Chapter 71 #5
“We are what we are, Beth Fahey, and we make no apologies for that. We were here on this land long before the humans built their towns along the river. If they didn’t want to deal with us, they could have gone elsewhere or stayed away from us.
They chose to build their towns and chose to touch our land—and us.
To mate with some of us. And sometimes they learn the cost of breaking a bargain with us. ”
They circled the lake and headed back to the pavilion.
“There are a couple of things I want to show you in the morning,” Lucas said. “We’ll consider obliging me to be the second favor you owe the Arcana.”
“All right. I can check out of my room after breakfast.”
“There’s no need for that. The room is for your use until you’re ready to catch the ferry.”
Authority. Command. And something else, something more. Something dangerous.
“Thank you.”
Lucas nodded. “There’s Kia. She’ll take you back to the hotel.”
“Good night. I’ll see you in the morning.” Were those words considered a bargain among the Arcana? She wasn’t sure.
A life torn asunder. Nothing she could do about that tonight.
Even if she called Bonnie and agreed to pay the twenty thousand dollars she didn’t have, the threat would always be there.
Even if Bonnie made something up just to cause trouble, a DNA test would provide all the proof needed that Beth Fahey wasn’t completely human.
Lucas walked back into the pavilion and joined the others who had waited for him.
“Fire burns away the old, but it also makes room for the new,” Zerah said, holding up a card.
“Are you going to show Beth Fahey the possibility of the new?” Jack asked.
Lucas nodded. “Tomorrow.” He looked at them, his most trusted counselors. Power swelled inside him, wanting to burst free. “I want to know everything there is to know about Bonnie Wilson, especially which branch of the Arcana paid her for looking after Beth Fahey—and why.”
He’d seen the stylized A in the corner of one of the sketches in Beth’s book and knew of only one person who signed her drawings that way.
If Beth was descended from Arianna Greenwood, he could guess which branch of the Arcana had been watching her for most of her life.
The why? He wasn’t sure he wanted the answer to why.
41
After looking over the impressive breakfast buffet, Beth settled for scrambled eggs and toast, hoping the simple food would settle a stomach made queasy by a sleepless night and nerves.
Fate wasn’t a narrow road lined with high walls.
There were turnoffs and turnarounds. And sometimes there were unexpected sinkholes or mudslides that could alter a person’s choices.
Her first trip across the river was because of a man purchasing the use of a ghost gun to shoot three people.
His fate was sealed when he pulled the trigger, but he could have had a different life if he’d changed his mind and returned the bullets and the gun.
Choices could make a difference, but she didn’t think whatever choice she made would change the fact that Bonnie was going to do something that would tear apart the life she’d built.
It didn’t take a great leap of logic to understand that the kernel of uneasiness most of her colleagues felt about her would contribute to her life being torn asunder.
A man approached her table, his plate piled so high with food the slightest shake of his hand would start an avalanche that would spill over the table and onto the floor.
“May I join you?” He didn’t wait for an answer, just set his plate on the table. Since the foods at the top of the pile were already starting to slide, maybe he realized he didn’t have time to hear her reply.
“I’m waiting for someone,” Beth said. Had she seen his face before? Not on a missing person flyer but somewhere else connected to the police?
“He’s not here now.” The man smiled before shoveling food into his mouth.
“How do you know I’m waiting for a man?”
“You don’t look like someone who plays for the other team. I’m Richard.” He chomped on a sausage. “And you are?”
“Someone who enjoys quiet time with her breakfast.”
Richard looked at the scant amount of food on her plate. “Not much of an appetite. Love affair gone sour?”
“Do you have a business card, Richard?” Beth pushed aside her plate.
“A licensed private investigator would carry business cards.” If she was wrong about his profession, he’d correct her, but she didn’t think she was wrong.
Spotting Ethan Sharpe and Jack Frost walking toward her, she raised her voice.
“Or are you just a snoop who is here to cause trouble for someone?”
He smirked. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”
Ethan stood behind Richard’s chair. Jack came up on the side of the table, blocking any chance of escape.
