Shimmer (Riley Bloom #2)(3)

“It was back in England, in Devon, if I remember correctly.” He squinted as though trying to remember the exact date, like it’d been centuries ago or something, when we both knew he’d kicked it just over a decade ago, back in 1999, courtesy of bone cancer, and just days away from the millennium too. Then lifting his shoulders, he added, “Anyway, they’re most often seen in Devon, Norfolk, Suffolk, and Essex, but still, I—”

“Wait—what do you mean, they?” I asked, aware of Buttercup creeping toward my side, nuzzling my leg in a desperate attempt to ease his way back into my good graces. “You mean there’s more than one?”

“Snarly Yows?” Bodhi tilted his head in a way that caused his bangs to swoop into his eyes. “Yeah, lots more.” He nodded, combing his fingers through his hair and pushing the strands back into place.

“Snarly—what?” My voice squeaked, unable to make sense of the word.

“Snarly Yow, Black Shuck, Phantom Dog, Galleytrot, Shug Monkey, Hateful Thing, Hell Beast…” He shrugged, instantly manifesting a long green straw he started to chew as he looked all around. Face arranged as though he expected to find a whole pack of them storming the sand, but coming away with little more than a heavy shroud of mist, he just looked at me and said, “They go by a lot of different names. And though the legends slightly differ, when you get right down to it, it all amounts to basically the same thing. A big, black, menacing dog with glowing eyes—sometimes one in the middle of his forehead, sometimes where his head would’ve been if it weren’t missing—” He looked at me. “That sort of thing. Though they’re not relegated to just England. Once, while I was on assignment in Egypt, I spotted a really big one, much bigger than the one you just saw. I mean it was fierce. I thought for sure it was some kind of crazed black stallion. You can’t even imagine the size of that thing.” He shook his head at the memory. “Anyway, it was guarding some centuries-old tomb. That’s what they like to do, you know—guard old graves and tombs and such.”

He peered at me from under a thick set of lashes, lashes he probably enhanced in some way in order to make himself appear irresistible. From what I saw at graduation—or whatever they call that day when he first started to glow in that deep greenish shade that was enough to signal to whoever was in charge of these things that he was ready to serve as my guide—from all the catcalls and wolf whistles that followed him right from his seat all the way down to the stage, well, it clearly was working.

Or at least on some less-discerning spirits anyway.

Me, I was pretty much immune to it.

He continued to look at me, practically begging for me to be impressed with his exotic journey. But no way would I give that to him. No way would I give him the satisfaction.

So he’d traveled to Egypt. On assignment. Where he’d faced down some phantom dog that was even bigger than the one I just saw.

Big deal.

So what?

In the short amount of time since I’d crossed the bridge to my new home in the Here & Now, I’d already aced an assignment at a pretty impressive castle in the English countryside, had already soared directly above the bustling streets of London, and was at that very moment enjoying a nice little vacay on one of the Virgin Islands—all of that happening within a very short, very brief, amount of time, thankyouverymuch. Which left me with no doubt that there’d be plenty more travel in store for me, what with all the assignments I’d have, and all the lingering souls I’d be expected to cross over.

“Anyway,” he said, still chomping away, that green straw bobbing up and down in his mouth in what was clearly an annoying habit held over from his time on the earth plane, “even though legend says that coming across one is a bad omen—a portent of death—”

“A portent?” I looked at him, my brow rising, convinced he was trying to show off again.

“An omen, a sign, a—”

“I know what it means.” I rolled my eyes and waved it away, waved away his lame attempt to impress me, to lord his oh-so-big vocabulary over me.

“Anyway, the thing is,” he continued, squinting as he gazed up and down the mostly empty beach, “even though the legends all claim that whoever sees a Black Shuck will be dead within a year, that’s obviously something you don’t have to worry about. I mean, seeing as you’re already dead and all…”

“So that’s it, then?” I placed my hands on my hips and stared. “You’re just gonna let this psycho phantom hellhound run amok, and basically terrorize all the people on the beach, and do nothing to stop it?”

He shrugged, obviously not nearly as alarmed by the prospect as I was. “Guess I don’t really see the point,” he said. “I mean, face it, Riley, the only one who seems to be terrorized by the dog is you.”

I searched his face, searched for obvious signs (portents!) of mocking, but came up empty. So then I said, “What about Buttercup, then? What about that yelp that I heard? He sounded scared to death—so to speak.”

But Bodhi just laughed. “Mad maybe, but definitely not scared. That was my bad. I caught his ball in midair and flew with it. He wasn’t too pleased, but you got over it, didn’t you, boy?” His voice grew all soft and mushy as he reached down to give Buttercup a good scratch between the ears. And it was all I could do not to cringe when I saw how quickly my dog abandoned my side in order to scooch back toward Bodhi’s, where he sat, happily gazing at him, all drooly and goo-goo eyed.