Page 10 of Monster's Baby

“Does it have a toilet?”I asked, clutching my stomach.

“It’ll pass.But yes.”

“Then I’m all for it.”

“You were a good boy, Tsunami,” Aiden said, rubbing the dragon’s snout.“Thank you.”

I waved a little.“Thank you for the great first ride,” I said politely, although ‘great’ wasn’t the word I wanted to use.It could have been much worse.

We stripped out of our riding leathers before leaving the stable, making a pile of them that Aiden assured me would be taken care of.

“Come on!”he said, pulling me by the hand, a boyish grin of glee on his face.

I followed readily enough, curious to see what he considered his favorite place that wasn’t the dragon stables.

He led me to a copse of trees not far from the chateau, the only sense of the sea the brine in the air.

“This is beautiful,” I said, looking around the glade.“Did you plant these trees yourself?They’re not very old.”

“I did.”Aiden pushed through them until he reached a clearing in the middle.He spread his arms wide.“Here it is.”

I nodded.“It’s a very nice field.”

Aiden chuckled.“One more step.”

The tingle of magic in the air hit me the next moment, and I almost rolled my eyes at myself.Of course Aiden would hide it.One more step showed me the most intricate playhouse I’d ever seen.

“Oh!”I gasped, clasping my hands in front of my mouth.“I would have loved to have this when I was a child!”

“It grew with me.Hayden did a lot of the spellwork.He wanted me to have somewhere I could go that was just mine when I came home from boarding school.”

“That’s really sweet.”I spotted the door.“Can we go in?”

“Of course.”

The building was rustic, but fully functional.A partial kitchen was off the main living space, a tiny bathroom and a reading room in the opposite direction.The walls were partial climbing gym, partial display shelving.High above, various openings led to different areas that I couldn’t make out from the lower level.

“Go ahead,” Aiden encouraged me.

I wiped my hands on the seat of my jeans and grabbed the jutting out portions of the climbing wall.It took a moment for me to get used to the motion of climbing, but I reached the second level in a short time.I stood, chest heaving, proud of myself for managing the climb.

I peeked into one opening after another.One led to a rope bridge across to another portion of the playhouse.Another was a sloping tube that led downward.I remembered seeing the slide from the outside.A third was an obstacle course across to the same place as the bridge.

My arms were still trembling a little from climbing the wall, so I chose to cross by the bridge.It was open to the air, but it was easy enough to cross, with a rope on either side to hold, one strung taut to walk on, and all tied together to avoid too much wobbling.

My efforts were completely worth it.On this side, there was a winding staircase that twisted up around a center firefighter-style pole.I lost track of the number of stairs I climbed, peeking out the sporadic windows as I came to them.Once I was higher than the tops of the trees, the stairs stopped at a trapdoor.I opened it upward and climbed a little ladder to a loft area.There was a telescope set up in the center, and I spotted controls on the wall that would open up the ceiling.

Making a mental note to ask Aiden if we could come back here at night, I looked around the rest of the tiny room.There was another tube, marking a slide.The opening was covered with a moveable plexiglass, so nobody would fall down accidentally.The pole in the center of the stairs had stopped below the trapdoor, for safety as well.There were cushions against the wall, large ones that looked extremely comfortable.

I debated with myself about whether I should take the slide or the pole back down.The slide won, and I lifted the plastic, sitting at the top with my legs in the tube.It was a steep drop, curling around the outside of the tower.The top of the tube was open, and I watched the sky and then the trees whiz by as I rode the slide down to the bottom.

Aiden met me.“What do you think?”

“I love it,” I said happily.“Can we use it tonight?”

Aiden considered the now cloudy sky.“Depends on the weather.”

“Of course.”

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