Liquid Steele (Daggers & Steele Book 9)

by Alex P. Berg

  “Were you here the night Johnny Nicchi went missing?” asked Quinto.

  “Well, no, not at night,” said Keonig. “Earlier that day, sure. I go to bed early.”

  “So you didn’t see Nicchi arrive, or leave in his ship, for that matter?”

  Keonig shook his head. “Sorry.”

  “You have a logbook?” I asked. “To keep track of what ships come and go and when?”

  Keonig laughed. “What do you think this is? The New Welwic Transport Authority?” His face suddenly lost it’s mirth, probably as he remembered where we were from. “Oh. You were serious. No, we don’t. Guys barely interact with me unless they’re in trouble. They pay their slip fees, usually on a monthly basis. Other than that? I’m telling you, I’m a mediator more than anything else.”

  Silverbrook grunted. “Please. You sit and nap at your desk six hours out of eight.”

  “Hey, you don’t see me denigrating what you do,” said Keonig. “You’re not much more than a mediator, yourself.”

  “Maybe not, but I’m a hell of a lot better at it than you are, you old fart.”

  Shay joined us, having given up on her search. “Do you know if anyone else around here might’ve had a view of what happened to Nicchi’s ship that night?”

  “Sure,” said Keonig. “Any of the guys on the neighboring piers. I think Bronmuth already talked to them, though, didn’t you?”

  The dwarf nodded. “I did, and I told them that.”

  “Still, might be worth talking to them again,” said Steele. “Not that we don’t trust your testimony, Silverbrook, but sometimes you can get more juice out of a lemon on the second press, if you get what I mean.”

  It was kind of a kinky turn of phrase. It was also one that suggested Shay’s plan of action included something I most certainly did not want to do any more of today.

  “You, ah…know if anyone else might’ve noticed what ships came in or out that night?” I asked Keonig. “Some nosy Nancy with a bad case of insomnia who lives on the shore, perhaps?”

  Keonig’s squinty eyes suggested he didn’t get my sense of humor. “There’s Old Man Connors. He mans the lighthouse at the tip of the cove. He’s a night owl, and if memory serves me right, it was a clear night that night. If anyone saw anything in the bay other than the fishermen and crabbers, it would’ve been him.”

  Silverbrook groaned. “Oh, come on, Keonig. Crackpot Connors? There’s a reason he never leaves that lighthouse.”

  “Hey, I’m just answering the man’s question.”

  Silverbrook shot me a look. “You don’t want to meet him. He’s a total kook.”

  “Are you kidding?” I said. “Kooks are some of the best sources, provided you know how to handle them.”

  “I’m with Silverbrook,” said Steele. “Let’s canvass the docks, see what the witnesses who don’t jump at shadows and mumble to themselves have to say.”

  “We can do both, you know,” I said. “I count four of us.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Seriously.”

  Steele sighed and rolled her eyes. “Fine. Not like I’ve had any luck changing your mind on anything else today. Quinto. You’re with me. Meet you back here in an hour or two, okay, Daggers?”

  She didn’t give me time to respond, heading down the dock with purposeful steps. Quinto gave me a reluctant shrug before following.

  Shay’s vacuum left me both relieved and hollow. On the bright side, I’d avoided banging my head into another brick wall of fishermen and crabbers. On the other, I’d apparently volunteered to be the solitary companion of one Bronmuth Silverbrook during my hiatus, and he looked none too enthused about having been surrendered to my guardianship.

  Still, I could deal with his mean-mugging. It was the butter-thick tension between me and Shay that concerned me.

  13

  Trees shaded the path to the lighthouse. Birds twittered in the leaves above, bees buzzed in the underbrush, and gravel crunched underfoot. A persistent sea breeze whisked up the path, enough to flutter my hair and cool my cheeks but not enough to make me reach for my pockets, not with the warm bursts of sunlight that punctured through the canopy like an intermittent rain of arrows.

  It was an idyllic setting—except for the dour dwarf who marched beside me.

