Page 21 of Shelf-Made Man
So Tobias and Denial had spent nearly three decades living together, and as far as he was concerned, the arrangement could have continued indefinitely.
Until an elf appeared in his home, leaving no more room for Denial.
When you collected data for a living, and you organized it and analyzed it, sometimes the conclusions were inescapable, no matter how unpleasant they might be. And Tobias had now collected a lot of data: His adopted status. His size. The difficulty with social connections. The fact that Alfie had at first believed him to be a troll. The glee he’d felt when battling the home-invading trolls—who’d at first assumed he was one of them. Jerry’s conviction that Tobias was not an ordinary human.
Of course, this self-revelation raised a lot of new questions. Had his mother known what he was? How did she come to adopt him? What had happened to his biological parents? How had he even left the other world and gotten into this one? Was he destined to become ill-natured and violent? What did all of this mean for his future? And what would Alfie do if he found out?
Rightnow, however, only one question was important.
Where was Alfie?
If Tobias was a troll, he might as well embrace the useful aspects of his nature. Alfie had told him that trolls could track anyone.
So he took a few deep breaths of the cold mountain air, closed his eyes, and followed the steps he always used for a thorny work problem. First he pictured a blank computer screen. At the top of the screen he placed a tiny image of the beginning, which in this case was him right now, in the middle of a parking lot with his breath pluming and the sky above slowly lightening. At the bottom of the screen he imagined the end result: Alfie, safe in Tobias’s arms. Now all he had to do was figure out the path between them.
When he was at work, that path consisted of numbers, computer code, and client specs. So what should it be now?
Elf. Christmas. Christmas tree. Tree!
Hadn’t Alfie mentioned that the forest here reminded him of home? It made sense that he’d retreat to the woods, which would also allow him to avoid endangering innocent bystanders when Snjokarl’s trolls arrived.
Alfie was in the forest; Tobias was sure of it. But they were surrounded by millions of acres of forest, and Tobias had no idea in which direction to set off. Plus, a substantial portion of this region had much rougher terrain than Tobias could handle. He hikedsometimes, but he wasn’t an experienced mountaineer.
“That’s fine,” he reminded himself. “You know the general program to use. Now concentrate on the specifics.”
His eyes remained closed, and as he focused on his steady heartbeat, another image began to appear on his mental screen. It was fuzzy at first but eventually clarified to Alfie sitting on the ground with his back against a tree, his knees drawn up and circled by his arms. He looked cold and lonely and miserable.
“Where?” Tobias murmured.
The screen cleared and was promptly replaced by a map depicting Siskiyou County. When Tobias zoomed in a little, a red circle appeared, exactly like when he searched for addresses on his phone. He continued to zoom in until the precise location was clear.
Alfie was five miles south, inside a state park and, thankfully, not far from the freeway.
Tobias took a few minutes to check out of the motel, then got into his car and zoomed out of town. He drove a lot faster than was legal or advisable, but there was very little traffic and the road was clear of ice and snow.
The lot at the state park was deserted. It was too early for most day use, and presumably, few people wanted to camp when the temperature was well below freezing. After parking in the spot farthest from the entrance and closest to where he knew Alfie sat, he took off downthe trail.
He might be more of a plodder than a sprinter, but he could keep going for a long time. And while hefeltthe cold, it didn’t bother him, didn’t make him shiver, didn’t make his skin chap. When he was little, his mother had fussed over him in winter, insisting that he wear warm coats, thick socks, and mittens. When it rained—which was often—she handed him umbrellas. But he’d always managed to lose the umbrellas and mittens, forget the coats at school, and wear holes in the socks. Eventually she’d accepted that he wasn’t going to succumb to hypothermia, and she’d given up on protecting him from the elements.
Was cold tolerance part of being a troll? He had no idea, but whatever the reason, he was thankful for it now as he hurried toward Alfie.
Dim light filtered through the evergreen branches, and Tobias’s tread was nearly silent on the needle-covered ground. He felt almost as if he had the world to himself. Under other circumstances, he would have quite enjoyed a jog in this place, where he wasn’t in danger of being run over by an inattentive driver or splashed by a bus barreling through puddles. Maybe, if he survived this adventure, he should consider moving out of Portland, maybe getting a little place up on Mt. Hood. He did mostly remote work anyway, and it wouldn’t be too terrible a commute if he didn’t have to do it often.
If he survived.
He jogged for over fifteen minutes, following the route map in his head, until he came to a spot that wasespecially crowded with trees. One of them, recently fallen, blocked the trail. Instead of clambering over it, Tobias walked slightly downhill and past the root end. There was no path, but at least the underbrush was a little easier to get through during the winter. He’d gone perhaps a hundred yards when he spied a cedar with a particularly thick trunk.
That was the one. He was as certain as he was of his own name—and more certain than he was of his species.
Heart racing, Tobias rushed to the tree. Alfie cowered at the base on the other side.
“It’s me!” Tobias announced as he collapsed to his knees beside Alfie.
Alfie’s eyes grew wide. “T-T-Tobias?” His lips were blue and his teeth chattered.
“Yes!”
“N-not a troll?”
