Unfallen Dead (20 page)

Charles Street wound around the western base of Beacon Hill, an area known as the Flat. It was the retail shopping district for the well-heeled, not so impressive an address as Briallen’s on Louisburg Square , but most Bostonians would have a hard time making the rent there, never mind owning an apartment.

“Thanks for arranging the interview. I’m surprised you wanted to come,” I said.

Keeva paused at the window of an antique store. “I was getting stir-crazy. I made macBain let me go.”

“Made him? I wasn’t aware anyone could make Dylan do anything.”

She smiled at me. “I discovered your Number One Fan hates memos. I’ve been burying him in them. I think he wanted a break.”

For a moment, it felt like old times, Keeva and I actually relaxing around each other. We did that back when we were partners. Which was not to say we let down our guards, but we could be social on occasion. On Pinckney Street, Murdock pulled up in front of the Ardman townhouse and met us at the door.

“I thought I was going to be late,” he said.

Keeva gave him a curt nod. Their polite animosity reflected the reality of their competing agencies. “Let me take it from here, gentlemen. Rosavear knows me.”

A young human-normal woman answered the doorbell. Most fey preferred other fey clans to act as servants, old habits from the days when servant was a code phrase for conquered slave. “Guild Director Keeva macNeve and guests. Lady Ardman should be expecting us,” Keeva said.

She grasped Keeva’s hand. “Sophie Wells, pleased to meet you, Director macNeve. These are the gentlemen from the police department?”

Keeva introduced us, and Wells shook hands with sincere attention before stepping back to let us in. The Ardman house was grand yet small-scale. Old movies shot on soundstages gave people the impression Boston brownstones were enormous. Most were smaller inside than the run-of-the-mill Mc-Mansions in the suburbs these days. A small foyer paved in black-and-white stone tiles opened onto a comfortable, tasteful parlor decorated in ochre and maroon.

Wells gestured to the room. “Please have a seat. I’ll let Lady Ardman know you’re here.”

Keeva and I sat on opposite ends of the couch while Murdock wandered to the window. Despite my typical experience with fey royalty, Lady Ardman appeared without the usual cooling-our-heels waiting time. She was a small woman, strongly built with a blunt attractiveness. Her long, narrow wings glowed a faint indigo, darkening to almost black at their sharp tips. Keeva had dropped the glamour hiding her wings when we entered the house, and they undulated behind her in soft gold-and-white folds. Inverni fairies tended to be smaller than their Danann cousins, but they still packed a punch in the essence department. They made no bones about reminding each other.

Keeva and I stood. I didn’t know many Inverni, so I took the opportunity to get a decent imprint of the species essence, especially after my strange experience in the alley during my run. As I shook her hand, her essence felt odd, not at all Danann but powerful in its own right. Species essence resonated similarly from person to person. She didn’t feel like my alley attacker. My attacker’s essence was a shadow of Ardman’s.

“I’m sorry to bother you, Rose, but these detectives were hoping you might help them with a case,” Keeva said as the three of us took seats. Murdock remained attentive beside an armchair.

“You’re no trouble, Keeva,” Ardman said, her smile a bright flash of white.

“It’s about the Viten case.”

And the smile disappeared. “I see. What could possibly have happened after all these years?”

I took that as my cue. “Lady Ardman, two people have been found murdered recently. They had a history with each other and the Viten case. We’re concerned their deaths might be related to it. My first question is have you noticed anything out of the ordinary lately that might concern you?”

Ardman straightened in her seat as her wings darkened. “Murder? Am I in danger?”

Keeva shot me an annoyed look. “Mr. Grey is asking as a precaution, Rose.”

She didn’t seem to believe her. “I haven’t noticed anything. Is there something I should be looking for?”

I softened my apparently insensitive tone. “I was hoping you could tell us. Our files do not show any living associates for Viten. We were wondering if your memory was different.”

“Lionel didn’t have any friends that I knew of, if that’s what you’re asking,” she said.

“Lionel?” Murdock asked.

Ardman looked at him as if she were only now realizing he was in the room. “That’s the name he used with me. I never knew him by his other names.” She paused, looking at Murdock with an uncomfortable expression. She approached him and lifted her hand to his face. “May I?”

