The Deer Prince's Murder: Book Two of 'Fantasy & Forensics' (Fantasy & Forensics 2) (7 page)

“Dayna, those people, those…beings that you work with? They came here for you. They needed your help, and you solved their problem.”

His eyes bored into mine. Gently for now, but underneath the soft brown there was a frightening hardness like granite. For the first time since I’d known Esteban, I wondered what it would be like sitting in custody when he came to interrogate me. If he thought that I was a murderer.

I didn’t even kid myself that it would be a pleasant experience.

“Yes…I solved their mystery. Cracked the case, put it to bed.”

“Now you’re being asked to come back and solve a new case. I’m guessing that they need you. And they’ll keep on needing you, won’t they?”

“It’s…possible.” I’d never mentioned Fitzwilliam’s job offer to Alanzo.

Esteban struggled with himself for a moment. Like he was trying to put something back into a box that was reserved only for his time on the job. He put his hands down, took a step back from me.

“You have to do what’s best for you, Dayna. I’m patient. I’ll wait some more. But don’t give me hope when there’s none to be had.”

And with that, he turned on his heel and walked out of Shelly’s office.

Leaving me feeling like I’d just gone ten rounds with Bob McClatchy.

Chapter Eight

Time went by as I sat in Shelly’s office chair. I don’t know how much. Maybe it wasn’t that long, but I spent a good part of it rubbing my temples like I’d picked up a stray migraine and taken it home. My stomach did feel better, but it was far from completely settled. My emotions were what had been jangled, though. The switcheroo pulled off by the Deputy Chief had affected me more than I had thought it would. Plus the idea that my friend Liam – the only loyal, kind Fayleene I’d ever met – was in terrible danger made my insides crawl.

And now Esteban had dropped a depth charge of insecurity into my lap. I didn’t need that on my plate. Not now, not ever. I mean, I wasn’t averse to dating. I liked men, I enjoyed sex, and I loved curling up with a warm, hard male body in bed.

Maybe that was part of my worry. If Esteban walked away from me, or I left for Andeluvia…who was there that I could see myself with, romantically or otherwise? I wasn’t about to start dating outside my species. Even if Magnus – when he’d been wearing Duke Kajari’s face – had sort of turned my head. But every other man I’d met so far had either been a) a part of the investigation into Benedict’s murder, b) a real dirtbag, or c) both.

I tamped all that down as I heard the tap of someone’s heels coming down the hallway. Whoever it was, she was whistling ‘Dixie’. I sighed to myself. Shelly meant well, but she wanted Harlequin-approved romances for her friends, and she was about a subtle as a Mac truck in her approach.

“Well, now,” she said, as she made her way past me and back to her seat. “When are you all going to send out the wedding invites?”

“Shelly!”

“Just kidding with you, hon.”

“Well, as it happens, Alanzo and I aren’t going out for a while.”

“What? Why not?”

“It’s a couple of things,” I hedged. “The big one is…well, maybe this whole thing with McClatchy has me spooked.”

“Hmph.” She reached into one of her cabinets, came up with a second microwavable container of soup, and proceeded to nuke it. “Well, that’s understandable, I guess. You know, I hear tell that McClatchy’s got the heart of a little boy.”

“He does?”

“Yep. In a jar. On his desk.”

“That makes me feel oh-so-much better.” I rubbed my temples again until the microwave bleeped that it was done. “What is with him? Why does McClatchy always act like he’s got an IV pole jammed up his rear end?”

Shelly picked up the heated container and settled back in her seat. The now familiar scent of tomato-cream floated my way as she took a couple gulps of warm soup. When she spoke next, I almost missed what she said.

“It was better when he first got here,” she said quietly.

That made me pay attention. A bunch of questions leaped to mind, but I’d known Shelly since I’d come to the LAPD from Chicago and she’d been kind enough to show a new kid the ropes. And I knew that she’d make her point in due time, if I was patient enough to keep my mouth shut and my ears open.

“Maybe because he didn’t have the rank,” she went on. “Maybe he didn’t get bit by that bug everyone seems to get out here. The kind that makes you hunger for power. When I arrived here years before you showed up, Bob McClatchy was just a mid-level bureaucrat. A socially awkward, kind of pushy guy, but he really wanted to make good.

