by H. D. Gordon
“I’m afraid not,” said Renner. “This very serious, Miss Fae. The Masked Maiden—as you call her—has committed some serious crimes, and needs to be stopped.”
I blinked as if this were all ridiculous. “Okay… well, I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I only know what I’ve seen on the news and read in the papers, and I’m not sure how that could be of any help.”
“How long have you lived in Grant City?” asked Renner, pulling a notebook and pen out of her suit jacket.
My hands wanted to clench into fists, but I didn’t let them. “Not long,” I answered. “Only a handful of months. Why?”
“So you arrived in, what, August? September?”
“Beginning of September,” I said.
“And where did you live before that?”
I blinked, my eyes flipping between the two suits. I held up a hand. “Wait a minute,” I said. “Shouldn’t my parent be here? Or a lawyer or something? What did this tip tell you?”
I shut my mouth, realizing that I had been rambling. Keep cool, Aria. Keep cool.
“When will your mother return?” asked Hathaway. He seemed to be the more civil of the two, a black man with a graying beard and perpetually down-turned mouth.
“She’s out of town,” I answered. “She won’t be back for a couple weeks.”
“And she left you here unsupervised?” asked Renner.
I made an attempt to keep the sneer off my face. “I’m almost eighteen years old, ma’am.”
In response, Renner scribbled something down in her notebook. She didn’t trust me, and I didn’t need to read her aura to know it. Detective Renner wasn’t a woman who easily trusted anyone.
“Where were you on the night of December 27th?” asked Renner.
“Um… hanging out with a couple of friends. Why?”
“What are the names of these ‘friends’?” Renner again. I was beginning to pick up on who was the good cop in this good-cop/bad-cop scenario.
I’m not sure if it was the effects of the last few days, or the fight with Nick, or maybe even the possibility that I didn’t always have as much control over my reactions as I’d like to think I had, but I was done with the accusatory way this woman was talking to me. I wanted these two gone. Was a moment alone to process thoughts too much for a girl to ask?
“Am I under arrest?” I said, asking a question of my own.
“No,” answered Hathaway.
Renner opened her mouth to say something, but I beat her to the punch.
“Do you guys have a warrant?”
“No.”
I nodded, walked over to the door, and opened it. “Well, then I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”
The two detectives looked at each other, and their auras told me that this had not done much in the way of putting me off their radar. At the moment, however, I couldn’t really seem to care.
After a couple of silent seconds, the two made their exits. Hathaway gave me a curt nod and stepped out into the hallway, but Renner paused in the doorway. She reached into her jacket—I wondered just how many things she could fit in there—and handed me a white card.
Her sharp eyes met mine, staring down at me from her Amazonian height, which I was sure she used frequently to intimidate. “If you think of anything that could help us, please call… We’ll be in touch, Miss Fae.”
Once they were gone, I leaned back against the door, letting out a rush of air. Sliding down against the door, I sat down and took a handful of moments to just breathe.
At this rate, Gods only knew when I’d get the chance again.
CHAPTER 49
Despite all the crazy that was happening in my ever-unraveling world, the minutes and hours and days passed in their ordinary fashion—without concern or care for my issues.
December 30th rolled around, the second to the last day of the year coming to its close the way the sun chases away the stars, without fuss or production. I hadn’t been to work at the flower shop in what felt like an eternity, and though Rose had been sympathetic when I called her last week to tell her I couldn’t come in for a terrible illness I’d acquired, being there beat being in my apartment, so I called her up and told her I was ready to return.
She’d looked at me strangely when I walked through the door, and though most of the visible injuries had healed thanks to my Faevian blood, I somehow felt when she regarded me that my newly acquired invisible scars were bared to her.
“Well, I’m glad to see you’re alive,” Rose said, after giving me that look. “When you called, I don’t know why, but it felt kind of like talking to a ghost… You been okay?”
