“Gobblewhatnow?”
“Cobble, and it’s?—”
DICK
The letters on the menu wiggled.
DICK! RIGHT! HAHA I GET IT NOW
DICK DICK DICK DICK DICK DICK DICK DICK?—
“Anyway!” Neil glared at the wall. “Norbert Gobblin’ Up Dick or whatever was a big fancy wizard who made a magical bracelet full of spirits, but no one can see them unless they own it.” He gestured between himself and Lou. “Or, like, if they owned it at any point in time. Lou is the owner of the Reliquary now?—”
“Except for Buffy!” Myrna whispered loudly.
“I was getting to that.” Neil held up his arm to show Seymour a bracelet with a single glass bead. “This is just one piece of the Reliquary. Lou has the rest.” He gestured toward Lou’s wrist where there was a matching bracelet but had many more glass baubles. “Buffy chose to leave the Reliquary and chill with me. Since I owned it for a while?—”
“Don’t remind me!” Flanders groaned noisily. “Worse time of my life.”
“—I can still hear and see everyone.” Neil ignored Flanders and stared intently at Seymour. “Which now brings us to you.”
“Me?” Seymour frowned. “What?”
“Did you know Neil wears socks with sandals?” Flanders whispered, his eyes glowing with fury. “Socks!”
Neil continued to ignore Flanders with absolute ease, which signaled this sort of thing probably happened a lot. “You can see them. The spirits.”
Flanders howled in dismay. “Imagine being bossed around by someone who wears socks with their sandals! Theagony!”
Myrna shushed him.
“Right.” Seymour nodded. “Spirits. Yup. The rockabilly chick, the fashion cop dog, and the talking wall?”
I AM NOT A WALL D:<
I AM ALSO NOT A SPIRIT OF THE RELIQUARY
“Then what the hell are you?” Seymour snorted. “Any relation to that hotel in Colorado or wherever?”
HOW DARE YOU
“Hey, relax. It’s okay.” Neil waved at Izba’s scrambling menu. “One thing at a time, please? Let’s figure out how this nice, normal human can see everybody.” He glanced over Seymour warily. “You are human, right?”
“Yeah!” Seymour threw up his hands. “Last time I checked.”
“Smells human.” Flanders retreated to a patch of sunshine near the door to flop down. “And mmm, like leather. Yummy, beautiful, classic leather.”
Lou wolfed in—as in, he turned back into a human. He was still quite tall and muscular with long dark hair and bright eyes, and he was very, very naked. “Smells human to me too.”
“Where are your clothes?” Neil asked. “Shouldn’t you at least put some pants on?”
“In a minute! I’m not leaving you alone with him.”
“I thought you just said he smells human.”
“But there are some creatures out there who can disguise their true form quite well.”
“I ain’t wearin’ any kinda disguise, and I would have definitely remembered if I’d ever owned a damn magical doodad like this.” Seymour raked his fingers through his hair and tried to find some flowers to look at. “Can we please move along to the part where I get to leave?”
