Magical Midlife Invasion (Leveling Up 3)

“She’s a grown woman, Martha. She knows what she’s doing,” he said, turning up the volume.

“Well.” Out of the corner of his eye, he could see her put her hands on her hips. She was getting stubborn. “I’m going to do some dusting. Surely a butler up in his years takes ages to get around to everything. Since he won’t let me braise the roast, at least I can find another way to be of help.”

“‘Don’t call me Shirley,’” he said out of reflex, quoting the movie Airplane!

The pitter-patter sounded for the third time.

“And I will check out whatever that is. God, I hope she isn’t hiding some sort of love child,” she muttered, heading out. “We haven’t seen her for a while. Maybe she adopted. Lord only knows what she’s gotten up to. Starting a new life might’ve addled her brain, poor dear…”

Her voice trailed off, so Pete didn’t hear where her train of thought led her, but he suspected it would somehow end where it always did—with Martha wondering if all his marbles were still rolling around in his head.

He chanced a glance at that mantel, just for grins.

An utterly flat piece of wood waited for him, no carvings or designs or anything, except for a woman in the center, staring at him.

“O-kay.” He flicked off the TV, placed the remote on the little table next to his chair, and stood. Time to get some air. He’d check out the garden first, and deal with the rat infestation later. There would be no re-homing him, thank you very much. He just had to get a grip on reality and then he’d be all set. No better place than a garden to clear his head and regroup. There was very little in a garden that had ever been able to shock him.SevenI touched down, out of breath, having flown to and from the mountain where the basajaun lived. Unfortunately, it was a large mountain, and we hadn’t been able to find him quickly enough. With dinner fast approaching, we’d decided to head home and look for him later.

Changing from my gargoyle form to my human form was a breeze now. It was slightly more difficult to pretend it was natural and comfortable to walk around nude within a group.

I tried to keep from covering myself as Ulric changed into his human form and reached into the sack of clothes he’d carried for the group, making it so Niamh didn’t have to wear it around her neck.

“Jessie, here.” He tossed my shapeless brown dress to me.

I shrugged it on as the others changed. Edgar was the only one who didn’t have to change, but I could tell he was grateful for the chance to take some deep breaths to calm down after being dangled above the ground by one of the gargoyles. He wasn’t very keen on heights.

“Where’s Austin?” Niamh asked, not at all worried that she was still partway through changing. I was the only one who seemed to care about the whole naked thing.

As if on cue, the enormous snow-white polar bear cut through the trees ahead, nearing the patch of flowers that had been munched on. For such a large creature, he was eerily silent, but he was venturing a little too close to the edge of the wood for my liking. I doubted my parents would be staring out the windows at the back of the house, and even if they were, the long shadows should mask Austin’s movements, but just in case…

I started forward to meet him, wanting to look at his wounds again anyway. We’d practiced the tripwire spell before heading out, and it hadn’t gone well—or rather it had gone too well. Austin had insisted he was fine before we left for the mountain, but I knew for a fact that the guy could handle a great deal of pain. I’d attempted to heal him from the air, but I’d sensed it wasn’t working properly from that height, especially with my level of fatigue. If he was still in pain, I wanted to do whatever I could to help.

“It bears repeating that the basajaun might not have been on his mountain because he’s been here, robbing the flowers,” Edgar mumbled.

“If he’s been here so recently, Austin will smell him,” Niamh replied, “and so ye can shut it.”

“Amen,” Cedric said. “I still don’t understand why you are so worried about those flowers. You have a million of them. Only a small portion are being eaten in a place they shouldn’t even be planted. Why not just forget about it?”

“Why don’t I just…” Edgar scoffed indignantly, and I tuned him out. If Cedric didn’t know not to question Edgar’s idiosyncrasies, there was no help for him.

The flare of light from Austin’s shift back into human made me squint, and the searing heat coated my front. It only lasted a moment, and then he stood facing me, his chest rising and falling with fatigue. I’d made everyone fly slowly, and thanks to Ivy House magic, he had the stamina of a twenty-year-old. He shouldn’t be this winded, which meant…