“Not for long. I was four years old when we left. I still remember the place though. There are so many amazing nooks for a little girl to explore.” We stepped into the library, skirting around the sheet-covered furniture. Huge picture windows filled two entire walls, and the other two were covered in floor-to-ceiling bookshelves and cabinets. A layer of dust covered everything that wasn’t protected, but otherwise, the place was in perfect condition and was exactly how I remembered it. I paused beside the fireplace and bent down to open a cabinet, revealing shelves of children’s books within.
Gray slipped away, and when I looked up, he was standing in front of the fireplace, staring at an object on the mantelpiece.
“You’ve been doing this your entire life, haven’t you?” he asked as he reached out and picked up a hand-blown vase in both hands. His fingers traced the ratachello pattern that crisscrossed in a pale web around the bulbous base. I simply stared.
“Where did you get that?” I asked, despite the fact that I’d just seen him pick it up. He shot me a confused look. “I mean … what the actual fuck? I made that when I was fifteen.”
“This?” he asked, holding the vase up. “It has your energy all over it. So do the other things.” He gestured around at a few of the shelves, and my eyes widened when I finally registered the assortment of handmade gewgaws that I had created when I was young. Yanked out of my nostalgic haze, I rushed to the shelf, staring uncomprehending at the vase, then seeing more artifacts of my life around on the other shelves, the walls, the mantel.
The assortment of creations scattered around the room were like a tribute to my evolution as an artist. The walls were covered with framed crayon drawings I’d made, as well as more detailed sketches as my skill improved. The built-in bookshelves were littered with the first little clay pots I’d hand-built as a child. Creating things was in my blood, and being confronted with it all only drove home how powerless I was to follow through with the masterpiece stuck in my head.
“How did these get here?”
“I’m guessing you didn’t make all this by the age of four,” Gray said.
I shook my head, still baffled. “No. I started with pottery when I was little. We had a studio in the barn behind the house. But I didn’t transition to glass until I was about twelve years old. I haven’t been back here since we left when I was four.”
He set the vase down and slipped up beside me, tilting my chin up so I had no choice but to look into his glowing silver eyes. “Sounds like you have a fan. There’s other magic in this room that isn’t yours. Your parents, perhaps? You haven’t mentioned your mother.”
He left the statement hanging as he stared down at me with an expectant look. I shook my head and stepped back from him, blinking in confusion. “No. She disappeared and never came back. That was why Dad and I left when I was little. Because Mom abandoned us here. This has got to be some kind of joke.”
But really there was no other explanation, was there? I stared up at Gray, silently pleading for him to offer some magical excuse for why my childhood creations were displayed around this room like it was some sort of museum.
“I’m sorry, April. Usually, the most obvious explanation is the truth. Either your dad came back and did this, or…”
“Or my mother’s still alive?”
“Or she was alive at least long enough to collect mementos of her daughter’s accomplishments. There’s no new energy here. The most recent signatures are a few years old.”
I bit my lip, near tears at the thought that she’d been alive but never came to see me. Did Dad know? He’d been absent so much since I turned eighteen and started college. I’d never been afraid of change since he and I moved so frequently when I was young, but I always came back to Seattle. Part of asserting my independence when I came of age had been insisting on staying put for a change, but Dad hadn’t been able to stick around to do the same. It was as if he was either running from something or searching for something on his ridiculous pilgrimage.
Gray let out an amused huff.
“Something in my head entertaining enough to laugh at?” I challenged.
“The bit about your dad’s pilgrimage,” he said with a quirk of his lips. “That’s an ursa tradition. Young ursa are all expected to embark on a pilgrimage out of the Sanctuary. It is both an escape and a search of sorts. A vision quest, for them to find themselves, or to learn about the human world and bring back knowledge or treasures that will benefit their home clans. Somehow I’m not surprised that he uses that term. I have a feeling he’s your source of ursa blood. And your mother…” He glanced around the room again, nodding slightly as if his suspicions were just confirmed. “With an estate this fine and her penchant for finding and hoarding treasures, she definitely has strong dragon blood running through her veins.” He picked up the vase again. “Except her idea of treasure was your art.”
His eyebrows turned down at the look I gave him. “Are you saying my mom was a hoarder?”
“Yes?” he said tentatively. “Aren’t you? It’s a trait of dragons. And evidently of Bloodline humans with dragon blood.”
With a sigh, I patted his chest, too tired to explain my poor attempt at a joke. Especially because he wasn’t exactly wrong. I had a really difficult time getting rid of anything.
I slipped my hand into his and wandered back the way we’d come, transfixed by the collection of art that peppered the edges of the bookshelves. Near the door, I paused at a shelf I hadn’t seen when we walked in. On it was a more recent flame-work sculpture I’d made from a series of botanical studies I’d been experimenting with. It was a tiny, delicate mariposa lily, one I’d been proud of but needed the money it would bring if I sold it too much to hang onto. Surrounding it were several framed photos of my parents and me when I was small, and of a few other friends and family. My grandmother, who was only the most faded memory was in one. Next to her stood an attractive younger woman, and beside her was my mother.
Gray made a low sound in his throat and picked up the photo. “You were cute as a baby.” He shot me a smile, then touched another face in the picture. “Who are the others?” he asked.
“The one on the right is my mom. The older woman is Grandma Meryl. And the other lady is Grandma’s friend Adele. I think they worked together, but my memory’s not exactly reliable that far back. And that handsome devil holding me is my dad.”
He kept staring at the photo with a strange expression. I touched his arm. “Something wrong?”
He seemed to come back to himself and tore his gaze away from the photo, setting it back on the shelf. “Not at all,” he said, smiling at me, then pointing at the glass flower. “I’d like to know where you got your inspiration for the amazing things you created.”
I gripped his hand and turned, tugging him behind me as I headed up the dark-stained oak staircase.
He chuckled when I pushed open the door to a bedroom on the second floor. Not my childhood room, but a nursery wasn’t the ideal place for us to sleep, and there were plenty of other rooms to choose from. “I definitely feel inspired in here,” he said, pressing a kiss to my neck from behind.
I leaned back against his chest with a sigh. “I’m too wiped out to show you anything else right now. The pick-me-up we shared earlier is pretty much spent. Nothing sounds more inspiring right now than a shower and then sleep.”