"Me?"
"Yes, you. Who're you again?"
"I'll tell this to Andrew," he said to the guard, speaking cold as always. He takes me inside his office nearby and opens an automatic door using a card. "You have not forgotten my face except my name? I'm Afvshaganifs, kids call me Avi."
I clap my hands slowly while staring at him. This generation made the filthy pirate gloom; he looks like a thirty-year-old decent man in a black suit, curly hair tied behind, shaved beard with few mustaches left, and an ax necklace. "What has this era done to you?" I praised.
"You're in love now?"
"I'm proud, not in love."
"What brings you here?"
"Haiban brought me here! I was with Andrew for help and he lost me. I'm looking for a mage who can help me and here you are, the end of my wandering. Can you use your spellbook? Because I can't."
"Yes, you can't, lady. I hold the main source of enchantment in my spellbook found in the academy."
"Then cut the crap and let me use my spellbook to return to my time. That's all I need! I won't use it against you!"
"Believable. But I don't give favors without bargaining."
"I don't have anything to give you. Look, the whole werewolf race is dying in my time. My family is there! And I need to stop Haiban before it's too late! I have to save them!"
"It all came to pass on this day, lady. And you seriously think you can defy Haiban?"
"I already did! But this one was a clever move."
"Why won't you just live this day? Life is easy. Everything is convenient. People are happier."
"I bet you'll kill me if I stay, no?"
He reclines and smirks.
"And what makes this life happy? Technologies? None of those toys could replace the value of my mate and twins, my friends, and my dogs that I left in the past."
"I'll give you one reason. Housewives have ten thousand monthly salaries."
May the angels protect me from this temptation. "Are you crazy? How am I supposed to be a housewife without my husband, hm?"
"Get a new one. He's dead today. You only think they're alive because you think about the past."
"Nonsense!" I slammed his table. "Tell me what you want if that's what you insist on before you help me."
"Lie down with me."
"... Excuse me...?"
I shivered with his obsessive stare! "Lady, I have the power. I have the gold and glory. What else I can't have is what the opposite sex can give." And he glanced at me from toe to head.
"My goddess!" I walk away from the table. "You've spent hundreds of years already without hitting a love life!? Look at you! Just keep up that bloom and you'll get a woman, not me." Then I point at my mate's bite mark. "Why do I have to lecture you about this...?"
"You're the one who's asking for help, not some other woman."
"Then forget it! Screw yourself!" And I walk out.
"Then stay here and die."
I turned my back when I saw his smirk. Is this pirate interested in me? I might puke at the thought of kissing him! This door is frustrating me too! I've been struggling to pull the handle and when I kick it, the door opens and Andrew catches my feet. "Granny! Here you are! I was looking for you."
"Okay. Put me down," I complained and that's when he dropped my leg. He came inside the office.
"Oh, you've met? I was planning to make you two meet. This saved time."
"Why did you hire a pirate?"
"How did you know he's a pirate?"
"I met him in his ship. And you?"
"He pirated movies and series so he's a pirate," he said that I don't understand. They greet each other like a regular co-worker. "Avi is assigned with the overseas transactions of cars to foreign investors. He's a sea captain and an asset to this ward."
"I see. He has helped so much to this family business I shouldn't demand anymore."
"What're you talking about? He's an enchanter. Maybe he can help us!" I had no choice when he held me on my shoulders and lends me the seat in front of this pirate's table. He came late and it's late to explain to him, perhaps he might convince his employee. Andrew occupies the other seat.
"Alright, Avi. You see..." He said the whole situation. "Can you help them return to their proper timeline?" he asks eventually. I look at Afvshaganifs, daringly.
"... Haiban... is the real problem," he started while spinning a pen with his fingers. "He prepares everything with details. Which means he brought you here to figure out something on your own. You don't need someone else. Everything you need is within your grasp. You'll just have to find it. To answer the question, I can't help you. In fact, you don't need it."
"Tsk. He wants me to pick up sugar in the sand," I murmured. "What do you know about werewolf history?"
"I lived in the sea for a half-century after I heard the birth of technology."
"You're so useless."
"But something is strange," Andrew picks out a pen and writes on his smartphone, "The growth of this business started in 1910 but you came from 1886. If your papsie-in-law exterminated all wolfies, how had my old paps started this business? His three puppies were young adults when old paps prospered. For the span of twenty-four years, the silver woof-woof family didn't die or didn't revive according to your papsie-in-law's plan. He probably spared your whole family."
"Or he probably didn't annihilate the werewolf race?" I asked.
"Yes. Recounting my grannies' records, my old paps lived in Cardozen City for a safe start."
"Why there? Why not Lanbarc or here?"
"A friend took them to a bar. Old paps mortgaged his former land to build his own house in Cardozen. And they are the only woof-woof there."
Plandreas wasn't safe for them? It's also given that they might be in danger if they lived in Lanbarc. And if Matheo took them in, that means he and his family survived! "What about his wife?"
"Apparently, there's no record about you nor your name."
"But you mentioned he had three kids. What about the records of his wife?"
"... The woman old paps loved was missing. So he had another wife named Hrista. She bears old paps a son who looks like him too."
"What...?"
"... Which one were you asking 'what'?"
"It's normal for a person to have another partner when the previous one is gone," Afvshaganifs teases.
"You..." I stole the pen from his table and hopped my knee on it to hit him. "Take me back to the past, now! I will bald that woman—!" He catches my wrists and grips me tightly.
Andrew is pulling me down on my waist. "Granny! Calm down!
"How could she replace me!? The audacity...! Let me go! And don't call me granny!!"
"Come on. This can't be a nice way to negotiate."
I stepped down from the table and flipped my hair. "Nice way? I'm not using magic yet! Do you know what he wanted in exchange? He wants me to have sex with him!" I denounced.
Now he looks despised at the pirate. "You're interested in my ancestor...?"
Afvshaganifs says, "Why not? She's a beautiful enchantress and her drunkard mate is dead today. I will not change my mind." He manifests his messy spellbook. "It's not a negotiation if only the other side will benefit from it. If she can't, she better play hide-and-seek well."
"Don't you dare..." I pushed Andrew behind me and formed my enchast.
"Okay. Okay. Not in my ward. It's unfair. I don't have magic," said Andrew—playing the peacemaker. "Avi, just don't be a hindrance if you keep proving me wrong that you can help us without demands. I'll give you another proposal. I'll pay you triple this month."
"I said I will not change my mind, boss. I have all the money needed."
I walked away and kicked the confusing door to open it. Andrew is calling for me and I keep misbehaving. I breathed in and out deeply, massaging my forehead from the headache caused by that suffocating office. I'm intrigued with this Hrista. It's understandable for Hessuel to attract women with his captivating eyes.
He did it once when I left him. But why would he do it twice? Did he wait for me? Did that Hrista take advantage of my absence!? Once a marked mate produces offspring from another party, it means the mark is null and void. They must've believed that I'm missing and dead. But I'm just here in the future! I stamped my foot!
"Granny! Granny, wait." Andrew catches up. Then he touches my arms. "Maybe Avi was telling the truth. We don't need his help. We've got everything we need."
"How am I supposed to return without a spellbook! And that Hrista... Why was she recorded in this family and not me?"
"Because you're here! I think you weren't recorded in the past because you weren't there. And once you return to your timeline, the records today can be altered."
"... Right. And we're stuck in reverse with this issue!"
The music rings, then Andrew answers the smartphone call. "What is it, Ruth?"
["Master, we're at the hospital right now. Linly is... dead."]
"What!?"