The door to the small shop slid silently shut behind me as I crossed to the counter, looking into one of the refrigerators that held a variety of floral arrangements, and not seeing any of them. I took a deep breath before responding, realizing that I’d missed the scent of the place, the feel of it here.
At last, I turned toward her, meeting her probing brown eyes. “I’ve been okay,” I answered. “I’m sorry for leaving you hanging. I know you’re going through some stuff, and I really wanted to be here for you.”
Rose waved a hand, adjusting her wire glasses over her nose and pushing back her graying hair. “No worries,” she said. “I’m just glad you’re okay. You had me worried.”
My throat grew tight but I swallowed past it. I seemed to be on the edge of tears a lot as of late. “Thank you,” I said.
And that was all that was said about it. If I hadn’t loved her before, I loved Rose for this. Her unwavering acceptance of me tugged at my heart. I asked about how her daughter, Rachel, was doing, and though she had answered in a positive way, the tumultuous nature of her aura spoke the truth. Seeing this made me feel like an even bigger buttwipe for taking off so much in the past week, but there was nothing to be done about it, anyway.
Now, it was nearly closing time. It had been a busy day at the shop, as New Year’s Eve was the following day. I’d filled orders for what felt like a million events, practically flying around the back of the shop and loading up the backs of the vans for the delivery drivers.
Once the flurry passed, though, I felt my familiar issues return to me like dogs to a dinner bell. Of course, because I was the luckiest girl in the world at the moment, this was when Caleb Cross walked through the door, the sun sinking beneath the buildings behind him.
Fighting the urge to duck behind the counter, I swallowed hard and gnawed my lip at the guilt that swirled in my stomach upon seeing him. I hadn’t spoken to him since I’d gone to his house for dinner on Christmas day, nor had I responded to his calls or texts.
It wasn’t because of anything he’d done, of course. I liked Caleb. He was smart, handsome, and sweet. In truth, he was everything I would want in a boyfriend, and maybe this was exactly the reason I hadn’t answered him. I was scared. I was hurt, and I was conflicted. Something inside of me had shifted, and I knew instinctively that whatever I chose to do next, whatever path I took, it would determine a great deal of my life, perhaps my destiny altogether.
Things were complicated enough. My slow fall into love with Caleb Cross would surely do nothing but further complicate things.
And, no, the fact that his father’s corporation had funded the reward money for the apprehension of The Masked Maiden did not help matters any.
Because I’m a super-smooth genius, when Caleb walked into Roses and approached the counter behind which I stood, what I said was, “Hey.”
This greeting hurt him somehow, though it was not evident in his posture or face. He was Caleb, after all, and so he offered me a smile, the dimples appearing in his cheeks, his bright blue eyes searching mine.
“Hey,” he said.
Silence followed. It felt like the air had been sucked out of the room. Rose had gone curiously quiet in the back room, though I was sure she was listening.
At last, Caleb’s guarded expression broke. “Where have you been?” he asked, his voice nearly a whisper.
My
next words pained me a bit to speak. “I can’t tell you,” I replied. “I wish I could, but I just can’t. Besides, I think you know, anyway.”
More silence, just the beating of two hearts. Now, I was sure Rose was listening, but I wasn’t sure I cared.
Caleb leaned over the counter separating us. With some hesitation, he reached up and brushed some of my wild hair behind my ear, his hand resting on my cheek.
“So it is you, then?” he whispered, too low for prying ears. “You’re the girl in the mask.”
This was not a question, and I didn’t answer. I only leaned into his touch, because he was warm, and he was familiar, and that was good. Part of me felt guilty about what had happened between Nick and I, but the other part of me just wanted to feel normal again. In the short time I’d known him, Caleb Cross had always managed to do that for me.
“Will you just answer one question for me?” he asked, and my heart paused in my chest.
With a shuddering breath, I nodded.
“Do you want to keep seeing me?” he asked, and I could see the apprehension flash through his aura. “Do you have any feelings for me? Feelings like… the feelings I have for you?” He paused, his next words a real struggle to speak, and an even bigger one to hear. “If you don’t, just tell me, and I’ll leave you alone. I promise.”