“He gravitated to me because we both supported the creation of a specialized forensics department. If the plans worked out, he’d be sure to get the lion’s share of the credit.” Shelly paused to take another sip before adding, “The irony of it is, neither of us foresaw that forensics would be moving out of the ‘Labs n’ Slabs’ wing and out to the crime site itself. Which is where specialists like you started to come in. But at the time, Bob came to me for advice. Even for stuff that wasn’t work related. For example, he used to ask me for horse-related information when he started dating this blonde bombshell of a woman, one who was part of the show-jumping circuit in Beverly Hills.”

I couldn’t help but interject. “Bob was dating someone…and came to you for information on the woman’s
horse?
”

“Sort of. He wanted stuff to talk about so he’d be able to impress her, not look quite so out-of-touch.”

“But…why’d he come to you?”

Shelly let out a soft laugh that made me think of sun-drenched peach orchards and warm pecan pie. “Because he knew something about me you don’t. Before I got into the medical examiner game, I used to be a big-animal vet. It’s not something I tell folks, because then I get a mess of questions that annoy me. Around here, people always want free veterinary advice on why their precious little kitty is acting neurotic, and I don’t do house pets.”

Suddenly my brain did one of its weird little
clicks
, and things began to snap into focus. I sat up, leaned to one side, and looked out into the hallway. It was empty. So I closed the door, took a breath, and then took an even bigger chance. My friend was a devout, Church-every-Sunday type of Christian, and I wasn’t sure how much she was going to believe. So I spoke slowly, cautiously, and hoped she didn’t think I was putting one over on her.

“Shelly, where I’ve been going…it’s really another world. It’s the one where…you know, my friend Galen is from.”

“You mean heaven,” she said, without a trace of irony or condescension.

“I’m not so sure you could call it heaven.”

She shrugged. “I’m willing to accept a lot more than you might think. But the way I figure it, Galen was some sort of spirit guide, some sort of angel. And that means that God’s placed the both of you on the path of some grander purpose.”

“I suppose…well, I can’t really argue that. Maybe there is some grander purpose, and I’m being tested right now. But this test, this problem? It’s tied to my friends, ones like Galen, and I’d really appreciate your expert opinion on something.”

A nod of agreement. “Okay, run it by me.”

“Earlier today, I saw a dead white-tailed deer.”

Shelly’s face took on a pained expression. “Oh, poor thing. Hit by a car?”

“Doubtful, at least where I saw it. The body was prone, legs tucked in. In fact, it looked peaceful, with no obvious signs of trauma. If it wasn’t for a few spots of ruffled hair, then I’d have guessed that this particular stag died in its sleep. I mean, it looks like it just stumbled and didn’t get up.”

“Could’ve just been old age. If it was a domesticated animal, anyway.”

“That’s what I thought, but then I looked at the stag’s left foreleg. The part where the knee would be on a human leg…it was extended sideways about a quarter-inch too far for it to be normal. Like the joint was too big to fit there. I suppose it’s possible that this particular animal possessed double-joints, something like that.”

A firm shake of the head. “Nope. Joint hypermobility is impossible in cervines. That extra give in a load-bearing part of the body would make it impossible for them to walk, let alone run when danger presented itself. What you saw there was a distal fracture or a full-on dislocation. That’s a very serious and ultimately fatal injury for that kind of animal. Sure as heck it wasn’t a peaceful death.”

“There’s more.”

“Go on, then. This is getting interesting.” She sat back in her chair, listening attentively.

“I’m not one-hundred percent sure of the time of death,” I confessed, “but the corpse was extremely fresh. This stag’s nose and lips were an abnormal shade of blue-black, and oil-slick shiny. As a matter of fact, I’d call it a shoe-polish kind of color.”

“Sure doesn’t sound natural to me.” Shelly steepled her fingers in thought for a moment. “We did see deer in the clinic from time to time…but a broken leg, with no sign of gunshot or fall-related trauma? That could mean a seizure. Brain dysfunction caused by parasites or the rabies virus, most likely. However, whenever we saw changes in the eye, lip, or nose tissues of a deer, it always meant that something was way out of balance in the animal’s body chemistry just prior to death.”

