I swiped open my notes. “I’ll write this down. All of it, Ellie. Even if I don’t consciously remember, part of me knows. I’ll follow Chihiro’s instructions. Your enchantments are going to see me as part of your world. I promise.” I just needed to be on the inside.
That was the key. It had to be the key. I needed to get inside the enchantments. Chihiro had. She got in and the enchantments stopped messing with her memory.
And Chihiro wasn’t the only one to get in.
“You have my dog,” I said.
She nodded. “I don’t bring him into town. I don’t want questions from mundanes who know he’s yours.”
“He got inside the enchantments. He comes to visit me every couple of days, then he leaves again on his own. He remembers you, and he always returns.”
Her brow knitted, and her mouth rounded. “I didn’t realize.”
“I think the enchantments don’t want you to realize. Because once you realize, you can pick and choose who comes in, and not the magic.”
Ellie straightened the backpack and looked up at the sky. “What if figuring out how to circumvent the enchantments is what triggers the magic that moves my cottage? It caused Chihiro agony. What if it does the same thing to you?” She looked up at the sky. “I can’t do this, Frank. I can’t find a way to be with you and then have you ripped away from me.”
“We don’t know if that will happen. Chihiro remembers you. We don’t—”
“I’ll shatter.” She ran toward the parking lot.
I’m big and I’m fast. I scooped her up before she got too far. I lifted her into the air and buried my face against her neck. “Let me try. Please, Ellie. Please,” I whispered.
Ellie wailed but she held on.
I’d fallen into this moment as if it was a magical pocket land. I had no past here, and only scant understanding of its rules. But I knew it would slam closed soon, and I’d lose her tears on my shoulder. I’d lose her arms around my chest and the feel of her hair against my neck.
I was head over heels in love with a magical woman whom I could only touch when the magic ignored us both.
“Frank!” someone called from the restaurant side of the trees. “Hey, Frank, you in there?”
Ellie pushed on my shoulders. “Put me down.”
“No.” I’d vowed long ago that I would never disrespect a woman’s wishes. But this was different. I would only comply with the side of her ambivalence I supported.
“Frank…” Ellie cupped my cheeks, and she kissed me with more passion than I’d ever felt from another woman. She wrapped her arms around my head and she kissed me as if this was the last time we would ever see each other.
I curled my fingers into her hair. “Please, Ellie,” I whispered.
“Frank?” the voice called again.
The defeat in Ellie’s sigh played across my lips and chin. Gently, she removed my hand from her hair, and just as gently, she kissed my fingers.
I was about to lose her again. Again. “No, no, Ellie, please,” I whispered. “Don’t go.”
She nodded toward the voice. “What’s the elf’s name?”
“Lennart,” I said. “He’s a good guy. He’ll help.” He would. All the elves would. She just needed to let me figure out how to make it happen.
She laid her forehead against my cheek. “He can’t.” Then she wiggled out of my embrace and ran down the path toward the parking lot.
Lennart popped through the brush.
I looked up at the elf who couldn’t see Ellie running away. I looked back as she vanished around the corner.
I wanted to yell out her name. I wanted to follow.
But Lennart put his hand on my shoulder. “Come on. Your satchel’s ready,” he said.
Ellie’s concealments screamed like a gang of terrified meerkats at the elf standing next to me. They screamed and they threw up their barriers.
And once again, the most important person in my life slipped away.
Chapter 6
Ellie disappeared into the thick trees beyond the church with her hands buried in her hoodie’s pocket and my backpack on her back. Gone, like a ghost. She vanished as if her enchantments refused to allow me to see her anymore.
My fist balled. My arm rose. The muscles of my back and arm tightened to throw every joule of my energy into a carved saint whose only mistake was to scowl down at the mundanes below.
“Hey!” Lennart caught my wrist. He’d come through the brush and onto the path around the church with hardly a sound. “No punching churches.”
He was larger than most of the other elves, with wider-than-average shoulders and a more prominent upper body than either Arne or Magnus. Lennart was overall thinner than the bear-like Bjorn, though, and looked like a rock star.
He was also one of the few elves strong enough to give me pause.
“Let go,” I said.
Lennart let go of my wrist. He stepped back, but held his arm ready in case he needed to catch another swing. “I saw your truck.” He pointed at the lot. “Are you okay?” He pointed at the spot on the church wall I was about to punch.
I wanted to tell him that Ellie ran away. I wanted him to whip up one of his stormy spells and send forth his thunder to find her enchantments. But no words left my mouth.
The confused look all the elves got when their questions got too close to Ellie manifested. He rubbed at the hat over his ears.
Lennart didn’t glamour his extra-thick sideburns, nor did he hide the lines of his elven tattoos much, and they shimmered in the late afternoon sun. Like Bjorn, Lennart leaned toward metal, and seldom wore anything other than black. Even the hunting leathers he wore while running with the wolves were solid black with only a few silver studs.
Today he wore a black t-shirt, black jeans, forearm-covering black leather bracers, and a white
