I nodded, impulsively gathering her in my arms. She rested her head on my shoulder, weeping, and the sound of her crying was the sound of her heart breaking.
Sandy motioned for me to stay where I was and headed out into the hall.
A few minutes later, she was back, carrying a cup of steaming tea as Primrose’s tears slowed. Primrose sat back and wiped her eyes with the handkerchief, then blew her nose. Sandy handed her the tea, cadging a grateful smile out of her.
“I can’t thank you enough for your visit. My Oak, he’s hurting so bad that he won’t talk about it. So I’ve spent the past twenty-four hours keeping my mouth shut, but it’s so hard. I felt like I was about to explode.” She dabbed her eyes again, then took a sip of the tea. “Thank you. I feel so lost. I’m not sure what to do next.”
Sandy scooched in on the other side. She picked up a shawl that was draped over the back of the love seat and draped it around Primrose’s shoulders. “I’m going to send my assistant over. His name is Alex and he can help you sort out what to do next. He’ll help you make arrangements for the service and so forth. Will that be all right?”
Primrose nodded, her eyes welling up again. “I can’t thank you enough. Oak will come around. I think he feels he failed them both. If we can only find Lavender and make sure she’s all right, that will help.”
“I’ll call you later this week and we’ll talk over a time for the spell.” I took down her number, storing it in my phone. Then Sandy and I left, after a round of hugs. Primrose waved at us from the door, a wistful look on her face.
As we slid back into the car, I gave one last look at the house. “I know what losing Tom was like for me. I can’t imagine losing a child. Two, actually. I hope to hell we find Lavender alive and well, or the pain is going to be too much for that woman.”
“I suspect Primrose is more resilient than you think. She just needs to be able to express her grief. It’s keeping it bottled inside that does the damage. I hope for her sake, her husband comes around to facing his loss. Grief can turn into a mean bitterness when ignored.” Sandy glanced at me. “We’ve done all we can here today, and I suspect we helped a lot more than you might think. Now, let’s talk about Rachel. I told you I had an idea.”
“Yeah, of finding her and staking her. If what Delia told me is true, then that would make Essie mighty happy.”
“It would make you happy too, don’t deny it.”
I grinned. Then, sobering, I said, “How can I, though? What do you think? You’ve lived on Bedlam a lot longer than I have. Why do you think Linda wouldn’t talk to Delia? Do you really think Essie might be looking at staging a coup and overthrowing the coven’s rule? And, by the way, where are we going next?”
“Why don’t we drive through the Bouncing Goats Espresso Shack and get a mocha while we talk?” She grinned at me. “Don’t tell me you’re going to pass up free caffeine?”
I snickered. “Of course not. Bouncing Goats it is.”
As we pulled into line, I told Sandy about the text. “What’s Durholm Hall? I don’t think I remember it from when I lived here last.”
Sandy stared at the screen. “Crap. That’s where I suspect Rachel might be hanging out. Durholm Hall was a private estate at first. The Durholm family owned it—well, the last of the Durholm family. Sheila Durholm. She was a dryad. The house is like a massive ode to nature with a tree growing right through the center. The entire mansion was built around it. But Sheila developed root cancer and she willed the house to the Arborview Society.”
The Arborview Society was a fraternal order of woodland-oriented Otherkin. Dryads, centaurs, nymphs, earth witches, anybody whose focus was on the preservation of nature and the practice of earth and water magic was welcome. They were a generally peaceful but powerful group who kept to themselves. Yet their lobbying powers in Congress were a silent, quiet force behind the scenes. They had affected a number of human measures regarding the forest industry, but managed to work so far under the covers that practically nobody outside of Bedlam—at least nobody in the human world—had heard of them.
“Why would she be there? A vampire? You think they’d hide her?”
“No, I don’t. But the mansion has a number of tunnels beneath it. The perfect place for a vampire who’s rogue to hang out. Nobody lives there. It’s a day-use facility for their organization. Generally, they roll up the sidewalk at sunset and seldom start before sunrise from what I understand. Sheila died three years ago and I doubt if the Society has explored even half of what’s hidden below that old mansion.”
