Free Earthbound: An Otherworld Novella by Yasmine Galenorn Page B

Chase had ordered for me, I had fallen in love with caffeine. In fact, it had only taken a couple days until I was hooked.
    “There’s a coffee shop next door. Why don’t I run over and get us some coffee and pastries?”
    “You’re just a bundle of energy aren’t you?”
    Iris could run rings around all of us.
    “It’s my nature. I’m a house sprite. We like to keep busy, and busy to us is what overwhelmed would be to most people. I like being active. I get antsy and edgy when I am forced to sit around too much.” And with that, she grabbed her wallet and headed out the door.
    While she was gone I wandered around the shop, running my hands over the spines of the books. How many of these could I read before we were sent home? I decided to start keeping a running booklist. I hadn’t been kidding when I said that, when our time here was up, I’d be carting home boxfuls of books with me.
    A couple minutes later, the jingle of the shop bell caught my attention and I headed toward the counter. And there he was: Henry Jeffries, with a huge smile on his face and a bouquet of flowers in a crystal vase.
    “I thought these might brighten the shop for you.” He handed them to me, looking around. “Is Miss Iris here? I thought perhaps she could recommend a few books to me.” The sparkle told me everything I had suspected was true. He had a crush on her.
    I had a feeling Iris wouldn’t be quite so enthusiastic.
    “She’ll be back in a few minutes. Feel free to look around. We have a new seating area over there,” I nodded toward the front of the store. Iris’s seating area was in front of the bay window on the left side of the shop, and she had positioned a sofa and a couple of recliners into a comfortable arrangement.
    Henry headed toward the stacks.
    I carried the vase over to the counter. As I moved behind the glass case, I spotted a pad of paper and a pencil. I decided I might as well try to draw the creature that we had seen last night, since we had found no usable information on the net.
    I sketched away, doing my best to capture the image. A few minutes later the door opened and Iris came in, a bag in one hand, and a drink tray in the other. She handed me an iced triple cherry chocolate latte. Her own drink was a caramel macchiato.
    “Anybody around?”
    I nodded toward Henry, who was standing in front of the science fiction section, raptly staring at the wall of books. Iris let out a little groan, then hushed herself before he heard.
    “Wonderful. Who the flowers from?”
    “From Henry. He asked about you,” I said with a smile.
    “What are you doing?” She leaned over the counter to look at what I was drawing. “When did you see a kerakal? I haven’t seen one in years, thank the gods.”
    “You know what this is?” I stared at her.
    “Of course. It’s a Germanic forest spirit, and boy is let me tell you, do those critters have nasty tempers. So, why are you sketching one?”
    “Because last night one attacked me and my sisters out in the woods in back of our house. We were on our way down to Birchwater pond when the thing came out of the woods and jumped us. It knocked me into a briar patch, and I’ve got nasty little scabs all over my thighs and butt. We had no clue what the thing was. Can you tell me about it?”
    “Kerakals are dangerous. They’re always hungry and always on the lookout for fresh meat. Some people get them mixed up with kobolds, but the fact is they’re an entirely different species of Fae. Not only are they nasty tempered, but they’re cunning, and they eat magic. If you’ve got one on your land you’re going to have to find it dispatch it because it won’t go away by itself.”
    “It vanished right in front of our eyes.”
    “What happened right before it vanished? And that’s a trademark—they can phase in and out, but they cannot do so quickly. If you catch it right after it phases in, it’s not going to be able to disappear for a while. I can’t recall how