  Silverbrook hadn’t talked since leaving the pier. To be fair, I hadn’t made an effort to break the ice, either, but if the small town cop was fishing for an apology, he was casting in the wrong spot. He needed to learn to hold his tongue if he hoped to investigate homicides successfully on his own, and even if he didn’t, a measure of restraint would help the rest of us solve the current case for him. Perhaps I’d have been more forgiving if his tongue had only slipped with Keonig, but he’d gushed over Bianca as if he were a school girl trying to ingratiate herself with the cool crowd. I understood the desire to serve and protect, but that had to be tempered when a murder investigation was afoot.

  Still, I probably owed the guy an apology, and getting my feet wet with him could be a good warm-up for what I needed to do later with Shay.

  I cleared my throat. “Look, Silverbrook. I’m, uh…sorry about my behavior back there. Keonig seems like a good guy. And you’re right. News of Johnny’s death is sure to travel regardless of what we do. It’s an investigative habit, I guess. Give away as little as you can. Let other people insert feet into their mouths, free of influence.”

  “It’s fine,” said Bronmuth. “I get it. You’re probably right.”

  His tone said he didn’t want to talk about it. Fair enough.

  “You like Aragosto?”

  He shot me a suspicious look, like he thought I might be trying to sell him a sickly goat in a horse disguise. “Sure. Why?”

  “Well, it’s just, ah…” How could I say it without seeming insensitive? “It’s not terribly diverse. Mostly humans in these parts, as far as I’ve seen.”

  “What are you talking about? There’s me, Thoringill, Tall Mike, Big Norma and her kid, the Flutterbright clan.”

  “A half dozen individuals isn’t exactly a lot, even in a town this size.”

  “So what are you trying to say? That folks here aren’t welcoming? That they don’t want me around? Or elves or pixies or ogres, for that matter? I thought living in the big city would make you more open to other cultures, not less.”

  “I’m not saying that at all. I’m just wondering what brought you here.”

  Silverbrook shrugged. “It’s a nice place to live. Rent’s cheap. It’s safe. What else is there?”

  I could think of a dozen other things off the top of my head, but fate decided I shouldn’t have to respond. The trees thinned in front of us, revealing a lighthouse that watched over the bay, five stories of bricks and mortar capped with an oversized, upturned lowball glass. A long crack ran from the whitewashed bricks at the bottom through the painted red bricks at the top, giving me serious reservations about the building’s structural stability, but it didn’t sway in the stiff, salty breeze that whipped over the exposed sea cliff some twenty paces before it, nor did it wobble when Bronmuth pounded on the front door, a warped hunk of peeling wood that might’ve been salvaged from a shipwreck a few decades ago.

  “Connors? You in?” he called, before looking back at me and muttering, “As if he’d be anywhere else…”

  A squeak sounded from inside, then a cluster of rapid footfalls followed by a loud clunk and the squeal of two dozen mice being tortured with a hot poker—which turned out to be the sound of front door opening.

  A frantic man popped into the gap, hunched over as much by age as by an obvious sense of suspicion. He stuck his head out the door, whipping it back and forth and sending the long tendrils of pale hair that hung from the sides of his head flying. One of them grazed me, but I doubt the man noticed. He seemed more preoccupied with seeing what lurked in the trees than taking note of us. When his head finally stilled, his eyes refused to follow suit, darting around and only briefly pausing on Silverbrook.

>   “Bronmuth,” he said. “You weren’t followed were you? And who’s your friend? Are you here for the delivery?”

  “Delivery?” I said.

  “Why would anyone follow me, Connors?” said Bronmuth. “Everyone knows where you live.”

  “Not true. This guy doesn’t.” Connors waggled a long, skeletal finger at me. “Well, he does now. See what you’ve done? Now every deliveryman within a hundred miles will know where to find me.”

  “I’m not a deliveryman,” I said. “And wouldn’t you want them to know where to find you? How would you get your deliveries, otherwise?”

  “Delivery. Singular,” said Connors, bringing his finger dangerously close to my face. “I only have the one, which is why I don’t need your kind banging down my door. Or not your kind, if you’re who you say you’re not. Sure you don’t have my spyglass tucked away inside your pants?”

  “Nope. That’s all me. One hundred percent natural Jake Daggers.”

  I didn’t expect him to get the joke. He didn’t disappoint.

  “Well, then? What is it? Can’t be you came here for nothing, Bronmuth. Spill it. I don’t have all day.”

