chest of stone, there was a heart of gold—not literally, of course. I wasn’t even sure if she had a real heart, but Hypatia was compassionate for a woman who had been dead for almost two thousand years.

“You can’t?” I repeated. “Does that mean you really can’t, or that you won’t?”

Hypatia sighed. “What do you want me to say, Goldie? I know each and every one of these volumes around us. I say I cannot help you, because I cannot find anything that will help your stepmother.”

I swallowed hard to keep myself from letting a sob escape. “That’s not possible! There has to be something!”

“About the disease, yes,” Hypatia said, pointing down toward one particularly large book on her desk. “A cure? Nothing. No one has ever found a cure.”

I read the paragraph she was pointing to and felt my brows draw together in confusion. “This disease has only existed since the separation with Faerie?”

Hypatia shrugged. “That is the first recorded case,” she said. “There may have been earlier cases that weren’t recorded.”

I flipped through the book. “But—the cases have been getting more severe over time?”

“The disease is spreading faster and hitting harder,” Hypatia agreed. “And there is no cure. It’s a plague—and all Magical creatures are affected.”

“How does it spread?” I asked, thinking of my pocket of Magical—and rare—creatures at home.

Hypatia shrugged. “If we knew that, maybe there would be a cure. No one knows how it spreads from victim to victim. The only thing we know about this disease is that it only affects Magical beings and that it is always fatal.”

I slumped back in my seat, hearing those last words echo repeatedly in my head. ‘Always fatal’ was not a reassuring thing to be up against.

“There has to be something,” I insisted, flipping through more pages of the book, trying to absorb everything written there.

“You young creatures feel such enmity with death,” Hypatia said sadly.

I glanced up at her, with her solid black eyes with no white around them. She looked ageless and ancient at once.

She did not look even remotely human.

“I’m not a fan of Death’s work,” I agreed. “I’ve had too many loved ones taken away too soon. I would be happier if I never had to deal with Death ever again.”

Hypatia chuckled, but I thought there was a note of bitterness in her voice. “Death is what makes life… bearable.”

Well, she would know. She had been cursed to live forever after that mob had tried to stone her to death and burn her body.

Like me with my bear—no one had asked her if that was what she wanted.

Until recently, she’d never been able to leave the Library at all. Only by vowing to return was she able to escape for a couple hours at a time. If she tried to stay away for too long, the Library would yank on her, as if the leash of a naughty dog, and drag her forcibly back.

After almost two thousand years of that, no wonder Hypatia sounded wistful when she talked of Death.

“I’m not going to give up,” I told her. “Can I take this book with me?”

Hypatia gave her hand a negligible gesture and I knew I would find an identical volume in my home library. “I will keep the Ouroboros searching for information,” she promised. “I fear that there is nothing there to find.”

Every time she implied that it was impossible, I felt my determination increase.

Maybe that’s why she did it.

Hypatia was a renowned teacher and philosopher. If she could motivate reluctant students, then she would have no trouble in manipulating me to work even harder.

“Time,” I muttered as I kissed her good-bye on the cheek and left the Library. “I need more time.”

I was so focused on my thoughts that I ran right into the person standing on the corner.

“I’m sorry,” I said, as I pulled myself up to my feet and dusted the seat of my jeans off. “I wasn’t looking where I was going.”

The stranger gave me a long, surprised look.

I touched my face. What, was I wearing jam from tea? Did I have hellcat fur on my sweater?

As far as I could tell, there was no reason this stranger should be staring at me like that.

“Did I hurt you?” I asked.

He shook his head, seeming to blink back from whatever lala-land he had been stuck in. “No, I’m quite well. Are you? That was quite a bump.”

I grimaced. “Just my pride,” I answered. “It’s a miracle I have any dignity left to bruise.”

He chuckled.

I tilted my head at him. He was tall—almost as tall as Kodi, but slender where Kodi was stockier—with light hair and solemn dark eyes.

He looked familiar somehow.

“Not to sound like a cheesy pick-up line,” I said, trying to puzzle it out. “But have I met you before?”

Again, that stare as if he had been struck by lightning. “Yes, yes we have. I was… acquainted with your father.”

“Oh,” I said, surprised that he would recognize me to make that connection. “I must have seen you at the funeral?”

He nodded.

“Well, I’m sorry I ran into you like that,” I said—wondering if I should make a break for it. The man was staring at me again, and it was rather unnerving.

“I’m not,” he said, his face completely devoid of emotion. I couldn’t tell if he was teasing me or not.

I tried to laugh, but it felt strange and awkward and fell flat.

I stuck my hand out with my most charming grin—my best defense in a situation like this one. “I’m Goldie, by the way.”

He looked down at my hand as if he’d never shaken one in his life. Slowly he took it, gave it a little squeeze, and let his hand drop again.

His hands, despite being in gloves, were even colder than mine were.

“I’m… Nat,” he said.

He stood there and looked at me until I felt like wriggling around like a little kid. “Well, it was nice to meet you—again,” I said. “I have to go to the office now.”

He nodded and I set off again, determined not to look over my shoulder at him.

Even without looking back, I could tell that he was watching me walk away.

Somehow, that didn’t bother me as much as it should have. He wasn’t acting within the boundaries of what anyone would call ‘normal’, yet there had been something kind and quiet about him.

I wondered how he had known my dad. Maybe he’d been one of Dad’s graduate students? There had been enough of them that I might have lost track of faces over the years.