“What made you think of it? What made you think that Rachel might be hiding there?” I edged up toward the speaker. “What do you want?”
“Triple-shot large mocha with a dusting of cinnamon.”
I ordered that, and a quad-shot white chocolate peppermint mocha for me. As we rounded the corner toward the service window, I started to pull out my card, but Sandy shoved a twenty my way.
“Let me pay today. Tell her to keep the change. It’s the holiday season. She can’t make all that much money.”
“Okay, but I buy the next one.” I eased into place at the window, handing the barista the twenty. As I accepted the drinks and handed them over to Sandy, she nestled them into the cup holders. Then I pulled into an open space in the parking lot next to the mini-mall adjacent to the coffee shop.
Sandy yelped as she burned her tongue on the hot drink, leaving a mustache of white foam on her lip. “Yowch. You’d think I’d learn to be patient one of these days.”
“Yeah, well, you’d think we’d both learn that finding an unopened bottle of tequila doesn’t mean we have to make a pitcher of margaritas and then drink them down in one sitting. But we know that’s not going to happen. We’re both unbalanced as hell and we probably always will be.” I scrunched up my nose at her. “So now, tell me why you thought of Durholm Hall.”
“Well, I was trying to think of all the best places on the island for a vampire to hide out. I realized there are far more than I could possibly come up with, so I began correlating what we knew. Rachel, as much as she’s a vampire, doesn’t seem the type to want to hide out with the worms and bugs in a cave. She probably wants to be near your house, given the object of her obsession is there. And did you forget? Aegis and the band are playing at a benefit for the Arborview Society for New Year’s—they’ll be right there in the hall.”
I blinked. How had that slipped my mind? “I’ve been so focused on the bed and breakfast that I haven’t paid much attention to his band schedule. If she’s there, it means easy access.”
“There’s more. I decided to do a little digging, since I had some free time this morning. I searched for Rachel on Wyrdwix.”
Wyrdwix was a Pretcom-oriented search engine. While it rivaled the other big ones, it also gave higher priority to the Pretcom and nature and focused on information not readily available to humans. Most of the humans hadn’t even caught on that it existed, though a few diehard ghost-busting types had, and word was slowly leaking out.
“What did you find?”
“Rachel tried to buy Durholm Hall seven years ago. There was a scuffle between her and Sheila Durholm that resulted in Rachel being ousted from Bedlam. Apparently, Sheila threatened to stake her if she didn’t leave well enough alone, and Lena ordered Rachel to leave the island. Rachel didn’t belong to Lena’s court, of course, but she acquiesced.”
“Do you think Essie knows about that?”
“I don’t know, but Rachel isn’t supposed to even be here, given nobody lifted Lena’s sanctions against her. I think Linda has to know this. She and Lena were actually friends.”
“So, if Rachel wanted to buy Durholm Hall, there had to be a reason. I mean, there are a lot of estates on the island and some of them have been sitting empty for a few decades. Why not buy one of the other ones if she couldn’t buy Durholm?”
Sandy consulted her notes. “I think I can answer that. Durholm Hall is built ove
r a vortex—a land vortex. That’s why the Arborview Society was so grateful that Sheila willed it to them. The earth energy there is strong. But it also acts as a gateway, from the bits and pieces of information that I found. There are rumors of something buried in the tunnels. A powerful artifact or gem, perhaps. I don’t know. But there’s something down there that amplifies power. Rachel is all about power.”
That made sense to me. “Maybe it’s something that would help her fight Essie for control. If Rachel is looking to oust the vampire queen and take her place, she’s going to need help. Essie is too strong, otherwise. And Essie has a small army behind her. Not just the members of her nest here, but the members of her court.”
“Do you think that they might be working together?” Sandy’s question jolted me out of my thoughts.
“Why do you say that?”
