“Trolls are the ones who hide under bridges, right?”
“They historically prefer a hovel by the water. Some kind of dugout or shack under a bridge is not uncommon. But most of the trolls that I am familiar with have left that traditional lifestyle and blend in with human society.”
“So the ME isn’t going to find out that he has a tail or something?”
“That would be awkward! Physiologically, they are quite similar enough to humans that a basic autopsy will only find minor variations. As long as they don’t do a DNA test.”
“What is she going to think when she finds these minor variations?”
“People live with quite a range of mutations and differences in development. Sometimes they don’t even know that they had a misplaced organ or something that works differently than we would expect and it isn’t discovered until after they die. She’ll just put it down to abnormal development that had nothing to do with his death.”
“And can trolls be killed by poisonous snakes? They’re not immune?”
“I’ve never heard anything to that effect. You’d have to talk to someone like Hunter, who has made a study of other species.”
“So…” Reg tried to tie it all together and see the bigger picture. “A troll who is known to be a snake handler, someone who has been bitten by snakes before, is found in a graveyard, dead with a snakebite on his neck.”
Jessup nodded. “By a psychic who claims to have just stumbled over the body.”
Reg sighed. “It’s true, though. I didn’t have any idea who he was.”
“And why were you there? In the cemetery. It’s important, Reg. If I can’t get your full story, I’m going to be in trouble and so are you. If we need to… finesse it, then we can talk about that. But I have to have something to start with.”
Reg looked at Sarah to see what she thought. Sarah gave a one-shouldered shrug. “Do whatever you think is best.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Jessup looked at Reg, waiting for the explanation.
“I’ve been having… some issues.”
“Psychic stuff? Voices? What?”
“I have… missing memory. I can’t tell you what I witnessed or what I was thinking. Because I can’t remember any of it.”
“You remember something.”
“No.”
“You knew about the snakebite. How did you know about that if you don’t remember what happened in the cemetery?”
“You showed me a picture.”
“It didn’t show up in the picture.”
“Yes, it did. I don’t remember anything that happened from the time I left my house until you took me back to the police station. Everything that happened in between is gone.”
“You can’t remember it.”
“No.”
“Why wouldn’t you be able to remember it? You seemed perfectly fine at the time.” Jessup stopped and reconsidered this statement. “Well, pretty normal. You did seem a little… distant.”
Reg nodded.
“How long has this been going on?”
“Just for a few days.”
“Have you seen a doctor or something? I think I would want to know what was going on if it was me.”
“I’ve been trying to figure it out. I talked to… Sarah.”
“That’s it? That’s the sum total of your research?”
“That’s not any of your business. Now I’ve answered your question. You know why I can’t tell you anything.”
“But there has to be a reason. And if we can figure out what that is, maybe we can unwind what happened here.”
“I don’t know why I went there. I was looking for something, maybe. But what or why… I don’t know. I was just… driven there. That’s all I know.”
“What about your houseguest?”
“What about him?”
“Did you start having these memory blanks after he started staying with you?”
“No. I was having trouble before he showed up.”
“Does he have psychic abilities?”
“I don’t know.” Reg thought about Etienne’s interactions with Starlight. “Maybe some. Like, with animals. I don’t think he communicates with humans telepathically. I don’t see how he could have had any influence on me.”
“Does he have anything to do with snakes? If he can communicate with them telepathically, then maybe he sent the snake to bite Nagendra.”
“He’s not that kind of person. He wouldn’t do something like that. He’s peaceful.”
“What is he?”
“He’s human.” Reg didn’t look at Sarah. She didn’t want Sarah to give it away. Etienne had said that he was human, that the Bigfoots considered themselves to fall into that category. So even if he weren’t Homo sapiens, Reg at least wasn’t lying about him being human. “A friend.”
“Can I meet him?”
“No. He’s kind of a hermit. He doesn’t like being around other people. But he had to come here for some family business. So he’s staying with me until he goes back home.”
“What’s his name?”
“Etienne,” Reg said after a moment of consideration. “And I don’t know what last name he uses.” He could use Legrande like James did, but Reg suspected that he didn’t use a last name at all. He lived by himself in the woods. He didn’t associate with other people, other than the skinwalker who did the mail runs for him. What use would he have for a last name? He must have put something on his letters to Ilka, and must have introduced himself to her and her family somehow. But it might have been through a complex genealogy rather than a last name.
”He doesn’t live around here?”
“No.”
“Does he have a criminal background?”
Reg laughed. “I don’t think so. I never asked him.”
“This isn’t some con that you’ve worked for before? Are you sheltering him from the police?”
“No. He just doesn’t want to have to deal with other people.”
“What is it he’s here for?”
“What does that matter?”
“I want to know how it connects up. If it does.”
“It doesn’t.”
“What is his business here?”
“Meeting his bride.”