There were those dang tears again, threatening to build up in my eyes and spill over. Strangely, it wasn’t until this very moment that I realized I was a mess. I was not in a stable or controlled state of mind. I was not falling into a depression; I was drowning in one.
“Caleb… I… I just don’t know,” I admitted, leveling my voice with conscious effort. I didn’t want to cry. I was so tired of crying. “I like you. A lot. It’s just… complicated.”
“I know.” Caleb sighed, running a hand through his thick hair. “And I came to tell you that you need to more careful…” His voice was barely audible now. “You’re under suspicion.”
My brow furrowed, my heart skipping a beat. A bad feeling circled in my belly. “What do you mean?”
Caleb’s blue eyes were as serious as an undertaker. “I overheard my father speaking with someone last night,” he admitted. “He doesn’t know I was listening, but whoever he was speaking to, they were asking about the Masked Maiden… and I heard your name come up.”
My mouth felt suddenly dry. “My name,” I repeated, my brain coming to a halt.
Caleb nodded, concern filling his blue eyes. “Yes, and they’re watching the city. They’re on the hunt. I don’t know why my father is involved with it, but the mayor and the Chief of Police want the girl in the mask caught, and my father seems to be helping them.”
Well, there was a spoonful to swallow.
“What exactly did you hear?” I said, once I’d relocated my voice.
“From what I understood, they’ve compiled a list of suspects, and whoever was on the other end of the phone must’ve said your name, because my father asked them to repeat it, and then he mumbled it himself.”
Caleb paused, and his expression darkened in the way it always did when he spoke of his father. From his aura, I gathered that there was more going on there that he wasn’t telling me about, but that was because he was still digging up information about Dr. Christian Cross’s true affairs as well. He didn’t trust his father, and something told me he was on the verge of having that feeling validated.
“Thank you for telling me,” I said, thinking of the detectives that had visited me this morning. My next words just slipped out. “I’m not sure I’ve earned the loyalty you’ve shown me, Caleb.”
A slight blush came to his handsome face, and he shoved his hands in his pockets. “We all have to be loyal to something, right?” He shrugged, his shoulders rising and falling one time. “I just try my best to pick worthwhile things.”
“I do have feelings for you,” I blurted out, deciding that if nothing else, Caleb Cross deserved the truth from me. “And I want to keep seeing you, but I might be leaving Grant City soon, and if I do…” I swallowed, the words harder to speak than I would have thought. “I won’t be coming back.”
Caleb leaned across the counter, the faint smell of his expensive cologne filling my senses, making an ache form in my chest. “Well, then, Aria Fae,” he said, his lips brushing my cheek in the sweetest of kisses, “I really hope you don’t leave Grant City.”
CHAPTER 50
“You don’t have to answer to them fools!” Sam exclaimed, jumping up from my bed and striding over to Nick.
A humorless laugh escaped me. “Sam, do you know that your grammar gets worse when you’re upset?”
Sam didn’t dignify this with a response. Her big blue eyes were locked on Nick as she pushed her black-rimmed glasses up her nose and tilted her head back to glare up at him. If not for the seriousness of the situation, her angry outbursts at Nick would be funny. It was much like watching a housecat hiss and claw at a lion.
“Aria doesn’t have to answer to your stupid superiors,” Sam said. “And that’s that.” She poked her little finger into Nick’s chest. Nick only raised an eyebrow and looked at me.
I sighed. “Actually, I do,” I told her. “He’s right. I have to go and report what happened.”
Sam looked at me like this was ridiculous. “Why? They kicked you out, remember? Tossed you away like some Taco Bell wrapper!”
“I’m still a part of the supernatural community,” I explained, “and as such, I’m subject to Broker Law.” I gave Sam what I hoped was a reassuring smile. “If I don’t go to them, they’ll just come to me.”
I shrugged my jacket over my shoulders, tucking my staff into the back of my pants. Sam watched me do so with folded arms.