Whoever he was, my gut—and my bear—both told me that he wasn’t a threat.

Chapter Four

There was nothing glamorous about being a lawyer—even when the Baehr brothers sent me around the world recovering endangered animals.

Paperwork was the bane of my existence.

Kodi tapped on my door and I looked up in relief. I was more than ready for a break.

“The Council of Magic has too many rules,” I announced, dumping a pile of papers into my ‘out’ box and wishing I could burn them and the pile that was easily ten times as tall sitting in my ‘in’ box. “Why does feeding a unicorn hay from an Ordinary’s farm require six different permits? It doesn’t make sense.”

“Hello to you, too,” Kodi teased.

“Argh,” I growled. “You knew I meant that.”

His grin broadened. “Yeah, I figured that’s what the griping meant.”

“It’s not griping when it’s true,” I muttered. “There are so many contradicting laws that I could be shut down by the Council of Magic for sneezing in the wrong direction.” I waved a paper at him. “This law says that it’s illegal to feed or nurture a baby dragon.” I picked up another sheet of paper. “This one says that it is illegal to act in a manner in which a baby dragon might come to danger or harm, including starvation or exposure to the elements.” I sighed and dropped my face to the desk. “Just kill me now.”

Kodi chuckled again. He came up behind me and started kneading the sore muscles at the base of my neck. “Having a rough day?”

I moaned as he found a particularly sore spot and worked it out—much gentler than anyone would expect of a were bear. “A rough day? What would make you suggest such a thing?”

Kodi dropped a kiss on the top of my head and turned me to face him.

I groaned. Why had he stopped rubbing my shoulders? That had been the high point of my day… week… month, sadly.

“So,” he said, stroking one of my blond curls back into place with a studious expression. “When were you going to tell me that Donovan moved into your house?”

I froze. “Um. I didn’t tell you yet?” I asked meekly.

He shook his head, crossing his arms in front of his chest. “Don’t you think that’s something I should know about—another guy living with my fiancée?”

I scowled at him. “You make it sound so torrid,” I said. “Donovan needed a place to live and he’s already working at the Preserve, and I had that suite upstairs, so it made more sense to let him live there.”

Kodi nodded. “I agree.”

I gaped at him. “Then why the whole disapproving act?”

“It’s not an act,” Kodi said. “I’m trying to understand why you felt like you couldn’t tell me that Donovan had moved in. I’ve been trying to wrap my brain around it. Were you afraid that I would act irrationally?”

I shook my head. Kodi was pretty even tempered. Him becoming angry had never crossed my mind.

“Maybe you’re afraid that I would be… jealous?” he raised an eyebrow at me.

I felt like the breath had been knocked out of me. “Why would you be jealous?” I asked.

“That’s what I’m asking myself. Should I be jealous, Goldie?”

I shook my head. “No.”

“There’s nothing going on between you and Donovan?”

I glared at him. “Don’t you know me better than that?”

Kodi sighed. “I thought I did. Hey, can I take you to dinner tonight? There’s something I want to talk to you about. I’ll drop you off at home afterward.”

I nodded. “Sure. Why not?”

I really wished I knew why I felt like there was a rock sitting in my gut.

Sometimes talking was over-rated.

Who needed to communicate, anyway?

When someone said they needed to talk to me, it was always bad news. Dad had done the ‘talk to you’ thing when he’d caught me smuggling piskies home in my backpack after one camping trip.

I had a feeling that I was being busted for something.

I just wished I knew what.

Magic Central, like most high-traffic places, had its share of ritzy restaurants. The most famous of these actually sat in the top of the dome and looked down on the activity below.

It was high enough to make pilots get vertigo.

I looked down at the herd of flying horses, as they winged across the dome like so many giant pigeons. I’d borrowed a dress from Willow, our dryad secretary at the firm, and I was glad I had taken the time to make myself look presentable.

This place was Fancy.

The dress was not something I would usually wear—being a silvery green-blue in color and very, very girly with a plunging neckline, thin straps that hardly existed, and a puffy circle skirt that swished every time I moved.

Add in the matching stilettos and I was in hell.

Kodi brushed my cheek with his lips. “You look beautiful,” he murmured.

“Thank you,” I said, glancing up at him through my eyelashes. He too had taken the time to get dressed up for our dinner. He looked stunning in his suit with his tie tightened and in place for once—instead of dangling half-off the way it usually was. “You look beautiful, too.”

He chuckled as we followed a satyr to our table. Satyrs were not usually good for polite company—being altogether too hairy and, well, horny—but this one was subdued and looked handsome—and clothed, for which I was immensely grateful.

Seeing a naked satyr once in a girl’s life is more than enough. In fact, most women would take one look and swear off men altogether.

“Our specials,” he was saying in a sleek accent that gave away his Greek origin, “are the duck and the lobster. We also have a delicate mousse pie for dessert.”

Kodi raised his eyebrows at me and I felt my lips curve to one side.

Kodi loved to tease me about lobsters.

At the ripe old age of thirteen I had been visiting my dad and his new wife, Gwyn, when we all decided to go to the dock to get something to eat.

My dad and Gwyn had selected two big, healthy lobsters to take home and cook.

That wouldn’t have been so bad, except that I got rather—attached to one of the lobsters. That led me to trying to reintroduce him to the ocean and ended up with my sobbing into my pillow while my parents enjoyed a dinner of Hurl-butt with butter.