I all but pounced on that answer. “Could that mean poison?”

“It’s possible.” Shelly held up a hand before I went on. “It’s only one of many possibilities. To be sure, you’d have to get a tissue sample, maybe a blood sample to run through the mass spectrometer. Still, the whole idea of poison is just out-and-out ridiculous.”

“Why?”

“Because people who want to get rid of deer don’t go around slipping arsenic into their lettuce. Depending on the state, you could be looking at a hefty fine from the Fish and Game Department if you tried to poison a sport animal. ‘Sides, if you want deer out of your garden, at least back in Texas, you just get the boys to shoot them and be done with it.”

“That does make sense,” I admitted.

Shelly took one last swig from the soup container, and then tossed the empty into the trash next to mine. “But you got me tarred with more than a speck of curiosity now, Dayna. What makes this particular stag so important?”

“Because it’s starting to make me wonder about something.”

“That being?”

I gave her a hard look.

“It’s making me question whether a good friend of mine is being railroaded into doing something that’s going to kill him.”

Chapter Nine

My car’s tires let out a screech as I took the exit off of Los Feliz Boulevard and up towards my house. Mind no longer awhirl, but more convinced than ever than I had not one, but two appointments that I wasn’t looking forward to. I drove up the driveway next to the sad, brown excuse of a lawn that surrounded my place and pulled into the garage.

I forced myself to take a deep breath as I watched the automatic door roll down into place. Had to remind myself that I was a damned
crime scene analyst
. I was supposed to make judgments based on hard evidence and nothing else.

And yet…

I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong with how everything was turning out in Andeluvia since the Protector of the Forest had died. I got out and headed to my room so I could swap out the business attire for some comfortable dress slacks, a new top, and some flatter shoes. If I had to speak to King Fitzwilliam, I wasn’t going to fool him into thinking that I was a well-heeled noblewoman. As a matter of fact, I got away with breaking a lot of the dress codes in the kingdom, simply because my clothes screamed ‘woman from another world’. And yes, the flats rocked no one’s world. But I wasn’t about to go for a spin in my pumps, not when a lot of Andeluvia paved things in uneven cobblestone.

It took just a couple of minutes for me to get ready. I took hold of Galen’s medallion and made ready to use the second of its four charges. Then thought about the long, drafty room where I’d first met Duke Kajari and the assorted nobility of what had been Benedict’s kingdom. I envisioned the vaulted ceiling, the red-and-green wall tapestries, and the deep-set windows. Thought about the dark wooden table at its center, and how the edges shone with fleur-de-lis of gold leaf.

A squeeze of the medallion, and everything vanished in a swirl of white light. The now familiar ozone stench, which defied my best attempts to block it out of mind. Followed by a jolt as I landed on the hard stone floor. I reeled like I’d had one too many Mai Tais before noon had rolled around.

“Be at ease, Dayna,” came Galen’s voice, as his strong, warm hand grabbed my arm to help steady me. “I’m here to support you, as best I am able.”

I waited a second or two for my head to clear. Galen looked down at me with kind concern. As usual, he was the rock in this magical world that I could count on. But I hadn’t missed that last phrase he’d spoken – and the disappointed tone in his voice.

“As best you’re able?” I asked. “That doesn’t sound promising.”

He gestured angrily at a tumble of books laid out in a heap on the nearby table. One of the centaur’s forehooves clacked in annoyed emphasis on the floor as he spoke.

“If there is one thing I have steadfastly admired about the human kingdoms, it is that they treat their knowledge properly. Binding them in books, storing them safely in libraries. And Benedict’s realm – pardon, Fitzwilliam’s realm – has always had the most complete, extensive records of anyplace in my world.”

“I’m guessing that we didn’t come up with much about our Fayleene’s dragon?”

“You misunderstand,” Galen corrected me. “It’s not that I came up with inadequate information. I came up with nothing,
nothing
at all about this ‘Sirrahon’! And that does not make sense, Dayna. Every dragon that ever lived is recorded in text. In the records of Andeluvia’s military, as a monster that had to be driven off, subdued, or killed. It is enough to drive a scholar insane.”

