Page 66 of Earth-Bound

Their eyes slid straight to Randall, pleading. Randall shook his head. “Better do as he says.”

And that was how the dragons and the dryad ended up fixing the roof of Randall and Broadmire’s house. I was amazed by how strong they were. I’d forgotten, in my time trapped inside my tree, what raw strength there could be in shifter bodies. They didn’t look overly muscular, but they carried the weights that pressed down against the earth, without even breaking sweat.

The only difficulty they had was that Arram didn’t like to leave the ground and wouldn’t climb any ladders, which I completely understood. However, they fetched and carried all the heavy equipment and the slates, and the dragons scurried around up there, doing their job.

Cuthbert stayed in the middle and told them what to do. They wouldn’t let him near the edge. “Don’t get too near the edge, Dimpy.”

“We can’t have you falling off, can we?”

“What will Anthony say?”

“What are we meant to tell Nana if you do yourself an injury?”

“Just stay there in the middle.”

It gave me and Joe a chance to get on with the garden, and I chuckled to myself as we worked, listening to them bickering up there.

“Don’t tell Nana that we’re so good at roofing, whatever you do.”

“She’ll have us doing repairs.”

Matty and Anthony came out of the house to see what the noise was. I tried not to laugh at their amazement that one troll got three dragons to do manual labour.

The three of them came down from the roof to meet their mates. It was instinctive. Even though they had seen their mate that morning, perhaps just an hour or so ago, they wanted to touch and talk and bond again.

Dum was describing how manly he was to Matty, Dee didn’t see why she should have to keep working while the other two didn’t and so came down to trail her fingers across the skin of Arram’s collarbone. Cuthbert stood before Anthony, with Anthony’s hands on his hips, and told him, “Terrund said he’d answer some questions about earth spirits later.”

The gleam in Anthony’s eyes as he turned them on me made me reconsider. I got the impression that someone like Anthony would want to know everything, not just get an answer to one or two quick questions.

Still, I supposed I had time on my side. Once I was at full strength and had mated Joe, I’d find Anthony and let him ask whatever he wanted.

Dum broke my train of thought by bounding over to us and holding out a small plastic device. “Say cheese, Terrund, I’m sending a selfie to Nana! She’ll want to know we met an earth spirit.”

There was a click and then Dum bounded away again.

“Who’s Nana?” asked Joe.

“Their grandmother, I believe. She is their elder; the leader of their clan.”

Joe’s face fell. “I can’t believe I forgot! I need to speak to Randall. Will you come with me?”

I took his hand, aware that he’d become upset, and we approached Randall where he was admiring the herb garden we’d started the day before.

Chapter 28: Joe

Icouldn’t believe I’d forgotten but between the mad dragons’ antics and being with Terrund all morning, it had flown out of my head.

I went over to Randall where he was standing with Broadmire beside him, and I clutched at Terrund’s hand. Already, I relied on his presence to bring me comfort. I hated doing anything that might become emotional and I had no real experience of it – I had always moved on so quickly that I didn’t build lasting relationships and I’d never had to comfort anyone before.

Clearing my throat, I said, “Hey, Randall, I just wanted to say… I’m sorry about your grandma.”

I can’t say that I ever liked the woman – I didn’t like any of them, in fact, except Randall – but that didn’t mean I wanted her dead. And I really was sorry to hear about it, if only for Randall’s sake.

He blinked at me. “What about her?”

“Uh, that she… died.”

Surely he knew that. He knew that, right?

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