“Consider this: Essie tells us that Rachel is out for control. The coven’s concerned enough that we turn our attention in Rachel’s direction. Rachel, of course, stirs up trouble and we take her out. That leaves Essie free to move, to start her revolt while everybody’s focused on Rachel.”
I thought about it for a moment, but it didn’t track. “Unless Essie’s the best damned actress there is, that doesn’t track to me. But the idea that Rachel could be searching for something buried below Durholm Hall makes sense. I wish I’d asked Aegis more about her last night.”
“Well, do you want to go out to the hall?” Sandy’s tone was on the verge of a dare.
I thought about it for a moment. “Don’t you think that members of the Arborview Society are there right now? It’s only 1:00 p.m.”
“No, they’re closed for the holidays except for a Solstice bash and a New Year’s Eve party. We can sneak around the grounds and have a look, if nothing else.”
Laughing, I capitulated. “Remember, we have an Esbat meeting tonight that we need to get ready for.” I glanced at the clock. “We’ll go, but we have to leave there by four o’clock at the latest. If Rachel is hiding out, I don’t want to be around when she wakes up. Sunset falls at 4:18 today.”
“You know to the exact moment, huh?” Sandy let out a snort.
“Hey, I like to keep tabs on my boyfriend’s schedule.”
“Let’s get a move on, then. You dressed warm enough for this?”
I nodded. “Yeah, unfortunately I am. You know, the last time I went along with one of your bright ideas, I bought the house.”
Sandy laughed as she leaned back in her seat. “See? I know what I’m doing. Besides, you know our pact.”
“By heart. I still think we’re a couple of fools.” But I joined in as she started to sing. We had thought up the chant centuries before when we had sealed our friendship in a blood-bound oath, binding ourselves as sisters of the heart.
Out of the frying pan, into the fire.
To the adventure, we always aspire.
Though the flames may be harsh and the smoke may be thick,
Whatever may come, together we stick.
Still singing, I put the car into gear and we headed toward Durholm Hall. Probably to our deaths, I thought, but hey, at least we’d be together.
Chapter 10
BEDLAM ISLAND WAS heavily wooded. The town proper was centralized and most of the inhabitants lived on the outskirts. Durholm Hall was further out than my house, along Razor’s Edge Road, a narrow two-lane road bordered on both sides by deep ravines filled with massive ferns, tall fir and cedar that reached for the sky, and birch and madrona trees. Brambles grew thick in the ravines and traversing through them could be an adventure in piercing all sorts of body parts you never considered piercing.
The road was of a fairly steep grade—a good seven to eight percent, uphill all the way. Though the two solitary snowplows the city of Bedlam owned got a good workout during the winter, Razor’s Edge Road was one of the last to be plowed. It had been scraped clean a few days back, but the latest buildup of snow had left a thick covering of compacted ice and frozen snow on the asphalt, making the drive slick and dangerous.
“How on earth does the Arborview Society come out here every day to open up their offices? Or do they?” I gripped the steering wheel, leaning forward to make certain I could see clearly. The extra caffeine in my system wasn’t hurting matters any, either. I had snow tires on my car, but it still felt like the tires weren’t fully gripping the road.
“They don’t. Except for a skeleton staff a couple days a week, they close down right before Thanksgiving and open up again in mid-January.” Sandy stared out the side window. “You might want to pull toward the center a bit. You’re getting awfully close to the edge of the ravine over here.”
“That’s because this damned road is a narrow-ass strip that should probably be one-way, but they decided to try to make two lanes out of it. I can scrunch over a little more but if anybody on the way down took one of these S-curves too quickly, we’d be toast if we get any farther toward the center line.” I eased over another foot, but that was the best I could do. “I’m going twenty miles an hour right now.”
“And you’re doing just fine. At least we don’t have that far to go. It’s only about fifteen minutes away from your place.”
“Makes me glad I didn’t choose to buy farther out. My house is plenty rural, thank you.” I let out a short breath. “So, do you happen to know anything about the layout of this place? How big is it? You said there are tunnels below it?”