Jack gave Richard that sharp, feral smile. “We want to know, and you’re going to tell us.”
“Or what?”
“Or you will have a new job title: tethered goat.” Jack looked at Beth’s untouched food. “He’s waiting for you.”
Beth pushed away from the table. She gave Richard a long look, then hurried out of the hotel’s restaurant.
She paused in the lobby to send a note to her precinct e-mail, detailing Richard’s physical description.
He was smart not to provide a last name.
It would make it harder to find him, especially if he didn’t live in any of the towns around the Fate River.
Then again, maybe it wouldn’t be hard to find him if she started looking in the town where Bonnie now lived.
Keeping his hands beneath the table, Jack opened the camera app on the cell phone. He raised his hands and took a couple of quick pictures of the man who had sat down at Beth’s table without an invitation, ignoring the man’s squawked protest.
The man—Richard—put his hands on the table as if he were going to leave. His eyes widened. He sank back into the seat.
“My friend is holding a short, very sharp blade,” Jack said.
“If you try to leave again or cause any fuss while we’re talking, he’ll slip that blade between a couple of vertebrae and sever your spine.
It will be done so fast, you won’t even have time to feel the blade pierce the skin. Do you understand?”
“You can’t…” Richard sputtered.
“Can’t what? Kill you? Of course we can.
But we don’t have to kill you this time, as long as you answer our questions.
The Ladies Three have considered your presence here and set the price: one year of your life for every lie you tell while you’re talking to us.
I don’t know the measure of your years, but I hope you don’t tell so many lies that you end up expiring face-first in what is left of your breakfast.” Jack smiled.
“Tell us why you targeted the young woman sitting here, and who else is on your list of targets.”
“You didn’t sleep,” Lucas Frost said as he led Beth toward the cabins on the other side of the pavilion from the hotel.
“I had a lot to think about.” Did she look that haggard, or was he just very observant?
“Here is something else for you to think about.” Lucas unlocked and opened the door of the first cabin—a one-story building that was larger than the other cabins.
“This is our information center. It has phones, two computers for sending e-mail and accessing the internet, even a ham radio. It provides the Arcana with the ability to communicate with people and companies on the other side of the river. It also provides communication with the neighborhoods that also have such things.”
“I thought your office did that.”
“My office is mine. This is…communal. The building also holds two meeting rooms, which could also function as offices. The other cabins that are visible are for visiting families or people who want a place to stay that is more economical than the hotel.”
If she’d known that was a possibility, she would have inquired about using a cabin. She didn’t want to know what the hotel bill would do to her credit card. But…families?
“If whatever is coming changes circumstances so much that you can no longer do police work on the other side of the river, you can come here and work for me,” Lucas said. “Even if it doesn’t change things so much, you have that option.”
Beth stared at him. “To work for you? Doing what?”
“The same thing you’re doing now. Investigating when problems occur between the Arcana and humans. Being someone who can talk to the police and speak their language when they’re looking for information. Helping visitors when conflicts arise.”
“So I would commute every day?”
“No. You would live here.”
Something in his eyes, in his voice, made Beth uneasy. Like he was offering her a bolt-hole. Like he suspected she would need one.
“I could live here in…?”
“I’ll show you.”
They left the communications cabin. Behind the row of cabins were picnic tables and chairs beneath the trees.
There were even a couple of hammocks. Beyond that area was a gate so cleverly disguised she didn’t see it or realize there was a path leading to another part of the park until Lucas opened the gate and led her to a well-maintained path.
They walked for several minutes until they reached a large clearing that looked like a woodland fantasy combined with mundane practicality.
The cottages here weren’t in a row. They seemed to grow out of the land, connected by mulched pathways that all led to a sunny area where raised beds held a communal garden.
“The people who live in these cottages work in the hotel or run a food stand or work in the pavilion,” Lucas said.
“Most are like you—part Arcana. Two of the cottages are currently vacant. You could choose one as your residence. It would be most convenient for you to live within the boundaries of the park, but there is another place on Wyrd where humans have made a home. I’ll show it to you. It requires taking a shuttle.”