Chapter 1

1

Gideon ignored the feeling that he was being watched as he concentrated on sketching a woman picking flowers. He was seated across the glade from her with his back against a tall oak tree. When she finished, she paused briefly to give him a wave before leaving.

“Okay, Danny. You can come out, now.”

A boy, who appeared to be seven if that, slipped out of the shadows behind Gideon. “I was just watching you draw, Gid,” he said.

“It’s easier if you sit here.” Gideon patted the grass beside him, nodding when the boy dropped down next to him.

“How did you know I was there?”

Gideon chuckled. “You weren’t as quiet as you thought.”

“I tried,” the boy protested. “Can I see?”

“Sure.” Gideon turned the pad to show Danny the drawing.

“No. I mean…” Danny touched the side of his face.

“Good gods, you’ve seen them often enough.” He pulled his long, dark hair back to reveal his ears.

“I know,” Danny admitted. “But they’re neat.”

“They’re only ears,” Gideon replied with a smile. “Maybe a bit pointier than yours but still.”

“Because you’re half an elf.” Danny nodded hard.

“Yep.” Gideon let his hair fall back in place.

“I wish I was,” Danny said.

“No you don’t, not really. There’s a lot to be said for being you, exactly the way you are.”

Danny looked as if he didn’t believe him, but didn’t argue as he asked, “When are you going to teach me to draw. You promised you would.”

“Let’s see. Tomorrow’s Saturday so I’m free. How about you come by the house around ten. But not—” he tapped Danny’s chest, “—without your mom’s permission. Understand?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Good. Okay, it’s suppertime so you’d better go home before she thinks you’ve run away or been kidnapped.” Gideon got up, put the pad and his pencils in his backpack, and followed at a more sedate pace when Danny took off running.

The boy had disappeared from view by the time Gideon reached the main street through Lorwick. He paused as he often did to look around with a sense of contentment. The place suited him perfectly as he’d discovered the first time he’d visited. It was small, with barely four hundred residents, nestled along a cove on the rocky Maine coast. Winters could be brutal, but on a warm spring day, like today, it was idyllic.

It had been pure luck as far as Gideon was concerned that he’d arrived in town soon after the death of one of the older residents. According to the story he’d heard, the man’s children had moved away many years previously and had no intention of returning except for the funeral and to put the house up for sale. The moment he’d seen it, Gideon knew it would be perfect for him. It was small, with a main room, kitchen, and a pantry on the ground floor and two bedrooms and a bath on the second. A large, natural stone fireplace took up half the far end of the main room—with windows on each side overlooking the back yard—and each bedroom had its own, smaller fireplace. The real selling point however was the barn behind the house. One look and he knew it would be perfect for his studio.

He’d made an offer on the place and the acre of land it stood on at the edge of the town. Two months later it was his, lock, stock, and barrel. He’d settled in and then worked on the barn to make it an open, airy studio. Quite successfully in his opinion, and those of the townspeople who had made it a point to get to know him.

He was once again thankful that in the new, enlightened age that had slowly crept over the world, those like himself who were ‘other’, to use the popular term, had been able to reveal their existence without too much backlash from the human population. Of course there were always those people who hated anyone different from themselves and they had tried their best to isolate or eliminate the ‘creatures’. Thankfully, they had been relatively unsuccessful, especially after laws had been passed to make it illegal to intentionally harm anyone who wasn’t born human.

“Evening, Gid,” a man called out as Gideon strolled past the grocery store.

“Evening, Mr. Allard. How are you?”

“Couldn’t be better,” Mr. Allard replied. “And you?”

“The same.”

“There was someone looking for you,” Mr. Allard said. “Never seen him or his friends before. I didn’t say where you lived but if they kept asking around…” He shrugged.

“Thanks for the warning. What did they look like?”

“The main one had on a suit and a fedora. Not bad looking if you like the gangster type. The others were bruisers dressed all in black.” Mr. Allard chuckled. “In this weather I don’t envy them. They must have been sweating up a storm.”

“How long ago?”

“Umm, maybe half an hour.”

“Okay. Guess I’d better get home and hope they’re not looking for trouble.”

Mr. Allard grinned. “If they are I’m sure you can handle it. You may look artsy, but we all know there’s more to you than a handsome face and talent for painting pretty pictures.”

“Pretty pictures?” Gideon muttered. He laughed seconds later. His paintings were hardly that, at least not the way Mr. Allard had teased—because he wasteasing and Gideon knew it.