At least this reminder had a bouncy castle for the kids.
How much time inside the giant forced-air wonder, complete with turrets and a unicorn, would the kids demand? If I left right after the ceremony, I could probably get in another hour or two of searching before Maura and Akeyla got home.
“Frank,” Ed said as if reading my mind, “this post-Vegas obsession of yours isn’t healthy.”
Ed knew I was searching for someone. Every day, new surprise danced across his features when I asked for help. Then I got the bright idea to not ask and to offer a more mundane reason instead. Ed now thought I was looking for Marcus Aurelius. He remembered that there might be some sort of magical something-or-other involved, or a person, and when I had sheriff-actionable information, I’d share.
Besides, my “health” could weather most storms. We had a mystery woman trapped in concealment enchantments somewhere in Alfheim. What if she needed help? I needed to find her.
“Her name is Ellie Jones,” I said. That much I knew.
One eyebrow arched. He was surprised I had a name, yet he still looked like a man about to crack a joke about invisible “Canadian girlfriends” stealing dogs.
Which, I suspected, was the work of the concealment enchantments. Ed was not a man who would ignore any information that might indicate someone needed help. Even if he wasn’t an officer, he’d still be leading the volunteer squads doing sweeps.
I almost pulled out my phone. I almost showed him, yet again, the forlorn photo of Ellie and my wayward hound that always caught me off guard. How had the photo gotten onto my phone? Then my daily reminder appeared and I read the instructions from yet another mysterious woman named Chihiro Hatanaka, a Japanese woman enlisted by two kitsune to help me overcome the enchantments at the core of all my obsessive issues.
Ed never remembered the photo. I rarely did. Thankfully, I had Chihiro’s list to help me overcome at least some of the forgetfulness.
But I had a name. I had a slightly sad photo of a beautiful woman with my dog. And I had a need.
Ed looked out over the hundreds of white chairs filling the open spaces under two of the park’s larger oak trees. The area was usually used for band shelter seating. Instead of orienting the chairs to the east, where the shelter loomed over one corner of the park, the chairs had been oriented north, toward the trees.
Strong branches arched outward from both trees and mingled their rustling, reddish leaves. The elves had hung a partition of candles, ivy, apples, nuts, and fruits from the branches, sheltering a small tented area behind the trees. Arne and Dagrun would renew their vows in front of the elven bounty, among the chattering squirrels and the multitude of their friends and family.
The entire structure was autumn beauty at its finest.
Near the band shelter, an elf blew a horn. All the chatter stopped. People clasped hands and made their way to the seats.
It was time for Ed and me to find Gerard and Bjorn, and to take our places at the end of the aisle leading to the trees.
“Looks like we’re up,” Ed said.
I adjusted my cufflinks and straightened my tie yet again, then clasped his shoulder. “Come, my friend,” I said, and walked toward our fellow groomsmen.
Bjorn Thorsson was a muscular, bear-like elf with extra-thick sideburns he never glamoured when he hid most of his also-extra-thick ponytail and his roundly pointed ears. He also stood eye-to-eye with Arne and Magnus, but carried enough width in his shoulders that he was almost as broad-chested as I.
He brewed up the best mead and craft beers in the state of Minnesota. Besides Alfheim’s growing tourism industry and all of Magnus’s business connections, we were becoming a foodie haven, and Bjorn’s offerings at Raven’s Gaze were a big part of why.
He also bred cats, mostly of the elf-approved Norwegian Forest variety; but he kept the foul-tempered Mr. Mole Rat, a tom of that gremlin-like hairless breed the name of which I could never remember, and the only cat on Earth that disliked my ex, Benta the Nameless.
I’d always suspected Bjorn was quite proud of Mr. Mole Rat. Hopefully that delight would not interfere with Arne and Dag’s ceremony.
Bjorn stood at the end of the aisle between the chairs with his hands clasped behind his back and a stern-yet-approving look on his face. Like all the other elves, he’d glamoured away his most obvious magical characteristics. Bjorn, though, glamoured up shoulder-length black hair, which he pulled back into a mundane-worthy ponytail. I suspected he wore some Scandinavian hard rock band t-shirt under the suit, too.
Bjorn, like his cat, was what the kids these days called “metal.”
Gerard, phone in hand, stood next to Bjorn, wearing a well-tailored gray suit like the rest of us. Jaxson knelt on the chair next to his father, his hands on the chair’s back and his chin up so he could stare at Gerard’s phone.
Jaxson pointed at the band shelter. “Mom and Akeyla will be out in a moment,” he said. Maura and Benta must not be registering in his nine-year-old head, which was to be expected when the two most important women in his young life were out of his sight.
Gerard patted his shoulder and tucked away his phone. “Why don’t you go up front and snag yourself a good seat with the pack?” He nodded toward the front and off to the side, where others of the Alfheim Pack, and Ed’s family, gathered.
Jaxson, wide-eyed and looking overwhelmed, nodded once. He stood tall, straightened his button-front shirt in much the same way we all kept pulling on our cufflinks, and all but ran for the best seat in the house.
Gerard grinned as he watched his son go.
“I swear he grows