Murdock looked down at the hand and nodded. Ardman touched his cheek. After a moment, she regained her composure and withdrew to her chair. “Have you walked the Ways, Mr. Murdock?”

Murdock glanced sharply at me. “She wants to know if you are fey,” I said.

He gave a tentative smile. “No, ma’am.”

Ardman considered him. “Are you sure? Perhaps you don’t remember. Your essence reminds me of the fey friends of old.”

Keeva cleared her throat. “Detective Murdock is human normal, Rose. He was involved in a fey event that disrupted his essence.”

Ardman looked about to say more but remained silent.

“Did you ever meet a woman named Rhonda Powell?” asked Murdock. A little out of left field, but the Powell murder obviously still bothered him.

Ardman stiffened. “It is rude to mention her to me, Detective Murdock. That affair was a private pain to me for years that I never wanted revealed. But to answer your question, no, I never met her. Lionel kept her in New York as far as I know.”

“You don’t know anyone else who might have an interest in your old case?” Murdock asked.

“Are you doubting my word, sir?” Ardman asked.

Keeva glared. “I think that’s enough, Detective Murdock. Lady Ardman has answered your question. Other than ensuring she feels safe, I believe we are finished, don’t you?”

Murdock didn’t react to her. “That’s fine. I just have one more question: Where were you last Thursday and the Tuesday before?”

The surprise on Keeva’s face made my day. Ardman laughed. “I supposed that is a polite way of asking me if I have an alibi on the days of these murders. I was here, Mr. Murdock. Both days. My staff’s loyalty does not extend to lying if you would like to verify that.”

Murdock nodded. “Thank you.”

“Thank you for your time, Rose,” said Keeva. Sophie Wells reappeared to let us out. As soon as the door closed behind us, Keeva whirled on Murdock. “That was way out of line, Detective.”

Murdock’s eyebrows went up. “What?”

“You don’t accuse royalty of murder, even if she is an Inverni,” she said.

I frowned. “Lay off, Keeva. He didn’t accuse her of anything. He was doing his job—even if she’s ‘an Inverni.’ What makes you think the Boston P.D. care whether she’s royalty or not?”

She narrowed her eyes at me. “You’re welcome for the help.” She launched herself into the sky with an angry buzz and disappeared over the roofline.

I shook my head as I watched her go. “It never lasts.”

I sat on a concrete block overlooking the fairy ring, waiting for Dylan. The trees on the hill had dropped their leaves in a thick carpet around the mushrooms. The air felt damp, cool, not cold. The fairy ring gave off its own warmth, a residual effect of its power. Gargoyles crouched among the trees, humming to themselves as they enjoyed the concentration of essence. They gathered around the fairy ring like an odd bunch of people watching the grass grow. I was curious why Dylan had asked me to meet him there instead of at a bar.

Despite the late hour, people milled outside the ring. Two Danann security agents roamed the perimeter, not actively preventing anyone from going near the ring but sending the message to behave. They ensured the mushrooms didn’t get damaged. Every year the city asked the Guild for security backup since it was better equipped to deal with drunk fey people who might, for instance, accidentally set things on fire with their minds. The Guild beefed up security on Samhain especially. Fey groups arrived with competing claims to the spot, fought over space, and trampled the ring as they attempted to perform their ceremonial rituals. The veil between worlds wouldn’t open, just as it had never opened since Convergence; people would be disappointed; everyone would go home grumpy. Except the here-born like me.

The here-born were fey who never knew Faerie or the ability to travel the Ways across realms. The Samhain celebrations have the odor of nostalgia for something we don’t remember or believe. Older generations may talk of speaking with the dead and seeing long-lost loved ones, but to the here-born, they’re all just stories like those of Santa Claus. Nice to know growing up, hard to swallow as an adult. We went through the prayers and the ceremonial fire-lightings, then hightailed it out on the town for Halloween parties with the human normals.

“Woolgathering?” Dylan asked as he came up behind me. He swung his long legs over the concrete bench.

I shrugged. “A little. I was just wondering if rituals mean anything to me.”

Dylan gazed across the fairy ring. “Everyone has rituals that mean something to them. You’re asking a larger question.”

I eyeballed him. “Do tell, O, psychic one.”

He kept his gaze ahead, but smiled. “You’re wondering if anything means enough to you to have a ritual for it.”

