Would you lay off?Calvin retorted.I already said you were right about that! What more do you want?!
Some groveling would be nice,it muttered.
Tearing his attention away from the pointless task of arguing with the wyvern, Calvin looked across at Kieran – who was looking back and forth between Calvin and Diana, clearly dying for confirmation as to whether they were mates or not.
Diana had obviously picked up on the vibe, because she smiled at Kieran. “Yes, Calvin is my mate,” she said, taking Calvin’s free hand for a moment and giving it a quick squeeze before letting go.
A sunny smile spread across Kieran’s face.
“I knew it,” he said. “I’m really happy for both of you.”
“I’m very lucky,” Calvin said, meaning every word.
“Now that we’ve dealt with the elephant in the room,” Diana said, “should we get down to business? Calvin said that you know a friendly sprite who might be able to help us out.”
Kieran nodded, looking a little disappointed that he wouldn’t be getting any more relationship gossip at this stage.
“Sieval is a sprite who was trapped in this house for many years before Natasha and I moved in,” he began, gesturing broadly with his hand. “It was friends with my great uncle, but then it got stuck here after my great uncle passed away.”
Calvin racked his brains in an attempt to remember what little he knew about sprites. “Sprites have a connection to an object, don’t they?”
“That’s right,” Kieran said. “Sieval is bonded to a specific rock. Wherever that rock goes, Sieval goes… but Sieval itself cannot carry the rock. So once we met Sieval and heard its story, we carried the rock back to the pond where it originally lived before my uncle brought its rock here to be part of one of his collections – he was a bit of an eccentric. But they… well, I guess you could say they became friends. Of course, no one knew about Sieval to take the rock back to where my uncle found it after he died. But once Natasha and I found out about it, we made sure it got home. It’s lived there ever since.”
“Sievalreallydoesn’t sound anything like the sprite that I met,” Calvin said. “Polar opposite, in fact. But I guess that doesn’t necessarily mean anything – after all, humans and shifters can have pretty different personalities as well.”
Kieran frowned. “Itispretty weird in this situation, though. Sieval always said that sprites are shy, and when I went out there this morning for a chat, it basically confirmed it was the case.”
He thought for a moment, then went on. “Still, itdidsay that it had heard of one sprite many years ago that was quite hot-tempered and liked to cause trouble for those few unwary travelers that encountered it. Sieval didn’t even know if this sprite lived nearby, or in an entirely different part of the world. It did say that this other sprite was thought to live in an isolated area, though.”
“That certainly sounds like the one I encountered,” Calvin said grimly. “I guess it’s possible that someone picked up her object at some point without knowing what it was, and it made its way to a more populated area. Or maybe there was even some construction work done near her home and the object was carried away offsite, along with anything else that got cleared out.”
“And there have been a lot of minor natural disasters around here,” added Diana, who was apparently having no issues taking all of this weirdness in. “There’ve been landslides farther up the mountain, and there was that flood in the canyon last year as well. There are tons of ways that an object could’ve gotten moved down the mountain, if she was higher up to begin with.”
“Or maybe she was here under our noses all along,” Kieran said. “You said that you found her pond after going down an overgrown path that looked unused – she could’ve been here for centuries, mostly cut off from human contact because the main path was just outside of her range.”
“Whatever the case,” Calvin said, “it sounds like she’s been cranky for a long time, whether she’s a local or not. Did Sieval have any advice on how we should deal with her?”
“About that…” Kieran said. “Sieval asked whether you would be able to travel to where it lives and talk face to face. I don’t think it really relished the idea of trying to relay questions back and forth via a third party. And it doesn’t want to leave its pond if it can help it. Sprites are very bonded to their homes.”
Calvin nodded. “Of course.” A thought occurred to him. “Would Sieval mind if Diana also came?”
“I don’t think so,” Kieran replied. “Sieval’s always made it clear that it considers any friend of ours to be a friend of theirs.”
Calvin turned to Diana. “What do you say? Would you like to add ‘meeting a sprite’ to the list of things you’ve done today?”
Diana smiled. “Sure, why not? As long as it’s the friendly one, I’m up for it.”
Calvin smiled back.
“Okay, then,” he said to Kieran. “How do we find Sieval?”
Chapter 11
Diana followed Calvin and Kieran outside, half listening as they chatted quietly about how to reach Sieval’s pond.
She shook her head, still somewhat in disbelief at everything.
Today sure has been quite the day – and it’s barely lunchtime!
