“Mr. Frank,” Jax said. “Will you come up to the house tonight?” He didn’t add so you can watch over Akeyla while I run but the thought was as clear in his magic as one of Sal’s head-pushed understandings.
Axlam’s exasperation moved as a wave through her magic. She knelt next to her son. “What did I tell you at home? Akeyla is an elf. Frank is coming up to the house with us. He’s going to be there with several other adult elves. Right, Frank?”
“Yes,” I said. “Sal will be there, too.”
Jax nodded. “Okay.”
Axlam brushed a big snowflake off his shoulder. “Now you apologize to Akeyla. We’ll be leaving as soon as Mayor Tyrsdottir is ready.”
He twisted his head as if listening. “Akeyla and Sophia are on the deck. Akeyla is setting a spell to keep Marcus Aurelius’s water from freezing in case he comes home.”
Axlam looked as surprised as I had been when I’d come home.
“They’re right next to the door, where Dag can see them,” I said.
Sif sniffed at the air as if she smelled Dag’s magic. “Our Queen has put in place a layered alarm, guard, and protection spell, but it’s safe for wolves.” She leaned forward so she was eye-to-eye with Jax. “I’ll walk you through it.”
He looked up at Axlam.
Some of Axlam’s surprise subsided. She patted Jax’s shoulder. “Go on, then.” She watched Sif walk with Jax as he ran through the gate and rounded the corner of the house. “Let’s hope this goes well and they don’t go full pon farr.”
I didn’t catch the reference.
She grinned. “Never mind.” Axlam turned back toward me, but stopped facing Bloodyhood.
I’d parked in front of the garage, angled so that from where I was standing in front of the house, I couldn’t see the driver’s side of the plow.
She pointed. “I think that notebook of yours left you another gift.”
I walked around the front of my truck and there, balanced on the corner of the plow, were two photographic plates.
Ellie had been here. She’d stopped by, called, then left the plates when I didn’t answer.
I snatched the photos off the plow and ducked around the garage. No Ellie. I jogged toward the path into the woods. No Ellie there, and no footprints.
I swore.
Axlam extended her hand. I handed over the plates.
“Ed gave Arne and Dag plates just like these after you vanished into Vampland. He said they’d fallen out of the notebook.” She tucked one plate into her pocket and pulled the other out of its sleeve. “I was pretty sure at the time we were dealing with some sort of concealment enchantment. I forgot about the whole thing until now.” She flipped the plate over. “They didn’t come from Rose’s notebook, did they?”
“No.” Since she was in her less-magical human form, I could tell her the truth. “You never remember. It’s part of the concealments.”
She stared at the plate. “Samhain,” she muttered. “Veils thin.” Then she held it out. “What am I looking at?”
I took the photo. Bjorn’s old church was on the left side, hidden in the trees, and Raven’s Gaze on the right, with the big oak out front. In the lower left corner of the image, the top of Bloodyhood’s plow blade was just visible.
“The woman who takes these photos, her name is Ellie Jones,” I said. “She’s been in Alfheim for a while. I’m not sure how long because I forget every evening. She must have taken the image two days ago, when I delivered the memory card to Lennart.”
Bright points shimmered in the oak tree as if two stars had decided to perch in the branches, and had to be the two ravens. Elven magic hung like aurora fingers around the pub and the church. But what caught my attention was the layers Ellie had mentioned.
“She’s a seer,” I said. “Her stone takes photos of magic.”
“A witch? The elves won’t be happy about that, Frank.” Axlam pointed over my arm. “These two points are Lennart’s ravens?”
“Yes,” I said. “This is elf magic.”
I traced my finger over the most obvious, and prominent, layer—the greens, blues, yellows, and purples of the stormy magic I associated with Bjorn and Lennart. The area’s natural magic mixed with the elf energy, and wove itself in and around all the trees and plants.
Nothing new or unusual. I was looking at the same magical world I saw daily, if brighter and more obvious.
This time, though, with the bright sun hitting the buildings and the magical build up to Samhain, other layers came into focus. Layers which, when I tipped the plate, were on different holographic planes than Alfheim’s elf magic.
At the top, a soft shimmering of white sparks that looked almost like a veil. Under that, a second veil, this one colder, more wintry, and also just barely discernable. And sandwiched between the robust elf magic and the veils, one small, intruding pimple of carapace blackness contained to the walk in front of the church. Except in the photo, the carapace didn’t look like a shell. It looked like an open muzzle of a dark, toothsome wolf.
“That’s St. Martin,” Axlam said.
I nodded. “It confirms that St. Martin’s benefactor is dark wolf magic.” But who? Or what?
Axlam pulled the other photo out of her pocket.
In the image, I stood on the path to the church in my re-wedding attire. Wisps of elven magic clung to me as they always did, but I wasn’t the focus. St. Martin stood next to me like the little arrogant poseur he was, complete with his shadow shell. This close, it lost its wolf maw form and returned to the carapace I was used to seeing.
I tilted the plate. The carapace was contained to one thin slice in the photo’s holographic layers.
“I wonder what that means,” Axlam said.
“Dag might know.” I re-sleeved the photo and put them both into my pocket.
“Come,” Axlam motioned toward the house. “I don’t hear yelling, but we still need to make sure the kids aren’t fighting.”
I
