When last we met: Everyone was looking at the newcomer with the elongated head, T-shirt and jeans leaning up against the fence. “What? Impossible!” The little green monster grinned an enormous grin and waved his hand in greeting. There came an enormously bright flash.
And just as suddenly as he had appeared, the green guy vanished.
“What in heaven’s name was that all about?” Dejah asked.
“I thought I killed him,” said Seth the Dragon. “And Clancy the worblatt.”
“You’re losing your touch, Seth,” one of the other dragons said.
“That’s OK, I don’t like killing folks,” Seth said. “I’d rather hurt him real bad.”
“Evil beings don’t die so easily anyway,” said the leader of the eagles. “They wanted to taunt us and make us doubt our power and ability.”
“Now we know when they’re coming,” said Grenn the elfin being. “Hurricane force on Halloween morning, and this seems to be the epicenter.”
“I still don’t understand why it’s all happening here,” I said. “There’s nothing special or especially magical about this place.”
“Speak for yourself,” said Summer.
I saw the faraway look in my younger dog’s eyes and realized she was right. My wife and I called this little plot of land Serenity Valley, and the enormous willow trees — which were sticks in the ground when we planted them — led me to dub the estate Three Willows after I lost her. I have spent a dozen years writing about how special and magical this place is, a place that the most evil of evils would have to hate and possibly destroy.
I looked at Grenn, my new little friend from the race of elfin beings whose name I could not pronounce.
“And who are you anyway, Grenn?” I asked. “You said you were here before we built the house.”
“And for a thousand generations before that,” said the [unpronounceable]. “Minding our own business until you people started crowding us out.”
“I asked you before, why didn’t you let us know you were here? Maybe we could have worked something out,” I said.
“We didn’t think that was who you are,” Grenn said. “Now that I’ve gotten to know you a little, maybe you’re not so bad.”
One of the other [unpronounceables], one with a sorcerer’s robe, came up next to Grenn with an urgent look on his face.
“If the Evil One is bringing a hurricane here, we need to start planning,” the mystic one said. “We have spells to cast, potions to conjure. We have to stop wasting time.”
“But we want to help,” Dejah said. The little person in the robe rolled his eyes.
“We don’t need your help.”
“Actually, Blurg, the dogs have been somewhat useful so far,” Grenn said.
“Ri-ight,” said the one named Blurg. “All they ever do is chase squirrels and foul the yard.”
“I don’t mean to intrude,” said Seth the Dragon in a low purr — the problem with a dragon purring is even that sounds menacing. “You’re talking about friends of mine.”
“Aww, thanks,” Summer said. “You’re our friend, too — I think. Seth is our friend, isn’t he, Dejah?”
“Of course he is, don’t be silly,” said Dejah.
“You little guys are terrific with the magic stuff,” said the dragon, “but I think beating this thing might take all of us working together.”
“I’m with you there,” Grenn said, earning a wide-eyed “Harrumph” from Blurg. “Oh, go round up the others and start preparing some spells and such. I’ll be with you in a few minutes.”
Blurg stalked off as if he had been dismissed, which of course he had been.
“To answer your question, we are everywhere, living what you humans would call a sustainable life,” Grenn said. “We return what we take from the land in ways that leave it exactly as we found it. That’s why it’s so easy to escape detection unless we choose for you to detect us.”
“Given what I’ve seen today, I think there’s a lot going on in these woods that have escaped detection by our civilization,” I said.
One of the [unpronounceables] guffawed. “Your ‘civilization’ ain’t exactly civilized.”
“What about you?” I asked, turning to the eagle. “There seems to be an eagle warrior society of some kind going on.”
“It’s nice of you to ask,” the eagle chief said. “Let me tell you about it.”
