doubt that any other demons would be foolish enough to seek a confrontation.”
“As long as the danger stays on the sidelines,” Walter said, lowering Excalibur’s point to the ground, “let’s get started on what we came here to do.”
“But first …” Thigocia blew a hot dry breeze toward the three humans.
Walter spread out his arms, letting the desert-like wind flap his wet sleeves. “Ahhh! The Sahara treatment!”
Ashley and Karen stripped off their coats and basked in the drying flow.
“Can’t beat this with a stick,” Karen said, squeezing her eyes closed. “Ashley, I’m glad your mom is so full of hot air.”
“Good one.” Walter pointed at Karen and winked. “And it’s a good thing she doesn’t need a breath mint.”
As Walter and Karen continued trading jokes about hot air and halitosis, Ashley rotated her body slowly and basked in the luxurious breeze. She winced now and then at the heat and the inane jokes as she watched Walter playfully jabbing Karen. Would he ever grow out of his childish ways? He was a valiant warrior, but at times he seemed like such a kid. Still, it would be fun to join in, kind of let loose and laugh with them. She closed her eyes and shook her head. No. Someone had to be serious around here, so it might as well be her.
After a few minutes, the girls put their coats back on, now warm and dry. Walter patted Thigocia on her side. “You’re better than a thousand hair dryers, and we didn’t have to worry about popping a circuit!”
“Time to get to work!” Picking up her bag, Ashley strode through lush, calf-high grass until she reached a thinner section with only a short carpet of greenery. Something underneath had obviously stunted the growth. She scuffed her shoe across the soil, exposing a solid foundation. “There’s a slab here,” she said, looking back at her mother. “Was this our home site?”
“It has to be.” Thigocia flicked her tail toward a tall oak. “That tree was next to your grandfather’s bedroom window.”
Ashley walked under the oak’s dripping branches and ran her hand along the trunk’s rough bark. Her fingers traced a deep furrow until they came across the outline of a heart. Stooping, she gazed at the initials carved in the center but could only make out the first letter of each pairT and H.
“Timothy and Hannah,” she whispered.
A trickle of memories seeped into her mind, a lanky man lifting her into the tree’s lowest bough. As his brown eyes gleamed, a smile radiated from his noble face, but as thin veils darkened the scene, he backed away, his body fading as he withdrew. With her little bare toes wiggling in front of her, she reached out a pair of chubby hands, and a childlike voice squeaked out.
“Daddy!” Ashley said softly, tears welling as she dug a fingernail into the bark. “Daddy, come back!”
Her mind’s eye still watching from the tree, a window came into view, white drapes drawn closed on the inside. Her thoughts drew her into the bedroom, and, against the adjacent wall, she found a single bed covered with a blue downy comforter. Another man, an older man this time, sat on the edge and gestured for her to come to his lap.
Ashley whispered the nickname she gave to the man after her father died. “Daddy!” He had become a replacement daddy, a kind but sickly old man who assuaged the pain in a little girl’s heart. After a few seconds, the image of her departed grandfather also faded away in darkening shadows.
New memories flowed. As a two-year-old girl, she leaped into her grandfather’s outstretched arms, a book tightly clutched to her frilly nightgown. He took the huge volume and opened to the first page, squinting at the opening lines. “Are you sure you want to read this? It’s really dark and scary.”
She ran her finger across a sketch of a solitary man walking in the midst of a gloomy forest. The black-and-white drawing seemed so real, she could almost hear his feet shuffling through the path’s tangled weeds. “I already read it to myself, but I didn’t understand all of it.”
Her grandfather slid his hand over the drawing. “So you want me to explain it?”
Little Ashley nodded. “Especially the scary parts. They gave me goosey bumps.”
Withdrawing a pair of reading glasses from his pocket, he sighed. “Okay, let’s see what this says …”