“You’re not in trouble, right?” she asked, finally accepting that I was going to have to go. “The Scarecrow was taken care of, so they should just thank you and send you on your way? You’re not going to go to supernatural prison or anything?”
Standing before Sam, I placed my hands on her shoulders, trying to reassure her that I was not in any trouble, despite the fact that I was not entirely sure of this myself. I would not be telling the superiors about Thomas Reid’s role in the events concerning the Scarecrow’s death. I would be lying to people who were nearly impossible to lie to. All I had to do was somehow convince Nick go along with it.
Much easier said than done.
“Aria,” Nick said, speaking to me in the cold manner he’d adopted. “We need to go. They’re expecting us.”
“Sam,” I said, meeting her eyes, “Everything is going to be fine, okay? Don’t worry about me.”
Sam’s hands clutched at mine where I held her shoulders. Tears had begun to well up in her eyes, but I could tell she was fighting them. “But you’re coming back, right? You’re coming home to Grant City?”
I kissed her forehead, brushing some of her strawberry-blonde hair back and offering a smile that splintered my heart. “I’ll be back,” I promised.
The question was, would I be back to stay?
***
My stomach lurched and my head buzzed. It took me a couple of seconds of swaying on my feet to regain my balance. I blinked, clearing my vision and taking in the smirk Nick had on his face.
“You’re out of practice,” he said. “Traveling through the portal disoriented you.”
I barely heard him. I was too busy staring at the building before me, taking in the sights of the hidden city that housed the headquarters of the Peace Brokers.
Even though I had visited Tectus Island just over four months ago for the hearing that had resulted in my banishment, it felt like stepping into a dream or a memory—a place I’d thought I’d never see again. Tectus Island was a territory between the worlds that belonged solely to the Peace Brokers. It could not, in fact, be reached by anyone who was not of Halfling (half-human and half-supernatural) blood. The portals that accessed the land simply would not permit it. As such, Tectus Island was a place only a select few ever saw. No one lived he
re but the superiors, but many commuted to fulfill their duties as Brokers.
For all intents and purposes, it was the equivalent to the CIA headquarters in the human world. Tectus Island was the office the operatives reported to, an impenetrable fortress.
The sky here was the softest of blues, and mountains ringed the place like a wall, their peaks poking at the sky like enormous, jagged teeth. The air smelled as fresh as a new rain, though only a few wispy white clouds floated above. Beyond the border of the mountains, the land fell off into space, flat and inaccessible, as the humans once believed the Earth to be. Tectus was an island, rather than a planet—a point in time, rather than a place. It was here where the future of the supernatural worlds was decided, where the most clandestine of moves were made.
It was here that my fate had been decided four months ago, and would again be decided today.
Halflings of all sorts buzzed about the place, all of them focused on completing some task, some order they’d been given. To the east, I could hear the new recruits training, Halfling children between the ages of eleven and thirteen being made to hone their abilities so that they could better serve the Broker agenda. There were grunts as they absorbed blows, cries of rage as they went on the attack, the clatter of colliding weapons.
To the west was The Gardens, where the Green Test was taken (a detail one did not learn until completing that part of training). The Gardens, though appearing no larger than a city park on the outside, became a certifiable labyrinth once stepped into, a place that could produce all manner of beast or situation imaginable. Like a poisonous flower, its looks were deceiving.
Directly before me stood the towering structure where the superiors of the Peace Brokers conducted business. The building had stood for hundreds, if not thousands of years, a construct of the universe rather than something made by mortal hands. The face of it opened right into a mountain that seemed to exist for no other purpose than the one it currently served.
Unlike the mountains one might find in the human world, the one that held the center of Tectus Island was a striking silver, the rock that composed it native to this space between worlds. Though I’d never known the weather here to be anything but mild, the Silver Mountain looked cold, even with the three suns in the sky shining down in my face. It had felt the same way the last time I’d been here, and I realized with some bitterness that I was scared.