“All right,” I admitted, and put my palms down on the long table, staring at the tumbled pile of books like I could will them to tell me something new. “I feel like we just got the wind knocked out of our sails here. There has to be a reason that this dragon’s not in the texts. Perhaps it simply hasn’t ever attacked this kingdom before, so no one has known about it.”

“Unlikely. You recall, of course, the two dragons that we encountered in the Fayleene woods?”

A snort escaped my nostrils. “I’m not likely to forget that particular ‘encounter’, as you so eloquently put it.”

“Those two were mere striplings, at most no more than twenty or thirty years old. As dragons mature and grow older, they simply grow bigger. Their appetite, their need and raw ability for wanton destruction – all scale up immeasurably as the years pile on.”

I stared at him. “How old – and how big – do these reptiles get?”

“That brings us to the nub of the matter. No one really knows how long dragons live, or how big they might get. The oldest Andeluvian histories go back to the founding of this kingdom, more than seven centuries ago. Several decades after that, the entire Andeluvian army declared war. Not on a fellow nation, but an ancient dragon named Balaur the Black. According to legend, the dragon in question had been around for close to a millennia, and could ‘thrash giant ironwood trees to ribbons’.”

This discussion definitely wasn’t giving me the warm and fuzzies, that much was sure.

“Furthermore,” Galen continued, “despite roasting, crushing, or disemboweling half of Andeluvia’s knights, the beast was brought down. Balaur was measured, and was said to be as long as ‘the royal share of a furlong’, which is a rather intimidating measurement.”

I had to do a little mental juggling to keep up, based on my studies of Fitzwilliam’s realm over the last couple of weeks. An Andeluvian ‘furlong’ was around one hundred and sixty yards. The ‘royal share’ was a poetic reference to the base tax rate everyone paid to the king, which was a fifth of any earned sum of money. So a fifth of a furlong came out to thirty-two yards, which in turn meant…

My stomach did a little flip-flop over the number that popped into my head. Balaur would have been around one-hundred feet long. That equaled the length of three double-decker busses, or five fully grown Great White sharks. My brain refused to really consider that as an accurate number. In my world, gravity put a definite limit on a land-based creature’s size. That was the reason elephants topped out where they did.

“Galen…didn’t the Fayleene call Sirrahon an ‘ancient’ stone dragon?”

He face took on a dour expression. “I’m afraid that they did.”

I turned away from the table and began to pace. “Then this dragon could be serious trouble. Do we have any news from Liam, or Shaw?”

“The Heir to the Protector has sent word that he’s on his way with news of the dragon’s current locale. Shaw sent me a similar message. If their estimates are correct, they should both be here within the next hour.”

“That’s something, then.”

“Perhaps. Or perhaps not.” Galen studied me curiously. “Given how the odds in our favor appear to be diminishing with astonishing rapidity, should we not go to King Fitzwilliam and ask for this boon you spoke of earlier?”

That stopped me in mid-pace. I bit my lip as I considered the distasteful option ahead of me. I didn’t like this from the start, and it only got worse. As far as I knew, the Fayleene weren’t a major power like Fitzwilliam’s realm or the Centaur Kingdom. So if power wasn’t the motive, who would have a vendetta against Liam? Specifically, who would hold a need for vengeance that was so intense, so all-consuming, that they would murder the Protector of the Forest in order to put Liam in danger?

My mind kept leading me back to one possibility. That it was one of the people who had benefited from the Good King Benedict’s murder. And of those, the main ones had been put into the palace dungeon. Could one of them be issuing orders from their cell? Or could one of their followers be on the loose?

Either way, it sent prickles down my back. And it made what I was going to ask even more gut-churning difficult. But Galen deserved an answer.

“Yes, we’ll go speak to the King,” I stated. “As court wizard, would you mind conveying me into his presence? I think your word might have more weight than mine.”

