Heart Of Atlantis

portal called out to them before it vanished.
    Alaric narrowed his eyes. “We have
got
to find another way to travel,” he grumbled.
    She started laughing and took his hand, and they walked forward into their future.
    Together. Forever.
    And she wouldn’t have it any other way.

Epilogue
    Château des Loups, in the Swiss Alps, six months later
    Quinn sipped the fine cognac and sighed with pleasure. “This is the best trip we’ve taken yet.”
    “You said that about Paris,” Alaric said, smiling at her over his ale. He was sure she became more beautiful every day, especially now that she actually ate on a regular basis. “Also Rio, Alaska, Fiji, London, China—am I forgetting any?”
    “They were
all
the best trips ever,” she said happily. “Nobody needs me to tell them what to do, or figure out how to feed fifty new recruits with a budget that doesn’t stretch past macaroni and cheese, or shoot any vampires, or rescue any skunk shifters—”
    “Really?” He grimaced. “Skunk shifters?”
    “In the Smoky Mountains,” she said. “You wouldn’t believe—”
    “I don’t want to know,” he said firmly. “Some stories are better left untold.”
    She grinned. “I didn’t know you were squeamish, tough guy.”
    “I simply have discriminating taste,” he said haughtily.
    “And skunks don’t taste good.”
    They both laughed.
    She bit her lip, always a sign of nerves with her. “So you don’t ever get, I don’t know, maybe a little bored?”
    He wondered how to avoid any hidden reefs in this conversation. “Well,” he said cautiously, “there are times when I wonder if I could be of use for more than vacation and leisure.”
    Her eyes lit up. “Exactly! Not that we want to go back to the way things were, but maybe we could do something to help someone once in a while. You know, not officially but on a kind of pro bono basis.”
    He grinned at her and leaned back in his chair. “Yes. I think I’d like that. Only if you would, of course. I’m perfectly content to spend all day every day licking that place on your—”
    “Alaric!” Her cheeks turned scarlet, as they always did when he teased her, and he marveled anew that his wanton wife was so shy in so many ways.
    A commotion at the front of the lodge caught their attention, and a man and woman clutching each other ran in, shouting and crying.
    “Our son, please, somebody help us, they took our son,” the man shouted.
    His wife, for clearly they were a couple, just sobbed, unable even to speak.
    “We were on the trail behind the lodge, and they came out of nowhere, like giant hairy ghosts,” the man said, his eyes wild. “We’ve never seen such monsters! You must believe me, we would never make this up. They were gray, with red eyes, and at least eight feet tall—”
    The old man nursing a whiskey at the bar interrupted him. “We’ve got a feral pack of shape-shifting yetis around here. They like to take kids, young and juicy. Let ’em sit around for a couple of days before they kill ’em, so you still have a chance if you go now.”
    The woman’s eyes rolled back in her head and she dropped like a stone—fainted dead away. Her husband caught her on the way down, but then he burst into tears. “Who will help me?”
    Quinn put her hand on Alaric’s. “Oh, honey, isn’t it a lovely day for a hike?”
    “It’s freezing outside.”
    She stroked her lips with one finger and then lightly licked her lips and finger, both, while she watched her husband’s eyes glaze over.
    “Brisk, is what I meant to say,” he amended. “Great day for a brisk walk.”
    Quinn stood up and walked over to the couple sitting on the floor. “Don’t worry. We’ll find him for you.”
    “Yetis,” Alaric said, coming up behind her with her coat. “It had to be yetis.”
    “Better than skunks,” she reminded him. “Our life together will never be boring.”
    “Thank the gods for that,” he murmured, before he helped her into her coat and walked out onto the frozen mountainside to hunt for shape-shifting yetis.
    In the very back of the bar, a large man with eyes that constantly shifted from blue to green to blue again watched them go.
    AND HE CALLED ME A DERANGED FOOL
, Poseidon thought, smiling fondly.
I’LL HAVE HIM BACK YET. ESPECIALLY WHEN THEY FIND OUT THEIR FIRST DAUGHTER IS ON THE WAY. THEY SHOULD NAME HER AFTER ME.
    POSEIDONA, I THINK.
    Still smiling, the sea god dropped a gold coin on the table and vanished. He had the next