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and took his arm. The universe seemed to shift, and something clicked into place. After the long months of darkness, he was back at her side. It felt right.
    As they started for the door, a short, plump woman burst into the Sheriff’s Department and tottered up to the front desk on a pair of high-heeled boots. She wore her hair shaved close in the front and long in the back. The bristles at the top of her scalp were bright pink, fading into stringy, yellow locks that fell below her shoulders. A tight top displayed her fleshy arms and overflowing cleavage, and her stocky legs were encased sausage-like in shiny, form-fitting black breeches that ended below the knee. This vision of oddness carried a writhing furry lump under one arm. The lump was conical at one end. An alarming noise emanated from the depths of the cone, like the slathering growl of a rabid wolf.
    More like a pack of rabid wolves, Ansgar decided, his warrior instincts roused.
    Or a demon.
    The creature swung its head in his direction, giving Ansgar a glimpse of glowing, yellow eyes. A demon, right enough, though smallish in size. But the djegrali were sly and took many forms.
    He barked out a command, and his bow appeared in his hand. Readying an arrow, he stepped in front of Evie.
    “Hold, demon spawn,” he said in a thunderous voice. “Release the human or die.”
    The woman in the boots screeched and clutched the demon to her bosom. “Mothertrucker, who are you?”
    The door to the ladies’ room opened with the sound of rushing water, and a steely-eyed matron with a towering poof of gray hair marched out.
    “What in tarnation’s going on?” she demanded. “Can’t a body twinkle around here without the whole place breaking out in crazy?”
    “Beware,” Ansgar said grimly. “That woman has a demon.”
    “What are you, high?” The gray-haired woman glared at him. “It’s a Chihuahua. Get rid of that bow now before I call a deputy.”
    Chihuahua. A small breed of dog with large, pointed ears popular with humans.
    “Oh.” Ansgar lowered his weapon. “That is different.”

Chapter Five
    T he woman with the dog rounded on Ansgar. “What is your problem, mister? You ought to be ashamed of yourself, picking on a poor, helpless little pooch.”
    Evie eased around Ansgar to get a better look. Pink Converse boots, the woman with the mullet from hell wore pink Converse boots. Crushed against her ample bosom was a gunmetal blue Chihuahua with an inverted lamp shade on its head. The dog’s eerie golden eyes shone at the bottom of the cone, and its mouth bristled with an impressive set of gleaming, white teeth.
    Helpless? Evie smothered a giggle. That Chihuahua looked about as helpless as a cornered wolverine.
    “Don’t you worry, Frodo, Mommy won’t let the bad man hurt her widdle Precious,” Mullet Woman said, cooing into the cone. “Even if he is sex on a stick and so fine he makes Mommy think about abandoning our No-More-Men-Because-Men-Are-Scum-Sucking-Low-Life-Two-Timing-Weasel-Dick- Bastards resolution. The one we made after Daddy runned off with Brittany, the husband-stealing ’ho from Loo-zee-anna.”
    Ansgar slung the bow across his back. “I did not realize the creature was a dog with that contraption upon its head.”
    The elegant weapon he carried was hand carved of pale, gleaming wood, beautiful and deadly like the man who wielded it. The bow had scarcely settled across his wide shoulders when it faded and vanished from view. Poof! It was gone, just like that, and the quiver of arrows with it. She darted a startled glance at the other two women. They were too busy gawking at Ansgar to notice his little magic act, thank goodness.
    An image of Ansgar dressed in leather warrior garb flashed through Evie’s mind. She frowned, trying to hold on to the scrap of memory, but it was gone.
    A ripple of unease shook her. How could she have a memory of Ansgar when they’d met less than an hour ago?
    Shaking off her disturbing thoughts, she