“Oh.” Jessup looked taken aback. “Okay. Yeah, I’m not sure how that would have anything to do with this business unless she’s the daughter of the troll.”
“No, she’s not. I told you, he’s human. Not troll. He’s not connected. This all started before he showed up.”
Jessup stared off into the distance, probably trying to go through everything she already knew to see if there were anything else she should be asking Reg.
“You’re not aware of anyone in town that has anything to do with snakes?”
Forst had chased away the snake in the back yard. He hadn’t had anything to do with it being there in the first place. Not that Reg could figure out, anyway. Etienne hadn’t had anything to do with the shoelace Reg had said looked like a snake.
“I don’t know anyone who handles snakes or even has a pet snake.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Eventually, Jessup went on her way. Reg looked at Sarah, rolling her eyes. “Well… that was interesting.”
“You didn’t tell her anything about having seen a snake here.”
“No, I didn’t see how that could help her. There are snakes all over the place. It isn’t like they’re going to go hunting them down and bringing in every snake in the area to see if it is the one that bit this… Nagendra. I don’t see any connection between seeing a snake here and a troll being bitten by one somewhere else.”
“Don’t you?”
“Coincidences do happen.”
“Yes, but when magic or other paranormal forces are involved… coincidences may flag spells and sorcery.”
“Why would anyone put a spell on a snake? If you wanted to kill someone, there have to be more efficient ways.”
“Maybe Nage
ndra was trying to perform a spell in the cemetery. Maybe his snake turned on him. He was known to be a snake handler, so it’s not surprising that a snake was near him before he died. It was more likely to be his own snake than one that just happened to wander by.”
A picture flashed through Reg’s mind of a snake wandering along in the cemetery, swaying from side to side, just casually on a slither through the grass. She snickered at the picture.
The door to the cottage opened a crack. Reg looked toward it. “Etienne?”
“Is she gone?”
Reg nodded. “Just me and Sarah here.”
He opened the door a few inches. “Breakfast is ready. If you talk for much longer, it will get cold.”
“Sorry. I’ll come eat. Sarah, would you like to stay and have a bite?”
“I’ve already had my breakfast today. I’d better not start doubling up.” Sarah patted her slightly thick middle. “Got to keep in shape for the young men, you know.”
Reg laughed and went back into her cottage to join Etienne. They sat down at the table as they had for stew the night before, taking the same chairs as if it were already an established routine. Reg watched Etienne spoon vegetables from the skillet onto his large plate, then took it from him and put a few on her plate. Mostly the potatoes and carrots. She wasn’t really a vegetable person, but Etienne’s meals had always been delicious, so she was willing to try a little. If she didn’t want it, she could just tell him that she wasn’t used to eating breakfast, which was true. She rarely had anything but coffee before noon.
She speared a potato and put it into her mouth. It was salty and savory, with the sweetness of caramelized onions. Reg chewed slowly, enjoying it. She wasn’t sure how he had gotten it crisp on the outside and soft in the middle. She remembered a number of failed dishes from when she was younger, trying to take her turn cooking for the family at a foster home or attempting to be domestic once she had moved out and had her own apartment from time to time. Her potatoes had ended up either burned on the outside and raw in the middle, or mushy all the way through.
“Very good,” she told Etienne. “Thank you. I normally don’t even eat breakfast, but this is really good.” She kept eating.
Etienne nodded his thanks and worked on his large mound of vegetables. “It is nice to be lazy and not have to go out and forage my own food.”
“Yeah, I guess I never thought about that. It’s nice to always be able to have freshly-picked stuff, straight from the garden… or the wilds. But you do have to go to the work of collecting it before you even start cooking.”
A person would have to know what he was making before beginning to cook—no rummaging through the fridge to find what you had bought at the grocery store. Reg would probably have starved if she had to live on her own in the wilderness like Etienne did. She wasn’t exactly made of the right stuff.
“If you had been raised to survive in the swamp, you would be able to,” Etienne commented.
“I guess so. But I didn’t learn everything I was trained to do, so there’s no guarantee. I might have been the first one in the family to have a terrible accident.”
Etienne looked at her for a moment, then nodded his head very slightly. “Accidents are not uncommon,” he admitted. “Unfortunately, not everyone survives to a ripe old age.”
Reg hadn’t thought about that. She didn’t mean to make him feel sad about family members he had lost in unfortunate accidents. “Oh… I’m sorry. I didn’t even think about that. I was just joking.”
“What were you talking about with your friend outside?” he asked, changing the subject.
“With Sarah?”
“Your other friend who came by.”
“Oh… I’m not sure I would call her my friend. I mean, we have been, but she’s more of a cop than a friend.”
Etienne was looking at her questioningly.
“She’s a policeman,” Reg explained. “She was coming to talk to me about… something that happened last night. I didn’t actually have anything to do with it, but they think I am somehow involved. I have to keep telling them that I’m not…”
“Ah.”
“Can you communicate telepathically with snakes?”