  “You don’t?”

  Connors started to scold me but was forced to stop in mid waggle.

  “This is Detective Daggers,” said Silverbrook. “From the city? He was, ah…convinced it would be helpful to talk to you about a case of ours.”

  “Case? What case?” Connors gave us the shifty eye, which seemed to be his default.

  “You’d heard Johnny Nicchi went missing, right?”

  “Nicchi!” cried Connors. “Why didn’t you say so? Get in here!”

  The man grabbed me by the jacket and yanked, pulling me into his abode. I blinked, as much in response to the man’s speed as the darkness that swallowed me. Or dimness, more like. A pair of narrow slits cut through the brick walls to the afternoon sun outside, and a bit more light filtered down past the metal spiral staircase in the middle of the lighthouse. A cot had been pushed against a wooden desk covered in junk, the pair of them making a hundred and twenty degree angle against the curved wall. A single worn chair sat in front of the latter, an unlit lantern occupying the space a posterior normally might, but the makeshift home’s opulence ended there.

  At least Connors didn’t invite us to take a seat. After releasing me, he waved at Silverbrook. “Go on. Get in here and close the door. Keep out prying ears.”

  Bronmuth grudgingly obliged, plunging the room further into the grip of shadows. “For the second time, Connors, no one followed us. No one’s here to spy on you.”

  “Says you,” said the old man, “and yet you’re the ones here asking about Nicchi, who so mysteriously disappeared into the night.”

  “So you’ve heard, then.” I’d started to think the trip might be a waste.

  “Course I’ve heard,” said Connors. “What do you take me for? Some crazed reclusive hermit?”

  I glanced at Bronmuth, mostly because I didn’t think I could keep the mirth off my face. Either way, I was grateful for the dim lighting. “Right. Well, that’s why we’re here. To talk to you about that night.”

  Connors narrowed an eye in my direction. “What night?”

  “Uh…the night Nicchi went missing?”

  “Is that a question?”

  “It started out as a clarification and turned into a question as I went along.”

  Connors crossed his arms. “For real, Bronmuth, who is this guy? Can we trust him?”

  “I already told you, his name is Daggers. He’s a detective, of the public kind. As far as whether we can trust him? Probably. You certainly can.”

  “Why me, certainly?” said Connors. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Just tell him what he wants to know so we can leave, will you?”

  Connors didn’t relax. He scowled, then waved me in. “Alright. Here.”

  “Here, where?” I asked.

  “Here, here. Close in. I already told you about the prying ears.”

  My patience was wearing thin, but I did as he asked. He’d piqued my interest.

  “I remember the night as if it were yesterday,” said Connors in a low voice. “I was on the catwalk outside the lantern room, feeling the breeze whipping through my hair and filling my lungs with the smell of the sea. I was gazing onto the bay, probably around midnight—I don’t sleep as well as I used to—and then, I spotted it. Out past where the breakers start, a fog started forming. Slow at first, then thick as a bowl of clam chowder. And out of it—a ghost ship! Tendrils of fog creeping along the sides, tatters in the sails, barnacles eating every inch of the sides—”

  “Whoa, whoa,” said Bronmuth. “Connors, what the hell are you talking about?”

  “The ship, man,” said Connors. “Night of Nicchi’s disappearance. What? Don’t give me that look. Okay, maybe it wasn’t a ghost ship. But that fog sure was creepy, and with the wind flapping the sails, you’ll forgive me for thinking they were in tatters. Hard to tell by the light of the moon. But I’m pretty sure some of them had seen better days.”

  Bronmuth held a couple fingers to his temple. “I don’t even know where to start. Nicchi’s ship wasn’t big. It was a diminutive sloop, barely bigger than a catboat, and last I saw it wasn’t covered in barnacles or flying tattered sails. Also, if Nicchi disappeared and his ship along with him, don’t you think it would’ve been leaving the harbor, not entering it? So I don’t know what ship you saw, but it sure as hell wasn’t Nicchi’s, because it also wasn’t foggy the night of his disappearance.”

  Connors blinked and scratched his head. “It wasn’t? How long has it been since he went missing?”

  “Ten days ago tonight,” said Bronmuth.

