Page 8 of A Shifter Disaster Thanksgiving

But her attention was quickly diverted away by the scene that spread before her. The village looked like something out of a Christmas card. Cabins identical to Sylvester’s lined the small street, creating a narrow, winding path that curved just out of sight. In the distance, looming over the snow-covered tops of the cabins, stood a towering forest of pine trees.

The village was larger than she’d expected. And if there was one such village on this mountain, there had to be others. And the trees. Why hadn’t she spotted any of this earlier when she was falling?

Oh, right—she’d been too busy panicking to register much besides the plummeting plane, the dragon that had appeared out of nowhere, and the ground rushing up to meet her.

Despite the freezing cold, Diane found the sight somewhat warming. Forget Christmas cards—it looked like something out of a novel she’d once read. What was it again?Moonlight? No,Twilight. It reminded her of the town in that novel, minus the modern roads and buildings—and cars.

Hopefully, there weren’t any century-old vampires lurking around. Diane doubted she would be so lucky. She’d already hadan encounter with a dragon. There was no telling what else was in store for her. “I won’t be running into the woods with any diamond-skinned men, that’s for sure,” she murmured.

Still, this place was almost unreal. If the fact that she was in danger didn’t keep nagging at her, she might have considered using the village as the setting for her next book.

Diane Garrick stood in the middle of the street that night, ankle-deep in the snow, waiting for her darling husband to come around the bend. The cold bit at her skin, and her breathing grew shallower by the minute, but she remained where she stood. He would be back, soon—

Her stomach growled again, reminding her she needed to eat something before she passed out from hunger and exhaustion. She glanced up and down the street, which was surprisingly empty except for her, and decided to head eastward.

But before she able to take more than few steps, a loud voice stopped her in her tracks.

“Stop right there! Don’t move another muscle!”

Chapter Four

Inside the Blacksmith’s Forge

“Careful with that blade, Sylvester,” Jon said. “You’ll take someone’s eye out with it if you’re not careful.”

Sylvester looked at the red-hot steel blade he’d just finished forging, examining it for flaws. When he found none, he set the sword in the water trough, causing a loud hiss and a surge of bubbles. With work on the sword completed, he reached for the battle-ax head he’d been working on earlier. He looked at it, frowned, then held it over the roaring furnace.

The dragonflame licked his hands, but it was a sensation he had grown accustomed to over decades of hard work and by virtue of his birth. When he felt the blade had been melted enough, he withdrew it, placed it on his anvil, and hammered it. Sparks illuminated the forge with each strike, and the din of his hammering along with Jon’s, filled the air.

“That sword looks terrible,” Sylvester said suddenly.

Jon struck his longsword once more, the sound ricocheting off the stone walls of the forge. “What?”

“I said,” Sylvester repeated a little louder, “your sword is terrible. It’s misshapen. If anyone carried that into battle, they would be flattened in seconds.”

His friend’s lips curved into a grin that revealed the gap in his teeth. “I think I’m doing a good job, Sylvester. Why don’t you mind your own business? Unless you want me to test it on you.”

Jon grabbed the reddened handle of the sword and pretended to jab Sylvester with it. Both men burst out laughing. They’d worked together long enough to know how to take a ribbing from each other. In fact, it was impressive how close the two men had become, considering that Jon and his wife had only moved into the village and become his neighbors less than a year ago. Like Sylvester, Jon was a dragon shifter, and working in the forgehad been convenient for him. Although Sylvester was used to working alone, he did not mind the company.

The way he saw it, Jon was a welcome friend, and he was one of the few people in Pine Gap who treated him as just Sylvester, not the son of the late chief or the brother of the current one. Sylvester had no interest in being the village chieftain. He preferred blacksmithing, which he’d done for decades.

“So,” Jon said, striking once again with his hammer, “are we going to address the dragon in the room?”

Sylvester frowned at his friend. “What are you talking about?”

“Your meeting with your brother.”

That wiped the last traces of the smile off Sylvester’s lips. He placed the ax head in the water, watching the surface bubble and steam.

Jon tried again. “Do you not want to talk about it?”

Sylvester sighed, causing smoke to spurt from his nostrils. “It was nothing new. He told me that I was focusing on the wrong thing. That I should be concerning myself more with the threat of war,” he said, scoffing. “Does he really expect me to believe he had no hand in our father’s death when that’s his response to me asking about it?”

Jon was silent for the next few seconds, which Sylvester was grateful for. He stroked his greying beard with a blackened hand, his hazel eyes regarding his friend carefully. “You shouldn’t let Gregory’s response get to you,” he said carefully.

Sylvester stared at his friend with incredulity. “What? How can you even say that?”

“Your brother is focusing on what he considers to be most important right now. I understand how you feel, but the tensions between this village and Glenstra are growing. It’s only a matter of time before that our enemies strike. As village chief, he’s doing everything he can to make sure that we are not vulnerable when that happens.”

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