The centaur bowed modestly, but I suspected that he beamed a little inside at the compliment. He led the way at his high-stepping trot, only ducking slightly as we went through a doorway’s narrow pointed arch. Galen had been originally sent to the Good King Benedict’s court as a gesture of goodwill and peace. Given his evident magical talent and even-tempered nature, he’d been promptly appointed to the position of court wizard by Benedict himself.

This trusted position allowed us to pass by the red and black suited guards and enter the throne room without too much of a challenge. The chamber was huge, framed by a series of ice blue marble-lined alcoves. Each alcove held a skinny window of stained glass which let in lots of light and a rainbow of bright colors.

All of which provided an interesting contrast to the man who sat upon the throne.

No one could doubt that the Good King Benedict’s genes had been successfully passed on. Fitzwilliam had a carbon copy of his father’s aquiline nose, high-domed forehead, and a mane of shoulder-length blond hair salted at the temples with a dash of white. His clean-shaven lantern jaw gave his face a drawn appearance, but it served to frame a masculine mouth that could twitch at one end into a catlike grin.

He wore a loose-bodied gray robe trimmed with fur from some silvery-pelted animal and studded with freshwater pearls. A heavy gold belt wrapped securely about his waist. The silhouette of a rampant griffin had been stamped on the buckle. The same design was repeated at the center of the golden circlet he wore at his brow.

Beneath the crown, Fitzwilliam’s tired gray eyes roamed back and forth without focusing on much of anything. His lack of interest, wandering gaze, and slouchy position on the seat of power all conveyed the sense that the monarch was bored out of his skull.

Oblivious to that fact, the two elderly gentlemen standing below the throne’s dais continued to drone on at intervals from a set of scrolls. They looked important and slightly silly at the same time. The two were dressed in fine linen, while each wore a cap that looked like it came from the Mad Hatter’s reject pile. But their droning was cut short as Fitzwilliam spotted us, sat bolt upright, and cleared his throat.

“Ambassadors, we must cut the diplomatic niceties short for the day,” he said, in a clear, commanding tone. “There are urgent matters of the state which the court wizard must bring to my attention. We shall pick this up tomorrow, perhaps.”

The two men shot a disapproving glance at Galen and a puzzled one at me. But instead of objecting, they thought better of it and bowed, walking backwards out of the room. Fitzwilliam got up, put his crown aside on a velvet pillow set on a pedastal next to the throne, and gave a stretch. A small
pop
sounded from the small of his back, and he sighed contentedly.

“Thank the makers of our world that you arrived, Galen,” he quipped. “If I had to listen to one more article on our ‘favorable agreements of trade’, I would have chosen to fall belly-first upon the point of my broadsword.”

“The duties of the Crown can lie full upon the brow, your Majesty,” Galen said sympathetically.

“Full and monotonously. How on earth did my father put up with this?”

“Heavy drinking, for the most part, sire.”

Fitzwilliam let out a laugh at that. I found myself relaxing a little. The affable person I’d met at the coronation seemed to be the real man, from what I could tell. The king then shifted his attention to me, and I felt his appraising and rather forward male gaze taking in the measure of my stance as well as my bust size.

“Well, Lady Chrissie, you appear as fair as a delicate flower.” Fitzwilliam stepped forward, took my hand, and then raised it to his lips for a kiss. “Thank you for rescuing me from the rigors of diplomacy.”

I wasn’t all that keen on being called ‘Lady’ anything, let alone a delicate flower. But it was enough for me to grit my teeth and give the ghost of a curtsey in response. Galen had schooled me in the basics of court etiquette, so I could no longer claim ignorance on how to behave around nobility. Plus, I didn’t want to start annoying the man who might just become my boss.

“Sire,” I said, and damn if that didn’t sound weird coming from my lips, “maybe I don’t understand. If the ambassadors bore you, why not delegate their meeting to some Duke or Earl who’s got nothing better to do for the morning?”

A chuckle. “Alas, that would not be respectful, in this case. These two fine fellows come from the seaside kingdom of Kescar, the realm which lost their ambassador in the same incident where my father met his end.”

I nodded in understanding. Many forgot that when King Benedict and his friend Duke Kajari were slain, so was this third, Kescarian man. Fitzwilliam was doing his best to smooth over what had to have been a major diplomatic snafu.