5. Chapter Five

Chapter Five

Seb

Z amm shifted to one of her larger dragon sizes, and I was a little surprised that Sera didn’t shift into her manticore form because the two of them usually liked to fly together. Instead, she climbed onto Ailin’s shoulder, gave his cheek a nuzzle, and meowed at me in a way that I knew meant, “Get your butt moving.”

So… I got my butt moving and climbed onto Zamm’s back. We had a saddle for her at home, but it wasn’t necessary, especially for a short ride. There was a natural dip where her neck met her shoulders that was perfect for sitting on. And she didn’t mind when I held onto her spikes while she flew. I’d ridden on her back enough times to be somewhat of an expert. So had Ailin, for that matter.

We’d borrowed a sheet from the house, and keeping the cursed objects inside their individual shields, we wrapped them up in the sheet to make them easier to carry. Zamm agreed to grab the sheet for us, and I was grateful since that meant the scary doll would be farther away from Ailin. The last thing we needed was him freaking out midair.

Ailin climbed on behind me and nestled up to my ass in a way I knew he was doing on purpose to get a rise out of me since we were still in public. I wiggled around a little, making him groan, and I smiled to myself.

“Proud of yourself?” he asked.

“Yep.”

He snorted in my ear, and I felt Sera settle on his lap so she was held between us and couldn’t fall off.

Once Ailin wrapped his arms around me, I said, “We’re ready, Zamm.”

My Bonded stood and grabbed hold of the sheet of cursed objects in one of her taloned hands. Then she squatted down before launching up into the air. Before she could start to fall back down, she opened her wings to catch the draft, gave them a mighty flap, and we were up, soaring in the air.

Ailin rested his cheek against my back, leaning over the top of Sera so he could reach me. I honestly couldn’t wait to get home, put on comfy clothes, climb into bed, and wrap him in my arms.

In my head, Ailin said, “Me too, baby. I’m so done with this day.”

“We’re just grabbing the other cursed objects and leaving, right?”

“Right.”

“Do you really think it’s a good idea to bring those things onto coven land?”

He was quiet for a few seconds, clearly thinking things over. “We have all those things in the basement, and half of them are more dangerous than these things. We can keep them shielded in the basement while we sleep.”

He had me there. We had a number of magical items that we’d deemed too dangerous for use in our basement. When a dangerous magical item appeared anywhere in Brinnswick, we were usually called in to take care of it. Unfortunately, many of those things were too powerful to destroy, or they held too much history for us to destroy them in good faith.

Ailin had been collecting things like that since long before I met him, and I supported him in this venture because he was making the world a safer place.

That didn’t mean I liked having those things in our home, though.

But I also knew they were in the safest place they could be, and they were shielded and safeguarded to high heaven. There really wasn’t a better place to take the damn toys and Christmas decorations.

“Yeah, okay. That’s fine. I just worry.”

He kissed the back of my neck. “I know you do, but I’ll keep you safe.”

I snorted. “I’m pretty sure it’ll be me keeping you safe if those things attack us. You were terrified of that doll.”

“It turned its head so it was backwards and looked at me with blood coming out of its mouth and all over its face!”

I couldn’t help but laugh. I’d seen this man go up against so many other things that were absolutely terrifying without even blinking, like giants, literal giants, and huge-ass sea monsters, and evil rougarous, and zombie-like huge-ass ogres. And here this little dolly was the thing that scared him.

“Shut up!”

I continued laughing. “After all the shit you’ve given me about being scared of snakes and spiders, I’m planning on milking this for a very, very long time.”

He grumbled and rested his head on my back, and I just kept laughing. I couldn’t help it. He wasn’t actually angry or upset. In fact, I was pretty sure he was a little embarrassed but mostly amused by my amusement.

Not that he would admit that out loud.

It didn’t take long for us to fly over the first street we’d started on where Alec’s tent was still set up, and I couldn’t help but frown down at it. Nearly every house had a pile of toys and decorations on their lawn, lying in ruins. It was really damn depressing, honestly.

“I feel bad for all the kids that lost their new toys,” Ailin said, clearly on the same page as me.

“Me too. And they were gifts from Santa… that makes them special.”

He sighed, and after a few seconds, he gave me a squeeze. “We could… maybe buy them new toys—that we make sure aren’t cursed or whatever—and give them out to the kids.”

That made me smile, and I wasn’t the least bit surprised by this. My viramore was always trying to help people, and when it came to kids, he went above and beyond. Ailin and I weren’t the richest people in our country or anything, but we definitely weren’t hurting for money either. “I’d like that.”

“Okay. New plan. Go home, sleep, wake up, eat some food, go to the mall to question them, buy a ton of toys, and hand them out to the kids. We can have Del and some of the other kids start examining the cursed objects while we’re doing all of that because we need more people on this anyway. We’ll leave Del in charge.” Our son, Delaro, was very into experiments and would jump at the chance to help out, especially since he’d be exploring something we hadn’t seen before.

“Sounds great.”

After we touched down, collected the rest of the spelled Christmas objects, and got in the car—with Ailin driving—I pulled out my phone to send a text in the family chat.

Me: Just wanted to tell you guys that Dad is scared of a little dolly.

I attached a picture of said dolly, then sent it off. It didn’t take long for the kids to start texting back.

Opal: To be honest, I think I’d be afraid of that thing too. Ew.

Tio: Are you sure Dad’s scared of it? Can’t he just like blast it or something?

Me: Definitely terrified. He even screamed. It was amazing.

Thayer: Please tell me you have that on video.

Me: Unfortunately no, but we’re bringing the doll home, so you’ll get to see it for yourselves.

Bas: Priceless.

Clover: That thing is gross. Can’t wait to see it.

Del: Is that blood on its face?

Jorah: Probably. Toys have been attacking people… with teeth.

Del: Ew. I want to see it.

I snorted at that. Of course he wanted to see it.

Bas: Can we let that thing out of its shield and see what Dad does?

Niya: Yessss. I vote for yes.

Thayer: Me too.

Jorah: Me three.

Opal: We’re recording it! And it has to be a sudden drop of the shield. We gotta surprise him.

Niya: Try to make him scream.

Willow: That sounds hilarious. I’m in.

I chuckled as the kids continued making plans on how to scare Ailin, even though it was in the family chat… which Ailin was a part of. I’d feel bad except Ailin had been letting the kids scare the shit out of me with snakes and spiders for years. Payback was a bitch.

“Why are you laughing so evilly over there? I have to assume it has something to do with how much my phone is buzzing?”

My laugh grew. “Oh, A, you’re going to be hating life later.”

He glanced at me, then let out a long sigh. “You told them about the fucking doll, didn’t you?”

“Sure did.”

“So glad you’re so proud of yourself over there.”

I snorted and reached over to pat his thigh. “Thanks, babe.”

He snorted and shook his head, but I could tell he was reluctantly amused.