  Connors mumbled to himself, ticking fingers in the air as he stared into nothingness. “Oh. Right then. I was off by a night. Never mind.”

  Bronmuth gave a labored sigh. “Come on, Daggers. Let’s go.”

  “Wait,” said Connors. “Just because I was off by a night doesn’t mean I don’t remember. Ten nights ago, right. I didn’t see his boat leave. Wasn’t outside much. Was sawing logs, actually. One of the few nights in recent memory I managed a few hours of uninterrupted sleep.”

  “So you didn’t see his boat. Got it. Daggers?” Bronmuth shot his thumb toward the door.

  “Hold on,” said Connors. “I didn’t see it. That doesn’t mean I didn’t hear anything. That’s what woke me, see. After a few hours of rest. The sound. The cries.”

  “Cries?” I asked.

  “That’s right. The pained cries—of the merfolk!”

  “Oh, for the love of…” Bronmuth shot a symbol of piety toward the skies. “Daggers, I’m leaving. You coming or not?”

  “Just a sec,” I said. “You said you heard mermaids? What do they even sound like?”

  “Like people, normally, lest you hurt them, then they’re more like dolphins. High-pitched, squeaky, haunting. And I didn’t say mermaids. Merfolk. Males and females, savvy?”

  “Right. Of course.”

  “Oh, come on. You can’t honestly believe this crap, can you?” said Bronmuth. “Nobody’s seen merfolk in a hundred years, and even then they were probably nothing more than a horny sailor’s sunstroke-induced fantasy.”

  “Not true,” said Connors. “I’ve seen ‘em with my own eyes. Not ten nights ago, mind you, but recently. A few years past.”

  “Right,” said Bronmuth. “And I’d bet your army of made up ghost pirates would back you up on that, if we asked them?”

  Connors shook his head, suddenly embarrassed. “Martinsvale would if he were around. He’s the one who took me to ‘em one night, rest his soul.”

  “So all we need to corroborate your story is the testimony of a dead man,” said Bronmuth. “Perfect. We’ll get on that as soon as we find a medium. Not that it matters, because we’re not looking for mermaids, we’re looking for a fisherman who was murdered at sea.”

  “Merfolk.” Connors crossed his arms and s
hrunk into a corner. “And I saw them. Heard them, I mean. I did…”

  Silverbrook yanked open the door and glared at me. “You coming?”

  I nodded, even though I thought continuing to interview Connors might prove fruitful. Based on Bronmuth’s look of frustration, he hadn’t made the connection. We had mentioned that Nicchi had been murdered by trident, right?

  14

  Daggers of color stabbed across the twilit sky as Silverbrook and I returned to the docks, tendrils of carnation pink and coral, orange peel, lavender, and ultramarine, as vibrant as a painting against a backdrop of steel gray.

  The metaphor wasn’t lost on me, but if the gods intended to send me a message via sunlight and clouds, they’d have to be more blunt. Form the clouds into letters, perhaps, or focus the sun’s rays onto a target to catch my eye.

  I spotted Shay and Quinto on a quay in the distance. I waved, expecting to be ignored, but despite his thinning hair, Quinto’s eyes remained sharp. The big guy waved back, nudged Shay, and the pair started toward us.

  We met by a set of pilings covered in fragrant white droppings, at least a portion of which belonged to the gray and white gull who currently perched there. He cawed repeatedly as we approached. I thought he might fly off as we closed to swatting range, but the sucker paid us as much attention as he might a stiff breeze. He just kept on cawing and decorating the post with his excrement. He must’ve been a local.

  Shay gave the bird a sidelong glance as she and Quinto arrived. “Well. That didn’t take quite as long as I expected, though I suppose your timing is right.”

  “Why?” I asked. “Did you just unearth an exciting clue?”

  Shay pointed to the sky. “I simply meant we’re running out of daylight. What did you learn from this Connors fellow?”

  “That’s he’s battier than I remembered,” said Bronmuth. “The rest doesn’t even merit repeating. I can’t believe you convinced me going out there was a good idea.”

  “Come on, Silverbrook,” I said. “I thought we bonded on the walk. To say it was a waste of time hurts me deeply. Besides, we did learn the coastal waters of Aragosto are haunted by ghost pirates and mermaids, among other things.”