“Tunnels, yes—they’re sealed brick, I gather. No dirt walls. I don’t exactly know why but they’re there. They can’t be terribly extensive, though, or the house would cave in on top of them. The land up here isn’t all that stable and one good quake could probably send a wall of mud and debris sliding down the ravines. Any house built near the edge of one would go right along with it.”
“Is the land gated?”
“Gated, yes, but not to keep the public out. One of the purposes of the Arborview Society is to promote an understanding among the woodland Fae and others. They’re working to protect the environment, so they make themselves as accessible as they can to humans and Pretcom alike. Because you know as well as I do that the werewolves and some of the other shifters aren’t nearly as eco-conscious as witches and Fae.”
She was right. The preternatural community had its problems, and one of them was an inborn tendency to cling to one’s own kind. The werewolves and a few of the other shifters tended to be more human in nature than the rest of us. They had learned to walk among human society for years before we all just came out of the broom closet, so to speak.
When the clock turned over to the year 2000, the Otherkin slipped out of the shadows. The next couple years had been rocky, with a number of skirmishes, but society had finally quieted down. The hate groups were still around, but for the most part they were more afraid of us than we were of them. They kept their rhetoric on the verbal side rather than putting it into action. The few times the backlash reached violence, the Otherkin had made certain to exhibit exactly what we were capable of. There would be no repeat of the Spanish Inquisition, no government-sanctioned witch hunters. That was a given—not up for debate.
But a subset of humans preferred some of the Otherkin over the rest because they seemed most familiar. The good old boys tended to like the werewolves. The feminists liked the witches. Everybody both gravitated to—and feared—the Fae. And so on.
Sandy pulled out her phone and consulted her notes. “Durholm Hall is about the size of your place, in terms of the house. But it sits on fifteen acres, so there’s a lot of land there and most of it is heavily wooded. There’s a grove in the woods somewhere, about an acre in size, that they use for public rituals and ceremonies. I think they must have private areas that are cordoned off, too, but that’s my own speculation.”
“I doubt if we can cover the entire area—not thoroughly—before four o’clock, but we should be able to scope out at least part of it. What are we looking for?”
�
�Your guess is as good as mine. Anything that seems odd or out of the ordinary. Anything that seems misplaced.” She glanced at me, then lifted her backpack that she had brought along. “I know you’re going to yell at me, but I brought along a few things.”
“You didn’t.” I had asked her time and again not to bring any wooden stakes to the house, in consideration of Aegis’s feelings. Sandy tended to go around armed with whatever she could find that would fit in a tote bag. She owned a pearl-handled gun, though our magic was stronger than most bullets—stronger, though maybe not as lethal, usually. Bullets had one use: to shoot things and/or people. Magic could be targeted in a number of directions. Sandy also carried mace, pepper spray, brass knuckles, and a switchblade. I had to hand it to her—she lived by the motto, “Be prepared.”
“Yes, I did. I brought four stakes in case we find more vampires than we bargained for. And given the text you received, that’s a distinct possibility. We can’t just sit back and wait, Maddy. The more we find out, the more it sounds like we’re at the tip of the iceberg, the edge of a vampire war. If Essie or Rachel intend to take over Bedlam, it doesn’t matter which one it is. We’re all in trouble.”
She had a point. I just didn’t want to think about it, but since I had somehow been dropkicked squarely in the center of this altercation, I had better face it. “Fine. We’re going vampire hunting. I just hope we find them before they realize we’re tracking them down.”
“Me too,” Sandy said. “Me too.”
THE GATE AT Durholm Hall was closed, but unlocked. I stopped while Sandy jumped out from the car and waded through the snow to open it up. She waited until I pulled through, then closed it behind us. No use in drawing attention to the fact that we were here. The drive to the house only took a couple of moments, but the snow was fresh and unmarked by tire tracks other than ours. We were the only ones who had come through today, as far as I could tell.
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