He stopped eating, fork raised partway to his mouth. Reg realized that the question had been a little abrupt. She should have done a better job building up to it. She ate a few bites of her own meal to try to cover up for the awkwardness.
“I can… have some communication with most animals,” Etienne said slowly. “It isn’t exactly like talking to them.”
“Yeah. I couldn’t hear you when you talked to Starlight or to the panther in the swamp. So I didn’t think that it was… actual words.”
Etienne nodded his agreement.
“So you can communicate some things with them. Feelings. Impressions. But what else? Do you understand them? And if so, how clearly?”
Etienne made a muffled noise and didn’t try to answer the stampede of questions for a while. “Why do you want to know this, Reg Rawlins?”
“There was a snake in my yard. I don’t know if it is still there. I don’t know why it was there. Or if it has anything to do with… what happened last night. It wouldn’t slither all the way from here to the cemetery, would it?”
She realized belatedly that Etienne probably had no idea where the cemetery was. She scratched the back of her head, trying to figure out how to ask for what she needed a little more clearly.
“I am not a snake charmer,” Etienne said slowly. “And I cannot call them. I would have to see it gaze-to-gaze to communicate with it.”
“I’m sure it’s nothing to do with the cemetery anyway. That was just… something stupid. Something that my friend wondered about.”
“Snakes do not usually travel far from their birthplace,” Etienne confirmed. “The ones around here do not migrate.”
“Yeah, that makes sense. So it had to be another snake at the cemetery.”
Etienne looked across the table at her. Reg thought that he was going to discuss it further, but then decided not to complicate things any more than they already were.
“Are you looking forward to seeing Ilka this afternoon? Is there anything you need to do before then?”
“Oh, so many things,” Etienne groaned, shaking his head and pulling his whiskers anxiously. “Why did she have to come without any warning? I cannot have anything prepared for her.”
“Maybe that’s why. She didn’t want you to go to the trouble. She wanted to see you and talk with you face-to-face without all the artificial stuff. Just you and her, in your natural states.”
Etienne scratched his ear vigorously, turning away from her. She wondered if he were embarrassed by what she had said. She hadn’t meant to insinuate anything.
“Anyway… if you need to run any errands or need me to pick something up for you, we should talk about it now. Even though it is early now, the time will go quickly.”
“I would like to bathe. I want to be very well-groomed when I meet her.”
“Sure, no problem. I don’t need the bathroom for any length of time today. You can shower or bath, whichever you like. And there is plenty of soap and… hair care products in there.”
“Thank you, that is very kind. I got everything else I needed yesterday, though I may need some time today to make sure that everything is prepared.”
“Do you know where she is going to stay? I can’t really offer her any space here. Not that you don’t already know that.”
“If she has not made arrangements for lodging, we will help her with that. James said that he could… e-transfer me money if we needed to do anything for her.” He looked at Reg, eyes wide and helpless. “I don’t know how.”
“If you don’t have a bank account, he can send it to mine and then we can take out cash or pay with a debit card.”
His eyes were still wide. He had no clue about all the modern conveniences. He was still stuck back in the old days using cash and gold. He had no idea how the r
est worked.
“Don’t worry about it. We’ll work it out. Your brother said he would help you with the negotiations too?”
“Yes. Though he is not experienced in matrimonial negotiation. I think… he never thought that he would need it. He married a modern girl like himself. They didn’t go through all the rigor of a traditional courting and wedding arrangements. And he probably didn’t think that I would ever meet a girl with prospects.”
“Well, you surprised him, didn’t you!” Reg scraped the last few vegetables across her plate and finished them off. She was astonished that she had eaten everything. Maybe if Etienne were feeding her all the time, she wouldn’t be gaining so much weight. She wouldn’t need to be eating fast food crap all the time.
Etienne made a snuffle of agreement and, when he was ready, prepared himself for his morning ablutions.
Chapter Thirty
As Reg had predicted, the day passed by quickly. It seemed like they were either waiting for something that was taking forever or working feverishly on the arrangements. There didn’t seem to be any happy medium.
Eventually, they were on their way to the dock. Reg ordered an Uber van, deciding she wasn’t going to try fitting two Bigfoots into her little car. Even if they could be squeezed in, she was sure they would wreck the suspension.
“You can sit closer to me. No one is going to notice you,” Reg encouraged. Probably no one would take a second look at him, even if they did see him beyond the reflection in the window.
“I am more comfortable back here,” Etienne assured her. They had reconfigured the seating so that he was sitting by himself. After they picked up their charge, the two lovebirds could sit together and chat. Not exactly out of earshot of Reg and the Uber driver, but at least they would be able to talk. Etienne didn’t seem to want to be alone with Ilka anyway. Reg didn’t know if that was because he was afraid of her or because of Sasquatch courting traditions. She supposed that any old human culture would expect the prospective couple to be properly chaperoned as well.
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