Dylan always seemed to understand what I was thinking before I did. Apparently, he still had the knack. “True enough. I’ve been ripped down to the point where everything I thought I wanted is kinda meaningless.”

Dylan swayed his feet in small arcs. “We used to want the same things. You’re not as sure of yourself as you used to be.”

I smiled ruefully. “Maybe not all the same things. Lots of things have changed about me. I’m going to go with ‘that’s a good thing’ for now.”

He seemed about to say something, but changed his mind and chuckled. “Yeah. I guess you have to. We have to. Everyone has to get through the day.”

I glanced at him. That sounded a little world-weary for Dylan, but I didn’t detect any hint of melancholy about him. He was happy with where and who he was. It showed in the set of his jaw and the relaxed way he held his shoulders. He may recognize flaws in himself, maybe even admit to them, but they didn’t bother him. They never had, for as long as I could remember. He was comfortable in his own skin in a way I didn’t know if I could be anymore.

We sat in companionable silence. “Why did you leave like that, Connor? After everything that happened, you up and moved to Boston without even discussing it.”

The question was ten years in the making. I tried to brave it out, so I didn’t look at him and tried to sound indifferent. “It was my career, my decision.”

He snorted. “I didn’t say you needed my permission. We were a team. A good one. After the
Pride Wind
, we could have written our own orders. I thought you’d at least ask my advice. Danu’s blood, you left a message on my answering machine and didn’t take my calls for a year before I gave up.”

I rubbed my face. “I didn’t want the responsibility.”

He frowned. “For what?”

I couldn’t look at him. I didn’t want to see the hurt. “You. I didn’t want to be responsible for you. That day on the ferry, when our essences merged, I felt what you felt. I didn’t want the responsibility of not hurting you. So I left.”

He shook his head. “Uh . . . thanks?”

My chest tightened with anger. I never wanted to have this conversation. Whether I was angry at myself for causing the situation or Dylan for pressing it, it meant facing up to yet another example of my bad behavior. I knew I had to if I wanted to get on with my life. I didn’t have to like it.

“What did you want to happen, Dylan? Have me tell you I didn’t feel the same way? Did you want to hear that? Could we have worked together after that? What would have happened if you took too many risks for me and died because of it? What kind of position is that to put me in?”

He shrugged and smiled. “The same one you’d be in anyway. When our essences merged, I felt what you felt, too, you know. The difference between us was that it confirmed what I already knew. I’m not stupid, Connor. I knew the score. The one thing I knew was that regardless, we would still do the right thing at the right time. That’s why we worked so well together. When that knife hit my chest, you threw yourself in front of that essence-bolt to protect me, and it had nothing to do with how you felt about me personally and everything to do with the man you are. Above everything else, I knew I could always respect and trust you. I thought you would do the same.”

I frowned. “What essence-bolt?”

He looked at me in disbelief. “The essence-bolt on the
Pride Wind
that hit you in the head. I thought it killed you.”

“Dylan, I don’t remember getting hit with an essence-bolt.”

His face turned pensive. “I’ll never forget it. You fell next to me. Everything but you faded to white. All I could see was you. The next thing I knew, you merged our essences and saved my life.”

I stared at my feet. I didn’t remember. My stomach felt sick. All this time, and Bergin Vize wasn’t the first time I’d lost my memory. Maybe the
Pride Wind
wasn’t the first time either. How the hell was I supposed to figure out the first time I didn’t remember something?

“Con?”

I shook myself out of my reverie. “I’m sorry, Dyl. That’s all I think I can say, and it doesn’t cover it. I should have trusted that you would have been okay about it.”

“You did, but, maybe not in the right way. I got over it. You. I would have either way. But, thanks. I needed to hear that,” he said.

“I’m an idiot. We could have been friends all this time.”

He shrugged. “We’re druids. Ten years is nothing.”

I didn’t want to get into my mortality fears, so I tried to lighten the mood. “Now that that’s out of the way, want to go get a beer?”

He hesitated, and I felt a smidge of guilt that he was thinking I was trampling on his feelings again. “Actually, I asked you here for your input on my current job.” He nodded to the fairy ring. “I was hoping with that hopped-up ability of yours, you could tell me what’s there.”