Dating for Demons by Serena Robar Page A

library.
    “What else do you need?” It was go time.

Six

    PIPER

    “ I t could be Elven. I have a friend who speaks Elven. Maybe he can take a look at it?”
    I blew air out of my mouth in frustration. “You know, Wayne, if it isn’t Klingon, I’m going out on a limb and sayin’ it probably isn’t Elvish either. Thanks anyway.”
    I was officially at a dead end. Wayne was the last of a long list of dead ends. It wasn’t Persian, Latin, Chinese, Egyptian or, thank goodness, Klingon. The Prophesy’s original text was a complete and utter friggin’ mystery. Still.
    “Looks like ancient Runic,” a deep voice whispered in my ear, tickling my neck and sending my pulse racing.
    “You!” I exclaimed, rather uncoolly. “I mean, hey, Hunter. What a surprise.”
    Wayne took one look at Hunter, with his tall, muscular body and windblown, shoulder-length hair, and practically raced out of the teahouse.
    Hunter smirked at Wayne’s hasty departure while making himself comfortable in his still-warm seat. I raised an eyebrow at his forwardness. God, I loved a man with confidence.
    “Would you jump in my grave as quick?” It was something my grandpa always said to us kids when we scrambled to take possession of his favorite recliner after he got up to use the bathroom. I was never sure quite what it meant but it seemed appropriate for the moment.
    “Do you always start conversations with grave references?” Hunter asked smoothly.
    “Do you really know anything about Runic language?” I challenged back, trying to play it as cool as he was acting. I frowned at the paper in front of me.
    He shrugged indifferently. Oh boy, he was so hot.
    “Prove it to me.” I pushed the page in his direction.
    He leaned forward, pointing to the symbols on the page. “See how the letters are all at an angle? Like slash marks? Runic is ancient. Back when important messages were carved on wood or stone. See here, it’s easier to carve a straight slash than a curve.” He slid a switchblade from his boot and demonstrated by slashing the air in lines.
    I think he was trying to shock me by pulling out a blade to make his point, but I’d seen Undead implode. A little ol’ knife was not going to freak me out.
    I ignored him and analyzed the letters again. “Huh,” I grunted. He might have something there. “Now how come five other college students and one professor had no idea what this language was?”
    “Probably because it isn’t straight Runic. It looks like a mixture of Runic with something else. Perhaps Ogden script? See, these letters are different. Also, Ogden script is read from left to right while these here are read from right to left.”
    “Ogden script?” I was completely baffled.
    Hunter tucked his knife neatly back into his boot. “Ogden script is another ancient language. Used by tree priests.”
    I stared at him in wonder and disbelief. Who was this guy that he had a working knowledge of ancient scripts about trees, anyway?
    “So what does that mean?” I asked, completely confused.
    “It means someone combined two very different ancient languages and married them in some way. To create a language or code only they could understand.”
    “But you understand it?” I ventured, curious.
    He leaned back and smiled. “Maybe. What’s it for?”
    I debated on what to tell him. After all, I didn’t know this guy at all, but I really wouldn’t mind the prospect of a little one-on-one tutoring from him. However, the last time I met him he happened to arrive on the scene of a very messy vampire tussle where Colby was hurt and almost staked. She was convinced he was trouble, so I couldn’t really spill the beans about vampires and ancient prophesies. Not to mention it would make me sound crazy.
    “Scavenger hunt. Part of Greek Week.”
    He raised an eyebrow at me in question. “You don’t strike me as a Greek.”
    “I’m not. Just helping out a friend. She wants to win really bad.”
    He looked unconvinced. I